This document provides a self-evaluation by Betsy-Jo Warren of her performance in a showcase called "A Night at the Musicals" where she demonstrated her skills in acting, dancing, and singing. The showcase included performances of songs and dances from Chicago and other musicals. Betsy-Jo discusses preparing for her roles, rehearsing choreography such as "Cell Block Tango" and "All That Jazz", working with her ensemble, and overcoming challenges with character development, vocals, and adapting to a smaller stage than anticipated. She reflects on the value of recording rehearsals and receiving feedback from various teachers to improve her skills for the showcase.

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Final evaluation
On Thursday 23rd of February I performed in my showcase called ‘A Night at the Musicals’ it
contained all three art forms that I was being examined for.The idea of this showcase was to
have each performance go into the one that had previously been on stage, this is so that there
were smooth transitions and that the performance didn’t seem jumpy. In order to prepare for
this I had to develop my existing skills in order to prove could acting and dance.
In this showcase I had to show that I was capable of performing all three art forms. In order to
do this I had choose songs and dances frommusicals that included all three, me and my group
decided that All that Jazzand Cell BlockTango fromChicago wouldbe perfectas they contain
monologues to act while I wouldhave to sing and dance. I also had to take part in a solo
performance and an ensemble singing piece.
In order to start learning Cell BlockTango and All that JazzI had to learn about the
choreographer and his background. I started to look at how Fosse grew up and learnt about all
of the promiscuous clubs and bars he used to perform in. This foreshadowing his later career
and how it includes sexual tones throughout. Fosse’s style is very contorted and focuses on
certain parts of the body, forexample he would choreograph movements where only the wrist
would be moving and the performers would have to isolate the rest of their bodies.
I had to be able to perform the same dance routine to the one that they do in the show, however
many versions of the dance are performed in chairs, my group and I felt that it didn’t lookvery
intimidating, and wouldn’t be functionalfor our showcase as wewouldneed to be able to get of
stage really quickly and try to take the chairs with us as there would be no time for stage crew
to take them away.When researching differentversions of Cell BlockTango, My group and I
found one where the performers were using a ballet bar. This looked effectiveas it allowedus
all to have different levels and would workbetter withthe limited space we wouldbe provided
with when the stage was built.
Before I started to learn the choreography the group had to decide whichcharacter they would
be paying, I picked to play June, the woman who stabs her husband ten times, this was
important as it allowed me to start working on characterisation straight away. One skill that i
struggled with was my characterisation as I didn’t have the same amount of confidencein my
acting ability than I did within my singing and dancing ability. Because I knew I would have
longer to prepare my character it put me at ease and allowed me to really go into depth, and
figure out what qualities made my character how she was.
When i started to learn the choreography i felt like June was the sassy woman and that the
change in music while I was performing my monologue proved it. So when I would perform my
monologue I would have her come across as crazy to emphasise how much her husband has
affectedher mental state. HoweverIn order to improve my company and I wouldrecord
ourselves performing the sections that wehad learnt .This meant that when we watched them
back wecould see where we needed to improve. When watching it back I realised that within
the context of the show Chicago, my character would be found guilty if she acted the way I was
playing her, This motivated me to change how I played my character and make her come across
as much calmer and calculated in order to imply that her murder was pre planned and not an
‘accident’.

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I started learning the choreography in different sections starting withthe parts that were the
most challenging and would take the longest to perfect. Howeverhalf way through learning the
routine weall knew that it would have to be modified so that we could have the maximum
amount of breath controland be able to project while singing. This meant the kicks and hair
whips have to be removed so that our song wasn’t being aimed at the floorin some sections and
lose its power forthe audience.
