Shakespeare in Fall

So last week, I took 49 students (and 5 chaperones) down to Cedar City, Utah to compete in the Utah High School Shakespeare Competition. We had lots of fun, saw great shows (another post later), cringed in horror while Jackie sang Ice Ice Baby to everyone on the bus and had a student take 2nd in monologues, 1st in costuming, 2nd (as a team) in the technical olympics, 1st in the dance duo and 2nd in dance ensemble. But that's not what the Shakespeare Competition is about. Here are memories (in no particular order) I have:

• In 1992 going and competing in scenes with Danny Jewell and Nathan Culmer with a scene from The Tempest. We took first, all got scholarships to SUU and none of us accepted them. I chipped Danny's front tooth in our 3rd round with my bottle. Sabra Gertsch and Kirt Bateman were so mad because they took 2nd and worked about 4 months on their scene- while we whipped it together (with help from John Adams) in 2 days.


• That same year, waking up in the middle of the night hearing Alexis Baigue vomiting somewhere in the hotel room. I think it was the tub or the sink. It then woke up Nathan Longhurst and Kirt Bateman. Alexis kept apologizing to us between heaves. Then we all decided to incorporate vomiting into the lines of King Lear. I think it made for a stronger scene.


• Wearing a costume in 1991 in monologues and seeing THAT EXACT SAME COSTUME in 2006 in West Jordan High School's ensemble. At least the tights were different.


• Having my mom dye my tights a beautiful powder blue for my monologue in 1991.


• Going down as a student teacher in 1999. We had our crazy 85 year old, chain smoking bus driver Clay. He takes off from a dance leaving Shawnda Moss, Bradley Moss and myself behind. Shawnda is fuming as we walk back to the hotel. I tell her I'll talk to him while she chews out the students for leaving on a bus without a chaperone on it. I knock on the door and he opens it smoking a cigarette while wearing a white wife beater- AND NO PANTS OR UNDERWEAR. I had not been trained for this at BYU. I asked him why he left the school with no adults on the bus and he replied, "You weren't there." I found this perfectly valid and ran away so he could close his door. The whole bus ride back, I couldn't look at him without turning red. Shawnda had him fired.


• From 2009, having the manager of the hotel call me to tell me "I'm so sorry- but your students broke two of our beds." What I found funny was he kept apologizing- like the beds should have been made to withstand four 17 year olds jumping on them.


• Running in pouring rain with dance company in 2007 trying to figure out where the dance competition was taking place.


• Going to the coaches reception one time and listening (and watching) a drama teacher get drunker and drunker until all he kept repeating was "Shakespeare's all about the f***ing". He said this about 25 times. I just kept nodding and sipped my Sprite.


• Performing our western style Taming of the Shrew in front of everyone at the awards ceremony.


• Watching Neal Johnson with his middle school students following him around like lemmings- and following him even more closely when he was mean to them. In fact, just being around Neal Johnson and listening to his stories makes the Shakespeare Competition worth it every year. (Especially the year his student accidentally stabbed another student in the back with a plastic dagger in the middle of a performance in front of all the judges).


• Being pulled up on stage in 2009 for The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Abridged and made to run back and forth across the stage. Jackie swore my pants were going to fall down in front of everyone, but they were firmly cinched across my waist.