This semester Marquette's theatre department has offered many interesting classes. Acting 1, Acting 3, Acting 5, Directing, Theatre Management, Stage Craft, Costume Tech, Aspects of Theatrical Design, and Play Analysis are the big ones. Each one of these class finals showcase either a performance or a portfolio viewing. These performances and showcases are presented to the Marquette campus the same way that all of our main stage shows are presented. The classes create flyers, press releases, Facebook groups, and Twitter updates. The performances are made to show the rest of campus what we can do and the kind of work that we are producing.
I am not an acting emphasis major so I do not have any part in the acting or directing finals, but I will be at the performances to view them and give feedback as well as support. In the past, I have taken stage craft, costume tech, aspects of theatrical design, and play analysis. I will not be a part of any of these finals either but I will be there for support. I will also be helping my professors judge these finals and make sure that everyone is safe while they are taking their final.
The only theatre final performance that I have a major part in this semester is Theatre Management. For our class final, my class was to gather actors, directors, plays, playwrights, and a production team in order to create an afternoon of stage readings. This project has prepared myself, as well as my class, to act as a professional production team. We had to find the money to fund the production, we had to send out press releases to our local newspapers, we had to communicate with new playwrights in order to get approval to use their scripts, and we had to keep a timeline and budget so that everything goes smoothly. Our performance techs Saturday morning and we perform Saturday afternoon. It is very exciting to finally be able to see our hard work come to life.
The exciting life of a theatre major's finals week starts tonight. Good luck to all of the well put together performances and well thought out designs.
