UAL Assignment 1 - Principles Of Performance (Year 1, 2023)

 Candidate Declaration - I confirm that the attached portfolio is all my own work* and does not include any work completed by anyone other than myself.

Warm Up Exercises

One warm up exercise that helped to improve my improvisation and devising skills was a warm up all about emotions. I briefly mention this exercise in PRODUCTION DIARIES, DATE : WEDNESDAY 13th SEPTEMBER. We had to split off into two circles to do this task. So, the point of the exercise is to learn to match and counter emotions when it is needed in acting, whilst also considering what is being said to you and responding - the exercise was labelled as a listening exercise as it was about us listening to one another and connecting simply through emotion. Kelly in our small circles handed someone a slip of paper with a certain emotion on it and a prompt line. From here, that person had to go stand in the centre of the circle with another person from the circle (who has no idea what the paper says) and read out their prompt in the emotion it named. So, for example if the line was 'GET OUT' in 'anger' the person had to read that line angry. From this, the other person originally had to respond  in the exact same emotion as the person who read out the line. So if someone was crying, you had to cry. If someone was shouting, you had to shout and so on.  This helped to improve my improvisation skills as when i was called into the centre of the circle, i had no idea what was on the other persons slip of paper and i had to come up with my response on the spot, not knowing what i would be doing. This is why it was really good, as it helped me to manage my emotions on the same level as another student in the class making it so that in the future i will work better with that person as i know i can match that same energy. As for devising skills, it helped me improve this as them emotions that i had just matched in the centre of the circle, i knew at some point i would need to tone them up or down, so we had the opportunity to learn these emotions on a similar level but it also allowed us to know that if it can be matched it can be countered. So, as a result it improved devising skills because as an individual and a group we learnt that no matter the situation we get put in whether it be improv or scripted that thought of what level of emotion needed in response to what is being said to you will always be there.

Another warm up that helped to improve my improvisation and devising skills was a warm up

A warm up that i believe would be useful to help everyone learn and develop character is a 'speed dating' type of warm up. So, everyone walks around the room with a character in their mind that is completely different to them as a person - different age, personality, even gender if they want to and when someone shouts 'match' you go to the closest person to you, and act as if you're in a speed dating situation and you have to act and improvise with the other person both in character. So you and this other character will be having a conversation in speed dating - tell me about yourself, what do you like, etc. I think this will be useful as it is quick thinking and on the spot improvisation that is about getting you out of your head and into the body of your new character.

Production Diaries 

FOR PRODUCTION DIARIES SEE POST:   https://siennasactingexperience.blogspot.com/2023/09/year-1-term-1.html

Character Study

My character in the performance was a Victorian child who sold newspapers on the street. I know that Victorian children were severely overworked and underpaid as they were easy labour, therefore all the working conditions they were in were poor as nobody cared enough about these children to do anything about it for years. My character was emotionally strong yet physically weak, she works on the streets every single day selling people newspapers just to earn enough money to keep herself alive. She barely had any spare money after simply buying food for the family and any spare she couldn't save, it went back into the job buying more newspapers to sell. It was an endless cycle she cannot get out of. Therefore, even though she was a child, she was quite mature when it came to actually speaking to people based on the things she's seen and the environment she was in. As a result of being on the streets every day with no escape, she has experienced and seen awful things happen which is why my first line of the show is so impactful: ''Be careful Mr, be careful Miss, there are bad guys around here, everywhere around here. Nobody is safe, nobody. Not you, or you, or you.'' This is where my character is very first introduced. I am positioned in the top stalls and come out from hiding within the seats to the main walk way, which is where the board for the newspapers is positioned. My positioning in this scene was very important, as it shows how my character is scared of the environment she is in but she jumps at an opportunity to try and sell her newspapers for her hunger. The boards i use in this scene are also vital as they show the character of Jack the Ripper being on the loose, which proves later on that it genuinely isn't safe, as we hear the laugh of Jack the Ripper from one of our other actors. Everything was placed carefully to ensure that the audience knew what was going on in the moment and had an understanding of the history around the children. The entire point of my character was to help move the storyline of Jack the Ripper along whilst also giving the audience an understanding of how hard children had to work in that time just to get something to eat. To portray this character well, i had a costume with a flat cap and a checked top with normal trousers and dirt all over my face. This showed the class level i was in and how much i was out in the streets. As for my acting, i performed in a way which presented my character as scared, wanting to help these people even though nobody is helping her. I focused on facial expressions and running towards or walking very close to the audience. Another way this was shown was my fear of other character such as the child snatchers, i ran away and hid from them and when i was terrified at the end i made my character run and grab onto the tour guides, as a child would do to their parent if they were afraid. This all went exactly how i wanted it to. The way i had the audience invest in the character was by handing them things and having a physical interaction with them. They took newspapers and roses from me, and i went extremely close to them when i could. I gave my character the direction of trying to get out of this place of misery, which i showed by some other scenes of me still playing and singing (though it being a Halloween piece, this singing and playing was done in a slow, creepy way) which demonstrated the fact that my character was still a child who wanted to have fun even though they had been through so much. Overall, my character just wanted to be a normal child who could play with her friends and sing songs but that wasn't possible, so she did so in between working. When people were visible to sell newspapers to, it was a focus on that instead of being a child and living life.

