Day 1 on the Acting Masterclass

 

Back in the rehearsal room with the woman that changed it all for me and many others. Morning coffee is sipped over bubbling conversations of lost and confused actors in the industry – I guess we are all here for the same reasons then! We get straight off with some volleyball and it feels so good to be back in a room playing with other artists. As the day proceeds, a few others and I get to revisit Kristine’s practice, only this time there are a few hidden gems for each individual. The practice itself becomes clearer and clearer, in other word’s cutting out all the academic bullshit and just keeping it as simple as ‘ finding the pleasure to play’. There’s no fancy explanation and this sends a very settling feeling through me as a director. My new gem for today was directing in Vietnamese, it was such a poignant moment for me in my process. This ease and instinctive way of working came flooding out of me and there I was ‘underneath the rehearsal room’ as Kristine puts it! So fascinating how the mother tongue can empower you as an artist even though I you might feel you identify with your British side a lot more!

Anna Nguyen

 

Day 1 of our Actors Masterclass but my second workshop with Kristine and it feels good to be back. The key word here is Masterclass.  From the get go we are brought into a room to master our craft and artistry. Everything has a meaning and reason and is useful! So we play games for 2 hours to begin with. But not just any theatre games, we work in detail, intelligently and maturely to play games as only we as actors can. And it is actually beautiful to watch, when we play well together! Who would have thought a game of keeping a soft ball in the air between 10 people or musical chairs could actually be beautiful to watch. Don’t get me wrong though- it isn’t an easy task as we discover and are pushed to find the reason behind games old and new. Words and concepts easily bandied about in the rehearsal room such as focus, team work, warming up, and readiness are all thrown out for the simplicity but specificity of “PLAYING WELL TOGETHER” playing as an artist and not as a child.

Already everything I have been previously taught is being turned on its head and it actually makes sense. Later we throw out the idea of “Character” and introduce ourselves onto the stage and the joy of ‘Anna-Maria’ playing well with other actors and with the text!

“If we the actors are not present on stage then there is nothing to see” or words very closely to that effect.

So picking up from where I left off in my last workshop with Tamasha (Nov 2011). I work in a Ugandan accent on a London Nigerian piece of writing (I know it sounds messy and crazy but it works!) and the piece flies in ways I cannot explain. Knowing that the Ugandan accent is some kind of key to help me unlock the way I play with text and with other actors – I quickly use this to help find exciting choices and freedom to play with the text. Then I am switching between this and my naturalLondonaccent but keeping the same freedom and sense of play. What took me a week to begin to uncover in the last workshop comes to fruition in a matter of minutes. I now understand what this key is, how powerful it is and how i can start to use it independently.

This is going to be an amazing week I can feel it already…

Anna-Maria Nabirye

Observership on ‘The Arrival’ at Alchemy Festival at Southbank Centre

As someone who is experimenting with visual arts, performance art & new circus crossover, I was curious about the showcase performance of Tamasha’s the Arrival at the Alchemy Festival, Southbank. I applied for the observership as I thought it could be a fantastic opportunity to witness a week of rehearsals leading to 9 performances at the Royal Festival Hall and to be a part of the creative process in such an unusual and site specific situation. The rehearsals were open to all and the staging of the production unfolded to passersby each day. It was a privilege to observe director Kristine Landon-Smith at work, leading a team of creatives, to be able to meet and engage with all the performers and the production team on a daily basis.

The daily rehearsals, which were fully open to the public, took place in the RFH foyer’s space on the 2^nd floor, in front of large glass walls, surrounded by staircase, a lift and a seating area. The performance spot was rigged with circus apparatuses: 2 poles, silks, straps, rope and slack-rope all neutral in colour (black and white).These formed a part of the stage design together with a number of subtly suspended white paper birds and an enlarged sepia portrait illustrations out of Shaun Tan’s graphic novel.

The working conditions seemed quite challenging, with largely no rehearsal space privacy whatsoever. The director, choreographer, performers and production team needed to be able to block out the constant passing by and visitor interactions with the space, and the festival as a whole. One needed to be ‘in the zone’, concentrated fully on the task rather than on a flux of external stimuli ranging from frequent loud sounds of events happening in the space nearby (workshops, concerts and performances), through toddlers running into the rehearsing area, to the people ascending / descending the staircase and just general mingling of the public. What was remarkable is that Kristine as a leader kept calm, clear in her intentions and directions. She held absolute charge of the rehearsal process and schedule, assisted by production manager Tom’s attention to organisational detail.

My main focus during the observership was to see how a professional and experienced director works on a production that merges circus with theatre and visual arts. I was interested to particularly observe the following areas:

• how a theatre director negotiates ways of rehearsing a circus / theatre performance piece and interacts with not only performers but the whole creative and technical crew
• how  a work inspired by initial source that is purely visual, develops into a theatrical production
•  the dramaturgical possibilities in site-specific performance
• how one negotiates and organises timescale and the logistical needs and practicalities of such a process

A collaborative approach to creation of such a cross over genre is clearly essential. Kristine employed a talented young choreographer, Freddie Opoku-Addaie, whose role was to take care of the physical aspects of the performance – the football and a ship scene in particular. She also had Circus Space’s acrobatics lecturer, Glen Stewart, as an adviser present at a few of the rehearsal sessions. It was a joy to witness scenes being constructed and how the whole collaborative team interacted at ease, as Kristine is a very encouraging director for both her performers and collaborators.

