Marketing Poster drafts

Draft 1

Positive aspects about this poster:

• Includes both SToRMS and N2C Theatre's information so if anybody needs to get in touch with either organisation then their information in there.
• Has rehearsal pictures on there so that the target audience see what the process was like and can get a taster of what they can expect when they see the performance.
• Questions relating to the main message of the piece, communication and the need for more people to openly talk about what they are experiencing with their friends, for the audience to answer once when they enter the room and once when they go out so that they can see if their opinion has changed over the course of the piece.
• The layout of the pictures, I feel, gives the whole poster a focal point and with the companies information in that central section then I feel like they are more likely to contact them.

Negative aspects:

• Lots of blank space because I didn't want to overfill the page with lots of information as that would immediately make the target audience switch off from reading it and that defeats the whole purpose of a poster which is to inform people of the piece and interest them to watch it. 

In order to fix this I made a second draft that fills up more of the space.

Draft 2

I think that draft 2 will be the poster that we use as it includes all of the main messages that we want to focus on without it being overbearing to an onlooker. The photos are from the rehearsal process which show what is to be expected of the piece and the links included to both the Theatre company and the SToRMS website are clear for people to find out more information.

TIE (Storms) Review

Performance Review

Positive points:

• Comedic timing - audience responded as we expected to the jokes that were made and if we went out to speak to them afterwards the interaction was always easier if there was a joke that had come before it as it made them feel like the atmosphere wasn't as pressuring on them.
• Pace - was majority kept up throughout the whole thing and the speed of the lines throughout was good and kept the audience engaged with the action onstage.
• Opening sequence - when showing the penises to the audience, it created a comedic atmosphere and introduced them to the topic easier and we did get a lot of laughter from the audience considering we were showing them fake penises that we then proceeded to put down our trousers. This was the response that we were expecting and it allowed us to use this to our advantage when we were talking to them because they had clearly seen the penises.
• Facilitation - majority of the facilitation was said in a clear and precise way so that when we did go out to the audience, they knew what was going on and the conversation could start and flow much easier.
• Reflective listening groups - I thought that the end groups worked really well and, specifically my group, found the 7 sins of communication very interesting to try and work out what they each were and then we intrigued to find out examples of each one and identify them in real life. We found that a lot of them identified moments in their own lives when they had seen these and that gave me a nice segway into trying to get them to realise how that made them feel and then proceeding to link that to reactions that they had seen in the piece. Also in my group one of the members came and found me towards the end of the session and told me that he was grateful for us talking about this as he was struggling with some of these things and he hoped that he would now have some of his friends to talk to him about it. This proves that in that audience of 40/50 students, we helped at least one person and that was the overall aim of the piece and it highlights the need for someone to hear what we were saying. It was an amazing feeling knowing that we had helped someone and helped them have a changed opinion on boys communicating how they are feeling with each other.
• Approaching the audience - Every time that we went out to the audience, I feel like the whole cast didn't make the atmosphere awkward and we approach the groups quite naturally and our body language was quite open reflecting the fact that we wanted them to be open to interpretation and I hope that that message came across to them as I wanted them to feel like we weren't going to judge them on what they say, we just wanted to understand their thought process and also their interpretation of the piece.

Negative points

• Murmuring during transition - For an unknown reason, when we got to the cross transition, the murmuring stopped and this therefore made the atmosphere drop, losing the effect that we wanted it to have on the audience which was for them to see the feelings building up in John's head.
• Pace - at times, the pace and speed of lines increased which meant that it was hard for the audience to catch onto what we were saying and this therefore made the continuity of the storyline and the audience's understanding of what was going on slightly harder to follow.
• Refocusing the audience - even though the facilitators had microphones, at times it was hard to understand what they were saying due to them not waiting for the audience to have fully re-focused on the piece and re-engaged with John's emotions. During the facilitation of the sliding scale, the audience hadn't finished their conversations and were still talking/laughing about some of the things that we had previously been discussing and so they lost the explanation of us wanting them to raise their hands when we got to their option and so when we proceeded to carry out the exercise, they didn't understand what to do which resulted in the exercise not getting the result that we wanted because they didn't hear what to do. We did cover it though by making the joke that everyone had broken their arms and so that allowed us to pick the atmosphere back up and carry on the piece.
• Repore with the audience during interactive sections - As expected, there were particular groups of students who weren't interested in the piece and weren't interested in giving their opinions to us which made it hard for some of the questions to be answered. To get around this we had to use some of the techniques that we had previously discussed in the lesson before when we had discussed ways to initiate the conversation. Sometimes this worked and others there was no response at all except for them laughing amongst themselves.

