Positivity and Criticism.

3/06/2014
  From the director's criticism, we need to add on some more to our piece because it only comes to 7 minutes when it should be 10 at least. To make this the length that it needs to be we are adding on half a page of script which should end fine. It also ends on a more even note, for example we ended it on the news of pregnancy, whereas when we carry on the script it ends with Cliff and Alison coming to a conclusion of that if there are no other options Alison will just have to accept it. This gives Cliff more time to process the news that he has just been told and also gives the audience time to see more reactions from the characters too.
  We also need to get an iron and an ironing board because when showing the director what we had done so far, he couldn't see the real fall that we do. This is when the two men and scrapping and Alison gets thrown on to the floor by Jimmy pushing Cliff into her. When this happens however I (Alison) will be carrying folded and ironed clothes to put away with the iron on top of the pile so that when she falls she also gets burnt from the iron. Using these real props makes the performance more realistic and natural which is how it should be.
  The positive feedback that my group received was that when Jimmy is going on about his problems and the worlds problems, it would be common to see the other characters making obvious gestures of annoyance towards him such as shrugging, rolling eyes, huffing, etc. but we didn't do this, we were more subtle and basically ignored him but still shown some signs of annoyance toward him too. This worked better for us because we knew that it had to be naturalistic and as a group we thought about if we were in this real situation how would we react and these were the answers because nobody in real life would be so dramatic realistically. More positive feedback that we received was that the relationships that we held were natural. They were realistic and shown easily because as a group we are close as individuals anyway so this was easy. All of the characters had a good relationship shown in how they should, for example when Alison is knocked over and burnt Cliff shouts at Jimmy and helps her up, Alison screams at Jimmy and then Cliff tries to joke with her to cheer her up and holds her. This would happen in real life with these types of characters. I thought that it was naturalistic and real, it shown the audience the real side of the characters like how they react with each other. Naturally Cliff would help Alison up and try to comfort her whilst Jimmy would just leave and act like he was in the right even if he wasn't. The only criticism said here however would be that Cliff should hold Alison just slightly longer. When we first put this together, we made it that he breaks away from her when she is saying that she wants to give up with love but the director's comments were that he should break away from her after he has said his speech to her about her being "too young and too lovely" to stop loving. In my opinion, this works a lot better because it keeps the relationship up with the pair and also shows that they have a tight bond together too. This also flows a lot better doing this because then it gives Alison a reason to leave Cliff's side, when she tells him that she is pregnant. It also shows that this news has really affected her because she wants to break away from the comfort. She wants to just get away from everybody and this will show to the audience too. It keeps the relationship shown too indicating that even though she is very close with Cliff and does tell him the news before anyone else, she is still afraid to get close to anyone obviously after getting close to Jimmy and that not really ending well for her.

  My characterisation has come along a lot more since just starting to rehearse. I have taken the director's notes into consideration and applied it when needed. I have improved my character a lot more too, I have given her more emotion to deal with. For example when we first started to research into our scene and just started to rehearse when I get thrown to the floor and burnt I used to get up quickly and just look really annoyed. Now we have improved this section by Alison staying on the floor and it's actually Cliff who helps her up in the end after shouting at Jimmy first but then quickly tending to her. Then she eventually gets up and screams in Jimmy's face for him to go away and throws a piece of clothing at him too. I really liked this improvement because it made the section a lot more dramatic and more naturalistic because it was sort of a in the heat of the moment thing. It shows a different side to Alison too, showing the audience that she isn't really how she comes across. She does have real emotions, she isn't just an object like she is to Jimmy. It shows more realistic emotion and brings a lot of adrenaline and energy to the section too.

  I have actually learnt new things about my character, for example when I first read the script I expected my character to be quiet and calm, keeping to herself and staying out of trouble. Now from rehearsing I can see that Alison can actually be fiesty and quite hot headed like her husband. Maybe this is the reason that she was attracted to him in the first place, Jimmy is possibly how she wants to apply herself. She is a reserved person but can when she wants be loud and get her point across to who she wants to. I wouldn't of known this without the rehearsals which has helped me a lot by going over how would she really feel in the situations she is in.

