I was so excited to be accepted into a 5-day-long intensive course in The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, led by Paula Garfield (Deafinitely Theatre), which was packed with expertise and collaboration. In such a short time, we all covered so much!

• Acting for theatre (led by Paula Garfield)

• Acting for Film (led by Frazer Cobb)

• Translation in BSL (led by Paula Garfield)

• Movement in space (led by Anna Seymour)

• Translation from Text to BSL/VV (led by Lisa Kelly)

• Developing Visual Vernacular (led by Zoë McWhinney)

• Had a Q&A with Fifi Garfield & Rose Ayling-Ellis about the current acting industry and hopes for the future

To wrap it all up, we chose parts from Contractions (Written by Mike Bartlett), Grounded (written by George Brant), or Bull (Written by Mike Bartlett) and performed them in front of our group for peer review/ feedback. (I performed a scene from Contractions).

AS AN ADDITIONAL BONUS - that week we were lucky enough that there was such plentiful Deaf-informed, and Deaf led art on offer that we could catch after the workshops (Pictures below):

• Watched SORDA and took part in asking questions to the Director, Eva Libertad

• Watched the Deaf Republic (co-collaborated with Illya Kaminsky’s poems) and talked to Lisa Kelly (actor) & Zoë McWhinney (consultant and writer) about its production.

I feel so honoured to laugh with and learn more from all the people I met this week. I look forward to seeing, working and laughing with all of them again in the future.