daily blogs

​

                                  New term 

24/1/22 

It’s the beginning of a new term and our project this time is the connections play. The play we’re doing is called ‘remote’ I’ve discussed the story line in my bling post named ‘first look at connections’ that I written a few months ago when we read the script. We discussed all of the provokes us young people live with and how we have no voice to change most of them. It helped us see the motivation behind Antlers decisions and it helped us get a clearer view of the story. Then our next activity was to get into groups of 5 and discuss what we thought the dashes (lines without name attached) and how we thought they’d be portrayed. La Toya came up with the idea that the readers would be on stage a few at a time and could walk around the characters but the characters don’t know they’re there. I thought this was a good idea however, I suggested that it might be a better idea to make the readers a character themselves to give them more purpose. So I said we could have Two readers sitting in the bottom right corner telling the story to not the audience but a few younger people, and as they’re reading it more like a story, it’s being acted out like a play in the background as if it’s showing you what they see in their minds. Then to mix La Toyas idea in we thought the narrators could walk into the story sometimes but it would be metaphorical and more just like they’re explaining what’s going on. I thought the two writers could be Atlas and Blister in the future telling their own story but it just doesn’t tell you that you guess or just old people in general, however, the rest of my group thought we wouldn’t be able to do the makeup or have people who look similar. I think that those problems have easy solutions and aren’t really problems however, I think it’s a lot easier if they’re just people reading the story. 

25/1/22

Today we learned how to properly film a self tape. Since our auditions for the connections play are going to be through self tapes, today taught us everything we need to know about them and how to correctly and professionally do it. We learned to have the camera eye line, with the camera zoomed so you can only see from above your head to your chest unless you want to show the casting director more of your body language. We also learnt that you need to have a plain background with plain colours so nothing takes away or distracts from your performance. I said I wanted to audition for Finn because there’s a lot you can do with the character and also because she has the most growth from the beginning to the end as she leaves the gang. I thought it would be useful to play a more real character in theatre. I also wanted to go for Antler because she’s also very realistic talking about real problems and she is extremely different to Violet. She is aware of the problems of the world and carries a lot of weight and responsibility for a 16 year old girl. I thinks she’s a character you can really give your all to and there’s lots of ways you can do it. My favourite character right now is Antler. 

26/1/22

 re-read the play on Monday and refreshed my memory of the characters and story line and today we read it all together so we and Kelly could imagine it coming to life more. I read for Antler with Rebecca and kadie and everyone who wanted to be a certain part played that character. It was so exiting to see it start to take off and I really think it’s going to be a good play. After the exercises we did today based of Una Hagen’s research on character development I feel like I know so much more about Antler ready for audition tapes being filmed tomorrow. We wrote their name, she, where they are, time it was set and literal time. We thought it was a very present time piece that reflected today’s life for teenagers.  We really looked in depth into the characters and it explained everything they were saying and it made so much more Sense. I’m extremely excited for self taping tomorrow. 

27/1/22

Today I filmed my first self tape which was for Antler. I am really interested in filming for Antler for a few reasons, one because she is so so different to Violet and I really want to push myself to improve on my abilities. Another reason is because, she represents a lot of young people in this day and age and although her reasoning from going up the tree and protesting spreads an important message that could help the world, it also reminds people to look at their actions and see what's causing them and to change you're perspective when things don't make sense. After doing the character development sheet yesterday, my reading for the character has already improved. the motivation behind her had completely changed and it turned the whole character into someone else, someone everyone can relate too. I filmed it with Kadie and we both read for each other filmed it, watched it and gave advice then filmed again few times. I'll talk to you tomorrow when I read for my second character :)

28/1/22

Today i read for Finn, I hadn't done character development on her at college so I did it at home instead, i made a full backstory so what she said made sense to me and so i could get into her mindset. I'd changed it from what i originally saw her being like, she was different because i understood her in a different way to when i was first introduced to her. I like Finn because she's complex and misunderstood and there's so much freedom to make her a character you want her to play. I think the self tape went okay, I feel like you can never be fully satisfied when filming a self tape because you have so many opportunities to try again but, at some point, you just have to trust that you've accurately pitched how you would play the character.

I get really nervous thinking about the fact that there is only one cast and 7 characters, i literally feel sick writing this right now, however i know that whether you get a named character or not you have the power to turn what you have into someone you are excited to play. See you on Monday when we might be getting the cast list :)!

31/1/22

Today, the whole class got put in groups to preform as their favourite character. I got paired with Ethan to improvise a scene between Antler and Desk. we did a scene which was set a few months before the play was set. i tried to include crystal to so it felt like i was Antler. i wanted to include the sweetness because of course she's sweet that's how she ended up with too much pressure on her shoulders. then i also wanted to show how it annoyed her and but she did it anyway because she had to. i think Magen and Rebecca who are also going for Antler were really good at it and both played it very differently to me. Magen is more anxious and Rebecca is more annoyed. exited and nervous to see the cast list tomorrow, i think every character had someone really good going for them so this show is going to be amazing!!

