Hamilton, "Review" / Evaluation

1.) What did you find out about the background production? Characters, themes, etc...?

      Its set in the 18th century; Hamilton is an orphan from the Caribbean. There is an economical war regarding taxes. He talks to everyone and reassures them that it will be fine . At the start there are many colonies who talk about Hamilton through a rap like song, One even talks of loving him.


2.) What did you learn about the skills to be part of the production? 

You need to be on the ball 100%. You cannot lack focus, because the directors or your employers won't want to employ you again. They are most likely going to employ someone whose punctual, learns their lines and who are completely savvy with what's going on because if you miss a trick, you might not get as far as you want to. You also have to do your best for the role. Some of the actors who are apart of Hamilton went to extremes to get the role. The lady had a sore throat, and lost her voice when it came to last audition day , but she managed to persevere with it and land her role. One of the male stars, had injured himself, and this was because his wife was in labour and a he was on his motorbike , he crashed into a side of a lorry but still performed the next day.

Goes to show that if you put your mind to something you can achieve and if you are in extreme circumstances like them, you can pull through it.

3.) What did you find out about the challenges of working as a performer in the industry?

Sometimes times, things don't exactly go to plan. But there are ways around these situations. The lady told us that she was so exhausted , she went out of focus on stage and forgot her lyrics and lines. But she pulled through and managed to pull it off, But it goes to show that despite having draw backs you can get through things. Everyone is human, people make mistakes. But its how you get over them and work around them that makes you more skilled , I believe, because then it doesn't ruin the whole show. Another challenge, was that casting can be a very sticky business to dabble in. You may not hear back from an audition, as one of the actors were saying to us, for a whole year. You can't let this set you back though because in the mean time you could try for other roles or paths into the industry. Gladly, for the actor, they got the role, but you may not always be that lucky.

4.) How can this inform your own approach to your training?

This knowledge I've gained from this talk is that,  You must persevere with what you have got. You should always go for the first opportunity you get. It could be a while before you launch you big break. It has taught me that you must essentially, play yourself  within roles and embody the character on how you perceive it. It then makes it more unique. You can play characters more exaggerated but, I prefer to go subtle approaches within my characters on first auditions, I like to play it safe then that way it's not overbearable or too much.

                                           Evaluation 

1. What techniques were used to make it appeal to a modern audience and how well did the story sell?

They used song/rap to convey and tell the story. They used lots of lights and set to make it more exiting to the audience and to not make it boring. They used a lot of levels to show who had power and who was inferior. The ensemble all worked together, there wasn't a dull moment with the whole cast on stage, without their grit and constant keeping within character then the production wouldn't have been as successful as it was. They never spoke within the period it was set. They mainly spoke American because it was set in new York, but they spoke modern to fit the modern audience. They tended to only mention the key dates that included pivotal points within history and the most important, to always keep the audience engaged within the story and so the play doesn't drag and become boring. The only period part they donned were the costumes; everything else was modernised.

2. How did particular performances standout? what made their performances special?

I really liked all the parts in which Rachelle Anne Go's performance of Eliza Hamilton. Every single time she was on stage it lit up. She didn't dish out a dull moment nor did she perform of a low standard either, she was a complete phenomenon. She even cried real tears at the end, so it was clear that she put the upmost effort into her work. She had previously explained that it was hard for her growing up in the Phillipeans, a career in performing was un heard of. So she tried for finding musical theatre jobs in London. One of her jobs was most notably playing Ariel in the Disney show on stage "The Little Mermaid" and other works including Hamilton. On one of her applications to joining the cast of Hamilton she never heard back from them for a year,; so she is a symbol of determination and resilience because although she never heard back for a year she kept going and then it all went in her favour because if she just gave up she probably wouldn't be where she is now.

