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.  

4.2.15 Rehearsals

As a group, we all rehearsed and blocked our final scene, and at the end of the day, performed this to Andy, and we received helpful feedback from him on how to make it stronger. It was mainly about the blocking, as at some points we were all very crowded together and we were not making the most of the space, I feel this is partly because most of us are still using the script at some points, so we are all focusing on getting our lines right,and this is restricting us from being able to move about the space and focus on our physicality. 
We all need to focus on the blocking and the positioning of the characters in order to create a passionate and structured scene together.
Some of us had only rehearsed this scene once or twice, and we were missing characters which does not help, but we had people who helped fill in. 
I feel we need to step this scene up and come together and help each other.
My own personal goal is to learn all my lines for this scene by the start of next week, as the script restricts me from acting as well as I can. And we all need to focus much more, this scene is very long, especially when we stop and start every minute to block the scene, so I understand it does get tiring but this is one of the most important scenes in the play, so we need to focus and concentrate together.
I hope by the next rehearsal this scene improves, as I was quite worried today as it was just all over the place, and some people were fully on script which worries me as well.

My scene with Sav is looking really good and we have developed a really playful relationship between the two characters and I enjoy this scene so much, as the two characters have such banter with each other and Sav and I work well with each other and understand each others acting methods. My main aim for this scene is to just become stronger with Viola's physicality and to make sure we make the most of the space, which I feel we do, but we can always improve this.
I mainly want to focus on the final scene, as this scene is the one which definitely needs more rehearsing and attention.

5.02.15

Today's rehearsal I feel went really well and we have made massive improvements to our final scene. We all stayed behind for an extra 2 hours to rehearse and block the scene and we performed it to the 1st years and Andy at the end of the day.
We received positive feedback and on the whole the scene has improved massively from when we performed it on Friday. Mainly because we have thought very carefully about the blocking and stage positions, and most of us have become more familiar with our lines, however there all still a couple of people who are still fully on script, which needs to change as we are only 3 weeks away from our show! I am nearly there with all my lines, it is just the last few lines I need to learn, and I will set myself a target to learn these this weekend, as I feel I am much stronger and confident at the beginning and middle of the scene, as I know all my lines for this part, it is just the last section I need to learn as it is restricting me from performing 100 percent, and it feels annoying holding the script for prompts.

We ran through the scene and began by mainly focusing on the blocking, we went through it very carefully and made choices which have received very positive feedback. Our main issue was not using enough of the space and we were all slightly on top of each other throughout the whole scene, the scene itself is about 15-20 minutes long, so the blocking is very important. We now are much more spaced out around the stage, and have got the entrances and exits very sharp, we just need to keep rehearsing it and everyone needs to be off script before we can really begin to act to our best abilities.
Yunis and myself focused very hard on how our characters interact with each other from the beginning right to the end, again mainly focusing on the blocking of the characters. At the beginning we enter, and I stand staggered behind Yunis, so he is not blocking me any more, as this was a problem previously. And most of the scene I am quite close to Yunis, as Viola serves Orsino and is clearly very respectful of him. The part we have really improved is when Orsino learns from Olivia that the two of them have been together behind his back and that Olivia loves Cesario and not Orsino, Orsino becomes very angry as he feels deceived by the pair of them, particulalry Viola, who in actual fact has not done anything wrong, and she is completely confused and baffled throughout the whole scene as she receives so many accusations, which have all been because of Sebestian! 
Yunis and I made the decision to try out Orsino grabbing Viola and pushing her towards Olivia, as he is explaining how he would rather kill Cesario, his boy who he loves, than to see them together, and Viola is besotted with Orsino and will do anything for him, and as Orsino pushes Viola towards Olivia after saying "Come boy with me, my thoughts are ripe in mischief, i'll sacrifice the lamb that I do love, to spite a ravens heart within a dove..." and as Yunis pushes me towards Olivia, I ran after him pleading with him to stay, portraying desperation and love "And I most jocund, apt and willingly, to do you rest, a thousands deaths would die" Viola is saying here that she will do anything to make him happy, even if it means taking her life in order to save his pride. After showing this, we received good feedback and Andy said that Yunis should be even more physical with me and throw me to the floor and walking off just before I ran after him, this would be Yunis grabbing the back of my neck, and me throwing myself forward so it seems he has thrown me to the floor. I really like this idea and we will try this out in our next rehearsal. I feel it will show just how low Viola is feeling as she has already been accused of things she has not done, but I do not think she really cares about anything else, as long as Orsino is by her side. But in this moment, she can feel Orsino slipping away from her, and you really see her grovelling for him, which portrays her love, and she inevitably reveals this to Olivia in my next lines. I think the positioning for this is really good as I am standing in between Yunis and Sav, stuck in the middle of the two characters, and I really want to portray to the audience just how hard it is for Viola, as she has found herself within this love triangle, when all she really wants is Orsino to love her for the woman she is! 
I feel all the movements in this scene have been really carefully thought out and we worked well as a team to block this, and now I feel every move Viola makes is finding meaning, which was the main thing I was concerned about, as when we first rehearsed this scene, I found myself not knowing where to stand or what to do, but now I do not feel like that, I feel much more confident playing Viola as I know each move I make means something. 

