Performance Day

Today, we did our performance twice; once to a class and the other to our real audience. Both were very different and contrasted because of the audiences' ages and qualities. Also, we ran through all the different sections and transitions of the show so that we were all clear on what we were doing.

Practice Audience
The first audience had passed my window group on their way to the foyer for the show to begin, and we didn't realise it was them at the time until they had gone past and the initial surprise we wanted them to feel wasn't going to be there anymore. So when the piece began, they knew that we were there, but they still watched our part as a respectable audience would and moved on. When we ran through to get to our promenade line part, we didn't know how to get past the audience because we didn't want to go through the front and break the concentration they had on the locker people, so we squeezed behind them and had to use an alternative route to get to our places due to the fact that the audience were moving so much quicker than we thought they would have. So if we had gone up to our places via the stairs we planned to take, we would have had to squeeze past the audience and they would have seen us run to our places and start.
The transition from the promenade to the speed dating was smooth and went according to plan, but the speed dating didn't. The boys who sat down at my table didn't understand why we weren't replying to them and some of them got frustrated and left before the time was up. There were different approaches to trying to coax an answer out of us from gentle talking and guessing what we wanted to say to aggressive ways of asking where they were direct, quite rude about it and intimidating. The range of reactions I got were interesting because this is a situation which threw the actor/audience relationship for them and they didn't know what to do or how to react, so they left out of confusion and perhaps copying what all their peers were doing in an attempt to look 'cool'. This was one thing that I wasn't expecting so if it were to happen again, I was prepared.
Everything else went according to plan and the audience were very cooperative and helpful with feedback.

Proper Audience
The proper audience were a lot more cooperative and mature than the first audience because on the speed dating part, there wasn't anybody walking out or making comments. The men I had at my table for speed dating were actually quite sweet and they reacted how I had expected them to. I could see that they were confused and it might have kicked their self-esteem down a little bit but they understood that I wasn't talking because I couldn't not because I didn't like them.
The transitions were smooth, quick and lasted about 2 minutes. The audience didn't get in the way and some of them actually helped move the chairs. The gameshow went very well and the positioning was better than the first run-through because at first, the scientists and the panel were too close together and it looked like they were one whole panel. This time, they were separated and both in good lighting.
The chair transition from the gameshow to the dance and physical part was slightly more different because I wasn't expecting to have as big of an audience as we did. Some of us danced the chairs to their place and others danced the audience to the seats and those who were dancing the audience to their seats were only really meant to take one member at a time, but they had to take two people at a time by the hand. Some of the audience members went along with it and let themselves be pulled and danced to wherever, but some others weren't so sure of the actors and may not have trusted them so they were a bit more difficult to move. Otherwise it could have been because they're uncomfortable with physical contact from people who they don't know. People can be quite reserved with the hand holding but it worked and we got them to their seats quickly and it was fun for them.

I think on the whole, the performance went really well because nobody forgot lines, dropped the energy and the audience were always intrigued. If I were to perform it again, I would change where my window group come back inside the building to one of the two fire exits to avoid the audience: one behind the space, somewhere the audience wouldn't be accessing whatsoever or another fire exit which is in another corridor that is further away, but only by a little bit and it's right by the stairs.
Personally I think I did well because I didn't drop the energy, lose my physicality or character, my Australian accent was sturdy and it didn't falter into my normal accent. The only thing I would have improved about my performance is contact with the audience. Even though I was speed dating at a table, I didn't lead any of them to the chairs after She Loves Me She Loves Me Not and my eye contact went above their heads. I only looked a few of them in the eye.