Jessica Clubbe

Shanice Edwards- ‘A mix of bravado and sensitivity’ (Fisher, 2003, Online)

May 23, 2013May 24, 2013 Jessica Clubbe

Playing Shanice Edwards, a girl of several personalities was a challenge. On the surface she comes across as a girl a confident who knows what she wants but after exploring the character deeper it was very apparent that this was untrue. When Shanice first steps on the stage the audience is presented with a fun loving girl accompanied by her best friend Ronnie, its not until later on in the play where the audience is able to understand the complexities of this character. After the show had finished I was pleasantly shocked at how well the audience received my character. After spending a vast amount of time with my director and dramaturge working on my monologue scene talking to Kwame the audience reacted in a way that neither of us had imagined. This is the only scene where people see Shanice for who she is, a flirtatious young girl who knows she’s attractive. I thoroughly enjoyed developing this scene, attempting to flirt with someone who isn’t there is a task but once performing it to an auditorium full of people using the nerves as positive energy I was able to take the flirtatious energy up another level causing a humorous reaction from the audience.

During the scene between Shanice and Joe during rehearsals I had struggled with how to place myself. Shanice is nervous, angry but also willing to talk to Joe about what she knows, trying to portray all three of those emotions at the same time took some time in rehearsal. Similar to my pervious monologue I used the nervous energy as a positive and allowed the audience to see my nerves as this is how my character was feeling. With the questions Joe was asking me thrown from all different directions I felt as if I was being interrogated.

Scene 22 is when Emile finally admits to the audience that he killed Kwame, the emotions within the scene reached a level that they had never been before. Within rehearsal creating the right amount of tension and emotion in this scene took several rehearsals approaching different angles. We attempted the scene with Shanice keeping her distance from Emile showing how the love was deteriorating to throwing myself at Emile with constant grabbing and touching showing affection, neither of these worked. In the end we found what was right and once in the moment on show night I believe we portrayed the right amount of emotion.

One line within the script that as a company we were worried about was ‘shut the fuck up Ronnie, I’ll rip your tits off’ (WAKEUP Theatre, 2013, p. 57). The reason we were slightly apprehensive about this line is due to consistent cast corpsing throughout the rehearsal process. Myself an other cast memebers within the scene needed to create enough tension and emotion within the scene so that the audience believed the anger I was feeling. In the performance I got the reaction that I wanted, not only was there no laughing from the audience it was deadly silent, the atmosphere was deafening, you could hear a pin drop. We had correctly exposed the intensity within the scene as the whole audience was eagerly keen to listen to every single word spoken.

During the last scene the audience sees another side to Shanice. During this scene I cant help but feel sorry for her as she sits in the café where she works everyday, explaining to Dwayne how Emile has left to stay with his sister and Ronnie has gone away with her mum, the two people who she cared about most and thought felt the same have left her and now she has nothing better to do than go to the ‘usual places’ and see the ‘usual people’ (WAKEUP Theatre, 2013, p. 66).

I think that has Shanice found herself stuck in a situation where she lost track of what is right and wrong, whilst trying to stay loyal to her boyfriend and friends she gets herself caught in a web of lies. Finding it hard to admit the fact that she had feelings for Kwame and how she no longer feels the same for Emile, after taking part in Kwame’s death, she constantly hides her true feelings. She is girl who doesn’t know what she wants or how to act with certain people and because of this she hides who she really is. I feel that my interpretation of Shanice Edwards in WAKEUP Theatre’s 130,000, highlighted all of these problems. As an actor I feel sorry for Shanice as I believe she was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Works Cited

Fisher, Phillip (2003) British Theatre Guide. Online: http://www.britishtheatreguide.info/reviews/fallout-rev (accessed 12nd May 2013)

WAKEUP Theatre (2013) 130,000 an adaptation of Fallout by Roy Williams, Lincoln: Lincoln School of Performing Arts.

@WAKEUPtheatre

May 22, 2013May 24, 2013 Jessica Clubbe

Online marketing is a current and instant way to help build a business. ‘Technologies such as Twitter have the potential to give us more than just an opportunity to tell others what happened in our day. If we understand and appreciate what Twitter is capable of, we can use it to instantly share our lives with others, and we can use it to reach more people in a meaningful way’(Comm, 2012, p. x). You can share news within the comfort of your own home or wherever you are via a mobile phone. Having only 140 characters to write a message a person only gets a snip-it of what you want to say.

