It may be just a few weeks since Ariela Nazar-Rosen graduated from RCS’s Classical and Contemporary Text programme but there’s another major milestone fast approaching … her debut at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Ariela is preparing to take her solo show, make the Bed, to one of the world’s biggest arts festivals, where it will run from 11-25 August at ZOO Playground.

The 60-minute performance explores what it’s like when your thoughts consume you whole. When black-and-white thinking takes over. When you have anxiety. And what it can feel like to sit with that anxiety in real time. 

Using gesture, physicality and soundscapes, Ariela brings the audience along with her on an anxiety-filled downward spiral. In showing her own struggle with mental illness, particularly anxiety, she wanted to create a piece in which other anxious people could see their own experiences reflected.

For those who do not live with anxiety themselves, she hopes they can get a glimpse into how hard it is when everything in life is reduced to one, all-consuming thought.

Ariela, who is based in New York City, joined the year-long MA Classical and Contemporary Text (Acting) programme before continuing her journey on the MFA. In those additional four months (16 months in total), students create a substantial piece of original work that will serve as a ‘creative calling card’ to take to industry.

For Ariela, it’s the intimate and immersive make the Bed, which is directed by fellow CCT graduate Cecilia Thoden van Velzen.

Here, she tells us how the show came to be and offers an insight into life at RCS.

“If there’s nothing you can do in a day, at least make the bed. Then you can say you accomplished one thing.”

 

Ariela’s mother, Joan K. Rosen

Tell us about your show make the Bed – what inspired it? 

On the day my friends were leaving Glasgow after a fantastic visit, I woke up to see blood spotting on my duvet by my ankles. I had bite marks on my wrists and face. I saw small stains on my pillowcases. Bed bugs had gotten into my flat from my friends’ suitcases and were crawling in the seams of my mattress and all over me when I was asleep (when I could fall asleep).

Except – spoiler alert – there were no bugs. There were never any to begin with.

It was all anxiety. make the Bed is an in-real-time exploration of me in that room, working to overcome those all-consuming anxious thoughts, which are preventing me from making the bed and leaving my room.

How did you develop it during your time at RCS?

I originally signed up for the MA course because I thought that the brief for the MFA was to create something on your own, and I didn’t feel ready for that, nor did I feel like I had anything to say.

As the year went on, the amount of growth I saw in myself was unlike anything I had experienced. I felt more excited at the thought of creating and devising work for a term.

I also wanted to have those extra four months in the programme as a transition period to move from the more structured MA schedule to a self-directed MFA period that more closely mirrors what it’s like in the industry.

When this bed bug scare happened, I finally understood and accepted that what I was experiencing, and what I had been struggling for most of my adult life, was anxiety.

I realised that my struggle with anxiety had been affecting my daily life more than I had ever thought. And I knew that that was something that I needed to create a piece about.

Ironically, the main reason why I did not sign up for the MFA (not feeling interested in or ready to create something on my own) is exactly what I ended up doing for my project.

I had originally imagined the piece as a narrative-driven exploration of my anxiety through the exchange of voice notes between myself and my therapist.

I had a meeting with Josh Armstrong, one of the lecturers at RCS – who oversaw our MFA and is just brilliant – who said to me that “there is a world in which this piece is in real-time with you in your room.” And that’s what it ended up being.

So, the piece transformed into one that is heavily movement and gesture based. It’s a departure from anything I’ve ever done. Everything that I’ve worked on has been text-based and driven.

This is very physical, and when devising, I looked at the kind of movement exercises that we did in classes with Josh, such as the Six Viewpoints and visiting artists like the Company of Wolves, and Lecoq with lecturer Leonor Estrada, which was all so invaluable.

I truly believe that it was that MA year that got me to the place of saying I feel ready. I became more confident as an artist, with taking initiative, and asserting what it is that I’m looking for in my art that I create and/or am a part of.

What do you hope audiences take away from make the Bed?

At its core, I want to open the door for conversations around mental illness so we can work to destigmatise those struggles and encourage asking for help, in whatever way is best for the person.

