La Revoltosa

In this episode, I spoke about where I was with my project after the meeting with my tutor and teacher and the last class we had with David.

In David’s class, we discussed the book ‘On the technique of Acting’ by Checkov, and we did an exercise about it. The understanding of the body and how important that understanding is for an actor to perform. One of the exercises we did was to have different parts of our body leading us… A hand, the hips, the noise, the shoulders… David asked as to which was the part of the body that was leading the movement of our characters in our performance. I found that exercise extremely useful for my performance. One of my characters, the narrator, moves following their hands in a theatrical manner. For the mother, the movement is led by the chest and for the son, the movement is led by the head.

We did another exercise embodying an idea: The idea we were working with was the idea of perfection.

At this stage, I felt very lost with where I was going with my performance because I didn’t have still clear what I had to do and my different ideas were not working. I needed guidance to come to terms with my final performance.

I had the idea of creating diverse content for my project investigating the different techniques, influences and areas I wanted to deepen my knowledge in like masks, multi-rolling, immersive theatre, performance, naturalistic acting and Bretch.

In this episode, I spoke about the feedback I got after I showed where I was with my performance. I explained I did not have my performance fully prepared for that first show and where I was with the development of my idea. Which performers and artists influenced my performance and the challenges I encountered when I first tried to do on a stage.

I realised it was very difficult to do the multi-rolling on stage in a one-person show. My original idea of the puppet did not work as planned and I had to rethink it.

I explained how I felt pressed by time and concerned about being able to create my performance on time because of the circumstances around my personal life at the time.

I mentioned how I was thinking to redo my performance into a stand-up comedy, thinking about simplifying it and doing a monologue without multi-rolling. The topic is a difficult topic and reminded me of the type of stand-up comedy that Trevor Noah does.

In my process of thinking about changing my performance, I talked about the influence of Marina Abramovich and her performance ‘The Artist is present’ at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York in 2010. I was considering breaking my dissertation/performance into different parts for being uploaded in Tiktok and each part would represent one area of study. I considered creating a performance in the park for the people to participate in based on her performance at the MoMA.

In this episode, I spoke about my performance and its development. I knew I wanted to include an element of modern dance in my performance that would represent pain. The stage would be a space of pain where the story unfolds. I revised my original draft of the idea I designed in Jack’s class and decided to be the mother of the main character and tell the story from her point of view instead of the child’s. At this stage, I devised the idea of playing two characters: The narrator and the mother. I am influenced by a Spanish pop group of the 80s and a particular song ‘Hijo de la Luna’ for the creation of the character of the narrator, for their tempo at the time of speaking and the movement of their body.  At the time of writing the script for the narrator, I felt the influence of the poems of the Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca.

In this episode, I also spoke about the idea of introducing masks and the idea of the narrator wearing a mask. It was important to me to depict the narrator as a character without any feelings on their face. I thought about the variety of expressions the mask could get on stage with the lighting and the idea of letting the light change the character and mood of the narrator. Considering the seven states of Lecoq, the narrator impersonates the ‘stage manager’.

I mentioned the influence the Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan had over the creation of my puppet. I looked to make the audience think about the abusive use of screens by children during the pandemic and after the pandemic. The puppet would have represented that idea.

To my surprise, I observed how my identity in the country I was born started to make its way to my performance. I considered adding flamenco a saeta to my performance to represent the feelings of the mother towards the child.

I mentioned how I wanted to make the audience think with my performance. To think about the relationship they have with their family and what are the things that have changed and what could be improved.

In this episode, I spoke about my project and where am I with it now. David helped us with the research skills: What were you investigating and what were you going to find out that you don't know already.

My question was how the interactions between family members changed during the pandemic and what was the role of social media in that change.

David made us question what we thought we would find out after our research. I explained where I got my idea for the project and how I am developing it. I mentioned the project is largely based in personal experiences and that is the reason why I am allowing myself to be subjective about the topic.

We did again an exercise using the seven states of tension of Lecoq. We did a little impro where each of us had to represent two states and David should guess what state those were.

I discovered while doing this exercise that comedy can be easily achieved just by doing this exercises. I reminded me the British comedy sketches of the 70s like The Monty Python or Mr Bean.

I discussed a performance I went to see and how that performance influenced the development of my own performance.

I talked about Grotowski and the influence Grotowski’s teaching have over me as a performer and over the development of my performance for the end of this term.

In this episode, I spoke about what we did during David’s class on the 31st of May. Prior to our class, David checked our final dissertation and adjusted the classes for helping us with it.

