Introduction/First Two Weeks
Ensemble weeks began in order to assist in producing a feeling of community amongst the group. It felt daunting to create devised pieces based on our own memories surrounding comedy, tragedy and satire but it forced us to be bold. Unafraid to share, I was proud to say that we re-enacted one of my ‘comedic’ stories about an incident where my Dad ordered too many croissants. During this process of creation I was put in groups that had a more relaxed stance (slightly less professional) and this was tricky to deal with as I knew it wasn’t my place to step in especially as I had only just met them. I had to take a step back and I found this difficult as I naturally take the lead. It was also difficult to sit back and watch other groups have some highly focused and effective performances. But I sat back and believe that now I have more of a respected voice amongst the group and I have the confidence to voice my concerns within a group and be an active member in it.
We then came together (in ensemble weeks) to work on our adaptation of ‘Dionysis’ focusing on hysteria and Dionysis’s partying behaviours. Working in Slung Low in a festival style form brought a sense of ensemble and helped to break down fear between groups. I really found a sense of fun during these first 2 ensemble weeks. It gently settled me in ready for more intense skills weeks.
Movement
Devised Movement
Originally I saw links between Devised Movement and styles I had explored in physical theatre, however I wasn’t expecting it to be as ‘free’. So, near the beginning of this module, I felt more comfortable in creation that was slow or rehearsed [REFER TO NO.1]. Reading ‘Rhythm In Acting And Performance’ in order to proactively enhance my understanding of movement practice, I realised this stemmed from me wanting to control and understand rather than give myself a freedom to embody and play freely. Morris (2017) states “the use of ‘Kinaesthetic response’ within Viewpoints training can be seen as a means of bringing the performer into an immediate relationship with impulses… rather than making decisions based on established expectations or artistic preconceptions” which reinforces the idea that overthinking can obstruct play. This made me further understand what Eilon intended to extract from us during an exercise – we would frequently visit at the beginning of each lesson – in which we would walk around the room and feed off group energy and play with patterns of movement (viewpoints) such as pace, shape, topography, gesture… I learnt to improvise more instead of forcing my own creative and thought out ideas for concepts such as ‘gesture’. Also being encouraged by Eilon’s words to me that I had ‘a calm yet excited energy’ when improvising movement made me feel like I was beginning to grasp the concept of being ‘present’ and ‘receptive’ to a group dynamic. That comment really stuck with me and motivates me still, especially as it came at a time of uncertainty.
Another reason I struggled in Devised Movement near the beginning was a further need for control within an ensemble. When one individual would break free from the group without ‘feeding’ into it, it would frustrate me. However I learnt, over time, to focus less on individuals that would distract me and more on everyone simultaneously via a soft gaze – which Eilon referenced often. I grew to understand its meaning as it formed a coping mechanism for how I work moving forward. As now I focus on the overall experience and group rather than smaller inconveniences such as one potentially detrimental individual breaking away from the ensemble. For example, during the ‘ball game’ in which we would pass balls around the circle and some people would break away from the intensity of the workshop and joke around, I would stop myself from following. I got better at this as we progressed through the year and played the ball game more as I gauged from the book ‘Rhythm In Acting and Performance’ that ensembles were unsuccessful if a performer is not in sync with the rest of the group, therefore I comprehended that it wasn’t my duty to make sure we were all synced but just focus on whether I was. I learnt and applied these steps to my assessed movement piece by making sure to focus on my individual relation to the ensemble.
I also made sure to bring a sense of receptiveness and active energy and awareness to the piece (not just going through the motions but bringing a new life to them) similar to the concept drawn on by Mike Alfreds in ‘Different Every Night’ (looked at with Esther in Acting Technique) of finding more nuances between each performance despite it being rehearsed in order to give it a more authentic and fulfilled performance. For example I would focus on relationships within the performance so when performing the Charleston section, I made sure to share a smile and wink with Dom’s character (the host of the speakeasy) as I stood next to him for a while (which wasn’t the case during rehearsals) and thought it would add a familiarity to the piece. This was different to rehearsals and was based on instinct amidst the performance.
