Who are you? What year are you? What are your interests?
My name is Amelia Eichmeier. I am a senior this year! I love theater (especially Shakespeare), music, playing guitar, my cats, and writing poetry.
What exactly do you do for Alice in Wonderland?
I am the iconic White Queen, a hot mess of a chess piece who guides Alice with her loving advice.
What brought you to join the cast for Alice in Wonderland?
This is my tenth mainstage show out of twelve — I have to finish out the streak! Also, Homestead Theater is one of my favorite places and my most ridiculous memories have been made here.
Do you have any stories from rehearsals, practices or crew sessions?
As you may know, we have a very aerial-infused show. My silk moment in the show is getting tangled in one, which was so very fun to choreograph. Doing things incorrectly is quite the freeing experience. Another GREAT moment is when Figg closed a curtain for the coronation scene and took Matthew (Tweedle-dee!) out with it. It was pure comedy gold.
Alice in Wonderland is about a fantastical land with many famous characters and Alice who ventures throughout. How have you connected to the story?
This story is interesting because Alice starts feeling trapped by her everyday world, but finds her escape through her own imagination in a world that isn’t her own. As a creative person, I find my escape from the everyday world is through theater and music– it is my personal Wonderland.
Also, the White Queen is somehow both someone who is a mess and someone who knows most of what’s going on, which is coincidentally a great description of me as a person.
You are using a script that was created at Homestead in 2015, how have you changed it? What have you added or taken away?
I didn’t change a lot of the lines that I had, but I definitely had a process of figuring out what the intentions were behind the lines written for my character. It was a fun puzzle to figure that out and it was fun to adapt old lines to new blocking. For those lines we did change, we cut a few lines to give Alice more strength and less tears and to move the story along. I’ve added one bit that carries some of the White Queen’s more unique traits to Act Two.
What’s one thing that is different in this play or rehearsal process than anything else we’ve done in the Homestead Theatre Department?
There are so many individual characters and one-on-one scenes in this show– in one corner, you’ve got the mad-tea-party, and in the other, you’ve got the Caterpillar. It often feels like we’re creating little pieces of art that we string together, which makes this really cool and cohesive piece. It’s so fun to come in and see the work that others have been doing on the days that I wasn’t called!
Anything else you want to talk about?
Yesterday I found out that in the books, the White Queen transforms into a sheep and I was SHOCKED. I am devastated that I cannot be a sheep onstage. But I know that the show must go on.
Come see “Alice in Wonderland” Oct 21 and 22 at 7pm and Oct 23 at 1pm
Act Out 