Proms and Petticoats

Since I left my job at the end of June, any chance of a rest have been non-existent. In fact, I think I’ve been busier since leaving work than when I was working. But one of the reasons I left — though I’ve not left permanently, sorry fellow tutors, you just can’t get rid of me — was because I knew this summer was going to be a big one. I had a dozen shows lined up, holidays planned, and rehearsals to power through. It’s been an unforgettable few weeks. I’m terrible for letting amazing experiences slip into memory, so more for my own sake, I wanted to keep them all stacked neat and tidy where I can revisit them. Once uni life hits, this summer will be a blur. It would be a shame to forget it.

Screw Your Life Advice

It’s been a busy few weeks: I took a trip with my boyfriend to celebrate our anniversary, I’ve been working and rehearsing non-stop (we perform at the end of next month!), and there have been many frequent trips to IKEA since I got accepted into uni. I didn’t anticipate how much there was to buy; thankfully a lot of my family have come through and bought the bulk of stuff (#blessed).


Despite all of the excitement and wonderful weekends spent doing lovely things, I’d been feeling a bit like crap on a stick for a while. And like anyone with access to wifi and a working internet, I tried to find the answer as to why I felt so down in the dark depths of the internet. I didn’t know why I felt like that, because there was nothing really causing it. As I trawled through the internet, there were countless Cosmo articles, think pieces online, and self-help quizzes to look through . . . And they were all bollocks.


There was a trend of articles and social media posts designed to inspire, motivate, and relate to all of us twenty-somethings currently riding through life. But am I the only one who finds them tiring and completely irrelevant? I feel like I’m being battered over the head with lists like “20 things to do before you’re 20”, or “How to live your best life in your 20’s”. It feels like I’m being lectured for living my life the wrong way. And they’re all the same, the same boring points about letting people go, taking opportunities, and travelling outside of your postcode.


All of these points are completely valid! Yes, let toxic people go! Seek the job you want! Ask out the person you like! Try and travel as much as you can!


But all of these lists and articles and think pieces never deter from the same, overdone structure. The Cosmo article about ~exploring~ your sexuality whilst you’re still young and wild in your twenties ignores the fact that you can explore your sexuality at any point in your life. There are people realising their sexualities at the age of 99 (high five to the trans army veteran, what an inspo). Being with the same partner for all of your twenties isn’t depriving you of sexual fulfillment — if you don’t tick every box on the sex bucket list, newsflash! That’s okay! It’s not a bad thing if you’re with the same person for all of your “young” years, just like how it’s totally okay to date lots of people in your twenties and have lots of sexual experiences. It’s not a competition. Stop telling me that these are my years to ~find~ myself sexually — I already found myself, and I didn’t need your condescending article to do it. Instead, let people decide what they want to do for themselves.


Not everyone can afford the time or money to travel. That’s a fact of life. There are ways to do it cheap, for as long or as little as you like. I applaud and am envious of all of my friends and colleagues who have taken some dazzling trips all around the world.


At my job, I have only a handful of weeks for holiday, and I have to book it off waaaaayyy in advance. I’m on a part time wage, which isn’t enough to afford a plane ticket unless I save for a year. And my parents are the protective sort — they would have never let me galavant off to Sweden to go inter-railing on my own, or even with friends. That kind of thing would take lots of bargaining, pleading, and probably even then still wouldn’t happen. The circumstances are different for everyone; fear of flying, financial difficulty, young children, being a carer, school, work. Let’s stop guilting people for not being take the same opportunties as others.


Everyone’s experiences with uni, school, friendship groups are all different. The issue I have with these articles is that they’re all generic and apply to only one type of experience.


Everyone has their own lesson to learn in life — but the lessons are their own, and we are left with wisdom applicable to our own life. We may be able to impart that wisdom to someone in a similar situation, but those feelings and experiences will never be exactly the same.


It’s always reassuring to know that we’re not alone. It’s why I went looking for help in the first place, and I’m sure these articles provide that reassurance. But they’re not a Bible, 10 Commandments-style guide to how to live your best life. I promise, you’re not wasting your 20’s if you haven’t had the same sexual experiences as your friends, or you only have a few close acquaintances as opposed to a banging #squad, or that you haven’t visited Bali or Amsterdam yet. There will be a time for all of that — and it doesn’t have to be right here, right now.

Women's History Month and Cheeseburgers

With February now over, I’m sure we can all say a warm welcome to March. The heralding month of Spring, I can already feel the change in the air; persistent sunshine, open windows, and everyone starts to put away their thickest woollen scarves, not to be seen again until next winter. And with Spring comes the inevitable Spring cleaning. I like to treat this time of year as a mental health check – the warmer weather makes us all feel a little brighter, and it’s a good time to shake off any lingering cobwebs in our minds.