In this class, we did some exercises based on Stanislavski's method. We did an exercise about visualization, given circumstances, actions and objectives. In the first exercise, with clear given circumstances set, we had to get our objective without taking. In the second exercise, after the given circumstances were given, actors can talk to each other and should aim to get their objective. In the last exercise, after clear given circumstances, we were encouraged to see, to use our imagination for helping the audience see what we saw. Both actors had an objective and played an impro where both of them were givers.

I mentioned my experience doing impro before and being aware of being a giver actor and helping/supporting my scene partner with the impro. 

We did an exercise based on the seven states of tension of Lecoq. The seven states of tension were the following:

• Exhausted or catatonic. The Jellyfish.
• Laid back – the “Californian”
• Neutral
• Alert
• Suspense
• Passionate
• Tragic

I talked about what point I was at with my final performance and the difficulties I was encountering while developing the performance.

In this episode I spoke about my experience filming Grief and the differences between filming and theatre.

We filmed most of the scenes of Grief last Saturday in three different locations: A house, the Marketing suite and the green area outside UEL Stratford.

It is very different to film a script than to perform it as a theatre play.

Theatre plays are performed for weeks if not months while an actor preparing a scene for a film may meet their scene partner for the first time on set. I have been given the advice of doing this exercise: Delivering your lines in completely different ways which will help you not only memorise your lines, but also to change the way you deliver them in case your director will ask you to do so.

Also in theatre there is only the point of view of the audience while in film you have many points of view indicated by the frame of the camera. In film the director and the DOP work hand on hand to deliver the director's vision of the film. In theatre the director is the main person orquestating the play while in film both director and DOP must work together to get the final product, the film.

As an actor, in theatre you can play bigger and your voice needs to be protected while in film it is quite the opposite and ‘less is more’ applies: Your movements should be minimal, your voice should go down and sometimes actors are required to be in a very unnatural position but that it looks good on camera. My scene partner and I had to be opposite each other as if we were facing each other while we were facing in reality to the camera and talking about something that was placed behind us. On the other hand, in films the scenes are shorter and there is less dialogue to learn per take which makes it easier for actors to deliver their lines (as opposed to theatre where dialogues tend to be very long).

During filming, the camera dictates the position of the actors and the length of the takes as some things simply cannot be done within a take because of the limitations of the cameras.

In our filming of Grief, many parts of the script were cut during the scenes to make the dialogues much shorter, our movements were limited by the frame of the camera and we had to bring down our performances making them more minimal.

In this episode I spoke about my thoughts after performing Grief at UEL and the challenges I encountered.

Our teacher and director Ed Hughes was giving us some tips in the second day of performing Grief:

1. Playing the true emotions.
2. Not devoicing.
3. Learning the lines, knowing the lines.
4. Not forcing the feelings.

My personal feedback was about devoicing, leaving beats in between lines and playing the feelings.

I found this performance very challenging which brought me to question why I found it challenging and what I was doing right and I was doing wrong.

There are moments in every actor’s life where you question your capacities as an actor and your abilities and that is part of the journey of being an actor and growing as an actor.

In this episode I talk about the movies that have touched my heart like ‘UP’ (2009), ‘Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind’ (2004), ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest’ (1975). I also mention how I would like my performance/project for the next semester to mirror one of these stories by also touching the hearts of the audience. I mention how important it is for me to pass a message on with my performance and I elaborate a bit on the idea of what family represents to me and how I feel the idea of family has been distorted by the current gender norms of society(not sure if that’s what you mean?). I also mention how the pandemic has really affected children and what I want to achieve with my performance.

In this episode I comment on what we did in Carrie’s class on the 31/03/22. I further discussed some exercises we did during the class. The first one was about picking up a gesture from somebody else and implementing it into our own story. Another exercise was observing somebody else's way of walking and giving feedback about how they walk and their gestures.

Carrie asked us to write and bring a script on a conversation we would have with our younger and older selves. During the class she was asking some questions that both characters had to answer.  We then did the walk exercise as one of the characters and the point of the exercise was to observe how the walk changed and what elements stayed with us.

I also talk about ‘the digital double’. We did an exercise on the topic by recording ourselves as our character and then projecting that face over our face and asking the questions that our digital double will answer (the previous recording done of your character).

And lastly I will talk about how I was thinking of staging this performance.

In this episode we will see what we did during Jack's class in week 4.

In this episode I talk about what we did at Jack's Class on the 24th of February, 2022.

We discuss the STORY CIRCLE and how to organise a story: YOU, NEED GO, SEARCH, FIND, TAKE, RETURN, CHANGE. I then explain what every part of the story is about.