  When asking questions about my character I did ask why was she with Jimmy, what attracted her? and why does she not see that Cliff would be a lot better for her? I am trying to work to understand the context of the script too and also, more in depth about my role of Alison. Asking questions about everything helps me to understand a lot more about what is happening and in addition helps me to apply whatever is needed to the section of the script that we are performing and also how my character can develop more. My questions helped me to understand a lot more about what I am really doing too. It helped me work towards more goals on what to do in different sections and how to make my character more naturalistic and real. I asked myself questons too, such as how would I react in this exact situation? Would I leave the house? Would I stay and just get on with it? or would I think of another escape route? When questioning things like this I take many things into consideration too, like why exactly would I choose this option? I really like this part of being Alison, she is similar to me in the way that she just gets on with things but does blow out when everything is heated and brought to the surface. In the situations that I am put it as Alison I would act basically the same as she does which is in my opinion why it has been so easy to rememeber my lines for this and also act so quickly and have a very natural response to everything.

  One of my lines when I turn off the 'concert' and Jimmy looks at me fed up I say "really Jimmy, you're like a child." In real life I can imagine that I would say that if someone was acting up towards me. This is why I really understand how Alison is feeling 24/7. She is fed up but still keeps her cool until she needs to release any anger showing real emotion towards someone.

  For specific bits in our section I have annotated my script for example when we made changes to the section by addinng on more at the end I wrote on the script about this. Also I wrote on it about how I move around the room in various ways, I especially wrote about the fall that I do too when I get pushed over by the boys inn the fuss.

  I also talk a lot about the main bit of me and Cliff. When I tell him that I am pregnant with Jimmy's baby, I annotated how I would be feeling and the actions that I would take such as just before I tell him we are both really close and hugging, etc. but then when I tell him a change in behaviour is noticed between the two, but then in the end they do go back to each other but more out of Cliff's sympathy. When blocking this scene and annotating the script, I wrote that I would try and win back Cliff's sympathy and love towards my character when noticing the change. He walks away to get scissors for the bandage to cut it and I follow him round wherever he goes trying to sort of win him back. This will show the audience her real feelings, how she really feels toward Cliff and also how she reacts to not having pity. She gets confused at the no fuss attitude towards the news, this is probably because she is used to Jimmy having such big emotions and reactions towards everything. She then seems shocked when Cliff is so calm and normal. He does show sadness towards her because obviously she has in a way betrayed him. His love to her has been very clear and now she is pregnant to someone who doesn't treat her right and she knows it. I think he feels more sorry for my character than anger towards her, but maybe secretly wishes that it never happened or that he didn't ever fall for her in the first place.

  The emotions towards the involved characters are to Jimmy annoyance, sometimes hatred and dread. To Cliff it is more like a little crush and envy that he isn't in her situation and can do what he wants but will always be loved. The audience will pick up on this too, the relationships we hold as characters is very clear and this was also mentioned by the director. When things like the mallicous fall happens in the fault of Jimmy, the audience will be shocked but also expect it because they can see what Jimmy is really like from the start. He is a character that is not to be loved, maybe only when he shows his true colours and feels bad after the fall. He goes straight to his wife apologising and feeling sorry for her but the audience will also see that this is just an act and would be quickly cancelled out when he does something else in anger towards her. The audience would then feel sorry for Alison's life, she would feel angry however and not sorry for herself as she gets feisty and fights back to him. This in my opinion would shock the audience as this is the first time that they see this calm and contect character act this way. For the first time she shows actual dominance against the men and steals the attention from her forever agitating husband. I think most of the time the audience will feel the complete opposite for Alison in how she is actually feeling. She is good at hiding her emotions and clearing herself up very quickly. When she sends Jimmy away from her and also Cliff to get her soap for her burn she does have a break down moment for a second, but then when Cliff comes back she gets back to herself acting like nothing has happened. She only really does this once and it is when she is alone, this will show the audience how strong she is of a person and that she only closes down when she is alone because maybe she wants to be the strong one of the household and not show any fear or defeat incase her husband then dwells on this and makes it worse. If he see's any signs of insecurity or defeat he would easily pounce on it and take the person down fast. She has to always be on her guard and only gets a few seconds to loose herself for a moment but has to snap back quickly.

