Following on from my last post,
here’s more of the opportunities I’ve been lucky enough to take advantage of in
my first year at Southampton...
January:
- Exams.
- Worth it, however, for the post-exam parties!
- Took part in filming for SUSUtv’s A Game of Sport period drama as a tavern customer – a 5.30am wakeup perhaps wasn’t so welcome, but the end result was so professional and polished that it was a credit to everyone involved.
February:
- Got to grips with my new modules, doing my best to learn from my
mistakes of the previous semester.
- Saw student shows of Sondheim’s Sunday in the Park with George, Noel Coward’s Bittersweet and magic and comedy at SUSU – there’s always something happening there worth checking out!
- Co-hosted an event – ‘Southampton’s Got Talent’ – live for the first time; nerve-wracking (and it really showed in the final footage as I’m constantly shifting feet!) but a great first taste of another performance type.
- Acted in Theatre Group’s Unseen, a unique process in which the cast met one another on a Saturday, knowing that we had a week to produce a piece of devised theatre which could be performed four times the following Saturday for charity. Themed around the premise of a secretive cult, our own quickly came together as a team of misfit characters we’d adopted (I became a depressive in a dead-end job, so slightly more serious than You Can't Take It With You, see my previous post!), and the end result was something we were all delighted with – although, at the end of a long week, most of us fell asleep at the after-show party!
- Saw student shows of Sondheim’s Sunday in the Park with George, Noel Coward’s Bittersweet and magic and comedy at SUSU – there’s always something happening there worth checking out!
- Co-hosted an event – ‘Southampton’s Got Talent’ – live for the first time; nerve-wracking (and it really showed in the final footage as I’m constantly shifting feet!) but a great first taste of another performance type.
- Acted in Theatre Group’s Unseen, a unique process in which the cast met one another on a Saturday, knowing that we had a week to produce a piece of devised theatre which could be performed four times the following Saturday for charity. Themed around the premise of a secretive cult, our own quickly came together as a team of misfit characters we’d adopted (I became a depressive in a dead-end job, so slightly more serious than You Can't Take It With You, see my previous post!), and the end result was something we were all delighted with – although, at the end of a long week, most of us fell asleep at the after-show party!
The Unseen ‘family’!
March:
- Got stuck into SUSU elections – I’ll leave them for another post, I
reckon, or you’ll never reach the end of this one!
- Saw yet more excellent Performing Arts productions such as Showstoppers’ The Wedding Singer and Theatre Group’s Lear in the Nuffield Theatre. Even if you don’t take part, it’s well worth going along to see student performances, as their quality does their respective shows more than justice, and they’re fairly cheap nights of entertainment for students too.
- Acted in another SUSUtv project, the soap opera Gordon Avenue – hopefully also coming soon!
- Watched the mighty Southampton FC at St Mary’s Stadium at home to both Ipswich (1-1) and then Barnsley (2-0 win) within a few days. Check out the student deals SUSU offers; they’re superb value for money.
- Managed to be all packed up before the parents arrived to collect me for Easter holidays. Well, it’s the only time of the year I managed it!
- Saw yet more excellent Performing Arts productions such as Showstoppers’ The Wedding Singer and Theatre Group’s Lear in the Nuffield Theatre. Even if you don’t take part, it’s well worth going along to see student performances, as their quality does their respective shows more than justice, and they’re fairly cheap nights of entertainment for students too.
- Acted in another SUSUtv project, the soap opera Gordon Avenue – hopefully also coming soon!
- Watched the mighty Southampton FC at St Mary’s Stadium at home to both Ipswich (1-1) and then Barnsley (2-0 win) within a few days. Check out the student deals SUSU offers; they’re superb value for money.
- Managed to be all packed up before the parents arrived to collect me for Easter holidays. Well, it’s the only time of the year I managed it!
April:
- Ran for positions on the Theatre Group and SUSUtv committees at their respective Annual General Meetings; I was unsuccessful, but it was definitely worth a shot, and there’s always next year!
- Went to the Performing Arts Summer Ball, a chance to get dapper, eat posh food and have a great night in a swanky venue with the brilliant friends I’d made over the course of a year’s worth of acting.
- Performed in the annual Theatre Group Showcase, a series of ten to fifteen minute scenes which attempted to display diverse, challenging original student theatre. I was involved in ‘Come Gather’, a sketch in which I, a larger-than-life, run-down alcoholic named Graves, put on a travelling show alongside the rather more melancholy Mortenson and our neurotic stage manager Terry. It’d take a while to rattle off everything that happened in Showcase, but sufficed to say it seemed to go down well with the audience (and ‘Come Gather’ was mentioned in both student and local press!). It also featured one of the best personal moments I’ve ever had on stage, when, after my character made a groan-inducing pun, the sound effect of a rimshot (better known as a ‘*ba dum tisssh*’) played over the theatre’s speakers – if only that happened every time I made a joke!
The final show I was involved in this year, the Showcase. Starting the
advertising early this time round: Next November, come and see Charles Dickens’
Great Expectations!
May:
- A coursework rush, having
the pleasure of seeing a magnificent spectacle of a stage show called ‘Vindice’
(a modern rewrite of the Revenger’s Tragedy), exams galore, and then the
inevitable summer celebrations!
Phew!
And that’s not to mention birthday parties, many nights out, and lots
and lots of time spent with the books (naturally)! I’m ultimately quite
confident that I got as much out of first year as I possibly could have without
activities detracting from my progress on my course, a goal which I was very
happy to achieve.
So... that was my first year! Any final tips for Freshers?
Well, I guess I’d challenge any people coming in to get out there, and
enjoy being in the playground that is Southampton – I certainly did!
Robin
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