End of Term

First term is drawing to a close.

Tomorrow is our final assessment: movement/character study - something I am really looking forward to.  I have been investigating the Nurse (from Romeo & Juliet) with rigour and passion.  The homework:  I went through the entire play first writing down FACTS (what we know about the character: age, location, marriages, children, family life, etc).  The next section of my notebook was on OPINIONS (what other people say about my character) - for example "good nurse" "honest nurse" "O, she is lame" with who said it about you.  The third reading is to write down KEY WORDS (words that your character speaks about).  I created a chart with key word categories across the top (eg. Nature, Family, God/Religion, Body, Insult, Money, Travel, Emotions, etc.) and down the side I separated it by acts of the play.  Each time a key word in popped up in a line, I ticked the appropriate box.  This gives you a true sense of the words that your character says - words that the audience hears coming out of your mouth.  For the Nurse, it was a surprise. As much as she is usually portrayed as a wise-cracking bawdy, what actually comes out of her mouth is primarily about God, with speaking, travel and the body following.  She speaks about the body with the detachment of a medical professional - without lewd connotation.  You also get to see act-by-act how your thinking/speaking changes over the course of the play.  The final section is for INTUITIONS (anything you just have a feeling about - not supported by the text.)  This section is to allow your gut instinct a place to be released - and referred to later to see if it was correct or off-base.  The homework gives you a clear picture of what the text says.  Shakespeare writes each of his characters with a different voice.  They use different words, speak with a different musicality.  It is our pleasure as actors to mine the treasures that are in the text.

The next step was done in class - and was about putting the work IN THE BODY.  Instead of making intellectual, emotional choices - we approached it from the outside --> in.  We fed the body with the information, allowing that to inform our understanding of the character.  We brought in the first speech (or scene) of the character - the first time the character is introduced to the audience - and used it for the following exercises.  Vowels:  speak only the vowels of each of your lines.  Listen to the different vowel sounds in Lady Macbeth's first line, "Glamis thou art, and Cawdor, and shalt be what thou art promis'd" and Titania's first line, "These are the forgeries of jealousy; And never, since the middle summer's spring, met we on hill, in dale, forest or mead..."  Immediately you get a strong sense of the sound and music your character uses.  Next was Scoring: we stepped out the syllables.  Does your character speak in simple, straightforward words, or use complex language and thought?  With the Nurse, it was primarily monosyllabic, "And she was wean'd - I never shall forget it - of all the days of the year upon that day."

The next three exercises are to understand the energy of thought (still using the first speech).
1.  Anywhere there is punctuation, turn 90º.
2.  Walk in between those shifts.  Is it a long walk between the thoughts, or just the turn?  How much (mental) space must you cover to make the leaps between thoughts: turn that into physical space.
3.  Wherever you walked a few paces = drop to touch the ground
Wherever you walked many paces = drop to touch the ground, and stand back up.  This exercise changes from distance between thoughts to the energy expended to jump between thoughts.
(You may find that there are certain topics that your character has to spend much more mental energy on - eg. Rosalind when talking about her father uses lots of energy, when having battle of wits she is quite at ease.  The Nurse, however, spends lots of energy just to get through a simple sentence.)

The next day of class we worked on EMBODIMENT.
Sitting with my homework notebook,  I went through all the FACTS as "I" statements, allowing them to settle.  I read through the OPINIONS, allowing them to impact me.  I went through the KEY WORDS with the most checks, to see what words I remembered and let the lips form them.  (In religion category, I might remember "Lord" "heaven" "beshrew" "Christian" "faith".)  We then went through a reverie - an imaginative journey into waking up as the character as a child.  What was the bed like? The fabric? The clothes? Breakfast? Were you still hungry or full? Activities for the day? Who says prayers with you?  Again we did the reverie waking up as the character 6 months before the play starts.