The ending part of the scene when Viola and Seb are finally reunited is looking really good, as myself and Chloe walk towards each other very slowly, as if both in a trance as they cannot believe their eyes! It is effective, and we stare into each other eyes, and as we come closer together, both characters become more familiar and excited to be seeing each other. We received feedback from this, and Andy added that we should both fall to our knees, and hug each other, and as Seb stands to go and speak with Olivia, I will stay on my knees and wait for Orsino to come to me, as he says "Give me thy hand, and let me see thee in thy womans weeds" and then he will pick me up from the floor and we will embrace each other.

I am really happy with today's rehearsals, it was hard work getting the blocking together, but we received good feedback which I am pleased with, and I feel we can all take it further by rehearsing over and over as a group,as this scene is very important as it where everything is revealed and the characters come together, or break apart. When everyone is off script, this is when the scene will really develop, as i find it so hard to act to my best abilities when holding the script and I am sure everyone would agree with me. My goals for next rehearsal is to be off the script completely and to develop mine and Yunis' character relationship and find moments of tenderness between the two characters.

3.2.15

In today's lesson we worked on our text and the meaning of our speeches. We started with a focus exercise walking around the drama studio in sync with each other, 1 person, then 2 people, 3 then 4 and so on. We then included our characters text from the play individually as well as focusing on the 2 leaders in the room, who were the lead walkers using gestures and different movements which we all had to copy, as well as LISTENING to the person performing their text and that person had to as well FOLLOW the leader too, so we all had to have exceptional concentration and focus, as we were all doing 2-3 things at the same time. 

This exercise was inspired by Enrique Pardo "Bringing meaning to text" 

We repeated this exercise four times and I felt everytime we all got better and our concentration levels were higher. This exercise helped me to become much more familiar with my text, I know my lines for my scenes but it helped even more as I was multi tasking whilst performing my text as I was focusing on whoever I was following and projecting my voice to the room and to the other actors, we were asked to perform our lines NOT in our character, as we were avoiding characterisation and focusing more on the meaning of the text and bringing attention to ourselves and making sure we project. 
This exercise helped me to understand my characters speech in a different way, and I learned different ways to portray this to an audience, I was engaged to the MEANING of what Viola is saying, and was not just trying to get my lines right and project, which is also important, but I feel understanding the deep meaning of the text aids you to perform stronger.This is the speech I chose to use in this exercise....
"Most radiant, exquisite and un matchable beauty.....(she pauses and seems confused as she does not know which lady is the lady of the house)
I pray you tell me if you be the lady of the house...for I never saw her?
I would be loath to cast away my speech, for besides that it is excellently well penned, I have taken great pains to con it!
Good beauties, let me sustain no scorn, I am very compitible.....
Even to the least sinister usage!"

The exercise has helped me to find different ways to deliver this speech, as right at the beginning, Viola is performing a speech Orsino or herself has prepared for Olivia, but then she interrupts herself, by questioning to two women, as she is unaware who is who, as they both have black veils over their faces. And I feel adding a pause helps create effect, and will add to the confusion sense from Viola. And I also feel Viola should sound slightly annoyed on the third line of the monologue, as she is basically saying, she does not want to waste a perfectly thought out speech on the wrong lady of the house! And she is expressing how she has put in a lot of time and effort to write this speech. So when performing this, I want to seem slightly annoyed and impatient as she clearly wants to know who the lady of the house is, so she can get on with it!

