Today we rehearsed from the beginning of the play again.
Not all of the groups were here so it was kind of bitty, but not too bad.
The scene I rehearsed today was the first scene Ariel is in, which in my opinion is one of his best scenes because he has a lot to say and it's interesting to actually work with that much dialogue.
Sam and I rehearsed it earlier in 226, just running lines, but when I rehearsed it with Rob, I was rehearsing with Nuray instead.
I found it quite interesting to work with Nuray, because doing the same script but with a different actress makes me actually think about it in different ways. I have to play off Nuray and our approach to it www different to mine and Sam's approach.
I can focus more on the sort of things Ariel would say rather than do in this scene and I enjoy playing about with the delivery. I want to show he's happy to have done so well what Prospero asked him too.
I'm still getting used to it to be honest, with this character I'm finding it takes me a lot of exploration to really decide what I'm doing with him, and I'm finding more to do and tweak every time rehearse.
We had tutorial in the afternoon, in which we discussed the context assignment and did some group research for it.
Tuesday 3rd February 2015
This morning the green group (my group yay!) did rehearsal from where we left off yesterday.
The scene I was in was the one with Alonso, Gonzalo and Sebastian/Antonio, where Ariel comes in to warn Gonzalo of the peril they are in.
Because in my other scenes, I'm mostly trying to be quite delicate and dainty, pretty subtle, in this one I wanted to show a relatively stark contrast.
Ariel has to wake them, it's urgent, as this is his master's command and he must not fail and allow Gonzalo and Antonio to die. I tried to actually inject more strength into my voice.
I can't actually shake Gonzalo awake because I think that Id like to keep a visible barrier between Ariel, a spirit, and the mortal characters throughout the whole play. It's something I think would be cool, so I'm trying to really shake them awake with only my words.
Wednesday 4th February 2015
This morning my group for the Tempest spent an hour with Sharon.
In the lesson we looked at sounds on the island and movements that might go with them, and most of the lesson was based around one of Caliban's speeches.
We started with a warm up and then we started doing sound exercises. We had to lie in a circle on the ground, our heads together, and choose a noise that we thought you might be able to hear on the island. We all started making our noises, varying them in volume and changing them a bit as we went along, and we managed to create quite an atmosphere using the combination of the noises we were all making. It was a load of sounds that put the imagery in my mind of the airy parts of the island, such as up in the trees, the birds in the sky, the waves on the shore, and literally the storm sounds of blowing wind and thunder crashing.
I must admit, at first it felt strange, but after a while, we relaxed into it, and it became quite melodic in a way. I found it very soothing, it was a nice and relaxing exercise.
We started with a warm up and then we started doing sound exercises. We had to lie in a circle on the ground, our heads together, and choose a noise that we thought you might be able to hear on the island. We all started making our noises, varying them in volume and changing them a bit as we went along, and we managed to create quite an atmosphere using the combination of the noises we were all making. It was a load of sounds that put the imagery in my mind of the airy parts of the island, such as up in the trees, the birds in the sky, the waves on the shore, and literally the storm sounds of blowing wind and thunder crashing.
I must admit, at first it felt strange, but after a while, we relaxed into it, and it became quite melodic in a way. I found it very soothing, it was a nice and relaxing exercise.
Then we started to move about the space, doing exercises where we embodied the sounds we had been making, and together we gave visual imagery to the island.
We worked on this for quite a while, and I found this easier than just making the sounds because I had more to work with and more to develop.
We then moved on to looking at Caliban's speech about the noises of the island:
"Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises,
Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.
Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments
Will hum about mine ears, and sometime voices
That, if I then had waked after long sleep,
Will make me sleep again: and then, in dreaming,
The clouds methought would open and show riches
Ready to drop upon me that, when I waked,
I cried to dream again." (http://shakespeare.mit.edu/tempest/tempest.3.2.html)
We did exercises with the text, picking out words, reading out lines, reciting it together, and going through taking a line each with the others making our sounds of the island underneath.
This helped me to get to grips with the text we were working with and I found it helpful because I got to look at the meaning and quality of each individual word. It was like picking apart the piece of text and analysing it in a way that meant we still got to be being vocal and physical.
Our next task was to get into pairs. Once each, we had to use lines from the speech and welcoming movements to try and bring our partner, who was being one of the noises of the island, into the space where we were. We had to use a reassuring tone and kind body language along with pieces of the text to persuade them that they were safe.
This helped me to get to grips with the text we were working with and I found it helpful because I got to look at the meaning and quality of each individual word. It was like picking apart the piece of text and analysing it in a way that meant we still got to be being vocal and physical.
Our next task was to get into pairs. Once each, we had to use lines from the speech and welcoming movements to try and bring our partner, who was being one of the noises of the island, into the space where we were. We had to use a reassuring tone and kind body language along with pieces of the text to persuade them that they were safe.
And finally, a few people volunteered to read out the entire chunk of text and attempt to bring everyone else into the space with them.
I found this lesson immensely helpful, it's done me some real good, I think. Because in rehearsals we are normally looking more at the lines and the blocking, we haven't done that much physically yet as a group. So even though I've been working a lot on my personal physicality as Ariel and trying to develop it each time, it hasn't felt all together comfortable sometimes.
This morning's lesson gave me the space to really think about the world of the play and get comfortable with it physically, feel at one with it, and completely experiment with different movements and even sounds to become more comfortable with myself in the stage space.
I'm definitely going to take the skills I gained today and apply them to the rest of our rehearsals, as I feel way more experimental and free to try out different things with my body language and stuff.
Ariel is a spirit, after all, and I'm finding that his posture, body language and movements are a really important part of the role.
I'm looking forward to working on it more with the additional aid that this session provided me with.
I found this lesson immensely helpful, it's done me some real good, I think. Because in rehearsals we are normally looking more at the lines and the blocking, we haven't done that much physically yet as a group. So even though I've been working a lot on my personal physicality as Ariel and trying to develop it each time, it hasn't felt all together comfortable sometimes.
This morning's lesson gave me the space to really think about the world of the play and get comfortable with it physically, feel at one with it, and completely experiment with different movements and even sounds to become more comfortable with myself in the stage space.
I'm definitely going to take the skills I gained today and apply them to the rest of our rehearsals, as I feel way more experimental and free to try out different things with my body language and stuff.
Ariel is a spirit, after all, and I'm finding that his posture, body language and movements are a really important part of the role.
I'm looking forward to working on it more with the additional aid that this session provided me with.
Thursday 7th February 2015
Today we rehearsed in the morning and a bit in the afternoon. I spent most of the day prompting, as we're off book now and we need someone to always be ready to help out if someone forgets a line.
The scene I rehearsed in the theatre was where Ariel appears as a Harpie, sent to frighten Antonio, Alonso and Gonzalo.
It was kinda difficult to do this scene, because when we perform it, my monologue will be on voiceover. So as I'm rehearsing it at the moment I'm reading it from the script and that makes it harder to do anything physically. But I think that it'll be easier when I'm not using the script. Ariel just needs to be a scary presence at this point I think, so I'm going to change my body language and everything for this scene, I want to be able to see a complete transformation.
In self directed learning time Shaday, Ria, Ryan, Amber and I rehearsed the "thou liest" scene and jack, Jerome and Nuray gave feedback. We worked on it for quite a while and I think we've perfected it pretty well now.
The feedback Jack gave me was to try and say the thou liest lines as Trinculo would say it himself in the situation, quite annoyingly and aggravated.
Monday 9th February 2015
Today we just did rehearsals in the morning and there was nothing in particular I made note of for blog.
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