Evaluation

Pre Run-

• Hospital scene:

When watching myself back in the hospital scene I have noticed a coupe areas in which there is space for improvement for example I need to work on my naturalism and the way the I carry my body language and facial expressions through my character. I noticed that I was smiling in this scene when in reality if I was really going to tell someone about a bombing I would most likely not be smiling so I need to ensure that when we film these scenes for real I change my facial expressions and concentrate and making it look as realistic and authentic as possible.

• Party Scene:

Upon evaluating this scene I think that I need to further work on my character development on Ethel and really adding her background to her character to give my performance more depth and layers to it. I think that I need to focus more also of remaining in character because I noticed accent I use for ‘Ethels’ voice was slipping in and out and this makes for a difficult time being able to believe the character and the realism it carries across to thee audience. I think that ii also need to focus on my body language and ow I carry my self whilst sitting and having a conversation

• Ration Fashion Scene:

Upon watching my self back in this scene I think that I need to focus on my professionalism during this scene and being professional as if I was really presenting a tv show, I think that I need to do this whilst still remaining bubbly and energetic making it fun for the audience to watch. However I feel that the energy I have been giving is very entertaining and interesting to watch.

• Boarder Control Scene:

Watching myself back in these pre runs doing this scene I feel like I need to work on my professionalism and making sure that I am a serious as can be considering I am supposed to be a German Officer and even though this is a comedic parody supposed to ridicule the German border control during the war I still need to act like overly serious man of era who is from Germany.

Final Run-

• Border Control Scene Memory: Thinking back to this scene I think that I slightly buckled under the pressure of this scene as the change in pronunciation and accent really threw me off. in combination with the natural environment and weather being as cold as it was. We were all freezing cold and distracted further by having a cold body temperature. This made for a big distraction but I feel like I managed to compose myself and perform a few good takes. I think that I became more comfortable with this scene the more takes we shot and more comfortable in the character I was portraying. I don’t think that I was very comfortable with the accent but I tried to give it the best that I had however for future productions/ performances I feel that taking more time and effort into focusing on a particular accent would help me go a long way and additional research on the particular accent for example YouTube or acting books. However once I had started to become more comfortable and settled with the situation and environment/ weather conditions I relaxed more into it used better body language and facial expressions to more exaggerate the character.
• Border control scene watched: After watching this scene back I feel that my performance could have been of a lot higher quality, I feel that because I was not comfortable doing the accent I felt very silly and improper. Although I feel that I had maintained good body language throughout the performance resulting in a semi good performance overall. I believe that I found it hard to remain focused and have a straight facial expression throughout especially when faced with the baguette costume.
• Hospital Scene memory: I think that this scene went well although I only had a small part to perform. However due to the amount of times that we had to shoot this scene it became very repetitive, I also struggled with a height issue as my scene partners were both sitting in the scene and I had to walk in and the sort of crouch down to ‘Elizabeth’s’ level whilst having a conversation with her, however by crouching I was able to solve a technical camera problem so that cameras were not having to be re-adjusted. I enjoyed being in character for this scene as ‘Ethel’ and I feel like I was able to explore this character more and give more to my facial expressions and body language as this is my character for both the hospital and party scenes. I think that I explored this character more than I did for ‘sassy Silvia’ and the guard from the border patrol scene because this was my ‘main character’ and by doing this and having a background and detailed knowledge about ‘Ethels’ life and upbringing it really helped me to give a more authentic and realistic performance whilst trying to embody and capture a real lady from the WW2 era.
• Hospital scene watched: after watching back the Hospital scene although I only had a small amount of screen time in this scene I think that I set out a good base for my character ‘Ethel’. I feel that my accent sounded good and realistic and set the base for Ethel being from the upper classes with a posh accent. I feel that I had good facial expressions during this scene that were believable and fit for the emotions and feelings of ethel during that scene whilst having to tell her best friend that her husband had survived the bombing much to Elizabeth’s demise. I think that my body language could have been stronger in this scene and been more open.
• Ration Fashion Scene memory: I really enjoyed filming this scene and I feel like I did a good job of embodying a very perky, happy-go-lucky tv presenter of the time. I believe that the nerves got to us a little between my self and my co actor so the first couple of takes were a bit choppy. We kept messing up our lines or forgetting what we were meant to say next, however once we became more comfortable with this scene I think it went quite well and smoothly. I enjoyed playing this over the top, enthusiastic and sarcastic persona and being able to be over eccentric and excitable. I think that I did a good of presenting a realistic and believable performance whilst having fun with it. However during this scene I struggled with my costume choices as my shoes were high heeled and I had to put a lot of focus into standing still and not falling over and I feel like this may have taken away from my performance somewhat. There was one point during our performance in which I almost broke character when something went wrong and one of the actors/ models had a prop fall out of her hair however I managed to pull my self back and compose myself allowing us to continue with filming the scene.
• Ration Fashion Watched. When watching the final cut of this scene back I have noticed that my body language was very closed off and sluggish, I feel that I lacked confidence in this scene. I looked very uncomfortable in this scene but I also think this is due to the foot wear that i was wearing during this scene, reflecting upon this I shouldn’t have gone with this choice of shoe for the scene. I think that some of my strong points of this scene were interacting with the audience ( camera) however it would have improved the quality of my performance if I had, had more confidence in my self during this scene because at times i did not know where to look or position my face (towards the back of the stage away from the camera, or pointing in the direction of or directly down the camera lens. I feel that my self and my co-host had good on screen chemistry together however due to stresses of the day and the blocking/ ques of the ‘actors’ being behind or off the scene look awkward or ‘scripted’ in places. However I had strong facial expressions throughout the scene presenting a serious however comedic performance overall.
• Party Scene memory: I think that by the time we got to filming this scene to company morale had significantly gone down due to the stresses of the day and pressure to get it filmed and wrap the day up due to time constraints. However I feel that I despite these problems I was able to give a realistic and authentic performance. I really enjoyed portraying this character and using a upper-class accent portraying that my character came from quite a high up family and/or background. I think that my body language and facial expressions were very authentic and realistic for the audience. Although we had some mic problems due to being one mic short and then also mics moving and the sounds becoming muffled or hard to hear, however I think that despite these issues we were able to do a few clean shots.
• Party Scene watched: After watching this scene back I have noticed that I fidget a lot during my performances with my hands and it is something that I need to work on as this can be very distracting for audiences. However I feel that I had strong body language throughout this performance and strong character interaction with the other actors in this scene. I think that throughout this scene I had good facial expressions, although at times I need to remember to keep in character and react as if i were the character and not myself. I feel that I made a strong background for Ethel and it shows through my performance. I feel that for the dance part of this performance it didn’t look as neat as it should have and this is due to lack of rehearsal together due to the fact that we just didn’t have enough time.
• Ration voice advert: Listening back to this recording I feel that I had strong vocals and a balanced tone throughout the recording.

