HAN VAN SCIVER

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Happy Spring!

4/13/2014

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Happy Spring! Winter has finally left us in Philly.
It's been an exciting few months - I am currently staring graduation in the face and trying not to blink!

Updates:
1. Romeo and Juliet! We opened Wednesday, and we run through May 18th. The 9-show-a-week schedule is rough, but I am loving the show. It was a good process, and I'm super proud of what we've created. In our production, we feature four contemporary sonnets written by students and adults. As part of the promotion for the show, we recorded the top ten sonnets (there was an open call for submissions) to release to the public. So here's a mildly embarrassing video of me doing one (to the right). Check out the show! (Fb event).

2. Breed X! I was in New York for a few days this March, filming a project called Breed X. To learn about the project, check out their kickstarter and their facebook. Or, yaknow, check out a really terrifying photo from the shoot (to the right). I played "The Guide." The project is written and directed by the fabulous Audrey Hamm. Makeup by Alisa Ortiz. Yay film!

3. By Tuesday -- I also have begun shooting a Penn student film, called "By Tuesday," produced by Bent Button Productions. It is written and directed by Ann Molin. Will post the finished product when we finish! It's about a couple college-age room mates. I play a lady named Chloe. So far, I've gotten to eat a lot of popcorn on camera. Which has been fabulous.

4. Directors Gathering - I also recently photographed the first monthly "Directors Gathering" salon meeting. The DG is a fabulous service organization for Philadelphia theatremakers. Check out their website and facebook, and the album from the event!

5. Henry IV: Your Prince and Mine -- I have been cast as a lieutenant in the army for the annual Shakespeare in Clark Park summer show. They're doing Henry IV! Haven't started yet....but thrilled to be a part of it. Apparently they're using a HUGE civilian army. Cool beans.

6. Dischord - Dischord A Capella, a fabulous group on Penn's campus, recently had their spring concert. I took a bunch of promotional photos. Check out a few of my favorites to the right. Will be uploading more soon, under "recent captures" on my photography page. Also: their website! Their facebook!

7. Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo - The theatre group iNtuitons (I'm on the board! I directed for them this past fall!) just had their spring show. Check out some rehearsal room shots I took during the process. Fabulous group. Oh, and their website!

Whew.
Other things brewing/upcoming -- 
Stuff Happens is still in the process of casting. Can't wait to get started. Circle Mirror Transformation is likely happening in May! We had to change dates, due to an issue getting rights...but now it's full steam ahead. And.....Yalla, the bellydance troupe at UPenn, also has an upcoming show. I will be shooting some promo shots on Monday. Photos to come!

Thaz all folks. Happy, happy spring!
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BADA!

8/13/2013

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As of last night - I have returned from my UK adventure! I'm jet-lagged as all hell, but full and happy and grateful for the best training experience of my life. So. There's that.

I'll start at the beginning. I spent my summer living here: (see to the right.) Essentially, I lived in a castle. More specifically, I lived at Magdalen College (pronounced "Maudlin"). I had classes 9 hours a day with the freaking greatest professors I've ever met.

The run-down:
I studied Shakespeare with Zoe Waites. She is a magical nymph-goddess, who has acted many seasons with the RSC in Stratford. She played Juliet at age 22. Casual. We worked on all sorts of technical/texty stuff. Lots of work with regard to how to get inside the verse, how to respect it/not be constrained by it, how to be focused, open and professional in a rehearsal room, how to craft a character. We worked specifically on The Tempest and The Winter's Tale. I was cast as Hermione, and worked on scene 2.1. Got to march around with a 9-month pregnancy bump (i.e. a sack of salt in my gym shorts.) Loved. It. 

I studied Modern with the inimitable Paola Dionisotti - another RSC veteran, and all around phenomenal woman and actress. Learned so much from her. Favorite quotables: "So much of acting is coated with a custard of emotion..." "Distill reality by playing an objective." "Shall we have the Spice Girls?" We did lots of vocal work, and she pressed us to be simple and unselfish in our approach to scene studies. We focused on scenes from David Grieg's Miniskirts in Kabul and Michael Gordon's Grace. I was cast as Ruth in Grace - the perpetually unhappy (but admirably fierce) lawyer and semi-fiance to Tom, the priest-to-be son of Grace, the ascerbic college professor/professional atheist. There were lots of tears, and there was lots of fun. Fun fact - I played a pregnant wife/girlfriend in both classes. Opposite the same boy. #coincidence?

