his movement was slow and soft. His voice was in a welsh accent, which is a great story telling accent. His tone was soft but happy and uplifting and his facial expression was always in a smile with his eyes bright. Compared to his other character, Jason, this is a dramatic change. Jason’s posture was always strong and upright with his head held high and his nose in the air. His movement and gestures were sharp and without regret or thought. And he spoke confidently, in a serious, bold tone and the pitch low and manly. Each actor changed all these qualities in their own way, to create a personality and traits for the character they were playing. Another way they used multi-role play was by using personal props. These props were very minimalistic but once again they were personal to the character they were playing. I thought all of the 3 actors did an amazing job of multi-role play and they have given me many ideas and inspired me to think more about my roles.
The set on the stage was very simple and minimalistic. This was definitely more of a quality to the performance than negative. It didn’t look over the top and it didn’t need to be. Splendid productions state on their website that “Splendid’s powerful cast of three will show how an ancient story can resonate through time, and how the simplest of theatrical ideas can have a devastating impact.” And this is exactly what they did, especially with the set. It was so simple yet creative at the same time and even though a rope was just placed in a square on the stage, once the actors stepped into that rope the whole atmosphere changed and thats what created such a devastating impact. The set represented Greek Theatre. It represented the Unities that the play was all in one day, one place and one story. It made the audience concentrate on the actors and appreciate what they were doing and how much of creative thinking had been put into the performance. What I thought was most effective about the set was that the audience was used as part of the set. Multiple times the actors came into where the audience was watching, and they were still in character. Other times they would interact with the audience. But the fact was, they knew the audience was always going to be part of the set however, we didn’t. And thats what I thought was so interesting and using the audience really involved them and kept them interacted but also added a lot of symbolism to the story. The main piece of set was a thick rope shaped in a large square centre stage. The rope was the most used part of the set because inside of it the were playing a character and playing the scene. Yet outside of the rope, they were telling the story and being narrators. The minimal set was most effective and was more effective then it would’ve been with complicated set because it forced the actors to be creative and imaginative by miming etc. As they didn’t rely on the set to do the job for them.
The actors used choral speaking which is when actors speak at the same time. They did this when they introduced “Ancient Greece”. This was very effective as they changed their voice style a lot throughout and added a lot of humor to it and gestures which gave the audience a break from the seriousness and intensity of the storyline, broke up the story and kept them interested in the performance. It was in unison perfectly and in my opinion it was important that they added humor as it brightened up the performance. The actors performed this very clearly and loud. The actions during the song made it more effective as it added character to the performance and made it more interesting. Also, it involved the audience through laughter. Another reason it was effective was that it focused on the tragic elements of the story but these negative themes were not as harsh as they spoke boldly and humorously about it. The choral speaking had an interesting contrast between conversations and the formal narrative and without it I don’t think the performance would have been as enjoyable because it was clear the choral speaking had a great lasting impact on the audience.
The actors used direct address to interact with the audience a lot throughout the performance and especially the pre show. I watched them sit and talk with other people but they were completely in character whilst doing this. They all had their scarves around the head and one of the actors had some knitting in her hand, so it was clear that this character was a story telling granny narrator. Repeatedly, they would say “Oh dear” to people. This was effective as you could tell that it was building up to the story and tragedy. Direct address is always effective to an audience in my opinion. It makes it a greater experience for the audience as you’re involving them and they feel like they’re in the story and living it. I believe it makes the audience experience more emotions than they would just sat watching. Direct address can make it feel more personal to the audience because even though you know whats happening is not real, you can’t help but sympathize with the actors playing them because you feel so involved.
Splendid Productions also used a few songs in the performance but my favorite was what was named the “revenge song”. This brightened up the performance as the actors had a great skill of breaking of from such seriousness of the story and adding some humor and fun into it which made it much more enjoyable for the audience. This song was quite upbeat as it had one of the actors playing a guitar. It concentrated on quite tragic and negative themes of not only the story but the outside society too but the actors cleverly presented them in a humorous way to the audience. In this song the actors also performed some improvisation as they reacted to the audience’s reactions to the song.
