Weaknesses:
One of my main weaknesses is turning away from the audience during a performance I can usually correct myself but having to think about it can distract me from what I am saying. This is defiantly something I will have to concentrate on because it is a main thing that people may notice or pick up on and the audience will not clearly hear what I am saying. This can also make the audience feel left out just like when someone you are talking to turns their back on you, by correcting this weakness I will improve my performance by being able to interact with the audience, making the performance for them more enjoyable.
Another weakness is not being organised especially with papers and coursework, but also with time which is crucial for creating a polished and professional performance. To try and organise my time better will be harder but it would be worth it, there are things I could do to improve like creating a schedule and sticking to it or planning with others what we shall do next, I just need to find out which of these work for me. A bad plan can lead to a bad performance, especially if I am working on a part for some time, but having bad organisation skills would be disastrous if I am playing more than one role or rehearsing for two or more plays, which could be very likely. This is another one of my top priorities.
Also a weakness is not using all the space that I have, when I did my GCSE piece I did not use all the space between the audience and I which was about 1 ½ meters this is something I regret because it may well have enhanced my performance especially when I was angry and shouting at the audience, I realised this straight after we finished but not when I was performing, although I now know for future performances. But this can once again make the audience feel left out from the performance. Judi Dench said that “acting is for others” so if the audience doesn’t feel like they are connecting with the performance, the actor has failed.
I often struggle to keep to scripts written by someone else because I struggle to remember the words exactly and I often find myself thinking that things would sound better if I altered something. I can learn the script if I apply myself but it’s not something I particularly enjoy, or if I can relate with what the scrip says, for example Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare is difficult because it is not spoken in modern day language. The only way to really improve is rehearsing the lines on my own and with others.
Not moving enough when saying a monologue is often a weakness of mine, because I often get so absorbed in concentrating on my diction that I don’t even realise that I have just stood still for the entire thing, rehearsing is key to correcting this weakness.
Aims:
My first aim is to not turn my back on the audience in a performance; I mentioned that I did this sometimes when, to achieve this aim I will have to concentrate on this in rehearsals so that in performances which are in front of an audience I automatically do this. This is a very important aim for me because I want every performance I do makes the audience feel like they are part of it.
Secondly I need to become more organised especially with papers and coursework, but also with time which is crucial for creating a polished and professional performance. I know that organising my paperwork should not be too difficult I just need to stop leaving it around and keep all notes no matter how useless I think they are at the time.
Another aim is to ask for more feedback from unbiased people, i.e. people who are not my friends who are more likely to give me good feedback instead of critical because they don’t want to hurt my feelings.
To start rehearsals in my costume as soon as possible, because it really does help me portray the mannerisms and voice of my character, but often when rehearsing I do not get into my costume until a few days before the performance and this limits the time spent in character.
Deciding what is a priority and what can be done in my own time is also something I need to work on, this is crucial because learning lines can easily be done at home but movement is not so easily done at home because of the lack of space compared to the hall I have available to use in the class so it would be pointless having all that space and either talking to others about plans for whatever project we’re working on or learning lines.
Work Schedule
As well as attending the workshops, to improve my movements, voice and overall skill in performing arts, I researched actors Janet Mcteer, Helena Bonham-Carter and Judi Dench to see how they prepared for a performance, this was very interesting to me because it allowed me to see how professional actors saw acting and performing, their opinions gave me something to think about afterwards such as when she commented how observing other people is now like breathing. This has influenced me because when I’m out around lots of people I watch their mannerisms, because you never know when it could come in useful.
On the 28th October 2009 I went to see “A Winter’s Tale” at the theatre. This was defiantly important because it gave me an insight into how actors in a theatre perform and I could relate some of the thing I was taught in the workshops to what they were doing on stage.
Outside of movement workshops I attend movement and fitness classes in school, this helps me prepare for movement workshops because It goes without saying that it would be ideal for this body to be as fit and as flexible as it can be. After all the physical demands placed on an actor are many and can be extremely tough especially if performing night after night.
To be able to perform at best, I need to practice what I have learnt in a workshop at home, this is necessary because it allows me to improve upon what I learnt in the previous workshop without taking up precious time in classes, as well as showing dedication to the workshops. For example after workshop 2 I went home and practiced against a wall on my posture, I finally managed to do it quite well, but without going home and doing it I wouldn’t have been able to. Again when bringing movement into the Launcelot monologue I practiced at home, by experimenting with movement but also with learning the lines so I could use time in the class more efficiently instead of sitting down trying to learn the words so that my hands could be free to move.
