CONTENT WARNING: This piece contains physical violence, torture, emotional or verbal violence, mentions of suicide or self-harm, sexism and misogyny, and classism or socio-economic prejudice.
A Tuned Masterpiece
Screenplay
Description
A Tuned Masterpiece is about a middle class worker named Braun. In a fluke incident, he must go to a show in town. Here he observes acts that progressively get worse as the show goes on. The screenplay dives deeper into the issues lying around social media. It shows major concerns revolving around content material, binging, the inner workings of social media, and what it means to turn humanity into a spectacle for others. (Duration: 53 pages.)
Biography
Lauren Rake is a senior from Muskegon, MI. She is in Film Studies at MSU, and has made the Dean’s List in Spring 2023, and continues to love learning more in the program. Lauren is also a proud Alpha Omicron Pi alum, as well as a Disney College Program alum too. She is excited to graduate in the spring, and to keep writing no matter what. She would also like to thank God, who kept her grounded and is guiding her consistently, and her family and friends who encouraged her to keep working hard in everything that she does.
Reflection
Something that I learned is that the reckoning that COVID had on us feels like forever ago, but is still so prevalent. Through my process, I was constantly reminded of feelings that I had during this time like isolation, a desperate need for normalcy, and reliance on social media to stay “social”. I remembered how angry I felt after realizing that after the pandemic, I still struggled with my dependence on technology. Through these emotions, I was able to write something that made me feel like I was able to point out side effects of the pandemic to other’s. I believe that in the next few years, we will witness art that resembles the hardship, emotions, and grief that we’ve experienced in the last three years. I also believe that the art received will have so many perspectives on different things that have happened too. Art that resembles the pandemic can be conflicting, but its important because it gives us the perspective of everyone during such a weird time in history. That is also why I believe CAL students would benefit greatly
from this type of financial support. Financially supporting art and artists encourages artists at MSU to channel their integrity into something meaningful. It gives their audience great insight into their emotions and perspectives, and it would continue the dialogue of what we need to do as a society to move on and be in touch with the world again. Being able to provide myself materials like textbooks and books on screenwriting through the grant helped inspire me in my writing as well as give me a sense of direction with my script. I do think that these are all important topics that are being shared as well. I think that maintaining personal themes like the ones listed will help CAL students in the future come up with ways they want to express themselves. Hopefully, it also inspires others outside CAL to make art to share their stories with these hard hitting topics.