My favorite actor was Kerry Frampton who plays Medea. I really sympathized with this character as an audience member and Kerry played her perfectly and took me through a whirlwind of emotions which proves she has a great impact as an actress. One of my favorite moments from Kerry as Medea was when it was just her and Jason on the stage expressing their emotions towards each other. In these scenes they performed and built up to conflict really well and before the scenes, they would hold a Tableaux and I thought this was very effective as at the beginning, when Medea found out about Jason’s unfaithfulness, their first one on one started with Jason reaching out his arms with a gesture and Medea having a vulnerable gesture back. As the performance progressed towards the end when Jason finds out about Medea killing her children, their next encounter pictures Medea reaching out towards Jason with a lunge and Jason holds back this time, he is vulnerable. I thought this was very effective especially on Kerry’s part, as it focuses on the transitions of Medea’s character and takes you through the reality and realness of the performance. Kerry’s facial expressions we’re very effective in her performance and I could tell that this is what she really concentrated on along with her voice. She made sure her facial expressions we’re matching everything that was going on and not what time did I catch her relaxing her face. Most of the time throughout the performance she was pleading with other characters and sometimes turning to the audience and pleading. Her facial expressions during this would be sad, her eyebrows would be in a from, her eyes would be sinking and screaming for help. Her tone of voice would be so soft and convincing with the pitch low and volume quiet and subtle. And thats why I loved Kerry’s performance because she really drilled in to every element that it took to perform this character and made it her own. She created Medea as someone the audience could sympathise with and feel sorry for even though she did such a horrific revenge towards Jason.
Timing was a very key part in this performance. Throughout of the performance the actors spoke in unison, especially in the “Ancient Greece” choral speaking . If the timing wasn’t on point during this, it would immediately put a flaw in the performance and not give the same effect that it should and that it did. Timing would also be very important during the “revenge song”. This song told a story throughout it and having a guitar playing in line with the words, meant that timing was very important. Focus is also a very key skill for an actor. If an actor loses focus at any time, the whole performance has the potential to fall apart and even though the actors don’t realise it, to the audience it is very easy to spot when an actor loses focus. Focus was used throughout the whole
performance in “Medea” and was very important to do so. When the audience had the potential to distract a character for example, when somebody couldn’t stop laughing in the audience over the performance, the actors still kept complete focus and stayed in character completely and at one point, they played on it and used improvisation into the performance. If an actor doesn’t look confident in a performance, the audience struggle to believe the character they are playing and the actor would struggle to perform to the best of their ability. However, this was not the case at all during this performance as the actors had 100% confident throughout. They we’re total professionals and never lost an inch of confidence. The moment where I thought all three of the actors confidence was off the scale, was when they did the choral speaking. Because they added comedy into it and large gestures, it could have had potential to lose confidence as the actors could have felt uncomfortable or embarrassed at one point. The three actors were consistently confident throughout this, and it made it a lot more enjoyable for the audience because of this.
I have learnt a lot from the Medea performance and very glad that I got the chance to watch it. It really opened my eyes to ideas and proved to me that if you really put your mind to it, you can come up with such creative, unique and simple ideas that have a huge impact to the audience. It taught me that you don’t need to have a huge production with huge costumes and a huge set to create a powerful performance. I will definitely use the costume change ideas for my future work, as I thought the scarves were very effective and a brilliant idea for costume changes. I was inspired by the teamwork and confidence of the actors and that is something I will most certainly use in my work. Splendid productions have taught me that the littlest ideas and details can make a giant impact and it doesn’t always have to be a huge productions. I will think a lot more into details in my future work and really work on my character development and all my facial expressions, gestures, voice etc. I have learnt that it really does make a difference from an audiences’ perspective.