Twitter is a mobile social network which allows you to keep in touch with friends, family, businesses and companies that you may want to keep in touch with or are interested in. Twitter enables you to share what you are doing with the world, it gives small businesses and entrepreneurs the edge that they can’t necessarily get. ‘Every day, we see dozens of new ideas and ways to use twitter’ (Fitton, 2012, p. 6) as a brand new theatre company we had to incorporate these new ideas and use Twitter to its full capability to ensure that as a company we are creating a broad database of potential audience members. Through Twitter as a company we are able to promote 130,000 for free, without spending hundreds of pounds on promotional material.

When first creating the Twitter the design was a pivotal part.

When a potential follower first accesses our sight we want them to get a good first impression. The design is essential as that first impression could decide weather they follow the company or judge them and move on. With a little touch of creativity and a clever design, by Tweeting the right thing a company may catch the eye of a potential follower. A potential follower leads to word of mouth witch could then possibly increase ticket sales. Having a professional logo as our profile picture and a professional promotional picture as our header instantly we create a professional first impression. Potential customers and followers get to know the face behind the company, which can help building Wakeup Theatre.

When writing tweets the art was keeping it simple, ‘Twitter geniuses sprung form the idea of serving as a status update tool, and at its most basic level, that’s what it is’ ( Thomases, 2012, p. 20). Having only 140 characters, tweets are meant to be kept at a basic level. Twitters ‘clean interface and easy to understand’ (Thomases, 2010, p. 25) layout makes is accessible to anyone. The biggest mistake criticues see companies do on Twitter is when they first hit Twitter they think of it as a ‘channel to push out information’ (O’Reilly and Milstein, 2012, p. 201) , by adding complicated Tweets with hyperlinks to other more complicated means of advertisement there is a potential fear that we may be turning away audience members. In The Twitter Book, Tom O’Reilly and Sarah Milstein say that ‘the average number of tweets per day amongst all users [is] ‘4.22’ (O’Reilly and Milston, 2012, p. 129).Tweeting on average 3 to 4 times a day it appeared that @WAKEUPtheatre kept our followers engaged. We were lucky enough to have several Reweets and Tweets’by companies such as @WhatsOnLincol, @unilincol, @MyUniLincoln, @UBTLincoln and @LPAC_Lincoln witch lead to a dramatic increase in our followers.

After every post we would always try and hashtag. Hashtagging by adding a the simple # symbol before writing a word or phrase enables another person who is specifically researching something to type in said word or phrase and the message will appear. For example on the 28^th February we wrote this Tweet:

Here we hashtagged ‘#realwords’ ‘#realworlds’ and ‘#realpeople’ (WAKEUP Theatre, 2013, Online). If a person was researching something about real words then our tweet would come up, hopefully once they take a look round our page they will follow the company and take an interest in what we do.

On the 9th May we uploaded our first promotional shot, shown here:

This was the first time that our followers had seen us as a cast and were able to get a slight insight into what 130.00 may be. When tweeting the picture we asked the question ‘what do you think?'(WAKEUP Theatre, 2013, Online) by addressing our followers directing it enabled them to feel personally engaged.

Occasionally we would upload pictures from our rehearsals, shown here:

This was to ensure our followers that the work we were creating was developing ready for the performance. People generally enjoy pictures so by posting a tweet that is a picture followers are more likely to have a look, by incorporating ticket information underneath the picture we are constantly reminding followers the information they need to know.

On the 13th May we uploaded a ‘sneak preview of part of our set’ (WAKEUP Theatre, 2013, Online).

This picture gathered a lot of interest. Potential audience members asked questions and people were intrigued to as what the box was, this picture was a effective marketing tool.

Works Cited

Comm, Joel (2010) Twitter Power 2.0: How to Dominate Your Market One Tweet at a Time, New Jersey: John Wiley & Son

Fitton, Laura (2012) Twitter For Dummies, New Jersey: John Wiley & Son

O’Reilly and Sarah Milstein (2012) The Twitter Book, Sebastopol: O’Reilly Media

Thomases, Hollis (2010) Twitter Marketing: An Hour a Day, Indiana: Wiley Publishing

WAKEUP Theatre (2013) 130,000 an adaptation of Fallout by Roy Williams, Lincoln: Lincoln School of Performing Arts.

WAKEUPtheatre (2013) Twitter, 23 May. Available at: https://twitter.com/WAKEUPtheatre (accessed: 24th May 2013)

Costume Design.

April 19, 2013May 24, 2013 Jessica Clubbe

As stated in the director’s note, WAKEUP theatre do not want their audience to be bombarded with visual spectacle in the palpable forms of set and costume design. Therefore, the costume for 130, 000 had to represent this. The director discussed that she wanted very simple costume so WAKEUP’s actors could multi-role efficiently and at a fast pace. In order to achieve this it was decided that all of WAKEUP’s actors would wear a black top, black bottoms and black shoes as a costume base. Any other costume would take form in an accessary or jacket so it could be easily taken on or off.

