9

“Hold onto your butts!” mutters Samuel L. Jackson as our heroes start their tour in Jurassic Park. For our research presentation on the visual effects in this film my partner, American classmate Matt Block, kicked us off by saying the same thing to the class. We had a lot of fun with this presentation, maybe a bit too much. We came dressed in shirts, khaki shorts and long socks, I wore a hat, and Matt broke out his wound make-up wizardry to give us each some vicious looking cuts and bruises; as if to suggest we’d just survived Jurassic Park! I hope we don’t get marked down for not taking it seriously enough. We saw no point in making the presentation dry and academic even if that is what the assignment might have suggested. I learned that theoretical and academic research doesn’t have to be dull and dusty. It can be an exciting adventure, complete with dinosaurs!

This week was the culmination of all our work on the Mike Leigh project. We’d all created and developed our own characters, we’d met with other characters and worked on improvisations, as a group we’d written a script, and now this week we shot it. It was very quick. We only had one day to shoot a twenty-minute script so it felt a bit rushed through and before I knew it we’d wrapped, and that was the end of my character.

Also this week I met up with a very friendly agent and actress called Joanna Hole. She is almost certainly the most useful contact I have but it was so refreshing just to meet up and chat as real people. I didn’t feel I needed to ‘make an impression’ or ‘network’ in any way, we just genuinely got to know each other a bit. And that’s what it’s really about. I do think a career ought not to be built just on contacts with people that you know a bit or have worked with, but on real relationships.

I love Christmas. And I love singing. So imagine Carol Services. Actually the best thing about Carol Services for me is that they’re an excuse to bring friends along to church. All three of my flatmates came along last Sunday evening. I was part of a small group singing Silent Night in English, German and Mandarin! This Sunday two of my classmates came along. All Souls do awesome Carol Services. Joyful arrangements of carols with a big orchestral accompaniment, powerful musical performances, and an engaging talk about the real meaning of Christmas where the Gospel is explained loudly and clearly. Just perfect for bringing my non-Christian friends along to and it always led to good chats later on.

What were the odds that I would end up living right next to the work place of one of the only people I know in London, a primary school teacher called Alice? What are the chances that she would be responsible for putting on a nativity show and would invite me to come in and help? What is the likelihood that it would actually happen? Not high, but it did. I love being with and working with children so much, and I really miss it when I’m studying; there’s too many people of a similar age about. I need to spend time with some like-minded primary school kids to get things back in perspective. So I went in one day, watched them rehearse the play, gave them some suggestions and played some drama games with them. I enjoyed it just as much as my course work. It’s been said before: acting is child’s play. So maybe this is another option for the future. As Alice put it in a text afterwards, “You had a real natural flair with them – if you don’t make it to Hollywood…”