Reflection of the performance

On the 10th May we had our final performance, and we all arrived at 9am to begin with a short briefing with Clare and to organize what we would need to do in the lead up to the performance. This only lasted a few minutes and myself and Anouchka then took the next few hours to set up. Clare had already set up two screens on the ground and third floors for our documentary to be shown so with the video already sorted- we focused most of our time on setting up for the applause. During the briefing we told the whole class what our project was about and asked that they help us by participating in the applause. The class all seemed very excited- admittedly this was probably at the prospect of being able to make a lot of noise in an otherwise quiet space, however everyone was happy to help.

Between 9:30 and 11am myself and Anouchka recruited a few of our friends and colleagues to help us give out the flyers. We printed 100 flyers and walked around the library handing them out to people and explaining what the applause was about. We advised them to go and watch the video beforehand which a lot of people did. We also put some flyers around the entrance of the library so people could pick them up as they entered.

The documentary turned out to be very successful and a lot of people came to watch. The staff were all very excited to see the final video as they had been a part of making it. One of the participants (Lisa peace) actually watched the video several times as she enjoyed it so much. We were thanked by many staff members for bringing to light what they do and giving them some appreciation. We were also told by Clare that our documentary had a heartfelt reason behind it that she found to be quite touching.

At around 12:30 the applause was drawing close and we decided to ask some of our colleagues to stand in different places around the library on different floors. This is so we would have a definite clap coming from spaces all throughout the library and hopefully this would make people join in. It also meant that we could all see each other. We decided that the applause would begin with a hand signal from myself and Anouchka that was a count down from 5.

The applause itself turned out extremely well and went a lot better than expected. The sound was thunderous and there was also people cheering and whistling as well as just clapping. It could be heard throughout the entire library and we had a vast amount of people joining in outside of the Theatre Studies community.