We have began to look at our ending scene, which includes all of us second years, and Steven as Antonio. We read through the scene then discussed together the themes and how this scene should be portrayed to the audience, we asked ourselves questions like do we want the ending of the play to be comical? Do we want to end with all the characters in love and happy? Do we want to end the play portraying how some characters got what they desired by others fell victim to unrequited love? Do we want to end the play with a deep meaning to make the audience think?
Personally, for my character I feel Viola has got what she wanted and her desires have been met, as she was in love with Orsino, and has ended up with Orsino realising his love for her, and has asked her to marry him, or to be "her masters mistress" but in plays I have seen and the film, they end up marrying at Olivias house. And Viola has been re united with her long lost twin brother, Sebestian, so I feel Viola is very happy at the end of the play and feels her deceit as acting as a man has paid off greatly, and she achieved her objectives. Whereas, a few of the other characters like Olivia, Malvolio and Maria- their endings are questionable, as Olivia is originally in love with Cesario(Viola) and as she learns she is actually a woman, she must feel very let down and betrayed, but in the film she ends up with Sebestian anyway. We discussed how Status determines the characters endings as Orsino and Olivia are very powerful and rich, so at the end of the day they may not be as affected, as they have everything they want anyway, so it may not be a great concern as to who they will end up with.
The play will press on status very much, as the politics within the play are important, as it shows the different statuses of the character and we want to show this to the audience. I definitely want to portray the unrequited love at the end of the play, as it is sad when someone does not feel the same way in relationships, and this needs to be shown, as it is raw and real emotions, regardless of the status.

The classes views on how the characters are feeling in this scene and the themes of the characters

30.01.15

I feel in today's rehearsal Sav and I made huge progress in our scene, as we are now off script and know all of our lines, we can act freely now without holding the script, and we have made progress on our blocking and our character physicality's. 
The scene is much more playful now, and we are really playing around with the scene, and have tried out different things. An example of something we tried today...

• Follow the leader game: as I have mentioned before in my blogs, we have tried out lots of exercises and games in order to create more play and humour in the scene. Playing follow the leader really works for this scene, and it is Sav who is following me. As Olivia's interest in Viola grows, she begins to be touchy feely with Viola and starts to move closer to her on every line, and as she does this, I move further away from her, as I have sussed that she might be attracted to me. Further to this, we performed our scene to our class and we were told we need to make it more clear as to when Viola realises Olivia has feelings for her, and we have taken on board this feedback and we both said today that this game makes it much more clear at what point the flirting begins, and it has made the scene much stronger. So we definitely intend to keep the follow the lead game incorporated into this scene.

We have blocked the scene throughout, and all we need to do now is to keep rehearsing it, and acting on the feedback we receive. I feel every time we rehearse the scene it gets better and better, and I feel more confident about my abilities to play Viola. At first it was quite a daunting thought to be playing a woman pretending to be a man and I did not know if I was happy with the casting, but I have really come to enjoy Viola's character and I love playing her, especially in my scene with Sav. The scene on the whole is mainly comical, and I feel this is the best way for us to portray the scene, as Twelfth Night is a comedy anyway. 

The moment in this scene where Viola realises Olivia is flirting with her, and also when Olivia realises she has feelings for her, is when Olivia takes off her veil to reveal her face to Viola and Viola responds to her beauty...

"Excellently done, if god did all"Again this line is very comical as she is complimenting Olivia as her face is excellent, but then he retracts this compliment by saying, your face is only beautiful if it is natural and made by god only, this I am going to portray as a joke shared with the audience, when I say "if god did all" I will direct it to the audience, as if Olivia cannot hear what I am saying. This will be funny for the audience, but will also build a relationship between Viola and the audience as I want to get the audience involved on this joke.

