We are going to perform three same performances on both days. The first one on Wednesday will be recorded by a camera and there will be students from a secondary school to watch our performance. We were to stay frozen on stage while the audience was coming in to take their seats. I was a christmas tree for my tableau, my arms were hardly lifted after a few minutes. After the first performance, I changed my tableau slightly by lifting them a little bit lower so I don't get tired in a short time.
Tableau at the beginning
What Went Well? We used the skill "cheat with our feet", which we learned from last year (Link to the blog). A Christmas Carol has quite a lot of ensemble scenes like parties or on streets, whenever I was in it, I tried to stay some distance away from each character so those scenes make more sense with people all over the space. Other than that, we picked up our ques as fast as we could so we won't make the audience to wait for long, but at the same time, during each scene, we paused for a bit when is necessary for the audience to have time to understand the play. I think I did really well in every beginning for all three performances when I'm the solicitor, I showed my face being annoyed by Scrooge as I've gone to him every single year asking the same thing from him.
Even Better If...
During the second performance on Thursday, I was told to speak louder in the Cratchits scene. When I went on stage, I need to show more of a mother figure so they will know that I am someone they need to be focused on there. I should sound like I am shouting at the kids wanting them to stop playing and answer my question, as I was busy all day cleaning the house and preparing for the christmas dinner. In Fred's party scene, I can be more active and have more interactions with the guests other than only listening to Fred. For example, in the guessing game, I could talk to the person beside me, trying to ask her for some ideas, this will make the game more interesting to watch, because the audience might get more intense if they see us guessing it so hard like we're actually playing.
Overall for our performances:
I think we all did amazing work, we got the audience involving with the scary Marley coming from behind them. I personally love our dances, I can tell we're making the audience to want to move their body following the music. We've input so many materials in this show, for examples, the seriousness of Scrooge's changing, the pitiful family, the happy ending, also the dances the songs to entertain the audience. That Christmas vibe we brought to everyone is so strong that I can barely remember the Christmas is not here yet.
The acting community is gaining bigger year after year, there are two types of acting industry which is stage acting as well as film acting. Despite the long history of the tradition of the theatre, it's long been deemed as an activity for the higher class and while this has started changing in the last century, film has since become the media of choice for most people. However, what can the stage offer that the screen can't? Masses of audience nowadays are asking for more quality productions from the actors in each or both industries. In the same standard of productions, is there truly any difference between the long-separated worlds of theatre and film? Or one of them do require more skills than the other?
Me as a drama theatre student, the most obvious difference for me is the audience between theatre and film. In a theatre, actors and audience are separated by a distance ranging on a small sized stage from a few feet to hundreds of feet in a large auditorium. Actors were told to exaggerate their movements and expressions also to project a loud and clear voice during each of their performance because when everyone in the audience is here, they need to be able to listen and see them clearly, especially from the last row. Audience needs to see their faces but not their back, actors have to be very aware of where they are standing and which side are they facing. As for screen actors, their audience can watch them in every angle depending on how the director wants to film it. The audience can be looking into the actor's eyes watching tears flow down or looking at the big city from above the sky. Screen actors are only allowed to do smaller movements and simpler facial expression because they need to look natural with every single cell in their body, sometimes they do not know how big or small to show their expression, it may cause them looking stiff for overdoing it to act natural. They need to know where the cameras are all the time to prevent walking out of the frame, some directors only allow their actors to move in limited spaces in order to get the perfect background. The next difference between stage actors and screen actors is time and set. For theatre actor, they got plenty of time to do rehearsals, to get to know their role as well as their partners in different scenes also a few full runs before the real show, by the time they perform it to the audience, they have practiced dozens of times. The sets in theatre are always sorted out and organized beside or at the back of the stage as they need to bring all that out to change the whole scene when necessary. In the opposite, film sets are chaotic places packed with cameras, lighting lamps, audio equipment and wires everywhere as all the equipment are not built in like in theatre. While the actors are being filmed, it is possible that hundreds of crew members might be walking beside them. Film actors do not get too much time to learn their lines as those scripts are still possible to be changed until director shouts "Action!". In the same scene, film actors may get a chance to take numerous takes with different dialogue which the production group will then cut and change in the edit. The atmosphere while watching a show in a theatre or on a TV is vastly different too. A theatre performance will never be duplicated in the cinema, it feels more current and real when the audience is a matter of feet away from the show rather than on the other side of the globe. A show like this cannot be redone in the same way ever again that everyone in the audience will share that specific experience. Theatre performance is a matter of exclusivity because once the show is over, it's gone for good, only the people who bought a ticket could enjoy it. Most of the theatre in London only focus on doing one play in the entire theatre, for example, Palace Theatre only perform Harry Potter, Fortune Theatre only perform The Woman in Black, Queen's Theatre only perform Les Miserables, and a few more that only perform the same play over and over again every day. These theatres' targeted audience will be those that love the play and the style the actors perform it in live, most of the audience most likely watched everything on film before they watch the live performance.
By comparison, films can be enjoyed over and over again, in the same way you watched it the first time. The best of it is that people could enjoy it anywhere they like, at the place they feel comfortable with. Films are attractive to most audience because of the unrealistic story that will never really happen in real life but film productions are able to make it happen with effects and dramatic movements from the actors also with the help of amazing work from screenwriter and producer. Some films do reproduce the atmosphere you can find in the theatre, that having two levels of performance in one single production to reduce the space between actor and audience. "High School Musical" and "Friends" are two of the examples that incorporate the same elements of showing the audience the 'reality' behind the camera. The examples from above are some obvious differences from both industries. Let's begin with the ocean deep of skills that the actors need to develop and how these skills will be used in their own field. Scripts for the stage actors are often not allowed to have any large changes due to the popularity of that play, it will embarrass the actors when famous dialogue is said wrongly, the show wouldn't make sense for the audience at the same time. Stage actors need to be a fast thinker that can improvise anything in their brain as well as acting out, also need to have enough creativity to fix their mistake when they're halfway through their performance. I don't believe in the say of "the audience won't know if we did wrong", well they actually will know because as I said from above, most theatre audiences knew what they are getting in to and the 'professional' ones might've watched the show many times before, they just indulging in theatre performance because they love it so it doesn't mean they don't know if we did wrong, actors obviously don't want the audience saying "I watched a better one last time". Back to the point, improvising skill is really important for a stage actor as they have so much time to understand the whole play and their own character, they are more likely to able to think of another way interpreting that moment. On the other hand, improvising isn't so important for screen actor, because the director will be trying every way to make the scene trustable, actors try as many of dialogues as they could ever imagine just to make that moment right, then, it will be film editor's job to cut and put all short scenes together. Actors have to be aware of continuity each time they perform a scene on camera because they will never know which take will ultimately be used, so they need to be consistent. Other than being consistent for each scene, they also need to worry about the continuity between different scenes. For any of their own reason, film and TV always shoot their scenes out of order, they might shoot scenes from the end of the movie first and there's also a very high probability that the actors only get to shoot their first scene on the last day in set. If your character is violent at the beginning but somehow become nice at the end, you might not sure of what really happened earlier and how aggressive you were before becoming the good one, you always need to hold your emotions and acting energy on track in case you fail to act accordingly. It wouldn't make sense for the audience also for the editor to edit if your characteristics keep changing throughout the whole movie.
