Mark Diven - Fairport
By: Colleen Law
Updated: April 18, 2011
In this week Scholastic Arts Spotlight a quintessential team player. Fairport High School senior Mark Diven is class president, captain of the improv team, and is routinely cast in school plays and musicals. When you meet him, you just know he's going places!
On his way to becoming a working actor, Mark Diven is working hard. Here he is rehearsing a monologue for his college auditions.
"This is a Charlie Monologue from a play by Nick Hall, called Eat Your Heart Out. It's about a waiter in Manhattan and he's in his 20's and he's frustrated that he's not getting roles as an actor."
Mark is getting roles---and lots of them. His favorite so far----playing Brutus, in Julius Caesar.
Mark isn't just a standout in Fairport High School's theater program. For the past three summers, he's been selected to participate in Geva Theater’s summer conservatory. He really does love the stage.
"Believe it or not, I have a lot of stage fright,” says Mark. “ The buildup is really intense, I get out there and I'm sweating it out and it's really overwhelming but then as soon as the lights come up and it's time for me to speak my lines I really do drop into the character and hit my stream of consciousness as a character and know where I am and why I'm doing it and know how powerful actors can be."
Mark’s Theatre Teacher Keri Griffith says, "I'm so proud, I've known Mark for three years and just seen him grow as an actor and a student and my heart just soars for him when he's on stage."
Mark first wowed audiences at Fairport playing the role of Jimmie, in Almost Maine. Now, he's almost to college. And already looking beyond.
"Working regularly in New York as a stage actor. And also in films I'd like to have a taste of the two, that would be my dream," says Mark.
