The cast of Hamilton came into our college including the actor who played Aron Burr who told us about the history of the play and what it represented.
1. What did you find out about the background of the production? Background, context, characters, themes etc.
The writer of the musical initially only wrote the opening song, but because of the huge success that this had, he decided to develop it into a whole musical. The musical is based on one of the founding fathers of America who doesn't get a large amount of recognition in history. The writer, Lin Manuel-Miranda, felt it was important to find a way to recognize his importance in history.
2. What did you learn about the skills required to be part of the production?
One of the actors who played Eliza Hamilton told us about the concentration needed every single night to pull off the show. We talked about what to do if you made a mistake on stage and she told us from her experience to just carry on and try and get back on track. We also learned how to manage time when you're doing 8 productions a week and how important it is to take care of yourself and stay motivated.
3. What did you find out about the challenges of working as a performer in the industry?
We were told about the difficulties of balancing everyday life with performing. The key is to get into a routine and make sure that you stay motivated and passionate.
4. How can this inform your own approach to your training?
I will take this advice and keep it in mind whilst training so that later on in my career I will be prepared for what is to come.
Hamilton review
On the 6th November, we went to see the first educational performance of Hamilton- this was not my first time seeing it however it certainly didn't disappoint second time around. I paid particular attention to techniques the actors used which made them stand out. **
I thought the show was engaging to watch throughout and well directed in terms of staging and flow. Some stand out characters for me were Eliza Hamilton and Maria Reynolds. They stood out for me as very strong singers and I thought the interpretation that the actors put into the songs was astounding. Something that surprised me in this production was the way they pulled off having an adult playing 9-year-old Phillip. I thought the physicality the actor used was very clever and delivered the clear story line that needed to be understood by the audience. The opening number made this musical stand out amongst others as the first song explains most of the plot however this does not detract from the performance as a whole, in fact, I think it adds more audience interest in this instance.
Project Workshop
05/11/18
In today's class we came up with a sequence of 4 movements based on our chosen protest subject. We then partnered up to create a longer performance piece as a duet.
In this video I am working with Tilia, we are on the left. I combined my topic of mental health awareness with her topic of keeping the sea free of plastic to save the lives of fish. This protest topic is particularly important to me as I have suffered with a lot of stress induced anxiety in the past therefore i felt I could use my strong feelings about this topic to enhance my performance and help me find a personal connection with this performance piece.
I think our movements could have been more precise in some areas for example when we do the pointing action. However I think the moment where we're miming shouting and protesting worked really well so this should be something carried on towards the final draft.
This helped us develop some ideas for our performance at the British Museum based on the 'I Object' exhibition.
Project Workshop
06/11/18
We started to further develop our piece by playing around with how we can integrate our performance with the other groups. In this video the front group is a piece we created with Alex and Nehemie and the back group created their own piece. Today we only got as far as positioning ourselves with them however we will start to adapt the movements as we carry on devising our protest piece.
Project Workshop
12/11/18
Today we revisited the work we did last week and started to refine and develop the movements so our performance looked cleaner. We then joined up with the other group of 4 to integrate our performances to create one piece. We positioned ourselves around each other and took parts such as the frantic running in our piece and instead of running around each other we ran in and out of the other group who were doing a slower movement.
We used wide range of pace and levels, for example the point where we're on the floor banging our fists and the other group is standing above us. Also we practised being in sync with each other through the beginning of the piece.
Project Workshop
13/11/18
This week we added to and refined our work from yesterday. We took our last section and adapted the spacing so that we were in more of semi circle type shape which was an idea I suggested at the beginning of the class when we discussed how we were going to adapt and develop our work.
In our blog session we looked at different satirical videos shown in the links from the word document below.
Project Workshop
19/11/18
At the beginning of today's class we warmed up and then sat down further discussing our protest ideas and our views on society. We were each given a piece of paper on which we wrote key words and emotions relating to our chosen topic of protest. We used these ideas to create a sequence of movements that we shared to each other which were then adapted into duets.
When creating my individual piece, I thought about things that have happened to me in the past and tried to represent these events through movement and acting. However when combining my piece with Ghazal we thought more about the effect on the audience so used some bigger, more dramatic movements.
For my individual performance I was told it might benefit my performance speed my movements up and make them more concise and whilst my duet was more fast paced there were still moments that perhaps took up too much time.
Project Workshop
20/11/18
In today's lesson we focused on integrating our duets into the devised performance to work towards completing it. We had a visit from Nick who works at the British Museum and was organising our performance. As we were getting closer to the performance we started to think about what sort of costume we would wear to contrast the environment we would be performing in in order to catch the public's attention. We discussed that we would do two performances in the middle of the day in order to attract a bigger crowd and deliver the most impact to the audience watching.
Project Workshop
27/11/18
How did you work to refine and rehearse the piece today? What did you need to focus on?
In this session we finished our performance and decided on an ending. After I performed my duet with Ghazal I waited on the floor to then be picked up by Sonah- representing a change in mood within the piece as we begin to lift each other up and support one another. I performed certain actions from the duet to her as she performed actions to me as though we were sharing our feelings with each other. We then proceeded to walk back into a clump to unify us back together. We walked round each other as though we were in a crowd then formed two lines and said our slogans again- however we took the point of view of someone who doesn't believe what we do. The line I said had particular significance to me as it was something that was often said to me during high school.
What do you need to refine and rehearse before Thursday and Friday?
