The world of theater school is a horribly volatile mixture
of extreme emotions. One day, or a week,
or perhaps even for a whole month, you’ll be feeling super positive about
everything in the world. You’re doing
well in your classes, you’re learning like never before, and with the whole
world of Broadway going on around you, you think, “I’m totally going to be able
to do this!”
And then, one morning, you wake up and everything feels
wrong. Maybe it’s a side effect from
your sleep aid, or from the lack of
sleep. It might be hormones, stress,
exhaustion, dehydration, fatigue, malnutrition, or a number of other battles we
constantly must fight as college theatre students.
Somehow, you start feeling anxious and even a little bit
depressed. You’re physically exhausted,
swamped in work you probably should have done a week ago, final demos are one
week away, and you have to struggle with the fact that your college experience
is already one-quarter of the way over.
And then your teachers tell you, very nicely, that this is the real
world of acting, it’s not all rainbows and unicorns, and you are always working. Even when you’re sleeping. And they mean well, but in this anxious,
depressed state, you begin to feel like the apocalypse is upon you.
Then you go to your last class of the week, anxious for the
weekend so you can lock yourself up in your tiny dorm room and pretend you are anywhere else. But in your last class, your teacher says, “I
want you to walk into the room like your name was just written above the title of a Broadway show.”
And suddenly, you can see
it. You can see your name in lights,
and you can feel that joyful sensation within in you, and as you start to walk,
a sense of pride fills you from your head to your toe, and you smile this
brilliant smile, thinking, yes, I can do
it, and I will!
And in the rest of said class, you dance like your life
depends on it, and you’re utterly exhausted from a long week of depression, and
you can’t breathe because it’s such a hard dance, and you can feel the blisters
on your feet and the ache in the ball of your foot from dancing in two-inch heels
for four hours that day. And you don’t
even mind, because this is the world you
want to live in.
You want to be
exhausted and fatigued and sleep deprived, because it means you get the chance to
act. And sing. And dance.
For a paycheck!
And you love it.
Always remember that. When you
love something like this, no work is too much work.
Ever.
Love, Little Me