What was your role in the production? Actor, Director, Rehearsal Manager, Script production, Script Writer.

What challenges did you face during the production?  During this production I faced challenges such as having differences with other cast members, I struggled with trying to learn the German accent, during the border control scene I found it difficult to keep composure due the creative choice of costume for other cast members and also due to the outside environment whilst filming. I had difficulties with some of the costumes I wore such as the German officer outfit and the choice of shoes i wore during the ration fashion.

How did you cope with these challenges? I coped with these challenges by talking problems I had through with other cast members i may have issues with and working through and resolving these issues. This enabled us to work better together as a cast and there for produce better work overall. To help me cope with the challenges of learning a German accent I researched the accent and how it sounded, I used German accent tutorial videos on You-tube and Google. To combat the issues of being cold during filming the border control scene I kept my body moving between shots to keep warm. To deal with the challenge of keeping my composure also during the border control scene i used skills i have learnt and adapted through performing in theatre on stage.  

What new skills did you learn in the process?  I learnt to work better in a team environment as working more on the production on side really adds pressure to the work load and it can put constraints on working relationships throughout the creation process through to filming. I learnt more about using Stanislavski’s methods such as given circumstances and the magic if. Using given circumstances and developing this skill even further helped me to dive even deeper into my characters to really give them deeper more realistic backgrounds hopefully this shows through my performances. The Magic If is another new skill that i acquired and have been developing I liked playing with the idea of giving a character a what if situation and how different circumstances may effect how my character portrays themselves. I have also learnt how to project and use the different range of accents that I can do whilst also trying to learn and acquire new accents that I can do.

What skills might you still need to develop?  I think that I still need to further develop my facial expressions and body language whilst acting in situations i may not have acted in. I think that I need to work on having smaller less theatrical facial expressions and body language as the comparison between theatre and stage are two completely different scales of acting. For example whilst on stage facial expressions and body language need to be exaggerated and over the top, so that even the audience sitting at the very back are able to see all of the facial expressions and body language, where as screen acting doesn’t not require this over the top kind of acting and rather a more subtle and realistic body language and facial languages. I think that I could further develop my skill of self discipline whilst during rehearsals so that i can make the most effective use of my time. Further developing the skill of professionalism in the workplace will help me going to my hopeful future career.

Overall, how successful do you think the production was? I think that the production went really well and together as a whole cast we came together and made something that is incredible. We faced considerable challenges throughout the process but as a team we overcame them and created a exiting and interesting script and through the process we created a in-depth, creative and well thought film. The combined effort and skill of all of our cast members, actors, editors, directors, script editors, producers, music artists and so on helped to make this production far greater than my expectations.

What would you do differently if we did the project again? If i were to do this project again I would make sure that us as performing artists had more actual rehearsal time in which to rehearse scenes and block them out better.

What skills/techniques/roles would you like to develop in the next project?  I would like to further develop my skills for professionalism so that i can carry this with through whatever profession I have a job in.