BTG WEEK 3

WEEK 3

We were warned that the third week was going to be one of the most challenging ones.  And boy were tensions high, but we made it through!  It also flew by!


Monday June 22, 2015

We started our morning with Yoga.  She took it a bit easier on us today, I think someone clued her in on how much physical activity we are doing!  After yoga, we had singing class with Mark.  Today he gave us group pieces for the Kern Musical Monday.  We got "The Song is You", "The Way You Look Tonight" and "Fine Romance".  We had Dance Class in the afternoon.  I think Ilana wanted to take it easy, so at the start of class she had us lie on our mats and stretch as we listened to the ballet from "An American in Paris" (it is a beautiful piece of music that is like 20 minutes long).  Then we went into the death warm up (a shorted version of it).  Then the Bells cast had to leave for rehearsal, so the rest of us learned the choreo to "One" from "A Chorus Line".  This was exhausting (because kick line at the end!) but tons of fun!

Tuesday June 23, 2015

Our day started with dance class, and since it was just the small group (Bells cast had rehearsal) Ilana decided to do something fun with us.  So after the warmup, and after we reviewed "One" we learned the choreo to N*Sync's "Bye, Bye, Bye"!  This was so much fun, and we all thoroughly enjoyed channeling our inner boy band members.  Later in the afternoon we had class with Isadora Wolfe.  Isadora is the daughter of  Kate Maguire (who is the creative director of BTG) and she is a part of Sleep No More in NYC.  She is also 5 months pregnant, but that does not get in her way.  She still moves better than any of us can!  She warmed us up with 1.5 hours of pilates (omg so hard!!) and then did a half an hour of improvisational dance (omg so much fun.  and physically demanding!).  Needless to say, by the end of the day we were exhausted.  So much dance.  So much pilates.  So much physical exercise.  oof.  We've been joking that there has not been a day where we haven't been sore since we started.  But really though.  I cannot remember a day when I wasn't tired physically!  Later I had to do car parking.  In a rainstorm.  I got soaked.

Wednesday June 24, 2015

Today we started class with Isadora.  Today we did 1.5 hours of improv dance and did 15 min of pilates.  We were all happy with this!  She had us focus on our spacial awareness and awareness of ourselves.  Later in the afternoon we had dance class with Ilana again.  Today was our last day with her until the end of July, but that did not stop her from working us super hard.  We did the death warm up, and then reviewed every single dance we have learned with her.  Once again, it was another physically exhausting day.

Thursday June 25, 2015

We started the morning off with class with Isadora again.  We focused on warming up the body and more improv movement and pilates.  We then had three hours of singing with Mark in the afternoon.  We went over Kern and Sondheim/Schwartz pieces.  Thursday night I had car parking again, but no rain storms :)

Friday June 26, 2015

Today we started off with class with Isadora.  The whole class was improv dance.  It was magical and wonderful.  And by that I mean it was exhausting and we were all sweating and gasping for air at the end.  But we had an exciting afternoon coming for us!  The Mary Poppins cast performed a couple of songs at Tanglewood (which is a famous concert venue)!  It is a beautiful grounds with green lawns and a beautiful old house!  The cast performed so well, and then we took amazing pictures. It was overall a fun afternoon.  Then we went to Lenox and had lunch at a very cute cafe called "Haven" which was delish! We spent the evening going shopping and relaxing.

The Apprentices at Tanglewood.

Saturday June 27, 2015

Today was our last class with Isadora.  We spent it doing improvisational dance and the class flew by!  We had the rest of the day off, except the Mary Poppin's cast had rehearsal all day.  Maggie and I wanted to do something nice for them so we made them dinner!  We made Chicken Parmesan and pasta, and had a nice "family" meal with everyone!  Maggie and I spent the evening walking around the Berkshire Mall, Target and Walmart before calling it a night.






Sunday June 28, 2015

This was our second day off!  I had brunch with a family friend, and then in the afternoon Maggie and I went to the Lee Outlets.  We then went home and watched The Fault in Our Stars, clean and organized the refrigerators (don't get me started on the fridge situation) and found an interesting Chinese restaurant.  The rest of the evening was spent memorizing texts for our Suzuki class.

We became fairies at Tanglewood! Maggie, me, Christian, Sophie and Eleanor.