Roy Williams and director of Channel 4’s adaptation of Fallout are praised by critics for providing costume and language that is ‘so close to their own’ (Mason, 2008, Online) . Ian Rickson took the play back to the streets of London with his visually correct costume and design; WAKEUP Theatre need to provide the same visual stimulant. As each actor in the production only have one item of costume per character, the concept of jackets for the London gang seemed appropriate. Costumes that were used in channel 4’s interpretation of Fallout, and the films Kidulthood and Adulthood were WAKEUP’s main inspiration, this is because the young men featured in the films are similar to the ones in Fallout.

Dwayne – the leader of the gang would wear this jacket:

Followed by Emile’s jacket shown here:

Emile is constantly in Dwaynes shadow so having the two boys in the same jacket but contrasting colours will reveal to the audience this copy-cat relationship. This will also visually aid the audience to see the hierarchy within the gang and the constant desire that Emile seeks respect from Dwayne.

Perry and Clinton’s costumes weren’t as visibly poignant, shown here:

As both characters constantly try hard to fit in it was decided that their symbolic item of clothing needent be a point of attention. Placing them both in typical South-East London youth attire it was clear to an audience who they were.

When first choosing an outfit for Shanice we wanted a jacket that represented the area she was from but also showed her inner flirtatious girlie character.

When first placing her in this jacket for the promotional pictures it really worked, but once placing it upon a stage the jacket became more of a coat and didn’t look right. It was then decided that Shanice needed to look more like she was working. Once the polo top and the hat was worn, the costume suited the stage.

As Shanice and Ronnie are best friends, placing them both in pink seemed fitting to our production.

For Kwame, his costume was chosen because of the verbatim extracts that were read in the production. Both transcripts from Doreen and the brief that detective Emma provides both mention he was on his way home from school when he was attacked. Therefore a simple tie and an urban street hoody would do the trick!

Detective Emma and detective Joe were in simple smart clothing to portray their authority, shown here:

The rest of the characters within 130, 000 are those that spoke in the Stephen Lawrence inquiry. The director equally distributed the verbatim extracts and most of them are played by two or more actors, so a simple black blazer or prop would suffice. (see props list).

Works Cited

Mason, Rowena (2008) Channel 4 Fallout film exposes ‘real’ face of London knife crime, Online: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2240872/Channel-4-Fallout-film-exposes-real-face-of-London-knife-crime.html (accessed 01 May 2013).

Shanice Edwards

April 16, 2013May 24, 2013 Jessica Clubbe

In WAKEUP Theatre’s rendition of Roy Williams Fallout, named 130,000, I play a character named Shanice Edwards. Shanice Edwards is a young girl around the age of 16 brought up in Southeast London. Believed to what would have been a challenging upbringing she finds herself involved within the wrong crowd. After her boyfriend Emile Bains and fellow gang member take part in a teen stabbing Shanice finds herself ‘stuck in the middle, a go between who wants to do the right thing but is torn by a sense of loyalty’ (Mbatha-Raw, 2008, Online).

When first receiving the script for 130,000, reading Shanice’s lines, I was presented with a vast array of emotions. She is a girl who changes her mood and how she speaks and acts depending on who she is with. Having never been placed within the situations that she has been presented with the characterisation was a challenge.

When working on the development for my characterisation I have been continuously watching channel 4’s adaptation of Roy William’s Fallout. Even though as a company we have changed part of the script, watching this adaptation helped me immensely when working Shanice’s relationships with other characters. Gugu Mbatha-Raw played the character of Shanice in Channels 4’s adaptation of Roy Williams Fallout, she played a ‘nice mix of bravado and sensitivity’ (Fisher, 2003 Online). Watching the adaptation several times and researching interviews with Gugu I was able to get a clear understanding of the character and an insight into Gugu’s interpretation.

As preparation for writing the play Fallout, Roy Williams ‘ spent hours talking to teenage gang members in Manchester and London, picking up their phrases and accents. He also listened to the young people around him rather than blocking out their noisy chatter on buses or in the street’ (Mason, 2008, Online). Trying to master the accent was a whole challenge in itself. The language within the script is written in urban Southeast London dialect, something I only knew little about, as a company we had little understanding of how the words should be said. Reviews stated that ‘the street lingo always seems realistic’ (Fisher 2003, online) so it was essential that as a cast we were able to attempt the same. To gain better knowledge and understanding of this dialect, watching Channel 4’s adaptation of Fallout, E4’s series The Youngers and films such as Kidulthood and Adulthood helped myself and many others amongst the cast to practice and copy how the words should sound. When attempting a Southeast London accent the key is to to isolate specific sounds that occur within that accent, for example ‘th’ changes to ‘d’, when getting towards the ends of words I normally finish them with a closed mouth but when attempting a Southeast London accent a lot of the word should be ended wide mouthed creating a completely different sound, with a vast amount of practice I was able to find a voice for Shanice.