Week 23: TIE (Storms)

Last rehearsal before performance

We used this week to focus on the SToRMS T.I.E in order to get it as fluid as possible and performance ready because we had our performance the following Friday. We wanted to do as many run-throughs as possible both cue runs and full runs in order for us to feel confident and prepared for the performance. We wanted to get as much feedback as possible from our teacher so that we had the best performance that the audience would gain the most advantage from. One of the run-throughs, we found that we could emphasise the fact that we have fake penises and use it to our advantage so we wanted to go out in front of the audience and actually show them what we have to make them feel uncomfortable. We found that we could do it in a Berkoff style so using the extreme facial expressions to emphasise the fact that we are all females and we are talking to an all male audience. This also added to the comedic elements of the piece but the fact that we were being so serious about it meant that that also added to the comedy.

http://youtu.be/eaUhkcPPA0M

The piece was around 40 minutes long and that was without the interactive group section at the end which we thought was enough time for the audience to grasp the idea of what we wanted them to take from the piece.

The main feedback that we got from the run-throughs was:

• All of the earlier scenes - perfectly timed and the speed of the lines was slow enough for the audience to grasp what was going on in the scene.
• Start sequence - nice timing, allowed the atmosphere to be established and the tone of the piece to be set.
• More noise - need more noise when we are doing the crossover transition where we are saying lines. The atmosphere needs to be kept up so that they are constantly being interested in the piece in order for them to both understand what is going on and to gain the most out of the performance.
• Centre the scenes - Because of the new audience seating arrangement, we are so used to being further to one side than the other and so we needed to realign the scenes so that they were central and the whole audience were involved in the scene.
• Asides - Need to be shared with all sides of the audience so that they all felt like they can understand what is going on and understand the information that the asides are sharing with them because that's the whole purpose of the sides - to add extra information to the scene.
• Pace - the overall pace of the piece was very sustained and allowed the piece to have a calmer atmosphere so that the audience were more inclined to listen to what we were saying and therefore understand it more.
• Line pick ups- need to be slightly quicker during the societal pressures on boys section as this is a quicker pace section where the audience's attention needs to be verbally taken through what each little scene is so that they understand.
• Facilitator tone - The tone of the facilitators was good and accurate so that the audience were getting the information that they need in a tone that was easy to listen to and easy for them to take in.
• More irritated thank yous - When Caitlin is getting annoyed with Imogen, we wanted the thank yous to get more irritated to add to the joke and comedic timing of the lines.
• Family scene - needs to be brought further forward on the stage so that the audience feel more connect and immersed in the scene. But we also need to make sure that when we bring it forward, we don't close the scene from the audience on the outside. We need to involve the whole audience and not just those at the front and centre.
• Define the asides - For the maximum effect of the asides, there needs to be a juxtaposing atmosphere change to make them more defined and stand out more. One of the ones that need to be changed is the aside that is done by the school teacher in the school scene as we need it to be giving the audience the right message and the atmosphere helps set that up.
• Murmuring - We need to have continuous murmuring in the background of when the thoughts are building up on John as it adds to the atmosphere and when we go past John in the crossover scene, the lines that are being singled out at that point need to be shouted over the top which also adds to the tension that is building reflecting the breaking point that John is at.
• No props- At the start of the rehearsal process, we started using props like a cup and bottle in the scene but in particular when John "throws" the bottle, we found that there was the sound of the bottle bouncing along the floor whilst Hannah was trying to carry on her John lines which was taking the focus away from the lines that were being said.
• Caitlin's narrator tone - As the piece goes on, we wanted the narrator's tone to reflect the status that we had given them at the start of the piece as the leaders of the performance and so their tone, towards the middle and end of the piece, needed to be more formal. And then when we go into the smaller groups that is when they are able to use a slightly less formal approach.
• Corridor scene - volume needs to be louder to reflect the atmosphere of the school
• Barriers to Communication facilitation - doesn't make sense as the lines that are said are repeated and so we need to add in the line "John may think that he's communicating clearly," so that the audience can understand that John is communicating but perhaps not in a way that is clear enough for Holly to understand what he is trying to say.
• Context for the friends scene - If we add in some context then it might make more sense for the audience to understand the timeline that we are using and so we want to add in the line "Earlier in the evening."
• Echoing lines - There was a line that was repeated that we needed to change so that the audience didn't get confused about what was going on and so after the small scene where we fake what John's friends would look like when he tries to talk to them about his feelings, we got the facilitator to say "that looks ridiculous" instead of repeating the same line of " nothing like this would ever happen."
• Reflective listening - We originally had a version of the reflective listening on a slide on the powerpoint but after considering it we found that it wasn't as helpful as we thought and it was also a distraction from the subjects that we would be talking about it in our groups.