1/2/22

Today we were auditioning for Remote again. We had to go into groups of character i went into the Antler group. There's3 of us going for Antler but only me and Rebecca were in this lesson. I went with La Toya to do a scene, she's going for desk. then after these scenes were shown Kane asked different people to do different scenes with different people. I did another scene as Antler but with Jamie this time who's going for Oil. I tried to add in the frustration Antler was feeling along with all of the uncertainty and pressure she was feeling. I preferred this scene to the last one i preformed just because there's more I can put into it. After college, we found out the cast list! I didn't get the role of Antler because I didn't play it the way Kelly and Kane had in mind and that's okay. I am very exited to see what we do with the dashes and how we make them an entertaining part of the play.

2/2/22

Today was a fun day. we started blocking the show. first of all all the dashes had to create a character for themselves. we started this by playing an improv game, we all sat around the sides and imagined the room was a park, then we had to go into the scene and do something people would do in a park. me and Tamara went in and sunbathed then Latoya and Emie joined us by eating ice lolly's next to us, then we changed our characters and we became a yoga group. Then me and Justin broke off from the group and we became single parents with our prams out on a walk then on a picnic in the park. My dash character is an early thirties single mom named Cindy with her 5 month old Daisy. She's best friends with Connor who id a single, gay dad to his son Bobby-Lee. Cindy is a face book mom who loves to gossip and loves her wine. She loves baby Daisy. She also loves her 'me' time. Then there's my other character that is witch to half way through the show. She's called Aria and she's 17. she is a bit of a hippie with her best friends Cassie, Lilia and I forgot what Justin's character is called. She is free spirited and likes to go to the park with her fiends to listen to music, smoke weed and joke about. They're not chavs. I'm so exited to keep developing these scenes and characters this is so much fun!

3/2/22

Today we went to watch blood brothers at the Durham theatre! I had such a fun time, the whole experience was good, getting the train together and watching the show knowing that we’ll be preforming it in a few months. I loved the show and absolutely can’t wait till we start working on it. Right now the characters that I want to go for are are Mrs Johnstone because she has so much depth and personality and because it’s a scouse accent that would be a challenge. I think playing her would really help me grow into a much better actor because of the characters development and connections with other characters. Another character is like to go for is Linda. She also has a scouse accent that would challenge me. Linda is a very confident character that changes drastically from the beginning till the end to the point where you’re not just playing one character. I think playing her would make me a much more confident actor. I’ve written a review which is also posted on my blog if you’d like to see my full opinion on the play. Overall I really enjoyed the show. 

7/2/22

Today we played a game where we walked into the circle and said a character we thought was good, a part of the show we liked and a part we disliked. A character that stood out to me was Mrs Johnston she excellently portrayed emotion. A part of the show I like was the set, the set was amazing and so detailed. A part of the show that I disliked was that the Lyons chemistry, I feel like they didn’t have much chemistry because of the mother but she was an understudy so she didn’t have as much rehearsal time so that might be why. After that, we just rehearsed more of the connections show. People have started bringing in more props and the stage is looking a lot more full now. There’s people meditating, me and Justin are with our babies, Samantha is on her scooter, Harleys on a bench and Karly is around and we’re only a quarter of the way through. I like that trinity is scaring around in her roller skates. I think this show is going to be really great!

8/2/22

Today we worked more on our connections play, Remote. We went into more detail with our character development by getting a printed out copy of the sheet. We went into a lot more detail and discovered a lot more about our characters that will help us understand and preform them (I will post the character development sheet on my blog). Then to help us create our characters even more we had to create a scenario for our characters that isn’t on the script and film it to post on our blog. For Cindy it’s going to be a hair tutorial on a client in her salon for Instagram reels and her baby Daisy will be crying in the back and she carries her and opens a bottle of wine. And for Aria the young hippie-ish cool girl, I thought she could do a YouTube video of a day in her life or an activity she was doing. I think she will have painted a picture but I haven’t fully decided yet. Great and helpful day! :)

9/2/22

Today we finished blocking the whole show! Now we can fully concentrate on learning the lines and acting it out with more personality because we know what we’re doing. Me and Justin were given more lines as Cindy and Connor and we’ve cut out our other characters of hippy teens because we found a way to keep our characters throughout! I’m very exited about this show and have high hopes for it. I was called out today for tutorial with Kane and we discussed how the thing I have to improve in most is my projection!! :)

10/2/22

Today we started something completely new. We started our writing lesson so we can eventually write our own scripts. To start us off we have to write a 250 words intro to a story that comes from, 

• ...you received a letter informing you that you had won a competition?

 • ...your brother/mother announced they were leaving?

