Evaluation (of the New Theatre performance):

I instantly felt very nervous in the wings, particularly as I knew once we had set out onto the stage for the pre-set as the audience came in we would not come off until the very end of the show. I managed this effectively by revisiting relaxation exercises, some of which are Stanislavski’s which I learnt from term 1, and found this very useful to aid my relaxation. I also did some stretches backstage as we could not talk and remained focused as Donna, my Arden schoolgirl character, and centred my focus on the play ahead rather than who was coming to watch. I felt that once onstage I relaxed a lot and feel this was due to the fun and playful pre-set which helped me to settle into my character and the atmosphere we were in and interact with others.

Central to the play is the relationship between the two cousins.  Throughout the play their close supported bond is evident by all they do and say to each other.  This is best illustrated when Rosalind is banned from the court and Celia leaves her family and comfortable position to accompany her.  Despite their close warm friendship, they are very different personalities and it is important that I conveyed this.  I feel I conveyed the warmth, affection and loyalty Celia has for Rosalind which remains unshaken throughout the play.  It is a playful relationship in which they frequently tease each other despite the gravity of their situation which felt very present when performing.

I feel I was most dynamic and light-hearted when I was on the top of the climbing frame and discussing my sighting of Orlando.  I was able to be short and reprimand her to be quiet and “cry holla to thy tongue” but also playfully balance this by saying “There he lay, stretched along, like a wounded knight”.  By using large hand movements and slowing the words down, I feel it was an effective counterpoint to Rosalind’s anxious anticipation.  

I was always conscious of maintaining the character of a school girl and trying to intently engage with both the action and the school girls watching the play. However , I feel when transforming from the schoolgirl Donna to Celia in a scene I think I could have made this more physically obvious. Initially at the start of the rehearsal process Donna was portrayed as quiet purposefully to contrast the more playful nature of Celia but as the process continued I felt if Donna appeared too quiet and vacant she may suck the energy from the rest of the cast and the actors and not bring much to the ensemble side of our production by appearing to stand out as not as involved with the piece. Therefore, I feel my character of Donna and Celia were not so physically contrasting and seemed more similar so there could have been a more dynamic difference from the two. I conveyed the strength of the relationship between Donna and Linda (mine and Ffion’s character) by us choosing to stage this with her lying on my lap at the beginning as we watch and engage with the play.

As a cast we started off with a balanced and dynamic mixture of levels of sitting, lying and standing around the frame but the majority of the cast started to sit towards the end. I realised this so stood out to balance the levels but found that me and Ruby were the only two standing at that current time which may have drawn extra unwanted attention to us from the scene. Although this was not the intention I chose to keep leaning in a standing position on the back of the frame to balance out the levels across the ensemble. In hindsight I could have encouraged someone else to stand up with my as school girls but instead I communicated with them still but from another level.

I conveyed Celia’s hurt when Rosalind felt Celia had no reason to be downcast.  I know Celia was distressed by this. I think that I could have conveyed Celia’s reaction to herself and Rosalind being banished by her own father more dramatically, even been in tears, but I think I managed to convey the playfulness and expectation as we turned a life-threatening situation into a shared adventure as we plan our departure to the forest of Arden.  

There were times in hindsight throughout the play where Celia is portraying her excitement and I think I could have spoken this more slowly despite her upbeat attitude. As a group in a small theatre I was heard by my parents at the rear of the theatre but I was conscious that a bigger venue would have required more projection. I will take all of this on board for our performance at Brighton Fringe Festival which will be an exciting challenge.

A performance which I really admire from our casts is of Sophia’s portrayal of “Silvius”. I think as a more-heavily comedic role it would be easy to go over-board into melodrama, but I feel she balanced the light-hearted humour and silliness of the character with strong truthfulness. This meant that her character was both funny to the audience and us but could still be taken seriously as she portrayed Silvius’s deep-rooted love for Phoebe. Rather than playing solely to the light superficial comedy of the role, she proved her character had a strong purpose and objective without trying to be funny or playing up to the audience’s attention so I admired this well-balance and entertaining performance. I also reacted with her at several moments across the play as a school girl as she too was very involved with the scenes we were watching.

Watching the other casts of “As You Like It”:

As well as evaluating my own performance I noticed factors from watching the other casts perform different adaptations afterwards which were useful to reflect upon. (Some of these are notes that do not apply to my role or our production due to the different concepts but are still good points to remember and refer to for future performances and for Common Ground which will also be in the new theatre).

-         -  Watching other casts perform reinforced the importance of projection,

-        -   Some cast members dropped their character as they were nearly off stage and out of audience sight. This does not apply to ours as we do not leave the stage but is useful to note for commonground as it momentarily takes you out of the moment to reality,

-        -   Make entrances sharp and clear, not leaving dead space in between,

-          - As long as you stay committed the audience shall believe in what you are saying despite mishaps. A good example of this is when Michael as Oliver forgot to bring on his “bloody napkin”. He wove this into the performance by telling Celia and Rosalind in character that he forgot it. This worked well as he remained calm, focused and in the moment meaning it added to the comical effect of this play rather than stumbling and making this appear a mistake. In fact, as he handled this so well, I thought that Jack had directed it in this way on purpose for comedy value which shows with commitment an actor can continue to make an audience member believe in/engage in his/her performance,

-     -     Playing comical roles as purely comical makes them appear as if they are only there for the audience’s satisfaction and can be hard to remember that they too have feelings, objectives of a scene/act/play/life and that there character’s life would continue offstage even if the actor is not performing to an audience.