INTRODUCTION

Since starting first year, I’ve made immense improvement within my knowledge and ability in each module as well as personal progression in my confidence and professional mentality. I believe I’ve gained valuable skills in a range of practices, enhancing my versatility as a performer and beginning to unconsciously amalgamate tools across different classes. In my reflecting process, I’ve acquired a clearer awareness of my strengths and weaknesses as an artist and clarified the areas I need to continue improving, by making a structured action plan to follow over the summer in preparation for second year. This portfolio reflects on my artistic development across acting, voice and movement and highlights goals I’ve set myself for ongoing my training, as I solidify my process before entering the industry.

One specific area I’ve improved is my ability to set myself targets because in October, I identified one of my biggest obstacles to consistent practice was having “unclear goals”, resulting in a lack of motivation and resilience (see figure 2). Therefore, I researched and applied the SMART target technique to make my goals more specific as I believe my main error was being vague because I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to achieve yet. However, after applying the SMART method, I’ve obtained a strong, more professional work ethic due to having detailed clarity on my priorities as well as gaining confidence I will achieve them as they’re more realistic.

Overall, curating this portfolio has given me valuable insight into who I am as an artist, where I view myself in the industry and what actions I need to make to maintain my development. Reflecting on my progress this year has been a positive experience because I’m proud of my achievements so far and look forward to reaching future milestones in my training for the next two years.

CONFIDENCE

This video of my comedy improvisation from Screen demonstrates my willingness to attempt a bold choice, immediately leading the scene with an engaging offer, without worrying about it playing out perfect (see figure 4). My relaxed attitude allowed me to confidently deliver witty one-liners in response to my partners dialogue on the spot and respond on reactions from the audience, regardless of whether I was successful in making them laugh. For example, at 02:42, I felt my attempt at a comedic offer failed as my line didn’t generate a response, but then from persevering and changing tactic, I received a big laugh from the audience at 03:03. Despite my growth over the year, I need to continue my journey of building confidence because I still get anxious when performing in front of the class sometimes and particularly recently in my end of year assessments.

figure 4

Over summer, I intend to work on this by reading the book The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck (2016) by Mark Manson, which I’ve been recommended will help me lose the idea of perfectionism in my head and be more willing to get things wrong as he said “everything worthwhile in life is won through surmounting the associated negative experience. Any attempt to escape the negative, to avoid it or quash it or silence it, only backfires” (Manson, 2016). My goal for Year 2 is to amalgamate deep breathing techniques I’ve learnt from mindfulness exercises in Voice Technique and utilise them when feeling anxious before performances and auditions next year because I’ve noticed sometimes the adrenaline rush affects my breath support, causing my voice to sound shaky.

ACTING TECHNIQUE

A milestone for me this year was being introduced to the theatre practitioner Uta Hagen in Acting Technique because I had no previous experience in exploring her methods but found her techniques have transformed my approach to naturalism. We started with her ‘Changes of Self’ exercise where I performed three real phone calls I’ve had to three different people, each showing a contrasting side of me as a person, with the aim being to demonstrate my raw, ugly self with authenticity (see figure 5). 

Initially, I found it challenging to display my vulnerable side in front of an audience and struggled to fully commit to the extent of what my genuine state of inner rage and frustration truthfully looked like in the actual argument I had on the phone to my best friend (see figure 6). I received feedback from Alex saying I was too polite in showing my intimate side and need to practice activating authentic sensitive, heightened emotions to the class to feel more comfortable and prevent me ‘emoting’ as it didn’t look naturalistic. Throughout this process, I used Hagen’s book Respect for Acting (1973) as a guide to understanding the importance of having an awareness of self, particularly chapter 2 ‘Identity’ where she states “we have an image of who we think we are, but we are more than this — we can be childish, stupid, angry, arrogant, etc. An actor must develop a full sense of his own identity” (Hagen, 1973). 

The breakthrough for me in this module was working on exercise 5: ‘Endowment’, where I inhabited one circumstance that affects a character’s state, I chose drunk, and used two objects in a manner that you wouldn’t be able to truthfully perform on stage, I chose cutting my finger on a sharp knife and eating gooey chocolate cake (see figure 7). 

Watching ‘Uta Hagen’s Acting Class part 1’ (see figure 8) was essential in my preparation for the exercises, particularly when she teaches that to play someone drunk you must “go for one area of the body that is out of control” (Hagen, 2015, 1:20:05).

