"If You Work You Could Have The Capitano, Easy"

Today we started playing with the masks students have made themselves. Due to Barcelona I didn't get round to finishing (or starting) mine but it's coming!

"A good mask changes"

Some of the masks weren't clear enough in their features (e.g. we can't see the nose) or features were painted in distracting ways. The good ones were simple.

"When you enter you have to try many things, to know which way we like the mask."

"You have to find your way with this mask - don't imitate others'."

"Your idea of a small character is always bad...with a small character you don't progress. You play Minnie Mouse."

"You have to try the mask...to test...by walking on the edges...it's delicate."

Shout with an accent! Try and find something! With a lower voice!

"The audience wants to discover the mask everyday with you."

~

Feeling quuiiite sleep deprived I held off getting up for a while but eventually got up and tried a student-made mask (it looked a bit like a wrinkly old man). I tried lots of different voices and physicalities and characters. All whilst on stage - shifting and listening to see if anything works. Nothing really did. But then Philippe stopped me and got someone to put the mask of Il Capitano on me and hand me a sword. Then I played again as this Spanish macho soldier.

"He needs to be more ridiculous. Less logical." A song. A stutter. Philippe got me to do things like open my mouth wide, say "ha!" then close it. And repeat. Open! Close! Open! Close!... "Make your mouth tight like a puckered chicken's arse. Now BIG SMILE." Bizarre things.

"He's a floppy character. Scared of the army...of battle... Pretend to be an idiot."

"Capitano is ridiculous. He has a dream. He thinks people are looking at him when nobody is."

After a bit Philippe asked if anyone wanted to come on stage with me and do an improvisation where Il Capitano is trying to get in bed with a women - flirting - but she is very strict and won't do it for 10 minutes... There were no takers. Gutted - cause it meant I couldn't play some more. I even tried to woo someone into coming on but not today.

"If you work you could have the Capitano, easy."

I'm going to come tomorrow with a costume and work on being ridiculous. It feels really good to be getting close!

~

At the end of class Charles gave a student-made mask a go which looked a bit like the lion from The Wizard of Oz with a big brushy moustache.

He was struggling and didn't know what to do. He couldn't bring life to the mask.

Q: "Who would you have fun to imitate the voice of?"

A: Harvey (a New Yorker, new to this workshop)

So with the mask off, we enjoy Charles enjoying mocking Harvey's voice. "Hiiii everybooody! I'm Haaaarvey! Wanna do some Yooooga with meeee?" He has fun - we have fun. Then he does the same but with the mask on, and every time Philippe beats the drum he has to stop in a fixed point. With Charles' unique fun (it's his special pleasure) and with the technique of showing the mask (allowing us to see it from different angles and for a bit of time) the mask comes alive and we love it.