• ...you found something strange in the cereal?

• ...you realised you were the only person left in the world?

• ...you knew something that no one else did?

It also has to follow the same pattern as every story to be interesting. The storyline will be  A lead character discovers s/he wants something,S/he gets into trouble trying to get what s/he wants, S/he now has to get out of trouble to get what s/he wants, And at the end of the story, win or lose, the character usually realises that they now want something else instead...or need to change their attitude to other people in order to get what they want. I will post my story start when it’s completed. Then we switch will our classmates for middle and end.

Today we also watched Toms show which was a singing show. It was nice to support the other course that supports us. After watching it I don’t think I’ll do that course because it foco used on singing. But overall it was very entertaining and fun.

14/2/22

Today was fun, we rehearsed a lot and I got to use the buggy for my character Cindy’s baby. I feel like I’m starting to get the character a lot more and it’ll be a lot better when I learn all my lines. We were working in the actual space we will have at York instead of what we’d have at our theatre, connections really want to see us get through challenges like adapting to different spaces so it’s good that we’ve already started working on it.

15/2/22

Today we were rehearsing the rest of the show. I was focusing on my characterisation which I think is getting better. We finished blocking every scene in the York space and we assigned all of the lines. I’m glad we all know what we’re doing now so we can fully bring the stage to life. I know that I need to learn all my lines and focus on projection so that’s what I’ll be focusing on mainly because I know that if it’s not good this show will be bad and I won’t get a good part in the next one, blood brothers. After college I met will Hollie, Martin, Adrian and Henry to film Their music video. We went to salt burn and we were there for about 3 hours. It was freezing cold but it was very insightful and fun. I like working on more film projects so I can get experience and be comfortable in front of the camera and also so there’s more to add to my showreel. 

16/2/22

Today we did a bit of a different lesson. We started off playing our warm up games as normal we played mob-boss wink murder which is fun and gets us all connecting. Then we played an improv game where two people go into the circle and one of them is speaking gibberish and the other one is translating like they’re in court and they’re trying to convince everyone that they didn’t do the crime. But we don’t know what the crime is so that’s also part of the challenge. Then we played the improv game where someone had to be on the floor one on the chair and one stood up the whole time we played this for a while and kept switching people in. Then to get everyone involved we went into groups and kept playing this game where we were all involved and having fun with it. Subconsciously, this taught us how to tell stories, how to devise a scene. We learnt improvisation which can really help you save a scene or just make it more interesting. It helped us work on our listening and reacting skills and learnt how to love with purpose in a scene. It helped us get more comfortable preforming in front of an audience and it helped us focus and be present in the moment. This fun game really helps us grow as actors and it doesn't feel like work. When doing rehearsals I noticed some unnamed characters with really good characterisation like the yoga girls, they all know their characters and commit to them through the whole show. Much like the old grandpas that are always kicking about the park, they deliver every line like their characters would and they are focused throughout. I have high hopes for this show. 

Final week of Rehearsal

 

Heading into this week everybody was definitely stressed and anxious. Because of our last show getting pushed back due to covid, we had less rehearsal time than usual. Then we spent the weeks we had before half term getting to know the story, auditioning, creating our own characters, blocking scenes and then hardest of all, dishing out all of the dash lines to characters that would make sense saying them. I think that was definitely a challenge because we ended up passing the lines around so much even till just before half term because we just wanted the show to make sense and then Dylan couldn’t do the show anymore so people had to get his lines. Then characters changed so different lines matched there character so it changed again. With this it made it hard for us all to remember our line then because of how randomly spaced out the lines were it made it a challenge to remember our cues, so I think even though I knew my lines I was still too scared to leave my script just in case there was a cue I’d forgotten about. However, we did a task where we all stood in a circle and did a speedy read through and I think because using the scripts wasn’t an option we really had to trust that we knew our lines and then when I turned out for me that I did know all my lines and cues when under the pressure it gave me a lot of confidence. On the same day a student who had already done this show before and ,who is now on Tom’s course, came in to give us some advice. It was comforting when she told us that she, and the rest of her class,  shared all the same problems with remembering lines and queues because of the nameless lines. Her advice to us was to either record the cue lines and then say your lines after so you can remember. To be honest, I think this could be great advice but I used a different method that I read about. The method I used was just going over all the queues and then just telling myself that what my character says after that line what I would personally say it. After that we just ran it without scripts (for the most part) so we could fully focus on our body language and cues. We moved the set around a tiny bit by just switching the tree and bench around but it was super easy to adjust to them changes because it didn’t really change much haha. We were all a bit annoyed that even though we had an important show next week we were only allowed to use the theatre 1 day in the week before we still managed to re block it all really well in the short amount of time we had. Tom told us we had to work on our stage craft so that’s something we worked on and by the time we did the show, Tom was impressed with our stage craft improvements. 