Then we moved to our feet.  We started to move as the character with clear physical choices.  Where is the weight? The breath? The focus?  How do they sit? How long do they stay still?  Are they used to carrying weapons?  What is their release gesture (lowering shoulder, sitting into hip, brushing hair out of eyes)?  We then tested this body against the first speech.  By reading the speech out loud, we changed the body as needed in response to the words.  We introduced the public vs. private self (what is the difference in weight, focus, rhythm?)  and then revisited the first speech with the public and private self explored within the text.

So....yeah...that's the prep work so that we were able to get ready for the assessment day.  We are to come in dressed as the character in 2011 London.  There is an amazing amount of freedom to dress within the parameters of 'normality' - something that wouldn't draw stares on the streets of London today.   We have chosen who we are in modern terms (for my Nurse, a New Orleans Katrina refugee working as a nanny for a wealthy family who has relocated to Chicago).  We have an interview with our teacher and 5 other of the "characters" - on modern issues (war in Iraq, gay marriage, education reform).  You quickly realise how much of the homework has worked its way into your thought process.  You know when you would speak up, and when you would keep your mouth shut.  You quickly make alliances and enemies with the other members of the panel.  You have an understanding of what issues are hot buttons for your character and which ones you have little to no opinion about.  With our group of 6 (now no longer strangers) - we spoke our CORE SPEECH.  The core speech is the speech in the play where your character is challenged; where things must change.  The core speech is spoken to and reacted off of the other people in your space.  If they move away from you, you might need to follow them, OR you might need to find someone who is supportive in the group to start speaking to.

The final (and really exciting) part is the FREE FORM.  One person in the group begins their core speech.  At any point, if something they say sparks a reaction in you, you may respond with any of your lines, in any order.  (This requires an absolute backwards-and-forwards memorisation of your core speech, by the way.)  You may say one line over and over.  You may continue through a chunk of your speech.  You may say one or two lines and stop.  The group creates a dynamic piece of theatre by reacting in the moment off of each other, using Shakespeare's text in order to respond.

I know, I know...very technical description of the exercise, but it is a very different approach for me.  I am so used to the inside --> out method of working.  To put the character in my body so strongly before any intellectual choices are made has been phenomenally exciting.

We had our scene assessments on Monday.  Just for a bit of added pressure, the casting director from the Royal Shakespeare Company was running a "mock audition" while watching the scenes.  Surprisingly, the added pressure did not amount to nerves.  It was more relaxed and confident than the assessment last term.   For this one, I did the Hamlet/Gertrude closet scene.  My scene partner was lovely.  He brought some of the best work I've seen: working in the moment, bringing passion and levels into his work.  My work?  I felt much as I have for the last two months of work:  serviceable.  I don't feel as though I have made any sorts of breakthroughs in my performance this term.  I did have a wonderful lighbulb moment when rehearsing for the Hamlet scene - we decided to do a run where we 'over-acted' it.  And I realised that I CAN'T overact this scene.  It is not reality television, it is larger than life.  It requires something more than small acting.  I've always been afraid of "acting with a capital A".  And to get away from my bad habits as a teenager, that was probably a good thing.  But equally, I cannot bring film acting to a stage version of the closet scene.  It requires SO much more.

The main discovery for me in the last few months has been much more of a personal nature.  With the amount of work that was piled on - I found myself under a crunch.  No matter how much work I did, I was always behind.  And my first instinct when I got under the gun was to slip back into the groove (ok, ok, RUT) of my former work patterns - specifically, a choke hold on it to force it into what I think it needs to be.  The sense of play, the sense of relaxation and fun ran away screaming as my stronghold came in to GET IT DONE RIGHT.  It took me about a month to realise that I was even doing it.  I looked around, noticed that I wasn't having fun anymore, and wondered what the hell happened?!?  Oh, right, my body jumped in - "I know how to deal with stress and overload!  I know!  I know!  I've done this before."  I had to gently thank it for trying to help me, and remind it that I am trying out this new approach instead.  It is very much like riding your bicycle and driving along a tram track.  Your wheels just WANT to go into the deep groove of habit.  It takes a conscious choice to pull your tires out and set along a new path.

So it is.