If I'm still thinking one of the industries still require more skills than the other, it's just because both were facing the completely different struggles. A movie might take half a year of the screen actors' time to stay on set, and at the same period, actors were not allowed to work in another movie set as one of their contract procedures with the company, the money they earn all depends on the popularity of their movie which will release another half a year after they done shooting. In a year of time, stage actors might already perform two big shows, their working time is more flexible and productive. That's the reason why screen actors earn more than stage actors, they took the one year risk to shoot for a movie they don't even know if the audience will like it. Each has their own difficulties, there is no point for comparison as the main objective for an actor is to bring joy and experiences for the audience, no matter they're in a theatre or in the cinema.
On Wednesday, we did two dances for the party scenes with Mandy and Sharon.
Week 7
On Wednesday, we did a full run through with dances and singing without stopping. Throughout the rehearsal, there're still moments that we don't know when to enter and exit. We then worked on both party scenes with dances which is the Fezziwig's office party and Fred's house party.
On Thursday, we worked on the personalities of our character, we need to find what I say to others and what others say about me in the play. I did my character of Fred's wife thinking where and when we met each other and my personal back-story, also the house when Fred and I live.
I wrote about the party scene and also my back-story.
Abe wrote about his first scene in the play with Scrooge
and how Fred and his wife met
also his family background.
The house where Fred and his wife live. They live in Central London.
I drew this house according to Abe's information for the houses in Victorian times.
Week 8
On Wednesday, we did some creative stuff in a group with Mandy. Here are the videos.
The second one here is the final dance before the performance end where all casts will be involved.
Week 9
Monologue assessment (check unit 10 monologue blog)
Week 10
We've been rehearsing in the theatre this week.
upstage - space for the characters
downstage - the dining area for the Cratchits
I always love entertaining people around me with all sorts of noises and weird movements. Their laughter had been the greatest thing to hear. That's how I started to like performing since I was young. I went to an international secondary school which I could choose Speech and Drama as a subject. Since then, I've developed more skills with a professional teacher. To be honest, I never thought of going for Performing Arts after graduating from high school. But my Drama teacher, Miss Barclay told me that she sees the potential in me and if I somehow ended up choosing Performing Arts in the future, she could write me a reference to get into a good college.
During the final year of key stage 4, I joined an academy outside the school. In high school, we definitely go to all lessons/rehearsals because classes were back to back and we got nowhere to go, being on time is normal for me. But in that academy, especially every Sunday morning, sleepiness came to me eventually, being late and skipping rehearsals are happening. The difficult time catching up for new changes in the show and slowing the pace of others had urged me to change my attitude towards the attendance The changes in my attitude led me to be a more responsible actress.
I've performed some musical shows on big stages with over hundreds of audience, well-known ones including Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, The Muppets movie, Legally Blonde. Besides from musical pieces, I joined drama classes as well, but we don't perform famous pieces from any famous author, we performed pieces written by my own teacher, Mr. Ivan. He is not a writer or an actor, but he writes amazing scripts. I always get to play those characters that suit my personality, which is not challenging at all. He once told me, challenges start in college and university, and this academy is to train for my disciplinary and confidence. Instead of exploring new skills, they want us to build a strong base being a performer. I've also once experienced to perform a 60 minutes play with only one week of time to prepare. A regular Christmas play written by Mr. Ivan and three Christmas songs. It was a really tough week for me as I was in the choir as well as acting. I need to learn all harmony for each song and all my parts from the play. We even did out technical and costumes run four hours before the performance. Everything was a rush but it turned out a marvelous show. Mr. Casey, the founder of the academy, also my vocal tutor, wanted us to believe in ourselves, he said believing in what we can do is the only way to success in every way.
In the academy, we listened to each other's life story to learn about their character not in a play, but in real life. We take turns every time to be the storyteller, we can choose how much of our life we wanted to share with the class, but only truths. We, as a class, is family, we know each other's ups and downs, weaknesses and triggered point, and how capable are them in different fields. The exercise did not teach me any skill that I can put in my acting, but it taught me not to judge a person by not understanding them first. Listening to one another not only aiding me in my life also makes me a more reliable person to others, and I've also learned to see inside people and observe what they need. Everyone can work in a group, just like a big company; but working in a group as a group is different, we listen, we care, we help, and of course, we stay connected.
I started to think performing is just part of me, that's when I decided to come all the way from Malaysia to here, at Westminster Kingsway College. There were better options for me but I chose it because sometimes we tend to learn more from a simpler environment. In the first year, we performed two big plays Romeo and Juliet by Shakespeare and Fugee by Abi Morgan. I was baffled when I got a character, Gregory which only has two lines in the entire play for Romeo and Juliet. I started thinking that was quite unfair because I believe I deserve a better role than that. But I remembered the quote "there are no small parts, only small actors". I began to put in more effort in my tiny bits, trying to show everyone that I am capable of playing any role, I want to make my only scene and lines count, I want to make me important. During a workshop in College, we focused on the ensemble work. We talked about the different places we came from, we talked about where do we want to be in the future, we talked about preferences being outside exploring the world or continue to stay at the play where we started everything.
