All Sunshine, All Shadow Snippets
Week 1 Prompts
Prompt 1:
The Barbarian | Write about an incident that would anger your character. Why would this make them angry? How do they deal with that anger?
Louisa: Ms. Wilson clearly has no idea how plays should be run, and she's been making very pointed (even petty) comments about the girls learning their lines, especially Lousia (since she has the most lines. It's becoming difficult to rehearse when every time one of them calls "Line!," Ms. Wilson returns with a "Really?!" and breaks the entire flow of the scene, causing even more forgetfulness. Because Lousia is the president of the Thespian Society (and the bravest), the girls ask her to speak with Ms. Wilson after rehearsal. Ms. Wilson isn't able to take criticism, especially coming from a teenager, and the conversation turns into a full-blown argument. Lousia starts crying out of frustration and anger, knowing she has lost the fight to a nonsensical person. She rushes out of the auditorium, straight to her boyfriend's house to try and pull herself together. Having an adult talk to her like this has never happened, and it really shifts her worldview and shakes her confidence. She isn't able to approach her senior year in the same way, nor she is able to tackle her college auditions as she thought she could.
Abigail: Abigail is upset that once again Louisa has the lead role. This time it feels more personal. Abigail has always connected with Little Women—she's an aspiring writer just like Jo trying to go against the grain. She really thought she was above high school trivialities, but when she sees the cast list posted that fateful morning, all she can see is red. She didn't even get cast as one of the sisters—she has to play Marmee, the mom! The casting was clearly based on height alone since she is taller than the other girls. But what about all the hard work she's put in? What about her talent? Her unique ability to relate Jo? Becasue she's not processing her emotions, she begins to act toward Louisa, making snide comments and taking Ms. Wilson's side when a clear schism has formed between them. Abigail doesn't even realize she's angry. Her feelings are masked by her desire to not be like everyone else, and she struggles to take accountability for her behavior. Plus Louisa's response to her lashing out is not befitting of an angel either.
Anna: Anna's new fixation on her boyfriend has turned her life inside out. She used to be "Miss Goody Two Shoes," but her relationship has her lying to her mom, her sister, and even her friends. She can't see that Johnny is clearly jealous of her time spent in extracurriculars, especially how time-consuming the school play is. He's especially not happy that her character, Meg, gets married in the play. But when he sabotages her dress on the night of the final dress rehearsal, she finally takes off her rose-colored glasses. However, she's not just angry at Johnny, she's angry at the entire system of high school—the cliques, the college applications, the stress—it feels like her whole life is falling apart.
May: May has been best friends with Lizzie since they were little. But when Lizzie finally reveals that she'll be moving away before the school year finishes—and she had known well before their senior year started, she's livid. So livid she doesn't even process when Lizzie tells her about her feelings for May. Instead, May starts to mirror Abigail, making snide remarks toward Louisa and Lizzie—it's an easy way to vent the unprocessed frustration and heartbreak. She also starts to aspire to be like Ms. Wilson, especially after the woman confides in May that most people, especially very cool people, drop all their high school friends to upgrade to new ones in college.
Lizzie: Lizzie's dad is making them move during spring break, right after the spring play finishes. Sure, he had a once-in-a-lifetime job opportunity that probably shouldn't be passed up, especially when it concerns Lizzie's college funding. But it is unorthodox to move in the middle of the school year, especially during May's last year (Lizzie is one year behind the rest of the crew). She'll have to finish her last year of high school as a new kid in Ohio of all places, and she'll miss all the plans she made with May to celebrate graduation. For Lizzie, her parents' decision is unconscionable, turning her into a absolute nightmare at home and a shell of her former self at school.
WC: 730/300
Prompt 2:
The Bard | Write about a performance that occurs in your setting. Are performances common to see? Are the performers local to the area, or have they travelled to perform here?
