Experience about the two monologues

This week, we acted out two monologues which base on the plot of the "Fences"; and my monologues are about a man who is called Gabriel.

Because half of Gabriel's head was gone during the war, and he got a metal plate on his head, he was foolish all the time. My part was about Gabriel talked about how he and St. Peter ate cookies in heaven and also how happy he was when he saw St. Peter got his brother's name in the book.

The most important emotion of Gabriel is that how cheery he was all the time. when I acted out the first draft of the monologue, I tried to be happy, and did some exaggerate body movements in order to show how happy Gabriel was. But I felt awkward and nervous when I was on the stage, I did not smile at all. Also at the beginning of my monologue, I did not stage well so I just stood there and grabbed my sleeves. But after I sit down on the stage, I felt much comfortable so I spoke fluently.

During the second monologue, instead of standing there and holding my sleeves, I actually ran to the center of the stage and then sit there, made eye contacts with audience and I think the most improvement for me is the volume of the sound. There is line which Gabriel said:“St. Peter would go off to sleep and tell me to wake him up when it's time to open the gates for the judgement.” Because this is a secret, I tried to whispered instead of talking.

By performing this monologue, I realized that it would be much easier if a person was not getting nervous or awkward on the stage. Also, audience might influence actors. So during the play, if an actor make some mistake, do not laugh at him or her. Because that will make him or her feel sad and it also might distract him or her.

For me, the difficulties are I will not express my emotion if I feel embarrassed or awkward on the stage. Also, I could not smile in front of people. I could only smile or laugh when my friends around me.

My classmates did pretty well on the monologue! One thing is that they can control their feeling and show it to audience. Like I felt how sad Rose was when my classmate said words with trembling sounds. One thing that is difficult for them is to memorize the script(monologue). Sometimes they forgot the next words, and then they had to go over it again. When they did the second time, it would not be better than the first time. Because they would be more nervous.