No matter how far our minds go, we are here, together to go through some amazing processes, to be as a group of actors and actresses performing to each of our upcoming shows. I am able to work alone or in a company, I focus on myself and observe people at the same time. I am not a very active speaker but I really love being that person that brings all of our heart together as a class, reminding each other our passion when we begin to walk to this path. Now that I am going to graduate from this college in six months of time. I need to start preparing for my new adventure in life. Drama School is definitely my choice, I know there are so much more skills that I haven't developed yet, I am more than ready to accept the challenges and struggles forcing me to become a more professional actress, all I need are experiences, I am not afraid of making mistakes because that's the way I can figure out how to solve them. Looking forward to work with a larger group of people, be on a bigger stage under the eyes of the audiences from all over the world courageously and performing gracefully.
Monologue Assessment
The contemporary monologue I choose is Hector's opening speech from THE HISTORY BOY.
Monologue:
Now fades the thunder of the youth of England clearing summer's obligatory hurdles. Felicitations to you all. Well done, Scripps! Bravo, Dakin! Crowther, congratulations. And Rudge, too. Remarkable. All, all deserve prices. All, all have done that noble and necessary thing, you have satisfied the examiners of the Joint Matriculation Board, and now, proudly jingling your A Levels, those longed-for emblems of your conformity, you come before me once again to resume your education. Boys, boys, boys. A Levels, are credentials, qualifications, the footing of your CV. Your Cheat's Visa. Time now for the bits in between. You will see from the timetable that our esteemed Headmaster has given these periods the euphemistic title -- of General Studies. Euphemism, A verbal fig-leaf. The mild or vague expression being General Studies. The harsh or direct one, useless knowledge. The otiose -- the trash, the department of...why bother? If, heaven forfend, I was ever entrusted with the timetable, I would call these lessons a waste of time. Nothing that happens here has anything to do with getting on, but remember, open quotation marks, 'All knowledge is precious whether or not it serves the slightest human use,' close quotation marks. Who said? Lockwood? Crowther? Timms? Akthar? 'Loveliest of trees the cherry now.' 'A. E. Housman.'
Characteristic of Hector
A beloved General Studies teacher who believes that the boys should learn literature by heart in order to help them weather life's difficulties that will benefit their development as men. He thinks that exam preparation is the enemy of education, he often has the boys act out scenes or sing songs, and he seems unhampered by the usual school rules. Hector is married to a woman but he is a closeted homosexual. He often takes his male students for rides on his motorcycle, during which he fondles their genitals, and this eventually leads him to lose his job.
Pros and Cons of Higher Education
Pros More opportunities - Get more opportunities to meet important industry people and create strong connections. Agents from showbiz often look for new 'rising star' from drama school or university, especially those renowned ones because they think these schools produce quality actors. Joanne Baron said "Getting a degree represents a time to mature and grow and take a variety of courses that enhance an actor's skill set."
Personal Development - Get to experience a lot of performing, able to speak publicly. Able to develop the ability to stay calm, problem solver. Less possibility to get hypomnesia (memory loss) as actors always need to memorize their scripts.
Cons
Getting a high paid job is not guaranteed- Some of the very successful actors/actresses you admire might not be what you think they are, some of them get involved in showbiz because of the use of relation. Without the help of someone powerful in the field, they might just be working in the office for the rest of their lives. Other than your talented acting skills, if you can't get an agent to get you job opportunities, you mean nothing after all.
On Wednesday, we went to film our monologue. I found it hard to only speak my monologue without any big expressions and movements as I rehearsed. I'm very used to memorize my lines with movements, so when I did an action I know what I need to say. What's easy for me in this filming, is that the person I'm going to speak to is the camera, which means I only need to look into the camera when I speak. I've got a bad habit when it comes to acting/performing, is that I tend to look around the space when I'm supposed to be focused on only a spot. Having an object to look in to is way easier for me instead of looking to an imaginary person in front of me.
This week, we continue to work on our script.
Week 5
On Wednesday, we watched everyone's monologue video we did last week. I could see everyone's energy was very strong as they're keeping their eye contact with the camera, and we were able to watch that. I think Gabriel and Abe did a really great job as they raised their volume more when it comes to an intense part of their monologue. I could see them changing the softness and fierce in their eyes.
Running order for
A Christmas Carol
GROUP DISCUSSION
Jeremy wanted the audience to feel involved in the play, he suggested we could look at the audience and have some interactions with them during the show. Brad said Christmas Carol has always been a very cheerful and fun play to watch, so we could amplify the moral in the play which is the changes of Scrooge's attitude. We could perform Christmas Carol in a whole different way that audience will never expect by making it more serious and emotional. Some of us disagreed on that as we wanted it to be fun for the audience to watch. I suggested adding some scary elements in the play, when Marley comes out, we could scare the audience by letting Marley to come out from the audience seats. We might also add the sound of the chain to make it more real.
What we want the audience to think of our performance
In this week, with Rob and Sharon, we've been discussing a lot about what are we going to achieve in our second year. A Christmas Carol, a play we are going to perform just before the end of term one. It's just two months away, and this term will be the toughest term as beside a performance, we need to be done with another two units as well, which is our personal statement and an essay with 1500 words.
For the essay, we were to write about things that we're passionate that relate to acting. For that, I would like to do something with the Theatres in the UK and compare them with other countries, to see how different are the opportunities in and outside of the UK could give for the people who learned ACTING.
Things I'm going to research for my essay:
The three places that contain much work opportunities for actors/actresses. China, America, England.
Percentage of students in acting courses chose to work in the performing industry as well.
Theatre and TV, which is more popular in few different countries.
which requires fewer skills? acts behind a camera or on a stage?
On Wednesday, we watched "A Christmas Carol" film in class. This is to rewind our memory back to the story. Rewatching it makes me realize that I've forgotten some of the important events in the film. As we are going to perform this play, I put more focus in it throughout the film as I know I will not watch it at home myself after that. I've plotted the important parts in the play.
Why is listing down the important things from a play/film helpful?
Writing down all the points I got from the play as an audience shows what a real audience might also see when we perform it. In order to make our performance better than others, is to show more things to the audience and make them bring away the same old play but brimming with more emotions. I now know that large pieces from the play, so it's time to work on all the small but interesting details in there that will catch the audience more.
