Holli Rausch

So as I read Bryce‘s post on Thursday and left my comments, I did a little self-analysis. I am the absolute worst at remembering things from movies and TV shows. Let me tell you a story to express myself better.

Once upon a weekend when I worked at camp for my first year, I watched the movie Cast Away (starring Tom Hanks). When I started it, I thought “I think that I don’t like this movie, but I can’t remember why.” Throughout the movie I kept thinking how good it was and that I had to have been mistaken about not liking it before. I laughed at his conversations with Wilson the volleyball, and cried when his wife had moved on and didn’t take him back, I also was curious as to what was in the FedEx package he chose not to open.

At the end, he drove on a gravel road and met another car. They smiled at eachother or something. Then he pulled up to a house and carried the package onto the porch. He rang the doorbell. But no one was home. He left the package at the front door, and drove off. And for some reason, I am thinking that at the very end there some reference to a fork in the road (of his life or something stupid like that). I can’t quite remember.

To the writers of Cast Away: You mean to tell me that I’m not going to EVER know what was in that stupid package?! Do you think you were being CREATIVE? No, you were being LAZY because you couldn’t think of anything good enough to actually be IN the STUPID PACKAGE!

I quickly remembered why I don’t like the movie. Now I hate it because I experienced that anger. Twice. Three times, if you count this post. Four, if you count when I read this post. When the credits started rolling, I was screaming at the TV. I think Jackie might have witnessed this. I was very angry and left the house and went and shot hoops for a while, with a basketball that badly needed to be pumped up. Which made me more angry. I felt like this guy.

The other day, I saw an advertisement on TV – otherwise known as a commercial – that said Cast Away was going to be on TNT this weekend. I thought, “Oh! Miles and I should watch that!” Anyway, thanks to Bryce, for saving me.

And probably saving Miles.

We’re one week away from the Freshman showcase opening night. I have been satisfied with the way The Great Diversion had been going. I changed a lot of things earlier this week, and it’s really improved. I think my actors, Molly Weeldreyer and Jamie Grimes, could tell the difference too. It still needed some tweaking yet, however, just some fine tuning. Nothing big, but just little ways where it could be better. I just didn’t think my actors were quite ready. Which was OK, because we still had over a week.

Today though, marked the beginning of the final stretch. I told them that today would be the last day I would help them with lines if they get stuck, because from here on out I was going to have people come and be our “audience”. Molly and Jamie really performed at their best. I didn’t have to feed a line once. The notes I took were all positive. More like, “I liked it when you did ___” or “Good job on remembering to ____”. I was really impressed. We went through it again, because I wanted to see if it was luck, or if the show really improved that much in one night. Again, they nailed it! I was so impressed. I even cheered! (Lame, I know.)

Anyway, the real test is to keep it up for the next week. I know we’ll probably have an “off” day sometime, but I hope it’s during these rehearsals, rather than next Wednesday and Thursday. For the performances I’ve been involved in, my last dress rehearsal was always terrible and the real shows were great. Let’s hope for a bad dress rehearsal on Tuesday!

Performance dates: Wednesday, Oct 11, 7:30PM, TC Underground and Thursday, Oct 12, 7:30PM, TC Underground All are welcome! (Admission is a non-perishable food item for the Food Pantry.) Also, I was kidding about the Zombies and brains in my last post about this.