RITA HAS CHANGED SINCE WE LAST SAW HER. EXPLAIN HOW YOU WOULD DIRECT AN ACTRESS PLAYING RITA IN THIS SCENE TO HIGHLIGHT THESE CHANGES. (act 2 scene1 )
Willy Russell was born in Whiston, near Liverpool, England, in 1947. Russell has written a string of popular, award-winning plays and musicals, but perhaps one of the most well known is Educating Rita. In this play Willy Russell is very much producing a mirror image of parts of his life. As a child and growing up he didn't care much for school, he considered himself a kid from the 'D' stream and a piece of factory fodder. Eventually he realised he did not want to end up working in a factory, yet it was to late as there were only six months of school left he did not make an effort, he felt his fate lay in factory work so he spent his days in underground clubs and sagging of school. He left school generally uneducated and became a ladies hairdresser as Rita does in the play, he did not enjoy his job and he felt he was not good at it, eventually he got his own salon and on bad days he would retire to the back room and wrote, as he felt it was the only thing he could do.
Eventually he begun to write poetry, books and sketches but found himself interrupted by the world he was in, he wanted more. He soon realised that if he wanted to write he had to change, and find a world which would encourage such aspiration but this would mean a drastic change of course. He decided to go into the academic world to nourish his ideas, he enrolled himself in O level English literature and passed, yet to go to college he needed 5 O levels and he paid for this by working at a factory. He entered Childwall college and felt like he could start again. He felt at home. At the time working-class society and middle-class society were very much apart and clearly did not mix, for the working-class culture literature and education are not important and not part of their lives (Rita feels this is stifling her), yet for the middle-class people it is essential in their lives although Frank in the play seems to have grown tired of it.
Willy Russell was born in Whiston, near Liverpool, England, in 1947. Russell has written a string of popular, award-winning plays and musicals, but perhaps one of the most well known is Educating Rita. In this play Willy Russell is very much producing a mirror image of parts of his life. As a child and growing up he didn't care much for school, he considered himself a kid from the 'D' stream and a piece of factory fodder. Eventually he realised he did not want to end up working in a factory, yet it was to late as there were only six months of school left he did not make an effort, he felt his fate lay in factory work so he spent his days in underground clubs and sagging of school. He left school generally uneducated and became a ladies hairdresser as Rita does in the play, he did not enjoy his job and he felt he was not good at it, eventually he got his own salon and on bad days he would retire to the back room and wrote, as he felt it was the only thing he could do.
Eventually he begun to write poetry, books and sketches but found himself interrupted by the world he was in, he wanted more. He soon realised that if he wanted to write he had to change, and find a world which would encourage such aspiration but this would mean a drastic change of course. He decided to go into the academic world to nourish his ideas, he enrolled himself in O level English literature and passed, yet to go to college he needed 5 O levels and he paid for this by working at a factory. He entered Childwall college and felt like he could start again. He felt at home. At the time working-class society and middle-class society were very much apart and clearly did not mix, for the working-class culture literature and education are not important and not part of their lives (Rita feels this is stifling her), yet for the middle-class people it is essential in their lives although Frank in the play seems to have grown tired of it.