In this rehearsal recording and my final performance in class, I was successful at portraying drunk truthfully because I localized the physical feeling into my knees, making me naturally stumble backwards slightly when my body wasn’t being held upright (see figure 9 & 10). I also incorporated a skill from another of Hagen’s exercises by using the ‘fourth side’ to focus my half-closed eyes on a specific point on the wall behind the audience and stare while I was eating to demonstrate the zoning out of a drunk person. This was a vital turning point in transforming my naturalistic acting from simply putting on what I think an emotion looks like to instead dedicating time to research, understand and practically explore the intricate details of practitioner techniques for a more evidenced, polished end result. After exploring all 10 exercises, I believe I’ve enhanced the truthfulness in my acting as I’m able to apply her techniques with more subtle authenticity, remembering “your job is not to exhibit emotion but to experience it truthfully through action” from Hagen’s book A Challenge for the Actor (Hagen, 1991). To continue improving my application of Uta Hagen techniques in the future, I aim to rehearse these exercises frequently to maintain my understanding of her methods so I remember to apply them in my acting and progress my ability to repeat the same piece, without loosing the truthfulness as though it’s the first time.

figure 10

APPLICATION OF RESEARCH

Over the course of the year, I’ve explored a plethora of techniques to build my acting toolkit, by researching a variety of practitioners. Subsequently, I’ve improved my ability to apply research into a performance, specifically with adopting methods during a rehearsal process because I previously failed to amalgamate techniques in my acting. This was evident in my acting assessment where I performed a five-minute improvisation of an imagined scene from The Ruffian on the Stair (1976) by Joe Orton. In preparation, I developed a strong work ethic in my dedication to completing detailed research on the writer, time-period and play, adopting the ‘So What’ method to guarantee information is relevant and applicable to the piece. I studied Stanislavski’s methodology by reading An Actor’s Handbook (2008) to inform my acting choices and found his Method of Physical Actions the most helpful, given the piece required no dialogue (see figure 11).

I aimed to generate truthful emotion through purposeful action and psychophysical connection; “the significance of physical acts in highly tragic or dramatic moments is that the simpler they are, the easier it is to grasp them, the easier to allow them to lead you to your true objective.” (Stanislavski, 2008:08). However, I was unsuccessful at applying this into my acting performance (see figure 12), as my feedback states “at times, the work became focused on sustained high emotional intensity, and this limited the range and nuance within the performance. The work would benefit from allowing more moments of stillness and contemplation, which would create contrast and deepen the impact of the more heightened moments.” (Aldersley, 2026). 

To strengthen my emotional expression, I focused on implementing specific exercises from academic research into my process, rather than just learning the principles of a technique. For example, in my rehearsal process for performing a duologue from Antigone (2023) by Sophocles, I annotated a playable action verb for each line of the scene using Actions: The Actor’s Thesaurus (2004) by Marina Caldarone and Maggie Lloyd-Williams (see figure 13). This was highly effective for delivering more subtle expression in a state of intense emotion with high stakes because I found playing a particular word condensed my actions to be more meaningful, as my objective was more specific. I received feedback that my characterisation was clear and I strengthened my balance between control and release, however there were still some moments I was slightly overemphasised and ‘emoting’. Therefore, I need to delve into more dramatic texts to practice acting heightened material and experiment with lots of different techniques to find methods that work for me. To achieve this, one goal I’ve set myself over summer is to read The Art of Acting (2000) to investigate Stella Adler’s method on ‘Developing the imagination’ which will aid my development in avoiding forced emotion and over-dramatic acting. In Year 2, I aim to establish my own personalised process for approaching performances by broadening my knowledge of practitioners and gaining a clearer awareness of my self-practice as an artist.

MOVEMENT

Over the course of the year, I’ve made significant development in my understanding of how to apply movement techniques within a performance. Prior to starting my training, I often approached movement as something separate from acting, focusing mainly on the physical theatre aspect and struggling to interlink tools into my acting practice. Discovering Viewpoints was the pivotal moment for me that revealed the importance of incorporating physical storytelling within a naturalistic piece and begin to transfer tools from movement lessons into my acting. To solidify my understanding, I read The Viewpoints Book: A Practical Guide to Viewpoints and Composition by Anne Bogart and Tina Landau (2005), which was useful in teaching me “what’s important to remember about Viewpoints is that, just like other “methods” of acting, the goal is to be alive and engaged onstage. The beauty of Viewpoints is that it allows us to reach this goal, not by forcing it out of ourselves, but by receiving it from others, and ourselves.” (Bogart & Landau, 2005: 80). After revisiting my reflective journal, I think the most essential lesson was learning about kinesthetic response, which refers to having an immediate reaction to move or stop based on impulses (see figure 14). 

