In my native Salt Lake City ( and most of the state, for that
matter) it is fairly common for those with a strong regional dialect to pronoun
words like 'deal', 'meal', or 'steel' with an 'ih' sound. As in “Wow, they were
having a great dill going on down at Smith’s, ” or “that was such a delicious
mill, I’m stuffed”. There are varying
degrees of this accent, and sometimes it is strong enough to where I can’t
understand what the person is saying if it is thick enough. (It’s almost always
a woman with short, spiky, highlighted hair.)
Perhaps it’s because I am an actor or have always been interested in
speech, but when we were younger, my friends and I would jokingly adopt this
accent, among other Utah-isms (my sister says oreeenge instead of orange, its kind of the best). Using the accent is a habit I
still carry with me today.
A few days ago I
wrote about gaining a thick skin, where I am slowly winning the battle of
dealing with rejection and losing my hypersensitivity to it. My next quest is to find a way to not let my
out of control and opposite-of-still nerves take over and consume me.
I do not know the source of nervousness (aka stage fright). I
don’t know if it helps to know, but I think it would help to know what to do
about it. I know many performers will
say to use the fear, change the nerves to excitement, etc. But I don’t know if they have the kind of
nerves that I do. I have never barfed because of them, but I have come close a
few times. I remember hyperventilating before it was my turn to sing in a class
in college, which I thought was normal until my friend got kind of freaked out,
seeing me writhing around gasping for air. Isn’t that how everyone behaves
before they sing? Turns out, no.
Of my own free will, it will be my turn to sing 16 bars of a
show tune in a few hours. I have been nervous the past week to the point
of a low-level flu, which is good in some ways because I can’t eat as much. I also used the nerves this week to practice
harder, which I guess is also a good thing. But I would rather sing for the joy and
fun of it rather than fearing for my life. It’s irrational, and it's painful. But, maybe that is not real life, and maybe the fear
will never go away, and maybe I just have to learn to dill with it.
Haha I'm glad you still can have a sense of humor even though you are struggling with such matters. I think that's a good thing. As for the nerves, I know what you are talking about. I never understood using the fear and never managed to. But something I do do to help the nerves a little is pretend I am a character who is auditioning for a play! As an actor, I like to believe I can truly embody characters... And because I am so self conscious about who I am, why not pretend to be another person?
ReplyDeleteI've actually created a second persona to help give myself something else to focus on and think about during auditions or when I feel vulnerable. Haha the person I embody has my Chinese name and he's a confident and smooth SOB that that has come from a rough childhood and has nothing to loose. I could give you a whole character breakdown but haha I won't bore you with details. Basically he is everything I want to be. I play him often and read books and other text embodying him. When I audition I just pretend I am in a improv scene and an playing him. Honestly sometimes I can't bring him out, but when I do, things generally in well.
I don't know if you've ever tried such a thing but it's actually quite fun and you don't have to be embarrassed about yourself because you will be acting and playing a character you yourself created.
Lizzy! You are not alone. At the preview of My Fair Lady on Thursday night my body was shaking during my solo. I haven't experienced that in quite a while. I was sure that the audience members were thinking, "Oh, that poor chap. Look at how terrified he is. Awww. Poor kid."
ReplyDeleteBut, you know, the show must go on. And in the end I am sure a few did notice my shaking... but probably not all. I managed to control my voice enough that the shakiness didn't come out too much vocally.
"The show must go on" is cliche' but it applies so much to each one of us. Auditioning must go on. Social pressures in rehearsals... backstage drama... self-judgement... nerves and stage fright... they all must go on.
For me, I think the key is that I love it still. I love the characters on stage. I love the audience. And I try oh so hard to love myself.
I hope your 16 bars are smashing just smashing. You, my friend, are the rill dill.