Right. Ok. I don't want to write a damn thing. It's that kind of thing where your brain is so overused that just the thought of doing something more complicated than blinking is gargantuan. ...I don't even know if that's how you spell gargantuan....and yet I'm too tired to spell check it. So that's a-what yer gonna git.
But I know I'll regret not rehashing through the last few days so here we go:
Monday was a FANTASTIC day. It was another day off and though we should have slept in, KS and I decided to get up early, walk the thirty minutes to the Young Vic theatre and queue for Hamlet tickets. Now, Hamlet is not a play that would normally get me out of bed at noon let alone 630am. But this Hamlet had Michael Sheen playing the title role. I. Love. Him. Now you may think, Oh you just love him on the level of vanilla ice cream. Cause, you know, everyone loves vanilla ice-cream. No friends. I love him on the level of a triple chocolate cake with gooey fudge center kind of love. Now that's serious. If you don't know who this guy is, IMDB him. You should recognize him. He has the most incredible presence and talent. And for those of you that know my "type"...it's talent. Ugh. This man oooooooozes it.
Anyway, we got in line and got tickets. They were cheap seats, the last row, but I was just happy to be there. Our teacher, Tom, said it was the best production he's ever seen so I know I wouldn't be disappointed. After the queue, KS and I went for breakfast in a diner. There's just something about a good diner that brings comfort starts the day right. Following that, I met up with AL and AK for a bit of vintage shopping. There was a store full of costume jewelry. ...sparkly things...heaven. But alas, I refrained. But oh if I has all the money in the world, that's one of the places I'd go.
I came back to the flat to do some homework and get ready for Hamlet. The show was...the BEST Hamlet I've ever seen. Sheen made Hamlet a man. Not a whiny boy. He was physical, made choices I've never seen, and he carried that mammoth of a show like it weighed nothing. The direction and set design themselves were wonderful. They set it in a psych ward and before the show you could take a walking tour back stage where they set up rooms that looked like you were really walking through an asylum. Some rooms would have workers with clip boards or on work breaks. There were medical sheets, and eating schedules. The dingy walls had postings of paintings done by inmates. The detail was amazing. And the production itself, there was a point where the floor of the stage was hooked up to chains and a huge chunk of it was lifted up to the ceiling to reveal a pit of sand where the burial of Ophelia would happen. There were just so many little details and I found myself gasping or leaning forward (I'm not usually an interactive theatre go-er)...oh the play within a play...and the fact they blended Hamlet with his Father with Fortinbras...amazing.
And what's more, at intermission KS and I were making our way to the bar for drinks and one of the ushers stopped us to ask if we wanted to be upgraded to third row center for free. uh...yup. We sure do. So we saw the remainder of the play from right up close and personal. Good. Day.
I also took the Tube home for the first time. Um, so the Tube (subway). It would take much more than a month to master that sucker.
On to actual work. Tuesday. In the words of my mother, "It sucked." She's the poet laureate of our family. :) But she's absolutely right in this instance.
It began so well. KS and I blasted old school Michael Jackson tunes as we got ready for school. This girl has been a Godsend. We'll talk through what we're going through on the walk home, we'll wake up and crack each other up with nonsense, and we give each other the space we need when we need it. We were feeling good from the night before and I personally was ready to get my head back into the right space. ...that lasted about two seconds.
First class was fine. It was a two hour session with Tom on Michael Chekhov's Theory and how we use it. A little history, a little academia. No problem. It was pretty interesting. Enough for me to want to buy one of his books to learn more. However they were freezing us out with the temperature of the room that it was hard to concentrate. However, for all those fellow actors out there, here's the Cliff's Notes. (JS, this is where you can cut and paste for your summative statements later.)
-Theatre is an extension of living.
-Performance is an art form and craft whose basic material is the human body-mind, and its life in space and mind.
-A performer is a 'material carrier' of the life of the performance. Basically, the actor is a two way channel. It connects the art to the audience. and vice versa.
-The idea is the imagination takes images in nature and incorporate them into your body. It's a constant dialogue. We do this through Gesture. Gestures call forth emotions and impulses. There are three main types of gestures: Atmospheric, Textual, and Psychological.