Week 2
After getting our script for "A Christmas Carol", we were asked to pick a character or two to audition for, the challenging part was this play contains lots of songs that are needed to sing out to the audience by certain characters, just like a musical play. The character I was going to audition for was Belle, Scrooge's ex-wife.
Why did I choose Belle? (reason) When Belle shows up in the play, she falls in love with Scrooge right away just like Scrooge did. She loves him so much and she supports what Scrooge was doing to make a better life for themselves in the future. Slowly, when Scrooge's life became richer, he only cares about the money he's earning and forgot how much love and attention he used to give to Belle. For me, Belle is a very elegant and understanding woman. The way she ended the relationship with Scrooge could show the pain she's in, she could be hurt so much the only reason was that she cared too much as well.
What will I need to do while playing Belle in the audition? The scene I'm doing was where Belle was ending the engagement with Scrooge. For that, I actually watched some of the videos on the internet to see how other people did with their emotions. As I wanted to show more on Scrooge's fault, that he was the one ended our relationship with his greediness and cold-hearted. I need to show more hurtful so that the judges could see me trying my last chance holding Scrooge back by breaking the relationship, still believing in him that he might come back apologizing in any minute. But until the end, Scrooge never realized how much he had changed while he was pursuing the wealth he actually possessed long ago. By saying "you fear the world too much", I am actually trying to let Scrooge know that he could let go of the fear and we could still be happy again without taking being wealthy so serious. I need to be persuasive when I was telling Scrooge how much he has changed after our engagement, the fascination with money covered his eyes for being a good husband.
On Thursday, we were divided into three groups representing Christmas Past, Christmas Present and Christmas yet to come. Abe, Abdul, Georgine and I were in a group of Christmas Past. We need to improvise the scenes that happened in the past. Four of us came out with a few scenes, including
Abe as the ghost, he brought Abdul, as Scrooge travel to the past.
Me as Fan, went to Scrooge's school to tell him that dad agreed to let him go back home during Christmas holiday.
The dance party that Mr. Fezziwig host after a long day of work.
Scrooge's proposal to Georgine, as Belle.
Belle coming in to end their relationship.
What's about our improvisation? I liked my group's improvisation quite well as we make use of every cast member in the group even though when one of us don't have to be in any character in a scene. In the very beginning, when Abe holds Abdul's hand, they traveled around the space like they're flying, whilst Georgine and I were standing straight putting our hands above our head to make a triangle at the back as buildings. Abe and Abdul used most of the space we got but not taking too long flying in the whole beginning, they stopped by jumping once on the ground together as they arrived at one of the scenes in the past. I personally like the jumping part, although it might not look so good, both of them took the effort to alter their pace for each other in order to jump at the same time. Abdul was fascinated by the place in front of him, the school Scrooge used to go. In the meantime, Georgina and I became little kids running around happily because it's Christmas. Scrooge walked forward to sit on his desk as flashing back to all the memory while he's here, I ran to the back and walked into the scene as Fan telling Scrooge that he can go back home for Christmas. We hugged before the scene ended, Abdul deviated from my hug but I remain frozen until Abe and Abdul went flying again to another scene. I think everything ran smoothly here as we were having problems on how are we suppose to bring the young Scrooge out from there as we got only four people. And I think the changes when Fan enters the scene was really nice, as the audience might only think Scrooge is yearning at his desk from the past until Fan comes in, that's the moment Abdul change from old Scrooge to young Scrooge. I went in again with Georgina, both were freezing in a dancing pose, Georgina raised both her arms like she was dancing with someone until Abdul came into the scene. We started to dance for a few seconds and Abdul began his proposal to Georgina. Both of them hugged each other and Georgina left with a blessed, but coming in again with a very upset face, she wanted to divorce with Abdul and said she has lost the "golden one" then ran out of the scene. This two scene was quite difficult as Georgina needs to carry both emotions with her, both very different expressions, one was the happiness Scrooge brought to her, another one was the disappointment to Scrooge.
Week 3
We watched a play called "King Lear" in Duke of York's Theatre. It was my first time watching it and that was a very wonderful show. I never read about the story before either as I always thought "King Lear" is a very boring story and it's all about kingdom, wars and fights among the people before reading its plot. After watching the whole play, I've changed my mind completely about the play. The play is full of many emotions and climaxes. I love it so much.
On Thursday, everyone got their role for A Christmas Carol. I got the role of one of the solicitors and also Fred's wife. The characters were not what I expected, why? (refer week 2 for which character I wanted to play at first)
What I think of getting Solicitor one? Solicitors visit Scrooge for fundraising to the poor but got rejected in a very ferocious way. I always believe that an exciting play/production often start their beginning with a big tension. Being the character that's going to be remembered throughout the whole play, I think this is a challenging one. To show how a horrible person is Scrooge, it's all from how he trying to be isolated from everyone else. Yelling to the solicitors, rejecting his nephew, Fred (in another scene). These are the details showing how cold-hearted is he especially when he talks about money or relates everything with money, while everyone was awaiting for Christmas day, he became more and more frustrated as he didn't know the happy of it and he doesn't understand why couldn't all these people use the time to earn more money instead of cheering around.
What I think of getting Fred's wife? Personally, this is a character I didn't want to get, not being mean to this character but I think Fred's wife is a lady that listens to her husband most of the time as Fred in-charges everything throughout their marriage, playing this role is like being a side role's side role, she doesn't even have a name in the play. Fred definitely is a wealthy man, not as wealthy as Scrooge but at least hosting a Christmas party is not a problem for him. Fred's wife is probably a woman wanted to marry a rich man in order to live a better life than before. She probably knows that Fred got a very wealthy uncle as well, so she decided to get near Fred and wanted to be a part of this wealthy family, but she never knew how Scrooge protected his money since he started earning them. She wishes to get something from Scrooge but he has never acknowledged her at all, that is why she was feeling impatience.
By the end of this week, we've rehearsed a few scenes by knowing how are we going to enter the stage and where should we stand while speaking, we haven't yet focused on our expression. Also, I've got another role which is Mrs. Cratchit.