Each circus performer devised their physical role and then fine tuned it under Kristine’s direction to suit the scene. The text, which referred to real life migrant and refugee accounts, was poetically scripted by Sita Brahmachari and beautifully delivered by the actors, Charlie Folorunsho as the lead character in particular. The role of music and sound was here crucial too as it evoked the external and inner landscape through which the characters were navigating and added a further emotional impact to the performers’ presence and movement.

It’s a shame that in this instance lighting couldn’t be employed – together with the noise pollution in my opinion, a major obstacle for working in such site-specific circumstances. As one can’t expect to have total control of one’s stagecraft as in a more conventional theatrical space, I felt that intimate and more poetic moments of the show and their dramaturgical impact got lost during some performances due to the ever present institutional light and competing festival sounds.

What I got from this week is a real insight into the complexities of working with a professional company in site-specific circumstances with the looming pressure of a deadline – which in my opinion is simultaneously limiting and enhancing. I realised what a physical toll such an intense work schedule takes on all, and especially on circus performers. In such a working environment, it is crucial to find ways of keeping the energy levels and focus up as the 3 performances were spread throughout the afternoon and the evening. The physical toll and aforementioned problems with noise and lack of control over lighting are however counterbalanced by the sheer amount of exposure this showcase gave to all involved.

Being a part of the Alchemy festival in the centre ofLondonbrought many thousands of people closer to the work and skills of Tamasha and Circus Space creatives, many of whom are probably new audiences for Tamasha, intercultural theatre and for circus/ theatre crossover in general.

Lara Ritosa Roberts – Observer

Day 6 on the Design Direct Course

‘It is the actor, not the character that is the medium to creating good theatre..’

Today’s journey was around continuing to shape our designs, and working closely with Kristine on deepening our directing approaches.  It’s enlightening to be in an environment where we are all treated as independent artists, on a journey…and a breath of fresh air for someone (Kris) to acknowledge this, and continue to hold us to our highest potential in each moment!

So liberating not to rely on a script when directing. Several times during my process, I found myself trying to justify, and make work the stage directions in the script, despite my instinct telling me, very loudly, that this stage direction doesn’t fit with the aesthetic we are creating!

And such a freeing feeling to surrender the need to ‘prepare‘ – a novel concept for me!  And actually my biggest revelation on the course so far…! In fact, I am so excited, I can’t wait to explore, and play with this new freedom…I just need to turn up, be open and ‘trust’…  Trust trust trust. Once the actors are happy, and activated, there is far less to do, than I often think…incredible…

Once I understand the aesthetic I’m working within, the actors can and will shape the scene. I simply need to be open and allow myself to respond to what’s in front of me. It’s far easier to be open once I relinquish the need to have the ‘right’ answer…and actually what I found was that within that openness there is a real sense of authenticity, where the ‘real’ work can happen. It’s not weakness not to know, rather there is great courage, strength/sincerity/honesty, and ultimately growth to be found in this journey (of openness/honesty.)

A wonderful, timely, and such an essential reminder, that the actor is the medium to creating good theatre, and the director is the channel for allowing the creativity to come through.

As Elizabeth Glibert says ‘the person acts as a channel for something greater to be born through their wok’.’

Such a joy to be in the presence of other artists collaborating so freely… I am inspired.

Renu Arora – Director

Day 9 on the New Writing Course

What? We’re finished? Where did these two weeks go?

Today we realised what was cooking. All this time we’ve been picking and playing with the raw ingredients Phillip, Sudha and the other speakers been giving us, making up our own little dishes, garnishing them with love and care – today we stepped back and saw that we had a whole buffet.

Day 8 on the New Writing Course

Tightrope

The tightrope between commercial success and artistic integrity is something most artists struggle with. During the course so far, we’ve concentrated on process, character development, finding our ‘truths’ and excavating from our portfolio of personal treasures. Commercial success and the business aspect of writing has been bubbling in the background. Every now and then, each of us has got our feet wet; debating and mulling the complexities of how to keep true and make a living from our art.

Day 8 on the Design Direct Course

Yesterday we kicked off with erecting our designs and working with the actors in the space. As per usual it was an exposing, but incredibly fruitful experience for the directors. My anxiety in having to perform these exercises over the years has lessened dramatically and has been fundamental to my learning. It is really difficult to allow your instincts and natural creativity to flow through when your congested with so much fear. So to those next taking the course, work on loosing that first before you apply! It was a real eye opener however, and probably why so many directors (myself guilty of) cannot be entirely honest in the space and prefer to skirt over certain issues in the rehearsal room rather than address it. It’s actually been liberating to be able to say to myself, this part is a bit tricky, I don’t have the answer yet! Having had the chance to observe the process three times also has proved very useful in terms of filtering out the vast amount of information over the last few days. Sound’s weird, but I never knew you could be so honest in a rehearsal room, and more importantly how imperative it was. The last few days have dawned on me hugely, and I realized that regardless of how much admiration I had for the artists that came in to speak with us, including Kristine, it was up to me to find my own voice within it all, and that if I started from this place I can achieve what I think is great work.