Movement Technique
Looking at movement – from the perspective of acting – has been really fascinating as things such as build and posture of a character have never been a priority of mine. These subtleties are actually what distinguish an actor from their character. It also helps you ‘get into character’ noting specific things about their physicality so you can ‘transform’. As an actor we want to be as moldeable as possible. So Zoe focused on techniques for us to build strength focusing on our specific personal challenges in order to aid us for character development in the long term. A technique we used was the pelvic clock in order to strengthen pelvic floor muscles and provide “positive differences in gait and trunk functions” (Abadi et al, 2023) all useful in developing a stronger actor. We also looked at the importance of the diaphragm muscle and how breathing effectively can increase range of motion and is self regulating so making sure to have steady breath and training things such as duration in ability to hold breath via diaghramatic breathing exercises will benefit your range as an actor. Learning the lumbar spine (lower) is for stability, the thoracic spine (mid) is for mobility and the cervical spine (higher) is for stability. So in order to improve their mobility/stability there are exercises such as lieing on the floor and rolling your leg over your body to mobilise the thoracic spine which are beneficial in assisting with its mobility. All of these will help with my ability to adapt with ease to different more physically demanding roles.
A key moment and I think my main takeaway from Animal Studies was helping me to ‘get out of my head’ and not worry about looking silly, because on the surface it sounds quite amusing but it forced me to take something which on the surface seems funny and actually delve deeper and take ownership of my process and develop something fully formed and believable. I really enjoyed creating a goat, looking at nuances such as their jaw movements, their rectangle eyes that have the ability to search out predators when eating, the way their legs bend in on themselves when they go to eat. See link to research done on my ‘Goat’ [NO.2].
I did have struggles that I had to overcome [REFER TO NO.3] as there are limitations but I worked around them, for example their energy levels and bounciness were hard to replicate on all fours so after some lessons trying to explore this ‘block’ I introduced crutches to my method, enabling faster movements and bounces that no longer impacted my hands and knees. Tilda commented how I looked like I was having a lot of fun and I was proud of myself for finding a way to overcome an obstacle and bring my ‘goat’ to life.
Dance and Choreography
Having previous experience with dance I thought this might aid me and to a certain degree it aided with my connection with my brain/body and fitness, yet I wasn’t expecting Donald’s focus on internal processes. For example, I was quite focused on how it ‘looked’ visually but this would restrict the intensity of my movements making me hold back and be conscious that it may not look aesthetic in the mirror, so Donald made me switch my mindset and worry less about how it looked and more about giving it all of my energy as it is clear that when you are putting all your energy in, that is what makes it enjoyable – the commitment.
During our Solos I was comparing myself quite a lot and for one session was frozen for most of it with a bit of a mental block. But getting more comfortable with each other, for example getting so sweaty at the start of sessions in a cardio and abdominal workout and running round the room looking silly helped to reduce my fear. In NO.4 you can see me stepping to the corner at the end of the session to film alone, whereas in NO.5 you can see me confidently performing it with other people around. I completed my solo within the group and was very happy with the finished product (despite it not necessarily being ‘technically’ accurate) because it was more about the process of creating a solo within a group and being passionate about it that mattered. Having a moment within the group piece for yourself felt very empowering [REFER TO NO.6]. I took this forward with my approach to the speakeasy ensemble dance piece making sure that I was taking the intensity of the warmup into my performance and I left broken after every session – knowing I was putting in all of my effort.
NO.4
NO.5
https://leedsconservatoire.cloud.panopto.eu/Panopto/Pages/Viewer.aspx?id=5b4b1290-6077-4d16-bf0d-b26500fc205e&start=8 Link to Full version of NO.6
NO.6
Acting
Improvisation
I found a vital method for my character development is improvisation, even if it’s just small form improvisation. For example when developing my character of Hazel for Till the Stars Come Down, a body scan with my eyes closed envisaging her home environment and her body’s condition is super helpful in identifying her differences to myself (she is a very different person). I think previous to this, I would apply too much of myself to the character. This was helpful as I could consider stuff such as who she might message e.g Sara’s babysitter and her daily routine. I will be implenting this into my acting process as it makes them a more three dimensional character in my portrayal of them because I will have considered off-text situations and my characters external context (not necessarily explained in the scenes from the script).
As seen in NO.7 we had a very interesting discussion during one of my lessons which stuck with me. We discussed how Emotion Memory can be damaging referencing ‘A Little Life’ (Harold Pinter Theatre, 2023) due to their cast needing therapy so we discussed that ‘feeling’ the emotion can be extremely negative so playing the emotions and faking it can be more ethical. It is your job and not therapy and you aren’t being paid to go to get to a potentially traumatic place mentally every night. I will therefore make sure to manage my ability to draw on emotions.
Watching Middleditch and Swartz (Netflix, 2020) in order to advance my intake of improvised theatre/performance I noticed how their bold choices and connection was the most important. Watching them feed off eachother so actively was really phenomenal to watch and makes me understand the importants of connection between cast members as it is far more captivating for an audience.