Week 22: TIE (Storms)

Preparing for performance

We have recently found out some provisional dates for performances at King Ecgberts School to launch the project and those are during the next week and so we used today's rehearsal to map out where the audience will be sitting and because it is being performed in our vicinity, we are able to rehearse in the actual performance space. We are thinking that we will be performing to roughly 50-60 pupils in year 11 so they are directly in the centre of our target audience age range. We are thinking that we are performing for 70 just so that we are prepared if it's anymore and that would roughly give us 10 students to work with in each interactive group.

The first thing that we decided to work on was the audience positioning so that we were prepared before the audience even entered the room, to make the interactive elements easier to divide up. We eventually came up with a curved seating arrangement that made sure everyone in the audience was involved in the piece and felt like they could interact with us. 

With the audience seating arrangement then in place we decided to do a run through and adjust anything to accommodate for the seating. The first thing that we came across was the first line of chairs that we sit in was very far forwards and the audience around the sides would only be able to see the backs and sides of the chairs. In order to change this we both brought the line backwards and made it into an arch instead of a line so that we could address the whole audience and play to all the sides of the stage in order to keep them involved.

The next problem came at the "societal pressures on boys" section as we were the opposite of the earlier problem and were all too far backwards. When we did bring the focal point of the action forwards, we then found that the sides of the stage could see the mechanics behind some of the sections so we needed to use the extra people to cover the mechanics at the side and this also allows the sides to see their reaction in regards to the situation, meaning that they are still being engaged in the piece. We also thought about the TV section when we are all facing forwards as the sides wouldn't be involved as much as the central section as we are facing in that direction but we wanted it to be realistic and we are all watching the same TV so it made more sense for that small section to be facing the front and centre to ensure it was realistic. 

We then found that we needed our dramatic asides to be directed to the whole audience and this was the hardest thing as there was only one person talking and they had to direct all lines to the entire audience which meant that they had to keep moving along the audience line so that they included everyone.

We then moved onto the section where the pressures are building up on John and we have him seated centrally and the rest of the cast cross behind him. The issue that we found from this was that the seat was too far backwards and so we moved it as close to the front as we could get which gave this section a theatre in the round feel. This also gave us more space to work with behind the chair and to involve the audience a little more we decided that when we cross and say our lines, we then exit through the diagonal exits that are in the audience so that it gave the piece a more dynamic and "in your face" feel to accentuate the building up of the pressures.

In order for the interactive sections to run as smoothly as possible, we decided which sections we were going to talk with so that we know which group to go to immediately. We also thought that when you address your group and some of the things that you have been discussing we need to come out into the audience to make the juxtaposition bigger and it also makes them more involved and connecting what we discussed with the actual scenario.

When we get feedback from the facilitation of who could John talk to, we need to think about how we are going to tell the audience that John doesn't want to react in their suggested way without telling them that they are wrong and so we wanted it to be more of a sharing of ideas and then have John saying that they are good suggestions but then giving a reason why it wouldn't work in this situation. 

After the run through, we decided to talk through the facilitation and interactive parts in depth and have a small practice of how we would respond to a wall of silent when we ask a question as this is one of the most expected response. We know this from the fact that the target audience are being specifically that, targeted, because they aren't communicating how they feel in an effective way. It made sense for us to have small role plays of how to get round non-communicative behaviour because we can't get annoyed at it or try and ignore it. We thought of a scenario such as being in a classroom and the teacher has moments when the teacher asks an impossible question to the class and the class will try and work out what the answer is and that silence is not an awkward silence. On other occasions there are times when the teacher will ask the simplest question and the class won't answer because it's that simple. And then the teacher will apply the same logic as they would to the first scenario and try to break it down to the class, that is when it gets awkward. Applying this situation to the piece, we were trying to work out the sections where we are asking them these simple questions that may result in the awkward silence that is hard to get out of. We decided that instead of simple questions, we have sections where the audience may not understand what we are asking them to do without us coming and explaining it and that's a potential way into a conversation because you can come up to them and ask them whether they know what they're doing and so that might be able to initiate a conversation. I think that when we come out to the audience, we need to find a way of saying "what do you think" in a more tangential and calmer way that invites them in and makes them feel like they can talk to us about what they've seen and not feel scared, because we're not teachers, we're sixth formers and we can use that to our advantage as we can have a conversation with them in a way that's very different from how a teacher can. The biggest problem that we could possibly face would be silence especially when we're performing a piece about communication.