Quartz High School does have an afterschool theatre program for its students. However, lack of funding and enthusiasm has been a problem for almost a decade now. Because there is usually a small but vocal group of active theatre kids, the school is able to pay one teacher or substitute to stay after school to direct play rehearsals twice a year. Mrs. Thomas was an English/Theatre teacher who took great joy in directing the plays up until this year. Her heart issues have caused her to dial back her involvement in extracurriculars, and she wanted to wind down for her impending retirement anyway. She was universally beloved by the Thespian Society. Ms. Wilson, an aspiring English teacher of sorts, works as a substitute at the school. And she was the only person to volunteer to take Mrs. Thomas's place. Ms. Wilson lacks Mrs. Thomas's understanding of how to make do with a slim budget or wrangle several boisterous children who would like nothing more than to be treated like young theatre professionals.
Usually, the plays are attended by the cast's parents and close friends, and other students who have been told they will receive extra credit for attending. The history of plays performed have been a slew of classic high school plays like Our Town or The Crucible, and when Mrs. Thomas was feeling especially creative: a controversial Christopher Durang play about a nun or her own version of Oliver Twist (cast entirely by women). Musicals are only done in years where the overlap between the Thespian Society and the afterschool choir is high. More years than not, the women interested in performing far outnumber the men.
The auditorium is strangely large for a school that barely funds its arts programs. There are 600 seats—the Thespian Society is happy when it can fill at least 100 of these during each night of its three-night weekend run. Behind the curtain, the wings are very small and there is no fly system. Whoever built the auditorium also neglected to add any backstage areas. The back auditorium connects directly to the school's boiler room. Here old costumes and set pieces are haphazardly stored, much to the fire marshal's chagrin. The boiler is large and old-school—it fills the air with an eerie sound, a sound that is almost undetectable, but when you walk out of the boiler room its absence is immediately noticeable. If one spends too much time in the room, waiting for their entrance in Act II say, the sound may start to sound like whispers in the air.
WC: 427/200
Last edited by Della Barfield on 8 Oct 2024, 16:34, edited 1 time in total.
sta 8 - eva 16 - str 5 - wis 11 - arc 5 - accuracy 13 |||| Parselmouth - Evasive Maneuvers - Beast Master
also Ruckus Weems | Quentin Gagné
All Sunshine, All Shadow Snippets
Week 2 Prompts
Prompt 3:
The Cleric | Write about an institution in your setting. Is it well-liked and appreciated, or disliked by the general population?
Quartz High School opened its doors in 1957, and it has always been a modest high school. It is just outside the large city of Quartz, which has many high schools of its own. Quartz High School predates these schools, thus it confusingly is the city's namesake school. Compared to the high schools in the city proper, Quartz High School is considered the "safer" option. It has lower rates of crime and disciplinary action. Many parents afraid of the rough and tumble nature of the "inner city" Quartz schools opt to send their kids to Quartz High School, which is only a ten-minute ride from the city limit. This makes the population of the high school diverse in economic class, but lacking diversity in terms of race or political affiliation. Kids busing in from the city might be relatively poorer (the rich kids in the city opt for private schools), while the kids living in the school's domain are descendants of wealthy farming families and own a lot of land. In addition to having its own middle school and elementary schools, Quartz High School has a few other feeder schools. These are small religious schools that are only to sustain a K–8 education, so their student are thrown to the wolves starting in ninth grade.
While parents seem satisfied with the school, especially parents who are happy alumni or those who have low expectations for quality of education, the students are another story. Like any school, the popular kids tend to enjoy school. Even as Quartz High School continues to fail in most sports leagues, these students have a lot of school spirit; it's an essential part of their high school experience. Students who are craving a more intellectual challenge or looking to pad their college resumes with AP classes and extracurriculars might find the options paltry. (Quartz High School only offers four AP classes, and the chess team is the only team winning anything.) Others still might find the homogeneity of the student body and teaching staff a far cry from the schools they see portrayed on the Disney channel. There is clear favoritism from the staff toward students who conform, and only a few teachers rally every year to put more arts funding into the budget. (Coincidentally, these teachers seem to be the hardest working, and their classes stand out in either rigor or creativity from the other cookie-cutter offerings.)
WC: 402/300
Prompt 4:
The Druid | Write about an animal/from the perspective of an animal that passes through your setting. Is it local to this area?