There Is No Plan B

Three years after achieving my A-levels, and a month after turning 21, I finally have confirmation that I'm going to university. Yes, that is a resounding chorus of "Finally!" you hear, as my friends and family celebrate with me. It's been a long time coming -- four tries at auditioning for drama school and university auditions,　numerous gap years spent working and travelling and acting. I'm a very reflective person (I'm an actor, we're all about the inner monologue), and when you attend auditions and uni applicant days, people will ask about you. I got asked quite a lot what A-levels I was studying -- and then got a complete look of surprise when I said "Actually, I'm 21? Yeah, I know, I don't look it! But I did my A-levels a loooong time ago."


And then people ask what I've been doing all this time, and what a gap year is like (or in my case, a lot of gap years), and if I regretted not attending university along with all my friends back in 2014.. Did I ever feel like I was left behind?


I recently had an audition at one of the top drama schools in London (not naming any names, but it has five letters and　Benedict Cumberbatch went there, so it's pretty good). And it went disastrously. Drama school auditions all run a little different structurally, but the preparation for them and the feeling of absolute sheer terror is all the same. At 17, drama school auditions are daunting and a whole other world to get your head around. After A-levels, drama school auditions become a desperate ordeal of jumping through hoops to escape your involuntary gap year (or two . . . or three).　And they really are "involuntary" -- you don't choose to be rejected from all the drama schools in the consortium, and then have to spend the next year living at home whilst all your friends start their degrees in Liverpool and Bristol and East Anglia, and you have to decide between applying for that vacancy at Tesco's or dodging your parents' looks of "Well, now how are you going to pay board?"


I did not choose to take four gap years, but that's the way these last few years have turned out. Drama school auditions are exhausting -- there's the panellists, watching you perform your monologues in excruciating detail. In　the disastrous drama school audition I attended earlier this week, I was only　two lines into my Shakespeare monologue before one of the panellists actually said -- right in the middle of my speech! -- "Oh dear", in complete dismay, and then dropped her pen as if to clearly say, "Well, this is the shittiest thing I've ever seen."


Two lines in! I hadn't even gotten to my first "alas"! I powered through and finished my monologue as if I hadn't heard the interruption. Bloody hell, I'm not that bad of an actor. I know how to perform Shakespeare.


Luckily, I'm not new to this. If I had been 18 and that had happened, I might have been crushed and so discouraged I'd never audition anywhere again. At 21, I'm fully aware that the panellist was an entitled prick, that they were rude and unfair, and at least I won't be paying £50 to audition there again (oh yeah, didn't you know? Us auditionees have got to pay £50 per audition, for EACH SCHOOL).


There's the second-guessing yourself during the workshop, which test your ability to be spontaneous and creative, work in groups, and respond to different stimulus. Usually, you leave a workshop pink and soaked in sweat -- and usually, in my case, I'm the only short, dark-haired girl in a sea of willowy, beautiful blonde girls who look like they play five classical instruments and holiday in the South of France.


And god, I love auditioning. I wouldn't do it if I didn't love it -- I love practising my speeches to then have the opportunity to show them to an audience (even if sometimes that audience is a judgemental panellist). I love talking to all the other people auditioning and hearing where they've travelled from, what speeches they're doing, what other schools they've auditioned for. If there's one piece of advice I'd recommend to anyone auditioning, it's talk to the other people around you. You're all in the same boat! None of the competitive, bitchy "drama" stereotypes exist in a drama school audition; you're allll in the this together (oh, High School Musical, how you've ruined that forever).


Someone in that room is just as nervous as you. The girl next to you is probably doing the same classical speech as you (believe me, there are very few speeches us girls can do from Shakepeare's repertoire, so expect a few other Viola's and Rosalind's to pop up). Talking and sharing your the terrible train journey at 5am down to the school puts you so much at ease, and distracts you from the insane amount of pressure on your day.


You've got to give it your best -- your definition of your best, because that's not always enough to succeed at an audition. There are so many more factors than just your ability to act. And rejection can happen.


And so, you're taking a gap year. UCAS is prompting you to go through Clearing, but you decide you want to have another go at auditioning next year. You're set on going to drama school hell or high water, and so you break it to everyone -- your optimistic sixth form teachers, your friends, your confused family -- that you're going to take a gap year, and apply again next year.


Some people choose to take a gap year anyway after their A-levels. To take a breather from education for a while (after all, you'd been doing it for thirteen years) before committing for another three years; or take a gap year to travel, whilst still young and not tied down; to work and save money before entering themselves into years of debt. All of these reasons are valid.


I was fine for the first few months. My parents understood I was committed to auditioning again, that it was drama school and an acting degree or nothing, I wasn’t going to settle. Other people weren’t as understanding; mostly, they were just confused as to why I was wasting my A-levels and not going to university and making the most of my “intelligence”, as opposed to doing a drama/acting degree. But if I couldn't do drama school, then I was only going to a university that offered an almost identical degree. And I still wanted to have a go at getting into drama school first. (I’m a very headstrong person, and I can articulate my reasons for doing things very well).


