Girl Interrputed

In our acting for film classes we have all been given a script and have been put into pairs.
Sav and I are doing a scene from Girl Interrupted 1999. The scene is between Suzanna(Winona Ryder) and Lisa(Angelina Jolie) and is set in a mental institute.
The scene also involves 3 other girls but they are not included and it will just be Sav and I.
We have watched the scene from the film and will watch the full film in our spare time.
The characters are very controversial, Lisa is a socio path who has a massive influence on all the other girls, and Suzanna is a writer who has been admitted to the mental institute by her doctor as she has depression and mixed vodka with aspirin.
We have not decided yet which character to play, as they are both very controversial and complex. Susanna's mental health is questionable as her reasons for being in the mental hospital are quite minor as she was referred by her doctor due to drinking and depression, but the doctor saw this as a suicide attempt, and Susanna had also been having an affair with a married man and became very depressed about this, and after she finished college. She is clearly very troubled but I don't think she belongs in a mental institute.
 But Lisa on the other hand has been diagnosed as a socio path, and from watching this scene I can clearly see she is very mentally unstable and always wants the attention on herself. She is like  a school bully, influencing all the other girls in the scene.The girls are Georgina, Polly and Daisy. 
Playing either characters would be good, as Suzanna is much more level headed and rational, she shows real emotions and is clearly disturbed by Lisa's behaviour. Whereas Lisa is completely mad, she rambles and runs after Suzanna shouting and swearing. Sav and I have read through the script a few times and have been discussing locations for this scene. We want to do it inside, somewhere that looks dark and neglected, there are lots of old unused rooms around the college that we could use for this scene.

24.02.2015

Exercises from today and Mondays lessons before rehearsals....

Facial expression exercise: This exercise we learned in Monday's lesson, with 1st and 2nd years all in one. We all had to walk around the studio space and then stop whenever asked to, and focus on ONE person in the room and copy exactly what they do with their face! And if they are copying another person in the room which basically everyone was, we not only had to copy what they were copying from whoever they were looking at, we had to completely copy everything they do, like scratching their head, blinking, itching, sneezing ect
It was SO funny, as you really notice just how many different faces and movements people make sub consciously. 
This exercise encouraged focus and concentration on each other, and it also made me feel very ready to rehearse our Shakespeare performance, as I was in the zone and very focused.
This exercise was very funny but also was useful, as it made you aware of your facial expressions when acting, and as an actor I feel I use my facial expressions quite a lot, to show how I feel, rather than always using dialogue to express how I feel.
I feel when acting as Viola, she uses her facial expressions to portray to the audience and other characters how she feels. And this exercise has helped me to always remember to portray my emotions through my facial expressions and body language, and not just through voice.

6.3.15

In today's lesson we began to focus on Bertolt Brecht and were introduced to our final year performance, which is written by Brecht in 1941 "Th Resistible rise of Arturo Ui" which chronicles the rise of Arturo Ui, a fictional gangster from Chicago. It is also set at the time Hitler came into power.It is a very political play and was written to make the audience think and want to make a change in their society
Brecht wrote this play in only THREE WEEKS, whilst in Finland, awaiting a visa for entry to the USA.
This play is heavily influenced by Hilter, and is seen as a satire of Hilters rise, and depicts the society at that time, and how it changed everything about society. The play was not available in English until 1961. The play is in the style of Epic Theatre, which was Brecht's main focus in plays. 
The play included a prologue, which outlines the plots, scenarios and characters right from the beginning, so the audience KNOW exactly what is going to happen and they cannot change this. 
Brecht was a firm believer in demonstrating, and not letting the actors be absorbed into their characters. He did not want the audience to feel the performance was real, this was not his aim. His aim was to make an impact on the audience and make them see what society is like and how they should make a change. He did not care for Naturalism, he was completely against Stanislavski, and felt audiences should not feel acting is real, he felt acting should portray the issues and outline how society changes everything. His plays are very political, but I argue that even though his plays are about real life situations, they are somehow not very realist, as he goes against Naturalism, and everything is very big and dramatic. Whereas Stanislavski felt actors should be very realistic and emotional, and wanted everything to be as believable as possible, as I feel he cared more about what the audience thought about the actors and the story lines of his plays, whereas Brecht, cared more about the real issues of his plays and the way the audiences felt AFTER watching the show.

