Panto Run-Through

We are now beginning to run the whole panto as if we were performing it to an audience. It is a very useful idea as then we know how long the show runs for and whether or not we went over or under the time. It is also good to see if we can keep the whole show running without stopping. For our first run-through I thought it went rather well considering it was our first time performing the whole thing. Obviously there were many mistakes such as people not knowing their cues and lines.


This week we were in every day for extra rehearsals because we really needed the long hours and time. We had to show it to our tutor many times so then she will know whether or not their is a pantomime in the making. It did get better after each run-through and our tutor did say this.


I have now decided to change my villager character a little. Previously my character was called Charlie and to put it mildly, he was a bit of a lowlife with not many friends to his name and had confidence issues. I have now decided to still keep the same name but to make him more of a people friendly kind of guy to add to the panto feeling. I've also made him a bit of a Jack the Lad character too because he is cocky and likes spending time with his friends. I decided to change my character a round a bit because I tend to act more this way on stage rather than the other way I came up with. For example in Scene 1 of Act 1, a fellow villager who I am standing with at the time says the line 'Marry you? Why, she won't even notice you. You're nothing but the son of a poor washerwoman', I tend to cheekily nod my head as I am agreeing with this villager. This adds to being a bit of a Jack the Lad who just hangs on his friends' every words.


For my guard character in the pantomime I like to compare him to Razoul, the captain of the Royal Guard from the 1992 Disney film, Aladdin. I also like to think that my character is the dominant one of the Emperor's guards in the panto. This is because I beat the other guard at Rock-paper-scissors and I cover the other guards' eyes when we visit the Princess in her chambers with the Vizier in Act 2. Razoul is described as a no nonsense, tough and intimidating guard of the Sultan much like I am in our pantomime. My guard character is extremely loyal to the Emperor, the Vizier and Princess Jasmine. I would also describe him with having no sympathy towards lawbreakers, whether young, old, male or female and that he is always taken very seriously and that is why he likes his job a little too much.

Panto Running of Act 1

We have now started running the first Act of our pantomime to our course tutor, as well as other people who are helping with the panto. After each run-through of the script we would be given individual notes and feedback. Our first run-through obviously didn't go very well as it was the first time we had gone through it without stopping. But the more run-throughs we did, the better it got. There is still a lot of work to be done but I do feel that we as a company are improving.


On one of the run-throughs I struggled with some basic moves of the opening dance, Live While We're Young which I am now in. I'm not in the whole dance but I do appear at the end when myself and other chorus members have to run on stage and carry on the dance alongside the other chorus members. My first mistake was that I thought when we had to run on stage, we had to clap. I also was unsure about what hand to click with and what leg to go across with. I did go up to the choreographer at the end of that run-through and she told me what was what.

For one of the guard scenes which I am in, in Act 1 myself and another guard have thought of the idea of playing Rock-paper-scissors to see who ends up being the Emperor's 'chair'. Whoever loses has the horrible task of being sat on by the Emperor. We got feedback that it was a good idea but we need to make a bigger thing of it.

I do feel that I have improved with being animated and more panto-like in the villager scenes as now I am starting to relax a bit more and join in with the interaction with other characters. I do feel however that I need to still make some of my reactions a little bigger and to not be afraid of exaggerating on stage.

Now that we have been going through Act 1 a lot now, I am now feeling really confident about the first half now. Usually I would have a script backstage which I would look at to see when I am on stage next. But now that I'm more familiar with Act 1 I know exactly when to come on and off stage.

Final Blocking of Act 2

We have now successfully blocked the whole of our pantomime which is good because now we can get on with just running it through all the time. I do feel that in this week's rehearsals I have improved a little with my villager character. This is because I no longer just stand their, I now interact with my fellow villagers. However I do need to still make my character become more animated and more like an actual pantomime character.


Earlier in the week when we had our personal coach we all got faced with a dilemma whilst being in character to our parts in the panto. The dilemma was that we were all in a bunker because their were some air strikes going on in Peking and whilst being in the bunker we all had to decide who would stay in the bunker and who would go outside and die from the air strikes as not all of us could stay in the bunker. I thought this was a very fun activity and it helped us on how to develop our characters. It also showed us how our characters would act in certain situations. As the task began, I decided that I would play my guard character in the bunker and I made the decision that I would sacrifice myself for the Emperor to live.


Whilst blocking the second half of our panto I was chosen to be one of the dancing boys for Abanazar. For that; myself and 3 other cast members had to dance to some Egyptian like music. I did find this very fun and enjoyable as I have never done anything like that before. It was something different.


During one of our singing lessons we had to sing the song Hit The Road Jack by Ray Charles https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=OY4jondX6tg . The chorus\villagers were put into small groups in single boy and girl groups and had to perform it with some attitude and a bit of sass! https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10205560421399267.  It was a fun exercise and it showed us how we should be performing our songs for the pantomime.

Aladdin Opening Villager Scene

This is the opening scene to the village of Peking after the Live While We're Young number. I did find watching myself through a video very useful. That way I can see what I look like on stage and how others are portraying their characters. I feel that my reactions need to be a lot bigger and I need to react more to the sudden changes in topic that the mains are talking about. Now that I have seen myself on stage, I can see where I am going wrong with my body language as I am still looking very stiff and locked. In future rehearsals I need to try and apply the feedback that I get given to me as well as the things I learn from my personal coaches' lessons.

Aladdin Rehearsals

Earlier in the week we were told that the 2nd year students would be helping us out in our pantomime. They would be mainly performing as villagers\chorus. When we were going through the opening scene to Act 1, with the 2nd years themselves being on stage, I did feel it was useful having them by our sides because they provided us original villagers with a little enthusiasm which meant we wouldn't just be standing around looking unengaged. So I did feel that having the 2nd years with us helped a lot.


We also went through the opening song, Live While We're Young by One Direction while the mains were line reading. But we danced and sang it in small groups of 5 on the stage to see who was the strongest performer and those people would be in the opening number. I did get some comments back stating that I looked really stiff and that I was interlocked. I think the reason why I was like that was because I didn't treat it like a competition which we were suppose to and that I was so busy worrying in my head whether or not I was doing the dance properly. I didn't get selected for the opening number which I completely understand so instead at the end of the song I would enter on the lyric of 'Tonight let's get some and live while we're young'. Then we would all go into the village scene and be carrying on with our business in the villager of Peking. I did find that we all had so much more energy this time a round and were a lot more switched on with our characters. I personally feel that had a lot to do with the 2nd years being with us and we could bounce of their energy.


On Wednesday mornings we have a 1 hour session with our personal coach who is meant to help us with our confidence on stage, audition techniques and character development etc. I do find these sessions useful as it is always good to be able to develop our characters in panto a little bit further. But I do need to try and apply this in our rehearsals for Aladdin. So far in our sessions we all had to walk around the room in the style of a panto character that our personal coach would say. We was then allowed to add in a few words and one particular movement that our own characters in Aladdin would use. I decided that I would go around the room miming as if I were carrying a basket to sell bread. We was then allowed to increase it on a scale of 1-10 with 10 being an exaggerated version of what were doing, and 1 being just casual about it. We was then put into small groups all with different stimulus's to act out our little performance in the style of panto characters. Our stimulus was the news. I decided to play a villain style news reporter who liked all news violent and dark. I did enjoy this task. We have now been set a little homework task to come up with a dark secret that our characters in the pantomime would have. My secret that my character would have is that he would have a secret crush on Widow Twankey but he told the whole villager how much he despised her.