I studied movement with Jackie Snow. Fun fact - she was head of "movement" direction for Sophia Coppola's Marie Antoinette. As a bit of a klutz, I found this class EXTREMELY useful. Lots of work in getting centered and present in your body, in building an ensemble, in understanding and enlarging your own range of movement, and all that jazz. Not to mention - she got me into way better shape.

I studied voice with the lovely Adrew Wade and Robert Price. (Not pictures, alas.) Both were superb in their own right. I had little to no voice training up until this program....Feeling WAY better about all that now. Worked on resonance, enunciation, the relationship between body and voice, between emotion and voice, accents, Shakespearean text-work, and all that good stuff. Oh, and there was some tai chi thrown in there too.

Last (but not least), I had the opportunity to study audition technique with John Gorie. (also not pictured.) Worked through a contemporary monologue from Everything Will Be Different, a Lady Macbeth piece, and learned a new piece from William Congreve's Way of the World. Really grateful to have had the chance to hone in on a few specific monologues/the technical choices that lead to a good audition.

There were 88 students in the program on the whole - we were sorted into six different companies. My group (the O'Neill group) was comprised of 14 different students. I lucked out big-time. I couldn't have asked for a kinder, more well-rounded group of individuals with whom to study theatre. I learned something different from everyone. Hoping to cross paths with all of 'em again in the future!

In addition to the 9 hours of class a day, we had the benefit of a number of masterclasses/workshops. I was picked (randomly) to work with John Barton (!!!) in three masterclass sessions observed by the rest of the program. What a lucky break. Also got to participate (along with erryone else) in sessions led by Julian Glover, Brian Cox, Fiona Shaw, Henry Goodman, Deborah Warner and David Harewood. Just to name a few. Woah.

In my spare time, I wandered around Oxford, ate a lot of brunch, and saw some shows! I visited Stratford and paid homage at Shakespeare's  grave. Also saw the RSC's Titus Andronicus and All's Well That Ends Well. Wowzers. Loved both. The Titus makes the cut of top ten things I've ever seen ever. Also adventured to London to see The Drowned Man - a new piece by the same folks who do Sleep No More in NYC. This one was based on Woyzeck. Way cool. We wandered around a mansion in relative silence for three hours, wearing masks, choosing who to follow/what strains of the story in which to invest.

Other than that...I wrote some pomes (check out How to Write About Oxford and Pinocchio) and learned a whole lot of Shakespeare. Also geared up for directing Midsummer and In Many Ways in the coming months. And read some of J.D. Salinger short stories. Also did some prep work for the thesis I'll be writing this fall. And took some pics. Check under Photography/recent captures. Meep!

Can't overstate how grateful I am for the truly wonderful experience in Oxford. Left the program a more informed, confident, driven, passionate and (hopefully!) skilled actor. Looking forward to auditioning soon as I'm back in the illadelph. 

I return to Philly tomorrow! Wow. Wow.

In slightly other news -- my extremely talented older sister just released an EP! Check it out. Preview videos and Pre-order Page. I totally wrote the lyrics for one of the songs. She's fabulous, and the cd is ridiculous. Lyrical, lovely, pop-rock fusiony goodness. 

That's all for now!
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Woah. I'm in Londontown?

7/8/2013

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PicturePatrick Lamborn, Michael Jorizzo, Angela Carter, Amanda Schoonover
Oh my, it's been a minute. What a busy (and lovely) summer. Last I wrote, I had just started an internship at the Arden, and I was getting psyched for Is This the End? and Seek and Hide. LOTS has happened since then.