What I think of getting Mrs. Cratchit? I think Mrs. Cratchit is a very loving and motherly woman. With her family's financial status, feeding four children is tough enough. The reason she dislike Scrooge so much is because her husband, Bob Cratchit, who works for him was downtrodden for working overtime and only getting very less wages. Her anger was triggered when Mr. Cratchit mentioned Scrooge's name during their Christmas dinner, but she's able to calm herself down and drink for Scrooge's health for her husband's sake. She is a very strong woman that she needs to take care of all the children also understanding his husband.
Ebenezer Scroogeis a miserly, cold-hearted, greedy businessman who thinks only of making money. He rejects a Christmas dinner invitation from his jolly nephew, Fred; he yells at charity workers; and he overworks his employee, Bob Cratchit. At night, Scrooge's former partner, Jacob Marley, has been dead for seven years, visits him in a form of a ghost. He has come to tell Scrooge that he is to be visited by three spirits over the next three days.
Christmas Past shows some of the main events in Scrooge's life to date, including his unhappy childhood, his happy apprenticeship to Mr. Fezziwig who cared for his employees, and the end of his engagement to a pretty young woman due to growing love of money. Scrooge shows newfound emotion when revisiting these scenes, often crying from identification with his former neglected self. The Ghost of Christmas Present shows him several current scenes of Christmas joy and charity, Bob Cratchit, celebrate Christmas with those they love, also how joyously are Fred and his clerk having a lot of fun in the room. Finally, a ragged boy and girl crawl out from the Ghost's robes. The Ghost calls them Ignorance and Want and warns Scrooge to beware of Ignorance.
In the final night, the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come shows him what he will leave behind when he is gone. He expresses the hope that these scenes of the future can be changed, and vows to incorporate the lessons of the past, present, and the future into his adoption of the Christmas spirits. Scrooge awakens on Christmas morning, a new man intent on doing good and celebrating the season with all those around him.
Charles John Huffman Dickens was born in Portsmouth, England on 7th February 1812, to Elizabeth Barrow and John Dickens. Charles was the second born of eight children. When Charles was 10, his family was facing huge financial difficulties, they decided to move to London all the way from Kent. In the year 1824, due to family poverty, Charles was sent to label bottles in Warren's blacking factory. During the same period, John Dickens was imprisoned for debt in Marshalsea prison.
The rest of the family moved to live near the prison, leaving Charles to live alone. This experience of lonely hardship was the most significant event of his life. It colored his view of the world and would later be described in a number of his novels.
In the age of fifteen, Charles was again forced to leave school and work as a parliament journalist and the clerk of an attorney. By 1832 he had become a reporter for two London newspaper and in the following year, he began to contribute a series of impressions and sketches to other newspapers and magazines, signing some of them "Boz" as his pseudonym. These scenes of London life went far to establish his reputation and were published in 1836 as Sketches by Boz, his first book. On the strength of this success, he married Catherine Hogarth, daughter of Evening Chronicle editor, George Hogarth. Together they had ten children. His early works
In the year 1836, Charles also began to publish The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club in 20 monthly installments. Pickwick became one of the most popular works of the time and continued to be so after it was published in book form in 1837.
Charles began publishing his new novel, Oliver Twist, his first novel, follows the fortunes of an innocent orphan through the London streets. The book was inspired by how Charles felt as an impoverished child forced to get by on his wits and earn his own keep. He was now editor of Bentley's Miscellany, a new monthly magazine. He continued publishing his novel in his later magazines, Household Worlds and All the Year Round.
Though Charles's career was successful, for the next decade, his books did not achieve the standard of his early success. These works include Nicholas Nickleby(1838), The Old Curiosity Shop (1840), and Barnaby Rudge (1841).
In 1842, Charles was as popular in America as he was in England, he and his wife, Catherine went on a five-month lecture tour of the United States, speaking out strongly against slavery and in support of other reforms. On his return, he wrote American Notes, a book that criticizes American life as being culturally backward and materialistic. His next novel, The Life and Adventures of Martin Chuzzlewit (1843), describes a man's struggle to survive on the ruthless American frontier.
During the year in which Chuzzlewit appeared, Charles also published a Christmas story, A Christmas Carol. The book features the timeless protagonist Ebenezer Scrooge, a curmudgeonly old miser who with the help of some ghosts, find the Christmas spirit. Charles penned the book in just six weeks, beginning in October and finishing just in time for the holiday celebrations. This book was a success, selling more than 6,000 copies upon publication. Readers in England and America were touched by the book's empathetic emotion depth. Despite literary critiques, the book remains one of the Dickens' most well-known and beloved works. Information from here & here & here
The real reason Charles Dickens wrote
A Christmas Carol
A Christmas Carol was intended as a social criticism, to bring attention to the hardships faced by England's lower classes. As from the researches above, I've noticed that Charles Dickens often writes what he experienced and seen in the society to his paper. In 1843, Dickens was horrified by reading a Government report - The Parliamentary Commission on the Employment of Women and Children, showing the horrific conditions under which very young children were made to work underground or to work tremendously long hours in appalling conditions in factories. Dickens read this and described himself as being "perfectly strike down by it" and he determined that he would strike, as he said, "the heaviest blow in my power" on behalf of these victims of the Industrial Revolution and in October 1843, he was giving a talk in Manchester. It was in the course of giving this talk in this large industrial city, that the idea came to him that the best thing he could do by way of calling public attention to the horror of this report, would be by writing a story, rather than an article - as he said, "something that would come down with sledgehammer force" - and this was the conception of the Christmas Carol, beginning, with the conception of Scrooge - that wonderful name, Scrooge - a combination of screw and gouge. Dickens hopes to illustrate how self-serving, insensitive people can be converted into charitable, caring, and socially conscious members of society through the intercession of moralizing quasi-religious lessons. He was involved in charities and social issues throughout his entire life. At the time that he wrote A Christmas Carol he was very concerned with impoverished children who turned to crime and delinquency in order to survive. He thought that education could provide a way to a better life for these children. The schools provided free education for children in the inner-city. The movement got its name from the way the children attending the school were dressed. They often wore tattered or ragged clothing. Dickens is also concerned to make his story the vehicle of Christian truths. The theme of A Christmas Carol is not simply Christmas feasting; it is a story of conversion, of release from the imprisoning chains of grasping covetousness worn by Marley's Ghost into the freedom of compassion and generosity, the smog-filled streets of the town in which Scrooge sees the ghosts of avaricious, selfish and grasping contemporaries.
