When Mummies Attack

Saint Mary's University

Wednesday 3rd of December
On Tuesday we began with another class with Dennis. This time and for future classes we were in one of the acting studios. Here we focused more on the how the definition we had created last class can be seen in the plays. We read from Synge’s Playboy of the Western World, though we focused on the main plot points to get the story. We discussed the language used and some of the major themes of the play. One main point we focused on we the line from Pegeen “There’s a great gap between a gallous story and a dirty deed.”

After this class, the group went for a cultural visit to the National Museum or Ireland. I did some wandering alone for a bit and almost scared myself as I unexpectedly went into the Ancient Egypt exhibit with various mummy relics. I just walked up the stairs and thought “oh what a cool blue light, I wonder what room this is…AAHHH!! MUMMIES!!” Sarcophagi tend to freak me out though, because I expect them to open and the dead to rise. Irrational, yes, but I still think it every time. We headed back to the hostel to have lunch and the actors prepared for acting. By this time they had a lot of memorizing to do so there was very little conversation I could have with them.

During their acting class I got the chance to finish up the task I had started yesterday. I was working in a sort of library/storage/copier/computer room upstairs. As I looked around the room, I saw that some books were not where they seemed like they should be. I asked Amy about it and she had wanted to re-organize it for a while and I could do that. So I had found myself a job for a while since I have no idea how long this will take.

That night we went to see the Old Curiosity Shop and the Gate Theatre. This was an adaptation on the book by Charles Dickens. The show was very different from what we were expecting and it was rather long. One thing I liked was the use of old style set changes. There would be panels that would slide in from the wings to create a person’s house on one side of the stage or bring two panels to make a forest. I had read about this and heard about it in classes, but it was great to get to see it in action.