We explored this with an exercise where five people would start walking back and forth, jumping, stopping and starting whenever they felt ready to, based on their internal impulses. We experimented with different Viewpoints altering pace, direction, topography, shape, levels and then were instructed to interact with each other. We executed this by using our senses and awareness, listening to others and responding, deciding by ourselves and not to others, telepathically working as an ensemble to move. Initially, I found it challenging to balance alternating all the Viewpoints at once and connect to my instincts because I tend to overanalyse my decisions in performances. But after consistent practice over time, it felt easier to transfer into my acting technique as I started actively listening and responding in the moment and even became more comfortable sustaining eye contact with others, which I previously found difficult. In combination with the other elements, I noticed a huge improvement in my awareness of proxemics and felt more present within a scene, which linked closely to my independent research on Sanford Meisner’s method, who’s “approach is based on bringing the actor back to his emotional impulses and to acting that is firmly rooted in the instinctive” from his book Sanford Meisner on Acting (Meisner & Longwell, 1987).

My development became evident recently when combining movement and voice to perform a verse of chorus from Antigone (2023) by Sophocles (see figure 15). Our application of Viewpoints was essential in crafting an engaging piece; our dynamic shifts of pace, variety of gestures incorporating objects to display character, alternating repetition and significantly using kinesthetic response to sustain synchronisation as an ensemble. Moving forward, I would like to work on synthesising these tools further because I received feedback from Eilon saying I could have made my movements less dance-like and more pedestrian to minimise down into a naturalistic form for playing a character. Therefore, my goal for utilising these skills next year is to apply Viewpoints to my characters in the Year 2 projects, by experimenting physically to find their specific topography, tempo, shape, etc, in each scene.

figure 15

DANCE & CHOREOGRAPHY

Since starting drama school, I’ve made major physical progress in improving my flexibility and stamina. This goal has been a key focus for me, due to the fact I grew up with a huge passion for dance and regularly attended classes until I left college in 2023, meaning I hadn’t frequently stretched or completed high-intensity exercise in years. This was an unexpected obstacle during the first few months of my training as I struggled to sustain my energy throughout a full 1 hour and 45 minute movement lesson, without feeling mentally and physically drained and loosing focus after half-way. Reflecting on my PDP from September, I set myself the goals to “practice dance twice a week outside of lessons to build my stamina” and “get my splits back by Christmas by stretching everyday” (see figure 1). In response, I committed to attending weekly stretching classes with my peers, including a combination of high-energy cardio, conditioning, circuit training and deep stretches of the entire body. Independently, I also allocated time at least three times a week to completing a physical warm-up in my room, including heat building cardio e.g star jumps, a core workout focusing on the abdominals and finishing with lunge, straddle and box split stretches. In combination with my 100% attendance, I believe I’ve improved my physical endurance because I now leave lessons feeling energised rather than exhausted and find it easier to maintain my concentration.

The difference between my ability in September (see figure 16) and May (see figure 17) clearly shows the transformation in my right-leg splits, which makes me feel proud of my dedication as well as relieved I’ve been able to regain this skill. In addition, I’ve found getting back into the routine of pushing myself physically has made an impact on my mental health as exercise boosts well-being, which consequently has increased my discipline and attitude towards my movement training. This video displays my ability to sustain high-energy choreography with enthusiasm and commitment, particularly towards the end of a six minute dance to ‘And You Don’t Even Know It’ from Everybody’s Talking about Jamie (2018) (see figure 18). However in observation, I still need to refine my performance techniques to add personality to my dancing by amalgamating skills I’ve learnt in Movement Technique, such as applying Laban Efforts for characterisation.

figure 18

A helpful quote I found from reading his book The Mastery of Movement states “each phase of movement, every small transference of weight, every single gesture of any part of the body reveals some feature of our inner life.” (Laban & Ullman, 2011). Moving forward, I aim to improve my emotional expression in my dance ability by choosing an effort action suited to each movement and read Actor Movement: Expression of the Physical Being (2015) by Debbie Green and Vanessa Ewan to broaden my knowledge of movement practitioners. Looking back at my targets, I’ve failed to achieve my goal to complete extra dance practice twice a week, which I believe is due to the adjustment of balancing my education and personal life this year. Given I’ll be more settled in starting Year 2, I’m going to make a commitment to attend the street commercial class at Yorkshire Dance every Wednesday, to enhance my mental and physical health.