We were asked to perform both days Wednesday and Thursday for two times each, so we're actually performing the same thing for four times.
What I think I did well
In the urban street scene, I kept my freezing position in much energy and did not change my facial expression even though I think no one will look at me during that time when Kojo is speaking in the center of the stage.
In scene 5, when I'm taking Kojo around the refuge, I imagined the bathroom and bedrooms at where they supposed to be, and I pointed them out in a believable way that the audience might also get to see my imagination
In scene 9, when Kojo met the social worker, I moved my chair to face the front more so the audience could see the expressions I made when I think the social worker is talking nonsense.
During my short monologue in the same scene, the other characters will stay freezing and I stood up while I was talking, to be in a funny way, I spelled out the "Mustash" that the social worker wrote wrongly. I also took his clipboard to show that I'm actually reading his note when I say "the young adult has a light mustache and a deep voice. That's what he'll put in Kojo's note."
In the second last scene when I am on stage as Girl Two, I did a lot of "bitchy" movements like playing with my hair or look around the audience seats to show that I'm eyeing for boys. And when Girl One says "this is what we always do" I took my phone out to take selfies. To show it more realistic, I turn my volume to the loudest so when I really take pictures, the sound of a picture is taken will be heard by the audience.
What I think we did well
Again, the freezing scene was so good when everyone walks into their position and stop moving until Kojo says "it starts...now". Everyone continues with what they were doing before freezing, Girls talking to each other, Cleaner starts sweeping the leaves on the ground, Woman with buggy walking leisurely with her baby. The whole stage becomes so lively that everyone was doing different things but all were so nice to watch at the same time because we worked as an ensemble.
In all the scenes when the man died, everyone shouted over each other, the chaos was so real to watch at as everyone on stage started to focus on the man and there're fear, panic, fright going on.
We used the area on the stage wisely as we leave enough space for others to go through but not too far away, we did not leave the awkward gap between one another. And when there're scenes with less than five people, they are aware of their blocking, they make sure everything happens in the center of the stage.
Everyone did a fantastic job picking their cues, there are no long pauses during the performances. In scene 21, Hassan and I did very well shouting over each other's line, it has risen the intensity to the highest, then all broke down when Kojo stops us by saying "ok, it's ok". I love this scene because it was full of different emotions by the characters that can be clearly seen by the audience.
I like Kojo's acting the most, he breaks the 4th wall very often throughout the play so means he needs to be in and out of this character in a single scene. When he tells the audience about the story, his voice is loud and clear, he will add the sad expressions when he started to talk about his family. But when he's in the character of Kojo, even though his voice is still able to be heard it has actually gone much softer than when he talks to the audience. He was really scared about most of the thing, when he first meets Ara, he doesn't even dare to go nearer but only stays a distant away. His eyes were very unsure, whenever someone is talking to him, he wouldn't look into the eyes of that person, he often looks around to show the insecurity of him.
Overall: We all did an amazing job for all four performances, our confidence and energy were stronger after each show, we did not lay back thinking doing the same show is boring. We used all the skills we earned throughout the year and pour it in to this final performance, I can't say this is a very perfect show, but we did our very best to perform it. Running a show is not easy, and we did four amazing shows in two days, I'm really proud of the results after putting so much effort in during rehearsals. Thinking back to the first performance this year, Romeo and Juliet, my improvements from there had gained so much and I definitely learned more than I can imagine. I'm looking forward to next year, performing a brand new style of play.
We did a full read through after getting the play FUGEE by Abi Morgan. I first thought it was very confusing because of all that flashing back, and I think the play can be shorter by reducing the times of flashing back. But in my other thought, I'm excited to know how this play will be performed to the audience because unlike any other plays I've known, this play begins with its ending scene.
At the beginning of the play, Kojo stabbed a random man on the street. Then, the story started to flash back a little showing what happened before that lead to this ending. Kojo is a fourteen-year-old boy who his family members were killed by children soldiers during his eleventh birthday. In order to save himself, Kojo's uncle made him a fake visa to travel to the UK. He was brought to a refuge where he met his new friends from different places.
The style of the play is pretty refreshing different from regularly plays they often start with telling everything step by step and end with its climax. Abi Morgan begins the play with a big scene that includes death, he then slowly reveal little bits of information in order to show the connection between the first scene and other scenes.
After reading through the whole play we had our own discussion in class, I think the play is interesting that it doesn't tell the normal story first, and let the audience to guess what happened before this and that. This can prevent the audience from getting bored or guessing out what's going to happen next as for FUGEE audience need to pay more attention to the story in order to know what happened before the man from the first scene was killed.
The second week after we got our script, everyone needs to think of a character they want to play for, but we got fewer casts, so some of us will need to be in multi-rolling.
The first character came to my mind was the woman with a buggy. I chose her because I'm interested in her exaggerated reactions throughout the beginning, and I really love playing this kind of character, I think it's because being crazy is easier than being normal actually, because deep in me, I'm quite a crazy person, so with this character I do not need to put in much effort as I can really play it naturally. I told one of my tutors, Sharon about this, she gave me an advice which because I've played a character like this before when I was in high school, why not try a different character to give myself a challenge and a chance to upgrade my acting.
I thought about it for awhile and came up with another choice, which was the refuge manager. I also took some time to re-read the scenes which when the manager was in. The reason why I ended up choosing this role it's because I have not tried any character like this before, in my experience, I've only tried roles that doesn't mean much to other characters in those plays. But for refuge manager, I felt like a big boss with people that need to listen to me. I can feel the importance of me after choosing it. I'm looking forward to act as a "team leader" for my first time.
