Drama Studio London
From January to August I had the pleasure to do an extended residency at Drama Studio London working across all three years of the BA Acting Course. In these very turbulent times it has been a challenging first six months. Moving everything online because of lockdown was the first big challenge, making sure student’s academic needs are met and that pastoral care is in place to support students working remotely. And more recently addressing concerns over Black Lives Matter, working hard to ensure that going forward the school has the right procedures and practices in place to ensure that the culture of the school is one where each and every student thrives.
The students are committed and engaged and I have enjoyed working across all three years of the BA Course immensely. Teaching storytelling and devising with our second years and introducing them to the headphone verbatim technique has been a joy. Students made two funny and poignant works on ‘Loss’ and ‘Faith’. The first years are now making headphone shows on ‘Strangers’ and ‘Key Workers’, following on from working with me on British realism where we did edited versions of A Taste of Honey by Shelagh Delaney and Look Back in Anger by John Osborne.
Moving to Zoom for a production of The Seagull by Chekov was quite an adventure and I found it thrilling to play with some of the advantages that Zoom had to offer us on this complex text. I set the play today in the time of Covid, Russia and with very little rewriting of the text I found it worked surprisingly well. Employing my intracultural theatre practice deepened student’s understanding of the world around them and it was a pleasure to engage in thoughtful and insightful conversations at every rehearsal. The discerning and astute reflections on the process below are a testimony of student’s interest and understanding of the complex issues of our times.
Student 1 Reflection
I remember distinctly a current 3rd year student telling me last year when he did Chekov/Ibsen, everyone got to do RP but as he was playing the only American character, he had to do a southern accent. At the time I didn’t think much on this, and I just accepted that I was going to play Nina in an RP accent, as that was how it’s been done before. Rehearsals with Kristine have made me think, if you can play any Shakespeare character with any race, sexuality, gender, age, nationality, whatever, why can’t Chekov be played the same way?
I didn’t think much, except a little relief, at being allowed to use my own accent. I try to use it whenever I can. But I could see on Hayden’s face when he was first told to stop putting on a posh accent, and just be himself. Kristine’s words are still ringing in my ears, ‘if I wanted an RP Treplev, I would have cast an RP Treplev. I wanted a Black British Treplev who’s grandmother came from the Caribbean.’ Obviously! You shouldn’t have to throw away your identity to play a part! You should bring who you are to the role you are playing, otherwise they would have just cast someone else.
I could talk about seeing the emotion and freedom and the weight that was lifted off Aitch’s shoulders when Kristine told them that they could play Arkadina as non-binary. I could talk about the simple human emotion they felt at being recognized and acknowledged as who they are. If Brutus can be played as a gay man, Mercutio as an old women, Macbeth as Trans, and the play would still make sense, and no one would bat an eye, Chekov should be the same.
How are you supposed to create a truthful and believable character if you are subconsciously uncomfortable within the rehearsal room?
Working with Kristine on The Seagull by Anton Chekhov was a unique and rewarding experience. Turning to Zoom whilst a global pandemic was changing our lives as we know it. I learnt not only how to create a play on line but I also learned a lot about the importance of ‘identity’ in the rehearsal room and how, as actors we can celebrate each other’s personal and cultural differences.
It is clear to me that we are living in a society that requires change; from the global response to the unlawful killing of George Floyd, that sparked an empowered resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement, to the twitter backlash that JK Rowling receives for her transphobic opinions. We are demanding our voices be heard.
At drama school, all students should be made to feel unapologetically safe to be themselves, without feeling like their background or ethnicity might somehow impede their training. Prejudice of any kind should be unwelcome in every drama school. Systemic and ingrained racism within individuals and institutions needs to be untangled. Jeopardising a student’s safety with displays of racism, homophobia, transphobia or the like, should be met with incredibly serious repercussions for the teacher/person in question.
As a white cisgender student I personally benefited from a system that for years has made it easier for me to succeed, it has been easy to subconsciously turn a blind eye. Now that I am being exposed to the experiences of BIPOC students and Transgender students at drama schools in the UK, I can see how much work there still is to be done. I intend to use my White Privilege to help amplify the voices of students around me that the industry looks less favourably on than myself. As well as using my own voice to be actively anti-racist.