Brecht was a firm believer in Karl Max and saw himself as a Marxist.
Marx was a German philosopher and believed that society issues were the root of everything and he was the founder of "Sociology" as he urged people to look into society and status. He felt that human societies progressed through class struggle, the constant battle between the wealthy who provide the money, and the working class, who provide the work! Coming from a wealthy middle class family, I feel Marx was very honest with his theories and wanted to make a change, as did Brecht, which is why the two went hand in hand. Marx wanted the working class to have equality, and wanted a classless society, Communism. 

This quiote adds to how Brecht wanted to make his audience think, and he wanted to make a change in society.

EXERCISE FROM TODAY:  
"Gest"
This exercise explores the gestures and attitudes used when acting as a Stereotype. Which is what Arturo Ui is influenced by, as the play includes stereotypes. The exercise focuses on;

• Political Criticism of characters
• Finding movements
• Simplify & clarify the movements to create a stereotype of a certain person
• Gest

We were given 5 stereotypes and were asked to walk around the room, "gesting" as this stereotype.

• Polictian
• Dodgy car salesman
• Business man
• Call centre worker
• Defence barrister for a GUILTY murderer

All these stereotypes were portrayed in two different ways. We were either mocking the stereotype or being fair to the stereotype. For example, we were put into groups of 4, and I was with Max, Liam and Zac. We chose Politicians, and we decided to use contrasting gests, in which all four of us would walk around the space and appear to be very greedy, smug and two faced, glaring out at the audience and making faces behind each others backs. Another gest we used is shaking hands. Every time we caught each others eyes, we would shake hands and smile pleasantly at each other, and look out to the audience as if we were posing for a picture, and as soon as we let go of each others hands we would return to our smug and two faced stereotype, only shaking hands in order to appear genuine and nice, when really we were just acting as money grabbing politicians, we were not FAIR to the stereotype and that is how we saw ourselves. Whereas another group, were more fair, using genuine and open gests, which portrayed honesty and care, contrasting with ours as we were portraying greed and hate.

This exercise was interesting as we explored how different gests can create a different story to the audience, even when given stereotypical characters to play. 

Self reflection of Viola

Since we began Twelfth Night I was instantly interested in Violas character and felt something just clicked with me, and I felt like I wanted to play her from the beginning. I did also want to play Olivia, but after reading the play,watching performances of the play and taking part in rehearsals I realised that Olivia was not really the right character for me and I did not find her as interesting or challenging as Viola. I feel Olivia would of been quite type cast for me, and I definitely was given a challenge with Viola but I loved playing her.

She is a very contrasting character as her gender changes and she deceives all the characters as they believe she is Cesario throughout until the end.
She is a very strong character and I feel I interpreted her well and portrayed her very honestly and I am proud of my characterisation choices.

Typically, I could of portrayed her in a very comical and silly way, as it is funny, a woman pretending to be a man to everyone, but after research and really thinking about her as a person/character I felt it was not right to make her very comical, as she has deep rooted emotions and raw feelings, she has lost her father and mother, AND believes to have lost her twin brother, so as a character she has experienced very serious and moving issues,and she is quite a young age, I would imagine only around 20. So I looked deeper into Viola, and also her feelings for Orsino I really made sure were  VERY clear to the audience as this is another important aspect to her. Some times I thought WHY does she love Orsino? He almost does not seem like her type, as she is so mischievous and courageous, you would typically think she would go for a more rough and raw man, and not Orsino who is very romantic and pretty predictable. But I feel Viola wants and needs stability, and love which her life lacks as she has lost her family, so I realised that Viola is quite vulnerable and feels she does not belong anywhere, she feels lost, and I believe that when she met Orsino she felt a connection to him as he is so open and loving, and invited her straight in, even though he believed her to be a man, she could see as a partner he would be loving and caring. 
So I wanted to show the audience, YES Viola is very witty and brave, and likes to make fun of Olivia and flirt with her, but she is lost and vulnerable, and wants stability and a home from Orsino, and I wanted to show the genuine love she has for her twin, and in the end scene when Chloe and I meet, I really felt that we showed the connection when we came together and embraced.

