Week 7: Classwork

Monday

We used all of mondays lesson exploring the scene between Creon and Antigone. It is after Antigone had been found trying to bury her brother and she has been brought to Creon because anyone that was found associating with Porphyron was to be put to death. In the scene, Creon is trying to convince Antigone to let him, hide the fact that it was his own niece who had committed the crime.

https://youtu.be/L_kHsJiZrZU

Me and my partner decided to work on the juxtaposition of the delivery of the lines between Antigone and Creon. We said that Antigone would be quite blunt as we thought that she wanted people to know that it was her that did it because if no one knows it was her then her actions would have no impact. Also we wanted Creon to become increasingly frustrated with Antigone because at the beginning he was trying to show her compassion and she completely ignored this factor and so by the end Creon was grasping at anything that would make Antigone see that he was trying to do the right thing by hiding the crime.

Wednesday

We used Wednesday's lesson to work on the first scene which is between Antigone and the Nurse which is after the first time she tries to bury her brother and she isn't caught. We discussed the nurse being really down to earth and being very scolding, especially about her dirty feet, but in a mothering way. We said that the Nurse would be very mothering as there is no mention of a mother for Antigone so we thought that the Nurse was as close to a mother for Antigone and her actions towards Antigone would reflect this. Even though there was this connection between the two of them, we said that some of the lines should be delivered like Antigone was in her own world as she had just started the massive task that she had set for herself and she had successfully began it without getting caught. 

We also thought that there should be a juxtaposition between the seriousness of Antigone and the humorous tone of the Nurse as we thought that she could bring some funny aspects to the scene with her reactions . There is a line that Antigone says that is "So I took my shoes off and melted into the landscape" which the Nurse replies with "You're going to have to wash those feet before you get back into bed." The delivery of this line is key because Antigone is suddenly in her own world and the audience are very confused by this answer and so are trying to decipher what she is trying to say so if the Nurses reaction is big and quite realistic, such as a gasp and/or a point with a bit of mumbling about how she spends all her time cleaning up after Antigone, then the audience are brought back to reality and out of Antigone's dream world.

The proxemics of this scene could affected the way the audience reacts to both the Nurse and Antigone. For example, we thought that at the back right hand side there would be an armchair which the Nurse would be asleep in before Antigone enters. And there would be a bowl of watermelon at the front and center.

We thought that the entrance of Antigone would have an impact on the audience as well so we had Antigone entering and placing her shoes down next to the sleeping nurse and then slowly walking round her whilst heading for the watermelon. We thought that if Antigone looked at the Nurse whilst walking round her whilst having a warming smile and though she was thanking her through the use of facial expression which would relax the audience slightly so that when the outburst of the Nurse when she wakes up and notices Antigone would be shocking and also funny.

https://youtu.be/qaQin_dFfDE