Okay, now it’s the week of the show, we’ve got 2/3 days of rehearsing to do and I’m pretty confident that we’re going to do well in the show because we always seem to figure it out just before.  Me and Justin have been thinking about ways to stay looking busy on stage since we spend so much time just sitting around on the stage and because we  don’t want to look boring/ out of character. We’ve decided to have coffee cups at the beginning of the show and wine at the end, then I got milk and a bottle so I could randomly feed my character’s baby throughout the show. I’ve been trying to work on my projection recently, no actually it’s been something I’ve tried to focus on the whole time we’ve been at college. I really don’t know why I find it so hard because it’s just talking  loud, it’s not complex and shouldn’t be difficult. Through the rehearsals I found myself focusing more on how loud I was than anything else. Kelly told me that she thinks it’s something I’ll have to work on forever because of my voice. I still try to be louder and it’s something I’ll be working on. I remember before preforming each Charlie show, my projection problem was the thing I was most stressed about because People couldn’t hear me enough so it’s what I was also stressed about for this show. We started to create our set by getting fake autumn leaves and scattering them along the floor, getting branches and sticks to make the trees and painting benches and boxes. Whilst they weee doing that, me kadie and La Toya were doing media marketing together. It was a good opportunity because we could use Kelly’s phone to create drafts and posts on Instagram. Because the higher ups at the college have said that we’re not allowed to log into the Instagram and post ourselves and that we have to do it through Kelly, it has made things a bit more difficult because we can’t just post in the moment. One thing I did do was go through and follow some of the people who follow the apta account, this got us another 100 followers in a few hours. The day of the show was so much more relaxed and a lot calmer than the rehearsal days. I think it was just because we all know our lines and cues now and that the blocking was all right. And even if there was a problem it was a nice environment to work it out in.  We were ready to preform. 

SHOWDAY!!

today is a day that we as a class have all looked forward to and dreaded. Exited to show off our creative ideas and hard work but afraid that we might accidentally miss a que or botch up a line. We went in and everyone was relaxed and exited because we knew we had done everything we could for it. we only did a small amount of rehearsing of just the end part of the show. we worked mainly on our reactions to the big fight that almost happens. i think us other people at the park really bring more life to the scene now that were all more dramatic about it because before we were more flat, this just really brings up the energy and gets people intrigued in the story. we all got ourselves ready and had a long break before our 2 pm show where musical theatre, art and design and the A level actors came to watch as a warm up for our show later on. Even though it was kind of a practice show we still had to show the audience what we can do and make sure they can see what we put into it. Also this performance goes into consideration when we get our practical grade for the show so we had to give it our all. i think my performance in the first show was quite good, i think i committed to my character and used props around me to create a realistic scene however, my volume wasn't loud enough and i just needed to project my voice more. even when i was doing the show i was continuously trying to up my volume but it is never loud enough, for some reason it always sounds like I'm just as loud as everyone around me, but i am working on it. i think as a whole the first show was good but there was problems like people forgetting lines, people communicating with the audience, projection problems. then we had a long break before the next show where we heard our notes and worked on them and just re energised ready for the second show. For this show we were nervous because we had the man here to watch but not that nervous because we’d already preformed it once and everybody was very supportive of each other. For this show I think things went much better than the first show. Exit’s and entrances onto the stage were much cleaner and smoother (there was a few mistakes with people bumping into the people they were looking for). There was also a small problem with projection but we were heard clearly for majority of the play. There was way less gaps between lines and cues. I personally think me and Justin were a bit more panicked for this show because we were sat in our bench and we’d just be saying in character what’s next because we knew how important it was to be good. I still needed to up my projection but it is a work in progress. Nothings ever perfect and there’s always stuff to be fixed but we gave it a good shot, I’ll let you know what notes he gives back :) 

14/3/22

Today was a fun day. It was the beginning of working on our end of year show, blood brothers. When you think of blood brothers on thing that comes to mind is the iconic scouse accent that most of the cast has. Now because of that it means we have to all have a great Liverpool accent ready for auditions. We all went in groups with someone who could do the accent then listened to what they said and repeated it with the accent. I like the accent but I do think it takes some time to warm it up. We went over the vowels as a class and it really helps you frame your sentences. Then we got a script from stags and hens the play by Willy — (which is amazing by the way) and we did a scene of that in groups. The girls went in groups of four and the boys went in groups of four or five. I was in a group with Kadie, La Toya and Emie. We dishes out the characters and ran the lines in a scouse accent. Then we added body language, then personal touches we thought our character would have. I absolutely adore this play so far and I really want to preform the full thing, it’s just so fun and different and I love the accent it has with it. Then we got a sentence to practice in the scouse accent it was, “ Time is taking its toll on Terry.” The other sounds we were given to practice we’re; Consonant Sounds

A Scouse accent has three very distinctive consonants: ‘t’s (TAKE WHAT?), ‘k’s (BACKTRACK) and ‘r’s (RARITY). You’ll also find – g-dropping (NOTHIN’ DOIN’), h-dropping (HARD HAT) and plosive ‘th’ sounds (THOSE THINGS). Here they are in more detail:

 1) TART- it is pronounced with /s/ to make an affricate [t͡s] in Scouse: TEA, TALK, PART, WITTY.ft

15/3/22

Today we spent the day catching up on assignments and starting a new task which is where we have to research a practitioner in the industry. I pared up with Emie to study Lee Strasberg. Once we’ve got all of our information we’re going to teach the rest of the class about him and his work.