 Viola was a complex character to play, as she almost had an alter ego, Cesario, and then Viola herself. Which was exposed at times when she was playing Cesario. I realised in mine and Sav's scene, that when Olivia asks, "Why what would you?" Viola begins to think about Orsino and how much she loves him, and in the monologue, Viola forgets she is Cesario and acts as Viola, and Olivia sees this in her, and feels the love and compassion Viola has, which ultimately makes Olivia fall in love with her. 
I enjoyed playing Viola so much and felt a connection to her, the casting was definitely the right thing to do, even though I did not agree when I received the casting, I quickly came to love Viola and I became more confident with my abilities to play her and really had fun playing her and trying out new methods with my acting. Playing Viola has been a big step for me as an actor and I am really grateful that I got to play her as I have learned and gained so much from it as an actor. I learned how to let go and not to think into things too much and to just do what feels right. And I can honestly feel and see a change in the way I act, Shakespeare has pushed me to become a stronger actor, and I do feel proud of myself, which is a very rewarding feeling as an actor as I want to feel good about myself, and to also make others feel good, whether they be audience, directors or other actors. I feel I thrive off of making others think and feel like they have learned something new, my main drive as an actor is to make a difference to make the audience think and feel like they have gained something.

Reflection of show night

Our performance night of Twelfth Night I feel went extremely well and I am really proud to have been a part of it.

Everyone gave it there all and I had such a good feeling before the show began. There were challenging circumstances at the show, but we all came together and got through this in the end, and Andy helped us out too!!
I feel the professionalism could have been better and people could/should have composed themselves in a better manner, but we still put on a great show, and it ran very smoothly. I received positive feedback from family and friends that the show was very well put together and no one noticed anything inconsistent, which made me feel really proud of the group.
Looking back on rehearsals I feel we all worked really hard and very long days, but it was clearly worth it.
The venue was a challenge, as the acoustics were VERY different from our other performance venues, and I felt the acoustic a challenge at times. I naturally project and articulate pretty well, so volume has never been an issue with me, but I did have to alter my voice in order to be understood, as the echo was a problem and I felt if I spoke too loud my words could not be heard as well, so I consciously made sure I was speaking very clearly and using my articulation to my advantage, I remember always thinking about the words before I said them, which was quite distracting as I was worried I would forget my lines, but thankfully I didn't.

I personally feel proud of my characterisation choices for Viola, and feel the audience liked the way I portrayed her, I had a good feeling from the audience when I was on stage and feel they enjoyed watching me, which is always an amazing feeling. Because one of the main reasons why I love performing is because I love to make the audience THINK and see things in a different way, probably why I really like Bertolt Brecht as a practitioner as he wants the audience to feel moved and want to make a change with current situations. I felt like this in my very first performance at City College, "Money don't matter tonight" this was my first show after only a month of studying Acting and I really wanted to make the audience SEE how today's society effects others, and this was based on Homelessness in England. And I remember researching homelessness in Brighton and it really made me think just how bad it is and how it increases all the time, so I really wanted to make the audience think. And ever since my first show, I have always felt this way. I like to make an impact on an audience, whether it be good or bad. 

