Sunday 19 May 2013

A-Z of Acting. P is for...

Perfection.

As previously mentioned in past blog posts, I will soon be entertaining the audiences of Bedfordshire and Northamptonshire with my portrayal of Hero in 'Much Ado About Nothing'. Last Sunday evening my script arrived in my email inbox, and I immediately sprung to action and printed the pages as fast as I could, so that I could begin to work on them first thing on Monday morning.

Monday morning tuned into the whole day, most of Tuesday afternoon, all of Wednesday, most of Thursday, and all of Friday morning too. For the first time in a while, I was feeling nervous about a play. I had secured the role that I had wanted, but after reading through the script, I couldn't get my head around the character. It was time for action!

I've performed the play before, but not in the role of Hero, and the editing of the play was also different to the last performance I did. I grabbed my trusty Cambridge Shakespeare Much Ado study guide and sat down and worked my way through the whole play. On every single page of script I wrote down what was happpening in each scene, I researched all of the words I didn't understand and scribbled them all down in the margins. I even wrote a modern day translation of each of my lines so that I fully understood everything I was saying.

I wrote essays on my characters relationships with everyone else in the play, I noted what everyone else said about my character throughout the story, I wrote a timeline of events that happen to her, basically, I didn't stop until I knew everything about her. I wanted to get inside her head and understand why she does what she does. And I'm still stuck!

Everyone wants their performances to be good. No, more than good. No-one wants to be the average person in the cast, if you want to work again, you have to be perfect. Which is why I put in so much work this week.

I am quite annoyed that I'm struggling already, I'm just hoping that things will be okay once we get into rehearsals. I'm sure other people will be able to help me out with their take on things, it's just infuriating when you can't seem to get something that you think should be easy.

I'm glad I did all of the work though. My parents were away for the week, so I was able to get so much done without getting hassled(!), and now they're back I've only got my lines to focus on which for me is the easy part! (And to be honest, I haven't really got too many of those! I mainly have to stand around looking pretty while people call me 'sweet' for the first two thirds of the play!)


My exercise regime also begins (again) tomorrow! I'm challenging myself to try and lose a stone in weight before the first performance. No-one wants to be a chunky bride, even if it is only a pretend wedding that goes a bit wrong! I will be the perfect Hero, it just might take a bit more work!

Nxxx


PS, If you remember me talking about a music video I did with my dance people back in April... it's finally here! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqFlqeQV9t4 Get your geek on! :) xxx

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