1. Seek and Hide was a blast. My day of glory playing a triking (a viking riding around a playhouse on a tricycle) was....well, glorious. It was great to have a project to work on/to meet some other really terrific artists. 
2. Is This the End?  went quite well! Thanks to the friends who came out for it. I made all sorts of changes to In Many Ways over the course of rehearsals. HUGE thanks to Sam, and to the terrific cast. I learned a lot - it will come in handy when it's remounted with iNtuitons for ATF this fall. Wahoo! Blurry pic from the reading to the left. (Also congrats to the other writers, and a big thanks to Primary Stages.)
3. All done at the Arden for the moment. Had a great summer there. /Got to check out A Little Night Music and Pinocchio before I left, too. As a non-romantic-opera-lover, I still found Night Music totally enjoyable. And as a non-six-year-old, I was completely enchanted by Pinocchio.
4. I got to be a reader (okay, just stage directions, but shhh) for a reading of a new work at InterAct this past month. The piece, called Two Front Teeth, was written by Katharine Clark Gray - one of the core playwrights there. Really neat, moving, complex piece of theatre - focused on the struggles of a lower-class couple, after the husband accidentally knocks out his wife's teeth in a plumbing accident.
5. I was in a student film project before the year ended, and a final cut was just posted online. Wahoo! I sort of co-wrote the script. (I.e. I wrote it, but then they sort of chopped it down by a factor of ten and rewrote it. Cuz apparently a 30 minute mind-trip-cross-cut-chick-flick "wasn't feasible?") Anyway, Missy Gouverne led the direction, and did a lot of the editing. Still a "student film" project, etc (i.e. not a lot of time/artistic freedom). But I think it turned out rather well! Featuring the super talented Jeremy Berman. Check it below.
6. ......I'm in London now! See pics below. Here for a stint, settling/checking out some awesome theatre. It's beautiful, to boot - so I've been taking some pics. I start at Oxford (BADA) on the 11th. Working a monologue, seeing as we have to re-audition when we get there. Getting lots of good ole' inspiration from all the wonderful stuff I've been seeing here. Oh, and BADA just announced three guest artists for the midsummer program. John Barton, Brian Cox and Fiona Shaw. Apparently there will be more. SO I'm feeling pretty damn lucky right now.
7. Oh! New poem.

Okay, thaz all for now. Cheerio, and stuff!

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Headshots, Graduation Shoot and ATF.

5/14/2013

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Ten days later, and finals are over, I am *somewhat* employed for the summer, Penn class of '13 has graduated, and I'm back home for a stint.

I had a blast doing two photoshoots over the past week. One was with the extremely talented and lovely Sarah Middough, and one was with fellow theatre artists Anya, Jay, Maddie and Tom. The latter group (as of Monday!) are now UPenn alumnae. Check out some of my favorite shots below. (Will upload more of them on the photography tab when I get around to it....)

Also, found out about a week ago that a play of mine will be included in the iNtuitons Alternative Theatre Festival (ATF) as part of the Philly Fringe! Whee! iNtuitons produces the festival at the start of each fall semester - it's comprised of 4-6 short, original and "experimental" plays. I will be directing my own piece, called In Many Ways. (I wrote it this semester for my play-writing class. etc etc etc.) Very stoked.

In other news, I've seen a lot of wonderful theatre these past few weeks. Had the opportunity to attend several readings of original work, reconnected with some old theatre friends, made some new ones. Feeling super inspired. On that note, here also is a charcoal & pastel I made of e.e. cummings. I was staring at a Klimt card when I was finishing it up, so. He's in there too. Sorta.

Happy summer, officially! (but not technically.)
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Midsummer, Photoshoots, And a New Pome.

5/2/2013

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The school year is winding down, the weather is getting warmer, and the summer is teeming with ALL of the projects. 

1.) Just found out I've been selected to direct A Midsummer Night's Dream for iNtuitons Experimental Theatre this upcoming fall! Couldn't be more excited. Check out the announcement on our fb page. And check out this nifty Pinterest page where designers are already brainstorming. I'm going to spend a lot of the summer preparing for September, when we will cast/begin rehearsing the show. It will likely go up in November.

2.) It seems like everyone wants a photoshoot this month. Which is great, cuz I love taking pikchas. Just did a shoot with the lovely Kendra Birdsall (pic below, also more in "Recent Captures" under photography). I have at least two more shoots booked in the coming week for some lovely actresses I work with at Penn. So stay tuned for more shots.

3.) New pome! Check it. Just the audio, plus the text posted below. Feedback always encouraged and appreciated.

4.) Thanks to my friend Zach, I've finally found a crash spot for Gretchen. My drum set. I'm going to start teaching him to play pretty soon. Hopefully this means I can start giving lessons to others as well! I'm all for spreading the percussion. or, whatever.

That's all for now!
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Post-Cloud 9, Photoshoots, 4 Play-Readings, The Wind Down

4/18/2013

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Woww. It's been a minute. I'll go right into updates.

1. Cloud 9 happened! Two weeks ago now, which is crazy. It was probably the most fun I've had performing in a while. The play, by Caryl Churchill, follows the lives (and sexual habits) of a family in Colonial Africa, and then re-imagines  them in London during the 1970s sexual revolution. It's a fantastic piece. Check out the full album here. And two of my favorite pics below.