Movement Workshops
Workshop 1- 15th September 2009
Aim: Improvise movements more instead of thinking through and planning because that can take time and to have learnt to become more spontaneous because I wanted it to have a natural flow which can often be achieved by improvising, to improve the scale of movement.
In our first workshop I experimented with moving around and using the space provided, and expressed myself as colours- not to act as a colour but to BE the colour. I also posed in abstract ways to form a still frame, which meant using my imagination instead of being told what to do and not understanding why, this let me come up with my own ideas, which was the same with the colours although many of us did the same type of movements for example light and happy for yellow, we each did it our own way.
Workshop 2–16th and 17th September 2009
Aim: Use spontaneous movements that were developed in workshop one, make movements more fluent and natural, and to keep the body relaxed but still controlled.
In our second workshop I learnt to relax and control the body to use it to its best advantage, we became feathers and individually moved as feathers, then joined up into two groups of three and created a performance to show the other group as feathers we synchronised some movements and individually moved to create a realistic performance. At first we lay on the floor and learnt to relax each part of the body, helping us create the part of a feather. When I worked in a group we chose to synchronise some of our movements but, as feathers do, go off and do movement in our own style and pace. I chose to make my movements slow because you often see feathers that look like they can’t be bothered to float off, then a gust of wind caught me and I got up and swirled in the same direction as the others in my group, then fell back to the group and rolled slowly from side to side.
Workshop 3-25th 28th and 29th September 2009
Aim: express my feelings and emotions with movement instead of speech. To work in sync with the music and the others in the group and make sure the performance has a lot of energy.
In the third workshop we listened to a piece of music from a silent movie and had to create a plot idea to carry out later, as a group. Firstly we listened to the music repeatedly so we could familiarise ourselves with it, then we took it in turns to explain the idea that first came to mind. As a group we decided to have two children sneaking out of the house, although the idea was not bad not of us really felt comfortable with it so scraped it and started again, we relaxed and thought of the ideas again, here are some of the ideas we came up with; Prison break not long or dramatic enough to fit in with the music, ghosts where one kills another resulting in them being haunted would have been too difficult to portray to the audience, fight between two men for the love of a woman, again not long enough for the piece of music and kids pretending to be robbers. We decided on this idea because we could take it and make a good performance of it. It started out two robbers sneaking away thinking they had robbed somewhere they ran into two policemen that chase them, catch them, the robbers beg for kindness from them they are tied up but the getaway driver goes and threatens to kill a civilian so the police shoot him, once the person is dead we find out it is just a child’s game because the parent(played by me) comes over and starts telling them that they all have to go home for their tea but they all try to run away, it doesn’t work and they all get in trouble. I was standing near the edge of the performance reading a newspaper with my small child playing next to me, she is then brought into the group, I decided that the game had gone too far and that they should all come home because it’s getting late, the group all try to run away but they can’t and are forced to go home. Next time when working in a group, I should try to make the overall performance, at times, more focal to one specific point because it was too wide and you can’t take in everything that is happening when you have to keep moving your eyes from one side of the stage to the other. This workshop was very different to all other workshops we had done because it was working to music, which meant that the timings had to be exact otherwise it would all be out of time and our movements would seem all wrong, this workshop defiantly helped me with keeping in time with the other actors and the music, because of the lack of dialogue we had to rely on our movements and our facial expressions which had to be overacted.
Workshop 4-2nd October 2009
Aim: Further develop aim from last workshop of using movement to show emotions, bring outlandish actions into an everyday scene, and explore what makes a movement ordinary and what makes a movement aberrant and what other variations I could do to make my movements “wild and large” but to make them get gradually bigger. To raise the dynamic scale, Aim for the level of prosthetic limitation, which wouldn’t be open to me in real life.
Jacques le coq- you are sitting at a cafe, opposite at another table someone makes a small gesture to you. You wonder if you know them, out of politeness you respond in the same way, they, put at ease begin to gesture more wildly making large movements playing with an object, little by little a complicity grows between you both an dialogue conducted in gestural signs or facial expressions. In the end they rise and start to walk towards you, smiling you also get up to greet them but they pass to someone behind you. I tried not to over think or rehearse too much which spoils the spontaneous way to react to the other person. I had fun playing the stranger who started or the person who thought they were being waved at, both ways I got to practice being abstract. When performing in front of the class I chose not to do a movement to attract the other person attention because to that was too realistic, so I pulled a face that no one (except maybe a small child) would pull in public, I used height variation as well I would be crawling on the ground then standing on my chair and making large hand gestures by the end of the scene I was making my movements as big as possible. I think that this workshop was really useful and I learnt a lot like, how to make my movements gradually get bigger but how to also make them discombobulate my partner and make my movements unsuitable for the ambience. I think that this workshop really helped me use the space open to me a lot more which was one of my weaknesses and I no longer feel that it is a big weakness and I now feel more confident using all of the space I have.
