Week Thirty-Three: The Rovers Performance

Official Final Performance: The Rovers

Monday 2nd June - Wednesday 11th June 2014

     All assignment work had been completed, the final performance of 'Junk' was a success, it was near time to wrap up year one on the Performing Arts Acting course and say farewell to Level 2 and begin Level 3 in September 2014.  But first there was another final project.  The year two, Level 3, students had been preparing and rehearsing for their final Restoration project, and their final performance at the college.  In this performance I and three other Level 2 students, were to join in and take parts of extras in the Level 3's final production at the college.  We happily agreed to take part in this production and I personally was delighted to work with the more experienced students again, after the success of us previously working together of the college's 2013 Christmas Pantomime.  Once we were given the scripts and watched a few rehearsals, we were all very anticipated to get started.

     When receiving the roles of servants in this piece of drama, titled 'The Rovers', and began to understand the plot of the script, we began to create ideas as to how we could physically and verbally present these characters on stage.  Even though we all had very little lines to learn and no more than two scenes each, in which our character was present, we still had opportunities to acknowledge what type of world this is, what status of living these characters are (in the amount of money they earn and what conditions they live in) and how we could present this on stage.  We also had to understand that, even though this is a comedy piece of work, there were many elements of which had to be taken seriously; in a way to make it a "dramedy" (a mix of the genres drama and comedy).  Therefore the idea I had was to create a posh, well mannered, and slightly cowardly character.  How I decided to present these characteristics on stage was simple but, I thought, would give a positive and effective outcome.

     I decided to present “posh” characteristic through my verbal side of my performance, this, I felt, would add the comedic tone to my performance, and would also give a hint towards a back story that this character has been a servant for all of his adulthood and is very loyal towards his master.  When it came to the presentation of the character being “well mannered” I decided to present this through the means of physicality, so during the main performance I would have the character stand straight and use facial expressions to show his understanding of his status and loyalty amongst his master, and his master’s rivalries.  While on the subject of rivalries, this is where the next characteristic came in the play, by making my character a “coward” I thought that would increase tension during the fight scenes as well as adding more comedy elements to the play, but I also thought it would back up the characters ambition to assist his master when needed.

     Once I had a plan of how I was going to present this character, we four extras then received another important job for the main performance.  One professional theatre element used in this production, which I found to be the most interesting, was the use of a rotating set.  The use of the rotating set was to be able to bring all the scenes to life.  While many plays have had to have been cut shorter, due to limited staging or timing wise, the plan for this production was to not cut any scenes at all.  For that reason we had to have a stage which showed the inside and outside of a multiple buildings, this is where the rotating set comes into the play.  The set was built to show the inside and the outside of a building.  But our job was to spin the stage during the performance.  The job was simple, but at first difficult as there were some issues concerning the wheels to move the set, which was rectified during the rehearsal process, and there was also the worry about hitting the set with lighting rigs or the back wall of the stage.  But all problems were quickly solved and then we managed to create a system in which we could spin the stage to a point that would seem simply smooth and quick from the audience’s point of view. 

     The next job we were tasked with was change the setting of the set to make it seem like different houses and different streets.  How this was accomplished was by us changing pictures on the wall, tables and chairs, and fruit bowls with other props.  Again all succeeded during the performance as we entered on stage in character knowing what our jobs were and changed the set as smoothly as possible, making the scene changes as equally as successful as the main performance.

     I found this whole production a success and a unique experience, in working with other groups, of both cast and crew members, to a degree of learning new techniques and expanding my experiences in the performing arts industries.  Memories which I shall treasure and look back on in future.