This had happened to Pip a few times in his life. He wasn't watching where he was flying, and wham—suddenly he couldn't see the sun anymore. Finding a way out was always taxing, and this time was no different. Well, it was probably worse even. He remembered he once got stuck in a small place but it had plenty of food droppings from the humans. When they weren't looking, he could steal a bite and go back to thinking about escape. Thinking was hard for Pip. What he didn't know was that he was a sparrow, and his brain was very small when you matched it up with the rest of the animal kingdom.
The space he was currently in was large and had no food droppings. The humans appeared intermittently, but when they opened the doors, there was no sign of sunlight. Pip was worried that flying through that door would mean he would tunnel deeper into the structure instead of finding his way out. Pip also didn't want the humans to see him; in fact, he thought they were also bad a thinking and only seemed to make loud noises and wave their wingless limbs at him.
He was growing hungrier by the day. Today would have to be the day escaped, or it would be too late. As usual, a group of humans showed up. Pip was high above them, perched on some metal tree-like structure. As usual, the humans stood around and made noises at each other, ranging in pitch. Pip supposed they had their own birdsong. It wasn't as pretty as his, but it was something. As usual, after the song and dance was over, the humans began to leave the space, tunneling deeper into their complex structure. When only two were left, Pip realized this was his chance—he would have to follow one. These two were now engaging in a strange birdsong; it sounded erratic, especially from the smaller one. It reminded Pip of that one time he had been chased by a cat—he had made noises that had a similar feeling. Suddenly the smaller one made a beeline toward a different door, one Pip had never noticed before. As soon as she opened it, sunlight created a clean rectangle on the floor, highlighting the human.
Pip moved as quickly as his hungry wings would let him—and he was outside! With a slam, the human closed the door to the structure and she also moved with haste. Pip wondered if humans ever hunted each other.
WC: 421/200
sta 8 - eva 16 - str 5 - wis 11 - arc 5 - accuracy 13 |||| Parselmouth - Evasive Maneuvers - Beast Master
also Ruckus Weems | Quentin Gagné
All Sunshine, All Shadow Snippets
Week 3 Prompts
Prompt 5:
The Fighter | Write about something/someone that needs defending. Does your character defend it/them? Why or why not?
Louisa: Louisa has a lot of pride in herself, her accomplishments, and her talents. Like most teenagers, she thinks very highly of herself. So she has a complicated relationship with criticism, and she has received very little criticism from adults. This is usually because she only does things she's good at, and she's very good at hiding her imperfections from others, including herself. Failure is not an option. So when Ms. Wilson threatens this facade by calling her talents and work ethic and time management into question, Louisa moves straight to a defensive position. She contemplates boycotting the play completely, and when her friends don't seem to be gun-ho with this plan, she has a hard time recognizing their perspective.
Abigail: For as long as she could remember, Abigail dreamed of being an author. This dream is the foundation of her life—it makes her unique from her peers. No one else around her spends their lunch period scribbling in a notebook. It gives her an air of mystery: What could she possibly be writing in there? The issue is sharing this writing with others. In order to defend her dream, she can't let others read her work yet. What if it's bad? What if people don't like it? If these anxious came true, her self-identity would shatter.
Anna: Anna has a new boyfriend, and her friends don't seem to like him. It's not fair because no one seems to have a problem with Louisa's boyfriend. She's always done everything right, and now she's trying desperately to break that mold her senior year. But her friends aren't even supporting her! To defend her rebellion, she has to defend her boyfriend, even when he makes it very difficult.
May: May has been friends with Lizzie the longest out of the whole group, so she should defend her friend's behavior and defend their friendship. But she doesn't. When Lizzie starts to act strange, even being cold and distant when so much drama is happening in drama club, May pushes down the uncomfortable feelings and begins to focus on Abigail and Ms. Wilson, people more at the center of the drama and attention.
Lizzie: Lizzie believes that she will never defend her feelings—she probably likes girls and doesn't like boys, and feels more than friendship and love for May. But if she never voices these feelings, they won't be real. She can just keep pushing them down and down.
WC: 405/300
sta 8 - eva 16 - str 5 - wis 11 - arc 5 - accuracy 13 |||| Parselmouth - Evasive Maneuvers - Beast Master
also Ruckus Weems | Quentin Gagné