Multitudes - Master of Fine Arts Capstone - REEL

A 15-minute reel of the capstone I completed as part of my MFA degree earlier this year. Though this performance was originally meant to be performed live, the circumstances surrounding the pandemic presented me with an opportunity to storyboard, shoot, and edit a filmed version of my story. I hope you enjoy! Please send me a message if you'd like to view the full 30-minute movie.
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Do you know who Hedy Lamarr is? A Hollywood actress in its golden age, Hedy's contributions to the world of technology greatly outshine her movie biography. Hedy is credited for developing and successfully applying "frequency-hopping," a mechanism by which radio waves hop between frequencies to evade signal-jamming. Her invention was ultimately not used as she had originally intended (to assist in the US Navy's war efforts), but its legacy would find its way into modern bluetooth systems and satellites... all this without her knowledge. Hedy Lamarr, at her prime, was regarded and advertised by MGM Studios as "the most beautiful girl in the world," a legacy which would confine her every move: right down to the roles she played in film. Hedy was forced to navigate a world that saw her as one-sided, but she was made of multitudes. She would not be contained.
This piece aims to explore Hedy's story next to a different sort of containment: that of the contemporary musical theater actress. In a #MeToo world, how is it that the majority of roles reserved to young women are ingenues: helplessly in love, helplessly dreaming of love, stripped of their agency? Ingenues are predominant in Broadway's own Golden Age (1943~1966), a genre frequently revived to this day. How does a contemporary actress navigate playing these kinds of roles, when she is so much more? How does she find that purpose?
This project is originally intended to be performed live.
Short movie directed and edited by Josephine Kraemer.
FAIR USE: This film may contain copyrighted material, the use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright holders. Through context, critical questioning, and educational framing, "Multitudes" therefore, creates a transformative use of copyrighted media. The material is presented for entirely non-profit educational purposes.