After this line, this is when Sav and I have decided to change our dynamics, and Olivia will come very close to Viola when speaking to her, and will be touching Viola on her arms, and will generally just be BLATANTLY flirting with Viola, and Viola will be very uncomfortable about this, and the audience will definitely notice, which will add to the comedy of the scene. As Viola is not interested in Olivia, but I feel she plays with her a lot and sees how far she can push Olivia. Viola is teasing Olivia in a way, which I find very amusing and I will portray this to the audience.

The line I really like from Viola is after Olivia expresses how she cannot love Orsino and he should of taken her answer long ago....Viola replies with;

"If I did love you.....in my masters flame"This line is so teasing to Olivia as for a brief moment when I say If I did love you, Sav comes very close to my face, almost hoping for Viola's love, and then I retract this by pausing for a few seconds and saying "in my masters flame" so I am leading Olivia to believe that I could love her, then I include Orsino again, to remind her that I am there to woo her for Orsino, and NOT for myself. 

I just really enjoy this scene as I am having fun playing around with the different behaviours Viola has, as at the beginning she is quite serious and confused as she wants to know who the lady of the house is, and then after she finds out who it is, she is very polite and witty with Olivia, and then when Maria leaves the scene, Viola then becomes very flirtatious with Olivia and begins to tease her, and then at the end of the scene Viola is uncomfortable and shocked as she realises Olivia has feelings for her. So for me this scene is a journey for Viola as she feels lots of different emotions and has different physicality's throughout so my goal for myself is to develop her gestures and the way she walks even further by practising how she moves over and over and also observing the way other actresses do this in Twelfth Night performances which I have been watching online.

This video here I really like the scene between Olivia and Viola(about 20 minutes in) the characters work really well together and it is so funny to watch, particularly Olivia as she hangs on every single word that comes out of Viola's mouth and you can see she is completely obsessed with her! This is what Sav and I have discussed and will be going for in our scene, as it is very funny and comical. 

At the end of our scene, when I say "Farewell, fare cruelty" I hold Sav's face as I say Farewell, and then hold for a few seconds, and let go and retract what i said with, "fare cruelty" and as I exit the scene, Sav followed me off and had her mouth open and her eyes wide, showing how obsessed Olivia is, and it was SO funny. It was completely improvised but it works so well and we are definitely going to use this in our scene!

I really want to start rehearsing my ending scene, which is the final scene with all the second years. We have spoken about this with Andy and will begin to rehearse on Wednesday morning. I am already learning my lines quickly, so when it comes to rehearsals I will already be able to freely act without holding my book to my face. 

28.1.15

In todays lesson we worked with the 1st years on our opening scene, the storm scene and the Orsino languishing scene. This was the first rehearsal on the Orsino scene "If music be the food of love" and I feel it went well and we all really got into the languishing style of the scene and I feel I really was absorbed into the singing at the start and the Food of love speech, which we all speak parts of in groups. The scene is really relaxing and I imagine I am in a luxurious room surrounded by rich and happy people, drinking the best wine and eating the best food and listening to beautiful music, and I am just living in it without  a care in the world, we are all Orsino's to a degree as we all love the same things and it feels like we all look up to him and aspire to be just like him. I really enjoy this scene and I have learned that when you imagine a setting and just be in the moment it really helps your concentration and focus, and it makes the scene more enjoyable. It is a very sensuous scene and we are all very engrossed considering we have only rehearsed this scene about 3 times now and the languishing vibes are very strong. I feel we can make this scene stronger by using more complicity, especially with the breaths we do in unison after Orsino(Greta) speaks.

The lines we all say together in Unison, are Curio's lines, so we are all representing Curio, who is Orsino's servant if you like...

"Will you go hunting my lord?"(all in unison)

"What, Curio?"(Greta as Orsino)

"The Hart" (this is a male deer)

"Why so I do, the noblest that I have, O when mine eyes did see Olivia first,

Me thought she purg'd the air of pestilence;

That instant was I turned into a hart (we gasp in unison)

And my desires, like fell and cruel hounds,

e'er since pursue me."

