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For some reason, this play made me feel very angry. The supervisor/ team leader, Elaine is very passive and doesn’t take into account the employees that have clearly been through more with her than Jack has been. Elaine makes it seem as if Jen and Bethany are here to help make his job easier rather than addressing the concerns they have brought up in the past that would help them work more efficiently as a “team” as Elaine suggested. Jen is clearly more passionate about her concerns being addressed and is offended when she is just written off and is accused of trying to bring the rest of the team down with her “bad attitude.” I’ve been in that same position. I saw many errors in a previous workplace and when I would bring them up, I was dismissed and was told “you’re exaggerating, trying to create drama.” It’s insulting, demeaning, humiliating and incredibly frustrating when your superior, who you put your trust in, just writes you off and doesn’t address the concerns you’ve seen. Bethany I like to think is the sort of middle ground between Elaine and Jen, She does want her and Jen’s concerns to be addressed but she also doesn’t want to step on anybody’s toes, like Elaine or Jack’s. However, because she is the neutral ground, that ends up making Jen look like a bit of the bad guy in the end. Something that I’m sure would hurt Bethany and Jen’s friendship to a certain degree.
ReplyDeleteBethanee Campos
In the play “Now We’re Really Getting Somewhere” tension builds way more at the end than in the beginning. In the beginning of the play, Jen and Bethany have a problem with the way Jack is handling situations with customers as a sales representative. However, they have never really told Jack how they truly feel so this is where things begin to spice. Elaine, who is the team leader, tells them to play nice and treat Jack with respect because he is a person, but I don’t think Jen really feels like they are getting anywhere with that attitude. Honestly, I agreed fully with Jen because you cannot keep working in an environment where nothing ever seems to get done and there is no communication flowing through the staff. If I were in that situation, I would have tried to express myself more. However, I think the main problem was Elaine the entire time because she always wanted to avoid the situation at hand every time, but Jen was not playing around anymore. She finally told Jack how she felt, and she even expressed herself to Elaine, which I thought was awesome and a cool little plot twist in the end.
ReplyDelete-Alec De La Garza
I feel that “Now We’re Really Getting Somewhere” was the most relatable play I’ve read. This play perfectly displays the everyday struggles one might face at work with stubborn bosses or unmotivated coworkers. In a way this play made me annoyed due to some of the characters being so relatable. Elaine was a character I wasn’t too fond of. As a boss, you should strive for a successful workplace but instead she only strived for a work place full of peace. What got my attention was the dialogue between Jen and Jack because Jen finally snapped to address the issue. Which was Jack doing not so well in the workplace. I think all the interrupting the characters were doing in between each other was creating so much tension between them. I was hoping Jen would somehow fight Elaine but she kept her cool and stayed professional. Lastly, when everyone leaves the conference room, Jen stays for a while. She then begins to chat to herself to somehow please herself. While she’s chanting, you can somehow feel the desperation in her attempts to feel good about herself or to finally feel happy. Especially because this play makes it well known that just about nobody seems to be happy.
ReplyDeleteI feel that “Now We’re Really Getting Somewhere” was the most relatable play I’ve read. This play perfectly displays the everyday struggles one might face at work with stubborn bosses or unmotivated coworkers. In a way this play made me annoyed due to some of the characters being so relatable. Elaine was a character I wasn’t too fond of. As a boss, you should strive for a successful workplace but instead she only strived for a work place full of peace. What got my attention was the dialogue between Jen and Jack because Jen finally snapped to address the issue. Which was Jack doing not so well in the workplace. I think all the interrupting the characters were doing in between each other was creating so much tension between them. I was hoping Jen would somehow fight Elaine but she kept her cool and stayed professional. Lastly, when everyone leaves the conference room, Jen stays for a while. She then begins to chat to herself to somehow please herself. While she’s chanting, you can somehow feel the desperation in her attempts to feel good about herself or to finally feel happy. Especially because this play makes it well known that just about nobody seems to be happy.