I also feel proud of myself and Sav's scene, as we put so much work and thought into that scene, and we were constantly trying out different things to see if they would work or not. We were always looking for ways to make it more enjoyable for the audience, and as well for ourselves. And I can honestly say, I enjoyed performing that scene so much, it is probably one of my favourites scenes from the past 18 months of studying! I feel we both connected well with each other as actors, and our characters had a playful banter with each other and we were constantly pushing each other and the two characters were always searching for a reaction from one another, which added to the humour and wit of the scene.
I feel overall, I enjoyed Twelfth Night so much as it is so outrageous at points, and then there are moments of genuine emotions, which make you think deeply, as well as it is being a comedy with ridiculous scenarios and over the top characters! I felt good about my acting in Shakespeare and feel I connected very well with Viola, and put a lot of emotions, research and understanding into the creation of my own Viola. Playing a woman pretending to be a man was completely new to me, and at first I was very daunted by this, but after researching into Viola and watching performances of Twelfth Night and changing my physicality, I grew to really love my character and I feel physically I did very well as I did just let go with Viola and really did enjoy playing her!

If I could perform this play again, I would probably of worked harder on the final scene with everyone, as I feel as a group we all focused more on our other scenes, rather than this scene. And I feel we all realised quite late into rehearsals that actually this is a very IMPORTANT scene, and we should of spent more time trying new things out and developing the character relationships. I feel my character in this scene was still strong, but the complicity of the group let us down sometimes, with simple things like queues, the relationships between the characters. I feel Unis and myself could of spent more time on the relationship between Orsino and Viola, I just felt on the whole that scene was the most neglected and if we had the chance to do it again, I would of been harder on the group to be more disciplined with the scene and for everyone to make more time to rehearse this scene.
I also feel I could of made Viola more charming to Olivia,as I did not want to make her too ncie to Olivia, as in the back of Viola's mind, she really hated Olivia for being the woman who Orsino loved. So I made the choice to keep her slightly cold towards Olivia, but I did make sure she was charming and quite flirtatious around Olivia, but I feel Viola was mocking Olivia a lot of the time, especially in Mine and sav's scene. But looking back, I could of gone further with the charm and see what difference it would of made to the scene. It probably would of made it more comical, but Sav and I made the choice to not make the scene too comical, like it has been done before in the past, as we looked into  both characters backgrounds and they have both lost a parent, and a sibling at this point, so we wanted to maintain a serious element, as these characters were hurting on the inside. Which I feel was the right decision as we were using Naturalism with our characters, and I wanted to portray Viola in a realistic way, not in a comical over the top way.

I am really pleased with the performance and felt as a group, 1st years included,we all worked very hard during rehearsals and in our spare time. I feel some people should of spent more time learning their lines,as this does hold back actors and affects the scenes, but overall the show went really well and there was nothing in particular that stood out to me or the audience, as I have been told. Shakespeare has helped me develop as an actor and I feel my acting has changed and I have definitely become more confident with my abilities and the physical aspect I have made a massive step, which I am really proud of. I have learned to let go, and be confident in my abilities and to just not think before I act, and this has honestly helped me so much and I can feel a change within myself from this.

Rehearsals so far

Orsino and Viola

Today and yesterday as a group we have rehearsed our final scene, and mine and Sav's scene.

On Monday we performed our scene to Andy and received really helpful feedback and have made changes to our scene, and it is now much stronger and more characterised.

And today as a whole group we spent the whole 3 hours working on our final scene, which needed tweaking, mainly the blocking, this now has made a massive improvement, and we all need to focus our energy on this scene.
Feedback from Andy Act 1 scene 5...

