Laura Ferrin (England) BAPP Blog

Through my research in to gender roles in the theatre industry for my inquiry, I have really found it fascinating to read so much in the wider sphere of 'feminist theory'.  Perhaps due to the fact I went straight from doing my A Levels to what was essentially a vocational course and read mostly fiction, listen to 'The Guilty Feminist' podcast and saw a lot of theatre, my knowledge of 'feminism' as a concept stems mostly from real-life experience. General awareness and study are really two wildly different things! However, through study I am discovering so much depth within feminist theory that I'm finding so interesting.  We are so quick to call ourselves 'feminists', especially within our generation who have grown up with the waves pretty much behind us. There is an inherent privilege (in my opinion) to be fighting for pay equality as a movement- but also able to live in a Western society, with the ability to be independent and forge our own paths s...

 As we start the new term and Module 3, I am feeling quite capable and ready to explore my research topic. This post will be a little abstract, a dash fractious and very reflective, but at the end of the day that is strongly encouraged on this course so I’m going with it!  It’s strange that in a time which involves a ‘whole world’ crisis and a more specific crisis in our industry, I feel so strangely equipped to move forward.  Even though everything changed overnight back in March, I recently realised that the friends I had that were used to performer life or freelance life adapted and flourished even amongst the absolute chaos around them. My belief that ‘adaptability’ is the key factor to sustaining a career in the arts (and quite frankly, just as an attitude to life!) feels even more relevant now. After all, performers never know where they’ll be in three months, or six months in- between jobs. They can deal with finding a job in-between, making their money work, start...

In Conversation! Lisa Kron:   I didn't start out as a writer. I was an actor. But I was told from the very beginning that there was no place for me in the theater. Lucy Simon:  Who told you that? Lisa:  My college theater professors who said, "You either need to lose fifty pounds or gain fifty pounds." As I like to say, I was told I was a character actress , which was a code word I realised later for "lesbian"…This professor said to me in a completely matter-of-fact way, "Well obviously, as you know, you don't convey any sexuality onstage." Why you would say that to a nineteen-year-old girl— Whilst researching further in to my topic for the inquiry in Module Three, I found this incredible article which facilitates a discussion between a group of prominent writers in musical theatre. What strikes me is that so many of these female writers have stories about being actors first and writing their own work because they have been told there'...

During a conversation with Adesola today, I had a bit of a lightbulb moment. I have been an actor and writer most of my life, but I had never undertaken the role of a ‘researcher’. Today, I realised that I had always seen research as this clear cut, clinical, unattainable thing. What I hadn’t quite understood was that research is just a means to develop understanding and doesn’t have to be closed minded or structured and clear cut.  The conversation made me revisit my favourite Ted Talk with fresh eyes, ‘The power of vulnerability’ sees the brilliant Brené Brown talking about vulnerability as a strength, human connection and her research in a lot of depth.  Upon rewatching, I realised that she approached her research with the same feeling I had: she wanted to break down ‘shame’ and understand it fully, putting it in to a neat little box that made total sense and wasn’t messy in any way. Of course, then she discusses how that year long project became six years of stu...

The RELIEF ! I have to admit, this has been the toughest module for me, both in terms of content and outside events (Life changing pandemic, anyone?) but I managed it, in spite of an incredibly stressful period in my life. Whilst writing my critical reflection I was able to come up with rather a lot of things that I had learnt during this period and also within the realms of module 2. Firstly, I’ve written on my blog before about how I’ve adapted to the lockdown, and I suppose from the outside it’s looked like it’s been easy for me. In some ways, creatively it has! The radio hosting and editing (which I’ve never done before!) is certainly a new skill and string to add to my bow as an actor!  But on a personal level, it’s been very taxing and worries about how I’m going to sustain myself mentally and financially have been constant. Absolutely everything in my life has been affected including my finances, my mental health, even my wedding date! 👰🏻 However, I have also l...

As I mentioned in my last post, we began using our time in Lockdown to adapt and work creatively. As we saw the way things were moving forward with the Coronavirus we bought a Vocal Booth to record remotely and both Tom & I signed up to a Voiceover site to do ad hoc work. After a short time we were asked to present ‘Children’s Corner’ on new Irish radio station Quarantine FM: Over the course of producing this new show, I felt I’d enhanced my skills and started to get to grips with remote recording and editing software. For ‘Children’s Corner’ Tom and I created content with the focus being on high energy games and a large section focused on a ‘theme’- like Under the Sea or Antarctica! We added in fun facts to educate about the topic and then the show culminated in a story involving the places we’d talked about. Although we had a vague outline of the segments and the storyline, most of this was just diving in and inventing characters and accents as we went along. As actors who h...

Hello everyone! Wanted to separate this blog from the previous as I felt it was important to focus on moving forward and talk about what I’m doing now at this strange time! First up, our friend has set up a pirate radio station called Quarantine FM! Tom and I are contributing our skills on the airwaves, presenting and creating a show called ‘Children’s Corner’. Yesterday we recorded lots of idents introducing the different shows and I was very much getting to grips with editing software - trying to improve my skills which will be needed over the coming months! We already had a fabulous mic but we bought a vocal booth because we wanted to make sure we could record over this quiet period in great quality too. Today we’ve been planning the segments and will be recording later on- which is exciting! We also were forced to cancel our cabaret for the safety of our performers and audience,  but we are hoping to pre- record and stream it tomorrow evening. Of course we will be ...