Units 1-4

 Principles of Performance

Within my first week as a class we discussed what requirements are important when becoming actors or studying acting:

• Observation
• Awareness 

This is a crucial skill whilst acting as a performer you should always be aware whilst performing, whether this is spacial, vocal or overall awareness.

• Confidence 

Confidence is a good trait for a performer, in order to continue your journey as an actor. You'll need to stand in front of your audience.

• Imagination/Creativity 

Imagination is the key to performing, this is because throughout acting you use your imagination to create our pieces, to feed our motivation and creating a meaning/story throughout our actions.

• Collaboration
• Team work

Teamwork is an essential part in Drama. Without it, no plays could be preformed and no activities could of been achieved. 

• Listening 
• Openness
• Vocals; Pitch, speed  

We also discussed what our fears are in terms of a class and as actors and we spoke about rules we'd stick to as a class in order to gain each others trust. 

• Habits 
• Being shy 
• Getting "it wrong"/Fear of failure 

Rules 

• Accepting each other
• Don't block
• Don't put each other down in terms of laughing at someones performance which is distracting and discouraging. Instead help and empower your peers. 

Throughout the term we've done a numerous of acting exercises which are I found very beneficial:

• Voice 

Vocal exercises are important because we need to warm up our voices as actors. I learnt how to avoid our glottis by practicing some vocal sounds (oo a,oh,ore) .I also practiced pronouncing my consonants in different ways. 

After doing the vocal exercise our class looked at poems and practiced our pronunciations, consonants, vowel sounds and working on our glottis.

• Body

Body exercises are vital because we need to be flexible, think about positioning and how your movement connects well on stage.

Drama workshops

Within our unit our teacher set up for us to take part in a drama workshop we were presented by different objects and improvised scenes using the objects as props, but we were able to be creative/imaginative by creating different persona's for each object. I believe this was beneficial to our class and course because we were able to branch if from just being basic and use the objects for their actual purpose. 


We have also worked with a company called papatango who allowed us to get into groups and create our own performances, I enjoyed this because we were able to learn how to write scripts and direct our own plays exactly how we wanted it. This allowed me to think clearer to my career choices in terms our becoming a director. 

Throughout the year we have been visited by a company called broken hearted youth theatre. I enjoy their sessions as they give you an insight on exactly what it takes to become an actor and how it really is when you leave school or college. They make sure we endure a professional manner within these sessions.

Greek Theatre 

 The time period of The Greek theatre was 700bc. During this time the major dramatists were Sophocles; who wrote both Oedipus the King and Antigone. Aeschylus who wrote The Suppliants and Euripides who wrote Medea and Trojan Women. To get an understanding of Greek plays we were each put into mini groups and looked at the play Medea. We were all given sections of the play to

perform section of the script and given feedback; within my group my peers told us that they found it interesting that we added our own soundscape in terms of how when one person spoke the rest of us acted as an orchestra, they also like the fact that we used our staging and movement effectively by moving about to show the difference in location We were also given constructive feedback in terms of our vocals; we were told to slow down when reading lines because it makes the performance look rushed and also making eye contact which didn't allow the audience to connect well with characters.

 I noticed that some of the reoccurring themes of the plays are that they all include Tragedy, comedy, love/romance. During the time Greek Theatre was at its peaks socially because they helped people to decide important issues regarding politics and their government. 

Within this unit we will be looking at Greek theatre. in particular Trojan Women, Antigone and Oedipus. We were all put into small groups and given our scripts between Trojan Women, Antigone and Oedipus. As a class we spoke about ways we can bring our performances to life and our teacher explained how we should be in one with our characters. We spoke about the quote said by Sanford Meisner "Acting is behaving truthfully in imagined circumstances" and what this meant to us, we discussed what will help us to interpret our meaning behind our characters&came up with the concept that acting is merely reacting, its a way you can use your imagination and also behave truthfully. 

When reading the play more and more I was able to become familiar with the text and I started making connections with the different language, I did this by underlining certain words I found difficult to understand and looked them up online. I also looked at video clips to get an idea of how these pieces have been performed already and how I could bring fourth ideas to my group on how we could add our own twists.

In our lesson we were given the chance to practice in the theatre to become comfortable with the spacing and how it'd feel performing our pieces in the theatre. Before beginning rehearsals we went through some vocal and tongue exercises to warm up our voices and spoke about subtext and reading between the lines within our performances. This was beneficial because this helped us think about our objectives as performers. When feeling confident to do a full run through of our plays, as a class we all watched each other perform and was given both individual and group feedback. As a group we were told that we all read our lines clearly and that our vocals were on key but also we were told that we could be more spacially aware in terms of not huddling up in just a corner but instead using up all the stage space provided. Individually I was told that when reading my lines I should try adding a comedic effect because as chorus my role is to inform the audience on what is happening within the scene and I have to get the attention of the audience but also by

doing this, I will be creating excitement to the performance After hearing this feedback I have taken time to think about ways I could perform my role without just reading my lines and not meaning anything I say, after hearing this feedback I have taken some time to reflect and find ways to better my character.