The first section of interaction that we have with the audience is when we ask them to identify the moments of non-verbal communication and we have specific questions written on the PowerPoint behind us that the audience need to answer. It is a fairly clear task and the only reason why that wouldn't be able to do it would be if they're choosing not to or they're not engaging because they don't see the point of it. Our job is to motivate them into giving us answers as we don't need to explain it, it's more about making them feel like there's a point in talking to us about their opinions. We could possibly even vocalise that it's a simple question but what we're trying to do by that is get them to think about the situations that they have been in and identify possible areas of non-verbal communication in those. We can even try and say that we have seen signs of non-verbal communication in our own conversations with our parents as a way into a conversation and make them feel like we're not being patronising and we actually value their opinions. If we only get one or two answers out of the group that's still okay because it's not all about getting everybody to answer but if the group hears someone talking openly about the piece then it might enable others to feel like they can too. We then paired off and worked on some ways that we thought could be conversation starters as this is our first interaction with them and we need to work out how to break the ice as the first contact is important as it sets the tone of the group discussion for both you and the person who will talk to them after you. We need ways to get under the façade of "we're not going to do anything," as we're quite far into the piece before we ask for audience participation. In our pairs, we discussed a few different ways of opening up the interactions that allows us to set the tone for the subjects that we will be talking about. We thought about introducing yourself - although this means that you will have to introduce yourself to every group that you talk to and avoiding telling them what you want because that seems very patronising.
We also talked about how there are different types of ice breakers because if they are already talking, then this allows you to listen to their conversation and pick up on the points that they are making and add in follow up questions to see the extent of their understanding. There is also the danger of them completely being silent at you if you proceed to ask them a question in which we thought that you could start to repeat some of the things that you heard in their conversation to spark them talking again. We found it hard to not fall into a patronising tone and not sound like it is scripted because we need to ask them questions about their understanding but we need to do it in a conversational tone instead of sounding like a teacher.
We then got the chance to practice how to start of the discussions on our teacher who become an audience member who had been hardly paying attention to the piece and once we had told them that we needed their opinions, suddenly found that they didn't know what to do. We found it very difficult to not approach the situation with a direct question as this made our student immediately not want to talk to us. Our teacher was being deliberately difficult so that we were prepared in case this actually happened in the piece and we would know to expect some students to be like that, hopefully they won't be that difficult and we know to expect the first discussion to start with silence. We need to not be put off by the awkwardness of the first interaction because if we think that the atmosphere is awkward and act like it is then that's going to make the situation worse. I think that we need to really think about these conversational sections and the facilitation before it as that facilitation is like a whole other performance and way of communicating that quite a lot of practitioners in Theatre in Education are lacking in and those that are, dynamically changes the atmosphere of the piece.
Some of us in the class, including myself, have had the opportunity to watch a couple of T.I.E pieces and there was a particular facilitator who was amazing and really engaging with the audience by just listening to things that we being said and drew people in to talk to him. He asked questions in a way that made the audience feel like their opinions were needed and made them feel fully engaged with the piece. We also saw the same company the following year and that facilitator wasn't there and there was a massive difference, not in terms of the acting or the subject that they were talking about but it was the quality of the facilitation that destroyed the piece. So we wanted to take the best assets of the good facilitator and use them in our piece so that we could make the atmosphere lighter and less pressuring on the audience to answer the questions that we need them to.
We discussed some more ideas like acknowledging the strangeness of the situation (an all-girl class speaking to an all-boy audience about communication), bypassing the strangeness of the situation and trying to make some observation and connection to the piece. If they're talking already, we have a massive head start because we can just listen to what they're saying and prompt more questions which is very different to asking direct questions. We could delegate who was going to talk to who which is quite a mechanical method but if we begin to pair people up, they may not be comfortable enough to talk to the person they've been paired with. We could begin with mentioning what non-verbal communication actually is and then we could make a joke out of the silence, if there is one, as in "you're demonstrating really good non-verbal communication right now." If we begin to expand on what we have seen in the scene then we could get them listening to what we are saying before we begin to ask them questions as it's more of an indirect approach. We found that it does help to have a bank of things that we could say in our heads and a shape that we can use because if we go up to them and have nothing and do get the response of a blank look then we are just relying on instinct and this can sometimes go really wrong.
I, personally, found this really helpful especially discussing ways that we could initiate the conversation and building up a bank of things that I could say to my group when the conversation begins.