Working with Kristine we were invited to bring our own cultural heritage and backgrounds into the rehearsals and were encouraged to explore characters in a way that felt natural to us as individuals. It was exciting to see some of my friends able to make bold and truthful choices that resonated with them personally, but this is just the start. This is a time for change; conservatoire training needs change, our industry needs change, our world needs change.
Student 2 Reflection
I had a really enjoyable, engaging and thought-provoking experience working with Kristine on an online ‘Zoom Production’ of The Seagull. Although at first I was sceptical about the quality of the work and how it would help me in my actor training, I found that Kristine very much brought the best out of myself and everyone in the cast, and helped make a really unique and memorable piece. She was always open to discussion and, especially during such a turbulent and eventful time, was very keen to hear our thoughts and ideas on inclusivity & diversity within theatre and training. Her focus on play, listening & discovery was a welcome change from the techniques of intense analysis and pre-planned actioning and I really felt it bring a liveliness to my work, and a great sense of joy to playing my character within it.
Student 3 Reflection
Having the simple, indispensable yet often unutilised permission to find the actor’s pleasure to play is one of the central themes in the journey of an actor in Kristine Landon- Smith's practice. I had the great opportunity to work with Kristine in our project of ‘The Seagull’ at Drama Studio London in the second year of my BA Acting training. Until now my process started by looking closely at text and making decisions for ‘character’, objectives and obstacles. However, it was not until I worked with Kristine that I realised how restrictive over analysing scripts and premature decision making can be when creating work. Because of this, the early stages of this process were quite difficult for me, because I was encouraged to bring myself into the rehearsal space, put myself in the driving seat and be the centre of importance in the work and to establish complicité with my fellow actors. For as long as I can remember I have been adding layers onto myself to create ‘character’ but as the process went on the idea of ‘character’ became an elusive concept that is quite inhibiting to the actor in getting to the truth of a scene. Character is made from the actor’s relationship with themselves and each other through the circumstances of the text as well as the language itself. An example of my struggles came when I kept putting on a heightened RP accent because I thought that was what the script needed. I focused on the external layers of the character and what I could put on myself to create ‘Arkadina’ instead of using my natural accent and focusing on what’s beneath the language and the giving myself permission to think- I am a red blooded human with the ability to feel all the feelings that the author has written about so I don’t need to do myself the disservice of faking it.
To continue, Kristine works very closely with the actor, I never felt alone in my anxieties or struggles nor when I was breaking through my habits to rediscover my enjoyment and personal place in the rehearsal process. However, what I really respect is Kristine’s trust in her work and the ability of the actor and that she feeds back, honestly. Warming up before a rehearsal with games and tasks that revolved around creating complicité and musicality between the actors is one of the many elements of the process I will take forward into the next rehearsal space I am in. The generosity and respect that was made between our company was a beautiful thing to be a part of and observing my peers discover and rediscover parts of themselves and having the focus on fully embodying and embracing all aspects of our personal and cultural foundations was so transformative and moving. I feel like we created magic over those few weeks and that came from the simple art of enjoying the work, language and most importantly each other. As an ensemble we brought all our stories to this story.
Student 4 Reflection
When I reflect on this process, the phrase being ‘active’ springs to mind, from a comment that Georgia made during class. I feel that the progress I’ve felt with this process lies in being able to marry being ‘active’ with ‘you’, your own humanity. But then of course humanity is different for everyone.
From watching my cohort throughout training, I’m proud to say they have gradually transformed into more confident and bold actors. With this scene study, a fresh new energy has been found. I’ve felt conviction in their deliveries, and a sense of ownership which I’ve glimpsed upon before, but this time it’s free flowing. This stands for everyone, but I’m referring mainly to black students and non-binary students in my group, who because of the respect of acknowledging their backgrounds/routes, skyrocketed their work as a result, in direct affect boosting the overall ensemble. By having the focus of bringing ‘you’, surely this must include your identity, so whether it’s an ethnicity or gender or gender expression… it is at the forefront of your ability to act, and once that is happening, the artist is free. It’s a joy to act, and a joy to be. But this was only achieved by working.
