Initial Response
When I was initially cast in Our Town by Thornton Wilder, I read the play twice to gauge a full understanding of characters relationships and themes within the play. I was struck by the everyday mundanity of the first two acts of the play, focusing on the simple pleasures of life and the characters hopes and aspirations for the future, in contrast to the sombre tone of act three of the play, which focuses on regrets of characters who have passed and the understanding that every second of life counts, which they gain in the afterlife. I was quick to notice similarities between the first two acts of Our Town and The Brightening Air, by Conor McPherson. The play focuses on relationships between a dysfunctional Irish family and the stakes remain low for the majority of the play, Our Town explores similar mundane action throughout, giving the actor the opportunity to explore the simplicity of human life, the communities we surround ourselves with and how we are affected by these communities.
World of the Play
Our Town, Thornton Wilder, is an iconic 20th Century play, set in Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire, and focuses on the beauty of everyday human life and what may happen after. I was thrilled to receive such an iconic play, which is performed at least once every single day. The play, conducted by the Stage Managers, follows the Webb and Gibbs families everyday lives, where love blossoms, marriages fail and parents learn to let go of their children. Tragedy strikes at the top of Act 3, where it is revealed that Emily Webb, wife of George Gibbs, passed away during childbirth. This act explores how little we appreciate our lives while we are living them, through the lens of the characters who have died and are given the opportunity to go back into the living to re-live one day of their lives.
Research
In the first week of the process, prior to casting, we discussed overarching themes of the play as well as the historical and political context of the play and when it was written. I found this part of the process extremely helpful as it allowed me to fully immerse myself in the time period of the play (1899-1913) and gain an understanding of what would’ve been going on in Grover’s Corners at the time.
As Grover’s Corners is a fictional town we focused our historical and political research on the state of New Hampshire, where the town is located. As a class, we created a time line, attached below, of important events that happened between 1600-2025 in the state, which was very informative because as years have passed the political and religious state of the country has changed massively. However, in the 1900’s the state was dominated by Protestant denominations and was majorly Republican. This helped me shape my character and her beliefs, as her family and the community she was surrounded by attended the congregational church.
Character
After initially reading the play, I was drawn to Emily Webb, specifically her epiphany in Act 3, as well as the flashback scene. I voiced this during the casting process, explaining that I thought that this role would challenge me and push me in the right way during my second year of training because, the role goes against my type cast, which tends to be more angular and stern characters, Emily has a beautiful, soft feminine energy that I was interested to explore both physically and emotionally. Furthermore, as a young woman who has moved away from home for the first time, I now truly understand what it is like to wish you could go back in time and fully appreciate everything my family has done for me, when I didn’t realise it. Therefore I felt like I fully understood what the character was thinking in Act 3 of the play and I truly believed that I could do her story justice. I was cast as Emily Webb in Act 3 of the play and I was elated, however I did feel an immediate sense of pressure as the central meaning of the play lies within Act 3, which would now be mostly my responsibility to convey.
I used Uta Hagan’s 21 questions when developing Emily as a character, this proved very helpful when trying to get an overview of how her mind works. I find these questions very valuable when reacting to other actors choices on stage, as a lot of the action is off the line and in reaction to those surrounding her. it helped me to discover how dependant she is on George and being constantly being surrounded by his love, which she doesn’t have in Act 3 of the play, and how she reacts in these situations where she is uncomfortable with her new surroundings.
As part of my character building process, I also created vision boards, photo albums and a character playlist, along side the other actors playing Emily. This proved extremely helpful to remind myself of place, feeling and time, immediately before any run of the show.
Process
At the start of each day, I would warm up both vocally and physically, using the vocal warm up I created in Jo’s voice classes last year and stretches we explored in movement. This made me feel ready to perform before each session started, eliminating any tension in my face, throat and body, as well as being able to explore the physicality of my character using music as a stimulus.
During the first week of rehearsals the entire group took part in a regression exercise led by Beth (Dir), where we would tell a childhood story to a partner and watch them act it out in class. Since first year, regression and substitution have played a key role in my process, allowing me to access memories vividly and identify the emotions in the memories, as well as the emotions I feel reliving those memories and what it does to my body, which I am able to draw a parallel to in some of the material I work on. I watched my partner re-enact a scene from my youth and I was filled with nostalgia, regret and joy, which is exactly what I had to channel as Emily Webb in act three. This became a key part of my process, as I would play music which I associated with key childhood memories and allow myself to feel the emotions I associated with those memories, In rehearsal I used these emotions in substitution to the emotions of the scene.
