SANTA CLAUS ISNT

COMING TO TOWN
JUST YET
(24/11/2014) (NEWSPAPER PROJECT & SCHOOLS TOUR)

To start off with The Newspaper Project, the first time we saw
the piece as a whole was for their tehcnical run. I was very
impressed, it was not how I expected it to be at all. I could see
mistakes and cues were dropped which slowed it down for us as
the audience however we knew they were still in rehearsal so
they could afford to let these sort of things happen now. In
comparrsion to the show, seeing it for a second time I was
entertained still and did not get bored at any points. It felt like a
different show, each thing that happened was still a surprise for
me and I felt in the performance there were more intentions and
suspnsion behind the different characters, there was more at
stake. I liked the rawness of the piece and the risks that the
actors took inside it, I think without those things, the piece would
not be successful as it was. Personally I would liked to have seen
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it again and bought my family with me to see the work I helped
create and direct. I am very proud of all the actors, especailly those that were in the sexual
discrimnation company. Of course there are things I would have liked to have been different but that
was just needing more reharsal time. Overall I enjoyed the piece and I certainly learned somehting
new.
At the beginng of the week out of our own intention and doing Harriet Avery, Daniella Sanderson
and I started to created choreography to the song Santa Claus is coming to town by Mariah Carey.
It was a lot of fun to get back on our feet creating material for our show and the exciting thing not
knoeing anyhting about it so creating this was a risk in itself. We continued to create it with the rest
of the company while teahcing them what we had created already. I found it such a challenge as a
few company members did not want to listen and join in, they were too busy having their own
conversations and distracting others from learning it. It felt a chore to teach it to them, whereas I
think if you dont want to be a part of it take yourself off the floor and dont be here to ruin it for
eveyrone else. After showing it to Carleigh Portelli, she was very happy with it and stated that it
would be our finale number to the show. I was very pleased with the outcome and felt that all the
hard work paid off and to think we dont have to worry about that know when we come to it, takes
weight off our shoulders.
Our task this week was to create a ball scene. As a company we created characters for ourselves and
a little choregraphy to along along with the brief of the villain and side kick enter the ball and ruin it
and ruin christmas. I nominated myself to be villain as I hadnt been one before, I found it a

challenge to be horrible and want to be the one to ruin the party. Something in the charcter changed
after speaking ot the other characters and Doctor Candy turned out to be a goody once and for all. I
like that it ended on a happy ending because that is always nicer and satisfying for an audience. The
task in itself was hard because once again some people were not taking it seriously and all they
wanted to do was muck around. Arguments arose for the most stupid and unnecessary reasons
which put us back a little and ruined it for fellow actors that wanted to do the work. We also
received a scene from the the script of our show which was extremely exciting as it set us up and
thoughts were running through my head of how the ending was going to turn out as there were so
many possibilites. What we had been told so far by
Carleigh was very magical and intriguing and the
character that interested me the most was Holly as
she was a bit dim but very enthusiastic and a happy
character. As this character was also inspired by
what I created for the character interviews a couple
of weeks ago, I felt it was most suited to me and I
knew the character well unless she had changed to
suit the piece. I worked on the scene we were given
with Harriet Avery, Daniella Sanderson, Erol
CREDITED: GOOGLE IMAGES
Uzunhasan, Connor Stoddart and Amber- Lilly Foxon
and we rehearsed it to perform it a few times on a loop for each actor to have a chance of reading
the characters they wanted. It was difficult to create different entrances and exits each time and
make it entertaining for the audience as it did become repetative. I enjoyed playing the character of
Grumpty, although he is dim it seems on the outside looking in that he knows what he is doing and
he knows what he wants. It was interesting to play that type of character and being an egg at the
same time too.
During monologue session this week we had the opportunity to
have individual discussions with Innes about different possibilities of
monologues for us for our drama school auditions. This was very
helpful for me as it has now given me a path to go down and I know
what to look for and what not to look for. I have learnt to find a
speech that is far from my personality in order to stand out and
show my versatility as an actor which I will take on board. As a
company that day we sung Oogee Floogee which was lots of fun as
we sung it in various ways and added harmonies too towards the
end. I believe as a company we enjoyed ourselves but I would have
liked for the focus to be a lot better as some people were messing
around during it which was spoiling it for us that wanted to take
part and learn something.
The highlight of my week this week was playing games and a
character improvisation in the afternoon on Friday; it was a fun and
a lovely way to end the week on a high. As it was all new to us,
spirits were high and we were eager to play. We created a net for
ourselves with the crash mats to play volleyball and made a wall

GAMES & EXERCISES

-

STICKY, STICKY GLUE

VOLLEYBALL

MAGIC LETTER

RIVER JUMP
BULLDOG

DODGEBALL

DOCTOR DODGEBALL

CRASH MAT/ HORN GAME

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with them to play dodgeball which was my favourite. We

worked as a company and although there was competiveness
this added to the hype and energy of the game. During the
improvisation I generally felt as Holly that I was in a different
world and that I had eaten the truth potion through an apple
with the fellow Holly. Together we kept blurting out the
location of Santas secret studio which gave Ruth and the eggs
the chance to ruin the Pre-flight Party and therefore ruin
Christmas. I feel doing work like this helps build a back story
for each character as some of it was not part of the script but
as the actor you can make it up for yourself to make sense in
your head why some of the actions that you do on stage as a
character.