Single - Contemporary Theatre Unit (FSN) - Blog 35 (Evaluation) - 16/12/15

Today was our performance of our contemporary play, The Flint Street Nativity and it was an extremely successful performance! The day after performing, I watched the recording of the performance to wrote down all the notes I could possibly make on my performance and also some very important notes on some of the other cast members performances which largely contributed to the success of the performance!

• Great movement fully portraying the role of a 7 year-old.
• Superb reactions in the conflict with Narrator (Ollie M) in opening argument.
• Opening monologue was great with confident, clear and characterised speech.
• Interaction with Gabriel (Rhiannon) was reputable with good pauses and stuttered speech to show fear.
• Upon entering, I didn't have my rocket as it was moved from where I placed it in the wings! I did well to exit when I shouldn't have but in a convincing fashion in order to find my rocket!
• Before exiting, I play with my rocket in the, "NASA to Voyager 10," part, so I did well to improvise and mime playing with the rocket then going to locate it afterwards!
• When waiting to deliver the, "Everyone's dead over..." line, I had to wait for Wise Gold (Hope) to say her line ("Ashley?"). In rehearsals, I always accidentally, skip over her line, however in this performance, I remembered but was left hanging in silence as she forgot about it, most likely due to my mistakes in rehearsals. This created an awkward 2 second silence.
• I stepped up onto the platform very slyly and made it look completely natural.
• My actions and gestures on the platform were very bold and large as to gain the audiences attention as I was further away than everyone else.
• My facial expressions and change of voice when Innkeeper (James) appeared were superb but my movement could've been a great deal better.
• When exiting off the platform into the wings, I notice that the trolley had been moved from the wings! This trolley held Peter Crouch and was vital to the next scene! Upon rewinding, I learnt that Angel (Cel) moved the trolley after we all dispersed following the song, "O Come All Ye Faithful." I was surprised that she'd done that as she'd never done it any of the rehearsals although it wasn't as much as of an issue as I thought as I quickly managed the situation by telling James the change of the trolley's location and how his movement would change based on it.
• My stuttering and stalling was effective at portraying Star's fear for Innkeeper)
• Great reaction to the escape of Peter Crouch with very loud, panicked screaming and cowering movement!
• Nice flowing and childish entrance after exiting with the Peter Crouch trolley.
• When sitting on the table waiting for my next dialogue, I did very well to interact with the other characters, Wise Gold (Hope) and Wise Frankincense (Ollie K), through mime. I also drew pictures and played with other toys on the table! I was very wise as to use the paper that was on the table to write a message to Ollie K; I didn't know where my rocket was and I needed to find it for my other scenes so I wrote on some paper, "Where's my rocket?" and he wrote in reply, "Somewhere in the left wing." This helped me find it a lot quicker including the help from Lorna when standing in the wings!
• When leading up to my next section of dialogue, ("Isn't! Isn't! Isn't!") my miming to Wise Gold (Hope) was in build up to our scene together! I was using physical gestures and spoke quietly as if we were already in debate before the audience actually hear us argue! This made the dialogue a great deal more fluent!
• After Innkeeper reveals the truth about Santa, we all coordinated well and gathered in the centre shouting and screaming to Miss Horrocks! We all stopped shouting at the same time as we had synchronised very well in rehearsals.
• In Act 1 Scene 2, my movement in my search for Peter Crouch was very effective at making it look like Marcus was wondering around. When I'm talking to Innkeeper (James) about my mission to find Peter Crouch, my gradient progression from large frantic actoins to small nervous gestures.
• My change in tone and pace of voice was effective at portraying the relationship between Star and Innkeeper and showed how Star, at first, needed to tell Innkeeper everything but later notices that Innkeeper isn't particularly bothered.
• Although the movement I did in this scene was very effective in entertaining the audience and showing the relationship between Star and Innkeeper, but I feel there wasn't enough movement. Upon looking back, I noticed that my movement seems very, "stop and start," and this can be improved by increasing the amount of movement I do and exaggerate this movement.