My original monologue i wrote was this:

[Coughing, Gasping, Crying} No, please no don’t be dead. I can’t do this on my own. It’s dark, its cold it’s scary why have you left me on my own? You are all I had down here. Everyone down here is mean and loud and it’s so horrible you were all that I had. {Pushing the cart from his crushed body} No, no. {Crying, but stopping} {Whispering to herself} I can’t stay here, I need to get back to work. I’m sorry, I must leave you. If I don’t master isn't going to be pleased. The coal, oh how am I supposed to move the coal, the cart is broken. {Panicking} WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO? He’s going to hurt me, he is going to hurt me I need to move this now. Please just move. If it doesn’t move I'm down here even longer tomorrow and I hate it here oh why has this happened. I want to go home.  

Which is very different to my final performance work however the research was able to cross across both dialogues, as they were both about children working in poor conditions all of the time. Therefore my original idea contributed well to my character as it allowed me to use all of my original ideas just within a different job for the child.

Promenade / Immersive Theatre - Influences Case Study

Promenade theatre. What is it? Well, to 'Promenade' means to walk, but it is a bit different in acting. Promenade theatre is where the audience follow the actors through their performance, moving with the actors as if they are apart of the show.

Immersive theatre. What is that? Immersive theatre is a performance where the actors surround or are the same level as the audience. It removes the stage and therefore removes that fourth wall. The audience somewhat play a role in immersive theatre, they are the witnesses to what is happening. It is all about breaking the fourth wall.

The Globe research that helped with the performance: 

As we went on an initial tour of the globe to find out our workspace, Josh told us some history on the Globe which is interesting and was also helpful. One thing which was interesting was the fact that the stage had full black wings and tabs to cover the backstage but it could also force a stage reality (making it look smaller or larger) This was useful as it meant we could use a more compact space if needed on the stage for performing which we used as we only had a small amount of people on the stage. There was many things that even if they weren't used to help me personally, they were still very interesting to learn as our entire piece was all about history and people in the past. Some of the things Josh taught us about the globe included: It had been open since 1935 and used for many things (even a cinema at one point), the artwork around the stage is meant to look 3d, everything is about symmetry, the stage is proscenium arch, the main stage is actually underground and many other facts. In my opinion, the thing that helped me most about the globe was the physical research. Being able to go inside the globe and explore different locations, understand the environment in which i would be performing in and from there i was able to create many different ideas. Seeing everything and the space we had to work with up close allowed me to write down what i think would work in different areas as shown above and below this text: 

These ideas contributed to my performance as it allowed me to be creative and envision projects that were not just my own but also other peoples, and even if the ideas didn't get used it still was good for my creativity. For example, everything i wrote about the children in each space allowed me to think about how they would be in the situation which contributed to my performance as when i got my allocated space i had a general idea of how i wanted to lay it out and how i wanted to portray my specific character. 

Some other facts i learnt:

-The Globe shut down and reopened many times - useful because the Globe had its own history and our performance was all about the past so it allowed me to realise there was history everywhere.

-There is a projection room that isn't open to the actors or the public because of past incidents which also links to history

-There is a speaker in every single room which is useful for the sound department as people could use certain audios if they needed it.

Evaluation of Performance

Overall, i believe that this performance went extremely well for the first show that me and many other people who were performing have done with the college. There was many things that went extremely well and some things that were bumpy, but as an overall i am proud of my performance and my classmates performances as we as a hole did extremely well with what we created. For my individual performance, i believe i managed to effectively deliver my acting in a way that gave us the reaction we wanted from the audience -  fear, creep factor, etc. as i had people physically react to my character and move away from me or audibly gasp. I know this meant it was effective and to keep doing what i was doing - this was mainly shown when i was doing nursery rhymes or creeping around the audience. This is the parts that i believed in my performance went really well, but there was parts i know i could improve on as well. For example for a few shows i delivered my lines too early meaning the performance wasn't as effective for certain members of the audience for that specific show. I took this as something to improve on for the next show but also for performances after that i will do in the future. This is also where for me personally, group teamwork was shown to improve the performance whilst we were still acting as for the next show we came up with the tour guides a way for me to not do this again and added a new cue line so that it would go well. Even though everyone had their own individual parts, everyone made sure to help out when needed if that to be improv or something to help improve the show after. From a further away perspective i could see people reacting in the way we wanted by our other actors. For example, the tour guides had great interactions with each performer individually and helped a lot to deliver the message the performer was trying to send to the audience. Something that could've been improved for me as a group was our end performance on certain shows, as sometimes the audience wasn't fully included and where we wanted them to be or we were a bit delayed but we managed to fix that in later shows through communication and team work.

I feel like this performance has improved me as an actor because it was a more difficult piece of acting as the audience are with you and you have to enclose on them and be right near them. This is why i feel like i have improved, as even though i was surrounded by people unfamiliar to me or even friends and family, i didn't break out of my character and stayed focused the whole time. I feel like another way i have improved was as the shows went on i got more confident in my acting, being able to project my voice more and not being afraid of the reactions from the audience. It also improved my team work skills as there were times where we all had to focus and help each other out to make the performance go as well as it did. For my next performance with the college, i would like to be more confident and vocal with my performance - being able to just act without a fear of judgement or something going wrong. I would also like to focus more on body language and voice as in this performance i very much channelled my own voice and body language instead of creating a whole new persona.