” Drama is primarily about action, not emotion. And the characters you play do not exist outside the pages of the script they spring from. Therefore, an allegiance to character rather than the story contained in the script is the misguided loyalty. It is first and foremost your obligation to help tell the playwright’s story rather than your character’s. That means you have to understand the mechanics of the script provided by the playwrigfht and, from that, make your own storytelling contribution before you engage in any practiacal scene work.” ( Miller 1995, p.1).

When our Director made the pulnitmate decision for us to perform Berkoff’s adaption of Kafkas’s ‘The Trial’, it was clear from the beginning this was going to be both challenging and like nothing else i had ever performed in before. Right from the first read through I  was immediately drawn to the complexity of the play, and how distinctly different each and every character was and the work that was going to be needed to reach the standards Berkoff intended his characters to reach.

     One of the most challenging , yet enjoyable parts of the process was the formation of the Chorus, who are a fundamental part of the play.  They link each scene together and show the audience the distinct contrast between the normality of Joseph K and their absurdness. Right from our first rehearsal our Directer Lucy got us to sit in our beginning positions and one by one we created our grotesque persona’s. “The grotesques are close to caricature. They have the same relationship to everyday life that can be seen in humorous drawings. They never deal with feelings or with psychology, but only with social functions.” (Leoq 2002, p 125).  Through exercises such as facial and physical warm ups, we were able to gain confidence and maturity in creating these grotesque persona’s which carried the story through  song , dance and sound scapes, and by narrating us through the story of Joseph K’s struggle. Physically the production was also very demanding as the pace needed to be fast moving and precise , so to be eating healthy , exercising regularly and leading a healthy lifestyle was something i chose to incorporate also to try and give as much physicality and energy as required.

With the creation of my character Leni, this came from an original idea from Lucy pictured this character to be, which was then development and practiced over time. When i originally read about this character i could not get my head around what her motifs and character was really about as one moment she seemed calm and collected, and the next crazy and wild! After some discussion with Lucy and bringing this character to life however, it soon began to make sense. I thoroughly enjoyed bringing this character to life, and as each rehearsal happened, I began to feel more and more comfortable with this part and began to have fun with it. Her wide eyed, childish behavior was even more developed when we began to do runs in costume as i then could exaggerate this character further by the use of my long skirt and a defined walk.  The relationship of her character with Joseph K was also interesting to develop overtime as it was for the other characters also. Each character Joseph K met with was a different scenario. with him becoming more and more distressed as the play goes on.

A useful game we played at the beginning of our rehearsal was to stand up individually and create a freeze frame of one of the characters within the play. This was both useful and interesting as we were able to see how clear and obvious the characters we all created were and if they could be exaggerated any further.

As an Actress i have thoroughly enjoyed partaking in this production and have never felt like a company has worked so hard both physically mentally and emotionally.

Word Count -623

Works Cited

Lecoq J-(2002)  The Moving Body- Teaching Creative Theatre -Methuen Publishing Limited

Miller B-(1995) The Scene Study Book = Roadmap to Sucess – Methuen Publishing Limited