Showback 1

Through documentation of the rehearsal process I will develop my understanding of verbatim through the research. With the techniques I have addressed, I want to understand what works and what doesn’t in becoming and creating a character. Within every few weeks, as a class we are required to show back everything that we have done through our performance process. This including where we stand with the performance pieces, academic work, website work and other things that we have done to contribute towards it. Show back 1 with Melanie allowed me to bring to the table what I had done and what I was working on. This allowed us all as a class to see what everyone is doing and to see a snippet of everyone’s performance pieces and where they stand currently.

Within my first rehearsal I wanted to try and get off script quick as possible. Using different exercises that I learned throughout my degree I tried to pick up the lines as quick as possible. This is something I struggle with all throughout my training as I have a difficulty doing so. So, by using exercises it allows me to unsure I obtain the lines fast and quickly.

My second rehearsal which continued on the following week and I wanted to be off script as soon as possible so I took my time with learning my lines and making sure I had every line down as much as I could for the few hours I had for that singular session. I have a bad habit for sub reading my lines. Meaning, I change and adapt words and sentences because I either don’t know my words as much as I should. This is important due to this being a verbatim performance, so I am developing dialogue that is real and going off script means I will be unfaithful to the character I am trying to portray in this instance. I have also been looking back to the zoom video that was filmed between me and Andy for the Ewart for reference so I can pick up characterisations and characteristics he has so I can fully embody his character.

Within my third rehearsal, I met with June Scott. June is another member on my course and offered to support me and give me advice through my process. To mention, she knows Andy Ewart’s quite well and was able to give me several critiques and advice through the process. Going over my lines several times, she notices characteristics that she found familiar to Andy and she agreed that I picked that up well. However, one contributes that she said I must work upon is using my ‘T’s’. Within a video taken of the rehearsals process of June she states ‘With the luxury of recording this process and looking back over the video, I’d watch out for the T’s within Verbatim. If you start as Andy and then end up sounding as you.’(2021, 32.18) Slowly as the monologue went on, June explained the worse my diction got as Andy pronounces his words somewhat over the top as well as his body language so my dialogue must match that. It gave me something to work upon and something to acknowledge for the future when rehearsing the monologues. I felt confident after this rehearsal for the show back that followed few days after

As I have been working a lot on my academic writing as well as my verbatim work, I felt like I didn’t have a lot to show in terms of presentation wise when it came to the actual show back. I showed Melanie a list of what I had done, what was in the process and what still needed to be finalised. (See Appendix 1 for List) This allowed me to present what I had and compare to where I was with other classmates in my class. Along with my list, I showed a snippet of my performance piece using the first section of Andy’s monologue. Due to technical difficulties because of the show back being on zoom, I was going to show a snippet of the monologue on Youtube (See Appendix 2 for video). Instead I decided to perform it live on zoom to my peers.

I found it difficult perform the piece over the zoom as I couldn’t see anyone on the screen meaning I couldn’t see my classes reactions and didn’t get support you’d normally get if a live audience was present. However, this did make me feel more comfortable because through the rehearsal process I have been interacting with my phone when videoing myself. It was comforting because I felt like I was working in a room by myself and didn’t get nerves that I’d previously get if in front of a live audience, if nerves were present I do not thing I’d personally be able to embody the character. Because the piece will be filmed in front of a camera and not in front of an audience, I believe this will allow me fully to invest into my character and help when workshopping the role in the final performance space. So, performing in front of a camera was more beneficial than it would be if it were to be in person.

One thing I have taken into consideration when creating my piece is the website that goes a long with it, I noticed that a lot of people in my class had their websites up and coming. Because I haven’t created a website before I find this quite difficult and haven’t really focused on that yet. I want to create my performance first so I can fully invest time into creating a website that fully represents me as a creator and artist.

I believe I would’ve found it more helpful if people in my class gave me some things to work upon or more ideas on what they liked or didn’t but due to it being such a small section of the piece I believe this maybe the reason, so going forward to the next show back I know that I should show more to receive better feedback. One thing that was mentioned from Melanie was that “it was leaving her wanting more.” She stated that she was excited to know the rest of the story and wanted to see where the story continued, which is a great source of feedback because I know the piece is heading in the direction, I want it to. As well as that, June implied that my performance was in a much better position than it was when she previously seen it. This is an important factor to know as this allows me to realise the performance is heading in a good direction and it is in fact improving and evolving.