• Viola(cesario) needs to make Olivia fall in love with him MORE, I need to make Cesario more appealing to really show the audience why Olivia falls for him
• Cesario monologue..."make me a willow cabin" either needs to be really personal and almost whispered, as Viola is really thinking about Orsino when delivering this monologue, so I need to show the true emotions through this monologue, so instead of making it very big and jumping into the blocks, I will tone it down and maintain eye contact with Olivia throughout and really portray real love and almost desperation in this monologue
• Olivia to be more clear with her feelings for Cesario, Sav needs to portray more loving feelings towards me in our scene, we were told to TONE it down as Sav was being too obvious, and now we have been advised to show her feelings but in a more serious way and less comical. I feel this works very well and is what i wanted to do from the start
• Maria and Olivia need to be more comical at the beginning before I enter, and need to seem as though they are taking the mick out of all the men Orsino sends over to Olivia. And the two women should sit at opposite ends to each other, in order to cause Cesario more confusion and it gives me a better staging position for when I enter, instead of standing basically over Olivia. I like this idea as it makes more sense for me to be standing in between the two women and adds to the humour of the scene as it shows Cesario going back and forth between the two, trying to figure out who is who. Whereas, me standing closer to Sav, gives away straight away who is the lady of the house
• On the whole the scene is good, and the characterisation choices are good, but we just need to ENJOY the scene more. I personally enjoy this scene more every time as we still come up with new ideas and play around with them and see if they work. I want to take Viola's witty personality even further and see how far the two characters can push each other.

I feel Sav and I tried out various different methods of acting in this scene, we first decided to focus the main theme on comedy and to try it in a very comical way, this worked to an extent as it added to the playfulness and allowed us as actors to have fun in this scene and feel more comfortable with each other.But we were advised to tone the comedy down, mainly about Olivias feelings for Cesario, and I feel since toning it down we have focused more on what this scene REALLY means to both characters. There are much deeper feelings with both characters and we chose to explore these

Viola is very much in love with Orsino, and is reluctant to woo Olivia for him, and does not know what she is doing, as she is trying her hardest to act as a man and deliver the speech Orsino has prepared for Olivia, but she walks into a nightmare as the two women taunt her at the beginning, but Viola is very strong willed and is quick to make both women very aware she will not be taken for an idiot and asserts herself very strongly on her entrance. I feel this best shows Viola for who she is as soon as she enters the stage, and as this is my first scene playing Viola, I want the audience to know straight away that she is a strong character, and finds it humorous challenging Olivia.

She is essentially jealous of Olivia to begin with, but sees straight through her very quickly, and notices she is TOO proud to ever please Orsino,and I feel from this point, she no longer sees Olivia as a threat, and begins to have fun with her.

The speech "make me a willow cabin" she delivers to Olivia, about what SHE would do if she were Orsino, is really about Orsino. She is expressing her love for Orsino, and Olivia recognises this true passion and love within Cesario, and clearly mistakes this love for HERSELF, and has no idea Cesario is talking about someone else. This is the point were Olivia really falls greatly for Cesario, it has been building throughout the scene, she has been sizing Cesario up, and after this speech she is sold to him, as she sees Cesarios love and honesty, and compassion.

So I made the decision to change the way I deliver this monologue and to make it very personal to Olivia, and to maintain a very strong eye contact throughout, and steer away from making it comical, which is what I was doing before. I feel it is good that Sav and I have tried this scene using different interpretations as it has lead us to create our characters and to become more confident with this scene as we know it inside out, and we have learned what does not work from this,

My goal for this week running up to the show, is to rehearse this scene over and over with Sav and Sophie, and to focus mainly on my monologue as I feel this is a very important part to the scene as it when the audience will see genuine feelings from Cesario, and Olivia will be able to react to these feelings in a deeper way.

Act 5 Scene 1 WHOLE GROUP SCENE: 24.02.15 REHEARSALS

Today we ALL focused on the ending final scene which features all second years plus Stephen as Antonio

We went through the whole scene and made adjustments on the blocking, which is the main issue in this scene, I feel we all worked very hard and we have made huge improvements and the scene feels and looks much more balanced and we are making the most of the space, and no one is blocking any one any more, as this was an issue as well. We are rehearsing at our performance venue tomorrow all day, so I feel this scene will develop even further as we will be in the exact space.

