A
I am one of eight graduate students accepted into SDSU’s (San Diego State University) MFA in Musical Theatre program. When I flew out to interview back in February, I was excited at the prospect of being on this campus filled with energy and teeming with so many students. A month later, I was accepted into the program, and New York City, my home, went into complete lockdown due to Covid-19. I adjusted my life to the confines of my studio apartment and stayed inside for weeks at a time. I moved my furniture around every day to work out and teach dance classes online. I cooked every single meal and hand washed all of my clothes in my bathtub. I found myself talking to myself and feeling helpless at the lack of human contact. The endless sounds of ambulance sirens ringing throughout the day became routine. This isolation became taxing on my mental health. Although restrictions were lifted during the summer, I was convinced that my first semester would be done completely online and that I would remain quarantined in New York City. In a way, this scenario felt ideal. I wouldn’t have to stress about packing my entire life and moving across the country. I would also be able to stay in the comfort of my own studio apartment where I’d have much more control over who I came in contact with.
SDSU announced that although the majority of students would take classes remotely, a small portion of students would take in-person classes. Happily, my cohort and I would begin our semester taking voice lessons, dance and studio classes in-person with only our History and Writing class online. Necessary precautions included mandatory mask wearing on campus, temperature checks and classes being moved into larger spaces to accommodate social distancing. As we quickly adapted to this new normal, an outbreak among the undergraduate students forced all classes to go completely remote in less than two weeks of the semester beginning. Though I began to have serious doubts about how effective virtual training could be for singing and acting, I reminded myself that I would only get out of my school work what I put into it. All work, research and practicing became a completely isolating and self-motivated task for the next four weeks.
Our workload remained packed as we began rehearsals for our concert version of the musical Chess. This large scale production would involve over 100 students from graduate/undergraduate performers, graduate designers, tv/film production students, the SDSU Symphony Orchestra and Chamber Choir. The original plan had been to rehearse in-person and film the concert on stage to stream in December. With the mandatory four week all virtual mode, we were unsure if filming would occur in-person or if we would be filming ourselves in our apartments. While it was difficult to learn the complex score of Chess remotely, what drove me to learning this material was that the final product would be a filmed performance that people can watch from home. Any flaws and imperfections would no longer be left onstage for that one-time live audience, but captured on film forever. At the end of the four week all virtual mode, the University reassessed the situation and allowed in-person classes to resume with mandatory testing every 14 days. I was more than happy to swab my nose to be able to perform live with my cohort as we went into tech rehearsals.
During the week of tech, we walked through the show with one another while wearing masks. I felt like the masks impeded the possibility of any honest response to my scene partners. Though concert versions of musicals tend to be more about the music, having this gift to perform live made me want to take advantage of any acting opportunity that there was. The design of the show was nine squares on stage that were nine feet apart. There would be no physical contact to keep social distancing with this staging. The production included undergrads who would be filmed individually and edited in, a singing chorus that would be edited in, as well as a full orchestra. For the purpose of filming the concert, we sang to a track which would be removed later on and replaced with the orchestra. Because of sound issues, the track had to be played live at a minimal volume to not bleed into the mics of the actors which made it difficult for us to hear the music. For the final run through, our masks came off, and we were able to both sing full out and hear one another for the first time. We had rehearsed for almost five weeks, yet it wasn’t until the run through before filming that we’d actually sing together without any restrictions.
To perform again on a stage felt both foreign and yet so comfortable. I felt prepared and unprepared at the same time. The preparation of the material was evident in all of us as we filmed, but live performance is not about what is on the page but how we as artists lift that material off of the page and breathe life into it. To have only one rehearsal to perform without masks before filming was not ideal. But it was necessary. The week of tech was filled with multiple Covid tests. We fastidiously followed all the guidelines that we knew to follow. No cast, crew or designer got sick from collaborating on this production. Chess would be the shining moment of triumph during these trials to safely perform during a pandemic. It felt like huge relief as the filming day came to an end. We had been able to safely perform with each other live. Regardless of what the final product will be, we were able to make it through a rehearsal process that was less than ideal but necessary.
As my first semester of grad school slowly comes to an end, I am once again feeling a sense of routine and normalcy. The rhythm to my daily movements is feeling stable. Though SDSU has announced that the school will revert back to an all virtual mode for the rest of the semester, I am certain that my cohort and I will continue to create performance opportunities that challenge the form of what we know as live theater. Like all performers, we are strong, malleable, and resilient artists who will adapt to any change that is thrown our way.
