Currently viewing the tag: "acting"

The Astro-Nida Journey

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The Astro-Nida Short courses are now over. The whole thing lasted for two weeks and I didn’t write much updates on the process on it, but I will now. It was a fantastic time and a wonderful experience being apart of this educational workshop. Even more so in the field which you love and want to try to excel as much as you can in. Here is the first day. As I went rushing up the floor of The Central Market, I met up with Calvin who also managed to get into Astro-Nida but under the script writing course. There we were running up the staircase of the Annexe Gallery to get to the opening launch. 

  

Daphne Iking was hosting the opening launch also happened to be part of the Screen Acting course. The first week was learning some basic stuff on acting such as how to breathe and some vocal warmups. As well as learning about how to do characterization for a role using the Uta Hagen 6 steps - you can read it at that link. Then a small bit on how to use the Laban method (you can read that here) which is sort of a physical perparation to get into character. From there we then moved into some actual screen work. We were given scripts to memorise and work on for characterization, from seriously dramatic stuff like siblings fighting on who should take their mother of life support system to a simple script from Grey’s Anatomy.

This was where we did our screenshots and that was the setup for Grey’s Anatomy.. Boooyah man!!! I got to act in that script! But I was hopping for Christina instead i got Meredith – not complaining hehe just telling. After doing some scene study and shooting, all the writers, directors and actors sat down for a reading session. See we had 16 writers meaning 16 scripts. Out of those 16 scripts, originally 4 were supposed to be picked so that could turn them into short films. But all the scripts were really good, so the tutors – after about nearly two hours of arguing it out – they picked 5 instead. Woots!! Great for the actors and the 5 scriptwriters, terrible for the directors. lol. Long editing process. Yves, the screen direction tutor sure had a long two days. 

 

 

 

We had some time to shoot pictures in class for a bit.

 

The lone actor with the writers :)

What I like the most about these two pictures at the staircase. I’ve always wanted to be in an art school and this was the closest I got to one. Imagine doing for a whole one year or three years of just purely interacting with the same people who have the same passion as you. We all spoke the same kind of lingo. We knew what were “eyelines” meant, what were the different kinds of shots called, what it meant to do characterization homework before a shoot. We all just understood what it was all about. Just that time of education where everyone wanted to learn a craft was just…. wow!

 

Who would’ve thunk that I would be working on Calvin’s script again along with MinLi’s boyfriend, Prakash who is also in the course but he was in the Screen Direction workshop. I was working with Laura and Kelvin in a love triangle. It was a situation where my character Linda had a huge crush on her old friend John -played by Kelvin. While John had a major crush on Vicki played by Laura. Felt quite Korean drama in a way lol. Here we are in the wardrobe department… our own version la. 

 That’s Laura over there putting on her makeup. 

We had about two days to rehearse and work on the characters. Discussing possible camera angles with the directors. Finding out the back story about the characters from the writer.  Then another two days to shoot the two minute film. 

 

This was what our set look like. I have to say my three directors – Raymond, Prakash and Adrian did a fab job on making the plain room look into a cozy office for an ad agency. 

 

 

The thing about shoots.. anything to do with the word shoot. Means you have quite a fair bit of waiting to do. That’s Raymond, giving some feedback I think. Prakash on the camera – our director of photography (DOP) and Adrian our sound man. 

Prakash and Adrian hard at the editing process. The end result was gorgeous guys. I don’t think I could’ve asked for any better directors, who understood the actors and did nothing else but try to make the story look good. Two thumbs ups! Raymand wasn’t around cause the poor guy had an asthma attack the day just before the finale. 

Friday night was the only time we got to party with everyone cause our tutors were to leave on Saturday night itself. It was a weird party, since we were all left standing not knowing where to go. I think we hung around for about 3 hours till finally someone made the decision that we were to go to Quattro.

 Here are nearly all the actors, directors and a couple of lone writers (that’s one of them right there in the blue sleeveless top :P – her name is Charlene) all waiting in front of Quattro. Cause at first we didn’t know we had a table booked for us, so we ended up walking to klcc after some of us paid a RM20 valet parking in front of Avenue K straight to The Apartment. 

 

Hanging at The Apartment first. 

 

 

At The Apartment, we had beers all around. i have to say I don’t think I’ve drunk that much beer in a week. Aiii calories calories. It’s a party la give us a break.