I don’t think that there is enough work out there that gives a first-hand account of what it’s like to live with these things – when your thoughts spiral and you can’t escape the black-and-white thinking, the debilitating thoughts.

I hope that in seeing my experience, people who may experience anxiety can connect in some way and maybe realise that they may need to seek help.

What made you want to study at RCS?

I had applied to a handful of schools in the UK as so many of the actors I admire come out of the UK training system – it’s top-tier education.

I came across RCS through UCAS and got excited seeing a programme that seemed to value the artist as an individual – with students having agency when it came to setting learning objectives and considering the type of work that they wanted to create.

And then, of course, students get to spend a month in residency at Shakespeare’s Globe, which is such an incredible gift. As I read more about RCS, it felt like it would be a dream.

I remember, on the audition panel, Marc (Silberschatz, who was programme head at the time) asked me, ‘if you come to study with us, what kind of artist do you want to be at the end of that course?’

I said I wanted to be an artist who feels more empowered. Having the chance to verbalise that and having Marc make that part of the interview, of prioritising what I was looking for, was really moving.

That’s something that I still come back to. I feel like I have, without sounding narcissistic, become more of that empowered artist. That I do have the capacity to make my own work. This course, and through it getting to create my own work, has given me so much more drive and really energised my journey.

Any favourite moments from your time at RCS?

I loved so much of it – how can I narrow it down?!

There’s all the time I had with the faculty. You get assigned a personal supervisor, and they help you with setting your learning outcome. We had certain goals or objectives that we had to surpass but then we were able to set a goal for ourselves, which was incredible, and really put us in the driver’s seat of our education.

I felt like I could go to the MA faculty, Marc, Brian, Leonor, Josh, Rogelio and Mel – with anything – they are brilliant and have such vast and deep specialisations so there was an amazing amount of perspective that they were able to share.

There was so much care and support. These lecturers are artists themselves and have busy lives but are so eager to make time for us. That was special, and I felt so taken care of.

Then, I would say the productions. I was in Marc’s production of The Summoning of Everyman and some of the work that he teaches, the performance of the unconscious, brought out the more ferocious and brazen side of me.

Before school, I was very much seen as the kind sister or supportive friend, and I was interested in exploring women who are messy, unapologetic, and fiery, and that was something that I was able to do in that show.

Also, as part of our course, we had a say in terms of casting that would add to our learning, and if we’re looking to explore a certain role. It helped me see that I could do these other types of characters, and that was so exhilarating.

What did you enjoy about studying and living in Glasgow?

The people are so friendly. I’d be in a shop talking to someone and they’d hear my accent and ask where I was from and how I was liking Scotland. When I said I loved it, they were so excited to hear about someone coming here and enjoying their time, and it felt like every person wanted to help make the experience even better.

When my family came to visit, they were blown away by the Scottish hospitality.

Glasgow and Scotland may not have the weather, but the people are so warm and so interested – they just want to talk, and you have so many random conversations when you’re out and about in the street. I loved it!

What would you say to those thinking about studying on the MA/MFA CCT programme?

Something that one of my professors and mentors, her name’s Marta Rainer, said to me when I was going through the whole application process, was there needs to be a feeling of ‘rightness’. What is drawing you to consider graduate school and what are you looking for?

MFAs are so personal, and you are so connected with the people around you. And it wasn’t until I was in it that I realised, whoa, these people are my community. They were my family.

When it comes to this course, every moment is so precious, and there’s something to be learned and gained from every experience.

There’s also letting yourself be vulnerable and recognising that you are here to learn, and it’s okay if there’s something that you don’t know. I remember in one of my (many) meetings with Josh, I was saying how nervous I was about creating something on my own.

Josh told me that I could really use this project, that I could use this educational space as an opportunity to take risks and try new things.

Those 16 months at RCS were such a gift. They have changed my life.

View Ariela’s profile on the MACCT page

Main image © YellowBelly

make the Bed © Robbie McFadzean/RCS

Consent © Tim Morozzo

Update …

Congratulations to Ariela and Cecilia for a five-star review from The Scotsman 

“an immersive study of mental health challenges”