National Theatre Connections Assignment 2024

Candidate Declaration - I confirm that the attached portfolio is all my own work and does not include any work completed by anyone other than myself. 

Task One

See Blogs from Week Commencing 9th of January to Shout! Show Week.

Task Two

A way I helped with the design of the production is with costume and props.  Firstly, I made myself a sock puppet to help the therapist during fading in, even helping some of my other classmates decorate theirs.  Aswell as the sock puppets, I also bought in multiple fidget toys that helped bring the Freaks and Geeks room to life, as when characters in The Calming Room were not speaking, they could be playing with fidget toys.  A few of the toys I bought in were a fidget spinner, two poppers, a slinky and a pin art board, which allowed people to  make interesting things using the pins.  For my costume I thought hard about what someone who would identify as a Freak and Geek would wear, finally settling on a back to the future shirt and an I am Kenough hoodie.  For my trousers, I wore joggers so I was more able to freely move around when doing yoga as in the performance I showed my characters eagerness to do yoga.

Task Three

In Shout I played an unnamed Freak and Geek, however, to make the piece more alive I took part in small scenes disconnected from the show to help build up my own character.  Firstly, I gave my character a name, Zac, so during scenes people wouldn't just be calling me Ben so we would be more immersed in the piece.  I then began acting an improvisation of a Yoga class which was led by Alan, a substitute teacher, who is desperately trying to take lead of the class whilst The Mean Girls and Cool Lads mock him not taking the class seriously.  In this improvisation, since my character had ADHD, I wasn't really paying attention to what the teacher was trying to get us to do as I was to busy fidgeting with a small infinity cube.  However the teacher noticed this and took it off me, making me begin doing yoga, which I wasn't very good at.  I feel this scene helped me get in the mindset of my character, as I saw how everyone else in the scene like the mean girls and teacher treated me so I knew how to interact with them during the main show.  Since I knew how The Mean Girls would treat me, at the start of Shout I made sure to exit the stage when I heard them, as I didn't want to be bullied.  I also worked on another scene with the Freaks and Geeks, telling the story of  how The Calming Room came to be.  In this scene we showed each of the Freaks and Geeks stumbling upon the room, Con being the first person, slowly making it more and more into the room it was shown in the play.  Once everyone had met in The Calming Room, we had a small group discussion about the outside world, with Con doing his typical fear-mongering, trying to convince us how dangerous it is.  Because of us doing this scene, I felt it strengthened the bond between the Freaks and Geeks in the show, and figuring out who would be friends with who in the room.

Task Four

The National Theatre was founded in 1963 with Laurence Oliver being its first director, however it took 13 years before the building dedicated to The National Theatre, would be open to the public.  The very first production put on by The National Theatre was Hamlet, premiering on the 22nd of October 1963.  The National was made with intentions of "Igniting creativity of young people" and "Sharing unforgettable stories with audiences", achieving these goals by putting on the yearly Connections festival.  The Connections programme is 30 years old and is used to showcase the talents of young up and coming actors, giving them a chance to perform a script written specifically for this event, for them to perform with their acting company.  The National Theatre works with many venues all around the UK to ensure that connections is as accessible as possible.  The Connections programme is described by many as being a "Bonding experience" and "make the cast celebrate like a family after".  This shows the amazing protentional of the Connections festival, as it helps more younger people discover their love for acting.  

Task Five

Completed Home performance at my highest level.

Task Six

The 21st of March was our home performance of Shout, where we performed in front of the lady from The National Theatre.  On the morning, we made sure to get a fully teched dress rehearsal done so we were fully prepared for the performance.  During the performance, everything went smoothly as everything had been choreographed perfectly so there was little chance of something going wrong.  Since I had no lines, I made sure every time I was on stage I was doing something so wherever the audience was looking something was happening, such as in the climate activist scene, when Olly stole my sign and had me try to take it back off him, to further show how the Freaks and Geeks are treated by the other characters.  The rest of the cast worked hard to bring the performance to life, especially the actors playing Tristan and Dana, who’s performances effectively portrayed the message of the show.  I feel our portrayal of Shout! showed everyone the struggles of going to a school with a disability, trying to ignore all the bullies and accept yourself.  We took the notes written by the author of the play and made sure to keep as close as we could to them, such as the characters in the calming room not to be punching bags, as they wanted the audience to laugh with them not at them.  However, we also altered some of the ideas of the play, such as going against what was suggested in the script and casting a boy to play Viv, Dana’s best friend.  This worked amazingly as he played the character perfectly and showed how we were different from the other performances of the same script.  As well as this, we also read in between the lines for the therapist scene, where while Dana is trying to fade in, the snakes are sock puppets instead of real snakes, making the scene more wacky and reinforcing that the show isn't to be taken too seriously.