Year 11 Evaluation

Name: Hannah P Form: 11W
Character: Margaret
Scene: Act one, Scene one Act one, Scene four Act one, Scene six

Question
Your Comments
What was your biggest challenge as an actor and how did you overcome it?
‘My mother said I never should’ is a naturalistic play which meant that I had to resist playing my role of Margaret in my preferred heightened-naturalism style. It would have detracted from the realist style if I had played Margaret with a voice would have been too high-pitched and a posture, stereotypical of a middle aged, middle class woman. I overcame this by preparing for my role as Margaret by using the Stanislavski technique of creating an emotional memory. It enabled me to make the character my own as she became personal to my own experiences and feelings.
What was you biggest challenge as a group, how did you overcome it?
As a group, it was difficult merging our different acting styles together in order to create a harmonious, balanced performance. Whilst almost half of the group prefer to act in a naturalistic way, some people are better suited for more expressionist scripts. This meant that we had to stage and chose our scenes in ways that gave each individual a chance to explore their chosen scripts in their own styles but yet would still have to work well with their partners.
What was your main strength as an actor how did this add to your scene?
My main strength as an actor was being able to adapt to any role I had been given by creating an emotional memory and history for that character. It added to my scenes, especially Act one Scene Four, where I had to display sub-text as there were a lot of pauses. It gave the scene more depth, especially when Margaret asks Jackie, ‘whatever am I going to tell Daddy’?, because it showed the audience that Margaret was clinging on to her daughters childhood.
What was your main strength as a group how did this add