Narcissus are also a type of flower

During this speech we are all lounging on the floor all linked together by lying on each other, holding hands and looking up to Orsino, who is standing above us, at the front of the stage, talking to us, as if he is a story teller. Orsino definitely loves the sound of his own voice, but I feel he is not an arrogant character, he just loves the idea of being in love and is very high maintenance and materialistic, but he is not a bad person at all. He is very caring and kind, just he could be seen as very shallow and vain. He does come across as a Narcissus, which means someone who is very vain and self loving. The word "Narcissism" comes from Greek Mythology which we learned about in today's lesson, about a young man named Narcissus, who was a hunter and fell in love with his own reflection in the lake. He was the son of a river god, Cephissus and a nymph, Liriope. Narcissus was very proud and self loving, and Nemesis noticed this behaviour and attracted the hunter to the river, where he saw his own reflection and fell in love instantly, he did not realise this was his reflection and thought he had discovered a new Greek God, and went to the river every day to gaze at himself, until one day he fell in and drowned. This was seen as Karma from Nemesis, as being a Narcissus is a bad trait, and one who has a fixation with their own appearance is not a good quality to have. This is where the term "Narcissism" stems from.

We were all discussing how we feel Orsino has these qualities slightly, but as I said before Orsino means well, and just purely wants to love and to be loved.

I learned a lot from today's lesson, as we were mainly taking direction from Siou and Andy on the opening scene, and I have learned that envisioning a scene in my mind and creating a vibe within myself REALLY helps me develop characterisation and to be more involved in a scene. I really enjoy this scene and I have realised that letting go inside my mind really does help my performance and I really hope this shows. The directions we received were mainly about physicality and stage presence, and this has also helped me in my character development for Viola as the physicality of a man are quite hard to get into, but I feel I am making progress with this, and the goal I set for myself to be off script last week has been achieved as I ran lines in my spare time and in college time, and now the scene is coming along so much better as Sav and I are BOTH off script which allows us to be more free, and certainly helps me as I have developed my posture and the way I walk, I feel comfortable in this physicality as I keep practising it in my spare time and during rehearsals, whereas before it felt very awkward and quite funny, as it is such a change from my own personal physicality. 

Monologues for auditions

Alright, by the cut of your suit you went to Oxford or wherever, and naturally think human beings dress like that. But you wear it with such disdain, my guess is you didn’t come from money. And your school friends never let you forget it. Which means you were at that school by the grace of someone else’s charity. Hence the chip on your shoulder. And since your first thought about me ran to orphan, I'd say that's what you are...
Now having just met you I wouldn’t go as far as calling you a cold hearted bastard. But it wouldn’t be a stretch to imagine. You think of women as disposable pleasure rather than meaningful pursuits. So as charming as you are, I’ll be keeping my eye on our government’s money, and off your perfectly formed ass. See even accountants have imagination...good night Mr Bond. (Casino royale, Vesper, film monologue)

That I did love the Moor to live with him,
My downright violence and storm of fortunes
May trumpet to the world: my heart's subdued
Even to the very quality of my lord:
I saw Othello's visage in his mind,
And to his honour and his valiant parts
Did I my soul and fortunes consecrate.
So that, dear lords, if I be left behind,
A moth of peace, and he go to the war,
The rites for which I love him are bereft me,
And I a heavy interim shall support

By his dear absence. Let me go with him.

(Othello, Desdemona, Shakespeare monologue choice number 1)

If nothing lets to make us happy both,
But this my masculine u'surp'd attire,
Do not embrace me, till each circumstance
Of play, time, fortune do cohere and jump
That I am VIOLA; which to confirm,
I'll bring you a captain in this town,
Where lie my maiden weeds; by whose gentle help
I was preserv'd to serve this noble count,
All the occurrence of my fortune since,
Hath been between this lady and this lord.

(Twelfth Night, Viola, Shakespeare monologue choice number 3)

Make me a willow cabin at your gate,
and call upon my soul within this house,
Write loyal cantons of contemned love,
And sing them loud even in the dead of night,
Halloo your name to the reverberate hills,
and make the babbling gossips of the air,
Cry out, OLIVIA, O you should not rest between the elements of air and earth
But you should pity me.

