This post comes a little later than I had first hoped, as I attended one of The National Youth Theatre's audition masterclass weeks on the week beginning 15th February, however with a couple of drama school auditions in between, and a lot of rehearsals etc, it's a few weeks since I did the course. None the less the course was very valuable and is worth a post giving a summary of the week.
Working on your monologue
- Back to the basics: I wouldn't say the course necessarily taught me anything I didn't know before, yet it did remind me that it's never too late to take it back to the basics with a monologue. When I started the course I had a bit of a mind block with all of the four monologues I had been working on for drama school, and couldn't work out why they weren't coming along as well as previous years. Throughout my life I have been very used to working on monologues as I started doing LAMDA exams when I was eight, but since I've been older, and working on monologues on my own without the assistance of a teacher or tutor, I have been a little lost. On the first day of the course we were made to sit down and write the answer to a whole list of questions, all of which were very basic Stanislavsky based questions, which helped you to create a whole back story for your character. These included questions that you may not know the answers to and ones which you are free to make up. For example how old are they? What class? What is their occupation? What is their life story up until this point? The occupation of their parents? Some of these may seem irrelevant, but it honestly helps you to get into the whole mindset of your character, rather that just their mind set in the speech. Then questions to do with the play were asked, for example what has happened in the play up until this point? The scene previous? The line previous? What is their super objective (what they want to achieve in the whole play?) and what is their objective in the monologue? This allows you to get a feel for everything you are feeling at the moment of your monologue, but also of everything your character has been through up until now. Once you have been through all of these questions you can then look back at your monologue and decide whether the answers to all of these questions might affect the way you say a line. You might realise why they are saying something when you hadn't realised before, or you might have decided something has happened in their life that makes your character speak in a certain manner, are they an angry or calm person etc. This is all preeeeety basic stuff, but sometimes, if your having a mind blank, it can help you find new units in your monologue.
- Playing with tone: Again, all of this is very simple stuff, and a lot of drama teachers will make you do these exercises when working on any monologue, but quite often there is a reason for that. We did an exercise I've done many times which involved doing your monologue in different styles and often ones which are a total contrast to the tone of your piece. For example doing the whole piece as if you are addressing a class of children, as if you really need a wee, as if you want to have sex with the person you're talking to etc. I read once that your monologue is like a whole play in two minutes, and in order to keep your audience engaged, you have to change the tone after every line. This exercise helped me to find those levels and places where tones which seem like they wont actually work, fit well. My monologue was Paulina from the winters tale, and although the overriding tone of the piece is anger, I found that doing it as if I was talking to a load of children brought out a patronising tone which actually really worked to undermine the character I was talking to. Doing the piece as if I needed a wee also made me hold back my anger which totally worked at points too. This meant that I could go through my monologue more intricately and find even more levels.
Other basics covered were simple things like looking at punctuation and really using it (especially in classical writing) as well as stressing particular words, not sounding like you're about to say a list when you begin a list, not letting a thought take an hour to come, but at the same time not rushing. Taking all of this into account allows for you to get the initial body of your monologue.
Interview technique
- Something which I really learned to do with Interview technique was that BODY LANGUAGE MATTERS MORE THAN ANYTHING. Apparently genuine scientific experiments have been conducted to find out what affects a person in an audition the most, and nearly sixty percent of the panel's initial judgement of you lies in your body language. If you seem too chilled or too nervous and tense they may not believe you to be serious enough or strong enough for drama school training. If you're posture isn't straight they may think you're not confident in your body as you have to shrink back (something that i'm guilty of). If you're not smiling they may find that you're not happy to be there or even that you're not a friendly person. It is all of these things that a panel notices first and then its what you say and how you act which comes next. This has made me very conscious of how I walk into any audition room for the first time.
- Another thing that we worked on was your actual interview technique and how you answer questions. The facilitator of the course said that from her experience of leading interviews it all comes down to time, and a person that can tell them everything they need to hear in response to a question is a good candidate. Short answers suggest you're uninterested and can be frustrating for a panelist if they are trying to find out things about you quickly. In saying this, going on too long with your answers and not sticking to the point can be just as irritating as not answering at all, as you may not have even given them the information they asked for. In an interview situation, the best thing you can do is answer the question in as much detail as you think is needed without straying from the point. Other things we learned to be effective when being interviewed is to find common ground with the person interviewing you, or relating to them in some way, engaging them: a good thing to think is what can you do for the panel? What do you think you have which can make their day better? Never apologise for yourself, don't say sorry i'm waffling or even sound sorry when you say hello, stay confident in everything you say and know that you deserve to be there.
Motivation
Most importantly, I found the week long course to be really motivational. When you're taking a gap year as I am, it's really easy to forget how many people are working for what you're working for, especially if you live somewhere out of the city or out of London, and you're not constantly surrounded by people who are doing the same thing. Most people in the town that I live in don't know what drama school is. Going away to London for a week and surrounding yourself with like minded people is one of the most motivational things you can do, and it gets you in the mindset. It also just made me do the work needed. If I had taken a week off work to work on my monologues I would never have worked on my technique as much as I did at NYT and I'm so grateful to have done it. It gave me a massive kick up the arse to work hard when i'm at home and most importantly, introduced me to a whole new bunch of awesome people just like me. It reminds you that you're not alone in all the stress and preparation.
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