Throughout my performance, I will be channeling the social message of how wrong the social construct was during this time period. My role will help me achieve my goal as the Chorus, played by me; gives the audience the insight of what the play is about and what is happening. My main objective is bringing the subtext to life through my role and I will be portraying this in a comedic way. My character will be very laid back and un bothered, I believe playing my role of the chorus in this way will differ from how it would have been performed in the 700s because they chorus would have been a big group who acted their roles as if they were in that era whereas I will be adding comedy to my performance. Also when reading my lines I will say them as if I am having a normal conversation with someone which will benefit both the audience because it allows them connect with my character as they will be able to relate but also understand why I am so unbothered by the story line. I will also be breaking the fourth wall with the audience by adding gestures and facial expressions when certain lines are being read by other actors on stage to convey my emotions and opinion on the matter. When coming to rehearsals I have understood the play more now and how to act out my character because I am able to add physicality which makes me feel as if I am being true to my character.

The Seagull- Anton Chekhov

Within this unit, I have been studying Anton Chekhov and 3 of his plays in particular; The Seagull, The three sisters, and Cherry Orchard.

Anton Chekhov was a Russian playwright and a short story writer, he is considered as one of the greatest writers of short fiction in history. Within his career as a playwright, he was able to produce four classics which are all held in high esteem by writers and critics.

When coming back from half term, we were all put into our groups and read through our scripts to familiarise ourselves with our role and as a group. After we were all given sugar paper and wrote out what we think the play is about and all we know such as;

• Could potentially be a metaphor in terms of 'The Seagull' = determination, the characters could be determined to achieve their goals.
• Reflects the play by characters emotions
• Contrasting characters e.g. Sorins always happy whereas others are sad
• The play is set in Russia
• Konstantin Gavrilavhich wrote the play

When first reading the play, I thought it was interesting but also very confusing as I didn't quite understand the objective or purpose of my character. I also thought about the social and historical contrasts within Russia during 1890s and early 1900s, bad living/working conditions, taxes rising and hunger within the cities increased frequent strikes. Due to my knowledge and research it helped me to familiarise myself with the content of the play and its historics.

In lesson we were all given our scripts and were casted before the half term. I was casted in 'The Seagull' playing the role as Masha. Masha always wears black due to being depressed and hating my life, as the play opens, "in mourning for her life". Masha is addicted to snus and alcohol which she heavily uses just to repress her emotions.

We also looked into themes that we've noticed throughout the play such as; 

- Nature; Chekhov uses ecocritical language to set the mood for the audience to understand most of the actors moods throughout the play. 

- Love; which is both reciprocated and also rejected, we see this conveyed within the relation between my character, Masha and Medvedenko who shes not in love with but in a relationship with. 

- Success and failure; Almost everyone in ' The Seagull' is longing for success although throughout failure is a reoccurring theme 

These themes are highlighted repeatedly throughout the play and are noticed by the audience due to the fact that some of the themes do occur in everyday life which creates a connection to the play for the audience.

Throughout our rehearsal we did a few warm ups specifically to help us within this units which differ but also still contain our usual vocal warm ups and stretches such as;

In pairs we were asked to devise a scene within a shop where person 1 wants to return an item and get her money back where as person 2, who works within the store needs to leave and close by 5pm because she has tickets to an event but she has to be overly polite and can't be rude to person 1. The overall aim is using sub-textual language in order to meet your objective. We also played the classic game of Grandma's footsteps which the moral of the game is basically playing tactical with the objective of reaching Grandma before she turns and notices you moving.

As a class we discussed the ways of using subtext when it comes to meeting your objectives and ended the discussion with the fact that all objectives have actions. Which are just tiny moments which we often call tactics to build or complete or given objective. This is our key focus for the unit as we ourselves as actors are trying to plan an objective in some form. Our teacher spoke to us about the 3 main "w's" which are

• Where are you within the scene 
• What time is it(either period, time of day, season etc)
• What does our character want 

Also because we are using Stanislavski's naturalistic method we as actors are able to make our performance ours, from our point of view but still staying to Chekhov's writing. 