3. How Successful was communication between the audience and the performers?

There was one particular actor in the ensemble cast that he would start up the audience. He would roll his tongue when he raps, like modern day rappers would do. He was also very comical which also geared the audience's reactions. The king also, did this thing where he "milked" one of the tunes he sang to get a reaction out of the audience. I thought the whole production was to get something out of the audience to be honest. The whole story was moulded around getting a message out of the audience which was that a nobody can make something out of their lives. Hamilton was an immigrant from the Caribbean, and became one of the most successful leaders of the USA within history. What the actors want, is to show that everyone can be similar to Hamilton in many ways. He was an orphan, he had no one to support him but became somebody through his own work and determination. Not everybody has support in their lives. I myself have many people,  from family and friends,who support what I do, but not everybody can be as grateful and as fortunate as I am, yet the people who I am surrounded by will help me push into being somebody and making something out of myself. But the actor who played the murderer, I feel he represented that there will be jealous and spiteful people in the world who will cause drawbacks but you must over come them; Hamilton's Legacy proved that he over came his enemies and people whom never liked his Ideas because he spawned a whole new nation and he changed the country for the better, the USA we know to day (even beyond the grave).  

  

Evaluation 22/10/2018

                                                         
           EVALUATION

Looking back on my performance,  I felt that on the whole it had gone quite successful. I feel that my skills as an actor over the past four weeks, with the help of mentors Rob and Sharron, have progressed a great deal. I feel that the practise that me and my partner Chloe , did the piece justice and reflecting on it it wasn't as bad as I had thought.


Ill admit , that I was nervous a great deal, doing my performance. I had never performed in front of people I had never met, only perhaps at GCSEs, but all productions at my old school were performed in my comfort zone. But , I never forgot any lines, they just came out in an unexpected order, but with improvisation skills me and Chloe worked together to overcome it.
I had managed to project my words out without coming across shouty, and even when I am meant to come across angry toward my final monologue I just projected my words a little louder without shouting. Because my character is meant to be a little psycho, psychopaths tend to come across shady and use subtle ways in manipulation, so that's how I intended to portray my version of the character.

My main objective was to ship Chloe's character off to serve a master. I portrayed it with a calm approach , more like a headmaster having a conversation with a student. She had no choice as she was a woman at the time and women had to be submissive at that period of time. That's how I had to come across. The character was quite snappy with words, as in he would always be quick on his feet with a comeback , sort of like he knew how the conversation would go before he had had it. His super-objective, being how he will make his goal happen, would be to slyly manipulate Chloe's character, Hecuba, in believing it to be her duty to serve. As it was unusual for a woman to plea with her fate, he sort of snapped at the ending monologue. But to make it come across more menacing , Rob and I agreed it to be said like , "  Oh enough", like a reminder of who's actually in charge here.

What I could improve with my skills , is that remember what Rob and Sharron had taught me within neutral stance. That walk and stand with knees slightly bent. I did , however it looked as tho I appeared to walk without any kneecaps at all. It came back to nerves and I slightly made my body uptight, but I now know with experience with performing in front the audience at west king, that I can act  more loosely and freely.

I feel that I had used my skills effectively. I used the right expressions and used the right gestures appropriate to my character , and all-in-all , It came across a quite good performance.

Rehearsals and feedback sessions before final show

Thursday the 27th september 2018

Today, Me and my partner Chloe practised our pieces of Greek theatre. I was still on script but the words were coming much more naturally. However I did learn the last half monologue, as I thought that would be the most challenging. Even though the saying goes, "Don't run before you can walk", I decided to jump straight in because , as I had said, it seemed more harder to master.
My approach to the role was more to make my inferior, who is Hecuba ( played by chloe), feel a lesser status to me , which I originally thought o getting close to her almost sort of looking down my nose to her. I circled her , from when when I entered from the point of my open paragraph, " As an emissary from the army of the greeks", with later rehearsals and the final performance I always kept that in as it is almost that my character is mocking her , telling her she's going to be sold as a slave to someone of higher of authority. He almost circles her to make her objectified, like he's admiring her in a museum, eying her up , see if shes good enough to be a slave, unknown to her at the time being.

In these rehearsals, I came to struggle with the pronunciation of the greek names. this is what I found most challenging even other than the acting itself. My original approach was to belt out my last monologue to make it seem more powerful; the character more fierce and more menacing, And to show a more furious and horrible side to him.
But with Robs feed back today, he helped me with pronunciation of the names, which sets a fundamental improvement to the acting immediately because now I will sound like I know what I'm doing and it will seem less slap-dash and un-bothered to learn the script, which wasn't the case at all. 
He told me to under play it a little, most primarily to not belt out the last line as it's really meant to be conversational , it can still have same effect if said more with spoken-anger than aggy and over the top emotional anger, which I took these notes on bored for a different approach next rehearsal.

