Last Lesson

This was the last lesson we had before our performance, in this lesson we ran through our piece from top to bottom in the space a few times.

This lesson we were mainly focused on perfecting the piece and getting rid of the lulls. The lulls of the piece was when energy was lost because the transition was bad or their was a long pause that had not been earned. This made the audience loose focus so we had make sure our transitions were quick and on point. However, we also learnt that some lulls could be earned, for example when everyone was talking as I walked around the space and then it turned to silence. At this moment I had earned the lull so before I began to speak I had to make sure it was completely silence so that I would have the audience focused on me, waiting for something to happen. I had to even wait until the squeak of the floor board from my shoe had been completed until I could begin my lines.

We also learnt that transitions are their to add to the performance not break it up, for example for one transition we had an overlap of lines, to add to the performance we needed to make sure this overlap was confident so that the lines could be heard and energy was not lost, when Danny was saying his line, and then the girls changed from screaming to trying to comfort James the overlap had to be slick and confident in order for the transition to be smooth.

Furthermore during this rehearsal we all had our costumes on. This was extremely helpful because it meant we were able to become the character more and it gave us a justification for what we were doing.

During the whole lesson we had to be focused, after break we lost focus which we shouldn't have done because it meant that we lost rehearsal time. We also learnt that when rehearsing and being directed we should not drop our characters and relax because it wastes time. If we drop our character then it takes time to get back into it and it is more complicated to take direction. In addition we learnt that during our performance we should not fidget because this draws the attention and focus away from what the audience are supposed to be looking at so if the braces break or your hair comes out you should just leave it and carry on with the performance.

Moreover, because we have been practising in our small drama room over the past few weeks we had to get used to the space and use it properly. We had to adapt the performance so that we did not have our backs to the audience and also adapt our voices so we could be heard. We had to 'learn the physics of the space' - this is what every actor has to do when performing somewhere so they know how to use their voice and body correctly according to the area they are performing in. Also when using our voice we should also remember not to throw away our last lines, we should sell them because even though the lines have ended it doesn't mean our acting should stop.

In this lesson I also learnt the difference between poise and pause because in quite a few peoples lines they were stopping in sentences when they should have looked like they were trying to continue the sentence. Pause is when you stop in a sentence and then carry it on, whereas poise is when you don't really stop the sentence because it looks like you are trying to carry it on. This is very useful for transitions and when a character is trying to say something they don't want to.

At the end of the lesson Sir gave us one more piece of advise he told us not to go crazy before the performance, he said we should be professional and save energy before the show so that we could give it 100%. We did some breathing exercises to calm us down, some tongue twisters and we also did this warm up where we would count from one to ten to ourselves feeling our mouth move, this was useful because it helped us with our articulation so during our performance we would speak with clarity. We also did these warm ups before we went on stage to calm our breathing and build up our energy.