 

 This is Yves Stenning the screen direction tutor who is a real happening dad. 

 

 And the sweet script writing tutor Nicholas Parsons. He reminds me a tadbit of Hugh Laurie. 

 

 Last but not least, Tahnee Mcguire a real sweetheart who was our course supervisor. Right behind me is the other lone writer, Sophia Goh. 

 

 

And final of the final. A picture had to be taken with the three chicas that I totally enjoyed hanging out with at nights after classes.

By the way out of respect for my tutor Mr Nicholas Bishop, I’ve not put up any pictures. We all had a nice discussion of what it means to be a celebrity and he is a well known one, especially in Australia with his own bunch of whacky fans. So just not to give them the satisfaction, no pictures :P  

Nicholas Bishop is a fantastic actor and tutor. He did nothing else but guide us on the journey of acting. Giving us the right technique and tips squeezed in just two weeks. He also happens to be the person who started ‘The Screen Actor‘ course at NIDA in Sydney

I have to say, with the hard work from everyone along with his great directions, we all surprised ourselves with the results. Some have found this a new joy and I sincerely hope that they will continue acting for a long time more as there are untapped potential talent. All the 14 actors – me included – you know who you are!

Saturday was the day of the finale, where we showcased everyone’s work. Directors and actors who made the five short films, along with 2 minutes pitches from all 16 of the writers. Time for everyone to get their ceritifcations and say their goodbyes..for now. I hope I get to work with all them again. That for certain we shall. :)  

   

 

Theatre Auditions

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The other night I had gone to KLPAC for the Ismail Audition that has been circulating around on kakiseni and of course on the KLPAC grounds. It was quite a scare heading in to audition for my drama teacher Joe Hasham. Why? Probably because this where he is no longer posing as teacher anymore but rather as that person who auditions you. Very different from the teacher in class where if you make a mistake it’s not so bad, just do it again and again till you get it right. Auditions for a performer is the real world. It’s just like a job interview. You go in not knowing what to expect, you have to be quick on your feet, you have to think real fast… of course you answer accordingly with your body. Where they will ask you to show you what you got. Usually at theater/musical auditions this is what they will ask you to do:
  1. It’s most likely the will ask you to DANCE first. Either they will give you a choreography which ranges from very simple to ridiculously complicated. Or you have to come up with your own routine already prepared from home and your own music. The latter of course sounds nicer, but you never know when sometimes you may forget your own choreography.
  2. Next up in line is they will ask you to SING. Have a song already prepared that you are comfortable with. Either have a minus one version, a piano sheet or have your voice really ready with accapella. But I noticed that some musicals prefer that you have some background music, and you may put them off if you go in with accapella. After singing your song, or prior to it. They may make you follow along with certain notes on the piano just to see your range or your ability to follow notes through.
  3. From there, they may hand you a SCRIPT and give you a role to try out for. Some may allow you to read from the script, others will insist that you memorise the script, which I hate! I’m already in enough stress as it is, stop making remember lines! But you have to be professional about it and pull through.
Those are the main things they would ask you to do. Another thing to be prepared for is, if you screw up on the first go at an audition, there is the likelihood, they will actually say stop..thank you very much and you free to leave now. Ouch! That means, sorry my dear you didn’t impress enough on the first go, so rather than wasting our time and yours we don’t to see what else you have to show. It’s harsh… :sniff: Thankfully I made it through for the Ismail auditions call back along with Min Li whom I met that same day. So we auditioned in the same group. Phewww. All the best to the both of us for next Monday.

The Emperor Trailer

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I am seriously so proud to say that my friend did this video. Her cinematography is really something to look forward to and brings in a different flavour to our local film scene. I am promoting it even more so because a number of the casts are friends of mine and I’m also in it. Albeit very very small. It was fun doing the shoot which you can . The main cast are Alfred Loh, Adrian Lai and Sean Yap whom I want to thank again for being so supportive to the platform performance last night. Adrian I’m so jealous of you, you always look good bleh ^_P hehehe. Other friends in the cast are Min Li, Sani, Grace (who is confirmed on Broadway Parodies Again Lah – congrats girl!!!), Victor and Kid. Forgive me if I get anything wrong… :aya: Anyways, don’t let me bore you have a look at the Emperor Trailer directed and written by Juliane Block.

