by Catherine Roberts, OSAI PR Counselor
Students’ days at Quartz Mountain are packed with
activities, and with upwards of five hours of class per day, they have plenty
of time to explore different areas of their discipline.
Acting students receive instruction and individualized
attention from two instructors—A. Dean Irby and Rena Cook. Irby has acted on Broadway, and his
television credits include The Cosby Show, Another World, and numerous television commercials. He also served
as acting coach for several television shows, including four years with The
Cosby Show. Cook is professor of voice at the University of Oklahoma,
and she also serves as voice coach at OSAI.
During the early afternoon of the first full day of class,
acting students work on voice. Cook instructs the students to draw a picture of
their voices—first, as they are now, and second, as they want their voice to
be.
She has them write a poem, addressed to their voices.
A few of the lines:
“You are small, you are sweet,
you are mine.”
“I didn’t ask for much but
wholesomeness.”
She asks them to read the poems aloud once, then again, this
time, in between posing as a group.
“Don’t apologize,” she instructs. “Speak the words as if
Shakespeare wrote them.”
“In you, warm comfort and cold
temper abound.”
“Make some noise that’s truly
profound.”
“You could be so smooth and
round, and I wish you would.”
“Open up, show some weakness—at
least try.”
The classroom buzzes with energy as the last poem concludes,
and Rena prompts them to reflect on the exercise. Several say it’s helpful to
articulate the differences between their voices in the present and the ideal.
One poem focused on creating vulnerability, and Rena encourages all the
students to “find power without effort” in their voices.
Acting instructor A. Dean Irby takes over, and has the
students form a circle and lay down on the ground. He leads them in guided
meditation.
Though the room is calm now, it’s still buzzing with as much energy
as when the students were discussing their poems. Dean slowly brings them out
of meditation and has them begin to repeat a line from their audition
monologues—a significant line “that describes who that character is.”
“I won’t survive if you run away
from me.”
“But what was a girl to do?”
“And yet for this he’s supposed
to go to heaven.”
For the first week of camp, the acting students will workshop
the monologues they used to audition for Quartz Mountain. The audition required
one humorous and one dramatic monologue; students have chosen one to workshop
with Dean and the class.
Irby hasn’t decided yet what the students will do for their presentation
during ONSTAGE Weekend. He’s waiting to see how the class evolves and if a
theme or motif presents itself. If
you’d like to see the acting students showcase their work, please join us on
Saturday, June 29th at 2:30 p.m. at the Robert M. Kerr Performing
Arts Center at Quartz Mountain. Click here for
the full performance schedule. Please keep in mind that classes are taught at a
collegiate level, and some performances may be inappropriate for children under
age 14.
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