16/3/22

Today we spent the day with Tom doing a singing lesson. This lesson was so so so much fun and it also helped a lot. Me and a few others were saying how we’d like to keep having singing lessons from him occasionally because although it’s not something we want to focous on it’s good to know. We warmed up our bodies, faces and voices by doing lots of different exercises. Then we started singing different little songs like sweet chariot and trying to harmonise. Then we went on to sing tell me it’s not true. We went in three groups I was put in the tone group, then there was high and low as well. He went over the lyrics with each group and then showed us how to sing in the tone we’d been put in. Eventually we were all singing together. After that, the girls sang Marilyn Monroe. This song is much easier because you can kind of talk it instead of singing it. This song is very repetitive so it’s easy to learn. I learnt a lot this lesson, like how your mouth and throat move when you sing, then also how to warm up ready to sing, and also how to harmonise. I had a great day and would love to do it again. 

21/3/22

Today we got the scripts for blood brothers and did a read through as year 1. I read parts of it as mrs Johnstone and already the main thing I have to work on is the accent. I can do the accent after hearing other people speaking in it for a little bit so when I was first I completely forgot how to do it eek, I’m very glad we get help for our auditions for this show. So far this script is really good and I’m exited to read more!!! :)

22/3/22

Today we rehearsed connections ‘remote’ again to prepare for York. We changed a few things according to the feedback we’ve been given to give ourselves the best chance possible. I think the changes have been really helpful and the show is just going to keep improving. Me and Justin now talk to the audience instead of each other but we talk to them as friends, I think this is a lot better because it helps me look towards the audience and project more. 

23/3/22

Today we continued working on remote. We were all fully focused on improving the show. Me and Justin are now on the stage at all times which makes it easier because now we don’t have to think of where we’re going on and off in the small York theatre. We’re all very dedicated to making this play great so we’re going to keep working for it. 

24/3/22

Today is the day we were supposed to do our presentation for the film and TV lesson however Tom's course were doing their show today so we went to watch them instead. i liked this show of theirs, it had a lot of drama and emotion in it which made it seem really fun to preform. they did 'the widows' show.

28/3/22

Today we did something very exiting and creative to get into the headspace of seven year olds so we can more accurately play young Linda, Mickey or Eddie. We started by laying down and just remembering things we used to do in year 2. Things we loved, things we hated and things we’d say. Then once we’d re sparked our memories we sat down and pretended Kelly was the teacher. We’d fidget and talk like children to fully get in character. Then we had to make poems as the characters and you could see a lot of characterisation from people. Then we played a game of duck duck goose as the characters. We really enjoyed letting ourselves go and enjoying just being free and careless for a while. Then after that we got given Mickeys monologue to learn in time for next week. The monologue is from when he’s seven so we really had to channel the young child we were earlier as-well as having a Scouse accent. Me and kadie sat and helped each other learn the whole thing in about 12 minutes by just saying a line out loud and then adding more each time. 

29/3/22

Today, we looked at a character sheet of blood brothers which told us the history of the story and the importance of certain aspects which we’ll have to figure out by research. Most of this we’ll be completing at home to develop the play. The sheets include things like plot summary, key themes, historical context, social context and cultural context. I look forward to reading more about it and I’ll update you when it’s completed. 

30/3/22

Today we had a guest come in to speak to us. An actor named Karl who is an ex student at Stockton riverside, came in to give us a charitable donation to fund some of our bus to York to preform at the connections competition. He said he appreciated all of the opportunities the course had given him and wanted to help us out. He’s been on channel four, batgirl and a few more things after taking a break from acting. He gave us advice and shared a few life lessons about how “the world doesn’t owe you anything, if you want something, no matter how hard it is you have to be the one to go out and get it.” This was really good advice because sometimes it feels like it should just happen. He watched remote and he gave us all advice. He told me and Justin to just be a bit quicker with ques which is something we already know we need to work on. Later on, me, Emie, Magen and trinity, who are the four people going for Mrs Johnstone, had a short singing lesson. We sang ‘Marilyn Monroe’ together a few times with the accent and then we sand the first half one by one. I definitely sang it in the wrong tone and messed it up because I prefer to talk it rather than sing it kind of because I’ve never had any singing training. But hopefully we have other chances to get the part because singing is definitely not my strong suit.

