Wordless Wednesday

Hats from Hello, Dolly!

Meet Reeny

Our fall 2010 intern is Reeny Hofrichter, master of accents, deviser of stories, and savior of the unavoidable busy work of a theatrical office (stored in the file we call “Intern Exploitation”.)

Reeny’s an actor (hence the accents, and trust me, she really can do pretty much any accent you throw at her), but likes just “being in the theater world.” Her ambition is on stage, but while she works towards that she says she “wants to do something artistic with my time. It’s so great to be in Chicago for theater, and there’s so much to do here. I want to learn all the different parts that make a theater work.”

We were all impressed with Reeny’s very comprehensive resume (listen up, job seekers, this woman knows how to write a resume that makes you sit up and read), full of intriguing insights like her ability to do accents, and a stint as a “story deviser,” which involves um,

What does it involve, again?

“It’s an aspect of ‘physical theater’,” says Reeny. “Theater involves language, emotion, and movement. Story devising is coming up with ways to move in a theatrical idiom—coming up with ensemble ideas and then getting the story across through movement.”

Still in the wings as an actor, Reeny regrettably does not know any famous people whom we could stalk, um, that is we mean, whose autograph she could get for us, but “My cousin’s ex-roommate dated Megan from Rock of Love just before she started dating Brett Michaels.” (If that means anything to you, you watch too much reality tv.)

She can also wiggle her ears.

She sings, she writes, what *can't* she do?

Turns out our "Yeomen" star Alicia Berneche is quite a poet as well. Alicia was a winner of the City of Evanston's recent poetry competition. Original poems by five Evanston residents were installed in concrete on the sidewalk ramp in front of the Evanston Public Library in downtown Evanston.

Alicia played leading lady Elsie in last June's The Yeomen of the Guard, Mabel in The Pirates of Penzance in 2009, as well as Marian in The Music Man and Phyllis in Iolanthe, both in 2008.

Here's Alicia's poem "The Poetic Foot"

Your feet scan these words
And feel the vibration of meaning
through their soles.
Poetry is motion
And the rhythm of bodies
That pound their stories
Into the earth.

You can see the inscription of her words at the Evanston Public Library at Church and Orrington in downtown Evanston