Apart from the blocking, we focused on the reactions of the characters, as in this scene there are periods of times when not everyone is talking, so we made sure that EVERYONE is always listening and reacting to the other characters, as this is so important. Acting is not just speaking and moving, it is listening, facial expressions, reactions, even looks with your eyes. So we made sure everyone stays in character at all times and that everyone actually understands what is going on, because I feel at times some people do not fully understand what is going on or the meaning of what the characters are saying. We worked on queues, as some queues are very slow, and as this is the ending scene we want to keep the pace and energy UP as we are closing the show and want it to end with a bang, we do not want the audience and ourselves to lose focus and interest as it is nearing the end of the play.

I feel for myself, I want to work on my reactions to the other characters, and the relationship between Orsino and Viola. As she is so happy in this scene as she finally gets what she wants and reveals herself as a woman and Orsino falls completely in love with her. So I really want to portray the different stages of Viola in this scene and just how she develops and unravels herself to the characters and audience.I feel the main points for Viola in this scene are, reuniting with her twin brother, confessing her feelings for Orsino and being at peace with her life and new friends. 

We worked on the joining of the twins, Chloe and myself. And made some changes about how the two interact on stage, and we have made them much more intimate as they hold hands a lot more and are always close together, whereas before, we embraced during our conversation about our father, but after that we kind of drifted away from each other, and it is important to show the strength of the duality between the twins as this is the MAIN theme in the play, and usually in other Shakespeare plays,clearly linked to Shakespeare's twin children in real life.

Tomorrow in our rehearsals I am going to focus hard on the relationship between Orsino and Viola and Seb and Viola as these are the most important factors of the scene. And to portray my love for Orsino even more to the audience and to him.

10.02.15

In today's lesson Sav and I focused on our first scene together and performed this to the class at the end, we had a run through of all our scenes in chronological order, except for the ending scene as this scene is very long and we did not have time to run through this. We had not rehearsed our scene together for about 4 days, as we have all been focusing on our ending scene recently, so Sav and I spent the whole lesson rehearsing our scene. 
Notes from director 

• Take more pauses for more effect in lines 
• Work on staging 
• Make it bigger in cesario monologue 
• Great characterisation 
• Make Olivia more subtle- tone it down 
• Playfulness 
• We both fully understand the sub text and meaning of our lines 

This feedback was very positive and I feel really happy with how our scene is constantly developing. We need to focus on the staging and we have recieved notes on how to do this and what staging positions we should be in. We need to make the scene more central and not walk off into to the back or move around too much, I knew this would be the main feedback as we both realised that the staging was a bit scattered and was all over the place! We have focused so hard on our characterisation and character relationships and objectives, the blocking has kind of been over riden. But now we know that everyone feels our characterisation is good, we need to focus on the blocking and this is what we will do in our next rehearsals.
We were told that the characters should mainly always be at the front of the stage, especially Olivia, and we should not walk around too much, as it has no purpose in the scene. We will definitely listen to these notes and improve the blocking as it is so important and we want to feel comfortable on stage.
A personal target for myself from this feedback is to make my monologue even bigger, when I am telling Olivia what I would do if I were Orsino. I want to jump up onto the black block Olivia was sitting on when saying this monologue, and make my gestures really big and over the top, because Viola is kind of doing this on purpose to shock Olivia, and I want to show this to the audience. I will rehearse this with Sav next time we have rehearsals and probably over the half term as me and Sav live really close to each other.
I want to jump down from the block just before shouting "Olivia" as I do this I am going to grab Sav and shake her, in a comical way. I just want to have lots of energy for this monologue as it is an important monologue, and this definitely increases Olivia's infatuation for Viola. And also I really want to capture Olivia's response to this monologue as well, for example, Sav and I have tried out Olivia trying to stop Viola from shouting by Ssshing her and trying to pull her down from the block, and I feel this really works  as it is over the top and funny.
During our next rehearsal I really want to perfect the blocking, and try out different gestures for my monologue.