I can see your glazed over expressions from here. And trust me, I have my moments as well. I sometimes feel like I'm two steps behind. Or as though I have grasp on the lesson and then suddenly it slides between my fingers like sand. It won't quite clearly stick. Like trying to get a good look at something through a smudgy window pane. (Did I put enough metaphors in there for you?)
We had another Context class then with Simon. Nothing to tell from there. Just more analyzation of how rehearsals and texts used to be done by in the day. There was a time when all the actors would get were the role they were playing and no cues. Or sometimes up to three words that would cue you in, but you had no idea when they were coming or who would say them. And we think acting is hard now. Can you just imagine having one or two rehearsals, then being thrown on stage with only your part in hand?
Finally it was our six hours of Acting with Tom again. And this was a rough time for me. I was personally in a very sensitive place. What's worse is I don't know why. This whole process has been like system overload. New city, new people, new stage, new material, new play, new new new new. And I am only just catching up on sleep. I never am alone except for maybe on the walk home. So I understand I'm going to be a little cuckoo for coco puffs. But what I don't like is when I don't notice what I'm giving off. A few people have mentioned that I've not been myself or seem a bit more tense than usual. And yes, I've felt off but most of the time if it looks like I've checked out or gone quiet, it's because I'm taking whatever five minutes are free to literally shut off my brain or go inwards so that I can be as "on" as humanly possible in this situation. In the normal world, at the end of the day I'd walk back to my private room, drink tea by myself, put on a movie, write my blog, and decompress. But there's none of that here. So I take those five minutes here and there to "be alone". The trick is to know who you are and what you need, and then find a way to get it. I know I need sleep, good music, coffee, endorphins, and the occasional alone moment or a moment where I can make a decision solely for myself that takes no other person into account. It could be as stupid as wanting to turn left on a street instead of right. Or using the lunch half hour to lay on the rehearsal floor listening to Jack Johnson meditating. Or maybe it IS to go out to the pub with friends. But it was MY decision. So often you have no control over this career or this life that when you finally get to make a decision, it's like a life line or a piece of solid ground. And yesterday I needed it. For some reason, I just did not "get it." The exercises just went wooooooosh over my head. And the more I talked about it either in my head or to someone else, the more lost I got. oooooo how I hate that. Eventually I just got to the point where I said "fuck it." Which is probably the thing to do. Go with the flow, don't think, just do. And then eventually something will click. ...or eventually the class will be over and you can buy a heineken and ice cream on the way home. Done and done.
Things I DID understand from that day:
The main characteristic of a true Pause is a moment of absolute radiation. There's moment when acting that is almost like a hiccup. You've probably experienced it without knowing it when watching a play or movie. Picture a guy, sitting at a cafe reading a newspaper. Total ease. He hears a voice next to him say, "Could I borrow the Arts section?" He looks up into a pair of green eyes and forgets to breathe. In that moment, they are both radiating whatever they are feeling at its peak. That pause in time has a tension. It is the tension between action and radiation. There are always pauses on stage. But when you steal time like that it cannot be sustained forever. It's like the tension within the pause expands but then releases to push the scene on. In sum, a pause is a slowing of the imaginary quality of time. It gives your brain more time to take snapshots. And times of crisis are when time slows the most. (Ever been in a car accident, and it lasted only moments, but you remember it so crystal clearly in images? Exactly).
The rest of the session was trying to create a constant dialogue between technique and intuition. Tom is very adamant about treating technique as a series of questions to ask yourself of your material, NOT a set of rules to follow. You must have the flexibility to maneuver between both. "Rules must swim in water, which is freedom."
He also showed us a diagram of the Globe stage and all the "money" spots. Because the Globe is, well, shaped like a globe, (and especially with the pillars obstructing views) there are certain places to stand and move. For instance, in most theatres I've worked in, the place to take would be down stage center. That would be death in the Globe unless you were facing upstage. The best place of power here would be slightly upstage center. It also is the best place for acoustics as well.
Oh jeezus. I've not even touched on today yet. Well, I guess it's another epic post, then...
Today was MUCH better.