Konstantin Stanislavski 

Konstantin Sergeievich Stanislavski Alexeiev was born 17 January 1863 – 7 August 1938. Konstantin was a Russian theatre practitioner and was one of the greatest and most influential of modern theatre practitioners. His method of acting is for the actor to become the role that they are playing . From a young boy Stanislavski was interested in being able to experience the role in which he wanted to maintaining characterisation in real life. This ties into his system in which it generates the actors conscious in order to generate our psychological/mental behavior by making them uncontrollable. Within our rehearsals our objective is to find what our characters ulterior motives.



Within rehersals I sometimes found it difficult to connect with my character Masha because I felt that she was sometimes too dark and quite ignorant to her boyfriend. I had to sometimes take a moment by myself within the rehersals to get back into character and focus on what my objective was which is to escape from the life I was living. Another technique I used was always trying to react and respond with my cast;

• By being an active listener
• Avoiding being too tentative
•  Remembering my cues
• Vocally
• Using eye contact and body language
  

I found this useful because I'd know how to react as the character Masha, depending on the response I'd get from other cast members. This was also useful because this helps overall performance based in terms of how to act when on stage whether I'm just standing there on scene or just acting . I was pleased with our final outcome of the performance as I felt extremely natural and comfortable with myself and my whole cast. I believe we conveyed the story line well and met our objectives.

Macbeth- Shakespeare

William Shakespeare 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616 was an English Poet , actor and a playwright; Shakespeare is considered to be greatest literary cannon and greatest writers known. Shakespeare produced most of his known works between 1589 and 1613. His  main genre was tragedies but also comedies and historic such as  Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, and Macbeth. Shakespeare wrote in iambic pentameter. The results were plays and sonnets that had ten syllables per line and with his plays, these lines were rhymed. The simplest way to describe the rhythm of iambic pentameter is to liken it to a heartbeat. I believe Shakespeare did so because the language he uses is presented beautifully as it was about telling a good story or furthering the plot.

Within this unit we are studying William Shakespeare's tragedy set in the 11th century, Macbeth who was a brave Scottish general who receives a prophecy from a group of witches, telling him one day he will become King of Scotland. It was said to be written 1606 during the time in the reign of James I and Macbeth was written as a reflection of his close friendship with the King..

My first response to Macbeth was I found the story interesting as I have read and studied, I think the overall story is educational because you learn a lot about the historic on Scotland, Very emotional in terms of being a tragedy.

Within the rehearsals we chose to perform the play in a classical genre due to respecting Shakespeare and the play as a whole we thought that staying true to the script would ensure that the audience would be brought back to the 11th century and seeing the play for its true-ness. I was set the role as one of the 3 witches (witch 2), being the 3 witches we thought of which way we could interpret the witches; we decided each witch would have their own persona in terms of having our own gestures, wearing different costumes so each character would be different. I found it difficult at first trying to portray the witches without being over the top and sticking to an old fashion witch.

As witch 2 I portrayed her to be self absorbed but fairly smart. My objective throughout the play is to bewilder the audience, create eeriness and suspense but to also inform the audience of what was happening throughout the play. I did this by direct eye contact with people in the audience, this helped build my character as it intimidated audience members but also they looked interested , over pronouncing certain words, vocal fluctuation physicality to irk the audiences.

Throughout the rehearsal process, I made contributed within helping my group creatively and helping them understand their character and how they could possibly portray them. I think this made things easier when working as a team because we were a big group and sometimes it is hard to be able to share all ideas and plan collectively without any disputes. I contributed within a sense of leadership skills as I was organised in terms of knowing how to please the group and sometimes lead warm ups to get everyone prepared during rehearsals and final rehearsals and am quite creative which I enjoyed and boosted my confidence over a whole. 

During the final rehearsal I enjoyed watching our performance even when not being on stage as everyone was in high spirits and watching the play that we as a group replicated as a whole. The lighting choices, sound and props that we all as a group chose worked well and was how we imagined it to be.

Throughout this year I have developed an number of skills in order to become a good actress within the future, I am passion in what I do and find that Drama is the route I would like to take within the future. My class mates and teachers have welcomed me within this year and I am pleased with the friends I have made and happy enough to work with. I have previously asked them how they feel about me as a class mate and they have said

• Communicating well, very grounded and confident 
• "when watching, you become your character"
• Good stage and vocal presence 
• Good energy and dedication when performing

 I have learnt how to physically engage myself in terms of being able to separate myself from distractions. I am very aware and observation, not just within my performance but within class which helps me with my behaviour. I feel very confident and grounded within my class as in knowing when to hold back, share ideas and being comfortable enough to show my leadership skills. I am extremely creative and can broaden my ideas in terms of thinking outside of the box and risking myself.