Thursday the 4th of October 2018

Today, I attempted to totally switch things around with my approach to the acting. First of, I tried a comedic approach. But not for the reaction of laughter, but more to look like I'm properly mocking the other character , Hecuba . The gestures were bigger , the expressions were more jester like. I wanted to try this approach because , the character of Talthybius is essentially mocking her but this time round I wanted that to be more obvious.
However, to the audience this came across the complete opposite. I appeared kore like a fool , and people couldn't exactly take my character seriously. I appeared to me more musical-theatre like , than appearing in a greek play. But on a more good and confident note I had learnt my lines, and pronounced the names much more better and clearly, than previous attempts, which was a perk.
Robs advice , was to keep your eyelines up. You are essentially engaging with the audience at points as well, Like on the 24th when he told us about using the 4th wall usefully and engage when needed to be to add extra effect. But you are telling the audience the story, so eyelines up is a good tip.
He loved the energy, but upon my entrance I have big hand gesture which comes across similar to jazz hands , which wasn't my intention whatsoever. I was told to under play enough , a subtle approach is the better option and can still have an equivalent effect. He said to keep the stillness of the piece as it adds the more conversational , natural feel to our take on the play.

Upon my feedback, I decided to give the character a more militant like authority, as he is an actual soldier. I decided to get rid of the "posh" accent I put on to make him seem more authoritative because in reality , like i mentioned on a previous post , the audience will find it more effective coming from the truthful meaning behind the character. So I just used my own accent, because virtually I'm playing myself as the character not someone else playing him. And with this approach i came across far more menacing and powerful than previous approaches.
I received feed back from peers, who all liked this new and original portrayal of Talthybius and they  deemed that this take on the character will be far more effective and successful.   

Inspiration I had in mind for my contribution to the project.

- https://youtu.be/mI8NHJh7RUU



- https://youtu.be/VyaeQe8DJVw




These two links are my main inspiration for the scene I will write for my character.
Of course I will tone down the language, but the click-beat-esque of the firing insults and row the characters have made me think of how I could write my scene. It's sort of realistic reaction of what would happen if someone was in that predicament too.

As my scene will tell mickey's storey of being cheated on , the latter link is more inspiring.

Papa-tango project 25th/26th September 2018

Tuesday the 25th September

Today with Sharron, we made our groups to work in so we can start writing our plays for the      Papa-Tango project. My group consists of Chloe, Danielle, and Elena. We created a Soap opera for our play, Nicknaming the project as West-Enders, taking inspiration from the Show Eastenders, Which is a modern form of tragedy, our topic of learning for the past  4-5 weeks of being at the college. Today we had come up with character names an objectives of all of us. The present day is set in 1987, But the flashbacks take place in 1970.

My character is, "Mickey Fowler". He just wants someone to trust. He was cheated on by his wife of three years ; who also was pregnant, without mickey's knowledge. He works in the cafe, and is as common as everyone who lives in the area the characters live in.
Chloe's Character is , "Claire Hardy". She wants power. She works as a secretary for an up market finance company at the back end of the area they live in, the more posher area. She looks down on everyone, even her husband, hence the reason she cheated on him. She thinks that she comes from a more upper class than everyone, than what she actually comes from. She gets pregnant, It still would have been shameful to have been a single mother in 1970, so she decides that once its birthed, she will put it up for adoption. Although it is mickey's she won't tell him because they had just split up.
Elena's character is "Mary-Rose Hardy". She wants Love. Not in a Romantic way, but for a family to love her. She came to Sudford (the fictional area they live) to find her real parents.
Lastly, Danielle's character is Vera west. A friend of Mickey and Claire. she's the adoptive mother of Mary-Rose Hardy. She has a gambling problem and constantly takes out her problem and anger out on poor Mary. She cant have kids, and another reason she took in the daughter of Claire.


Wednesday the 26th September 

Today we worked with karis, Who is part of Papa-Tango. She lead us through the various stages of writing a script.

                                                                                   
Exposition: The introduction to all the characters. The                                    beginning of the story, sets the scene well.