Workshop 5-5th October 2009
Aim: Accumulate strength of movement; perform in a group but still work on independent movements by working collectively, collaborate with the group and spontaneously.
Warm up: the cafe scene from workshop 4, then numbering ourselves from 1 to 7, then going into the centre of the hall in pairs and using our imagination with no planning, and performing then other people join in.
On the first go I did not really know how to act or know what to do, but by the second time we did it everybody just did what felt natural and not to try to come up with something amazing, just to do what we do automatically as a group. I think that the main component of this workshop was spontaneity, so my aim was to be spontaneous and not to watch what everyone else was doing. The first time was hard and I got quite stuck and the performance sort of lacked substance the group started off by shooting guns and the scene ended by us all dancing, but the second time was much more relaxed and fun where we started off by dancing and it ended with me playing dead. This workshop encouraged me to use improvising more, although it did take me some time to let go of all thoughts and inhibitions. But by the end I was letting all thoughts of pre-planning go and letting things go and I was open to whatever anyone else did.
Workshop 6-6th October 2009
Aim: clear all emotion from my mind whilst performing, realise the amount of space that is open to me.
Waking up in the mask; in a state of repose, relaxed, lying on the ground, we were asked to wake-up for the first time once the mask is awake what can it do? How can it move? This opens the actor up to the openness of the space around them. This encourages the actor not to take on a character but to take on a sense of neutrality because a character has a past whereas the mask does not. As a group we all woke up at our own pace and in our own way, I had to behave in a way as if everything was new to me, to me it did not seem like acting because it was not portraying a role of someone, but becoming neutral, blank canvas, not over thinking the movements which were controlled and precise.
After having a go as a group, we each took it in turn to go into the centre of the room and work in front of the rest of the group, I went first and chose not to think at all, otherwise I would have become worried that I was not doing it right, although I did not have a problem with worrying that mine wasn’t as good as the person before me. I feel that when I was in the mask, I did not feel any particular emotion that I was living in the moment and did not feel the need to question anything. It allowed me to feel a sense of “wholeness” what I felt emotionally and physically was the same; it integrated my mind and body and made me work on impulse. I devoted all energy, which would have been used on self-doubt, to investigating my surroundings and problem solving. Not only did I not have to take on any role, but I didn’t even have to be me, I was calm with no expression, no past and no thought of the future. Also the mask seemed to heighten my senses it made me become very aware to the space around me. I think that this workshop will help me in the future because it will allow me to give focused, expressive and emotive performances.
Workshop 7- 9th 12th and 13th October 2009
Aim: Instead of saying how I felt, use movement to convey my emotions and feelings of the situation to the audience. Using past experiences, remember to move around the space given instead of moving around on the same spot like I usually do when performing a monologue.
Lancelot’s monologue from “A merchant of Venice”. We were given a monologue spoken by Launcelot from the Merchant of Venice to perform for the rest of the group, but, it was to practice mainly our movements. We were given a few days to rehearse and practice using movements to convey what we were saying and to attract the audience. For this monologue I wanted to use all of the space because I have a tendency to stand still when reading out a monologue. The monologue was of Launcelot deciding whether to run away from his master or not, where one side of him is saying “run” and his conscience is saying that the sensible idea is to stay, to me this seemed like the devil and angel situation where one is on each shoulder, so I changed sides when playing each thought, it encouraged me to move more when talking and to use the space around me more effectively and I understood how movement can help the actor a lot more when performing a monologue. Next time when I perform a monologue, I will experiment with movement a lot more, to present my character to the audience. I think that this was the first monologue I ever performed where I was using movements more than voice to convey emotions, it was really useful learn how to do this, because when reading monologues later I will want to use both and one of my weaknesses was that I did not move enough when speaking a monologue, and I feel that I have managed to progress with this weakness, it is not yet a strength but with more practice soon it will not be a prominent weakness.
Workshop 8- 18th and 19th October 2009
Aim: Apply what I learnt in the previous workshop to this monologue so that I matched my voice with my movements which would strengthen them, also use unpredictability because it makes the performance more interesting.
Performing a monologue of our own choice, I chose to do a monologue that was modern, so I could practice on movement instead of pronouncing the words, and so I could learn it off by heart easier. It is quite a short and very straight forward; a lot of it is a woman talking to her as she speaks out loud what she is doing, like a running commentary, to me she seems to have an eating disorder and hates herself. This is the monologue;
“I can't take it anymore!!