Acting Technique
I really started to get to grips with ‘actioning’ a Stanislavskian and Mike Alfreds technique (which is where you give a verb to a line and put ‘I want to … them’) in Esther Dix’s Acting technique lessons. A focus on creating an emotion for the other person is fascinating and nothing I have ever tried before as usually I’m focused on how my emotion comes across. I think referring to actions as tactics has really helped me. And the idea of the ‘what’ being the text and the ‘how’ being the subtext is phrasing I find extremely helpful and it places importance on the actor and interpretation. I loved putting it into practice with text extracts from constellations and really trying to effect a response in the other actor. Using Actions: An Actors’ Thesaurus (Caldarone & Lloyd-Williams, 2004) has helped massively in finding different verbs to use when trying to action a line and I used it for my preparation for Ruffian on the Stair and Till the Stars Come Down.
Working on my character for Tom’s exercise of going around Leeds in character – a character we have created – really helped to develop a more detailed method in creating character. I used methods such as: writing a day in my life and acting it out, writing an email in character, responding to a prop stimulus e.g a plug. As seen in my notes attached (NO.8, NO.9, NO.10). This was very effective and helpful for the process of developing a final character and I would use these techniques moving forward to make a more rounded and detailed character.
My acting technique assessment in which I played Wilson from Ruffian on the Stair – during an improvised scene placed before Wilson goes to Joyce’s apartment to confront her – helped me to put my Stanislavski, Uta Hagen and Mike Alfreds research into practice. I made sure to make my performance different every time by reacting on impulse, despite it being rehearsed. As an actor I find my own personal context varies from one performance to the next and I want to embody this rather than ignore it. I took this from our work on Mike Alfreds and making performances ‘Different Every Night’ . Furthermore, during the scene I tried to not reflect back on my research into Wilson but work off of the moment as Mike Alfreds (in his book Different Every Night) believes people too often think that “using your head [and]… ratiocination will solve the problem of acting” (Mike Alfreds, 2007) when it has to be emotions driving scenes. You have to trust your research and place it to one side during the performance.
Being able to experiment with my own application of my acting process while working on Till The Stars Come Down has really helped me develop this as I move forward to second year. I started by reading the text and establishing my character’s relationships to others, making bold decisions about what she thinks of each person, e.g. that Auntie Carol is selfish and doesn’t have my (Hazel’s) best interests at heart (these ‘bold’ choices are focused on distinctly in our improvisation and sight reading lessons as these form interesting bases from which to build off). I then began to annotate my script by applying my Stanislavski style practice – actioning lines and developing objectives. I then moved onto focusing on Hazel’s physicality for example her ailments, because as a mother she will have had many strains on her body which will have led her to be less physically ‘able’ as she used to be (taking elements of what I covered in movement technique). My next step was to establish her home environment as this will be where she will be at her most comfortable and familiar – I would need to make sure I was equally familiar with the environment. In order to do this, I drew on Uta Hagen’s 5 senses method (covered by Tom Aldersley in term 1 of Acting technique lessons) in order to develop a complete understanding of the circumstances of the character (see image for notes about Uta Hagen for Till The Stars Come Down).
Sight Reading
Distance, Pace, Height, Placement in space, Direction Faced are the 5 principles of spatial relationships we are asked to consider during every scene and focusing on one’s we neglect. I applied a similar working process within my movement lessons with Eilon (Devised movement) and his use of topography and viewpoints, making sure I did not neglect one. I found Matthew Lewney’s principles to help me link this as it was more comprehensible for me to grasp it as it was how I’d use it within an acting scene, compared to movement with Eilon’s viewpoints. However the more I drew comparisons, the more I grasped it. Height reminded me of shape (your personal shape within space) and Pace (viewpoints) and Tempo (spatial relationships) aligned. This more simplistic combination of the two helps me to apply it to my working practice.
Sight Reading has massively improved my boldness and confidence. For example I hadn’t got up to read for a text the whole of the first term. Yet there was a pivotal moment in my training in week 3 of the second term when I stepped forward for a text called Constellations (which I had heard of but never read). I found it empowering and actually more enjoyable than sitting back and watching. I got lots of positive feedback about mine and Oscar’s interpretation of the script and this was the first time students in my class had ever given me direct compliments on my acting since starting. This really had a positive impact on my confidence as I felt like I was now good enough to be here and like I had proved myself in a way. This moment has really stuck with me and kept me going even when I’m doubting my abilities or comparing myself.