Improvising the important scenes from the play
We were divided into two groups and each will need to improvise and perform with the important scenes we remember after reading the whole play. Abdul, Jeremy, Gabriel, Jaychelle, Ilonka and I came out with some scenes that we remember.
a random man was stabbed by Kojo
in the airport when Kojo does not have his passport
Kojo's uncle gave Kojo a fake visa and ask him to leave
Kojo playing basketball with new people in the refuge
Counselor asking Kojo questions about himself
Ara teaching Kojo English
Kojo was told to leave the refuge cuz he's above 18 which is not true, he's only 14
Children soldiers killing Kojo's parents and his brother
Rehearsing the play
We have gotten our roles and acted out the play from the beginning. We focused on one thing first which was our blocking rather than focusing on our energy and tension in the play. I think working on our blocking first will make the whole progress easier after as we now know the cues for speaking our lines. We were able to know how we want our character to say that certain line in a certain position and how we want our character to be on the scene. We can avoid blocking other characters while saying our lines, also, other characters will know their best way to be on the stage in order to be seen by every single audience.
What did we achieve?... We were able to pick up our cues and be in the position as smoothly as we can. We get to work on our transitions as well, also our entrances and exits as we need to be straight into the next scene to prevent the audience from waiting too long.
We then worked on the scenes where most casts were in it, that was on the urban street where the man was stabbed by Kojo. There are casts like the market trader, young girls, cleaner and woman with buggy. Also, In scene 20 when Kojo describes the situation he first joins the children soldier. At the end of scene 20, it was a truck scene where everyone needs to be in, and scene 21 will be the scene where Kojo needs to leave. It's a bit rush for me to go into that scene as I need to exit with everyone else and come straight in again. For a better result, Rob asked me to stay at the end of scene 20 instead. In the truck scene, I'm one of the soldiers, so while the scene ends everyone will still need to exit with their facial expression on, but for me, there's gonna be a huge difference on my emotion. During the end of it, I will turn my body and walk neutral until I reach my position for the next scene which is walking towards Kojo from behind with his luggage.
Here's the video of scene 20 when Kojo is saying his monologue. Click to watch!!
After everyone is familiar with their cues in those big scenes, we started to do rehearsals according to the order of the scenes, I think this saves a lot of time as we do not need to worry more about people's absence as much as we all know what to do in the scene and people could just stand in to read the lines for people who are absent. During the other smaller scenes, while some of the people are doing their rehearsals, people that are not in the scene could continue with learning their lines. What I think about our rehearsals?... My movements and actions get more and more natural as I've been doing it many times, Rob and Sharon would stop us when they think we can add or change the style of acting a little, both of them are very responsible, as sometimes correcting a single scene might take up to half an hour. I like their spirit of how they wanted us to look nice and clean. I never complained about the tiredness during rehearsals to be honest, we actually just do what our tutors advice us to do. So during each rehearsal, I would put in my best concentration in order to get my acting as perfect as I can. I am aware of all reactions I made while other speaks, I will always make sure that I'm not just standing on a spot waiting to say my lines.
What is the 4th Wall?...
The Forth Wall is a theatrical term for the imaginary "wall" that exists between actors on stage and the audience. The actors pretend that they cannot hear or see the audience and the audience gets to enjoy the wonderful sensation of being a fly on the wall. The same effect often occurs in movies, only the fourth wall in that instance is a camera lens.
In the play Fugee, we broke the 4th wall most of the time especially Kojo, he often talks to the audience by telling his feeling in that moment or some additional plot from the story. As the refuge manager, I broke the 4th wall in scene 9, when the social worker is interviewing Kojo to know about his background. I tell the audience what I think about the social worker and also what do the social worker usually do.
more information about 4th wall can be found here.
Themes
Friendship - The very first friendship appears was when Ara and Kojo first meet, Kojo did not join others during movie night, he went upstairs himself and Ara follows his back to check if he's okay. Kojo was looking at his family photo, he must be missing them so much at that moment and Ara appears, Kojo must feel warm in his heart even though they don't understand what each other was saying. Ara is a very cheerful girl, she took the initiative to approach Kojo to let him get used to being in the refuge. Then, Chueng, He and Kojo sleep on a bunk bed where Cheung sleeps on top and Kojo sleeps underneath. In the first night, they chatted for a little about how they end up here in the refuge, Cheung knows that Kojo will be meeting with the social worker the next day, he reminds him to shave if not the social worker will think he's over-age. In scene 22, Kojo was on the train leaving to the hotel, the other kids (Ara, Roza, Cheung, Hassan) follow because they didn't want Kojo to leave alone, but got kicked out by the ticket collector just after the next stop as they got not enough money to buy a ticket.
Diversity - Represents the kids, They're all from different places around the world, they speak the different language have a different culture. I think it's some kind of fate that they could gather up and form a friendship bond.
Rejection - Rejections are what made the play happen. Kojo got age-disputed by the social worker after the next day of his arrival at the refugee camp, when he thinks he could finally be safe at that place but got rejected because of the hair on his face. Also around the end of the play, when Ara visits Kojo, they both know they like each other but when Ara asks him to "say it!" , the three words, Kojo replied something else instead. It's a rejection for Ara as Kojo doesn't want their relationship to go beyond friendship. Maybe Kojo is not ready yet, or maybe he doesn't want to impede Ara's bright future for staying in the same place as him and live the rest of their life underneath everyone's footstep.
My Character(on my point of view) Refuge Manager - Throughout the play, there's nowhere showing her name, her age or anything about her. All we can see was she is the owner of the children refuge. It is a difficult task that I can't get any information online while I was trying to do some research about the manager. At last, I've decided to learn about her by reading the script again. Her caring personality was shown a lot in the play for example In scene 5 she's patiently telling all the directions and everything that Kojo needs to know when he arrives in the children refuge. She's protective, in order to let Kojo stay, in the scene when Kojo being age-disputed, she defends Kojo by trying to let the social worker believe that he's only 14. She's not very powerful, in her words and how she apologizes to Kojo when she's forced to let him leave, I think she actually blames herself for not having the right to let the kid stay. In scene 21, which I can see the most of her, she was carrying many emotions with her in that scene. The sadness of letting Kojo leave, she must be unwilling to do that but she's only a refuge manager, she did her best to keep Kojo. When the other kids were listening to their conversations in the corridor and were all very upset after knowing Kojo needs to leave, she doesn't want the atmosphere in the room to be more down so she asked the kids to go down, but Hassan (one of the kids) shouted back saying "stupid pissing system", he must be feeling really unfair for Kojo and saying that on purpose to see if the manager could get him back. But yet the manager took away his chance for playing ping pong that day, behind it I think it's because the manager doesn't the kids to feel unfair, she wants them to learn about the cruelty of this society. To show the contrast of an elder and the kids, the manager needs to act really mature, the only way to calm the kids down, she needs to be more calm and steady and can't show much of her emotions. When Ara (another girl that is close to Kojo) asked what will happen to Kojo after this, the manager told her and the others that he will be processed and a decision will be made, they could get a visit in the hotel where Kojo is going to stay when he leaves the refuge. She told them like it's nothing to her, like she actually accepts the truth that Kojo needs to leave.