During improvisations/scenes within The Seagull, bringing everything to the forefront, for example exploring Hayden’s Jamaican, Diavian’s Guyanese, Aitch’s non binary outlook, all these peoples identities, it was actually the first time I’ve felt from them a complete surrender and an understanding that bringing your own skin is crucial, because they finally weren’t afraid to. This was of course explored with everyone, and I clearly remember everyone getting feedback in order to show themselves within the work, this is important.
However, I feel it goes much deeper than that… I came to the realisation the other day, during an improvisation with Aitch, that I’ve never had to think about my identity, and In reflection I honestly think it’s because I’m very confident that my identity is ‘accepted’ and I’ve never had it challenged or had any insecurities about bringing it forward, because I’m male, white, British, and straight. So that’s very interesting because it took one improvisation the other week for me to properly realise that, deep down. Also, I’ve known Aitch for a couple years and always supported them, knowing very early on that them being non-binary is not a choice but a fact, very much like it is that I identify in my head as male. And observing over time when for example they are mis-gendered, and not seeing a disappointment, but a draining of life from their entire being. So, as I said, they’ve always had my support, but only now do I see the power of their identity. To follow this up, it’s very interesting how knowing things on paper, talking outside of class, being aware of race etc, is very different from ‘working’ with those things within the classroom. I think there is a power here, and a great leap forward when it comes to training.
I appreciate that everything is a conversation and working with people’s identities is not a ‘labelling’ thing, but an ‘awareness’ thing, and this was very clear. Hayden worked with his Jamaican route accent in rehearsals and found a lot of colour, depth and ease, but then later chose to put that into his more generally used multi-cultural-English accent which he uses in everyday life. So, I understand that this entire way of work is an explorational thing, never about labelling, but exploring all that we can bring as an individual, and I’m confident that everyone else knows that too.
I did an improvisation with Aitch, linking it to the scene that we were playing, me being Trigorin who was announcing he was leaving Arkardina (Aitch) for someone else. Kristine factored in the reason I was leaving them was because they had made the transition from female, with details like cutting their hair short etc, so in affect I’d grown out of love with them, and they were to try and dig that truth out of me. The improvisation gave Aitch a very strong sense of raw grounding. In reflection to the improvisation afterwards, there were tears of joy from Aitch, as they were essentially at the heart of the work, and so relieved that they were acknowledged truthfully and could take this forward. I’m also aware there were tears of joy/sadness from Diavian, after having used her Guyanese accent in rehearsals to which she said, “The last time I spoke like that was in my audition”. This is upsetting for me, as I said I think I’ve never had to think in ways like this. It’s refreshing moving forward. By gaining a deeper insight into my peers has empowered me to seek new information to enable growth as an individual and a collective ensemble.
Student 5 Reflection
It was very eye opening to be exposed to Kristine’s intracultural approach in rehearsal and to witness fellow black students be given permission to use their cultural background through improvisation in order to explore being a black man or woman coming to a part predominantly played by someone white throughout history. To witness how liberating it was for the actor was a pleasure to watch and made me deeply consider outside of rehearsal how unfair it has been that up until this point in our training they had always had to forget their blackness when coming to a role but I had never had to forget my whiteness. I asked myself how can this be right, and how have I been so blind to it? I don’t think I have been blind to overt racism in my life but I definitely have been blind to covert racism that is so invisible to the ignorant eye but once revealed you realise it is one of the very foundations of every structure in place in our society. Unfortunately Drama School is just another system that perpetuates such prejudice. One of the issues is that Drama School is designed for the white student, with a euro-centric curriculum. In my experience it has also predominantly been led by a white man, with white teachers, directors and tutors. Therefore any student of colour has basically been forced to assimilate. For the first time since I started Drama School what Kristine has done has opened up the question about race and what it means in particular to be black, and though we were still rehearsing a Russian white man’s play she gave not just POC but everyone a place to bring their true artistic self to the space. She raised a very good point in our first rehearsal when we all naturally turned to an RP accent for our first read through. When did RP become the best, accepted substitute for Russian? And I agree, If it is acceptable to use RP in place of the Russian language then it is acceptable to use Guyanese, Jamaican, Scouse, West Country even my own ‘Standard’ English accent – whatever that is.