Week 20: TIE (Storms)

Run-through, and adding some Godber

Whilst we were doing a run-through, we decided that we had just passed over the idea of the gym as a societal pressure on boys and so we decided to add more of a Goberesque section in so that we could highlight the judgement that is placed on boys by others to be in shape. So following the Godber style that we have previously studied, we added in a synchronised sound and then separate stereotypical movements that reflect people working out in the gym. We used the snappy quick movements of the Godber style to make the transitions around the movement flow easily and we made sure that the piece was still able to flow and the story was still present throughout. We made sure that the movement was an appropriate length so that we weren't taking the focus away from the point of the piece and we also added in the movement to reflect the comment that we may need more banter and humour in the piece to keep the audience involved and interested. We also made sure that there was a rhythm to the movement to make each small section have a short focus.

We then had a small discussion about adding in the option of a helpline option in the who could John talk to section and which could trigger replies from John of "It's not that bad, I'm just pissed off" and "I don't even know how to get the numbers," which would allow us to introduce the perception of helplines as something that only people with mental illnesses can use and then when we move onto the group discussion later in the piece, we would address this. We wanted to tell the audience that some of the helplines, like the samaritans, are just there for someone to talk to and they can't form an opinion on what you're telling them because they don't know anything else about your life except what you tell them. We were also thinking of adding it to the list on the powerpoint in order for that discussion and the idea of helplines being introduced earlier in the piece.

Moving on through the piece, we decided that we need a more defined end so that the audience know that the focus has now shifted onto them and what they have learnt from the piece and so we decided to include these lines:

John's life isn't going to get better straight away
But if his friends are there to listen to him
It will make it easier.
John still has a lot of things going on in his life
For example, he'll still get told off when he goes home drunk.
Everybody's got stress in their life and everyone is going to feel like John at some point.
I'm stressed about the way people look at me
I'm stressed about not sleeping
I'm stressed about the future
The point we're making is that having a penis can sometimes get in the way of talking about these things.
What we're going to do now is talk about some issues that have been raised in piece and go over some of the ways you can be a better listener.

Adding in these personal anecdotes allows the audience to relate to the small stresses as real things that are happening in people's lives rather than just a story being told on stage. And the segway makes the piece that they have just seen make more sense and also opens up some discussion starting points for when we go into the audience. 

Week 18: TIE (Storms)

Reviewing Changes

Last week, we made some changes to the piece and there was a person missing so we had to use this weeks lesson to go over all of the changes and see if they worked like we wanted them to with everybody here.

We mainly focused on the response that we would have to the audience once they had given us some feedback because we wanted to be more positive especially when they are talking by nodding and possibly making more agreeing sounds so they they feel like their opinion is being both heard and understood. We also agreed that we need more positive reinforcement after the answer has been said and more praise needs to be given about their answer as well as repeating it so that the rest of the audience can also hear it. I feel like we also need to re-say the response in an accepting way to show that the answer that was given was correct and it was also appreciated. Having this positive reinforcement allows both the person who said it and the rest of the audience to open up more because they are being complimented on the work that they have submitted towards the piece. We did a blocky run-through of the piece before concentrating on the section that have audience interactions in them and we all added in more compliments and positive feedback to the audience.

Week 17: TIE (Storms)

Performing to an audience and making changes

So this week, we actually had the opportunity to perform in front of a group of around 15 students, some of which were female but only around 4 of them, the rest being male, who were all in the age bracket of our target audience, 14-16. Performing in front of them allowed us to practice our facilitation skills and also see what it would be like to actually speak to a group of people and find out some of the answers that they might say in regards to our questions about the piece. At the end of the performance, we asked them for some feedback about the good points and some points that may need improving.

Our groups good points included:

• Interaction with the audience - they said that they really enjoyed how involved the audience were in the whole piece and breaking that fourth wall really allowed them to ask any questions if they were unsure which, in turn, also allowed us to see where they were with their understanding of the piece and help them if needed. Specifically, the "morning after scene" was mentioned as it was easy to follow and the questions that were asking and the fact that we actually went out to discuss them, helped the audience to understand the situation more and this also meant that they could relate to it more.

Our groups points to improve on included:

• Difference between John being drunk and sober needs to be bigger - It was pointed out that there needs to be a bigger difference once the Alcohol factor has been removed from the mini cooper scene as the audience became confused whether John was actually sober or not.
• More options for the text message - some of the audience brought up the fact that they know that John's reply to Holly was inconsiderate and they said that they wouldn't have even thought of sending that. The only problem with more options is that, the text message triggers scenes that happen later on in the piece and so if we had options then we wouldn't know which one the audience was going to pick meaning the later scenes don't coincide with the earlier ones.
• Confusion with rewinding - there was a mass confusion about where in John's story we were skipping back to at certain points and so we need to make it clearer about where we have skipped back to and even give a short overview of what has happened so that the audience can understand the scene more and where in the story line it actually is.

