Jade Awakening

Starting Rehearsals

Fun fact: The image above is from a table reading of iParty with Victorious.

For the first couple rehearsals, all we did were table reads. That is, every cast member held the script in front of them and we simply spoke our dialogue to each other -- no physical acting yet, just verbal. We start on the first page and read through the first quarter of the show. In the very first pages, my character, Wendla, is speaking with her mother and innocently asks how babies are conceived.

"Mama," I say, "Don't be cross -- don't be. But I'm an aunt for the second time now, and I still have no idea how it happens."

Meredith, playing all adult women including my mother, says nothing as she's supposed to be stricken with surprise at my question.

"Mama, please. I'm ashamed to even ask. But then, who can I ask but you? You cannot imagine I still believe in the stork."

"I honestly don't know what I've done to deserve this kind of talk--"

The scene continues with Wendla's relentless desire to know how babies come to be and her mother cannot bring herself to explain the details to her daughter. What's sad about this is that discussions about reproduction used to be, and still is, quite taboo. While we are now at least taught the mechanics of reproduction, there is still so much that we adolescents are not introduced to and will have to figure out on our own. Frankly, I feel much of the same frustration that Wendla has toward her mother as I do toward our current society.

Eventually the mother gives in.

"All right then... For a woman to bear a child, she must... in her own personal way, she must... love her husband. Love him, as she can love only him. Only him... She must love with- her whole... heart. There. Now you know everything."

"Everything?" I ask, pressing for the truth.

"Everything. So help me."

"Mama!" I cry out like a child. Wendla knows it's not the whole truth and she feels betrayed.

Immediately following the conversation between Wendla and her mother is a musical number that we gloss over for today. The next scene cuts to Latin class at the boys' school. All of the boys struggle to pronounce the scripted words correctly and Sikowitz has to correct them multiple times.

"No! It's 'dum conderet urbem,' not 'dom candret urban,' Try again!"

It makes me feel more relaxed knowing that I'm not the one who's struggling right away. I'm actually carrying my lines pretty well so far.

Robbie's character, Moritz, is asleep in Latin class and gets a rude awakening from the professor. Moritz is then put on the spot and has to recite part of a scripture in Latin, but makes an error. The professor is about to rip him apart but then-

"If you please!" interjects Beck as Melchior.

"Pardon me?" asks Shawn as the professor.

"If you please. Can't we at least consider Moritz's choice of words a plausible conjecture for how the text might read?"

"Melchior Gabor, we are hardly here today to conjecture about textual conjectures. The boy has made an error."

"Yes, but an understandable error, sir."

Beck's character is saving Robbie's from the wrath of a cruel 19th century German Latin teacher. So far, Beck is the only one to not receive corrections from Sikowitz on his pronunciations -- he definitely either has a natural talent for this or he has worked hard to prepare for rehearsals... or both.