SEP Artists' Day 2011-2012

SEP is an outreach program by the Student Council of SSC HS Department. Now every year, there are certain events that are special other than the usual volunteer teaching program. Last November 19, 2011 was Artists' Day for the kids. Knowing that I am in my club called "Curtain Call", which is the drama club of my school in HS, I'd like to give a few notes about my second experience of SEP Artists' Day.

I am in my sophomore year of High School and this is NOT the first time I attended SEP Artists' Day. Last year, we also had Artists' Day for our SEP Activity and ours were pretty much hurried somehow. 

As I recall it, last year our Senior club president texted me the night before the actual day and told us to be at school for SEP Artists' Day especially those who can come. It was a rush.

The next day I went to school coming from my ballet class breathing heavily from running around CCP to home to school. As I came, only around 6 of us came out of 30 members of our club. Well it was explainable since we didn't really know what to do. But let's skip to the play part. We ended up staging a short skit about a potato saving his friend chicken from being fried as Fried Chicken by the "Mc Jolly" truck. The plot goes like this:

Chicken, always wake up early therefore as a rooster, he crows in the morning. It's a usual practice in the farm. But potato doesn't like waking up early and always gets to arguments with Chicken. So Spider is the one who always comes between them and stop them from fighting. But one day, chicken was "abducted" by the Mc Jolly driver and is going to be turned to the Mc Jolly Fried Chicken! "Oh no!" they all said. But since Potato is a good friend of Chicken, he goes and saves Chicken from the Mc Jolly Driver. Soon, they agree friendship between the two of them and vows peace with the other farm animals and plants.

For the sake of the children, I played the role of a spider. For the props and costume, since we didn't have any in the first place we bought as many cartolina, and yarns, glue, art papers and start making paper potatoes, paper spider and a rooster costume out of papers and all. It was kind of last minute because we weren't prepared with anything. I helped since I had some materials that could help in the process which was some markers, tape, staplers and double-sided tape. 

As we came there, we staged a play, had them act the role they like, and even stage the play themselves. It was dead tiring but worth my time.

This year, we prepared ourselves quite longer and better than last year. This year we had at least less than a week of preparation but we nailed some of the factors of theater in it. We stage a play called "Ang prinsipe na may mahabang ilong." In english it's "The Prince that has a Long Nose". The story goes like this:

One day, a handsome prince falls in love with a beautiful princess. Both of them loves each other. Every day the prince visits the princess and tries to ask her hand for marriage. But there was a hinder: the Princess' cat. The pet cat does not like the prince thus, the prince cannot go too near the princess because the cat is always with her.

So, the prince goes to the forests and finds an old man, a wizard perhaps, and asks for his help to chase the cat away. The old man/wizard then said to him "That cat is a monster! He will never allow you to come near the princess. Thus, if you what to be with the princess, then you have to step the cat's tail and it will die." Thanking the old man/wizard, the prince then hurriedly rushed to the princess' castle and called her.

"My Princess, are you there?" he said. as the princess response yes, he hurriedly steps at the cat's tail. The cat, furious enough then turned to a monster and bewitches the both of them "Because of your lame acts, I will put up a curse on you. You're first born son shall be born with a long nose!" There the cat then dies. 

Without realizing that the curse is true, the prince and the princess gets married. They become then the new king and queen of the kingdom. But as their son was born, the curse then becomes true. He was born with a long nose. He never goes out of the palace because of his nose that is as long as a sword and sometimes even hits his own father with it.

One day, the little prince asks again "Father, Mother why is my nose so long?" he asks. As the king was about to response, until he was hit by his nose and was silenced by his dearest queen to not let out about the curse. "My son, it's just really like that." The queen said. As the little prince gets depressed again, he goes to the forest with his servant maid and walks alone.The maid then tells the prince to stay put in the forest so that she can find their way back to the kingdom. 

While waiting for his maid, he heard a scream. "AHHHHH!!! Help me! Help me! I'm drowning!" Said by the commoner girl who was drowning in a sand quick. The prince then hurriedly goes to the girl trying to find something long to hold unto. Since he couldn't find any, he thought of one last solution. his nose. "Um...here! Hold my nose and I'll pull you out!" Said the prince as he pulls the girl out of the quicksand.

"Thank you! You saved my life!" Said the commoner girl. They then asks each others' name. the girl was Gracia and the prince's name is Prince Borris. At first sight, they then fall in love despite the prince's long nose. then a fairy comes in and says "Because of your beautiful rich heart, you are now free from your curse!" A fairy godmother said as she magically takes the nose away and return it to its original state. 

The both of them became happy and walked through the forest as the maid saw the prince. The maid was so shocked that they all left the forest and the maid started spreading the good news. As the prince and Gracia goes back to the kingdom, the queen and king was happy yet shocked by his new appearance. The prince then introduces Gracia. The queen then tells them that they'll take care of Gracia and even make her go to school. The story then ends with a "They all live happily every after". THE END.

Now you know the story, I'd like to let you know too that I became the prince. Being in an all-girls school, it is not much of a surprise when I become the prince. I am the prince who became the king. the one who stepped on the cat's tail. It was kind of weird since I'm an inch or two shorter than the princess. (Sorry for being short). 

After we staged the play, we asked the kids our audience to stage the play again with us. So it went like this. Kids who wanted to be the prince, will be taught the lines and how to  be a prince. And so on and so forth. So in my part, I had one boy who wanted to be king. I started it with giving him my paper crown and start asking if he liked the play and the like. I then started teaching him in stepping on the cat's tail and reading the lines. After the short moment of practice, the kids staged the play twice. And they even wanted a third encore for it! But time was running out. So our club moderator decided to do some story telling about a prince and a princess who could not say her name because of a curse. (I'll post the story in another blog post). 

After that, the kids went down to go back to their homes (since they went to our school). Then we had a short critique discussion. Our Ups and Down. 

As a summary, we had a great production. Despite the short time, and characters, we did great. Especially the costume and set design. Our costumes was prepared by a D. She used all her resources and connections to get things all done. Our set design was very simple yet promising. It as just made out of cartolina, paint and markers yet it made a good set for our short play. the audience impact was good. The kids were reacting to the story and they could understand our story. Time was also great and teamwork adds up to the point.

But our downs were that we have low voices. Because we were staging it in an open area, our voices were not that much heard especially if you were at the back. Our characterization were not that polished. It was not that great. We had some character break down. Another is that memorization. Yes,I am famous for this. Because of the short time, some of my lines and cues is forgotten. More like jumbled. I mixed prince and princess together, I hurry too fast, overlapping with the narrator. I even cried because of it at the end. It's the thing we called "MENTAL BLOCK". And it's not very pretty. Those are the main points of up and down of the short production but there's more than just that.we also talked about the attention span of the children, the program we used, which is not good and so. And even how we talk or teach the children to their certain character. It was tiring and hard but I said at the end "it was worth the experience". 

So this is it. After the event ended, I came home and dragged myself to bed and sleep. And this is not the only SEP I'm going to be attending to. I know that for sure.