Student 6 Reflection
Coming to the floor with a full sense of one’s own background, experience, and heritage, has been incredibly eye opening, and in terms of how I will begin to approach rehearsals, and the creation of ‘character’, it is something I will always be reminding myself of. As someone who suffers from a fair amount of anxiety it’s also helped to combat these feelings as it promotes deeply that I as the actor am enough. However I’ve found this methodology creates, for the company, something far more profound.
As a white Cis gendered male it is my privilege that in most spaces including rehearsal rooms, I don’t have to feel like I stick out. In most spaces I don’t have to pretend to be something that I am not in order to fit a ‘Status Quo’. This way of working has enabled the whole company whatever their background to embrace exactly what makes them them and use it to the fullest to create rich and fully connected performances. This enabling of everyone to start from the same place enriches the feel of the entire piece, and ensures nobody is left behind in the process. It ensured no member of the company had to feel like they were coming up against additional barriers. And even further helps to create freedom for all performers.
This change is not subtle either , it is so blatantly obvious when an actor is able to be as free as they can be, that it’s shocking it isn’t something more commonly discussed before the start of any process… It is as simple as genuinely working with who you have, not who you want in front of you.
Student 7 Reflection
Working with Kristine was an eye opening experience, by her asking you to bring yourself really makes you (the actor) feel valued in the rehearsal room and gives you the belief that you are enough, which is really important. Her idea of having the pleasure to play really reminded me exactly why I fell in love acting in the first place which sometimes can be lost by getting in my head, having the pleasure to play takes you out of your head and you enjoy just playing with your cast mates. I had never worked with a director that wanted you to bring culture and use your identity when rehearsing, as a black actor I feel this is important for me as I believe sometimes black actors identify can be lost or pushed aside, I wish more directors would work like this as it really helped me to find a freedom and make bigger discoveries as an actor. I feel Kristine really takes time to understand her actors and sees their strengths and weakness and therefore gets the best out of them. I will take everything I’ve learnt working with Kristine with me into the profession, it was a real pleasure to work with her.
Student 8 Reflection
Working with Kristine has honestly been one of the best, mind-blowing and beneficial experiences I’ve had : she allowed me to dip into practices I hadn’t been able to do before. Kristine’s ideas of ‘bringing one’s cultural context’ blew my mind because I had never thought that I would be able to use my Caribbean accent in a Chekov play (‘The Seagull’).
We had intense conversations about how other black actors have questioned whether they’re black or white whilst playing roles. The conversation lead to talking about black actors experiences in playing roles. I discovered that at times, when black actors are asked to play themselves, they almost forget how to because they’ve been ‘acting white’ throughout their acting career/training. This resonated with me a lot because the majority of the time I imagine the character, other, to myself. I know that I myself am Black and everyone can see that, but I didn’t think of my character being able to express and indulge in their black culture. With playing Masha in ‘The Seagull’, I was able to do this and apply this to my character for the first time. I was able to own this character. I was able to make her my own by including my culture and just be a black woman. I hadn’t felt that I could do this before, ever. Being given permission to just ‘be myself’, all of myself, was the most euphoric, liberating feeling ever.
Also, I’m this role I got to use my Caribbean accent, which was a struggle at first. When I spoke to Kristine she understood why I was struggling and we spoke about accents, their importance and that not everything society deems as appropriate is always correct. I gradually became comfortable with using my accent in front of my peers and I had to remind myself that yes it is different but it is mine. It is not just an accent, it is a part of who I am and I’m going to own it. I’m going to take this opportunity and run with it. Any insecurities that I had, I vowed that I was going to leave them behind because this was my moment. I loved the here and now approach and I will treasure it forever. It was a truly freeing experience that I will carry with me through my actor training and career. Anyone that gets to experience Kristine’s approach should count themselves lucky because it will - along with her as a director - blow your mind!