Itch scratched

I've just completed this four day acting school, reviewed here. I learned about breathing, presentation, voice control, posture and movement in exercises I've never done before and worked more with people than I have done for years.

Singing: Thanks to Grantley Buck, we sang from 'Some Enchanted Evening' and 'A Cockeyed Optimist ' from South Pacific, we sang 'A Real Nice Clambake' from Carousel. I haven't had singing lessons since I left school, and I'll swear they didn't teach me to open my throat like a foot-long dentist's syringe was coming at it. We all loved the singing classes, coming out buzzing with energy and happiness.

Fighting: we practised punching our partners with sound effects like we'd made contact. That's call a knap and is a method of making the sound without actually touching your partner. We learned strangling, another lesson was fighting with swords. This is how to do team work.

Moving: Marcelle Davies started the first day's movement class with a clapping exercise when we passed a clap around us, between us, across a circle, and extended it to call our names - a new way of learning a classes names. Another movement exercise with Jenni had us falling to the floor to a count of ten, and rising to a count of ten, but then reducing the count to six, to four, to two, to one. You have to be fit to do this course.

We learned to dance and perfected a pavane, enjoyed dancing jazz, & the training was professional for professionals. For instance, in the jazz class, first our teacher had us stand like professionals. "Now" she announced, "you look employable." Like we amateurs, and several would-be professionals, could ever be paid to dance professionally.

And Shakespeare, which was the class where we learned the least, perhaps because at least for the first session, the director was having a bad day. We didn't learn much about Shakespeare, or his work, just watched and listened to each other perform. If we rattled off the words by heart with no meaning to them, we got little help on interpretation - but learned we should have worked harder. If we hadn't learned the lines well enough to say them without more than a couple of prompts, even if too nervous, then we were told we could sit down again. Sometimes the director asked us why we chose to present characters in a particular way, and that usually seemed to mean that we didn't understand the character - like we were acting Cassius young when he was old.

Voice: Clare Davidson had us spouting Shakespeare with our tongues out and our heads between our legs, but it is amazing what a difference the exercise can make to the timbre and clarity of your voice.

Scenes: The director, Jeanette, started us with introductions. We had to pass round a box of matches, light a match and tell the story of our life in the time it took the match to burn. We watched each other, but the drama was in the lighted match. Then we were given a synopsis of the play, and the parts we were to take. Each of the three groups presented scenes from a different play

• 'My mother never told me',
• 'Old Times' by Pinter
• 'Closer' by Patrick Marber
  

In the last hour of the last day, we played our scenes to the other groups, and to the director, Paul Caister. And I finished the course in a love scene from Patrick Marber's 'Closer'.

Graft craft

Graft - tales of an actor is a one-man show that neighbours and we went to see locally last week. It's horrendously depressing from the black stage, the black costume, the black theme, and the shouts and struts of the actor, George Dillon. The theme is the career of a dedicated actor from start to sad end. The warning is "don't join the theatre".

I spoke to George Dillon afterwards, commenting that he had warned me off going to The Poor School next week for a short acting course. He said, "Good". He goes into schools aiming to put off the young and beautiful from an acting career. I pointed out that I was not young and beautiful, and he relooked at me, then asked if I had put enough money behind me to support myself! Then sighed, as if to say "well, can't persuade that one!"

Years ago I had acting training at college, and loved the experience enough to do amateur dramatics for a few years after, until gliding and husband took over all my time. I never seriously thought of going on stage. But I'm treating myself to this acting course next week, putting PhD thesis aside (all written, almost all done) and scratching my Thespian itch for the first time in thirty years.

Life, death and start again

Last year I had four funerals to go to - two nonagenarian aunties, an uncle, and the much younger husband of a long standing friend and colleague, so it was all rather sad. I'm delighted to report that this year starts with the announcement of an expected birth. One of my much loved step children rang me yesterday to announce the expected arrival of a new grandchild in July.

Hurrah! The more the merrier. I love big families - I always wanted one. The bigger the happier becuase there's always someone you'll get on with and find support from sometime, whether as a child or as an adult.

Cost of coffee

I like espresso, just the one cup a day. Other coffee is all right, but not the same. So in the office, each morning, I get myself a cup of espresso. This week, I toodled along, handed over my pound and waited for my usual five pence back (the university must be subsidising our coffee because it isn't expensive), but they said it is now 97p and gave me back only 3p. I guess it's the new rate of VAT and 2p on 95p is only a bit more than 2.5% extra VAT. Then I realised that the black coffee, which had also been 95p is now 105p. So someone is adding more than the VAT increase.

Grump!