• When performing my song, "O Little Town Of Bethlehem," I remembered all of the lyrics and put emotion behind every word with tone/pitch/volume of voice and movement linking to the lyrics.
• During rehearsals, Rob always got two lines the wrong way round in his song with Mary (Lorna), and he did the same thing in our final performance however this time he saved it amazingly! He changed his line in order to fit the rhyme scheme of the song! The audience weren't aware of this change which was what was needed!
• When I performed my small Innkeeper part, my movement was very good and provided comedic value to the scene! My intentional costume change was very quick and made the audience laugh! However when getting changed, I lost my star when running through the doorway and it landed on the floor on the stage! When I run back in for the final time during the scene I picked up my star on the way out to make sure I had it ready for the next scene.
• During this scene, I enter and exit three times; the first time I exited, I entered the wings and Charlie told me that Jesus is still onstage and on the floor and he's needed for the next scene! So upon entering the second time, I performed my dialogue then picked up Jesus and exited. With the play being very make shift as it's a primary school nativity, we could afford to make these mistakes and resolve them in this way as this is how it would be resolved within the play.
• When I perform my small dualogue with Innkeeper (James) for the second time, my movement was a lot better than the first time as I had more larger and exaggerated movements.
• When Hope wonders around looking for Adrian (Ollie K), she noticed that Jesus was left onstage when he shouldn't have been AGAIN!! She improvised very well by picking up Jesus and saying, "Oh no! Someone left Jesus again!" This was great as she was able to bring Jesus back to Lorna when she exited ready for the next scene.
• When Star sees his Uncle Ted in the audience, I was extremely loud and provided a convincing reaction with amazingly exaggerated gestures/actions, excited facial expressions and very loud speech!
• When we had to line up for Silent Night we get in the order, Me, Ollie M, Katya etc. and then when James enters he should stand between Ollie M and Katya but instead, in the final performance, he stood on the end next to me. This meant that when we run away in slow-motion James was in the wrong place so he had to run across Ollie and I. This meant it was also very difficult for Ollie to kick James when he's in my arms.
• My reprise of, "O Little Town..." was very emotional because of the tearful tone of voice I used and my lack of movement combined with my slouched posture. This helped portray the harsh truth that Marcus had gotten angry with a star! I performed this song for the perfect amount of time as this song is used for the rest of the cast to change into their adult costumes. I purposely performed the song for a long time to give the cast enough time and it certainly worked as I entered the wings to find everyone ready.
• My entrance as Uncle Ted was loud and confident just as it would be! My movement was very large and exaggerated and my voice was loud and wasn't hesitant at all.
• When the penny drops and everyone finds out Uncle Ted isn't Marcus' dad, I completely changed the character! My movements were contracted and very nervous with stuttered, quiet speech to represent the dip in confidence.
• For the rest of the scene, I kept consistently moving to make sure the scene wasn't too static. This included constantly walking, eating food and conversing with other parents.
• When it came to Sarah Bennet's Breakdown, a part which has always been an issue in rehearsals, we did very well! We started arguing quietly and progressively built up to a full blown argument. I feel the only way we could've improved is by taking our time a little more as it was over within 15 seconds.

Very Well Recieved Jokes:

• Dirty Pedro
• Sheppey in Spain
• "She's not gonna be Mary"
• MY DAD!
• "Don't grow up like my dad!"
• "There's me Dad!"
• Star enters in wrong costume
• Mary gives birth
• "THAT'S MY SOCIAL WORKER!"
• "Thank you!" (At the end of Shepherds song)
• "Jesus' heads fallen off!"
• "I've wet me leg"
• "38-40"
• "Stole jeans from MATALAN"
• "Longer playtime and biscuits!"
• "Frankenshit!"
• Wise Frankincense and Ass' song
• Bringing on Herod's palace
• Star seeing Uncle Ted in the audience
• Jesus is a twin?
• "More Myrrh!...AND FRANKENSHIT!"
• "These nativities are crap bless'em!"