Lafayette Campus News (www.lafayette.edu), October 10, 2007 — Christopher Duru ’10 (New York, N.Y.) is a Posse Scholar majoring in history. He performed in the recent production of 365 Days/365 Plays. The following is a firsthand account of Duru’s experiences during opening night and the performances.

Opening night was a rush of emotions. There was a general level of excitement backstage. However, I was overwhelmed by the question, “Will they get it?” My other cast mates shared this concern as well. The abstract nature of the play left much room for interpretation. Every line and every gesture had to count. Otherwise the meaning of the piece would be lost.

As an actor, one of the many challenges in performing was the brevity of the plays. Unlike other plays, the actor does not have two hours to develop a character. From the moment I stepped on stage, I had to have a fully developed character. Also if an actor is in multiple plays they have to make each character distinctly different from the last one they played. This is very difficult because of, as I stated before, the short nature of the plays and the mad dash of costume changes going on backstage. Therefore, when an actor was onstage it required a lot of concentration; this was sometimes helped or hindered by the audience.

The audience for the first performance and the brown bag preview had many professors, theater staff, and the directors of the plays. As a result, the audience was quicker in picking up many of the jokes and references in the plays. They were also more respectful of the theater space, remaining quiet for the entire performance and clapping at the appropriate times. However, the audience was also more subdued and the excitement level was not as high as the other performances.

Later on in the week, the audience contained more students. This audience was more excitable and enthusiastic. Many of them cheered their fellow classmates and enjoyed getting to see them perform. However, what this audience had in enthusiasm, they lacked in theater etiquette. Many in the audience were having conversations or inappropriately laughing. This would be distracting in a normal theater, but being in the small black box theater the audience noise was magnified. This was highly distracting to the actor and made it difficult to perform.

The differences in the audience were due to the reasons they came to see the performance. The first audience was more academic, they came to see the show for meaning and also to critique. This created a more professional atmosphere between the actors and the audience. The second audience was there because they were required to be at the performance for class, or to see their friends perform. As a result, the environment was more laid back, and many of them were not used to seeing a theater performance.

Overall the response to the plays was very positive. Many people told me they enjoyed watching it even if they didn’t entirely understand it. I enjoyed performing in this production. It challenged my versatility as an actor and it opened my eyes to the world of abstract thought.