1st Lesson working on the play

Lesson 1- 23rd January

This weeks lesson we got given our roles and began devising scene 1, act 1. I got given the role of Miss Havisham, which im over the moon about as this was the role i really wanted as i love the character and the interesting story behind her. I am glad ive been given the chance to give my take on her as i beleive i will give an original performance that will do the play justice.

We began by walking around the space, in neutral and picking up the energy. We then walked around adopting manerisms and physicalities of some of the some of the characters in the play. As i was walking around, i would begin to get into the physicality of the character, then i would change different movements like which part of the body i was leading from (nose, hips, head) and the energy the character was giving off. Experimenting with their physicality helped me to decide which way was better and what certain moves were most suited for that character. For example with the character Magwich i originally lead with my hips as i thought he was quite a heavy footed man, and quite big and  bulky causing him to lead with his hips, but towards the end of the exercise i began to lead with my nose as i thought he would be quite keeled over and hunch back.
From this activity i learnt that testing characters physicalities in a group can be extremely helpful as you can learn from others and adopt others ideas to make your character have the best physical outcome. 

 Next we started on the first scene of the play. First, we split onto four sides of the stage. We then walk on stage in neutral and stand, heads up and looking out onto the stage, this is a strong start and will cause a big impact at the start. The chorus then opens the play with the line "My father's family name being Pirrip..." all characters then say Pip in their character this also causes an impact and identifies everyone from the very start. Next all characters apart from Pip and the chorus move and then kneel down at the same time to become the gravestones, this sets the scene of the graveyard and is again very visually effective for the audience. This leads on to the scene were magwitch comes out from behind a gravestone and grabs Pip, asking him to steal a file from Joe's forge. From doing the first scene this week i have learnt that i have to be bold and keep up the energy throughout the play in order for the play to work and the audience to not get bored or lose interest