VOICE

Voice is the area I feel the most confident in my ability; I especially look forward to our Voice into Text lessons due to my interest in classical texts and passion for analysing William Shakespeare’s works. I’ve developed an excellent practical understanding of techniques required for healthy vocal production and been successful at breaking bad habits that occurred in my performances at the start of the year. In the first term, we worked on communicating meaning with our delivery of a poem with detailed analysis of literary techniques, such as rhythms, pauses, imagistic language, onomatopoeias, etc. We completed a practical exploration exercise where I walked around the space, stopped when I got to a piece of punctuation, then turned 90 degrees and took a short break before walking again as I continued reading the text. I found this ineffective for establishing the rhythms of my poem because the only punctuation was a full stop at the end of each sentence, although I found my energy increased when moving whilst speaking. After my final performance, I received feedback from Anita saying that I demonstrated clear articulation, supported projection and was well connected to the text but “each line felt disconnected with lots of stops and starts, instead I could have flowed lines together with shorter pauses” (see figure 19). 

I completed wider reading to find an exercise for poetry rhythms that works for me and discovered useful information in chapter 5 ‘Speaking Poetry’ from Voice and the Actor (1973) by Cicely Berry. She describes the various types of rhythmic metres in poetry with examples of different poems, explaining “there are countless permutations of rhythm where the sense stress and the metre stress go against each other, and enable you to stretch or shorten words as you wish – that is, to syncopate them” (Berry, 1973). I referred to her section on Shakespeare for help applying iambic pentameter to a sonnet for my voice assessment, as I was able to identify the ‘dee-dum-dee-dum’ rhythms and vocalise the correct emphasis in my performance (see figure 20). It also helped me annotate the punctuation with a better comprehension of how to deliver each pause, which was a vital point in my process because it informed my understanding of what I was saying and allowed me to translate the modern meaning clearer (see figure 21).

This development is reflected in my assessment feedback as I achieved a First with positive comments in reference to my connection to text, embodied storytelling and change of pace (see figure 22). To develop further, my next step is “to find more challenging text with emotional change whilst maintaining technique” (Clark, 2026), which coincides nicely with my goal for acting, to choose more difficult, dramatic material to practice performing heightened emotion naturalistically. To ensure I achieve this, I aim to read Measure for Measure by William Shakespeare over the summer and watch the Royal Shakespeare Company’s recording (2019) on Drama Online to observe how an actor can successfully act intensified circumstances whilst maintaining vocal support. As I transition into Year 2, my main goal is to maintain my voice technique progress by completing a vocal warm-up every day, utilising exercises I’ve learnt this year.

SINGING

Due to my passion for musical theatre, I valued having 1 to 1 singing lessons massively and benefitted from getting individual feedback as it sped up my progress rapidly. When I first accepted to study at Leeds, I was eager to continue developing my dancing and singing as well as my acting because it’s always been a dream of mine to pursue musical theatre; I loved performing in musicals at college but didn’t feel capable enough in my abilities to commit fully. Therefore, I’m extremely grateful I’ve been able to expand my versatility and regain confidence in these additional skills, which I will maintain with frequent practice over the summer.

The key area we focused on developing was my belting technique because I initially struggled to reach my upper register without straining my voice. In my first session, Sarah observed I was raising my jaw and leaning my head forwards when attempting to belt the higher notes, forcing the sound into an unhealthy placement and causing my throat to feel sore afterwards (see figure 23).

In this section of ‘On My Own’ from Les Misérables (1985), I struggled to transition smoothly from chest voice to a mixed belt, particularly on the word “life”, and dropped off the ends of lines, on “pretending” and “known”, in a soft, weak head voice, despite it needing a powerful delivery (see figure 24). To adjust my placement, I sang the same notes saying ‘nya nya nya’ making a nasal sound, which felt more relaxed and less forced because it automatically lowers the larynx, lifts the soft palate and creates the twang resonance needed to belt. I was successful at sustaining this healthy placement to strengthen my belt but still found it challenging to flip between registers smoothly without throat tension because I wasn’t supporting enough from the diaphragm. 

