Monday
Unfortunately one of the members of our group became seriously ill over the weekend and had to remain in hospital for a long span of time and therefore we could not perform on the set date that we had originally planned. Even though she was still in hospital in our Monday lesson, we still went over the simultaneous group actions that we have and discussed how big they need to be to help reiterate the Berkoff style.
Our group started a discussion about whether or not there actually is a woman in the window or not. We decided that in the beginning there possibly could be a woman there that Susan (The Woman Alone) is talking to as it gives her the motivation to turn off the music and actually start having a conversation with her and the reason that she connects so strongly with her is the fact that she wants her life to be like hers and sees herself in her. This could also be a reason why the woman could not be real as she could be imagining herself in the way that she wanted her life to be and her ideal appearance. Also towards the end, when she is about to kill herself, she looks through the window at this mystery woman and somehow she switches to the idea of killing someone else. We were saying that this could be her subconscious persuading her to do her deepest darkest thought or it could be the psychotic element taking over. Adding to this, if there was an actual person there in the window, surely the first thing that they would do, if they saw that someone was about to kill themselves, would be to call the police or get some help for her not tell her to turn her gun onto someone else.
We also found out the style of poster that we were going to have and you could say that it reflects the darkest side of her life as the colour scheme is very dark:
Our group started a discussion about whether or not there actually is a woman in the window or not. We decided that in the beginning there possibly could be a woman there that Susan (The Woman Alone) is talking to as it gives her the motivation to turn off the music and actually start having a conversation with her and the reason that she connects so strongly with her is the fact that she wants her life to be like hers and sees herself in her. This could also be a reason why the woman could not be real as she could be imagining herself in the way that she wanted her life to be and her ideal appearance. Also towards the end, when she is about to kill herself, she looks through the window at this mystery woman and somehow she switches to the idea of killing someone else. We were saying that this could be her subconscious persuading her to do her deepest darkest thought or it could be the psychotic element taking over. Adding to this, if there was an actual person there in the window, surely the first thing that they would do, if they saw that someone was about to kill themselves, would be to call the police or get some help for her not tell her to turn her gun onto someone else.
We also found out the style of poster that we were going to have and you could say that it reflects the darkest side of her life as the colour scheme is very dark:
The title was the first thing that caught my eye and I think that the use of black and white lettering reflects her life as she can switch from one subject to another very quickly and sometimes the subjects are talked about in depth (the black letters) and others are only touched upon (the white letters). The fact that we can't actually see her full face could represent the fact that we never actually get to know her as a person and/or on a personal level because she doesn't let us stay on one idea for a sustained period of time and so the audience can build only small connections to her and her life.
Looking at the poster, I think it initially shows the strain that is put on her with all of the things that she talks and thinks about and her frantic movement reflect the frustration and desperation she has for her life to be like someone else's. This poster doesn't show the comical way that it is portrayed in so I think that it will be a shock to the audience as they will end up laughing at points or hopefully all the way through. I hope that it causes the audience to reflect on their own lives as they watch this one woman go through all of the emotions and traumas that one person goes through in their lifetime and they are laughing at her struggling through it.
Wednesday
The member of our group that was ill, was released from hospital yesterday and so she came in so that we could rehearse for our performance date that was pushed backwards to our Monday lesson. This meant that we wouldn't have a big audience like the rest of the group, our audience would just be the members of our class and Mr Chipp and Miss Starbuck.
We began the rehearsal by doing a staggered full run-through of our section:
We discussed actually putting the gun prop in the sequence so that we would be able to rehearse with it and get used to using it in the run throughs. We also discussed where we thought the gun should be placed throughout the piece and we found that our options were:
In the end, we found that leaving it on a chair by itself would be our best option as the audience would see that it was there and be able to react to it throughout the whole piece.
When looking over the video, we commented on the fact that our movement need to be a lot more staccato and we need to accentuate the start and end of every single movement to continue to Berkoff style.
One thing that we found was very hard to incorporate was the movement of the riser and having the motivation to actually move the riser to where we needed it to be. So we changed the staging so that the riser was more central and made sure that Melody had a reason for going to get the riser towards the end. When I interrupt her line when she's on the phone we said that that could be the start of her visual breakdown, as we have slightly hinted about her mental breakdown through the tone of her lines, and she would begin to pace and talk under her breath whilst working herself up and then she would go and get the riser and slam in on the floor. This would symbolize her personality taking of control of the body and all of the rest of us taking a step backward as we know that we have no chance of having any control.
We began to experiment with the actual picking up of the gun and who is going to hold on to the gun itself. To begin with, we all used to bend down and pick the gun up but we decided that only Melody would pick it up as she is the psychotic personality and the others would just follow her lead as she is in control. The other personalities would make the loading of the gun noise and lean back to show the audience our reactions to us picking the gun up. The looking back at the audience would let us reconnect with them and pull them into the scene with us and because of the use of proxemics, we are directly at the front of the stage and so our facial expressions will be seen more clearly meaning they will have more impact.