First class, singing. We sound so good! Our teacher Joe composed a piece that we'll sing chorally at our presentation. A Capella. Yeah. We'll get there. :) And thank goodness singing puts me in a good mood because Text class with Giles was next.
Once again he dwelled on my sections. Stopping me every two lines, making me do it over and over. I kept thinking, this guy HATES the way I do text. He thinks I'm absolute crap! Why is it always me? Maybe I've really not gotten this like I thought. And this, people, is a lesson in what your self perception looks like when it's off. After ages of corrections, Giles asked for me to go through the reading (an excerpt of Isabella from Measure for Measure) one last time. I think he read the distress in my face, despite the fact I tried to smile through it. (Oh please, when have I EVER been able to hide how I really feel?) and he said, "You're very good, you see. Quite. that's why I'm being a bit harsh on you." ....whuh? I forget that that's how it works sometimes. Sometimes you get corrections because you suck. And sometimes you get corrections because someone wants you to be even better. There is a difference. Though I have to tell you, it doesn't always feel like there is when you are going through it. Either way, I have realized that I need to pick up the slack big time when it comes to text readings. It takes me a long time to get comfortable with it and sometimes time is a luxury.
Movement with Glynn-duh. Fun. High energy. Lots of galloping and gliding. I swear I've never been this active. At least not since AMDA and the five days a week dance classes. Anyway, we broke into three groups (in theory, they are the groups that we'll be in for the King Lear performance). As of right now, I'll be part of the end third of the play and we'll get our parts tomorrow. But for now, Glynn focused on finding the energy of each particular group. We skipped around, we walked around in geometric squares for a male energy, we walked in a crazy eight for female, and then we did a sort of ten step power pose of shooting an imaginary arrow. Sigh. I don't think I have the will to explain each in detail but we ended the class with a sort of dance party that focused on the three circles of attention: self, fellow actors, and audience. At the sound of the drum we'd freeze in a tableau as if someone took a photo of us. I truly love my group. We have a great energy. It's focused, free, professional, and fun. And I trust every one of them. That's saying something. Each one is a person I've admired and appreciated, so if the groups remain the same, I will count myself extremely lucky.
Finally. Yes, finally. We had two hours of acting. This went much better than yesterday. Gestures can be very confusing.
Textual gestures (what we did yesterday and I wanted to shoot myself) is the kind that you use for chunks of text. Using a physical embodiment of where your character is at emotionally at the time.
Atmospheric gestures are the type that create the outside world that your character resides in.
And Psychological gestures (what we focused on today) are ones that can define your character as a whole. Their overall character.
We'd find ourselves taking the space, performing our gestures grandly, then taking them internal but keeping the emotions that the gesture brought out, and radiating that to others.
We played with a mix of gestures, mingling and intermixing with each other. It was heavy stuff at times.
Then we ended the time with our directors. They'd build our atmosphere and then create abstract scenarios that could eventually be used in King Lear scene building. For example, our director VM would say, "the atmosphere is blue." We use that and do whatever. Then she'd say, "it's a deeper blue. and now there's a low note from a cello that is relentless and on going." and we'd continue. Then, "there's a white stripe that flashes through your blue." Silly? Perhaps. But from it we created a rather cold atmosphere that was hesitant and untrusting. The white stripe put an imaginary spotlight on AL for me and she became the one person of comfort. Then VM would direct that my surroundings were "more stone-like", she told AL to "protect Stacy", and told JS, I assume, "to attack Stacy". From that it became a stalking and scary situation. As I've mentioned before, JS has a focus that can be nerve racking. He goes after an exercise full out and demands the same from you. I learned a lot from that though. We did it a couple of times playing with the "centers." (see earlier blog dealing with THOUGHT, FEELING, and WILL). How does JS's attack change if he leads with his Will as opposed to his Feeling? How does my retreat change if I switch my centers a few times through out the same exercise. The Centers can change the entire atmosphere or tone or even point of the "scene" that we created. And from that you get choices. And choices, to directors, are like candy. And we alllllllllllll like candy.
And that, was just three days. And I still feel I've skimmed over everything. I feel good today though. I feel like I learned something today. I like myself today. I'd say that's pretty damn good.
Thinking of you x
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