Once cast, we were called in to rehearsal in smaller groups, I found this particularly useful when called in with the other two actors playing Emily, in Acts 1 & 2. Something that we were very passionate about was making it clear to the audience that we were all playing the same character from the second we took over the part. We spent time as a three sharing the choices we had made separately, in regards to Emily’s physicality and gestures, using Laban efforts as a starting point. After picking some standout adjectives about Emily (bold, afraid, graceful.) We decided that Emily moved using float and dab efforts, carrying her weight above her head in a medium kinesphere. This aided us when deciding upon gestures she would have and how she reflects her surroundings and mental state through gestures and physicality. For example, playing with her wedding ring when thinking about, or surrounded by George, and brushing her skirt twice before sitting down, to remain ladylike like her mother taught her to. Throughout this process I realised that I am an actor who struggles when coming up with gestures to give to my characters, I just don’t really know what to do with my hands a lot of the time, so these discussions really helped me, and made me feel a lot more comfortable in my approach when it comes to creating gestures, and understanding why different people do specific gestures and what this tells you about them as a person and socially.
A note which Beth gave me from the start of the rehearsal process was to be more theatrical. Initially I found this difficult as I was playing everything with an honesty to myself, feeling the emotions as I would in real life, in a naturalistic style. However this is for stage, so everything had to be slightly emphasised for the benefit of the audience. To achieve this I used an exercise which I learned in voice classes last year, where you physicalise every word in your line, while also allowing your voice to be affected by how to word sounds to you. For example, when talking to Mrs Gibbs about the new barn she wishes she could’ve shown her, I had to create a sense of magic and the feeling of Emily being transported back for just a couple of seconds. Physicalising each and every word allowed me to feel and see all of the structures I was describing, feeling all of the emotions in my body, altering my voice on the lines and creating a sense of heightened reality, making my performance more theatrical.
In the final week of rehearsals Beth led us in another exercise which allowed us to gain stronger connections with the other characters. We would pick a character song in our groups and then get up one by one into the space, with all the other company members sitting on chairs and in character interact with any of these characters who we felt drawn to in the moment. I used this opportunity to connect with James, who plays the younger version of George, because I wanted to establish the foundations of Emily and George’s relationship. I also connected with two of the characters Emily meets in the afterlife, Mrs Gibbs and Simon Stimson, being able to really access memories and feelings that Emily had prior to dying about these characters. I found this effective as I was struggling as to what the relationship between Emily and Simon was and in this exercise I was able to make a connection and establish an understanding with Simon, this helped me when interacting with him in Act 3 of the play.
This project marked the first time I was part of a scene which required intimacy coordination at Leeds Conservatoire, and initially I was nervous as to how it was going to be approached by our director. This also came as a surprise because the moment of intimacy, a kiss, was not in the script, we were approached by Beth, asking if it was okay to add the moment in, which Ed and I were happy to go ahead with, as we felt like the moment would add to feeling we were trying to create in the scene. This involved closed calls for myself and Ed, with the option of the director being there or not, where we would talk through the mechanics of the moment. The first intimacy call we requested Beth in the room, as neither of us had approached intimacy before and we wanted clear instructions of how we should decide what happens in the scene. A clear plan was made between all parties, there being a list of actions which needed to be carried out in order to communicate with the other person that we were consenting to the kiss, we also decided on a placeholder we could use during any run or performance, where our foreheads would be touching, if either of us didn’t want to go ahead with the kiss. Now, I could comfortably approach any intimate scene within a play, using the method established with Beth as I felt incredibly comfortable after we had a clear plan of exactly what was going to happen before and after the kiss, and a plan if we didn’t want to go ahead with it, which meant there was little to no pressure when it came to performing the scene in front of our peers, and the audience.
Script Work
Final Performance and Reflections
I am very proud of what I achieved during the process and in the performances of my first project. I was able to fully use my process, which I established in the first part of this year, allowing me to make bolder choices when it came to creating character and action within the scene, and I feel like this made me become a more fearless actor overall. I have learned that I would be interested in assistant directing the next project, as I had lots of ideas to contribute across the board and I really enjoyed digging into the play, even on an actor’s level. In the next project I aim to further improve my relationship with character physicality and gestures, getting a grasp on them earlier in the process and allowing myself more time to expand upon them.
It was lovely to work in a professional room with my class mates, who all helped provide a safe space, where I felt comfortable to make bold choices, and share my work and ideas fearlessly.