When the audience first see Shanice and her ‘jealously insecure boyfriend Emile’ (Fisher, 2003, Online) together in scene 5, immediately we wanted them to understand the relationship that they are in. When saying the line ‘yeah, I like this. Fits nice. Alright Emile?’(WAKEUP Theatre, 2013, p. 14) I first enter the stage with confidence showing Shanice’s flirty confident personality when joking around with best friend Ronnie, to soon see a change when noticing that Emile is in the Café. Taking a step back and coiling within myself whilst hiding my top, immediately showed the audience the relationship that the characters share.

Emile dominates within the relationship and is very controlling, when saying the line ‘you love me’ (WAKEUP Theatre, 2013, p. 14) he is telling Shanice that she does, with a subtle smile and brief glace away avoiding directly answering the question, Shanice doesn’t answer because she doesn’t love him. During other scenes she interrupts numerous conversations acting as if she is protecting Emile when really she is trying to stop him from slipping up. Scene 22 is the only time within the play where you see the true emotion and affection between Shanice and Emile. This is the only time where physical contact is made between the two characters throughout the play. I decided that this was the only appropriate time due to the circumstance of the scene, I believe that she does care for Emile and does have strong feelings for him but due to his consistent jealously and domineering personality those feelings are slowly staring to slip away.

The relationship between Joe and Shanice was another pivotal part of the play. ‘Joe quickly came to the conclusion that Emile’s flirtatious girlfriend Shanice was hiding something and he set off in relentless pursuit of her- not always in the most professional manor (O’Donovan, 2008, Online). Whenever Joe and Shanice where together there was always tension, be it sexual tension or tension due to guilt, this was something that never had to be lost. During scene 10 it is obvious that Shanice wants to talk to Joe, when she says ‘I could tell you thing about him, you know’ (WAKEUP Theatre, 2013, p. 26) referring to Emile she gives the audience an insight into another side of Shanice a part of her that knows the difference between right and wrong, but perhaps she is too scared to say. During rehearsals playing with the dynamics of this scene with our director created a number of different outcomes. Choosing different times sit down changed the dynamic of the scene, if I sat down too quick it would show the audience that Shanice feels very comfortable and is willing to talk to Joe when this is not the case. I felt that the only time where you see Shanice for herself is during her monologue talking to Kwame. Here I felt that I had true freedom to exploit her flirtatious personality.

Shanice also acts different when around Dwayne, the leader of the gang. Playing a character who acts differently depending on who she is with was a challenge. When asked the question, define Shanice, it was near to impossible as I believe that she didn’t know who she was.

When speaking a piece of verbatim, word for word spoken truth from Doreen Lawrence it was an experience like no other. As actor I have never had experience with verbatim until I joined Wakeup Theatre. Verbatim is a ‘form of theatre which places interviews with people at the heart of its process or product’ (Haedicke, 2009, p. 115), what I found essential throughout my process was research. Even though I only had a small part of verbatim every word was just as important as the next. When watching video interviews of Doreen Lawrence, analysing her moving, listening to how she spoke everything I acted seemed wrong. With constant reminding form our director that we are not trying to be Doreen we are just tools for expressing her words, I felt the pressure lifted, I only hope that I do her words justice.

Works Cited

Fisher, Phillip (2003) British Theatre Guide. Online: http://www.britishtheatreguide.info/reviews/fallout-rev (accessed 12nd April 2013)

Haedicke, Susan (2009) Political Performances: Theory and Practice, New York: Editions Rodopi

LastBroadcast.co.uk (2008) Gugu Mbatha-Raw (Fallout) Interview. Online: http://www.lastbroadcast.co.uk/tv/interviews/v/5102-gugu-mbatha-raw-fallout-interview.html (accessed 13st April 2012).

Mason, Rowena (2008) The Telegraph. Online: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2240872/Channel-4-Fallout-film-exposes-real-face-of-London-knife-crime.html (accessed 13st April 2013).

O’Donovan, Gerard (2008) The Telegraph. Online: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/3555712/Last-night-on-television-Fallout-Channel-4.html (accessed 12nd April 2013).

WAKEUP Theatre (2013) 130,000 an adaptation of Fallout by Roy Williams, Lincoln: Lincoln School of Performing Arts.