Post Platform Evaluation

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As some of you may know. I was at KLPac just now to perform for . [singlepic=21,450,,,center] [singlepic=20,450,,,center] I was in two short skits () one called Stuck by Glamorique and another called Red:A modern Day Fairytale by Calvin Wong. The thing with tonight…I was totally taken aback when i found out, that there were to be only two performances. See it’s suppose to be whoever that has a script they send it in for the month and perform it for people to see. But it’s quite sad that the people sending in scripts was so little. In the end it was only two performances…which was not knew to me, but had me both in them. On one hand i felt terrible because, it made me feel like such a stage hogger. But on another, I liked seeing it as a ‘platform’ where I could test myself and see has there been any differences since taking on Joe’s class. I will say that the classes have given me tools in order to figure out how to create a character and perform it better on stage. But as for my confidence…. oooo I need to buck up. :sniff: The night started off rather interesting with Glam’s campy comedy piece on the two Siamese Twins of different sexes, where I played the Talk show host who was so full of herself, Cherilyn Su. I’ll be evaluating myself here and I will say that I did not play her to my best abilities as I know I could have. Problem was I think the nervousness of being in two plays and the paranoia that both might have been bad, must’ve gotten to me. So yes I admit to pre-performance anxiety. But where I maybe had not done fantastically, the main characters of the show Valerie and Glam were great ^_^ . Their punchlines were on the dot and Glam played his character as the over the top transexual male twin funnily. Hahaha As for Red, despite the fact that we had set the setting of the piece in New York… It was quite funny that we had gamelan music playing in the background, which was completely off as the crowd was distracted for a bit. I am happy though that what was performed turned out slightly better than what i had thought, though I was not expecting people to laugh cause it’s not meant to be a funny piece! However i suppose the reason for the laugh is because, Marvin and I managed to play the truth of our characters. Even if his cab driver character was a psychopath, with bad intentions and wanted to kill my character, Carmen. Overall I think it was a nice run, but if i ever got to perform it again, I think with more rehearsals it could be massively improved. And thanks a lot to Calvin Wong for writing the script :) So in conclusion, on my performance, I’m partially happy cause I know I can do better. I’m happy at the fact that during rehearsals there was a lot of thought put out for building the different characters for both pieces. Though I shall admit that i had put more thought into my character Carmen in Red because while it’s a simple piece of a girl riding in a cab. There was a lot going on with her. She’s new in a city filled with possible nutcases, yet she still thinks that everyone is like in her town in Maine, that is all happy and talkative. As for the acting as the talkshow host, I gave it as best as I could for just now. I had practiced as much as possible, but I believe it could’ve been better. That’s ok, it’s a learning process and that was a great one, putting theory and practical stuff from class into practice. What I just need on my end next time, is to be calm, take a moment and prepare myself way more. Since I know I need more time to get into a character, rather than just pop..whee I’m in character. DOesn’t work that way. But the night was a fun one ^_^ and I got to take pics. Heheh. I was very appreciative that Collin Kirton, Joanna Bessey and Chris Ling were in the crowd. Although i will say pressure was felt haha. Hey when you have veterans/directors of the art in the crowd, you better do well. [singlepic=22,450,,,center]

Platform Rehearsals

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This week has been rather busy for me and yesterday was probably the whole chunk of my busy cake. Next Monday, me, Marvin, Glamorique and Valeria will be performing at KLPAC on The Platform. For some of you who may not remember let me refresh thy memories. The Platform is an open mic gig that is happening through the whole year at KLPAC once a month on the first Monday at 8.30pm. You can send in anything you like as long as it’s an original script that has never been performed before. It’s a great opportunity to just show case any work that you think that has potential or if you’d like feedback. You can read more on the details . It has been a hectic schedule of work in the morning and then moving on to rehearsals in the afternoon or the evening. I was pretty beat and I still am actually. But I’m really really glad, for once I didn’t have to go driving all the way to some far off place to rehearse, so Glam and Val thank you!!! I’ll be performing two skits. Both entirely different in genre and character.. phew. Imagine.. yesterday first at work i’m acting as myself. Then rushed back home to get into character as a divaish over the top prima donna talk host and break for a moment to get into the character of a naive girl from the country side. Aiii my brain was on fire, but just goes to show important the act in Joe’s class is. So yeah for those who you can make it on Monday do come and watch the ridiculousness of the show. I’ll do my best to put on a good show for ya ^_P No pressure lol.