Tag: Emma Chadaway

During the rehearsal process for Cagebirds, I found that I felt more comfortable and free with my character development once we had begun to rehearse with both props and costume. As Cagebirds is such a highly visual, physical piece, attempting to achieve the correct level of characterisation when having nothing to physically work with was particularly difficult. Not only this, but so much of the birds character traits are revealed in the way that they interact with things, meaning that once I had the props, I was able to develop my character as I was forced to decide how she would utilise the various toiletries that were available.

The main prop that I had consistently throughout rehearsals was a small compact mirror that I had been instructed to use as and when I felt it was appropriate. As my character was so painfully self-obsessed and constantly concerned with looking perfect I felt that she would probably be looking into the mirror for the majority of the time, even when talking to others. I played around with this within rehearsals, varying when I looked into the mirror and when I primped and preened with the make-up and hair supplies that were my other props. I felt most confident in my characterisation when using the mirror, particularly to deliver my lines to. I felt that my character would be more concerned with how she looked when she was saying things to others, rather than being concerned with how they took what she had to say. I also felt that this added another layer to my characterisation, as constantly looking at myself in the mirror when I was speaking became almost painfully difficult. The self-obsession of my character had to be at the highest level in order for me to match the other, more distinctive birds on stage. By forcing myself to consistently check my appearance at any given opportunity, it allowed the slightly darker themes of the play to come out. The themes of obsession, of trapping yourself and not wanting freedom felt extremely applicable to the Gazer, and I felt it was appropriate to never sit still, to always be looking in the mirror then finding some kind of beauty product to utilise. This became an almost frantic sense of never being satisfied, of attempting to reach an unachievable level of perfection, which I think added more depth to my character.

When attempting to create the physicality required for this production of Cagebirds, I undertook some research and was influenced by the work of Meyerhold, particularly his system of biomechanics which was a form of actor training involving using the physical body for expression. I was particularly interested by the way he wanted actors to acquire “the skill of expressive movement: to improve awareness of tension- relaxation; to subordinate movements to rhythm; to shift the balance; to fix positions,” (Kuzina). Meyerhold wanted to train his actors using etudes, which are defined sets of movements that allude to a certain activity. The “basic skills developed here are precision, balance, coordination, efficiency, rhytm, expressiveness, responsiveness, discipline and playfulness” (Pitches, 2003, p. 126). This seemed applicable to our production as we were all developing our own rituals for each individual character, similar to Meyerhold’s etudes. Meyerhold wanted biomechanics to “be a collective, not an individualistic, training and the idea of the actor fitting into a group was seen…to be healthily creative” ( (Leach, 1989, p. 73). This was extremely applicable to Cagebirds as although we were all involved with our own rituals, the overall effect was of us all participating in one large ritual, collectively.

Alicia had also suggested that each character had their own personal vocal ‘tick’, a sound that could signify the bird and allude to its personality through sound alone. These ‘ticks’ then grew to be more prevalent within the show, being overlapped and blended together to create different atmospheres at pivotal points during the production. My personal vocal ‘tick’ was difficult to create, some other actors decided that they would imitate the bird that they were portraying. I did not feel that this suited my character, who would want to appear as self-satisfied, contented and confident. We experimented with several choices during rehearsal but both Alicia and I felt that the noise that best suited the Gazer was a high-pitched, drawn out, contented sighing noise. This allowed the audience an insight into my character before I had even begun to speak, something which felt appropriate with the style that we had gone for as a company.

Works Cited

Kuzina, E. Biomechanics of V. Meyerhold for Contemporary Theatre . Available: http://www.biomeyer.com/main_en. Last accessed 25th May 2013.

Leach, R. (1989). Vsevolod Meyerhold. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Pitches, J. (2003). Vsevolod Meyerhold. Oxon: Routledge.

When I was first introduced to the play, The Cagebirds by David Campton, I was immediately stuck by the scope that it allowed for the actors playing each role. The simplistic nature of the text and the lack of many stage directions meant that there would be a lot of characterisation work required throughout this process in order to create both an entertaining and coherent piece. This characterisation work would be a combination of my own personal research and opinions on the character and the director, Alicia’s vision for the overall piece.

At the initial read-through, Alicia had prepared a preliminary cast list for the actors and had assigned us each to a role. The character that I was assigned was that of the Gazer, who as a character has certain obvious attributes. On the first read through, I made some notes on my initial impression of my character:

• Self-obsessed
• Obsessed with appearance
• Very proud
• Fishes for compliments
• Likes to think she is better than everyone
• Materialistic
• Shallow

These were very basic notes that had been jotted down as the read through was happening, but I wanted to ensure that my initial impressions were noted so that I could develop these as the rehearsal process went by.

During our initial discussions as a group, it was made clear that a lot of the pressure was on the actor’s portraying the ‘birds’ due to the plays static and at some points boring nature. This meant that a lot of individual research and character development was required. This seemed like quite a daunting task, so I researched actor training and looked at Stanislavski’s An Actor Prepares. It is said that “becoming acquainted with a part is a preparatory period in itself. It begins with one’s very first impressions from the first reading of the play” (Stanislavski, 1961, p. 3). I had made initial notes on my character and used these as a basis as they “are unexpected and direct…unpremeditated and unprejudiced” (Stanislavski, 1961, p. 3). Although this absurdist play perhaps does not allow for such a naturalistic way of preparing for a role, I wanted to dig deeper into my character in order to allow for an authentic portrayal.

We had agreed that the production would have a highly physical element, with all the characters having a particular bird assigned to them. This was a collaboration between the actors, the director and the costume designer. The bird that I was allocated was that of a peacock. I undertook some preliminary research into the behaviour of the bird, as it had been suggested that each actor would take on the ‘walk’ of their particular bird. I used the following video as a reference point:

I noticed that the peacock has a dinstinctive shuffle where it ruffles up its feathers whilst displaying them. I thought that this particular trait would really suit my own initial characterisation of the Gazer, as it comes across as attention-seeking, self important and proud. I trialed this movement during rehearsals, and got positive feedback from the director, Alicia so decided to keep it as part of my physical characterisation.

Whilst watching this video, I also took note of the particular head movements that the peacock makes, as we had been informed that we would all need our own personal head twitch throughout Cagebirds. I took note of how the peacock tends to move with its head first before its body, and attempted to copy this during rehearsals when examining the props surrounding me. This particular process was very difficult, as the non-naturalistic jerky movement was hard to maintain throughout. It required a lot of practice to get the right balance of head twitches, so that the impression of a peacock was given, without it being too much of a caricature.

I found the walk to be the most difficult part of my characterisation as the movement of a peacock is not particularly elegant, sophisticated or attention-seeking, something that I knew my character had to embody. During the rehearsal process, a lot of time was spent perfecting each birds’ individual walk, and many ideas were trialled. We explored the idea of a direct copy of the peacocks walk, but found that it did not give off the correct air of superiority, we also tried a strut, but felt that this was not bird-like enough. In the end, we settled on a slightly swaying totter, with more emphasis on the ‘shuffle’ than the walk. This was not only a character based decision, but a practical one, with my character having to navigate different levels frequently throughout the performance, this walk allowed me to do this quickly and efficiently.

Works Cited

Stanislavski, C. (1961). Creating a Role. New York: Routledge.