2. I've been doing some shooting! More specifically, I just did a shoot with the fabulous Trevor Pierce. Check out some photos in "recent captures" on the "photographer" page, as well as below. Spring = better light = time for shooting!

3. This Friday, I will be reading the role of Shprintsa in Cary Mazer's brand new Peer Gynt adaptation, called Pinchas Vontz. It reimagines the story through a Jewish/Yiddish lens. The reading is directed by Ed Sobel, and features other Penn students, professors and professional actors. Details here!

4. The iNtuitons First Annual Experimental Play-Reading  is this Saturday! Details here. I'm producing the project, which features three original works by professional Philadelphia playwrights. (I am also acting in two of the pieces!) Very excited for this project - it's (kind of) my baby. Also, the poster is beautiful.  Also, Jackie Goldfinger will be leading a talk-back.

5. On MONDAY my playwriting class will be having a reading - of our new work, produced in the class this semester. 2:15 pm, Bruce Montgomery Theatre on Penn's campus. I will be acting in the reading, as well as listening to my play read by professionals for the first time! (Very excited.) Class was taught by the inimitable Jacqueline Goldfinger.

6. LAST but not least - Pennsylvania Players is having a reading! April 26. I will be playing Julie in Impenetrable, directed by Jeremy Berman. More details coming soon.

That's all for now! In other news, I'm already getting stoked for BADA, and looking for projects for May/June. Have a lovely Thursday!
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All of the Busy. (Spring Break)

3/5/2013

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Oh boy. All of the things are happening! I think I'll go ahead and just make a list.

1. Poems! (The Excelano Project Show is in a week in a half. "Split No Lightning.")
2. Lines lines lines! (Children's Hour opens in 2.5 weeks. Cloud 9 opens in 4.5. BADA audition in 1.5)
3. Summer Apps! (Finishing up my very last application for summer acting intensive programs.)
4. Thesis! (Working on a proposal for an honors English thesis for UPenn.)
5. Playwriting! (Something I'm totally new at. Submitted a short piece to a Penn contest, for funsies) 

In my spare time, I'm writing little short poems, and taking too many pictures. Check out the view from where I'm staying.

Other things: I just watched a documentary called "The Artist is Present," about a performance art piece at the MOMA by Marina Abromovic. Check it out. One of those changes-the-way-I-think-about-humanity type things. I also just watched Amanda Palmer's TED talk. (Fun fact: I was at the gig when she first "practiced" the talk. If you track down the video, I'm sitting in the front row in an awkward green tank top.) Anyway, it was super inspiring. It's about the music industry, but also how art functions as an honest/personal exchange between artist and audience.

In other news, here's a video I acted in for a friend last year. (See below.) It was one of those "final project" type videos for a Video I class. I.e. all of us working on it agreed it was totally abysmal. But....The music! Is spectacular! And written by my extremely talented older sister, who wants to score films professionally. Check out that film score. And check out her website.
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ART Moola! (And PMA Adventures.)

2/20/2013

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It's official! EP raised $1,100 for WE CAN at our Cape Cod gig a few weeks ago. Super proud of The Excelano Project. Making money while making art to raise money to help other people make a change? Kind of the best thing ever.

In other news - went to the Philadelphia Museum of Art Today. And spent 45 minutes sitting in the Cy Twombly Trojan War Room. Anyone who's into contemporary (or really any) art - check that shiz out. It's breathtakingly beautiful. (See below photograph of one Lauren Yates, in said room. And one VanJawn, looking like a 12-year-old outside the museum.)

In other news - rehearsals for Children's Hour and Cloud 9 are progressing swimmingly. So very excited.

In other news - I recently lined up an audition for the BADA Summer in Oxford program, and an interview with the Stella Adler Studio in NYC for their Summer Conservatory program. *fingers crossed* I can study theatre somewhere this summer.

In other news, there is no other news.
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photoshoot: Lauren Yates

1/17/2013

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This week, I had the pleasure of doing a casual shoot for one of my very best friends - the inimitable Lauren Yates. Lauren (who goes by Yates, more than Lauren) is an incredibly talented poet and performer, and a recent graduate of UPenn. We wrote together in The Excelano Project for three consecutive semesters (i.e. she patiently taught me how to write, perform and edit for three consecutive semesters). Check out her blog. And when her chapbook drops, buy that shiz.

Below are some of my favorite images from the shoot. (Location: the bio pond at the south end of Penn's campus.)
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