We then had a full class discussion with our teacher included to feedback what we had found out from the audience's feedback and sort out what we need to fix and improve.

• Extended Family - As one of the options for "who should John talk to" one of the audience suggested extended family which we thought was a good option as they are less obliged to become defensive and will listen to what you have to say but they don't have to take immediate action because they aren't your parents and are more of a listening ear.
• Option of us repeating their point - During the piece, I asked one of the audience members to say their point to the rest of audience but I also gave them the option of me saying it and we discussed that it might have been too early on in the piece to suggest that as we want the audience to feel comfortable enough to say their point so if we let them have another option too early they may not feel comfortable later on.
• Positive Reinforcement - We needed a lot more positive language being fed back to the audience once they have said a point so that they feel included in the piece and also know that their answer was appreciated. We need to be giving them positive encouragement almost constantly after a point is made and this will both boost their confidence as well as help cover up some of the blank spots.
• Narrator's repeating the audience's points - We were saying that the narrator's need to re-say the point that has been made by the audience so that the whole audience can hear the point.
• Banter - we could use banter on stage between all of us on stage to make the atmosphere less pressuring on the audience and easier for us to talk to them and also easier for them to talk to each other.
• The piece as a whole - The piece is working in theory as the audience are saying what we wanted them to say but it feels flat when some of the jokes are being made. This could be due to timing or maybe some of the jokes are really funny.
• Pace - At times, the pace was slow which had a big effect on the feel and energy of the piece which also led to some sticky transitions that made the piece quite bumpy.
• Too much alcohol? - It was brought up that there was quite a lot of the piece based around alcohol but not everyone wants to drink which means that we could be aiming at a specific type of male, so some males may not react in the same way to the piece as they can't connect with what's going on. We also discussed the idea that it might be the difference between Year 10 and Year 11 as majority of people are normally introduced to alcohol influence more in Year 11
• Removing all the barriers - We need to establish the fact that by removing alcohol we could also remove swearing as alcohol can influence how your speech and language.
• Peer pressure in the mini cooper scene - Because peer pressure is one of the barriers on the list, we think that we need to keep everyone in the scene whilst Holly is there to act as another distraction for John. It would also give the scene energy and an atmosphere.
• Music - We could use music when we go out to talk to the audience so that it isn't completely silent whilst people are talking and when the music is turned off that is the signal for us to come back on stage and get some feedback.

 After discussing all of these changes, we decided to re-work the start. We decided that we would carry the chairs on separately instead of getting them off of the stack because we could then introduce the banter aspect as we could give each other smug looks as we know what is to come in the piece.

 - We also made more of the fact that we have fake penis' in our hands and made it more like we were proud of what we were going to do.

- We also kept the interaction between the "lads" quite quick so that the pace was kept up throughout and we used that as a starting point for the atmosphere especially with the music in the background.

- We decided to cut off some of the "societal pressures on boys" because we found that the audience had lost concentration during all of the different examples and so we cut some of them out and shortened that extract so that it wasn't as long and the audience would still remain included in the piece. We also changed one of the end examples from clothing to talking about going to the gym because we wanted to include some of the ideas that Sue, the client, spoke to us about when she came to review the piece. Adding in something about the gym was one of the points that she had mentioned as something that plays a very big part in the modern male's life and can become quite a pressuring factor. 

Week 16: TIE (Storms)

Adding in improvements

Due to us having the client review our piece last week, we focused on the feedback that we were given and went through the entire piece making sure that changes were being made and we were keeping what Sue said in our heads at all times.

We started with changing the line "80% of people who commit suicide have a penis" to "80% of people who die by suicide" so that suicide doesn't sound like a crime. We also changed the wording of some other lines so that it made the build up to the question easier for the audience to understand what we wanted them to do clearly. The line "please help me explain to my colleague what happened by answering the following questions with the person sat next to you," was changed to "right, we need you guys to help me explain to my colleague how non-verbal communication was used between all three characters in the scene you just saw. To help you out, we've put some questions up on the board for you to discuss with the people around you." We made sure that we included "with the people around you" so that they wouldn't be restricted to the person sat next to them and it also leaves room for bigger discussions. We also made sure that we the cast was called back, the instructions for what we wanted them to do was clearer and so we now say "let's replay the scene and when we reach a point of non-verbal communication, we'll pause the scene and hear some of your ideas." We thought that this wording made it much clearer to the audience what was about to happened when we replayed the scene and it also prepared them to be called on to say their ideas.