31/3/22

Today was the day we did our presentation. Me and the others had stayed back extra after it got pushed back a week and it was really helpful and a good job because we had to redo most of it after half of it was lost. We started by practicing who was saying what and quickly went over it so we knew what we were talking about. Then we listened to everyone else’s presentation, they were all very good ideas and I think there will be a lot of good scripts coming out of this. We all had very different ideas which is good and keeps it fresh and exiting. I think our presentation went really well. We’d made sure to put in all the information necessary and we designed it to make it interesting and pretty. We had our sheets of paper with points on so we weren’t constantly looking at the board and could connect with the audience more. I feel like I presented it confidently. We kept it upbeat and only included important information so it didn’t get boring and make the story seem unnecessary. (Production process of this is on a separate blog.)

okay now we've got 3 days till the show and things are getting real. were trying not to over do it before the show but we still need to work on it so this week were going to be going over it but not everyday so lets see what's happening.

4/4/22

So today, since we've got two weeks off after our show on Thursday and then were going to be completely focused on blood brothers we went over the whole blood brothers assignment. i like how this assignment is on paper so we can cross them off and annotate them. today we just did some work on remote and just tried to get it up to standard and refresh our memories for Thursday yayy.

5/4/22

todaay we worked on our presentations in the LRC. me and Emie are working together to find out everything we can about Lee Strasburg. we've completed about 9 pages full of information and fact checked stories. we've been writing all about method acting which he came up with so we can teach it to the class in a presentation when we come back to college after the easter holidays. We've also been looking into Heath ledger and how his tragic death could be linked to method acting and an example of how it can be taken too far and become dangerous. Lee is a very interesting man and i have used his method for projects in the past.

6/4/22

today was a fun day, last night a few of us got a text message from kelly asking us to do the photo shoot tomorrow to advertise the course. so in-between rehearsals for Remote (which is tomorrow by the way ahhhh) we went over to the eye and took some professional pictures. we were doing different emotions and holding different props like binders and giant hashtags. then we went around college taking pictures in different places, like walking through the corridor, sat outside and in the library. it was so fun doing this experience because it felt so professional and inportant and we all had a good laugh. then we went back to rehearsals and everything ran smoothly, at this point i have a lot of confidence in us for tomorrow and i'm ready to put all of these notes and good advice to use. were going on tourr yayyyy!! :)

show day vlog is posted separately :)

25/4/22 BLOOD BROTHERS BEGINS

Today was a good day, it was different to usual. So we started the day by getting our audition scripts that are going to be THIS THURSDAY ahhhh!!! It’s so nerve wracking and so exiting. I’m going for mrs Johnstone and then Kelly wants us to go for a second character so I’m also interested in mrs Lyons. I just feel like both of them are so emotionally complex and have a lot of depth. So I’m going to work on learning the script now :) then we had a tutorial lesson about knife crime and it was so impactful. The woman that came in to educate us was sharing real life tragedies that she and others had experience and it made me really emotional, I think that woman is really preventing a lot of heart breaking incidents by sharing these stories. 

Then later on me, La Toya, Kadie, Jo and our tutors went to the globe to discuss our Halloween project that we’re doing next year. We met with the person who ran the event last year and he showed us some videos of the last one. But we decided to take it in a bit of a different direction. Ours is more about following a story that happened in the past and being caught in the time between the past and the present and the living and the dead. I think this has a lot of work but we’ve already been marking what could happen at each point. I think we’re trying to make ours more sinister and eerie and classy rather than a lot of quick scares. I’m so exited that we all have a part in moulding this story, all of our ideas are really working well together. It’s fun to feel like we’re working for the globe and doing something important. I’m exited for future meeting !! :)

26/4/22

Today was a helpful day. We had a day in the theatre just on our own whilst Kelly and Kane were working with the TV and Film class and this time gave us time to discuss and decide who were going for.Then we had a chance to rehearse with each other so someone else who's going for the other part could practice character development too, so me and Geoffrey worked together for my mrs Johnstone and mrs Lyons and his Eddie. i know the mrs J script now but im not 100% confident with it yet because of the accent that i need to work on and now that im home im going to focous on mrs Lyons a bit more so i can be more confident in hers. Im better at the mrs Lyons accent but not as good with the mannerisms so thats what im going to work on. :)

27/4/22

So today was another day of rehearsals and I've improved a lot. i went over my Mrs Johnston audition script with Emie and we both feel a lot more confident with it now.Then i just went over the Mrs Lyons script on my own and just memorised a line at a time and added it on. then me and emie rehearsed the Marilyn Monroe song in the changing rooms ready for auditions tomorrow. im still not 100% comfortable with my lines but ill practice tonight. so im home now and ive been practising it for a while but im going to stop now so i dont overdo it and loose the energy ive put in it.

