John Cremer characters and scenes

We’ve named this after John Cremer from The Maydays as we learnt it from him.

So often in life we are having to pretend. We may have something going on in our life, or feeling a certain way, and yet then have to put on our professional face and go to work or school. We feel impulses all the time and yet have to block them to fit in and function.

This exercise is the opposite of all that and encourages people to find characters and scenes from living truthfully in the moment.

The director talks people through in these steps:

1. Everyone finds a space in the room, either stood up or sat down.
2. They close their eyes.
3. They connect to how they actually feel in the moment.
4. They don’t question question why they feel that, just acknowledge that it’s there.
5. They gradually allow their body to match that feeling, so not have the body “pretend” anymore. If they are tired they may lie down, if feeling nervous they can match that, if happy they may start jumping up and down.
6. They let that all increase.
7. They open their eyes.
8. They make sounds, whatever comes in the moment.
9. They walk around the room interacting in the moment with these new characters based in truth.

Can also do as scenes on stage.