I then read an example of how to organise a story by choosing to analyse The Dark Night.

I talk about the story I created in class following the methodology of the Story Circle: We had to choose two elements, an image and an object. We had to create a quick story and give it a title.

I then talk more about the story I have created, by explaining each part, as we had done beforehand with the example of The Dark Night.

I also talk further about the creation of a character- The Buffoon. The exercise we did to develop this character and how important the ‘walk’ is for developing a character. I also share a personal story of how somebody once mistook me as a thief in real life.

In this podcast I discuss what we did at the first class with Carrie. I will talk about one of the exercises we did. I called it ‘the hand exercise’. In this exercise, one actor behaves as if they are being hypnotised by the hand of the other actor.

I also talk about one exercise we did about the digital double: You cut-out the shape of your phone in an A4 cartoon. With your phone, another person records your face moving it as you please. Then you tape your phone to the cartoon you cut off in the first instance and place it covering your face. Then you move your body and the full image of your head being recorded moving while your body moves in a completely different way. The results are very interesting.

I then talk about the video I did for TIKTOK and about the digital double.

I will mention and go into detail in some of the pdf. files Carrie has sent to us like 'The Digital Double'  (2004), by Dixon where the idea of the digital double is more developed.

I talk about how some of these readings are influencing the preparation for my project next term.

I also talk about the last exercise we did with Carrie. One of my classmates recorded me while I was playing with that feeling. Then that recording is projected on my chest while we do an improv about breaking up. I explain how I feel so strongly about this exercise for my performance and as a performance in general.

And finally, I talk about some performances that Carrie showed us, where the digital double idea plays a bigger part in them. One performance in particular, a solo person performance and how you can tell the story as a solo person and how you can make the performance more interesting and engaging.

In this episode we spoke about what we did during another of Ed Hughes’ classes. We learnt a bit of choreography, resembling the walk of Londoner, then developed this with another bit of choreography where we pretended to be inside of a wagon in the underground. We will be using this choreography as the entrance of our performance in Grief.

During this class we are allowed to watch during the rehearsals of other scenes.

A tip Ed gave us about playing Pete was again thinking in the given circumstance (Stanislavsky, 2013): Where he lived, which school he attended, who his parents were, did something happen to him in his childhood, etc.

Once again, we were reminded about listening and being present.

A very strong tip he gave us was about being aware of devoicing. Some actors tend to speak quietly and with strain when they act. It is important to understand your habits and work on them.

Tips you can take from this session:

1. Go big: Do not hold it back.
2. Devoice: Use your own voice. Do not go quiet.
3. Listen and be present.
4. Find the truth of the character.
5. Think about the given circumstances of your character.
6. Help the other actor to carry on with the scene.
7. Walk as the character.

The job of the actor is to help their scene partner, to open the door to the other actor to continue with the conversation.

When we were talking about the play Grief, we had to think about:

1. Where is the play set?
2. What is the intended audience of this play?

Tips for Spanish speakers:

1. Pronounce your ‘d’ and ‘t’ at the end of the words.
2. Elongate your vowels.

In this episode I spoke about what we did in Ed Hughes’ class on the 8th of March 2022.

Tips:

1. Consider the previous circumstances of the character.
2. Voice: Bring the endings of your sentences/lines up. Practice your lines while moving and step in your last word. If people cannot hear you, they will lose interest in what you are doing.
3. Do not play the emotion. It is more interesting to see how you are holding that emotion, how you are battling to not show that emotion.
4. Play your lines: If you really play your lines, the emotion will follow.
5. Allow yourself to be affected by what the other actor says and create those thoughts: Do as it is the first time you ever heard it.
6. The characters are created in the moment: You cannot plan every action of your character. If you understand your character, things will come naturally.
7. Warm eyes: When we are acting for the camera we give this idea of privacy, inviting the audience into our world.

In this episode we talk about what we have done in our past classes and the exercises that are good for actors to improve their presence by listening and to focus. We talk about the president exercise and the clapping exercise.

I also mentioned an exercise we had done for creating a story: We had two groups with post-its and some text at either side of the class. We then had to flip a coin in order to pick-up the post-its from one side or the other and then used a dice in order to pick-up the text. We then had some material which created these random stories.

I also talk about the story I created and wrote in the last class. I explained further about the steps I took in order to create it. In this class we implement something new in our stories: Social media.

I talk a bit about the story I will be developing for the next semester and about Federico Garcia Lorca.

