The first strategy I implemented was to fully understand the context of my scene and the show in general. To do this I read the script that my scene is from. This gave me a strong understanding of what was going on inside my characters head at the time the scene starts and throughout. For example when we’re first meat drake in the play he is trying hard to convince his dad and therapist that he is actually a vampire so when wisteria immediately believed he was a vampire he felt accepted for the first time since his mum died. I then had to think about how to apply the knowledge of what is happening to the scene. To do this I looked through the text of our scene and identified places where this new found feeling of acceptance are. This then allowed me to focus on the behaviours and intentions behind my characters actions and words in those moments. For example when drake says “really? You’re not scared? Or disgusted?” He is incredibly distrusting as many people either tell him he’s lying or would make fun of him. So when Wisteria shows him that she is not like that he immediately wants to befriend her.

Another strategy i implemented was integrating characteristics into my performance. These small details help to create a more full and believable character, as that is a very human thing to do and it can be abnormal to see someone, especially a teenager, to be static and in control of all there movements. Some that I found for drake where when he was feeling anxious he would shuffle his feet and sway from side to side. When he didn’t know what to do with his arms we would play with the sides or tie on his cape. However a struggle I did have with that was making his small movements look like they were choices rather than me as an individual fidgeting. To do this I had to make some of his characteristics much bigger, like I would have him flip his cape dramatically every-time he would turn. This was clearly a character choice, that worked very well for drake as his personality was to be over the top. However I kept getting told that me fidgeting my feet looked like it was something I was doing rather than a character choice, I tried to change it in small ways like only doing it at very specific moments to make it clearer, but I was still getting the same notes, so i ended up just scrapping that characteristic.

An important strategy for me was implementing notes I was given into my performance. One note I got was that one of my lines was to stop my character from felling embarrassed and that I need to have some reaction to show this. So I tried lots of different things but was told I kept reacting to early. I spent time looking at the script and in pointing the exact moment that my character started to feel embarrassed. I then tried to play it as if my character was cutting of Wysteria when she said “that’s not exactly what that means” however this didn’t land very well as a joke and seemed more like I was rushing my lines so instead when she said that I stood and stared at her for a few seconds before reacting. And my reaction was as if I was shaking off what Wysteria had just said and changing the subject. Another note I got was to connect more to my character, this was something I found easy in the beginning of the rehearsal process but as time went on I found it very hard, I tried lots of different things like trying to actively live in the moment, or too create a detailed score of movements that would allow me to know what I’m doing at all times and to only focus on feeling in the moment but I found this only made the disconnection stronger. Eventually I started implementing the Misner technique buy continually wondering what would be said next and more importantly how it would be said, which gave me the opportunity to live more truthfully in the moments.