9/5/22

today was our first day of rehearsing the play. since we were missing some of cast one we started with cast two instead. this meant that i could spend the lesson just drilling my lines and annotating the script some more. its really important to learn the lines as fast as you can because 1. we have only got 3 weeks of rehearsal and 2. when were relying on the script we cant really act which means the director us unable to accurately direct. I was just going over a certain few lines until i knew them and worked my way through. my character has quite a lot of lines especially in the first half and i knew that would be one of the first things to rehearse so i just wanted to be confident with it. i had stayed up till 3am the night before since i was at work all weekend so by today i did know a lot of it but im not fully confident. I feel so connected to this character so when im doing these scenes i feel like theres a lot of emotion i can put into it. 

10/5/22

today was the first proper day of rehearsing cast one. we have leart from the very beginning to after the Marilyn Monroe song. its not a lot but these are two parts that are more specificaly choreographed. the very begining is meant to be quite ghostly and unrealistic because it's meant to be foreshadowing. it feels like were all reliving our fate because we stand up on ques. It's really quite eerie and i think when we find the music to pair with it, it will be really emotional and exciting. im also a part of the mrs johnstone dance part which is really fun and high energy, we are going to choreograph more tomorrow it'll be really gooddd!

11/5/22

So today was another fun and productive day. We started off by doing improvisation instead of playing games, Kelly thought it would be best for us to start doing some more Improv since we don’t do a lot of it. Our task was to Google superstitions and create a scene whether it be funny, serious to teach the other students about it . I went into a group with Kadie LaToya Emie and Megan. We created a scene about the 666 superstition and how a lot of people believe it went back to the Bible. People believe that saying 666 summons the devil. Our scene showed how people use religion to protect themselves from superstition and how to some people superstitions are stupid. Then we went on to rehearse Blood Brothers more. We did the scene from yesterday again but we had to go to the very end and stage that first. The way we’ve done it now is a lot more realistic and is more likely to make people cry which in the end is a main goal of ours because Blood Brothers is supposed to be sad. I think so far rehearsals are going really well however, we don’t have much time and with the films and Willy Russell show I think we’re all very stressed at the minute. I’m really struggling to see how we’re going to fit it all in as well as doing the coursework but I know it always works out in the end. ( ive written a piece all about superstition and blood brothers separate.)

12/5/22

I started off my day by coming in early and rehearsing for the showcase, our day out. it was a productive lesson however, i was annoying because some people didnt turn up and other people were in maths and english so the have a different rehearsal time. After that we went to the dance studio where we rehearsed and leaned all of the song we will be doing in the willy Russel showcase. i think preforming these songs is a good opportunity and something really fun and fresh. its something light that we can justv let our selves go in because it dosent have to be perfect.

16/5/22

Today was a day I spent filming for Casey and Freya. Instead of meeting at the college like I normally do, I met the whole cast at the church on Stockton high street. I found it really exciting to film in a building out of college all day, it felt very professional. We had a good time but overall we were all putting everything into our characters. I did make a mistake of looking into the camera when I wasn’t supposed to but we shot the scenes a few times so it’s okay. I also had another problem which is quite embarrassing, I had just finished a scene and I stood for a few minutes whilst they watched it back and I looked down and The top of my dress had slid down a bit too much haha. I feel so much more comfortable I front of the camera now compared to the beginning of the year and it’s so exiting! After filming me and Charley walked back to college and I stayed to learn some more lines for blood brothers. Actually I was supposed to be going over something for the showcase but when I got there the director was working on something else and the person I was working with was doing something else too so I learnt my mrs Lyons lines. 

17/5/22

Today I went over a scene with Geoffrey and Henry. Me and Kelly have been talking about how I need to be smothering Geoffrey in all our scenes because mrs Lyons is very loving has a physical touch love language we think. So we’ve been staging these scenes in a way that she can always be close to him. I need to work on my intimidation skills because he’s meant to be scared of me in a scene but I don’t feel like I’m acting scary at all so I’ll Google some tips and work on it. I do like how quickly she flips and comes back from it because it’s like I’m playing two different characters. I just love experimenting with how she lets her anxiety and paranoia take over her, it’s something I’m really having fun with. Then I stayed back after just to work on this scene more.

18/5/22

Today I spent more time just learning my lines and experimenting with scenes. I mainly work with Tamara and Geoffrey because Geoff is my scene partner for most scenes and me and Tam are both playing mrs Lyons so we help each other with scenes and remembering lines. Today we did mrs Lyons monologue where the audience starts to see more of her craziness shine through. She’s on the phone to her husband but we can only see her side of the conversation and she’s begging him to move them away. I liked how i really felt like I was on the phone to someone because I think you could really feel the realness of it. Later on I went out to the grass and rehearsed stags and Hens but we were missing a cast member again because there’s aa lot of scheduling conflicts with the Willy Russel show so we didn’t really get a lot done. We had already staged it so now it’s mainly about learning lines. After that we had a singing lesson with Tom where we staged tell me it’s not true for the showcase. It starts with Magen (because she’s an incredible singer!!!) , then the girls come in and then the boys come in. I think it’s really going to look good on the stage.

