So, in the part 1 write-up, I referenced this speech class I took in the summer in high school. This is probably the closest in my experiences to doing something like a Project Runway or Top Chef-style reality show–where you are expected to pump out creation after creation on long hours with very little time to recoup or really think through the thing you’re making. You’re basically just getting a crash course, then expected to pop out some genius.
Unsurprisingly, I don’t remember many of the presentations I put together for this class. Except for one. It starts out much like any episode of Project Runway or Top Chef–Heidi or Padma come out to the contestants, say a witty, scripted preamble, then go into the “Challenge” for the day: prepare a dramatic reading, complete with at least one physical prop. Must be at least three minutes in length. You have one day for this challenge. (I do not remember the teacher at all but am willing to bet she was not Heidi Klum or Padma Lakshmi levels of hot–few of us are.) So after sitting through the presentations from whatever nonsense was assigned yesterday, we are released and allowed to go work on what is due tomorrow.
I hear many people joke about snagging a skull from the science department to do Hamlet, in that sort of desperate way where they’re trying to gauge how this would land, because no other ideas are coming and they’re dying inside. The idea of trying to learn and be able to recite Shakespeare with one evening’s worth of prep did not sound appealing. So like many successful competition-based reality show contestants, I thought about what I knew and how I could fit this challenge to it. Like most moody teens from the early 2000s, I did not know Shakespeare. I did not have Robert Frost or Henry David Thoreau committed to the dome. What did I have embedded in my brain? Song lyrics. The metaphorical lightbulb of genius clicked. I knew what I had to do. And what I had to do was walk over to the nearest Walgreens and buy a puzzle.
The next day, presentations began, and we saw a fair amount of fumbling through Hamlet and other Romantic poets. Someone recreated the space landing audio with a toy spaceship. It was a lot of uninspired mediocre dishes. It was a ton of napkin-style mini-dresses in the unconventional materials challenge. I started to panic–either I messed this up royal, or I’ve done this better than anyone ever has, and I won’t know until I volunteer to get up there and present.
I finally get the nerve, go up there, quiet with my unopened puzzle, knowing I only had one shot at this. This was pre 8 Mile coming out, so I couldn’t even mom’s spaghetti to hype myself up. I just had to commit. What was I committing to? Well, ripping apart the box of a puzzle, throwing pieces around the room for a full minute before reciting the lyrics to Dashboard Confessional’s song “This Ruined Puzzle”. I also apparently committed to giving myself a few gnarly cardboard cuts on the stupid box, but…it landed. I got a 100 on the assignment and Padma would’ve definitely named me the winner of the challenge. Heidi gave me immunity for next week’s show, so I’m definitely not getting eliminated. Love that for me. Shout out to Claire from the last writeup, whose feedback included the joke “But not all of the pieces were face down :( ” which is still objectively hilarious, good job Claire.
What does this have to do with part 2 of our 2024 Musical Wrap-up conversation? You have to embrace who you are and let it drive you. If you are an emo teenage dirtbag, Shakespeare doesn’t got you, Chris Carrabba does. Also, a healthy dash of chaos and Committing to the Bit ™ always helps. And that’s the TLAT way. Enjoy the episode.