Costumes
For my character as the manager, I wore a plain white smart shirt with black trousers to show the professionalism in me. I also tie my hair up neatly, this is to show that my self-cultivation is high enough to be a good influencer for the kids.
For another character of girl two, I wore a plain black t-shirt as my top and others will be the same as when I'm the manager. Wearing black so that I do not catch the audience most attention from Kojo, Kojo's costumes throughout the play are all duller colour, if I wear a colourful costume as the girl, Audience will be really hard to stay focus on Kojo.
Sound & Lighting
We got the sound of a plane departing before the airport scene where Kojo did not have his passport.
The announcement voice during the tube scene when everyone's on the tube while the man speaks.
In the scene when Ara brings Kojo to the park to see trees, we got sounds of birds chirping and sound of the tree's branches hitting each other when the wind blows.
We got the sound of gunshots when Kojo's family were being shot by the children refuge.
There're some scenes when the man in the hotel was banging on the door, Abdul did the sound by hitting the floor hard.
At the end of the play, while some of the characters were saying their facts, the spotlight hit on them one by one according to the order they speak, to highlight them out as other characters will be on stage too.
Abi Morgan was born in 1968 in Cardiff, Wales. She was born into a family which was almost the stereotype of a theatrical family. Her father Gareth Morgan was the Artistic Director of the Gulbenkian Theatre in Newcastle and her mother Pat England was a successful repertory actor. Her parents divorced when she was in her teen year and her childhood was spent moving around the country while her mother acted in repertory theatre. She had attended seven separate schools during her childhood. Her sister is the fund-raiser at London's Unicorn Theatre.
After initial ambitions to become an actress herself, she decided to become a writer while reading drama and literature at Exeter University. She then took a postgraduate writing course at the Central School of Speech and Drama.
Her writing career
She made her debut for the stage with "Skinned" at Nuffield Theatre in 1998. She has written plays for some well-known theatre like National Theatre of Scotland, the Royal Court and Traverse Theatre. She got nominated as the most promising playwright at 2002 because of the 2001 play "Tender" for the Hampstead Theatre.
She was then commissioned to write the single drama "Sex Traffic" for Channel 4 in 2004 and won the 2005 BAFTA award for Best Drama Serial. She has since written a number of single dramas for television including "Tsunami: The Aftermath" in 2006, "Birdsong" in 2012 (it's a two-part television adaption of Sebastian Faulks's novel of the same title). She also wrote the legal drama "The Split", first shown on BBC1 in April 2018.
Morgan's first continuing drama series was "The Hour" in 2011. It was commissioned for a second series but cancelled after the second series was transmitted, all because of its ratings have been one quarter lower than the first.
In Abi Morgan's drama, the humanity and the disempowering nature of ideological structures are in a dance of constant tension with one another.
Click here to read more about Abi Morgan's experiences she shares with Simon Stephens
A refugee camp is intended as a temporary accommodation for people who have been forced to flee their home because of violence and persecution. Hostility built shelters means immediate protection, the camps allow UNHCR to deliver essential resources like food, water and medical attention during an emergency. They are constructed while crises unfold for people fleeing for their lives. More facts about refugees and refugee camp
2.6million refugees live in camps. Million more live in urban areas and informal dwellings.
80,000 number of refugees living in Za'atari refugee camp in Jordan. This is approximately the population of Scranton, Pennsylvania.
55% of refugees come from just three countries, Syria, Afghanistan and South Sudan.
By the end of 2016, 65.6 million individuals were forcibly displaced worldwide as a result of persecution, conflict, violence, or human rights violations. That was an increase of 300,000 people over the previous year.
3.5million of refugees that are school-age children not in school.
Bangladesh
Bangladesh has announced plans to build a refugee camp that could accommodate around 800,000 Rohingya Muslims pouring over the border from Myanmar. The camp would be the largest in the world.
The UN's refugee agency estimates there are an unprecedented 65.5 million refugees in the world today, split between urban centers or informal settlements, and more formal camps.
Here are some of the largest of these camps based on UN figures.
Bidibidi, Uganda: 285,000
Dadaab, Kenya:239,500
Kakuma, Kenya: 185,000
Nyarugusu, Tanzania:139,630
Zaatari, Jordan:80,140
One of the refugee companies in the UK
The REFUGEE COUNCIL is one of the leading charities in the UK working directly with refugees and supporting them to rebuild their lives.
The charity was founded in 1951 in response to the UN Convention for Refugees, which was created after World War II to ensure refugees were able to find safety in other countries. Since then, the Refugee Council has provided practical and emotional support to refugees from across the world to help them rebuild their lives and play a full part in society.
Children Soldiers
Thousands of children are serving as soldiers in armed conflicts around the world. These boys and girls, some as young as 8 years old, serve in government forces and armed opposition groups. They may fight on the front lines, participate in suicide missions, and act as spies, messengers, or lockouts. Girls may be forced into sexual slavery. Many are abducted or recruited by force, while others join out of desperation, believing that armed groups offer their best chance for survival.
Click here to watch children soldiers talking about their experiences and escapes
How are the pieces of information aiding me in my acting?...
From my research, I was surprised by the huge amount of vulnerable people around the world, I never knew there are so many people suffering for their whole life worrying about a safe place to live. By putting myself into the world of theirs, as a manager, I'm getting more realistic emotions inside me. I helped myself by imagine if my refugee camp is not the kind of very big ones, and only be able to support children, everything would start making sense as a child over 18 is considered as a young adult. In the play, I believe that Kojo is only 14, but for the social worker, it's impossible for him to believe a 14-year-old child will have hair on his face.
I've never experienced the situation like them or have any knowledge about this before knowing the play. The sympathy I feel for them can also be shown in the play as a manager.
