Katie Nowak | Actor & Stage Manager
Polaroid Stories
Persephone/Semele
by Naomi Iizuka | dir. Lavina Jadhwani | Fall 2021
Content Warning: contains strong language, drug use, and violence
Reflection
Polaroid Stories was a very formative experience for the rest of my time here at Loyola. I got the chance to work with guest artists that work in the Chicago theatre industry, along with people who will be a part of my journey in the performing arts program for the next three years.
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The goals I had for this project were to A) safely get into the headspace of a character with substance abuse issues, B) make my physicalization as an actor more intentional, and C) understand the flow and intention of my text. Setting these four goals at the beginning of the rehearsal process really helped me decide what I wanted to get out of this show from a developmental standpoint.
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I accomplished goal A by researching the lifestyles and reasons behind why substance abusers make the choice to prioritize their addictive substance over anything else, and I also delved into some character work to figure out why Persephone specifically made the decision to destroy her life and family because of how intensely addicted to cocaine she was. In short, she thought that cocaine would make her feel stable and secure, and in her need to get more of it she destroyed any real stability that was present in her life: her partner and her child. I had to relate this back to my own life to tap into that anger stemming from regret, and once I put it into a safe memory space, it was much easier and safer to think about these issues.
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Goal B was something that I figured out more during tech and performances rather than in rehearsal. In rehearsal, we just ran scenes maybe once or twice to get the blocking written down so I didn’t have a lot of time to experiment with how I wanted to move. When we went into tech and performances, however, I got to do all of my scenes consecutively without stopping. I got to see Persephone’s full story for the first time, and that changed the physical choices I made. I found time to sit in the wings and get into character by connecting to my own memories, as well as physicalizing the character so I didn’t have to think about how my body was moving once I got onstage. Overall, I found a very nice space to physicalize this character.
Goal C took more practice than I had anticipated. The text of Polaroid Stories is very confusing to begin with, as a lot of the lines that the characters say do not live in a world of realism. I had to test out at least three different line deliveries for each of my lines and monologues, and the meaning changed with each one. I had to think about what the subtext of my lines was rather than the actual words themselves, similar to a Shakespearean approach. After tinkering around a bit, though, I found a nice space for my text to live in subtextually. I always felt like I knew what the intention behind my text was.
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This production helped me connect to the Loyola mission in that it forced me to see life from the perspective of a less fortunate person than myself. Persephone is theoretically homeless, a drug addict, and a biological mother to a child she had to give up because of her substance abuse issues. It makes me take stock of how houseless people’s experiences may have been out of their control, and how a little bit of respect and kindness can go a long way for someone’s journey to bettering their circumstances. It felt like a very humanitarian way to think about how this production impacted me.
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Working on Polaroid Stories developed me in a professional sense by giving me networking opportunities with working professionals, intellectually by giving me a new character headspace to draw from, personally in the way that I now understand the reason behind why some people have substance abuse issues, and civically in the way that the community of Loyola now knows of my existence as a performer in this department. In all, Polaroid Stories was a very formative experience for me as an actor.