Lesson Review - 27/11/14

For this lesson, we were asked to chose our favourite character out of the tales we had explored, and created a monologue as that character. I chose the daughter in America and decided to base my monologue around the day she finds out she's going to America and how she is disappointed with her mothers reaction. I felt I explored the character well and was able to come up with another character within the performance that effected the daughter. In the monologue I talked about receiving the exceptance letter from the school in America. I started standing up, explaining how I wanted to be a phycologist, when I said the line, "I'm sitting at the table, waiting for the postman", I sat on a chair to made it more realistic. However, once I found out I got in, I got up to emphasise the excitement. Vocally, I built tension by spreading up towards the end when I'm describing my mum. I decided to use rhetorical questions in mine because I wanted to let the audience know what I am thinking and also what I am confused about. Because the questions are quite insensitive and most people would see why a mum would be upset, it shows the unsympathetic nature of my character. Looking back I wish I had developed that more, I could have extended the character to really emphasise the fact that she can't see why her mum wouldn't be happy for her and how she fails to see anyone elses point of view. I do feel like i could have explored the character more, emotionally. I needed to create more of a past for my character and talk about my relationship with my mother and more about how I felt. My monologue was very much a narration of this event, and i feel like because of this I failed to show any personality of my character. I also didn't use my acting skills as well as i could off because of this. I focused more on cramming in as much into a one minute monologue and how I was going to stage it, rather than taking the time to develop my character.

MY MONOLOGUE:

When I'm older I want to be a phycologist

I applied for a college in America

The letter comes today - to tell me if I got in

I'm sitting at the table, waiting for the postman, waiting for what seems like forever

Till i hear the letter box and mum goes to collect it

I'm anxious, excited, but anxious

She hands me the letter, thanks

I'm surprised at how much I shake when i open it, but that's understandable right?

I skim over the words and...I got in

Mum I got in, are your proud of me?

I see her face

Mum, she smiles but deep down she doesn't wan me to go

Mum

What's her problem

She's so protective and needy and emotional

And I'm trapped, suffocating, struggling to get out, to get away

But she's pressuring me to stay, holding me back, keeping me close

And for what?

Why does she need me?

What about what i want?

I think the monologue task helped me understand the play because it allowed me to come up with a back story for my chosen character. And i could see how they came to that place in their lives when they appear in the play. It also helped me understand the mum, because developing the daughter and more of her story meant I now know what the mum has gone through and how her reaction to her daughter moving differs. 

Rory performed a monologue about an alcoholic who doesn't realise he killed his wife. It was successful because he wrote it as if he was being interviewed by the police. It drew in the audience because we didn't know what he was being accused of. He varied the staging by sitting down and getting up as his anger grew, his voice also got older at this point. His use of contrast in his voice displayed the split personality of his character. He would quickly go from being angry to softening his voice. When he realises he was the one that killed his wife, the change in his face is very subtle but realistic and is very touching. He performed this very well and didn't over do any emotions. Alex's performance was also very successful. Her monologue was about being domestically abused by her boyfriend. She built up the emotion very realistically and approached the subject sensitively. Her voice was shaky towards the end as she began to cry and staging wise, she was didn't move but that enhanced the emotion. She enhanced her character by adding more of an east end accent. At the beginning she was very casual talking about her boyfriend, and then she starts to tap into the parts of their relationship which is quite rocky and then she shares how he abuses her. The emotion displayed on her face tells the story, and it's as if as she is speaking she realises herself the way he is treating her isn't right.

Unfortunately we didn't get to task 2 in the lesson.

In this lesson, I felt I worked at a merit. I was focused during the class and thought carefully about my monologue, writing it in a way that was easy to say so it sounded natural. All of the exercises done in the pervious lessons helped with this task. Especially when we wrote about a character and what she thought of herself and what people thought of her. This really helped my monologue, especially since I did both on the daughter in America.