Within sight reading we also played with status-exploring power dynamics in a scene. I now like to implement this into my working process, focusing on this when first introduced to a text. For example in ‘Till the stars come down’ (looked at in acting technique with Tom) I looked at my character Hazel’s status so in scene two she is in control and bossing people around but then there is a complete shift when Auntie Carol comes in and is able to get people to ‘wait on her’ as she asks Leanne to get her a cup of tea. This must elicit a response from me in terms of my relationship to her, moving away from her, nodding a lot in order to keep her happy etc.
Screen Acting
Advice from Phillip that really resonated with me was that when telling personal stories that are upsetting people’s natural response (viewed on Camera of our class telling sad stories) bring humour in and smile. I really want to carry this through into my acting as I think I tend to take upsetting monologues at surface level and want to highlight the dark rather than portray a more genuine response and add some light. This also is true about the other way round – people can be quite serious when telling happy and funny stories. I want to bring more light and dark to characters, whichever category they fit under.
A concept focused on heavily within Screen lessons is the idea of a connection between scene partners. This reminded me of the concepts learnt from actioning (‘I want to’) of Mike Alfreds. The idea that as an actor we should focus on impacting the other person, looking at what you want from them and focusing on what they are saying rather than being two dimensional and just focusing on yourself – being three dimensional, focusing on the parameters of the scene not just a bubble of focus surrounding your own acting. For example when doing script technique work in screen lessons we were told to hold connection and eye contact with our scene partner and only break that once they finish speaking by looking down at the script. This means that instead of breaking connection whilst they are speaking to you, you hold this connection showing your ability to secure a relationship with your scene partner. This links to actioning because it holds a focus on it being a two way conversation in which, like real life, you want to affect the other person so aren’t ignoring the effect of your words (when acting).
Research For Performance
Linking to what we worked on with Uta Hagaan (a branch of Stanislavski technique) on Emotion Memory covered by Tom Aldersley in Acting Technique classes, Tyrell got us to reflect on the concept of Emotion Memory. We considered whether, despite Stanislavski moving away from this technique towards the end of his career, it held any value. Tyrell, in our Research for Performance online lectures emphasised how it was subjective. Personally I believe I’d only use it for tamer emotions that don’t bring up negative and damaging emotions (like Tom said, we are not pursuing psychotherapy). I would also personally use it as a last resource because it can become ineffective as you exhaust the memory of the emotion, for example during a long running show. It can also be a cheat code, I believe as it gets rid of the point of acting and becoming someone else as you are going over your own experience rather than empathising with another’s situation. Therefore I would only use emotion memory if I was really struggling to portray an emotion and relate to a character.
A personal reflection on my application to our projects in Ben’s research for Performance lessons was that, for our first performance in which we were to make a Political Theatre performance based on Brechtian techniques, we took what seemed to be the easy route. We took a naturalistic play: ‘A Streetcar Named Desire’ and turned it into a Brechtian style performance through Meyerhold’s technique (he did the same with ‘A Doll’s House’). This was ineffective and confusing and on reflection I understand why Meyerhold did it during practice, rather than performance. I wish I had delved deeper, to find a more interesting and developed suggestion and contributed more to the early decisions but I sat back a bit and became a ‘follower’ within the project. Disappointed in the final project, I decided to step up and take a leadership position within our next project: Political Theatre in the 21st Century. I was really proud of my involvement within this project, helping to organise meet ups and help guide people to different areas of research. I would listen to our pitch (presentation) and provide notes (in a sensitive way) to the group which I was recently praised by my group for – I was fearful I was imposing or controlling. This has provided me with a sense of confidence moving forward and makes me feel like I can take more ownership over projects than I had done previously (as near the beginning of the year I didn’t want to annoy people so was a ‘follower’). See NO.11 of my reflections during Artistic Development at the start of year 1 of fear of volunteering and domineering in a new environment using the reflection method of inner cheerleader (Bethany – Blue) and inner critic (Sean – Pink).
Spoken and Sung Voice
Technical Voice
During the start of my vocal training, I struggled with releasing my breath. Having trained in singing I tend to force the voice out and I think this was because I wasn’t letting my jaw drop and allowing the breath to naturally drop in, in between phrasing (I would make a loud and thought out breath). I realised this in October 2024 as seen in NO.12 of my reflections. In order to aid with this I think placing less conscious importance on the breath and doing releasing exercises to force my body to loosen will aid in the breath coming more naturally. However I want to work on this further. Releasing techniques such as throwing the voice and jiggling sound through my belly and out of my mouth have really helped. When throwing my voice across the room in a released ‘aah’ sound, I wanted to make sure that my breath wasn’t audible and excessive and that I want to practice further.