When learning all that jazz the main problems I had was timing and being able to get into those
awkwardFosse positions. The reason this was important was because I needed to be able to
show that I could perform the style of dance that my practioner (Bob Fosse) wouldchoreograph
and to depict my understanding of his choreographic style. All that jazzwas an easier dance
routine to learn as it was all dances and sang in unison. I learnt All that Jazz relatively quickly,
this gave us more time to polish off the dance and make sure that all our movements were
executed at the same time in order forit to have the desired effectforthe audience, and to show
that I had an understanding of the dance and knew how it was meant to be performed.
To improve upon All that Jazzwe recorded ourselves performing it. This enabled us to see if we
were all in time and allowed us to be picky with our problems.For example one movement we
had to fixwas when our hands had to comedown and be flat. As before wewatched the
recording our hands were all facing different angles.
I had to source all of my costume and props, as I didn’t owna leotard or character shoes I had to
purchase some. The only problem I facedwith this was that I struggled to dance in a heel. This
was something that I had to put practice into and to do this I would bring them to every
rehearsal and wear them to rehearse in. I also soaked them in water and scored the souls of the
shoe in order to have the maximum amount of grip, so that I could build up my anger and power
throughout the dance and not feel unbalanced.
The second challenge I faced was the height of the bar wehad to dance on. As I am currently 5”
tall It was difficultfor me to look ‘stretched out’ and ‘promiscuous’ while reaching the height of
the bar. In order to fixthis our technician had to cut it down and lower it so it was more
accessible for the smaller members of the group. However even when this modification had
been completed, the bar was still difficultto use as there was a leg facing vertically on the floor,
this meant that we had to be aware of it and step over it within the dance without making it
obvious forthe audience members watching. On the night of the show weall did this with ease
and carried on making our faces and movements the focuspoint of the show.
It was necessary for me to rehearse with other teachers as they were able to improve upon
skills that other teachers couldn’t. An example of this is workingwith Mrs Guy. She is a singing
teacher and helped me to improve upon my confidencewhile singing and my projection by
teaching me how to support my voice. To do this I had to pull up my muscles in my lower
abdomen and make sure my diaphragm was wide. After learning this and working with her for a
few weeks I felt capable to perform in the showcase confidently,and give myself moments to
show my individual talent to the audience. One of these moments were when I sang my solo
‘Somewhere That’s Green’ in Little Shop of Horrors. This is the song that I had to on workthe
most at as I wouldn’t have anyone else’s vocalsto depend on. This was when my workon
projection was crucialas I had to be able to sing out through the whole theatre. I was told by
Mrs Guy to ‘Sing behind you, and to projectyour voiceto fill all of the space behind you’.This

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was so that I woulduse more energy while singing and push myself to project even further. The
one aspect about singing and projection that shocked me was that youneed to but in so much
more energy to sing the softer, more intimate parts of the song than what youneed when you’re
belting out a song.
Somewhere thats Green was not the only song that I had to workwith Mrs Guy on, I also sang
with my ensemble, ‘Little Shop of Horrors’, Skidrow’, ‘Seasons of Love’ and ‘Cell Block Tango’. It
was important forus all to attend these sessions as she helped us with our harmonies and solos.
She made it possible for us to structure our vocalsin order to let the solos shine through, an
example of this is in seasons of love when we all sing the bridge together and build up the
energy for my final high note where everyone stops singing and the audience then only have
one vocalto concentrate on. Though this was an amazing ensemble song to perform it did take
me a while to be able to comfortably reach that high note. It was important forme to be able to
execute it perfectly as the other members of my team were counting on me, If I didn’t sing it
properly or my note went flat it would taint the rest of the performance and bring the energy
down within the performance. In order to not let that happen I would practicethat high note as
much as I could, singings in rehearsals, dinners, after schools and even in the shower, which
would actually help my voiceas there is a heightened amount of water vapour in the air
soothing and lubricating the vocal chords as you sing.