The makeup and costume that we have decided is as follows:
- In Melody's pocket, as she could pull it out when she say "I'm going to kill myself" but that wouldn't be sticking to the stage directions as they say that the gun is on the wall.
- On a chair in the audience, have it placed there as the audience are walking in and let them react to it. No one would be allowed to move the gun and it would be surrounded with people in the audience.
- Or actually having someone in the audience hold it. This would mean that the gun would have to be forcibly taken off of someone which could have a bigger impact but not on the whole audience just that singular person who is holding the gun. We said that if Melody does take it off someone, then she could direct her line straight to that person and look at them with glossy eyes and really stare straight through them so they are really convinced that she is going to kill herself.
In the end, we found that leaving it on a chair by itself would be our best option as the audience would see that it was there and be able to react to it throughout the whole piece.
When looking over the video, we commented on the fact that our movement need to be a lot more staccato and we need to accentuate the start and end of every single movement to continue to Berkoff style.
One thing that we found was very hard to incorporate was the movement of the riser and having the motivation to actually move the riser to where we needed it to be. So we changed the staging so that the riser was more central and made sure that Melody had a reason for going to get the riser towards the end. When I interrupt her line when she's on the phone we said that that could be the start of her visual breakdown, as we have slightly hinted about her mental breakdown through the tone of her lines, and she would begin to pace and talk under her breath whilst working herself up and then she would go and get the riser and slam in on the floor. This would symbolize her personality taking of control of the body and all of the rest of us taking a step backward as we know that we have no chance of having any control.
We began to experiment with the actual picking up of the gun and who is going to hold on to the gun itself. To begin with, we all used to bend down and pick the gun up but we decided that only Melody would pick it up as she is the psychotic personality and the others would just follow her lead as she is in control. The other personalities would make the loading of the gun noise and lean back to show the audience our reactions to us picking the gun up. The looking back at the audience would let us reconnect with them and pull them into the scene with us and because of the use of proxemics, we are directly at the front of the stage and so our facial expressions will be seen more clearly meaning they will have more impact.
The makeup and costume that we have decided is as follows:
- Emily (Sexy trait) - black dress, with tights and black socks. Extreme makeup; bright eyeshadow, big eyelashes, lots of blusher and black lipstick
- Melody (Psychotic trait) - black trousers, black top, black socks. Almost Gothic makeup, heavy eyeshadow, thick eyeliner and black lipstick
- Sarah (Bubbly trait) - white top, black bottoms and white socks. Makeup would be mainly blusher, really red cheeks and black lipstick
- Me (Housewife trait) - White top, black trousers, black apron and white socks. Barely any makeup as the traditional housewife wouldn't be allowed to wear makeup, so just black lipstick.
We are all wearing black lipstick to symbolize that we all share the same mouth piece and we are fighting over who was in control.
Section 2:
No changes:
A list of the changes that we made:
- More emphasis on pulling the spoon out of Sarah.
- Smoother transitions, adding to the continuity of the style.
- Snap heads towards the person that is speaking so that we direct the audience's attention on who's speaking.
- "What are you talking about" - synchro move snaps us out of looking at Sarah, giving us motivation to move.
- More reactions to each other, reminding the audience that we are one person.
Here is the run through with the changes:
2nd Changes:
- Avoid blocking, to fix me blocking Sarah after the spoon has been pulled out I am going to walk round the back of Sarah instead and direct my attention on her so the audience are still focused on her.
- Melody shouldn't move out as much so that we can add to the staccato movement so if we are closer we can make the movements bigger.
- The overall pace of the piece feels very slow so we need to pick up the atmosphere and the pace.
Here's our final version of Section 2:
Section 3:
No changes:
Changes:
- Spacing - Emily don't lunge as far away so that we can maintain connection.
- Melody trumpet sound to make it clearer to the audience what's going on and who we are directing the line to
- "Slaughter" needs to be sharper
- Stay in "sod off" position so that the audience is drawn to Melody as she is moving and speaking until the unison movement on "hot water"
- Melody stepping out of the line needs to be more staccato so that the audience can really decipher what she's doing.
- Melody don't turn on "now's not the time to start playing jazz" so that it is directed at her.
Final outcome of Section 3:
Section 4:
No changes:
1st Changes:
- Synchronized snort after "pigging phone pig"
- Melody be verbally angry at me when I take the phone, meaning both more interaction between traits and the signal of her physical breakdown.
- Melody was blocking Emily in the middle of the run and so if she just takes a step to her right then she won't be anymore.
- "Pregnant" motions need to be bigger and in time.
- "Locked up" motions - hands crossed in front of chest on "My husband keeps me locked up"
- When we put the phone down on "click" all heads need to go down as well, only people who have lines should have their head up.
Run through with 1st changes:
2nd Changes:
- After "what a pig" synchronized snort again.
- "Locked up" motion after "Look at how old I am and my husband keeps me locked up" only above the head.
No comments:
Post a Comment