Creative Cafe: My First Open Mic Night Performance In Nottingham😊❤️🎭

Hello world! 

Welcome back to another blog. In this blog I’ll be taking you through my journey into how I got the chance to perform at my first scratch night called “Creative Cafe” where students from Nottingham Trent University wrote monologues and got actors to perform them live which was a lot of fun! This took place on 23rd April 2025 (3 months as I'm posting this! Seriously where has the time gone?!?!), and I performed a piece called "Nearly Normal" by Claire Suzanne who I actually met on the night too as seen below. So without further ado here is my journey as to how I did the rehearsal process:

Application:

I first got the notification of this event after my acting teacher Tim Bryn Smith, who runs Th Actors Workshop Nottingham, posted a callout on our community Facebook page. This was interesting, and I know after looking at the pieces which one I would want to do for me personally. I would need to make a slight tweak but all in all I knew that this piece would be the one I’d want to do. So for this I was instructed to do a section of the scene and thankfully I didn’t need to be off script due to the length of it. 

Rehearsal:

When I got the job, I spent a few weeks looking over at it. It got to the point where I thankfully didn’t need to look at the script, but because it was a rehearsed reading, I felt I should have the script anyway. I even managed to sneak in a quick rehearsal with my teacher who gave me a few notes, which did help. But throughout this process I thought I shouldn’t over rehearse it as I don’t want to overwhelm myself. But all in all I’m proud of the preparation I did and I couldn’t wait to get on that stage! 

Performance:

The performance itself was brilliant. It was a chilled atmosphere and everyone I saw was lovely. Just to break it down, here is what I thought of my performance along with the other pieces I saw.

My Piece:

My piece went better than I expected. Was I nervous? Yes I was. Did I enjoy it thought? Too right I did! The audience seemed to have loved it and I even got to meet the writer of the piece who was also autistic (which was a massive bonus) and she liked the changes I made to help make it my own. I do really hope I can keep working with her in the future, as with her talented writing and my acting, we could be a force to be reckoned with. Please see a link below to the full piece. 

https://youtu.be/ZPkT7DqySnE?si=GPSBlXhgRY4B9Gu9

Other Performances: 

Whilst I was there I got to witness other amazing pieces. These included a poem and a vampire tale. I also got to hear some music from a brilliant Nottingham band called Oddpulse as seen below with a little snippet of one of their songs. I didn’t expect to like their music this much, but even after this event, I can’t seem to get the chorus of their song “Ivy” out of my head lol! 

Reflection: 

Overall I thoroughly enjoyed the event. It was chill, calm and a place for me to enjoy myself and have fun. And I got the support from my fellow actors and the audience which was lovely to see. It’s moments like this also where it’s why I love the creative industry, as a piece like I did helps me find my voice, showing you can make something good out of something bad. 

And that was it for my experience of my first scratch night. I hope you enjoyed this read, and keep an eye on @ntucreatd to see more opportunities for creatives in the Nottinghamshire area for more opportunities!

Please also check out Th Actors Workshop Nottingham, where I got this opportunity from and you can check out what's coming up and how you can support the amazing community which helped me become the person I am today.

https://www.theactorsworkshopnottingham.com/

See you soon for another blog. Until next time…

This is The Autistic Actress signing off :)