Other than projection, another skill Ineeded to improve upon was my characterisation. This
was when working with my Drama teacher really helped as he always pushed us to emphasise
our emotions and to think about our body language and proxemics while performing a scene of
libretto. When I said that i would play Audrey in the little scene before Somewhere thats Green,
I was challenging myself and trying to push myself out of my comfortzone, as Audrey is a
character I haven’t really played before.She’s very coy and girly howeverin her ownworld at
the same time. The hardest thing for me to get right was her voiceas it is very high pitched with
an American accent. In order to improve my understanding of this character and how others
had played her I watched some videoclips on YouTube.While watching I found that a common
theme was her walk, where she wouldhave hardly any function in her legs caused by her pencil
skirt and her high heels. And she wouldalways seem to look away as she is quite a vulnerable
character. I started to try and add these characteristics to the scene, and others had noticed the
amount of research id done into this character. My teacher said that I needed to continue
practicing those characteristics on order to make my characterisation much more believable. I
feel that even when performing the showcase the aspect of Audrey I struggled withthe most
was her voiceand accent, as I felt that I slightly dropped it on the night. Therefore If I were to go
back and try and improve upon one thing before the showcase it would be my voiceand
intonation of my character Audrey.
I feel one rehearsal technique that helped me improve the most was to record ourselves and
watchit backas it showed to us where our faults were and what our performance looked and
sounded like to an audience. It helped the most when learning ‘All That Tango’ as it allowed me
to see if I was in time with all the other dancers and if my movements were sharp enough. One
key movement I remember it helping with the most was our hip rolls within ‘All That Jazz’ as
everyone was starting at different angles and it looked messy. It allowed us to watchit backand
make a decision as to where we were going to start our hip rolls from. We all decided the back
left corner wouldbe the perfect place as it was at the same angle formy whole company. I feel
that recording ourselves also allowed us to see if there were any chorographicalproblems. For

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example Rebecca and I have to cross over each other in order to get into the right places for
Ella’s monologue. Recording this showed to us whether it was a messy transition or not. Though
in rehearsals it wasn’t, when it came to the showcase, I looked a bit unbalanced as I had to guess
how much space I had between myself and the bar whilst walking backwards.
We also recorded some of our singing lessons in order forus to be able to hear our different
parts and learn them. This was important as it is easy to stand next to another performer and
sing their part instead of your own,so by doing this we were able to hear all the different
harmonies but pickout our ownand learn it withoutconfusion with the others.
To receivea better understanding forChicago, I first had to understand why it was made and
whoby. When we first started our preparation forour showcase we stated off withresearch. We
learnt about Fosse’s timeline of workand how he rose to fame. It became clear after watching
some of his repertoire that his night life background had really made an impression on him and
therefore on his worktoo. The darker more promiscuous atmosphere he has in his workshines
through in Chicago Starting withthe outfits wornby the women and finishing with the
suggestive chorography demonstrated by the ‘spread eagle’ within Velma’s monologue.
Howeverwe didn’t just have to learn about his past, we also had to study the differentaspect of
his choreography and what made it his ownstyle. I learnt that Fosse took inspiration from
himself, it was the reason he worehats, as he was going bald. Or the reason he isolated different
body parts, as his knees were turned inwards and he had to make up a whole new way to dance.
Being able to pick out certain movements that make a performance Fosse style and add them
into our own choreography as crucial, we had to learn about the fosse walks and how he would
isolate only writs or only legs. I feel that our rendition of ‘All That Tango’ was in true Fosse style,
and demonstrated our understanding of Chicago and Fosse himself.
While rehearsing Cell Block Tango we came across some problems, some of them had been
captured over our video recordings and rectifiedhowever others were made to be improved for
practical reasons. One of the most prominent ones was when we had to change the place of a
hair flip and some high kicks.The reason we had to remove the kicks were because some of the
people within my company were unable to execute them as they required more dance ability
than whatwe had. They reason we had to change the placement of the hair flip towards the end
of the song was because, it was impractical to sing and dance at the same time. What I mean by
this is that wewere singing towards the floor and the level of volume dropped as we were
singing. This meant that there was a risk that the backof the theatre wouldn’t be able to hear us
at this point. To rectify this problem we moved the hair flip to just before we had to start singing
and made it sharper in order for it to seem more aggressive and give to finale more power.
