Viva La Viv

This week I have had more alone time than I've had in years. The production I was working on had a great weekend of performances and has closed. Now I have five weeks until I start on my next project. I decided to come up with a few different ways to cure my loneliness and boredom. On Monday I went to Walmart by myself for the first time this year. I took a long time walking through every single aisle. While that method of shopping occupied my time, it also led to me spending more money than I had hoped. If you’re trying to save money I don't recommend retail therapy as your boredom remedy. The next day I decided to clean my room. This took me a few hours because I decided to get into all of the nooks and crannies. I made my bed and did my laundry as well. This remedy made me feel great about myself. A clean room automatically makes my mental health better. I started to appreciate my extra time because it allowed me to get my life somewhat together. That night I made myself a c...

One of the Facebook content strategies recommended in this week's chapter is to be authentic. This got me thinking about my social media presence and whether or not I am authentic online. I try to make it a rule to always post the things that make me happy. I enjoy taking pictures of my friends, family and even myself. With that in mind I would say I’m authentic. However, I often have to take many pictures of myself before I am happy enough with them to post. I usually won't post a picture if my hair or face looks weird. I even occasionally apply a filter or retouch a photo before posting. This led me to wonder if my audience is seeing the authentic me.  From a young age I was taught the value of beauty. This was often shown to me in the form of actors and celebrities. From that distance this form of beauty didn't seem so harmful. As I grew older I started to see the “beauty standard” around me in the form of my peers at school. It felt like I was constantly surrounded by ...

As a student with a difficult major and three minors, I have to take many classes. Most of the time my brain feels overwhelmed with different types of information from each class. Every once in a while these classes collide and give my brain a break. This has happened so much this past week that I knew I had to write about it. The first instance of this was with Arts Marketing and Principles of Social Media. Both of these classes have been teaching SMART objectives and SWOT analysis. In Arts Marketing we are all responsible for the marketing of one of our spring productions. We are still in the beginning stages so we are focusing on objectives and strategies. I have found this especially interesting because I am in charge of this year's big-ticket show . “Hello, Dolly!” is a classic and respected musical so the marketing of it is intricate. I have spent a lot of time thinking about how I want to approach it. In Principles of Social Media, we are talking about the same topic but on...

For the past two weeks, I have been stage managing ONU’s production of  “Commedia dell’Arte.” This production is a short workshop led by a guest director from Italy. Fabrizio Paladin, a highly respected actor, playwright, director and musician with expertise in improvisation, is good friends with ONU faculty member James Savage who lovingly describes him as an “Italian tornado”. So far I have loved learning from and working with Fabrizio. He is kind and hilarious but also extremely passionate and wise. Even though I am not a member of the cast I already feel like I have learned so much from him. I am grateful to have this experience and to learn from such a knowledgeable person.  “Commedia dell’Arte” was the start of modern theatre and show business. It helped globalize historical language through performance. It is a theater method that includes all styles and genres. This particular version was written by Fabrizio. It follows a servant named Zagna who accidentally delivers a...

This week I got to experience a form of social media that I never thought I would explore. Matt Cook and I partnered up for this podcasting project and lovingly named it “Trash Talk.” We have a close friend in our program who has run the Instagram account for the Theatre Arts Department for the past three years. Her name is Katja Roberts and she is currently a senior musical theatre major with a social media minor. I have always been impressed with the quality of content Katja creates and the number of people she reaches. Because of this, we decided that Katja was the perfect person to interview for our podcast. All three of us are currently in rehearsals for different productions so we met at 10 p.m. one night this week to film. Matt and I had previously made a list of about 15 questions that we thought would allow for thoughtful answers from Katja. Those questions were: Briefly introduce yourself and what you do here at ONU.  What interested you in the position of social media ma...

One thing I love about the Musical Theatre program at ONU is they make sure their students are well-rounded in the arts. One way they do this is by requiring an ASM credit to graduate. An ASM is an assistant stage manager for any ONU production. You can receive this credit by fully stage managing as well. This semester I am receiving my third ASM credit for stage managing our production of “Commedia dell'arte”. Many people in my program have asked me why I would continue to collect ASM credits when I no longer need them. Honestly, I really enjoy it! While I of course love to be onstage performing, I've found that I also love the offstage aspect of theatre. I have always been a fan of organization and routines so being in charge of a show fits well into my interests.  Last night was our first rehearsal. We have an Italian guest director here and he was really great. It was an educational experience witnessing my peers making art from a new perspective. Thankfully I felt well pre...

This week's chapter made me think a lot about my voice and who I can reach with it. In Section One, it states that blogs are popular because they “give everyday people a voice,” and I think this applies to other forms of social media as well. When I put something online I know more people will see it than if I had tried to spread the information differently. Additionally, I have the opportunity to be taken more seriously online because my voice isn't smothered by my gender or my age. People speaking up on social media have a history of making changes that wouldn't have been possible otherwise. Online, people can see wrongs and talk about them. This has become increasingly common in the past few years. Recently, a video went viral from a police officer's body cam. The video showed him and a fellow officer turning on a young Black wo man with seemingly no valid reason and killing her after she made a joke he didn't understand. This video spread so fast that people wer...

I am a sophomore musical theatre major at ONU and sometimes it can be a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, only some of my classes are academically challenging. On the other hand, my major has an extremely rigorous time commitment. From the first day of school, I've been in rehearsals almost every night. I've been learning new songs and memorizing lines for a show that plans to go up with less than two weeks of rehearsal. This particular show is exciting because it is different from your typical ONU production. It's what is called a director's lab. A director's lab is a show that is entirely put on by a student director. In this case, our show was also written and choreographed by that same student. Due to this, it is a very different experience and a larger time commitment than I am used to. Another thing we've jumped right into is auditions. This week is our second week of classes and our big audition week. “The ONU Holiday Spectacular” is the Christmas sh...

This chapter made me think a lot about how I have been used as consumer-generated content over the years. I especially recognized this in section two of this chapter as it discussed the #AerieREAL Campaign. I have been a big supporter and consumer of Aerie since I was in middle school. However, I had never really thought about why until I read this chapter. When I was in middle school, I struggled a lot with comparing myself to other people. This was only amplified by the fact that I had access to social media. I was unfortunately blinded by the use of filters and editing software like many young girls are. On one of the days that I was mindlessly scrolling through Instagram, I came across a brand that marketed itself as a brand for “real people”. I remember immediately being intrigued by that sentiment. Naturally, I asked my mom if we could please go to Aerie the next time we went to the mall. I was once again incredibly drawn in by their marketing strategy as it continued into the ph...