(Twelfth Night, Viola, Shakespeare monologue choice number 2)

She has a shadow on her lung, such night sweats, you must have noticed how thin and frail she is. And last winter she coughed up blood. Papa bought heartwood as soon as Doctor Payne made his diagnosis, poor Papa he did not realise how ill he was himself. Lucy always was a daddys girl, and he would have done anything to make her well. The sea air and so forth. 
Doctor Seward, her fiance, says we are to be very very careful. We must keep our dear Lucy away from the chills of the evening and the dampness of dawn.
(Dracula, Mina Westerman, modern monologue choice 1)

Monologue for next week

For our Monday lessons: Acting for camera, we have been asked to chose any monologue we wish from any film/book/play to perform in front of Andy, preferably a same sex monologue and no longer than a couple of minutes.
We have been asked NOT to use any Shakespeare monologues we know as it is has to be in modern text. We were also asked to pick a monologue which gives the impression that it is aimed at someone, so it should sound like I am talking to someone and not just talking to myself...
I have been thinking about female monologues I love from films and various plays, and have chosen this monologue from the James Bond film Casino Royale(2006) the monologue is spoken by Vesper, James Bond's love interest and accountant. This monologue is when the pair first lay eyes on each other, and they are both making assumptions about each other whilst sitting on an over night train together.


 Alright, by the cut of your suit you went to Oxford or wherever, and naturally think human beings dress like that. But you wear it with such disdain, my guess is you didn’t come from money. And your school friends never let you forget it. Hence the chip on your shoulder. And since your first thought about me ran to orphan, I'd say that's what you are...
Now having just met you I wouldn’t go as far as calling you a cold hearted bastard. But it wouldn’t be a stretch to imagine. You think of women as disposable pleasure rather than meaningful pursuits. So as charming as you are, I’ll be keeping my eye on our government’s money, and off your perfectly formed ass. See even accountants have imagination...good night Mr Bond.


I really like this monologue as it is very witty and sarcastic. Which is the type of character I love to play as I always get really into these types of characters, and she is a strong woman who knows what she is saying, and she is flirting with James in this scene, but in an understated way, as she has a reputation to uphold. So I feel this monologue will work well for me, and I will play around with it this week and learn the lines. I prefer serious monologues like this, with a hint of sarcasm and humour rather than comical light hearted monologues, I just can relate more to these types of monologues, as in a way it matches my own personal sense of humour, as I am quite dry and sarcastic as a person.

Michael Caine Masterclass video

This is the video from Michael Caine's famous Acting Masterclass for actors who want to act on screen.
I watched this video and I found it really interesting and helpful. Michael Caine emphasises the fact that "less is more" and actors do not have to "over act" on screen as the camera is watching everything you do, actors do not need to over do it on screen and he feels actors need to LISTEN and just be.
He aids simplicity and pushes on concentration. He as an actor feels concentration is very important in order to achieve what they want. I really like this video and I feel everyone should watch it, as it is inspiring and very logical to me, he wants actors to not get distracted and to just be in the moment. 

26.1.15 Acting for film

Michael Caine

In today's lesson, we filmed Greta and Heta;s scene from Doctors and Max and Jade's scene. We all took part as crew members, observers and actors. 

In Greta and Hetas scene Sav and I were crew members for the markers, we taped down 2 marking points each for Greta and Heta and in Max and Jade;s scene I sat as an observer, watching how the camera and boom are operated.

Although I was unfortunately absent from last weeks filming, I can still answer the questions we were given as I have worked in front of a camera before, doing modelling and TV acting work.

How does it feel to work in front of the camera? Since the age of 18 I have worked in front of cameras quite frequently for modelling shoots, and also small TV parts and fashion shows. I really enjoy working in front of the camera, and actually prefer it to theatre acting. I have always preferred it, because I feel more at ease in front of a camera becuase I know if I mess up my lines or do something wrong, there is always more takes, and it takes the pressure out of my mind. Even though filming for TV and film is SUCH a long process, and day shoots can take all day, and only have about 1 minute of a TV show or film completed. But to me it feels good to work in front of the camera and to feel supported by those around me, whereas when I perform on stage, I feel nervous before as you only get one shot and once your on stage, in a way your on your own as you cannot rely on the other actors to help you out if you forget a line! So I really enjoy working in front of the camera and I am really annoyed that I missed out on my chance last week due to an illness, as I have experience with working in front of the camera and would have loved to have done this again!!