While practicing for our showcase we knew that wewould need a male partner to dance with
throughout Cell BlockTango, this meant that wefirstly had to choreograph our solo sections
dancing withthe man. My section was shorter than the others howeverthey all followedthe
same pattern, this was so that the choreography wouldbe easy to learn forwhoever wouldbe
playing the male lead in our dance. My section of the song was all building up to when I stabbed
my ‘husband’ witha carving knife. This was the key moment within my monologue and the
point when I would have to start choreographing the male lead. Wewould all practice being the
male foreach other in our rehearsals so that we were all familiar with the footworkandcould
lead the male as wewould need to lookmore powerful.

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After we had rehearsed our parts and felt confidentwithin them it was time to teach our male
lead Jack,whohad volunteered for us, his parts. To do this wewould have lunch time rehearsals
and make sure to go through each part as many times as possible. We had to make a few
changes with whicharm westab him withor hand him a drink withso that we were using our
upstage arms. However they were the only complications we had withworking with someone
else.
When the stage was built it became clear that we had a lack of stage than what weonce had
while rehearsing. This meant that we had to adapt our proxemics while dancing in order forus
to be able execute the choreography at as high of a standard as what we had been doing in
rehearsals prior. It also meant that we couldstage how we wouldenter and exit the stage. This
was important as the idea of the showcase
was to have each act coming on straight after the other, depicting that wewould need to move
quickly in order to stay in time with the music.
I really enjoyed working within an ensemble as it let me experience what it is like within the
industry as almost every performer in the industry has been a part of the ensemble within a
show. I liked the factthat we all depend on each other and we push each other to be the best
that we can be in order to put on the best performance possible. I also learnt so much from the
people whosurrounded me, for example Rebecca wouldhelp me with my dance technique as it
wasn’t very good when I first started, and Paige and Ellie helped me with my singing as they
have been part of the choir and knew how to help me support my voiceand how to look after it.
I have developed my confidencewhilst workingwith them and in turn made my contribution to
the performance much better and much more valuable.
Within the showcasei had one solo song ‘Somewhere Thats Green’ and solo sections within the
songs Little Shop of Horrors, Skidrow and Seasons of Love.I feel that my skills in projection and
articulation improved massively as the rehearsal process went on, as the help fromMrs Guy and
looking after my voicereally made a difference. Because of this improvement my confidence
within my singing ability improved also. I think what helped with my development the most is
starting off singing songs that were in the ensemble, meaning that i couldbounce off of the
others energy and push myself to project. This way my singing ability could improve as I needed
to be able to sing my part in order for the song sound appealing for the audience.
Because of my growth in confidenceI felt that I couldsing a solo song after a scene of libretto.
This was a challenge forme and I needed to be able to support my vocalsas I had no one else to
rely on. This used to be a weakness forme as my articulation was poor and so was my
projection and characterization.From watching videos and listening to the soundtrack I was
able to resonate withthe character and make it believable for myself and the audience. When I
started getting positive feedback it motivated me further to improve upon my skills and my
character.
When I began learning dance techniques i needed to improve on my timing, dynamics and
characterization. Howeverfrom getting help from my dance teacher and learning basic jazz and
the Horton technique helped me build a foundation to start learning ‘All That Tango’ and a high
standard. However I skill that did help me was my ability to learn choreography quickly and to
be able to retain the movements. This allowed me to put in extra practice at home so that I could
get my technique perfect.

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In order to improve further I need to continue to develop my dance skills and make sure that my
body and muscles stay flexible. I also need to continue to develop my knowledge of the different
styles of dance in order to make sure that I am a versatile performer and can dance in many
different shows in many different styles. I need to continue to lookafter my voiceand build up
my repertoire, and I need to workon my characterizationand accents so that I am able to play a
wide range of characters.