More to come!
XOXO,
Kate

BTG Week 2

Hello friends! Last Sunday I found out I was cast in BTG's production of "The Club"  by Eve Merriam, I will be playing the part of Henry's Assistant.  I guess I will find out what that is at our Meet and Greet! I have been super busy with classes and other responsibilities but here is a recap of my second week as an apprentice!

WEEK 2

Monday June 15, 2015:

Today we started the day with car parking orientation.  Part of our responsibilities here is helping direct traffic and work concessions for the Fitzpatrick Main Stage and Unicorn Theatre, so this was the day that we learned how to organize the parking fields.  It was pouring rain and it was very confusing to understand what our instructor was trying to explain to us.  We left the orientation hoping we would not have to car park in the near future ;).  Following the orientation, we had to drive back to Pittsfield for the meet and greet for the "Bells Are Ringing"production.  This was a quick introduction, and then the cast stayed for a read through of the play.  The apprentices that were not cast in Bells went to Dance class.  The crazy warm up is starting to get easier as we get stronger.  Today we learned the Tap Dance to "Turn It Off" from "The Book of Mormon!"!  It was fun getting to do tap again, but dancing on concrete floors is killing my feet.

Tuesday June 16, 2015

We started our day off with singing with Mark Gionfriddo today.  The Bells kids were called for rehearsal, so it was just the apprentices that are in Mary Poppins and The Club.  We talked to us about the Musical Mondays we will be performing in.  The first will be all Jerome Kern songs, and the thrid Musical Monday will be titled "Even Stephen" and it will be a night of Stephen Sondheim and Stephen Schwartz songs.  The second Musical Monday will be a Rodger's and Hart Musical called "By Jupiter".  We were instructed to bring in any Schwartz/Sondheim/Kern song we had in our books to perform in class tomorrow.  He then taught us techniques to warm up our bodies and voices to get us ready to sing.  We spent an hour and a half warming up our bodies and voices before he let us leave class early so he could work a bit with the Mary Poppins cast apprentices.  The early dismissal was unexpected, but welcomed so we could catch up on more sleep.  After lunch, the Bells kids joined us again for dance class.  It once again started with the Broadway warm up, and then we learned the dance to "Two by Two" from "Book of Mormon".  This dance is cheesy and fun, and it might be my favorite one so far.

Wednesday June 17, 2015

Today we had our first Yoga lesson.  Everyone was super sore from dance class, and our instructor did a ton of strength poses, so by the end of the lesson we were all exhausted.  That class was quickly followed (as in a 5 min potty break) by singing with Mark.  He warmed us up and then wanted us to sing our Kern/Sondheim/Schwartz songs.  Since I do not have any songs by those performers in my repertoire, I did not sing, however, I enjoyed listening to my other apprentices.  We are a talented group! This was just a way for Mark to get to know our vocal styles a bit more so he could pick pieces for us to sing.  The next class of the day was dance with Ilana.  We started with the killer warm up and then went into choreo for "Joyful Joyful"from "Sister Act 2".  My foot was killing me from dancing on the concrete floors, so I was only able to learn about half of the dance before I had to sit out and ice it.  Everyone was really into it and we recorded it at the end of class.

Thursday June 18, 2015

Our day started off with singing with Mark.  He gave us our Jerome Kern pieces for the first Musical Monday.  He selected the song "Till the Clouds Roll By" for me to sing.  It is a cute piece and I am excited to get to work on it.  We ran through each of our solo pieces in class and then released for lunch.  We found out that our dance instructor pulled a muscle in her back and decided to cancel class.  We had a nice relaxing afternoon, we went to a local coffee shop and got to know each other better.  I have made a nice core group of friends.  There are five of us and we call ourselves "Team Ox Blood" (it is referring to the color, not actual Ox blood, we are not a cult).  Team Ox Blood is made up of me, my three roommates, Maggie, Eleanor and Sophie, and one of the boys, Christian.  Our leisurely afternoon ended with us having to go do car parking.  We we got there I was surprised with getting to do concessions!  And more surprising, I made $3.50 in tips! Whoopie!  We ended the day by going to Patricks Pub (Ox Blood's chosen hang out spot, we lower the average age in there by about 40 years) for a quick drink/bite to eat.  We ran into Ilana and Mark there, and Ilana stayed to hang out with us.  She told us stories about her adventures working on Broadway and we asked her about our favorite Broadway Stars.  We really like spending time with her.  When we left Patrick's she told us to wear all black to class the next day and bring our heels.