We then started discussing the idea of doing a potential second arm test during the sliding scale if no one decides to put their hands up to stop John when he's walking then we thought that someone could say something like "so you all think that John is going to get on his knees and beg for forgiveness" as a joke and then we would redo the sliding scale, asking for them to be honest.

Also during the "who should John talk to" scene, we were thinking about adding in the option of Childline or Samaritans etc as someone that he could talk to, or maybe not adding it on the slide that would be shown but when we go out and talk to the audience, we could mention it and see how they would react to Childline as an option. We would then have a true reaction from the target audience on how they would feel calling an anonymous line.

After these discussions, we then focused on the asides that are throughout the piece as we wanted them to have the most impact which meant that the atmospheres, from the actual scene to the asides, need to be as juxtaposing as possible. We went through each individual aside and made sure that we, as the cast, knew when the asides ended in order for us to bring the atmosphere back up.

We then moved onto the facilitation of the forum theatre as we have never actually clarified what we were going to say in that section and so we decided that Adam, John's friend, should be the one to introduce the idea of the audience telling him what to say and do in order for John to open up to him. We came up with some reasons, that we thought the audience might say, for why John isn't communicating. We thought of:

• He might be embarrassed of admitting he's struggling 
• It might be out of the blue
• The alcohol could be stopping him from communicating
• It's also in front of everyone

At this point, we would be in the audience asking questions in order for them to understand the situation more. If they did say that having the friends there was harder for John to explain how he's feelings then we would encourage them to put their hand up and suggest that Adam get John on his own.

We then decided to add in some chorus narration so that we could drip-feed some information to the audience about what was about to happen in the next scene, where Adam takes it upon himself to ask John how he's feeling instead of waiting for John to open up. One of the lines that I was given was "so here's our top tip for helping someone open up about their feelings," but we decided to change the line as saying "feelings" to an all-boy audience may cause them to switch off as it seems like a quite feminine thing to say. So we changed the line to "so here's our top tip for helping someone open up about stuff." We would therefore be using vocabulary that the audience can relate to and understand more in order for them to be able to unlock the real meaning behind the piece. We also had to change another line to "one thing that makes it easier to feel like someone gets you," for the same reason that we changed my line: so that the audience could relate to it more.

We also had a discussion about how we wanted to end the piece and we though that we could have a small section of reflective listening which is where we, as the cast, would go into character as John and give the audience a chance to practice reflecting John's feelings back to him. It also allows the audience a chance to see what it feels like to help someone open up and so if this situation happens in real life, they know what to do and how to react when someone is telling them how they are feeling and their situation. We would also highlight some mistakes that people make when communicating, which are thinks like direct questions which are more likely to make someone switch off instead of open up and so we would try and get them to avoid asking questions. At this point, we would also hand out the wise-talkers leaflets to reiterate what we have been saying about it being easier to ask than to explain. 

Week 15: TIE review (Storms)

Performing in front of the client

Before the client arrived, we had a 2 hour rehearsal of just running the piece again and again in order for the fluidity of the piece to replicate what we want it to be like in the actual performances. We added in a piece of music which added in comedic timing, making the idea of us "becoming" boys all the more effective because we are using humour to allow the audience to fully open up and take on board what we are going to tell them. This was from previous research that we had done and we found out that majority of males communicate through humour and so we are communicating in a way that they will understand.

At 3pm, the clients arrived in order to watch the piece and give us feedback on whether it fitted their campaign and whether it reached the points and topics that they wanted it to. They were also checking that the information that we are giving out is appropriate and in a way that is easily understandable. After the run-through, the client and Mr Chipp had a small discussion about the piece and whether they thought things needed changing. We then joined them after 30 minutes to receive this feedback so we could begin to think about adapting the piece.

Overall, the feedback that we got was very positive. They enjoyed the comedic start and they were happily surprised by the idea of us becoming boys as we have a completely female class and so they were glad that we found a way around it with the stereotypes of boys and still managed to keep the audience focused on the topics. It was very engaging for an audience to watch and they liked the way that it was very jokey at the start and then the seriousness of the piece came with the statistics which they agreed was very needed in the piece. The interactive side was very effective and they thought that the forum theatre section was a very good idea to keep the audience engaged with the piece and also an opportunity for us to check in with the audience on where their understanding of the topic is.

