Week 23: A Woman Alone

Introduction to A Woman Alone

Before we actually began working on the script, we were asked to buy it and I decided that I would research into previous performances of it and see what my first impressions of the synopsis was. 

A short synopsis that I found about the play said:

"Locked up in a flat, a solitary woman makes her confession. Amid domestic chores, dodgy phone calls, a sex-mad brother-in-law and a forever screaming baby she tells us the story of how her love for a young student led to her imprisonment at the hands of her jealous husband. Through farce to tragedy, her story propels the audience to its shocking climax."

My first impressions of the text was that it would be initially very hard for one person on stage to express the journey of emotions that they go through whilst explaining the story in a way that the audience can understand. I felt that the woman is very head-strong and will stick to her roots and what she knows is right.

I look at this website:

http://www.britishtheatreguide.info/reviews/a-woman-alone-etcetera-theatr-14186

And I thought that the photos on this website were a good representation of the roller-coaster of emotions that she goes through. After seeing this pictures I tried to imagine what it would be like for a group of people to perform this instead of one and I thought that it could have it's advantages as you wouldn't have to rely on one person to show all the different emotions and it may be clearer for the audience of the story-line that it going on beneath it if there were more people to look at and identify with.

 I searched for videos on YouTube of clips from performances of A Woman Alone and I found this one:

https://youtu.be/bDs_eFkAWnQ

I found these clips very interesting as it shows how the comedy can be placed in it and because we are thinking about doing it in a Berkoff style, we could emphasise the comedic points. Also if we were adapting her performance into a Berkoff style, we could make her facial expressions more extreme and have her more staccato in her movements so that we emphasise the fact that she is the only person on stage.