WEEK TWO

Solid Flesh Soliloquy Rehearsal 

Today we rehearsed the introduction scene, otherwise known as the funeral of King Hamlet, into the following scenes. Because of my absence I was in the dark about the blocking. I was told to sit at the very back of the stage facing the wall, here I would be watching a projection of my fathers home videos. For me, this was a bold choice as it showed Hamlets really emotionally fragile, youthful side, as opposed to straight teenage angst. 

Hamlet as a character, in our adaptation, is full of anger and hatred, but beneath that there is just a fragile and emotionally brittle child wanting his father and to be loved. Sometimes all someone needs is to love and be loved. And that's all he wants, but as the revelation of Claudius' actions unfold, Hamlet is forcibly thrust into vengeance. He can't mourn truly until Claudius has been killed. That,for Hamlet, is closure. 

Coupling this with the fact that I have been staged to a projector, it's a poignant image, as it flirts with the idea of death looming over the play like a vale. The image of a grieving son reminiscing on his past in the presence of his fathers funeral, yet not looking at the ceremony, is heartbreaking. Thus causing the audience to feel just as much grief for Hamlet as he has. 

For this show, I really wanted to dabble in method acting. Since my grandfather has passed away a month and a bit ago, he will be my stimulus for King Hamlets death. On top of this, my girlfriend and I are taking a break from each other, this will be my stimulus for Ophelia. I will use Stanislavsky's method of sense memory to be able to get into character. When at my grandfathers funeral, I stopped to take a mental picture and think about how I was feeling as I carried his coffin into the crematorium, so that I may trigger this feeling again when live I stage. On top of this, I have chosen to use my own personal home baby videos instead of the original planned, so that for the first 10 minutes of the play I am staring a my granddads face, as well as my brother and the rest of my family. 

Poster I created for Hamlet in my spare time

During my rehearsal of Too Too Solid Flesh, I performed the soliloquy to a microphone whilst wearing sunglasses, just like Kurt Cobain would wear. Kurt was also known for his self recorded demo tapes of him playing around with a reverb pedal he bought. This was a similarity I drew from Stuarts decision of the microphone. Kurt, as a angry and self hating teenager, monologing o himself in his bedroom.

Similar style to which my Hamlet will look.

Kurt monologing into a recorder in his bedroom, taken from the Montage of Heck documentary.