19/5/22

Today I finished blocking so many of my scenes for blood brothers, now I only have one scene left and i’ve blocked it all! I’m really exited to get it all blocked because it’s something I’ve really been worrying about, I still need to do a lot of experimenting with how I do scenes but it’s going good. Me and Emie came in a few hours early and we blocked the first 3 scenes ourselves because we hadn’t done that part yet and it’s made us both a lot more confident with our lines. I think I know majority of the script now however, mrs Lyons is VERY repetitive so I still get confused sometimes but since I’m going over the script at home too I should be fine :)

This week has been about completely drilling the show. We’ve just been going over and over it trying to make sure everybody knows what they’re doing and making sure most scenes has been rehearsed. I’m still feeling worried about it though because even though I’ve blocked most scenes I haven’t gone over them much with with the actual set, because there’s three casts we don’t have as much time to work on stuff with the directors and in the sets because other people are using it however, I’ve been making the most of my time and rehearsing with people separately just so we can feel more confident with it and be completely sure what we’re supposed to be doing. I think if we stay this focused in the following weeks to get it done we should be great but we cannot slack off now. The main scenes I am worried about is all of act one where it’s just me and Emie because I think them scenes are so critical to the play and cannot be messed up and I feel like although we’ve spent a LOT of time going over them on our own, I will feel so much better when Kelly there to properly tell us what she wants us to do and correct my mistakes.

This week has helped me so much!! We’re finally in the theatre where our actual set is and the set is looking really good so far. I went over all the beginning scenes with Kelly and the other Mrs Johnstone's and Mrs Lyons’ and it has made me feel so much better. I still feel like I can make her more manipulative but I’m currently trying to add in some things to my character that will really make people question whether Mrs Lyons is evil or just completely desperate. I’ve personally been playing it like she’s so desperate it’s making her do evil things. I’ve gone over all of my scenes in here and just getting to know the set we will be performing on has helped me so much and made me feel a lot less worried. When it wasn’t my turn to practice on stage I was upstairs rehearsing and going over different things. I also spent a lot of time doing character research and context research. I’ve been looking at different costume ideas and the first thing I’ve bought for it is the shoes they’re small black shoes with a little heel. I think for the rest of the costume I will have it at home, I just need to see what’s best, then next week I’ll bring it in to Kelly. There’s a scene where I have to get really mad at Eddie (Geoffrey) and i feel like before I wasn’t really in it, but now we’ve got the set I just feel like I can embody my character so much more and completely become her, it makes it so much easier to do these angry scenes because now it’s so much better. We also had LAMDA come in this week for a workshop. We went over a lot of scripts and learnt how to figure out a character with a tiny bit of information which was really useful. Then we looked at how a script with little information can be okay however you’re going to come out with something completely unique so if that’s not what the casting director is looking for you won’t get the part but we can’t help that. It was actually very insightful however, I still don’t really think that school is the top choice for me as it’s a lot of money and then you have to pay for you’re own accommodation and because there’s a lot of negativity around how they haven’t changed with the times. I think they’re lessons have been great but I don’t think i could go. 

This next week is where things got reallllyyyy intense. This was our final week of rehearsals and where we tech’d everything. We’ve been spending all day everyday just drilling scenes over and over and over again. It’s been so helpful to have this time and space. It also really helps the directors now that everybody is of script so you can see that things are improving very quickly now. When it wasn’t my turn I was still rehearsing in the other rooms and going over lines or doing work, I wanted to make use of all of my time whilst we had it. I’m not worried about any scenes anymore because I know what I’m supposed to be doing in all of them which is nice and it’s a weight off. We also went over some singing with Tom which was good because we needed to do it for arrows piece in the Willy Russel showcase. It was really to just help if us learn the songs  because Magen was singing lead of a lot of them because she’s so talented. Though I’m not worried about any scenes in particular and am still worried about the show in general, I’m just scared I’m going to do something wrong but that’s now because I haven’t rehearsed enough it’s just because I care enough about the show and I want it to be great. I went over stags and hens which is Tamara and Emily’s Willy Russel piece. That’s the scene for the showcase I feel most confident about because for the others I haven’t been able to make many rehearsals. We’ll Jo hasn’t had any rehearsals with me and Emie yet and Daniel's were always at times I was rehearsing something else or at a driving lesson which has made this showcase feel really stressful. We’re going to have to go over it before the show because I haven’t even staged a few of them yet. I’m way way wayyy more confident about blood brothers than the Willy Russel showcase.

(My evaluation of show day has been posted separately)