Frosines Monologue, ideas and rehearsal/ Molieres intentions

I have realised that when I perform my monologue I don't move or use gestures enough, this makes it look a bit wooden. Therefore I have been experimenting with gestures and movements which my character would use, I have come up with a  few ideas which i could in-corporate:

• When my character is calculating sums in her head, she could be counting on her fingers to make sure shes right
• I could add in a small pace or wander to make it look less awkward and wooden
• When there is an important line e.g. "why this girl will bring you twelve thousand a year" (as it is a persuasive line), i should put emphasis on the important words to make them stand out and make a point.

I am still experimenting with my monologue to see what suits my character in terms of movement but also with her intonation and volume. I have realised the importance of these skills, because you can know a monologue and read it out but this means nothing unless you can actually perform it, as in create a character and show its meaning.


I was also curious to see where Moliere took his inspiration from and why he wrote "The Miser".

I found out that he was in a way adapting a fable ("The miser and his gold") about a greedy man who buried his gold (Harpagon also buried his gold). The man checked on it every day, until one day his gold was stolen. The man realised that the gold hadn't helped or made him happy in any way, therefore a buried stone would have been just as useful, so he buried a stone in its place. The morale of this story is that money is not the most important aspect o life and can do more harm than good. This is of great importance because there are many similarity's between this and "The Miser", Harpagon harmed many people out of greed including his horses (half starved them), he turned his children against him who later stole his gold!, and basically for a useless substance as he never put his gold to any use. I believe  Moliere was trying to tell people to care about their family and Friends over money.

                                                                      

This is a video which explains the fable in simple terms, it may be helpful to view it :-)