ReplyDeleteClarissa Partida
The play , “Now We’re Really Getting Somewhere” actually gives a taste of some everyday issues some may have been facing or still have to deal with everyday while having to deal with inappropriate bosses. As a leader, I believe you should strive for a successful workplace due to the fact that by having your employees feel comfortable it definetly makes thed days better and "workable". Jack not performing his duty at his best, might have been one of the important points of the play since it is where Jen finally breaks it. Through this play there was plenty of tension caused by the entire working staff in one way or another. It is indeed important to address errors or concerns and have a good communication at your work place. However, i believe that one must be cautious when choosing the way of expressing such thoughts and feelings because we do not want to make soemone feel less or that they are the only ones wrong. We saw how Jen tries to cheer herself up, alone. This kinda shows how even though one appears to be alright on the outside, they might still be struggling within themselves, and that is where trying to not make anyone feel less comes in. It was a good play since it was a very realistic scenario and the issues touched.
ReplyDeleteVictoria Rodriguez
What I liked about the 10 minute play “Now We’re Really Getting Somewhere by Kristina Halvorson is that Bethany shows to be a good friend, when she tries to calm down Jen because Elaine has not come to work yet and she will be arriving to work late. I am glad Bethany and Jen rectify their attitudes towards Jack and Elaine, Jen Bethany were more willing to work with Jack to make his work easier. Jack is good man with a good heart the only thing is that he is not performing his job the right way. I kind of identify with Jack in a way because I know I am nice person with a good heart. However, sometimes I am an INCOMPETENT because I do not feel I perform my academics in the right way, so I totally understand what Jack is going through. What I did not like is that for some reason Bethany and Jen hate Jack because he is incompetent, he does not perform his job the right way. I won’t probably hate him because hate is a waste of time and energy. Hating a person is too much energy your focusing to something or someone who is not worthy. I don’t like the attitude Jen is having with Elaine her team leader she needs to respect her. Elaine is right Jen having a bad attitude is not going to help her she need to control her emotions, be professional and nice when she is working in the workplace area and leave problems at home.
ReplyDeleteOscar A. Jacome Serrano
I don’t think most people attend plays to see life’s tedium and daily annoyances played off on stage. That is what confuses me most about this play: who is it meant for? I assume the usual playgoers vary quite a bit with students and middle-aged people being the most represented. Many of the latter tell stories like this constantly, almost to the point of having the younger people jaded to something that they’ve hardly experienced, if at all. These two demographics are out, so which are left? Fancy or older playgoers perhaps? I can say that the play is relatable, in some places painfully so. Unfortunately, this is its greatest weakness. There is nothing notable about it outside of its relatability. Standard dialogue and the same complaints and comments that permeate our everyday lives make up this play. Maybe even you can associate with one of the characters more closely than the others. Your options here are a person out of patience, a person losing what little patience she has left, an exasperated boss trying to keep her team working well, and a wearied worker not wanting to take an extra step to help out some associates. Painfully ordinary.
ReplyDelete-Christopher Hinkle
I really enjoyed reading this play, it was very real and how it dealt with the issue. I feel like what happened with Jen is that she was finally tired, and it all burst at once. I don’t know if maybe because there was something else going on, or she just really hates her job. I feel like everyone gets like that at some point when they are stuck in a job they hate. Heck I’m going through it now, but I bite my lip and just carry through. She’s not passionate about her job I think that is true, but sometimes you are just stuck in that place. At the ending when she’s trying to give herself a pep talk almost. Sometimes you’re the only person that can do that. I think it should some reality on what it’s like working sometimes, and that you don’t respect the person you’re working with. You hate your job, but what can you do? I think this play hit closer to home then I thought it should because I feel that is a struggle I’m going through it right now, and I think I really do understand where Jen is coming from.
