Throughout the stages of rehearsals I found myself getting into the role of Justin Mattison very well.
My character is so different to all the others, the prisoners and other prison officers. Justin is a kind person but isn't necessarily a push over, as we see him constantly stand up to Sylvia and saying sarky comments such as "Why do they keep sending us prisoners? Don't they know Sylvia's on her break?" in the staffroom very sarcasticly.
So my characterization needed to be precise to each scene. Vocally I was very confident, I didn't have to put on an accent, I mean I did change the way spoke but it was a very minor difference to my normal voice. Also with my singing parts I was confident, after working with Kim I felt I had the notes and cues spot on.
Interactions:I felt that my character had interactions with many other characters such as Nikki, Helen and Sylvia. These three characters were double-cast and so each time I had scenes with these characters when they weren't always the same person playing them, the scene went differently than it would with the other cast. For example, Justin and Helens scene at Helen's flat, Helen played by Emily Green and Polly Lewis, in this scene my character goes to make a move on Helen but she pulls away. With Emily's cast, Helen rests her head on Justin's shoulder and then I leaned in to kiss her, whereas with Polly's cast instead of her resting on my shoulder, I took her hands and we had a moment looking into each others eyes and then I tried to kiss her.
So working with a double cast was at times a bit confusing, but it was also quite good to work with different people as the same characters and see what effect it made on each scene.
Character pace:Throughout the scenes my character, Justin, is seen as one who is maybe taken advantage of with him being more considerate to the prisoners than Sylvia or Jim. But because he is young and wants to do well he doesn't allow the prisoners to mock him any further or get taken advantage of than what they already do. For example, the scene starting with "Justin - On you go" to the Julies before their song "Life of Grime". We see the Julies giving Justin the come on becasue he is a young good looking man but Justin won't have any of it and starts to feel very uncomfortable with the situation, but that doesn't stop him from giving them orders.
The pace of Justin makes a change in the scene where Sylvia orders a drug search and afterwards orders Justin to take Shell away. In this scene Justin makes a stand against Jim and Sylvia, "Nikki's not your enemy Dockley. And I don't take my orders from bodybag". This is where it all changes because now Justin isn't seen as just some junior officer who lacks confidence, he is now seen as a strong willing man wanting to help the prisoners get their justice.
Challenges: Something that was a challenge for me was when I had to stick up for Helen against the prisoners because obviously I wanted to be supportive and help them get through the death of Rachel but I couldn't become too friendly with them because I still have my duties as a prison guard. In Helen's flat scene Helen Stewart was double cast and so it was sometimes problematic because I had certain things I did with Emily and other things with Polly. With Emily the scene was less awkward than with Polly because in Emily's cast my character was much more comforting and gave her a cuddle to try and reassure her. Whereas with Polly the scene was extremely awkward and I had to really put myself forward to her to let her know I have feelings for. This scene was very awkward and the mood was a bit down as this all happens after Rachel Hicks' death and it's a scene of two friends just comforting one and other. But Justin gets a bit too attached to Helen as he has had his eye on her for some time now and thinks this is more than just a drink with a friend. He turns up with a half drunk bottle of vodka so his intentions weren't of a friendly drink. He makes his move on Helen whilst comforting her when she gets upset, Helen out of instinct jumps up away from him and finds it hard to explain to Justin that she is a lesbian and in love with Nikki Wade. This information doesn't particularly shock Justin and his was the bit where I had to act as if he already had his suspicions about her sexuality but thought maybe he was wrong, but it turns out he was right and doesn't make any judgements of Helen, in fact I think the fact she told him made their friendship stronger. In this scene I was able to use a real life experience to make the characterization right, I myself have been in a situation where I tried to tell a girl that I had feelings for her but got rejected to find out she was interested in anoher person. This was actually a really big deal for me and at the time I took it really well and accepted that me and this girl were never going to happen. So I used this experience to help me get the right emotions to portray this scene and this is what I found challenging because of all the emotions I felt at the time in real life.
Another part of the play I found challenging was the way the prisoners sexually harassed Justin which happened on various ocassions with the Julies and Yvonne. This made my character very awkward and uncomfortable around the women. I portrayed this well because honestly I sometimes feel awkward when I'm being harassed, like any normal person. In "All banged up" I had to develop my character a lot because when we first rehearsed this scene I struggled to stay in character but I then used that to my advantage as my character, when being groped by Yvone and the Julies was very uncomfortable and so instead of laughing I found myself rather terrified and put this into my characterization and it benefitted me and the scene well.
Comparison:
Compared with the west end version of Bad Girls, there are few differences such as the size of the theatre. The west end theatres are far bigger than our Sealight Theatre, but we made great use of the space that we had for set and lighting plans. The set is another thing that had many differences again based on the size of the theatre and performing space. We used the old metal stage blocks which actually worked really well for the scenes in a prison. The sound of metal made more effect and made it more of a prison environment.
Obviously the actors in the west end show have had more training and have had more experience with doing professional work around the country. So the abilities are different between ours and the original cast but in all honesty a lot of the time, after watching the west end show, we portrayed the characters much better than the original cast.
In conclusion, I believe that our performance of bad girls was challenging for each and every one of us.
I feel that in any production, whether it's classical theatre, musical theatre, film or tv that the opening scene has to make a big impact on the audience and engage the audience immediately. And I feel that with the opening song "I shouldn't be here" it really makes an impact on the audience, you get introduced to all the characters, the song tells a story about the prisoners and the officers. And the story unfolds in every scene, also drawing the audience in further to the characters.
I feel confident in saying that we did this production justice and I feel my performance was really good, I had some great scenes, although I wasn't a leading role, I had some vital moments that changed the storyline in someways. Such as Justin finally standing up for himself against Sylvia and Jim and joining with the prisoners to put a stop to Fenner.
All in all a good production and a great portrayal of each character.