What skills did I use? The one thing I have learned from modelling and acting is that its all in your EYES. Eyes are so powerful and can tell a thousand stories, and acting in front of camera is reliant on your eyes and facial expressions to portray your characters emotions. So the main skill I have used when acting for camera previously is using facial expressions. Another skill I have used is maintaining eye contact with the other actors, I feel this really helped me out, as sometimes when filming I have became distracted by what is going on around me and it is so hard to not look at what everyone is doing sometimes! So maintaining eye contact and focus is a great skill, and it also makes you feel at ease with the other actors, as they are in the same boat as you and probably appreciate your eye contact as well!

What skills are different to acting on stage? "Theater acting is an operation with a scalpel, movie acting is an operation with a laser" Michael Caine

Acting for stage and camera are so different, a main difference is the physicality. Acting for stage requires a lot of gestures, movements and choreography, whereas acting for camera is much more subtle(depending on the film) of course if you are starring in a massive action movie, you may be required to be much more physical, but you would almost definitely have a body double for this. But acting on stage is all YOU. Also facial expressions are not as important when acting on stage, as your face may not be very well seen from the back of the theatre, this is why projection and voice is more important in stage acting. But in camera acting your face says EVERYTHING. You cannot get away with just saying the lines with passion and projection, you have to say it through your face and eyes, but on stage this is not very important as your face and eyes may not be seen very well. As Michael Caine has said, the camera sees everything, so every subtle gesture you make with your face, the camera will see it. So it does not require over the top facial expressions, as the camera sees every little gesture or movement you make. Another difference between the two are the durations. The duration of rehearsal an actor will have, the duration of the days of work they will do and performing/filming. Acting of camera, if it is a film, an actor will have a certain period of months, sometimes WEEKS! To learn their lines, and this will not normally be with the other actors, actors are required to go away separately and learn their lines, then return to filming knowing all their lines, and then they will begin to rehearse. If it is camera acting for a soap opera, actors will have very little time to rehearse their scene with the other actors, most of the time they would have only rehearsed the scene a few times before filming the real thing. Whereas acting for stage, actors will have much more time rehearsing together in a group and will generally have more time to rehearse,and then will have to repeat the performance for however many nights/days it is running for, whereas actors for films/tv shows will only have to film the scene ONCE in full, and will always film small parts of their scenes, and this is quite a long process, especially for films.

From watching today's scenes being filmed, I noticed a lot of differences in my class mates acting techniques, as we have always acted in theatre, and never in front of the camera, and I could definitely notice changes in their acting.

What skills were they using? Eye contact, particularly Greta and Heta, facial expressions and using eyes, more subtle movements and gestures, clear projection, always keeping eyes up and not looking down, working with markers, maintaining focus on the scene and not what was going on around them.

What did they do well? All the actors today focused really well and they were all very clear with their voices, projection is not massively important as they had the boom microphone always over their heads, but they still remembered to speak clearly and slowly. The focus was very good and they always stayed focused to the scene and not what was going around them(camera moving, boom moving, crew members talking quietly ect) They all expressed very clear emotions, as the scenes are all about pregnancy and miscarriage, which is quite a sensitive and tricky subject to get right when acting, and I feel they all achieved this. The scenes were very touching and raw, I could definitely feel the emotions in all of their acting.

What was it like working as crew? I really enjoyed working as crew as it allowed me to see what the crew actually have to do, and not just being their to act. It requires a lot of hard work, and team work is essential. I worked with Sav on the mark points for the actors, and helping out with the camera briefly and observing the scenes. I can see now the hard work that goes into preparing for scenes, and these scenes were only 30 seconds long! So I can only imagine the hard work that goes into films that are 3 hours long!

Best boy? A best boy is part of the film crew, and there are TWO types: Best boy electric and Best Boy grip. The best boy is responsible for the day to day operation of the lights and grips. They oversee the the management of the crew and do a lot of organising and hiring for crew members. 

Grip? A grip is a lighting and rigging technician in film, their responsibility is to build and maintain all of the equipment needed to support the cameras.

GRIPS WORKING ON A DOLLY(a dolly is a moving device which the camera can be placed on)

This is a drawing of the basic camera shot used for filming

These are the markers Sav and I made for Greta and Heta's scene