We ran the piece through several times to make sure the moves were solid in our head and then began to pick up on any points we might be going out of time with each other. The section where we went into a V shape was slightly messy so we went through and clarified exactly what we were doing and at what time.
Acting How did you work to refine and rehearse the piece today? What did you need to focus on?
In this session we finished our performance and decided on an ending. After I performed my duet with Ghazal I waited on the floor to then be picked up by Sonah- representing a change in mood within the piece as we begin to lift each other up and support one another. I performed certain actions from the duet to her as she performed actions to me as though we were sharing our feelings with each other. We then proceeded to walk back into a clump to unify us back together. We walked round each other as though we were in a crowd then formed two lines and said our slogans again- however we took the point of view of someone who doesn't believe what we do. The line I said had particular significance to me as it was something that was often said to me during high school.
What do you need to refine and rehearse before Thursday and Friday?
We ran the piece through several times to make sure the moves were solid in our head and then began to pick up on any points we might be going out of time with each other. The section where we went into a V shape was slightly messy so we went through and clarified exactly what we were doing and at what time.
20/11/18
We went round the circle sharing our acting warm ups and the purpose of them. Mine was a tongue twister to help improve articulation.
Diary of Anne Frank- we looked at a monologue from the diary of Ann frank and thought about how we could use our emotional memory to create a sense of realism so that we can later perform these to each other using the skills we have learnt.
Acting
27/11/18
In today's lesson we learnt about two types of objectives that a character may have in a scene.
- Super Objective
- Sub Objective
Emotional Memory
We were exploring realism by telling stories to each other and seeing if we could tell weather it was a true or false story
Musical Theatre Workshop
01/11/18
In today's lesson we sat down and discussed what we were going to work on in the forth coming lessons. Our teacher told us we would be performing the song 'Cinema Italiano' from the Musical Nine. We began by listening to the song and watching the performance from the movie by Kate Hudson. We then went through and allocated solo lines to each person and my solo line was right at the beginning.
Musical Theatre Workshop
15/11/18
Today, we carried on learning the 'Cinema Italiano' dance and we refined the section we already had to make sure everything fitted together and we could remember all the choreography and staging.
Musical Theatre Workshop
22/11/18
Today, we finished 'Cinema Italiano' and rehearsed it as many times as we could aiming to improve each time and get the moves into our muscle memory.
Risk Assessment for British Museum Performance
03/12/18
In today's class we sat down and discussed how to fill out a risk assessment. We thought about different risks associated with our 'I Object' performance and thought about the different precautions we needed to take to lower these risks as much as possible.
Musical Theatre
06/12/18
In todays session we watched our performance of 'Cinema Italiano' back and took some time to reflect on how it went. We were given a series of questions to answer to help us understand areas that could be improved.
How did it feel performing it?
I felt confident in myself and the dance moves as they were completely set in my head, I also felt like there was a good energy that we gave out as performers.
What's something that surprised you?
The space we were performing in was smaller than we expected however I minimised the movements accordingly to make sure the overall shape of our performance was tidy.
One thing you think you did well?
My projection in both my lines was good and every word I said could be heard clearly, also my dancing was in sync with the music
One thing that could be improved?
I think that I could have used my face more when performing as I noticed when watching the video back that my facial expressions were quite minimal. Also my characterisation throughout the song could have been stronger so I will take a particular focus on this for my next project.
How well did everyone work as a team?
We were mostly in sync throughout the song and had strong moments of group singing and dancing. There were moments where we became slightly out of sync however we were able to bring everything back together so overall I think we worked as a team very well.
National Theatre Backstage Tour
04/12/18
Whilst doing the backstage tour at the national theatre we filled out a list of questions regarding the history and structure of the national theatre.
In what year did the National Theatre open?
1976
How many seats does the Olivier theatre hold?
1160 seats
How many degrees are in peripheral vision in the Olivier?
118 degrees, this is the angle of peripheral vision which allows the performers to include everybody and means that each seat in the theatre has an equally good view of what is happening on stage.
How many theatres are there in total?
There are 3 theatres in total- the Olivier, the Lyttelton and the Dorfman theatre.
What different possibilities do the 3 theatres present for performance and what type of work does each of them show?
The Olivier Theatre is the largest of the 3 however still has an intimate feel due to it's unique design. This theatre tends to play greek tradegies and musicals and alternates between two shows
National Theatre Job Roles Research04/12/18
Costume Designer
Someone doing this kind of job may either be commissioned by a theatre or theatre company on a job by job basis or you may work for one particular theatre making costumes for every show they put on.
You would be working for the theatre company doing this job and as a part of the production team as costumes are an essential element in any show.
The yearly starting salary for someone in this sector is around £16-18k and goes up to £20-40k for more experienced designers.
To be successful in costume design, some industry-specific skills are required. These include:
- Drawing and design skills
- Research
- Ability to translate creative vision
- Knowledge of fabrics and construction
- Knowledge of new technologies
Casting Director
As a casting director, you can either work free-lance or part time/ full time for a company as a resident casting director. You would be working alongside the director however the director makes all the final decisions.
Casting Directors can work for a theatre or cast for movies or adverts depending on the type of casting director.
The average salary for a casting director is £44,850 per year. Major Hollywood casting directors can earn up to £65k per film.
To be a successful casting director you would need to be:
- good eye for talent
- work experience in this area
- good knowledge of industry trends
- further education in the arts
- communication skills
costume-designer
casting-director-job-description
https://www.planitplus.net/JobProfiles/View/42/19
https://www.ehow.co.uk/info_8537629_casting-directors-salary.html
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