Progression reflection

We went through lots of exercises with our contemporary monologue teachers where we
got extensive feedback such as try to believe you can see what you are saying, this helped
me because I felt like I was my character in real time, and I could really find the emotions he
was feeling. Finding my monologue was hard and a prolonged period because I couldn’t find
a monologue I connected with, I first found this script and I didn’t fully connect with it, but I
understood it, and I enjoyed portraying the character. After some feedback I changed my
monologue to something I was given by my course leaders, it's from killology and after
reading this play I realised not only do I like the monologue but I really enjoy the play as well
and so that helped me throughout the creative process, especially when it came to creating
decisions and motivations for my character. Throughout this process I found that I really enjoy
and thrive at young male character, ones that are emotionally damaged. My character loses his
dog and so this was a perfect chance for me to see what type of characters I am best suited too.
after testing with this character, I realised that my build, voice and presence compliments young
males between the age of 15-20 also the brooding nature of my body enhances the bond with
me and the character. I learnt what intrigues me as a creator I found that character who are trying
to deal with emotions and learn to except them are fascinating to me and really make my
character come alive. Some ways I can improve in the future would be to go into deep detail into
the script and explore all relations and emotions between the characters, I found that because I
had little detail of the script as a whole it inhibited me to progress at the rate that I could of. In
addition, I could of makes self-tapes of myself it would have enhanced my understanding of the
monologue and allowed me to critique myself and progress over time. I want to also put myself
in situation where I have to perform my monologue, not only to get feedback but also to become
more comfortable speaking it. Especially with my character my projection and command on stage
will boost my performance, my character being an emotive person allows my attributes to shine
through, also because of this unit I have learnt to analyse the text and through this analysis I can
translate the meaning of the script more precisely, which in turn allows me to convey more
emotions and effect the view more effectively. In addition, my effective use of keeping a lid on
the emotion but still showing it allows me to be concise and accurate to my characters true
emotions.

When we first picked out our classical monologues we went through various exercises with Alice
Barkley, like standing in a circle and reading some Shakespeare to start understanding how we
are to speak and to help us feel the words instead of trying to act the words. Alice used the
phrase let words do the work, meaning that the art of Shakespeare is best shown when you let
the words come out of your mouth effortlessly with no front of a character. Then when we got
our monologues, we went through them many times over the course of the term with Alice and I
got pointers like how I needed to find my strong decisions in the text Aswell as finding my
motivation. While going through this process I realised I was best suited for playing young men
and more specifically hot-headed young men. I came to this conclusion because of a
conversation we had with Alice as a group, we talked about not only what suited our appearances
but also what suited us mentally and personally I found that a character that has a temper and
struggle with emotion connects with the curiosity of my mind. I found that I excel in plays that fall
under the tragic genre this is because I enjoy the concepts and tropes that motif throughout the
play. To improve I could take videos of myself performing my monologue and review them.
This would help with understanding my decisions and motivations within the performance
therefore making a more in-depth character. I could also action the script, this would help
with understanding each line and the meaning of it. I could perform it in front of my peers so
I can get advice from many different creative people and change my performance according
to their reviews of it. I could also put myself in more intense environments to get myself
used to an audition environment.
My strengths like in projection, diction, and presence. These help me in my performance
because my character being a hot-headed individual would have traits that compliment
projection and a large presence very well. I also am able to take on feedback well and
respond to it accordingly this leads to a more in-depth performance. I have found that I can
handle anxiety inducing environments and am still able to challenge myself in these
environments.