Miles Malleson's Black Ell: Play Analysis

Summary of Performance
Our interpretation of Miles Malleson’s Black ‘Ell was framed within the context of First World War soldiers, in a trench dugout, performing a play written by one of their comrades (a characterisation of Malleson himself). Black ‘Ell is a play in one act, set in the kitchen of Mr and Mrs Gould as they await the return of their son, the war hero, only to find that he has developed an intense Anti-War sentiment.
Performed in traverse, the audience were seated ten feet apart. This gave us slightly more room than a large dugout, but enough space to accommodate the full audience whilst maintaining the overcrowded atmosphere we sought to create.
Furthermore, this concept required each actor to develop two characters: their

The last three to four minutes of the original script is essentially a monologue in which Harold explicitly outlines his opposition to the War. We divided these extensive speeches and integrated protests from soldiers and finally the Captain who states ‘Malleson, that is enough!’. There was one moment when I felt perhaps that Malleson had been left to talk for too long after he said, ‘The young ones [killing people] and the old ones feeling noble about it’ (Malleson 21). This felt like a direct reference to his superiors and it felt unnatural to remain quiet in the character of the captain at this point.
Additionally, we sought to enhance the comedic value of the first half of the play. Malleson’s original script presents exaggerated characters with the intention of mocking the ignorance of those on the Homefront so this was a strong basis on which to develop the beginning of the play into a comedy. Additionally, we took advantage of the ‘male’ soldier characters portraying Malleson’s female characters as comedic female impersonation was popular during World War One (illustrated in the photograph

As a result, all of Malleson’s female characters were played by females who were playing males impersonating females. In order to clarify this, we used bright red lipstick and the female characters stuffed their tops with newspaper. We also spent a significant amount of time during rehearsals experimenting with different vocal and physical mannerisms to create the exaggerated female characters. For example, we interpreted Jean, Harold’s sweetheart, as a playful character and therefore she was very tactile with Harold. She pushed him frequently in a light and flirtatious way and often giggled in a high-pitched tone. These mannerisms provoked the audience to laugh suggesting that we were successful in creating comedic female impersonations.
On the other hand, the large newspaper stuffed breasts only seemed to warrant a reaction at the beginning of the play so I feel we should have tried to choreograph them into the movement of the female characters so that they did not lose their impact. For example, these characters could have walked with their chests pushed forward, a common physicality used to characterise women in an exaggerated