Friday June 19, 2015

Today we started class off with singing with Mark, and today we were assigned our Sondheim/Schwartz songs!  I get to sing "The Worst Pies in London" from "Sweeny Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street"!  I am so excited because Mrs. Lovett is a dream role of mine!  We sang through all of the songs, and then were released from class.  We later had dance class, did the warm up, and then Ilana announced that we were learning the dance from Beyonce's "Single Ladies".  So we channelled our inner Queen Beys and learned the dance.  I was not picking the dance up AT ALL, so I decided to just move around and do hairography instead.  I later found out that I fooled people and they thought I did a good job with the dance!  Later Maggie, Sophie and I were scheduled to see "Thoreau, or Return to Walden" at the Unicorn.  It is a one man production, and it was brilliant.  It is set when Henry David Thoreau spent time in Walden, and it is centered around his thought on life, and commentary of events of the era.  It was touching, funny, sad, wonderful and the acting was ON POINT.  We all thoroughly enjoyed it.

Sunday June 21, 2015

Today was our first day off! Woo!  But it was spent doing more work.  Maggie and I were fortunate enough to be asked read with one of the actors in Deathtrap.  He needed to record a couple of video auditions, and he needed us to read with him.  It was interesting seeing how a professional actor works and I think Maggie and I both took a lot from the experience.  We then had to do our laundry.  So we found a coin-op laundromat and got it done.  Later that night we saw Jurassic World.  I loved it.


More to come!

XOXO,
Kate

BTG Week1

So I left for Pittsfield, Massachusetts on Friday June 5 around 9pm from LAX.  I then had a two hour layover in San Francisco, then had another hour layover in Minneapolis before finally landing in Hartford,CT on Saturday June 6th.  My mom's best friend from college, who I call "Aunt" Leslie, picked me up.  She and her two daughters, Sarah and Rebecca, my "Cousins"then drove me the hour to Pittsfield (with a pitt-stop at Dunkin Donuts!) to check into my house.

It is a big house which is called Buel House.  There are 34 people living in it.  Its pretty crazy living here.  We have 4 showers and one kitchen. Cooking and showering is complicated but I am trying to stay positive! 

That day as I was unpacking everything, the festival production interns invited me to go to a party at Jacob's Pillow, which is a famous dance company in the area.  My roommate, Sophie, who also arrived early, and I went with a few of the interns.  The theme was 90s and it was a blast!  We danced on the stage of their theatre, and met many cool people.

On Sunday 6/7, the rest of the apprentices moved in.  I spent the day finishing unpacking my things and getting to know my fellow acting apprentices.  We then had a meeting to meet the directors of our program and get our first week schedule.

On Monday 6/8 we started the day going to the Stockbridge Campus to get our costume measurements taken.  We then went to the meet and greet for the first play of their season, "Deathtrap".  We then went back to Pittsfield to go over safety information.  Finally in the afternoon we met with Mark Gionfriddo, who is the musical director of "Mary Poppins", to go over our audition songs.  

On Tuesday 6/9 we started the day with Lessac Training.  Lessac is a voice and movement technique.  We then broke for lunch, and then went over our audition pieces with Mark again in the afternoon.

On Wednesday 6/10 we once again started the day with Lessac Training.  In the afternoon we met our dance teacher.  Her name is Ilana Ransom Toepliz and she is awesome.  She was the assistant director for Violet the Musical on Broadway.  and many more cool projects!  She started class with what she calls "The Chorus Line Warm Up"  but us apprentices like to affectionately call it "Ilana's Trail of Tears".  It was apparently created by the cast of "A Chorus Line" and it is hell.  It works literally every muscle in the body.  We were in so much pain/soreness afterwords.  Hence the affectionate nickname.

Following the warm up we learned the choreo from "A Christmas Story" Dance Call Backs.  This served as our dance audition.  We then put on a mock audition for her and performed our songs for her.  I got nervous and don't think I did the best I could have done.  She had me re sing a section of my song, which went better.  I think a combo of tiredness/timechange/crazy dancing wore me out and made it hard to sing.