In this episode, I spoke about what we did in Ed Hughes’ class on the 1st of March 2022. Ed gave us the characters we were playing in the scene. I am playing Ed in scene two and Mary, the mum of Helen who committed sucide, in scene six. I spoke about the initial rehearsal I had with Sammie-Jo for scene two and the tips Ed gave us to help develop our characters.

The advice Ed gave me about my character was to think about what happened to my character prior to the scene, my ‘previous circumstances’, as Stanislavsky called them (Stanislavsky, 2013). My character has been working a lot on this project and probably did not sleep the night before the scene due to working on his presentation. I thought my character would be very high energy but Ed told me my character should move less, playing this scene like Pete does not understand what is going on.

Another piece of advice Ed gave me is to contain myself. As an actor you should contain your personality to step into the personality of your character.

When you take an option on how to play your character, do not take the most naturalistic one, but take the one that is more interesting for the audience to watch.

As an actor you make a choice for your actions. You  might have multiple choices to pick up from to work on an action, but you should always choose the option that perhaps is not the best thing you could do in real life, but is the most engaging to watch.

Advice to take from today:

1. Research the situation your character experienced prior to the scene.
2. Do not let your own personality overshadow your character’s personality.
3. Watch great comedians/actors like Charlie Chaplin, Laurel and Hardy, The Marx Brothers.
4. Take the option that is more interesting for the public to watch: The most powerful one.
5. Walk as your character.

In this episode I spoke about the two classes we attended with Ed Hughes on the 8th and 15th of February. During these classes we read through the script of the play Grief by David Kantounas. We will have our show at the end of the semester and right now we are reading it together to feel the play, discuss the play and for our director Ed Hughes to start casting us.

When actors are doing the reading, normally actors have been cast already,  but in our case, we were not yet.

Ed Hughes told us that he should respect the tempo of the play. This particular play is written at a very fast pace.

We were analysing how the play is written and the situation the characters encounter: The main character is Pete and he appears in all the scenes. He is having a breakdown and becomes obsessed with an actress who has committed sucide; the play unfolds around that initial situation.

In this play we talk about the shadow self that everyone has but does not like to show to others.

In this episode I also spoke about the research I was doing at the time about social media and acting. I was particularly researching TikTok and Instagram. I shared my findings about how TikTok has evolved since it was created and where it was then.

The main ideas to take from today’s class are:

• Respect the tempo of the play.
• Analyse the situations the characters have prior to the moments portrayed in the play and the relationship between the characters.
• Take your time to read the script and be full on without interruptions. The more you read the script, the more ideas come to you about the play and the characters.

* Please note I left this episode unedited and two interruptions occurred while I was recording it.

** My podcast changed the name from 'Tristan' to 'La Revoltosa'.

In this episode I spoke about what we did during Ed Hughes’ class on the 22nd of February. We took part in a mock casting scenario during which Ed demonstrated different variations of casting directors that he has encountered in the past (the one that is not interested, the one that is busy…)

What should you do in a casting?

1. Go for it: Give it your all. You have nothing, you would not lose anything. There is nothing to be afraid of as you go with nothing already.
2. Be the character: When you enter the room, you are the character already. The director is looking for the character, not you as an actor. As Mr Davenport says ‘Make your first 15 seconds count’ (Ken Davenport, 2020).
3. The relationship between the director and the actor is very important. There should be a connection in between them. If you do not  get that connection or they do not get that connection, it is better not to work with them.
4. The energy you have when you go to a casting: You have to bring something to the table. The director has probably seen a lot of people before you. You do not need to go really high but go with your energy up.
5. Control the room (particularly for castings in the USA): The actor sets the camera and takes control of the space. This is a way of showing to the director how well prepared for the casting the actor is. The director wants to see in the casting room an actor who is confident with what they are doing.
6. Do not talk too much: Be nice, be polite, talk but do not go over the top. The director knows what the story is about so you, as an actor, do not need to explain to the director what the story is about.
7. Do not feel you have to be sitting all the time: Follow your impulses, do not  hold them back.
8. Do not hold your voice: Do not try to hold your voice, be quiet and polite.
9. Once the casting is done, move on. The director has an idea in their mind about the character. And sometimes you can do a great casting but you might not fit the idea of the character the director has in mind, like maybe your voice or something you do. That is why, just do not obsess too much about your casting, just move on.
10. Always give your best in a casting because you might not get the part that time but the director will remember you and might call you for something else in the future.

*My podcast changed the name from 'Tristan' to 'La Revoltosa'.

In this episode I talk about what we did in our class with Jack on Thursday 24th of February. We are investigating the creation of characters and today was the turn of the buffoon. We also worked in the story circle and played some games.