I was applying for jobs and not really getting anywhere. My friends were in the swing of their degrees, and as they began assignments and lectures and freshers, it became harder to see them. I was busy starting a new amateur dramatics company, and they were busy with uni life, and it just meant I saw much less of my friends. A career in acting never felt farther away than it did those first few months after summer, when all of my friends had taken that big step and I was still at home, scrambling to adjust to not being in school anymore for the first time in years, having to find my own structure without the school day to do it for me.


That’s when I began to regret it. I remember, quite clearly, standing in my living room at home talking to my best friend like, “What have I done? I can’t do this. I’m not going to get into drama school this time round, I’m not good enough. But I can’t do any other degree, I can’t just give in and go to just any university and not do drama. What do I do?”


That’s when I felt at my worst. My friends had all seemed to forget about me in favour or their university friends and a new life on campus. I was the new kid at my theatre company, struggling to get roles and fit into an already established group. I couldn’t find a job or even get an interview because no where was hiring.


It was all very dire, cry cry, moan moan. There will be a point in that gap year where it looks like you made the worst decision of your life.


But your friends haven’t forgotten you. The pressure you feel to find a job and support yourself is all in your head — no one is expecting you to do anything except make the best decisions for you. The expected path of completing your A-levels to university to graduating to a job is not one path that fits all. There’s so much more of your life that you can fit in between those structured steps.

• Work, if you can. It doesn’t matter what the job — so don’t feel embarrassed working a til or cleaning tables - because if you’re planning on uni after your gap year, a job is a means to an end. It’s temporary. There’s so much that a job can bring you —
• Like a steady income! Weekly or monthly, I recommend so much that you save that money. Not all of it (I’m a big believer in treating myself), but some of it. Put it in a jar, an unused purse, in a savings account. After six months, there could be enough there to spend another six months travelling Europe or splashing out on a holiday. Last year, I saved enough money to fly to Arizona and spend a week in America visiting my best friend, and seeing the Grand Canyon. That hard work felt all the more worth it sitting next to her, on the ledge of the Canyon under the stars.
• A job means new people. As all your friends from school move away and make new friends at uni, you’re networking with your work mates and drinking jagerbombs at the work social. The difference between school friends and work friends is that you are often all of different ages, of different walks of life; some might be studying, and some might already have kids, and you can learn something from all of them. You really do mature and grow up in that environment.
• If you’re lucky, travel as much as you can. It doesn’t even have to be out of the UK, but see as much as you can. Take all of that to university with you.

If you want to know if would I recommend a gap year, then yes. I would. I’m not saying it should be a requirement, but if you’re already thinking about it, and want someone’s opinion, then there’s mine. I think a gap year well-spent makes you a little more well rounded, gives you a little more maturity entering university, and that coveted “life experience” people are always talking about. Yes, you’re one year behind from all your friends, but you’ve got a year of stories to tell.


As all my friends are about to graduate, I’ve begun making lists of what I need to start buying from IKEA. Just like everyone said, I got there in the end.

Live By Night: F*** you, Ben Affleck.

It's that time of year again, guys. Glitzy dresses, best dressed lists, a barrage of celebrity interviews, and red-carpet coverage.

Awards season.

There are shivers down my spine.Predictably, as an actor, it's one of my favourite times of the year. A time to be inspired, to rejoice over my favourite films of the year being nominated for the coveted Golden Globes, and to keep practising my ever-evolving Oscar speech.

And here's been a lot of films this year that I've loved! (Three guesses: all of them La La Land).

Annnddd . . . there's been a few that have needed me to be forcibly removed from the cinema screen.

Cut to: Live by Night.

Much Ado About My Birthday

For once, I wasn't travelling to London this weekend with my stomach in nervous knots.

I got two tickets to see the RSC's Much Ado About Nothing for Christmas, and luckily the date coincided perfectly with my birthday weekend. Look at that for timing *smirk emoji*

London was beautiful as ever, even covered in frost and freezing everyones tits off; she was all blue skies and proud old buildings, the Saturday shoppers making the most of the dry weather and the warm welcome of a café.

La La Land: What is success?

Spontaneous trips to the cinema are my thing. My other half and I have cinema memberships, which allow us to go and see an unlimited number of films for "free" (it's free when we see them, but it does cost us a £20 membership fee, mind). So cinema trips and I are quite a couple; we're romantic, we're nostalgic, we treat each other right. I treasure trips to the big screen, watching my favourite actors and being inspired.


Last night I went to see La La Land. It tells the tale of two aspiring, down on their luck artists in LA. It has every cliché in the book, but God do I love a cliché.