It's so amazing, and so much fun, I literally can't believe it. I know I was so nervous when I was still in the process of coming here, and I remember having doubts about the school, but it was all just nerves and I know that this is where I belong.
The teachers really aren't as intimidating as they were made out to be. My teachers are Paola one of the improv teachers, who is really funny. When we do a scene for her she'll tell us that it's a catastrophe, or that we were horrible, but always in the cutest way. She'll come up and rub your back, or hold you hand, but be very direct. She's great. She's so motherly, but knows exactly what she wants, and will stop you in the middle when it's not happening.
Then I have Jason, another improv teacher, but he has also done some movement, but I'm not sure if he was filling in, or something along those lines. Jason is the teacher who speaks the most English in class. When people look like they don't understand he'll always just repeat it in English.
Christophe is the acrobatics teacher, and he is so cool. He's like 60, or older, and he is the acrobatics teacher! We worked on rolling and tumbling the first class, and in the second we did handstands! I'd never done a handstand before, until last Friday! It was so amazing.
Francois is the James Bond of teachers. He just IS James Bond...of mime. Francois is Jacques Lecoq's son. Jacques is dead, but his wife, Fay, is still running the administrative part of the school, his daughter Pascale is starting to take over her mom's job, and Francois his son is a teacher. It's like a family theater school.
Anyway, Francois teaches..well, it's not really mime, but he will lay out a space, and we have to interact in it, but it's always very specific. Like, we did a pool scene, and we had the door to get in, the receptionist, a big window to see in the pool, stairs to go up to the changing rooms, stairs back down to the pool, the pool, diving board...etc. So he'd put like 5 or 6 of us into this "pool" and we'd have to perform a scene while respecting everything he previously established.
THEN we have a class called Autocours. Autocours is a class with no teacher, it's basically our time to rehearse for 1.5 hours everyday, to perform something on Friday. At the beginning of the week we are giving a theme, and then we have the week to get something together. We have to pick our own groups, of 6 or so, and just do it. Last week was "An event in a place." So pretty vague, but all the scenes have to be silent, and it has to be a justified silence. It's not that we CAN'T talk, but find placed and reasons where people just don't talk. But we still have to interact with each other without pantomime.
So, that was my first week at Lecoq, and I am just so happy. I love classes, and even though I have to leave my house at 8am everyday in order to get to class, it really hasn't been that bad. My SLC classes are going pretty well so far too. We had out first visit for Art History. We went to the atalier of Eugene Delacroix. Which was his house and his work space. I wanted to take pictures but we weren't allowed to. We could barely whisper!
So here are some more photos for ya.
This is the lake underneath the Paris Opera house. Like in Phantom of the Opera? I was there!!
More beautiful in the Paris Opera house
This is also in the Opera, and it was made by the same person who made the Hall of Mirrors in Verseilles!
This is from Delacroix's Atalier, we weren't supposed to take photos, but i snuck this one in...
This is from the "Ecole de Beaux Arts" this is like the best art school in Paris.
This is one of Delacroix's paintings, in the Church of St. Sulpice
And here is ME! I just got my hair cut, so thought you guys would want to see.