I'm up every day at five. Every day. Up at five, go for a jog, take a shower, wake Sally, cook breakfast—something healthy—egg whites, flax, kale, organic coffee, sprouted wheat. Sit down with Dave and Sally for breakfast. Eat a tiny portion. Be sure to leave some on the plate. Always leave some on the plate.
Get dressed. Something feminine, flattering. Kiss Dave goodbye. Make sure to give him a little something worth coming back home to.
Check on Sally. Comb her hair. Pack her lunch. Wait with her for the bus. Hug her goodbye. Make sure that hug lasts all day long...that she feels your arms around her even at recess when the mean kids pick on her because their moms don't hug them enough. Then let go. Watch her walk away, board the bus.
Choke back your tears. Taste the salt slide down the back of your throat. Go back inside. Check yourself in the mirror. Ugh. Turn around. Turn back hoping to see someone else. Cross through the kitchen. Pause. Feel the quiet of the empty house. No one watching. What can you eat? Open the pantry, look inside. Grab the jar of peanut butter. Unscrew the lid. Take a whiff. Stick your finger in the jar of peanut butter. Lick it off. Feel someone watching you. Shit. Turn around to face them. No one's there. Put the peanut butter away. Wash your hands, careful to remove any trace of peanut butter. Reapply lipstick. Head out the door. To work. Again.
This isn't fun anymore. There's something wrong with me.”
I liked this monologue because I understood it, which helped me know how someone would move in a situation like that. Firstly I read through the monologue about twice, then wrote down any immediate ideas, after that I got up and started acting out my ideas. As well as working on it in school I rehearsed my monologue at home so I knew it off by heart and to think up of any more movement ideas. After learning it I performed it to some of the class to receive any constructive criticism so that my final performance would be the best and allow me to show the full potential of the monologue. I found out that I needed to pick up on more key parts in the monologue to improve my performance by finding the climax in it and building up to it. So in my spare time I did this, I chose the part, where she is eating the peanut butter, I felt I had to raise the pace of the monologue at this part, then suddenly stopping it when she feels someone is watching her. I felt I got a lot out of this workshop, in the end I did manage to match my movements to my voice and I learnt that I don’t have to rely on my on my voice to portray a role, although it does help. I feel that I progressed in this workshop, especially is combining my voice and my movements to give a good performance. This is another workshop that is helping me correct my weaknesses of movement I think the more of these type of workshops I do the better I will get at using movements and space until they are second nature.
Voice workshops
Workshop 1-23rd September 2009
This was my first voice workshop; we started out with warm-up breathing exercises and learning to relax the body. We also concentrated on breathing and seeing where in the torso should rise, it should be just below the ribs where the diaphragm is not in the chest cavity, so the shoulders stay completely still. Later in the workshop we practicing in dictation and projection of words (woo, wow, whoa).
I learnt that breathing, as well as providing the body with oxygen, is to feed breath puffs to the vibrating vocal folds to produce a vocal sound, the deeper the breath the longer I can say my lines without running out of breath. To me this is very important to know because the more you know how the voice and sounds work the easier it is to progress and improve on them.
Workshop 2-30th September 2009
In this workshop we concentrated on breathing and posture, because without good posture you cannot have good breathing and without good breathing you cannot have good posture. Again we started with our warm up exercises, and then moved onto posture, firstly we lay on the floor and my back had to be against the floor from pelvis to the upper back, after sometime I managed it and had to then make the same position, but against a straight wall, this was more difficult because the head was not to touch the wall because it would rigidly shorten the cervical spine, my heels had to be practically touching the wall, my shoulders had to slope somewhat forward, my back had to be expanded with optimal space between the shoulder blades with an overall thoracic expansion and my pelvis had to gently curve forward and my abdominal wall had to curve inward and upward as part of the parenthesis-like curve in my back, and finally I had to loosen my calf muscles and knees.
This took a lot longer to get right than doing it on the ground, but with a little practice at home I was able to and I really think it helped me breathe better when speaking, this is something I will keep up with when rehearsing and warming up.
Workshop 3-7th October 2009
Before this workshop we were all asked to research and find a monologue to perform in front of the rest of the group in this workshop, we were also recorded saying the monologue and it was played back to us.