Determined to break this habit, I decided to complete daily vocal warm-ups, including neck stretches, jaw massaging, lip trill sirens, arpeggios on ‘ya’/‘na’ and snatch breaths on unvoiced fricatives to activate the abdominal muscles. To broaden my understanding, I researched the anatomy of the voice and discovered a useful chapter called ‘Disguising Register Transitions’ in Janice L Chapman’s book Singing and Teaching Singing (2006). One exercise I included in my routine was “practice singing a sustained note, sliding from modal to head register and back again, disguising the changeover and maintaining the clarity of the vowel. It is important to notice how much the support muscles, waistband in particular, are needed for this manoeuvre. Repeat on other appropriate pitches.” (Chapman, 2006). This helped me understand the significant role the rest of the body plays in vocal production because I’d never thought about needing to activate my intercostals or back muscles to support my voice. I’m now more comfortable singing higher up the scale because I can actively engage my abdominal muscles and modify vowel sounds to adjust my placement, which was vital for singing ‘No One Else’ from Natasha Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 (2013).

I reached the highest notes on “you and I” with power in my mixed voice without straining because I widened the “i” into an “ay” vowel, opening more space in the mouth for resonance and relaxing the jaw (see figure 25). However, I still need to work on grounding myself by shifting my weight slightly backwards and supporting from the feet upwards because the area in my range around my register break still sounds breathy and occasionally strained. I’m determined to continue completing a vocal warm-up every day over the summer, adding deep breathing and grounding exercises, as well as practicing the songs I’ve covered in my repertoire at least three times a week to sustain my progress with them. In Year 2, I aim to utilise my diaphragmatic breathing technique from Voice to improve my breath support and hopefully, feel confident enough in my ability to sing a solo in front of the class.

CONCLUSION

After reviewing my first year at drama school, I’m proud to say I’ve made immense progress in my confidence, acting, movement and voice abilities and have gained awareness of my achievements and challenges as an artist. Keeping a reflective journal has allowed me to highlight patterns in both areas I’ve developed and need to develop further in second year.

The main common theme I’ve identified in my daily reflections and feedback from tutors/peers is my lack of confidence because my self-doubt has prevented me from making bold choices across all classes. One key learning moment for me was creating our own character profile and completing an improvisation in the town centre of Leeds because I found it overwhelming having to play a character so juxtaposition from myself and interact with strangers inhabiting a confrontational manor. One SMART target I’ve set myself is to read Self-Confidence for Actors by Dr. Alexa (2023) Ispas over summer because I will be able to enter second year with a toolkit of psychological techniques to boost self-belief and apply calming strategies when I feel anxious for Year 2 projects and auditions.

Another repeated learning moment was when taking on a main role in a Sight Reading lesson because having to improvise a character without context and gradually gaining insight whilst performing has pushed me to make instant decisions on character choices, regardless of if they’re correct. To maintain my progress, I intend to practically sight read at least 6 plays over summer with a group of my peers, which will also act as advanced preparation for finding repertoire for auditions in second year and for third year showcase. 

A frequent theme in movement was the transformation in my physical endurance compared to the start of the year, specifically in my flexibility and stamina during dance. Therefore, I’m motivated to maintain my progress by completing a full body warm-up, stretch and workout for an hour every day. In addition to this, I will make a commitment to attend a street commercial dance class every Wednesday at Yorkshire Dance when I start Year 2 in September.

My frequent feedback in voice is that I have great articulation and strong connection to the words, a key moment being when performing my sonnet and narrative piece, however I still need to work on perfecting my Yorkshire accent because it wasn’t written off as an official skill. Reflecting on my difficulty with accents, I need to spend time preparing in advance for my American project in Year 2 by completing my own research listening to pronunciation and practice my General American accent for 5 minutes a day. In terms of maintenance, my goal for voice is to complete a vocal warm-up every day and practice singing a variety of songs as often as possible to ensure I sustain my progress on strengthening my abdominal support for belting.

In terms of my reflective practice, I will ensure to set SMART targets when starting my Personal Development Plan for Year 2 in September because I’ve realised I need more realistic goals for motivation to achieve them. I’ve made an action plan to continue development over summer but decided to not put too much pressure on myself to stay consistent with all of them because I realise the value of taking a break to rest for my well-being and avoid burnout (see figure 26). Overall, this year has demonstrated the importance of reflection as a tool for growth and laid the foundations in my training journey to becoming an independent, self-aware and talented performer.

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