Jo has commented on how I over support and sometimes at the start of lines sound like I’m straining and I think this is due to my conscious effort to support. I was also told by Craig during my 1 to 1 singing lessons that this is the case and that by doing exercises such as singing with my head between my legs, I should be able to bring the breath to a more natural pace.
After my Voice assessment, my feedback seemed to suggest that my vocal technique has improved and that I have grasped how to support my voice and how to be healthy with my production of voice. However I was told that during my Narrative Piece my choices for my characters could have been bolder in order to force me to adapt my technique for a louder voice, for example. Jo commented how I sounded like I was vocally healthy but perhaps I should expand more and see if my vocal technique would still support me if I took more risks. I therefore want to challenge myself moving forward to see if – when shouting – I can still support healthy production. However I am happy that for year 1 I have got a strong grasp of Vocal technique and healthy support and am happy that my creation of my own vocal warm-up [REFER TO NO.13] has been effective in producing a voice for my performance with warmth and body. My Vocal warm-up was edited throughout the year to make it personalised with lots of focus on breath connection and resonance. It can also be adapted to any piece of work with some exercises focusing on text I am in the process of focusing on.
I did struggle near the beginning with my Voice lessons because thinking about breathing and internal processes such as vocal fold vibrations made me a bit queasy as seen in my reflections from October 2024 [NO.14]. Doing different breathing patterns, quick releases on a ‘ha, ha, ha’ or long releases ‘haaaa’ and holding my lower abdominals to feel my lungs filling and retracting was slightly unnerving but I do feel that across the year this has improved.
Voice Into Text
I really enjoyed working on text that I had picked such as a contemporary poem. I chose ‘It Aint What You Do Its What It Does To You’ by Simon Armitage (1989) because it resonated with me as someone who grew up in the countryside; I loved its focus on little details in life. Chris said it was important to find a poem that you like as portraying the message of the poem will be more interesting to an audience if you are passionate about it. I therefore made the same effort for finding my sonnets modern and Shakespearian. When working on my Shakespeare I really took the idea of painting an image for each line of the dialogue and made sure to portray this through my performance emphasising the idea that if I can visualise it clear enough then the audience will too. I really enjoyed spending time on a shorter section of text (the poems) in order to provide work for each line e.g spending the time to action each line and draw out a visualised representation of the lines.
Conclusion
In summary I feel like, having worked with lots of different teachers and professionals, I am well set up for next year as I feel like I have developed a malleability in which I can competently work and adapt to any director, using my working practice but applying it to different professionals. My methods of reflection and note taking have become more effective over the year, meaning I no longer write everything that happens in a lesson but focus on my own key learning points, filtering it to make it more comprehensible and helpful for the long term.
My personal working practice still needs refining but I have a strong understanding of my own methods of approaching a new text: looking at status (Improvisation) creating super-objectives, objectives, uniting and actioning (Acting technique) my application of emotion memory if I’m struggling to empathise (Research for Performance and Acting Technique) and improvising to explore a character’s ‘day to day life’.
I feel I still need to work on my confidence as this affects my pacing (e.g rushing) so I want to focus on this, moving forward and make sure to slow down when delivering lines. Furthermore I think I need to work on my vocal technique as sometimes I feel like I force the voice out so potentially I need to focus less on actively pursuing strong vocal technique and be active but more relaxed with it.
Bibliography
Alfreds, M. (2007) Different Every Night. Nick Hern Book
Altaim, T., Ramakrishnan, V., Subramanian, S., Sureshkumar, S., Subramanian, M., Gaowgzeh, R., Alfawaz, S., Neamatallah, Z. & Abadi, M. (2023) Effectiveness of the Pelvic Clock and Static Bicycle Exercises on Wisconsin Gait Scale and Trunk Impairment Scale in Chronic Ambulatory Hemiplegic Patients: A Single Group Pre-Post Design. 16;11(2) https://doi.org/10.3390/healthcare11020279
Caldarone, M. & Lloyd-Williams, M (2004) Actions: An Actors Thesaurus. Nick Hern Books
Morris, E. (2017) Rhythm in Acting and Performance: Embodied Approaches and Understanding. Bloomsbury, Methuen Drama
Orton, J. (1976) The Ruffian on the Stair. Bloomsbury
Steel, B. (2024) Till the Stars Come Down. Faber & Faber
Armitage, S. (1989) Zoom!. Bloodaxe Books.
Teleography
Middleditch and Schwartz (2020) Polito, R. [TV Programme]. Netflix, 21 April.
Live Productions
A Little Life (2023) Director by Van Hove, I. Harold Pinter theatre, 5 August.
