Give Me My Robe, Put On My Crown

Clean Break students are women with experience of the criminal justice system or at risk of offending due to mental health needs and drug and alcohol use, and their self-image and society’s perception of them is often negative. Nicola's film transforms these negative perceptions into the more positive ones of artist and creator, through visually exploring the effect of performance on self-image and identity.

Give me My Robe, Put On My Crown screengrab / 2007

In Give Me My Robe, Put On My Crown Nicola Lane celebrates the talents and creativity of 4 women students successfully graduating from Clean Break’s 2005/06 Access to Theatre in the Community course, where each woman had prepared two audition pieces, one selected from Shakespeare and one from a contemporary playwright. The title comes from one woman’s performance of Cleopatra's speech from Shakespeare’s ‘Anthony and Cleopatra’: Give me my robe, put on my crown: I have immortal longings in me…

The women worked with Nicola and a professional make-up artist to represent the look and the persona they felt most expressed their characters. Using digital video, Nicola filmed the women performing straight to camera in head and shoulders close-up, with photographer and lighting designer Stuart Wellburn lighting the performances to reflect and enhance each characterisation.

Nicola edited the individual performances side by side in split screen, presenting the women both as individuals and as a group, the speeches edited as a dialogue between past and present, positive and negative, vulnerability and strength.

All images screengrabs from Give Me My Robe, Put On My Crown / 2007

Give Me My Robe, Put On My Crown

Colour / DV

Runtime: 30 mins

Director & editor: Nicola Lane

Lighting designer & camera: Stuart Welburn

Lighting Assistant: Yvonne Redway

Make-up design & advisor: Claudine Henderson

Make-up team: Reniece DuBois & Patrizia Carlotta

Production: Sarah Nixey & Samantha McNeil

Composer & sound mix: Louis Morand

Performance tutors: Anna Ziman & Tessa Walker

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