Obliquely related story.

𝕽𝖚𝖆𝖎𝖉𝖍𝖗𝖎𝖌𝖍

My wife was briefly an actor, and they were running The Cask. During one rehearsal, the guy playing Montresor was doing the brick laying, and he started going:

“One brick… ah, ah, aah!
Two bricks… ah, ah, aaah!”

I don’t know if you had to be there, but I almost died laughing. Now I can’t read or see a reference to The Cask without thinking about that.

Threeee bricks… ah, ah, aaaah!

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I have a newfound love for community theater.

I just saw The Little Mermaid musical at one last night.

For starters, Ursula was incredibly talented. If she was a slightly better dancer she’dve been on Broadway, but she sure as hell didn’t need Ariel’s voice. Not that Ariel wasn’t a talented singer. I guess the same could be said of the source material too though.

But then the costumes and props and even set designs were well done but obviously low-budget. Most of the sea life was on roller blades or heelys…they made no attempt to hide Flounder’s. Floatsam’s and Jetsam’s lit up.

Most the performers playing the daughters were in High School. Flounder’s was in middle school…which made his crush on Ariel all the cuter. And he was pretty talented, too.

But they didn’t take themselves to seriously. There was a seagull tapdance number led by Scuttle and I nearly pissed myself silent-laughing at the absurdity of it. Tritans crown fall off. There were two ensemble members in (off the shelf) sea turtle costumes that were totally phoning it in but they were absolutely my spirit animals. Like, I would love to be understudy to Second Sea Tortoise.

Just that these are all local real people who do this for fun, in addition to (most of them) having full-time jobs or being full-time students. That, to me, is pretty damn impressive.

CarrotsHaveEars

Do you mean your wife was briefly an actress?

_NoName_

actor is being treated as a gender-neutral term describing both genders more recently.

𝕽𝖚𝖆𝖎𝖉𝖍𝖗𝖎𝖌𝖍

Depends on who you ask. Many people in acting prefer “actor” to be non-gendered.

If you’re anti-PC, then you probably prefer the gendered terms. In my wife’s case, she was a female actor, and I respect that. So, “actor.”

𝕽𝖚𝖆𝖎𝖉𝖍𝖗𝖎𝖌𝖍

Community theater is the best, although K-12 can be pretty fantastic, too.

CarrotsHaveEars

Thanks. I don’t know about that. I grew up learning traditional British English, and I live in a non-English speaking country.

𝕽𝖚𝖆𝖎𝖉𝖍𝖗𝖎𝖌𝖍

No worries. I use “actresses” all the time, and “stewardess”, too, although I think nowadays you’re supposed to say “flight attendants”. The hard part is that some women actors want to be called “actors”, and some “actresses.” You never know.

In my story, it was “actor” because that’s what my wife wanted to use. It’s not a hard rule - it’s a difficult one, but not set in stone. It depends on the individual’s preference.