Waiting in the Wings

Introverts like me need a turn, too.

It’s been a sobering number of years since I sat in my eighth-grade English class, suffering through my classmates’ oral desecration of Cyrano de Bergerac. Despite the passage of time, I can readily conjure up the mixture of frustration, yearning, and indignation that brewed in me as they slogged their way through the play.

While most of the girls got a turn to monotonously drone the lines of the female lead, Roxanne, the teacher never picked me to read that role. To the casual observer, I was the shy, quiet girl who merely listened to the play. But internally, I was a theatrical director who shared my teacher’s anguish as she pleaded with the girls to read with some emotion.

“Put some feeling into it!” she yelled, hitting her hand on the desk.

I wanted to stand up and shout, “Amen!”

It was this way throughout most of high school. When we read King Lear, one of my classmates read the line “O, I am slain!” with all the passion of an automated appointment confirmation left on voicemail. I could’ve said the same line, listening to him.

It wasn’t the poor renditions of the plays that bothered me the most, though. What I most associate with these memories is having been perceived in a way that didn’t match how I felt inside. I believed I was being unfairly judged, typecast in my school career as a stereotypical shrinking violet who was never given the opportunity to bloom.

If I was lucky enough to get a part to read, it was usually a guard whose one moment of glory was to say, “Halt.” I know the saying about there being no small parts, but there’s only so much depth of character you can show with one word — a monosyllabic word, at that.

Perhaps my teachers thought they were doing me a favor, sparing me from embarrassment. They probably thought I might tremble and stumble over the words if I had to read more than a few. Indeed, when they called on me to answer a question during a class discussion, my heart started beating double-time. But I knew that, given the chance to read a character’s part — to become someone else — I could bring it to life with more feeling than nearly anyone.

At home, I was constantly reading plays aloud into a tape recorder with my friends and originating my own characters and plays. I created both male and female characters of all ages, and enjoyed altering my voice, accent, and personality for each one.

What frustrated me about school is that the outgoing kids always got the leads. The teachers probably thought they could better handle the spotlight, or that because they were more animated in class, their personalities would come through in their readings. I felt that we were pigeonholed into our respective roles of extroverted kids and introverted kids, and that we could never be seen in any other way.

In college, everything changed. I joined the drama organization, where possibilities outranked my shyness. It was there that I got my start in improvisational comedy. Although I had no official experience, I was given the chance to develop, and wasn’t discouraged from trying.

I have been performing improv ever since, in troupes as well as in improv-based shows like Tony ’n’ Tina’s Wedding. I still struggle a great deal with being reserved offstage, even though people who have seen me perform don’t believe that. Becoming a different person onstage and being able to create a variety of characters and scenarios in front of hundreds of people is more fun than I could ever have imagined. Though I always get nervous before shows, the overriding emotion is one of exhilaration and joy at being able to express myself in a way that fits.

Having experienced being both a yearning onlooker and a performer has helped me in my job as a preschool music teacher. I see the potential for children to be typecast like I was, even at their young ages. When a child declines my offers to give an idea or sing into the microphone on the karaoke machine, I offer again the next time. And the next time.

Sometimes it’s the child who barely says a word who will readily come and sing into the microphone, while the kids who are rarely at a loss for words cower at the prospect. In fact, many years ago, a boy at my school who almost never spoke all year stood center stage in his class’s talent show and confidently sang into a microphone, shocking the parents and teachers in attendance. When breakthroughs like this occur, I smile to myself and silently cheer, “You go!”

Moments like these remind me how careful we teachers must be. I try to remember from my own example that memories of being passed over can linger for years. I don’t want to be remembered as the teacher who never gave someone a chance, or the teacher who labeled children with my words or actions.

Children, too, learn to label each other at an early age. In my classes, children will often try to speak for a reserved classmate, assuming, “He doesn’t want a turn,” or “She doesn’t talk.” But I always offer every child a turn, knowing that the quiet child might just be waiting for the chance to free what’s inside and surprise us all.