Fixing Characters

Description:
This week we have kept working on the school play. As we have learnt on class, we are applying the conventions taught in order to develop the scenes. Now that we are creating scenes 1, 2 and 3, we are learning the dialogues and blocking different ways on doing it. We are focusing on building up specific scenes and creating dialogues to see what would fit better.

Micaela's character and mine appear on the same seen, so we were working on a contrast between them; in personalities, characteristics, voice and body expression.

Analysis:
We have assembled people by scenes and we are already set. I am working on "The family scene" as the serious aunt. This is a new thing for me since at first I was the nosey aunt which was always in for the latest gossip. But that's what it is about; being able to change without a problem, to accept mutations that will improve the play. Anyway, it is not about representing a character but to find the emotion inside of you and bring it out and represent it; not as something yours but as a universal emotion. That there helped me realise how to work on myself to bring out an emotion. This was was tough in terms of my character; it suffered different changes. I continued to believe I already had it, that it was developed at least 50%. Well, after every rehearsal I realise that I was completely wrong and that I need to keep up the effort to push myself to achieve what I want. So, linking the conventions with our characters is a challenge as well. We have to keep in mind what are they so we can express them. For example, the deformities, the wide eyes are things we have to take in account and never lose them while we are acting.
Moreover, when we had a more solid structure of the scene, we started acting and trying different proposals with our characters based on what we had been building over the last rehearsals. This meant we had to have a proposal for our characters already and to learn the lines as the scene progressed. As I already had a clear proposal of my character (nosey lady, low voice, squirrel-like posture) I started working on my intentions and how I was going to say things. I tried various ways of saying my lines as I learned them.

Visual image of the aunt I had in mind
Frankenweenie character

On this process I realised something that helped me improve my acting, it is not about finding traits and putting them together, not about acting like an aunt or creating; but it is about looking inside of you to find some kind of feeling or emotion and then make it trascend through you, which means to make it pass beyond yourself. To transmit and effect, to show the audience the emotion, to BE the emotion. And not a specify one, but a universal one. Something that people all around the world could feel and would feel identified to. In this way, I was interpreting an aunt, but I admit I was not doing my very best. I couldn't nail the right way to interpret this new figure of authority and seriousness. An example was given to me so I could create an intention while saying a line: to imagine the frustration I would feel if my parent wouldn't give me permission to go out. I imagined and felt the frustration while I was saying the line which helped me to improve. Later, I had to work on the voice and posture. My voice was being low but not low enough. It had to sound creepier, so I tried to do it but as well to alternate it with some higher pitches so it wouldn't be flat. I said one of my lines in an altered sound, but it didn't sound real until I tried it several times and used all my body to say it.
As for the body expression, it completely changed. What at first was a twisted position trying to look all deform changed to an elongated one. The idea of an old aunt, which was the authority was given to me; like one of those old ladies with big hair. So I had to take the inner authoritarian aunt that I had inside of me. This week I put effort in completing the tasks so my character would be almost ready for the next rehearsals; but I figured out it has a lot to improve and to keep on building and changing. Anyway, I believe I have improved my voice and my new body expression.

Aunt Josephine "A series of unfortunate events"
Visual stimuli for my interpretation

Connections:
I have found a couple of connections to this week's rehearsals. Firstly, I link it to "Confesiones de Ana Correa" but this time for a specific reason. I believe I now truly can feel what Ana felt during the process of creating her characters. I mean how she emotionally she attaches to them. I think that I'm doing it, not only because this kind of theatre demands it, but because it involves my real emotions and deep feelings while creating the character. "To grow as an actor, is to grow as a person", this phrase has come to life for me this week. I am trying to explore different emotions deep inside me, to get to know me better, to question why do I do the things I do.
El ultimo ensayo
As well, I can link these rehearsals with "El ultimo ensayo". This is in terms of how the characters in that play change without the audience noticing from one to another. In this case the changes have to be done in the character itself. I have to be able to change and mutate my character according to the situation, to the atmosphere. To be able to work on what I had created but as well to renovate it whenever necessary.

Reflections:

"You have to commit yourself to succeed. You need to sacrifice all you got, to get where you want to be."

During this week there are some remarkable things I learned. This quote here, represents very much them. I learned that as I was not doing my very best, I wasn't able to fulfil all I wanted to achieve this week. I was not connected completely during rehearsals which meant that I need to sacrifice in order to make my character complete. That changes in my character are not something I should reject, but something I should embrace to make the scene better. That I should BE the emotion not only try to act it out. I remember things that make me feel a certain way in order to interpret the emotion, based on experiences. I know that when people don't know me, they think I'm serious so I have tried to use my own seriousness to interpret it. But since it's something that only people that don't know me well can see I have to be able to transmit it through myself believing that everyone that watched me is someone that doesn't know me well.
I have learnt how as I am developing my character, I am learning new things about myself as well. Which ways would I rather act, why do I prefer them and why do I do the things I do. It makes me feel once again the emotions I am trying to interpret. As well, that I should work harder every rehearsal to achieve what my aim is. And that I shouldn't care if anyone's watching and let the emotion be. Liberating all of my energy. This leads me to the question is using our own experiences to remember or feel emotions again the most effective way of trascending emotionally? Or the only one?