“Step, two, three, four, bang, crash, gasp” is not how the typical student performer pictures his play or musical performance going.
Have you ever had the pleasure of watching someone you know make a complete fool of themselves while on stage? What about watching someone fall off a platform and land spread eagle in front of the audience?
I never had the pleasure of watching someone fall off a stage, because I was that “someone” who fell and everyone laughed at. It was pretty hysterical and I was laughing at myself after I came out of shock and realized my improvisation skills failed.
Theatre has always been a huge part of my life, even if I was not the best at it. I love to perform myself, watch local plays or take a trip to Chicago to see a musical. I am fascinated by performers’ ability to remember all of their lines, while portraying a character at the same time. It is a talent I know many of us wish we had.
When I first applied to Ferris, I checked to see if we had a theatre program or something of the sort, as if there was still hope for my acting career. Obviously, if I cannot stay on a stage maybe I should not have been there in the first place.
Nevertheless, I give a lot of credit to students who perform in shows and plays during their college career. Anyone who has never been in a performance will not understand the amount of work these students put into making their shows a success. It takes time, patience, teamwork and a lot of practice to make a show successful.
When I first saw a Ferris theatre production, I honestly was not impressed. In fact, I was cringing for the majority of the show. I am the kind of audience member who looks for flaws and mistakes. It is not because I want a show to go wrong or be bad. I think it is a bad habit of mine since I always try to strive for perfection. After working for one of the largest entertainment companies in the world (Walt Disney World Resorts), my expectations were pretty high when I transferred to Ferris in regards to the acting scene.
Now my levels of expectations have been brought back to reality and should be somewhat normal for what is about to come this weekend to the Williams Auditorium, “The Three Musketeers.” If you are a hard critic like myself and plan on watching the show, try to look past any mistakes or flubs if any do occur. Performing is fun, but also nerve racking and stressful. Every single audience member will be judging the entire show. I think it comes with the job of being an actor or actress. I tip my hat off to them and their ability to perform under the scrutiny of eyes such as my own.
I do hope the performance exceeds my expectations. Heck, I wish I had time this semester to actually be a part of the production. It is a part of my life that I sadly wish was not over. But I believe every college has loads of talent to share, including ours.
To those who have dedicated their time, talent and efforts for our Ferris productions, break a leg, but please do not break your leg literally by falling off the stage. It is not the best experience.
…This is completely unprofessional. I also find it rather rude that you choose to make fun of the theater department and then quickly claim that you have nothing to do with it. Why would you attack a specific group on campus?
Also, what’s with you and Disney!? I’m so sick of hearing about Disney from you. Your stupid story trying to “tug at our heartstrings” by referencing a child with leukemia sounded like it came out of a commercial. Stop writing a damn blog and learn to write like a journalist.
I have one question for you. Which show did you see at Ferris that made you think that all the shows here will suck.
Why would you post this the week of the show? The students who work for 7 weeks of the school year on that show find it very disrespectful of you to write something about the theater shows sucking. They work harder than a lot of students, they have school, a job, personal issues, and the show.
Please think how you would feel if you were in the show and someone wrote this and set you up to fail even before anyone could see you. Or what if someone wrote something about your articles before they came out about them being stupid and no one should read them. That person is not giving you a chance to prove your self.
Thinks no one has the right to smoke on campus.
Thinks one atheist billboard is shoving atheism down people’s throats while people actively advertise His House, hand out psalms, and even include tons of religious rhetoric in Torch articles.
Warns people that cell phones are giving them cancer when they’re not.
And now insults a production that has yet to be performed.
A+ track record.
I am a member of Ferris Theater, and was a cast member of the 3 Musketeers. When I read this article, I was outraged. First of all, what does you falling off the stage in your high school production have anything to do with our show? Second of all, the continuous back lashing of Ferris theater was unprofessional and definitely uncalled for considering the show hadn’t opened yet. The article basically said, ” I would go see the show, but I wouldn’t expect much from them”
Have you ever auditioned for a Ferris show? I worked my behind off to make the show a great one and so did the other 25ish cast mates of mine. I was particularly insulted, and you should be fired along with the other people who made up quotes.
This was very rude to write especially with the opening of the play that weekend. People that went to the play that I have talked to said that they have never seen flaws in the plays. I feel a public apology should be given out.
I think the first thing that needs to be addressed is your infatuation with mentioning Disney. I assume that you were a temporary employee under their “College Program” banner, living in Patterson Court, Chatham Square, or Vista Way. Fact is, I participated in that program as well, and I did not walk away with an over inflated sense of Disney’s accomplishments. While WDW does have quite a bit of entertainment under it’s belt, is not responsible for the accomplishments of Disney, only the park in Orlando. And furthermore, there is nothing there that should have raised your standards for performances on a college stage.
As far as your writing for this paper goes, I understand that as an opinions writer, you write about your opinion. Problem is, none of these opinions seem to be very well researched. Your article on the atheist billboard was quite ignorant of the issues, and obviously very biased. Your article on the debris near Japan was completely insensitive of the issues they are facing. Nuclear radiation is a serious danger there, and you decided to complain about trash?