I chose to do a relatively short monologue written by a woman about her next door neighbour;
Mr. Cornell, I have tried to be neighbourly, I have tried to be friendly and I have tried to be cordial...I don't know what it is that you're trying to be. That first night I was appreciative that you carried my trunk up the stairs...The fact that it slipped and fell five flights and smashed to pieces was not your fault...I didn't even mind the personal message you painted on the stairs. I thought it was crazy, but sort of sweet. However, things have now gone too far...I cannot accept gifts from a man I hardly know...Especially canned goods. And I read your little note. I can guess the gist of it even though I don't speak Italian. This has got to stop, Mr. Cornell. I can do very well without you leaving' little chocolate-almond Hershey bars in my mailbox-they melted yesterday, and now I got three gooey letters from home with nuts in 'them-and I can do without you sneaking' into my apartment after I go to work and painting' my balcony without telling' me about it. I stepped out there yesterday and my slippers are still glued to the floor. And I can do without you tying big bottles of eau de cologne to my cat's tail. The poor thing kept swishing' it yesterday and nearly beat herself to death...And most of all, I can certainly do without you watching' me get on the bus every day through that high-powered telescope. You got me so nervous the other day; I got on the wrong bus. In short, Mr. Cornell. And I don't want to have to say this again, leave me alone!!!!
This monologue worked well because it was written in modern day language therefore being easier to pronounce and understand.
When my voice was played back I could see that I did not pronounce my words very clearly, therefore my main aim is to improve upon my diction especially when speaking fast, not to miss out the last letters of my words.
Workshop 4-14 October 2009
Again we started the monologue with our exercises, then we moved onto “pleasure smelling” where I had to imagine that there was a beautiful pleasant-smelling flower right in front of me, the aroma attracts me and I squat down to get a better smell, cup the flower in both hands, and smell it’s lovely fragrance. I felt that my whole torso fill with the fragrance of that flower. I did this because smelling something that is pleasant affects the body and muscles in a different way to a foul smell.
There was not much body action, no push-pull-lift of my thoracic cavity, instead I felt and inflation and expansion of my intercostals.
Later I learnt that inhalation begins when brain signals to the diaphragm to contract- an action that lowers and flattens the muscles, with this the thoracic cavity increases in size, causing the density of the air in the lungs to be reduced, because the air pressure within the lungs is now less than the air pressure on the outside, new air rushes into the lungs through the trachea and bronchial tubes to restore the balance.
After finishing the “pleasure smelling” then moved onto numbering the words in my monologue “the music of vowels” these vowels and diphthongs are distinguished by the fact that they are produced perfectly with full forward facial posture, and all other vowels and consonants also benefit. Forward facial posture also acts the same way as cupping your hands around your mouth to emphasise the sound, because you are creating more space in your mouth, this again is something I am practicing with at home, and I do need to concentrate on this because it helps with consonant energy, which something I am trying to improve on.
Evaluation
For the past weeks I have been aiming to improve my strengths and weaknesses. I think that most of the workshops that I have attended have helped me, but they have also highlighted some more strengths, weaknesses and aims, which I added to my list, I think I have defiantly improved on everyone one of my weaknesses and aims but it will take some time before I can no longer call them my “weaknesses”.
I think that I have improved some of my weaknesses and advance my skills in some aspects of my work. One of my skills was that I could change the tone and dynamics of my voice quickly and fluently, I have bettered this by attending the voice workshops because when talking quickly I still needed people to hear all my words and learning how to pronounce my vowels correctly, which I practice at home and when I am talking to other people.
Another skill I have improved upon is taking constructing criticism and using it to enhance my performance. In workshop eight, where we each perform a monologue with movement in it, I performed it in front of some of the class I received some good information that I have been practicing so my monologue will reach its potential.
One of my weaknesses that I improved was turning away from the audience, but each time that I performed in front of the group I made sure to face them and I purposely made sure that I faced them. I think that I improved because of having movement workshops separate from voice because before then I had to split my time between voice and movement in class. Now I can concentrate on movement.
I have become more organised this year, I have kept all my papers together and, because during each workshop I would write all about it, what we were doing why I thought it would help me in performing and what I thought of the end result and how productively I used my time, then when I got home I would write up my workshops and I would add to the notes that I had in my book because I will have had more time to think about what I did in school.
Although I am close to improving all my skills and weaknesses I think as I progress through this year I will find more skills and weaknesses that I did not know of.
Even though trying to improve upon your skills time and time again can be challenging, I like doing so because it means that I can perform to the best of my ability, because the more you give to a performance the more you will get back.
And so it goes, this most elusive, mysterious and often misunderstood art form, the art of acting which lends itself to endless interpretation and endless speculation is one of the hardest jobs to sustain but at the same time is the most rewarding.