Build up:     This is when the plot thickens. Perhaps a row/fight                      occurs and tension arises between characters. Or a                     secret comes loose and the main plot begins to set                        in mould.

Climax:       A stranger comes to town (mainly appears in                                western style films).  Something happens like a                            murder or someone who was never meant to make                      a return , returns.

Consequence: Be-it a murder has just happened, the                                           consequence would be guilt or the other                                       character is arrested. it is a bad outcome of an                             action of what they just did.

Resolution: The villain is driven out or fights have been                                 resolved. The ending of the story and gives a finale                     from heart break to a happy ending.


We came up with consequences of each of the characters;

- Mickey wants someone to trust. People always mislead him in some way, like his wife. He hardly lets anyone in close , that's his downfall because he now never knows when hes got it good.
- Claire wants power. She'd do anything to get what she wants, even cheating on her husband with another bloke because she feels the place she lives in is too common for her liking.
- Elena , escapes her adoptive parents home, however she realises she was just a love child and still thinks no body loves her until her parents unites again to come together for her.
- Vera loses not only her friendship with the people who thought could trust her                                    , but her credit card had been declined due to all the money she owes.

We all decided the script should be called , "the abuse of trust" , as in a way trust has been exploited by every character , either too them or by them.
By the end of that session we had with Karis, we had almost a completed script in notes.

Monday the 24th September 2018

Today Rob led us through an Improvisation exercise in which we had made an excuse to our boss leave work early to meet our girlfriend at a concert. This was also to see how greatly we can be lead with direction. we each had to follow the scenario narrated by rob, for example "the train was delayed" or " you were on the wrong platform". The final one was the best , which was that our boss had "just entered the platform"; everyone had to try and rush and cover our faces around the space hoping that the boss wouldn't see us and consequently, and most probably have given us the sack.
Another exercise was that we had all been instructed that we had too choose someone in the group that we liked and didn't like.  and whoever we chose the conversation we had completely contrasted with each other. This was to explain the meaning of Subtext ,which is the hidden meaning behind the  conversation and interaction you as a character has with another character on stage. For instance; saying "oh it's you" can be said both with excitement and pure happiness , and in contrast can be spoken with dread and pure disgust. A simple line can be said with two completely different meanings or expression , thus changes the whole mood of the conversation of the two characters.

We also learned to give our characters objectives. An Objective , is the goal that your character wants to achieve throughout a given situation or script. For example, during the improvisation exercise our objectives were to try and reach our destination without being caught out by our boss. A             Super Objective is then what you do to make that goal possible , be it murder or betrayal of one of the other characters. An acting practitioner called Staford Meisner quoted that "Acting is behaving truthfully in given circumstances." As actors we may be acting in circumstances that we never experienced or never will experience. An example is that someone may have committed a brutal murder. Now you are either playing a family member of the deceased or a witness. Either way no character will be acting happy or jumping with joy... that wouldn't be acting completely truthfully. The actor playing the witness would be really distressed , outrage or completely hysterical seen as they had just witnessed a Gorey murder.
The actor playing a family member of the murdered will be completely infuriated mixed with being grief ridden. My point is that You want to the piece seem real , and the reactions need to be real, or else the audience wont be able to empathise with the characters affected.  The key word is empathy. That's is what actors have to to do with the very characters that they are playing.This is because the script may require a situation the actor may have never encountered before; the actor must try make the reactions and feeling as genuine as ever or it wont work. Certain thought processes drive our behaviour and basic emotion, Its a psychological fact. The actor has to empathise how the character will cope with what information or circumstance they are currently digesting. However, no two people are the same. On stage it is good to see a range of different reactions. You can then see the contrast of how the actors portray their character. Some actors may feel appropriate to show how the character is at wits-end , yet another actor may feel that subtle acting is the better way of acting to show how their character is completely drained on how the situation could have affected them physically as well as mentally.

Today we also began piecing our scripts of Greek plays together and sharing them with the group. It was the development of how we began from just reading through our scripts to beginning to block it and see in different areas how we can tone down certain parts because we feel that its too much, or even act out parts with more emotion because we felt we lacked energy first time round. We gave and received constructive criticism from the audience members and Rob which will help us further better our performances ready to be performed on the 8th of October.