On Thursday 6/11 We had more Lessac Training in the morning followed by dance, (and the hell warm up) in the afternoon.  In dance class we learned the original  choreo to "All That Jazz" from Chicago the musical.  That evening was the Opening party for the Berkshire Theatre Group.  So the apprentices got all dressed up and went.  There was food, drinks, and dancing.  I had a blast!

On Friday 6/12   We started our day with dance, did the evil warm up, and learned the original choreo to "Positive" from Legally Blonde the Musical. Right after dance we had a master class with Kate Maguire.  She is the head of the entire Berkshire Theatre Group.  She spent the first part of the class talking to us and getting to know us.  She then went to work on monologues with us.  However, we did not have enough time, and only 3 of the apprentices got to work.  She ended class saying that we will have more classes with her and will continue our work.  We had our last day of Lessac Training.  I really enjoyed learning this new technique and I am interested in looking into more classes once I get back to LA.  Our Equity Member Candidate paperwork was due.  I had to officially decide my stage name.  I decided that professionally I would be "Kate Woerner".

On Saturday 6/13 We started the morning with a masterclass with Joel Fram.  Joel is the musical director for "Bells are Ringing".  He just came off a 6 year stint as musical director of "Wicked" on Broadway, and his husband won a Tony for orchestration on "Once the Musical".  He wanted to see how fast we could learn harmony and sing it.  So for an hour and a half we learn about 6 measures from one of the numbers in "Bells are Ringing".  After that we had the apprentice work day at the Stockbridge campus.  Our job was to help get the mainstage ready for the new season.  My group which consisted of my one of my roommates Maggie, and Christian, cleaned windows for four hours. 

Sunday 6/14 was the day of the audition. I spent the morning getting ready and warming up.  Then walked over the theatre for the audition.  We had to do a song and a monologue followed by a movement call. I did the best I could.  My voice was tired and it was hard to get my high notes, but I think my monologue went well!  Later in the afternoon, a bunch of the apprentices went to Barrington Stage to see their season opening of "Man of La Mancha".

More to come!

XOXO,

Kate 

Brief Catch Up

Hello Blog Universe!


It has been quite some time since I last posted, so here is a brief catch-up on my life.

I graduated from college! (but you already knew that from my last post)  I spent the 6 weeks following college working for the wonderful Blank Theatre Company in Hollywood,CA as an apprentice for their 22nd Annual Young Playwrights Festival.  Those six weeks were crazy busy but very rewarding. I met many wonderful people, and had to fortune to work with "big names" in the LA theatre scene such as Daniel Henning, Michael Matthews and Barbara Bain, as well as many other crazy talented people.

Directly following that apprenticeship I stayed with The Blank Theatre as an Arts Administration and Producing Intern.  With that job I learned what it takes to put on live theatre in the Los Angeles community.  I also got to work closely with the theatre's producer, Sarah Allyn Bauer, who started out as a boss/mentor for me, and now I'm lucky to call her a friend.  I was also asked to be an Associate Producer on two of their main stage productions, "The Why" and "Sons of the Prophet" (Sons was extended TWICE.  We opened February 8th and wrapped on May 18th; it was quite the ride!)  as well as a workshop of a new play, "Knockout Mouse".  Through this experience I learned that producing really isn't my cup of tea, but I now have a huge respect for all the producers out there!


So between all of this, I actually needed to make some money.  I stumbled into two fantastic part time jobs, one as an Office Assistant at a private school in Thousand Oaks, and one as a Sales Associate at the Kate Spade Outlet.  I had so much fun working for these two employers and I have learned so much about me and life through them.

And in between all of that, I was accepted into the training program of The Groundlings School of Improv and Comedy in Hollywood.  Improv is a skill I NEVER thought I would do, so I was quite surprised to find myself in the training process of one of the best improv schools in the country.

Finally, in May I competed for and WON the Miss Moorpark Pageant!  I won top talent, top academics, and top interview.  It was quite the night for me!


In April I found out that I was accepted in the Berkshire Theatre Group's Acting Apprenticeship.  That means I will move the Pittsfield, Massachussetts for 12 weeks this summer.  It is an intensive musical theatre apprenticeship.  I will train with 14 other college aged students from the best of the best of broadway directors, dancers, and musical directors!  I am so excited!

More to come,

XOXO
Kate