Director’s Notes (1)

This is the last bit of writing left, after a year of working on Hack, Punt, Tool (and losing a lot of sleep and sanity):  A directors note…

Something unique and amazing about MIT is that everyone (from undergrads to faculty) comes here driven to do something epic. Some come to launch rockets, build robots, get A’s on psets, or cure cancer while others may want to be dorm president, be in a musical :), or (like our characters) pull an awesome hack.  Whatever it is, everyone works really hard on whatever they are passionate about to get it to the highest level possible.

But sometimes this “hardk0re” mentality is our downfall. Somewhere along the way, we lose track of why we had fun doing the epic stuff in the first place. I’ve found myself in this state at times at MIT.  I’ve always managed to recover (or at least somewhat recover),  but now thanks to my fellow writers and the cast and crew of the show, I have a few songs I can hum to remind me to pick my head up a little faster.

For me, directing this show has felt like “Mens et manus” at it’s finest. This was my first time directing, so I often felt like I was drinking from the firehose as Krista (my co-directing partner in crime) stepped on the hose so that the water would not blow my face off.  One of the most satisfying days of the rehearsal process was my very first blocking rehearsal.  I blocked a Corot-Kepler scene I had agonized over in the writing process, and then watched the actors run the scene over and over again, adding their own expression and ideas.  So much “hardk0re” work felt like it turned into a sun rise.

-Rachel Bowens-Rubin ’11 (Co-Director)