Do you see a trend here, editors? Consistently your writing lacks research, insight, and even basic writing skills. It can’t be called journalism. While I respect what The Torch tries to do, they don’t have to resort to being a rag where anyone can insult people just to fill their pages.
As far as this particular article goes…it’s just appalling. I understand that high standards abound. Anyone that picks up a script or learns how to run a sound board or a sewing machine has exceedingly high standards for themselves, and they all work endlessly to achieve the end goal of entertaining an audience of people and letting them loose themselves in a performance. This isn’t about you, or about your critiques, it’s about the people who are there to enjoy a story, and about the people who have put their own sweat, blood, and tears into the show.
You are simply disrespectful to people around you. You have potential as a writer, but until you realize that you can have an opinion without being insulting, that you can write an article without a target, you will never be a journalist. I hope this comment finds it’s way to your editors. I sincerely hope that they find a way to make amends to the people aren’t brave enough, or perhaps don’t feel that they can control themselves enough to comment. I hope that you learn the error in your ways. I’m sure if we met in person, you wouldn’t give the same awful impression as your writing.
//the enigma
There is a serious problem with the way you word your articles, especially the “Break a Leg” article. First off, I’d like to know what your article is clearly about? For the first half you only seem to want to discuss yourself and your renown credibility at being a critic. Especially the comment that you worked under Walt Disney like it’s a prestigious corporation of theater. Just let it be known that Disney is considered mediocre as far as acting goes, they have set character archetypes that actors are required to be, so there’s no creativity and no new emotional expression that get to be added with each new actor. Not saying that actors and crew members at Walt Disney don’t work hard, but that is not a true theater production. Something like that could never be put on a resume if someone was going into professional theater, because the experience has no validity in theater which would make most directors laugh. If you worked for Broadway then yes that might give you a bit more credit for your opinion, but what gives you the right to bash a theater performance the day before opening night? It’s completely unprofessional, it would be understandable if you saw the performance and written a review afterwards, but this is not the case.
What mainly concerns me is that you would release an article where half of it was gloating on how prestigious you are because you worked at Walt Disney. “After working for one of the largest entertainment companies in the world (Walt Disney World Resorts), my expectations were pretty high when I transferred to Ferris in regards to the acting scene.” May I add you never specified whether you worked in the acting portion of Disney or at a concession stand. You also commented that you were not impressed with a FSU theater performance. Which one? Chances are you might just have not liked the playwright, or it could have been a bad night, or who knows, you might have tried out for the performance and didn’t get in it so maybe it was a grudge? You are not very specific with your details thus rhetorically removes the ethos from your argument of having any right or credibility to judge our upcoming theater performance without even seeing it first.
It was very antagonistic and malicious the way the article was written. And from reading other articles like the Atheist billboard, no smoking on campus, and your two current ones the strip club and the tsunami articles you seem to have a reoccurring history of blatantly stating your opinion without reason or viable facts that would allow you to make such an assumption. The tsunami article was a very touchy subject that you managed to cover yourself on like the break a leg article very wistfully so you could ensue your ‘all mighty’ opinion upon the topic. Now I understand that you write for an opinion column, but you need to think of the way people will react to your articles and learn to voice your words carefully. You cannot just say after reporting that FSU theater really isn’t that good and that the upcoming play (which at the time was coming out the next day….) might have mistakes but its ok just look past them. Do you really think that will make people want to see the play? No, I really don’t think it does.
I would prefer it that you stay on one topic and not use your job just to talk highly of yourself and add little tidbits in there on other things (like our theater program) and say that it’s bad with no viable credibility and cover yourself by saying that you understand the hard work that goes into making a performance. If you actually knew the hard work going into a theater production then you would you, after worked yourself to the bone and then the night before you were supposed to perform you read an article telling the student body that FSU theater really isn’t that great and the performance most likely isn’t either, be understanding and enjoy the article? I really don’t think you would. Then why would you write such a virulent article bashing FSU theater? You should know that you upset a lot of people, not only actors, but the crew members, and all the volunteers that took time out of our day making costumes, building the set, lighting, tech-work, props, make-up, hair, programming, and all the “HARD WORK” that goes into an actual theater production. I believe that you owe a formal apology to the theater department, and a retraction should be published in the next issue of the Torch.
I am the Stage Manager of Three Musketeers and worked my butt off this semester to put this show on with an amazing cast and crew! I agree that you owe us an apology and I would also like a retraction be published in the new issue.
Did you happen to see the writeup we did in the next edition about the play?
https://fsutorch.com/2011/11/09/arts-entertainment/family-of-musketeers/
Yes the write-up in the current edition of the Torch was viewed. We very much appreciate that the Torch would put so much time and effort into making such a wonderful article. But the issue here is not about the Torch itself, but it was the writer. The way Angela abused her job position to write mainly about herself and then continue on to mock FSU theater is the mistake that is in contempt here. The only thing we’d like is a formal apology from the writer, just because a very nice article was written about the play doesn’t make the situation all right. The writer must know that she has to watch her wording otherwise she will continue to offend students at Ferris. It is her and only her that we require an apology from, and no one else. We cannot let her continue to think that she can get away with abusing her occupational power.