Trial and Error

One of the nice things about being the only person on this tour is that the show is entirely mine. Meaning, as was pressed home to me by my director, that I can change the show however I need to ensure that the audience enjoys themselves and receives the information. You see, I am both stage manager and actor, so the stage manager half of my brain is always checking with the actor half of my brain to make sure that any changes are consistent with the goals of the presentation. This is a nice amount of leeway, and one I am not used to having.

For one of the shows today, I decided it might be prudent to make a few small changes to the show. I was performing at a very nice elementary school on Long Island, where I had a very, VERY strange age split: my first show was kindergarten, first and fourth grades, while my second was second, third and fifth grade. Both shows were Musical Health Show. Which was probably not an ideal choice for the second group, as I find my fifth graders generally stare at me angrily during this show, unless they have to be "cool" in front of the kindergartners. Which, of course, in this case, they didn't. My suggestions that the second show be changed to Lighten Up! fell on deaf ears, so I was headed into an audience that I knew was going to be hostile towards me.

So, I decided to make some changes.

Mostly it was small shifts. Instead of goofy, over-the-top Slim, I became more of a "Coach Slim," who still has fun, but is a little more grounded and mature. This gained me some brownie points, although I still had three fifth grade boys staring me down hardcore. I messed with some of the trivia facts I ask during the brain section (and learned that nobody besides me knows that FDR is on the dime), asked questions specifically of my older students and used slightly more technical language.

However, I did make one big addition. In homage to my director Michael, I decided to throw in a quick section about the diaphragm.

As a quick refresher, the diaphragm is a large, flat muscle down at the base of your lungs. When you inhale, your diaphragm contracts and draws breath into your lungs. When you take a low, deep breath, you'll notice that your tummy puffs out a little. That's your diaphragm pushing your internal organs out of the way as it contracts. So you can visualize, here's an image stolen from Wikipedia:



(For all this information, I have the CAP21 voice faculty to thank).

Anyway, right after the heart section, I have my audience take a nice deep breath. One thing I have noticed is that little kids seem to think a deep breath means raising your shoulders. And, true to form, my entire audience looked like neckless monsters after my suggestion.

So, I stopped the show.

"Who knows what the second-hardest working muscle in your body is called?" I asked. After a few suggestions (including biceps, lips and tongue), I revealed the diaphragm and pointed it out on my suit. I had the audience practice taking deep breaths using their diaphragm and shallow breaths with their shoulders. We mirrored the diaphragm with our hands (making a tent on the exhale, and flattening out on the inhale). Finally, once I was convinced that my audience had gotten the point (about two minutes later), I asked everyone to take a nice deep breath.

Every shoulder in the audience shot up.

Oh well. I tried.

Call tomorrow: 8:30am. I'm driving all the way to Syracuse and back in one day. It's gonna be a long one.

Kid quote of the day: As a response to my question about the second-hardest working muscle in the body (the first, by the way, is the heart), a second grader responded, "The brain."