ReplyDelete-Alyssa Rangel
In “Now We’re Really Getting Somewhere,” is a reading that feels almost uncomfortably personal because I have been in this situation multiple times before in the jobs that I have had. I feel like I can resonate a lot with Jen because I am the person to go ahead and tell someone like it is at work. I do not ever want to be a part of the fall that someone else is doing. I made the connection with Bethany because having many co-workers with different personalities, egos, attitudes, etc. can indefinitely hinder the work environment. For example, Jack is literally the bad apple of the group and is bringing everyone down on their team. So the heat is brought up at the end, which was almost a little uncomfortable to read because it just reminded me of a recent situation that I was in. Long story short… do not use profanity in front of children under the age of 8 or not you are going to get caught and in trouble. It was not me, who did that… However, since no one wanted to step up and say who it was. My boss took that as everyone was at fault and we all got written up. This reading also proved to me that there is always a Jack in a group of people. If you know that one person in your friend group/coworkers/family then you understand that there really is a Jack in every group. It was a great reading and I thoroughly enjoyed how relatable it was.
ReplyDeleteKrista Olivarez
I really liked this play in particular and I appreciated how smoothly it plays out, a very fast read that kept me very entertained. I really enjoyed how it blends real-life professional and grounded environment with a more pre-mature conversation - really juxtaposes what is thought about during work vs what we actually have the guts to say. I think it also does a very good job at exposing some of the weaker aspects of us as humans in a professional environment (or any environment in general) because a lot of this is true, we let the stuff that bothers us consume us yet we never confront it and just let ourselves continue to be as tolerant as we can. And once we force ourselves to step-up, we never really speak our minds to our fullest to avoid confrontations. The banter between the characters was great.
ReplyDelete- Luis Garza
I really enjoyed reading this play because of the way it played out and because I was able to relate to it because of it. Working in retail can be pretty tough at times, especially when you come across workers who have a bad attitude or don’t want to work, or with bosses who dont care or are too lenient or too strict.
ReplyDeleteIn this play there is different characters with different personalities and they all act differently. Like Jack who is a bad coworker, that will have a negative effect on the others. Even if there is good workers, one persons negative attitude can affect the rest so it is very important that someone speaks up and tells someone what is going on so the situation can be addressed.
Cecilia Cantu
I loved this play, I think that when we read things we tend to subconsciously fit it into whatever situation were going through at that time. I can fit this into my 20s in general, because I think for most 20-somethings it’s a struggle mediocrity, much like Jen. Many of us, unfortunately, struggle with mental health, and it seems as though thats where Jen’s character went, we all have our boiling point. We all struggle with mediocrity and waiting things to change, so we then typically lash out at the things, and people in our surrounding environment that never change for the better, and we forgot to reflect and see that we ourselves need to change also. I think this play was a perfect example of a dead end job, with a higher ups that don’t make things any better. A position that we’ve all been n at one time or another. I think I relate most with Jen in this piece, especially more lately, I’ve been wanting to tell people how it is, and why things aren’t getting better, I’ve beat myself up plenty of times and I’ve had to constantly remind myself that I’m trying my best. Jen, although her character is described as being “Cynical and unhappy” I thought that by the end of the story, she was trying to help in the only way that she currently knew how. She was trying to help Jack see the good worker in Elaine, while also trying to get Jack to respect the entire support team.
ReplyDeleteAisha Teegarden
Now We’re Really Getting Somewhere shines a light on the difficulties with working with such different personalities ranging from passiveness (Elaine) to LET’S GET THIS TRAIN ON THE TRACKS (Jenn). This also highlights the differences of gender really do come into place in the work environment. We notice, from the girls’ perspective that they are not happy with how Jack ( the salesman) is treating their support team. His laziness often causes many customers to have to call the support team and often enough, it makes the support team’s job a lot hard because they do not know what is going on with that particular scenario. I enjoyed this play because I enjoy reading and discussing about the different gender role biases in any place one may go, from doctors to characters in a book. What Jenn seems to want is for Jack to care at least enough to let them know what is going on. I want to admire the author for discussing an issue of this caliber. As a person who has worked with a multitude of people in the past, I can surely say that teamwork is the main thing that can either make or break your time spent at that location.
ReplyDeleteJonathon Morin