Lesson 6

Posture

We started off by working on how to stand and sit in neutral. We were told that we must always concentrate and stay focused. I took on this advice and stood upright, with a straight back, feet shoulder width apart, chin up, arms by my side, chest out and imagining my head was attached to a piece of string which was holding my head up. I believe that this looks less lazy and much more confident for the audience, this will make them feel engaged with the piece. I think that if everyone does this, this will look very effective and will keep the audience’s attention throughout the performance. I felt like I was more aware of my surroundings and I was more enthusiastic and less distracted. Furthermore, this made the movement more fluent and create a stringer sense of working as an ensemble. We were told to maintain eye contact with the audience to create an engaging and intimate experience for them, this allowed us to connect to the audience on an emotional level. I believe that this will convey a strong, personal and moving message to the audience and will affect them much more than fidgeting or looking bored like we did before. Moreover, this creates a strong relationship between the actor and the audience which is one of Grotowski’s methods. He thought that if the actor creates a truthful connection with the audience, he would be able to change them. Before we worked on improving our physicality and posture, this was one of the main weaknesses of the show because we were lazy and didn’t put much energy into our work, however now our performance had improved greatly.

Lines

We each added in a line to our performance as a way conveying what is really going on our heads and how we truly feel through thought tracking. Normally, I don’t like thought tracking as the thoughts and emotions of the character should be made clear through their acting. I think that this is a very amateur and basic technique as it either shows something that is obvious or spoils the plot for the audience. I prefer theatre to be implicit and subtle rather than explicit and lazy. However, this works well in our performance as it shows the motivation behind our actions and allows us to think about why we, as teenagers, act in a certain way in society and allows us to think about what limits our self-expression and individuality. Therefore, it is very effective in the piece as it allows the audience to reflect on society’s expectations and boundaries that we take for granted in our everyday lives. The boys talk about why we act macho and intimidating. The girls talk about why they act feminine or wear makeup. My line is ‘I act hard to hide my insecurities.’ This means that I want to hide how I feel and show a lack of emotion. I feel like society expects men to act in a particular manner, therefore I try to follow these expectations by behaving in a particular way in order to impress people. This is an excellent exercise as it allows us to think deeply about ourselves and society, this makes our acting and the performance more personal and truthful. This will improve our acting as it is honest and means something to us, rather than fake acting which an audience won’t connect to or believe.  

Bath

We incorporated the bath into our performance. Becky would go into the bath while other actor poured water over her and filled up the bath. I think that Becky will be in her underwear in order to show the character’s vulnerability as she is exposed. This is effective as it relates to the previous scene of taking layers on and off. The bath is a metaphor for her cleaning herself and wiping away her sins. As she is in the bath, she realises that she cannot find herself and that she wants to rid herself from the air which represents the world she is living in.This is clever as it shows her purity and holiness despite society’s darker side and expectations. Moreover, this relates to ‘The Holy Actor.’ Grotowski believed that they could achieve this by getting rid of everything that was unnecessary or superfluous. Grotowski believed the perfect actor must sacrifice their body to acting, hence the term ‘holy actor.’ The bath symbolises this as Becky sacrifices her body to society. I think that the bath is a very effective metaphor. However, this may not be too clear to the audience who won’t know about Grotowski and may not think about the bath as deeply as we do, as actors in the performance. Furthermore, this will be very difficult for Becky as she won’t be able to be hidden from the audience as she is supposed to. This is because she won’t be able to breathe underwater if she is out of sight for the audience.

Comforting

After the boys short sequence of moves to demonstrate masculinity, the movement started to become manic and chaotic, we had lost any sense of timing and control which shows how we could no longer control what we were doing, it was too automatic and it had become very frustrating and it was chaos. This represented what was going through our heads. Gradually, the girls would come along and hold us to make us feel protected and safe. They repeat the phrase ‘It’s okay’ in order to comfort us. This is effective as it implies that there is a solution to the panic within society. We suddenly became calmer, relaxed and ourselves. We weren’t afraid to show our emotional or softer side. We would then gasp for breath and reach out which was an intelligent and effective way to show us trying to escape society and society’s expectations. Furthermore, it links to depression and shows us trying got end our lives by escaping which fits in excellently with the theme of mental health. It was very interesting that the girls were calming down and holding the boys rather than the other way round. This defies the social boundaries of normal or usual events and I find this intriuging. 

Experiments

I was asked to be a scientist in a group of experiments and tests we had given to the audience. There were 11 scientists and the audience were given 3 minutes to complete a task such as a group of riddles or a puzzle. This idea is very effective as it builds up an actor-audience relationship in a piece of immersive theatre in which the audience could interact with the actors. This gave the audience a chance to see something from the perspective of someone with a mental health issue. They can see how difficult or confusing every day activities can be for someone who is suffering with a mental health problem, therefore the audience will have a great knowledge and understanding of the key theme of our performance. This relates to Grotowski’s concept of creating a strong relationship between the actor and the audience to make the performance more captivating and personal for them. I feel like this came across very well in this scene.

Cellotape and torches

At the end of the piece, Charlie told the audience that they were entering the brain as he pulled back the curtain to reveal the rest of the actors standing in neutral, looking at the audience. As soon as the curtain was opened, we all began to walk around the room in a circle, with the audience being in the middle of the circle. We varied on pace as we walked around until we all started jogging, running and then completely stopped. I imagine that this will make the audience feel very intimidated or self-conscious. This will also help them relate to the struggles of mental health. This will be very effective if all the actors say in neutral and permanently keep eye contact with the audience. After this, we all slowly raised up our hands and some actors rand around with cellotape, creating a chain/connection between all the actors. After this, the lights were dimmed and some more actors ran around with torches and shined it on the cellotape. I think it was very aesthetically pleasing when the light shone on the tape and created a sense of serenity and calmness. I didn’t understand the theatrical effect on the audience and I don’t think they will understand it either. I think that it is possibly used in order to create a sense of ensemble and everyone coming together to show strength and defying social boundaries and mental health issues. 

Balloons

We finished the piece by getting the audience to write one of their fears such as failure of heights etc. onto a note which we would attach to a balloon before popping it. This is very personal to the audience and puts them in a vulnerable position which may make them feel uneasy. However, this is very effective as it allows us to connect to the audience on a personal and emotional level, therefore creating a strong relationship between the actors and the audience. Bursting the balloons was a metaphor for bursting your fears and getting rid of them. The message behind this was to face your fears and eventually overcome them, therefore making us emotionally stronger and braver. I think that this is very effective as it will be very moving for the audience.