14/11/12 - 17/11/12

 Week 10 of Milly's acting journey

On Monday 14th November, we spent the morning learning about our new assignment as our first assignment was due on this day in which I sent in the previous day after working on it for 3 weeks. I found my first assignment okay as a first one, it wasn't challenging and I felt that at times I was writing with ease and on a roll without realising. The only thing was learning about Jerzy Gratowski, a famous practitioner, as there were multiple theories he came up with and they all were different so finding his most famous was hard. They each made a difference so in my assignment I referenced his others but covered mainly his theory on "Poor Theatre." Looking back, the assignment was not difficult and I had to use a lot of my own knowledge and opinion of activities done in class, and especially the Stockton Globe Tour for Halloween. I'm ready and prepared for the next upcoming assignment as it's focused on mainly our Wizard Of Oz show, in which I'll be able to write lots as I play the titular character of Dorothy. I'll also be able to write about my experience with the film makers doing our copycat scenes and Whitby for the suspense films. Later on, we spent the day going through scene 2, which is where the Munchkins and Belinda The Good Witch Of The North meet Dorothy for the first time. I'm alongside this scene with Emily Howard, who plays her character amazingly and I'm so happy we get to act together in this show. The scene portrays emotions from Dorothy of surprise when she meets the Munchkins and Belinda, shock when she realises what she has done to the Wicked Witch and also when she meets the other Wicked Witch. There is also feeling of caution yet also curiosity as she is unknown to her surroundings yet she would like to discover more. I felt the scene went really well, and since we have done it a few times before as well, I've found that the repetition of doing it that day has allowed me to learn that scene easily. Rehearsing small scenes is certainly getting me excited for the real thing. 

On Tuesday 15th November, we spent the morning with Kane like normal monologues where a few people performed their monologues. I felt that I needed another week to prepare for mine since I was allowed that extra week so took it, so that it would be a detailed monologue and would slightly replicate the original. My monologue is from La La Land in which Mia played Emma Stone, tells Sebastian played by Ryan Gosling that she is having doubts about her acting career and she has no interest in being humiliated when an audition doesn't go right because of others. This scene spoke to me, as La La Land is one of my favourite films so I knew that I wanted to do one from it to give my fellow classmates and friends a chance to see what films I'm interested in. It also spoke to me as it's such a powerful scene in its foreground since she's basically admitting to her love that she has lost her other love of acting and that belief she has earlier in the film in herself has disappeared slowly, with every downfall and bad ending in her life. I find that what she says, is how I never feel about my future with acting and performing since I've wanted to do it since I can remember, and even though I'm not the most confident person ever, I understand that I will hear more NO's than YES in my life, and to not lose that confidence and disbelief in myself since they might not be looking for someone like me and when that Yes comes along, it'll all be worth it. Everyone's monologues were amazing and gave me an insight into my fellow peer's interests in film. A few did monologues from Doctor Who, which showed to me that they clearly must like and watch it, to be able to nail down his gestures, voice and enthusiasm concerning different subjects. Later on, once all the Year 2’s had arrived we looked deeper into our munchkin characters. We sat in a circle and tried to form relationships between everyone, in which me and Emily Howard came up with our beauty idea of working as beauticians in Munchkin land. I also formed a bond with Emie, who plays a little girl called Bonnie who is also my daughter. We had to act in character as our munchkins throughout our conversations after discovering who and what we meant to each other, in order to build some background in our characters. I gave my character Rose some further details, including I once did the Good Witches hair and she loved it, that I bring my blue hairbrush with me all the time, Popcorn (Emily) and I have shared a beauty shop for 5 years and much more. With our new found detailed Munchkins, we acted out scene 2 taking turn with each cast to allow everyone to play their own munchkin the way they have made their character to act. I found this lesson so interesting and crucial as it’s allowed me to expand in my Munchkin Rose and make my outfit more exciting and fit to my character. 

On Wednesday 16th November, we practiced scene 2 to show Kelly and see what she thinks. It went really well, and Kelly swiftly moved us on into the Wicked Witch of the West scene that follows on after our munchkin work. I got to work with Laura for the first time in this production, and after our work together at the Halloween tour at the Globe, we knew we would work really well together. Tom came in during Millie's read through of Dorothy, and we practiced our Yellow Brick Road chants with instrumental music behind us to make it sound more fascinating and not plain. In doing this, Tom had to have us say the chant over and over to come up with a musical structure for us which was majorly helpful for us as it meant it was rolling off the tongue and the chant was buried in our brains. We went away for break and Tom told us when we came back, that a random cast would fill in and do the scene where the Munchkin's enter so he could add in some additional music. Upon entering in, I saw Emily Howard and asked if she wanted to do this scene for Tom, and she said of course in which we did. I was so grateful for this lesson, since it meant I was confident in doing mine and Emily's scene as I had gone over it numerous times with Tom. Much like the chants, he needed to repeat the scene so that he could figure out a melody and when small notes would enter in, which allowed me to perfect my character of Dorothy in this scene. Another important lesson we all learnt on this day, was that despite a person not saying anything, their outer presence and how they appear in the background is super important as it creates a scene into something amazing as you now have body and a structure, which makes a performance look professional to an audience. Kelly mentioned it's a part of the integral part of acting and asking ourselves why whoever your character is, helps develop their reactions to others and build upon their own personal storyline. Moving forward, I have taken the point in asking your character why and making sure to act on it since it's clear how important it really is in a character's journey. 

On Thursday 17th November, we spent the majority of the afternoon going through individual character scenes which included Dorothy’s introduction to her future friends. We worked upstairs in the dance studio with Kelly, and whilst other casts were rehearsing with her help, myself and Emie, Connor and Geoffrey worked on the same scenes in a different area in the room. I thoroughly enjoyed this lesson since it was the first proper time I got to act through those scenes with my cast and we had a chance at figuring out how we would portray our characters and how they would feel meeting each other. Myself and Emie’s scene went swimmingly with us both having ideas when it came to spacing and moving around in order to spread ourselves out and not have to keep our scene in one small section of the stage. For example, I vigorously shake her hand on the line “I’m quite well, thank you how do you do?” and then move away to look further around me trying to hide my slight embarrassment due to my excitement at meeting a real life talking scarecrow. Another idea we had, is that to keep the scarecrow floppy and oblivious to her actions, Emie can whack her arms into me when we are standing up and her not notice what she has done as she moves away to carry on telling her story. The scarecrow is new to moving around so having her wave her arms around like it’s nothing was important in bringing energy to the stage. We as a cast got up to the poppy scene, meaning I had met the TinMan and the Lion which formed our team of 4. Kelly showed us how the cast 1 had worked on their chants, in which we then had to learn and copy which for me was quite hard and we didn’t say each line in order, Emie had one before me and then Connor did and then myself, even though I was stood in the middle so figuring that out with additional foot movements was something I was trying to wrap my head around. The lesson I spent going through lines, and eventually did mine and Emie’s scene off script which felt like such a huge achievement to me. To me, the lesson was crucial in the journey to the performance dates and it made me look forward to the exciting weeks ahead!