Mya Writes Things
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I went to the Shoebox Theater in Portland. A theater so tiny that it was named for a box because that’s what it feels like. The stage is approximate ten feet square, with a couple of seat rows on all four sides, and exits in the corners. When you sit for a play, you must cover your ears when the actors scream. You are within a danger zone, spitting distance. The play was The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare.
When the main antagonist Shylock gives a hugely bitter, split-flying monologue, leans over the railing, and looks right into your eyes… you’re supposed to (I guess) take it in with your expression, a face, a blank page. I did no such thing (I was told). I thought I held myself together pretty nicely. After the play was done, the actors thanked us as we exited. The man who played Shylock said he was so changed by my face that he delivered his next line entirely differently than before- and so did the actress who replies to him, and so did the third replying to her, and so on, and so forth… until I became the one responsible for a domino effect. He pointed me out to the others in the assembly to say “THIS IS THE ONE! THIS IS HER! She’s the one that erased SEVEN WEEKS of rehearsal!” I was confused and asked what it was that I did, exactly, and immediately apologized and he had replied, “No, it’s a GOOD THING!” When he pointed me out to the other players, he said, “This is the girl that changed the ending!” With a huge smile, he explained to me that people usually flinched back with fear or discomfort when he screamed into the audience. According to him, when he was snarling and spitting in my face, I gave him The Look of Pure Fury and Snark™ that seemed to say, “OH NO YOU DIDN’T.” That my inability to lean backwards, rather taking it in with a look of defiance and smiling judgment, that it changed everything he believed about his character in a single moment. His character was discombobulated, he delivered his next line completely differently than he ever had before. It was a large ensemble scene, there were probably four others in the tiny box with him at the time, and these gifted actors rolled with the punches. The next one responded to his immediate change, delivering her line differently, and then the next character had to respond to her differently, and then the next - by the time is probably wound up towards the next monologue, they were all playing slightly skewed versions of the characters that they had before. Suddenly motivations, tones, volumes, emphasis were changed all over the place. He told me that the entire play turned out differently than it had in any performance or rehearsal. The whole meaning had shifted for them. The other players came running out to meet me because they wanted to see the face of the person that threw Shylock into an alternate universe and dragged them all down with him. I wanted to say… “I love Shakespeare! I’ve been in a Shakespeare play. I’m an actress. I act. I’ve been involved with theater before. I Totally Get It.” But I didn’t, I was struck dumb, so I smiled and nodded a lot, thanking them for their performances, pretending I was a celebrity for the five minutes we passed through the shoelace-sized entry and back to the university van. I changed their ending, and yes, cliche time, they changed my life. I don’t know how, naturally. I still get chills thinking about it. I feel that memory every time I see a play. It replays whenever I pick up my old scripts from theater productions gone by. The older gentleman, acting the part of Shylock, screaming in my face, slamming his hands into the railing a mere few inches from my knees - he was so great. I was absolutely thrilled that I was this close to the character, the angry man bellowing at the Venetian court. I thought I was wearing a calm and collected poker face, but actually wore a challenging smirk and one raised eyebrow, and I wasn’t even aware that my face was making this expression. Maybe this would be less funny if I had done it on purpose. I still have no idea what the previous ending looked like. And no one else would either; anyone who attended later performances. Shylock said this is how they would do it for the rest of the play’s run; they liked “my ending better”. My ending, as if I had some great hand in it, just as much contribution as Shakespeare. Modern media always give heroes and heroines a subtitle nowadays. Clara: The Impossible Girl, from Doctor Who. Katniss Everdeen: The Girl on Fire, from The Hunger Games. Harry Potter: The Boy Who Lived. I’m perfectly fine not being The Chosen One for anything. If life were to grant me a subtitle, I would request, humbly, Mychal: The Girl Who Changed the Ending.
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May 2020
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