Page to Stage Performances Produce Intimate Moments

When Ivaylo Getov discovered that a girl actually was interested in his awkward, tentative trombone-playing self, “reams of adolescent issues were resolved because of that instrument,” he told a rapt audience at Pierson Playhouse Sunday night. One of nine storytellers, Getov chose to tell his personal roman ‘ clef through the voice of his trombone. Coached by writer Amy Friedman and producer Jim Pentecost, the teenagers presented their stories as the culmination of a two-week seminar, “From Page to Stage,” produced by Palisadian Diane Grant Feltham. Noting the resurgence of spoken word performance around the country, Friedman, who teaches writing at UCLA Extension, frequently attends spoken word performances around town and helps local storytellers hone their stories for the ear. “Spoken word is so intimate and creates a conversation among people like no other thing,” Friedman says. She and Pentecost collaborated on the seminar, inviting high school kids to participate in their trial run. Employing the same techniques she uses in her nonfiction essay writing classes, Friedman instructed the students to come to the first evening class completely open and empty. “A really big component to this, the most important thing, is that if you have a story you want to tell, do not speak it. No one gets to hear it for at least a week.” Friedman suggested that if the student tells the story first, the incentive to write it diminishes. In the first class, Friedman started with memory exercises to help the students turn off their brains and go into their guts’internal journaling, she calls it. Before they went to bed, they were instructed to write something, and again first thing in the morning. “By the end of the second night, everyone had a rough draft going, and by the end of the third night, and my intense editing, everyone got to hear their drafts,” Friedman said. “They were allowed to ask questions, but the writer was not allowed to answer them, only to use the questions in revising their stories. They were not allowed to discuss their piece with anybody, not even with their parents.” Over the weekend, the students revised their drafts, and when the students came back the following week, they were ready to work with Pentecost on stagecraft. Pentacost, who has a distinguished career as a producer, director and stage manager, helped them clarify their stories, pace them in terms of style and keep the length between eight and 15 minutes. “The kids like telling their own stories,” said Pentecost, who previously had not coached high school students in this performance technique. “I think this kind of teaching helps people make their pieces better and gives them confidence to tell a story and create their own special voice.” The stories were varied, some touching on romantic awakenings, others on fears and still others on friendships. Friedman and Pentecost varied the length and mood of the evening and separated each story with a scripted interlude. Shannon Noel and Angela Kurian, actresses who have worked with Friedman, introduced each piece which provided a neutral pause separating the intensity of the stories. At the close of the evening the actors were exhilarated. One boy said that he felt as if they all had participated in an intimate conversation. They had.