Quinn Anderson ’29
Hometown
Saint Paul, Minnesota
Academic Interest
Theatre & Archaeology
When I picture heaven, I picture a stage. Blinding my eyes, the golden lights warm my skin and slowly calm my beating heart. The pause before an action or a line of text is endless, and it feels like I have supersonic hearing. I take a breath, soaking in the quiet rustle of the audience, the air of anticipation coming from another actor in the wings, and even the gentle aching of my feet as my heels press into the wooden stage. Here, I am free. I take another breath with intention because if I don’t, I might forget to keep breathing. All my anxieties, expectations, and judgments become obsolete, and suddenly, I am filled with an intense sense of belonging.
I’ve been acting for as long as I can remember, from library programs to school clubs, but I only realized how much I cared about theater in the seventh grade. I was in an after-school theater program at my middle school, where I played a witty old lady. The moment I popped my head out of the curtains to say my first line, the auditorium packed full of my peers burst into giggles. I had a moment of euphoria where it felt like time had slowed down, and it was just me and the laughter. I realized that I did that; I made an entire room of people laugh. That’s when I knew that theater was all I ever wanted to do.
In my junior year, my teacher, Alex Hathaway, taught me how to share my heaven with the audience. He showed me how to open my heart when I act, give all of myself in a performance, and believe entirely in the circumstances of the play. When you are committed to a scene with your whole being, your acting ability is irrelevant. You could be watching the best actor in the world on stage and be bored out of your mind, but watching an actor who believes wholly in the circumstances of the piece is one of the most entertaining things imaginable.
I’ve grown from a starstruck twelve-year-old kid to an inspired senior through my experiences in theater. I’ve learned to collaborate artistically and academically with strangers, commit fully to something important to me, and be socially sensitive with my peers. I’m excited to discover new ways of doing theater and committing entirely to the projects I put my mind to. I plan to apply what I’ve learned from theater in the future because I want to create heaven on earth for myself and my community wherever my path takes me.