Blood Brothers Essay

Words: 982
Pages: 4

As part of our exploration of the text Blood Brothers we were asked to engage in a number of practical tasks. The first practical task I was asked to perform was Mickey's 'Nearly 8!' monologue. In this monologue it shows how Mickey looked up to Sammy and how he wanted to do the things that Sammy does but that he wasn’t allowed because he was the younger brother. I wanted to represent the fact the Mickey looked up to Sammy and how always wanted to be like him and act like him. It showed how he was the lower part of the family as the youngest boy he was always known as the weakest so he was picked on by his brother Sammy but he loves Sammy even though he's mean to him at times. I also wanted to represent the class and background that he is from as the way he spoke and the things he said are definitely not the way that a child from a higher class would speak like which showed the way he has been brought up with the influence of his naughty brother.
I wanted to represent this to show the irony of his monologue as when Mickey grows up he does become just like his brother and ends up in jail as his brother was clearly a bad influence. I also wanted to show how much of his worries have changed since he was a child as when he was seven he wanted to be like his brother and play games but in the future everything changes. His worries become more realistic as he loses his job gets which leads him into getting into trouble with his brother Sammy.
I tried to represent this by showing that Mickey was quite jealous or even angry but most of the times he was excited to tell the audience about what Sammy gets up to. The third paragraph of the monologue shows how he starts off all happy as in a way he is showing off that his brother is so cool and better than any other brother. At this point of the monologue I use gestures to show how children always want to explain what they are saying in more detail by acting everything out, so when he said "An' every time a hit." I showed it by placing my hand on my eye to pretend that I got hit. He explains how he can play with matches and how he can go to bed late but he can't himself because he's seven. At this point my tone becomes more stubborn and my pitch gets higher to prove my point as I become annoyed about the fact that I can't sleep late.
This moment was effective as it showed both sides of Mickey at the time. He starts off all happy about the fact that his brother is so amazing and can do all kinds of crazy things but ends up bragging about the fact that he can't do any of those things himself as he is only seven. I could have improved this by showing Mickey's view on how he can't do the things that his brother does in a different way. I could have become quieter to show how upset he is about it or I could have been angry all the way through the monologue to show that he can act like his brother and that he is nearly eight.
Doing this actuvity made me understand the whole play more as it gave me the basic information on how Mickey was brought up and how his opinion would change about his

brother as he grew older.
The practical activity they were asked to do was to re­enact the boys first meeting to show how everything first started and how they even became 'blood brothers' which lead onto future problems which eventually lead to both of their deaths.
They wanted to represent the way that each character came across to the audience to show