  To express these quickly changing emotions I would use the technique of 'emotion memory'. I would think of a time when I had to be in this situation, being stronger for somebody else. This could be when I had to comfort my friend, her mum was very ill but I had to stay completely positive for her as I knew that she was a strong person herself so if she cracked I would too. Staying strong for her wasn't easy at all as she was probably stronger than me at the time and I had a really close connection to the family too. I would use this when portraying Alison's emotions through emotion memory. This would then help me to show the audience that I really am that character and I would be believable too. I like using emotion memory for things like this because it is more naturalistic, however I would say that when using it it can take the focus away from my next line and make me completely forget where I am. This is because I get so focused on trying to bring back an emotion that has been sort of locked away that it takes time and I can't get it fast enough, then there is the problem of getting to caught up in it. If I unlock the memory I could easily not be able to snap back out of it like Alison would, so because of this I would prefer not to use this technique and instead just get into the motion of Alison and try and indicate her emotions as best I can.

  To claim higher marks on this performance I know what I need to do, as follows:

* Use my vocals and my clear movement to the best of my ability.

* Be totally assured in my character's motives and reasons for doing things.

* Be confident and clearly fluent.

* Be relaxed in my character and natural, like no one is watching and it is real life.

* Have commitment and a lot of focus towards the piece and also my character.

* If I do go into emotion memory, have a quick recovery.

This means that I will be using Stanavlaski's three step system. His style is to be calm, relaxed, focused and ready to do the performance. It is exactly how I should go about our piece, very real and natural. I enjoy using 'the system' because I think it should be how you should be in every performance, not just naturalisitic piece's. I would say that in whatever role you get you should always be calm and ready to perform in any circumstance. It helps with the naturalism of everything and makes everything a lot more real for the audience to see.

  In an earlier workshop we played a 'three chair game'. There were basically three chairs, the first made whoever sat in it act under played, more than natural just not really caring about whatever situation they have been given. The second chair was then if sat on the reaction of a soap opera, so still quite natural but with more of a drama element in it too. Finally the last chair was the most over the top, if sat on the person would have to act over hysterical about the situation they had been given. Crying, screaming, over the top laughing, these sort of emotions were valid on this chair but for example not on chair number one. For this performance I would say chair one would always be best, sometimes chair two would work but would need to be subtle and not all of the time. I think that this method is good to think about for Look back because it keeps a reminder in your head of how to react to things, not be over the top and always very neutral unless a bigger emotion is needed.

  If I had to think about what wouldn't be naturalistic, I would say when I say that I am pregnant, this could easily be turned into 'chair two', a soap drama. However I know that this is wrong for this type of performance so I dial it down a lot and in rehearsals I sort of whisper it in embarressment but so the audience will still be able to hear this big news. I know that I have to say this important line loud enough for the audience to hear because if not the rest of the piece wouldn't make sense to them and it is also so dramatic but does happen in real life in this bad sitation. It will be hard to not go soap opera with lines like this but I am sure my group is confident enough to not make small errors like this as it has to be real.

  Overall I would say that we are rehearsing really well so far, it is all going to plan and changes that need to be made and getting done. We are working at a great pace and we are taking comments into consideration from each other and also the director. We are taking notes that will hopefully improve and make the piece come along a lot smoother and also more real for the final performance.