They said that maybe we could change the line "80% of people who commit suicide have a penis" to "80% of people who die by suicide have a penis" because the word "commit" makes it  sound like a crime and not something that has happened to them. They also commented that they think we should have a bigger build-up or some sort of preparation before we ask the audience questions so, we need to get slightly further into the piece before we have any audience interaction just so the audience can really get a feel for the topic and understand what we want them to do once we do go out.

The client also brought up something that we had discussed earlier on in the rehearsal process, which was the idea that everybody goes through these problems which they have to deal with but, it can be just lots of little things instead of big topics that we have used like bereavement and financial status. These little things can build up as well as pressure until that person reaches a breaking point. This pressure, if not expressed or let out, over a period of time can lead to having an effect on the mental health of that person. The client expressed that this was one of the major starting points of a mental health problem and so we are considering having Adam, John's friend in the piece, showing signs of these little problems and showing that these problems effect everybody. Everybody comes across their own struggles in life and will recognise that build up of pressure but, we want people to know that there are ways of relieving that pressure and it doesn't have to be a massive thing. This is where we could bring more information about the SToRMs "Wise-talkers" campaign which focuses on recognising the signs of someone who is stressed or upset and taking the first step to talk to them about their problems instead of them coming to you. We want to highlight the fact that everyone needs to look out for everyone all the time because we are all dealing with the same problems and SToRMs want more people to take the steps to helping someone else.

We then moved on to a discussion of our ideas around Adam's character and the client mentioned ideas about modern society and the peer pressure of male's "image". One of the things that SToRMs do is look at alcohol in relation to mental health and challenging stigma. A huge thing for the males in our age range in modern culture is "gym culture," being bigger and having more muscles than your friends. The idea that the client had for Adam was that he could be big and outgoing on the outside but he still has internal anxieties about the way that he looks. So we wanted Adam to represent the idea of males using the gym to cover up their insecurities about their bodies and we would use this character to reveal and admit these insecurities about his image in order to normalise that idea and let the audience know that its okay to be insecure about your body and that many other people are going through the same thing. We wanted to use the idea of Adam being quite scrawny in year 7 and was picked on and now he goes to the gym five times a week and if he misses 2 session then he feels anxious about his weight gain. He appears to be this tall and muscular male but inside he is still that small boy. This issue to so relevant in the society that we live in and I think that once it has been commented on, because it isn't talked about enough, then people will start realising the signs in other people and hopefully use the methods that we have mentioned in the piece to talk to their friends about it. This could be possible with Adam's character as we would see the friends perspective of "John's a lad...he's only having a laugh...he's fine" as Adam doesn't see the other side of John that the audience do and we can accentuate the fact that John is going through all of his problems and his friend doesn't even realise that they are they reason behind his excessive drinking.

The client was then giving us information about the charity as a whole and mainly focused on the wise-talkers campaign which they want to launch with the TIE project, like CAMHS did with the previous year. We took a look at the leaflets that would be handed out and we found that it was to used to help people who know that someone else is going through a rough period of time to find routes into helping that other person talk about their situation. We said that there was a lot of words, all of which were important but it was a bit of an overload of information, also the SToRMs logo was only very small and so for advertising purposes it wouldn't do a very good job and also if someone wanted to get in touch with the producers then the SToRMs logo needs to be bigger in order for them to do that. There was a small change that needed to be made on one of the back pages as the telephone number for one of the companies had changed and we suggested the Samaritans number as you can text that number as well as call due to the modern society finding it easier to text someone instead of call them so including that number would be beneficial. We then moved onto how likely the target audience was to actually keeping the leaflet and what their response would be so we brought in three lads, two in year 11 and one in year 10, and asked them what their response would be to the leaflets after they've seen the piece. They all said that they would have most likely put it in the bin but after watching TIE would most likely keep it but maybe not actually use it because of it being so small.

We had the idea of actually bringing that reaction into the piece so like we were preempting their response to being given this leaflet. The least it could do was think more about their actions and perhaps actually read what they have been given in depth. We talked about what it would mean to throw the piece of paper away. Would they be saying they don't want to be a good friend? Do they not need it? Perhaps adding some of those questions into the piece would also be effective in getting them to rethink their actions regarding the leaflet. This led to us having a conversation about appealing more to using it to help a friend in need, not necessarily for yourself which might make people more likely to engage with the idea of it and also use it. They did comment that it was originally aimed at adults which led us to suggesting that maybe social media was the best route to go down when referring to our target audience. Caitlin mentioned that social media feels more personal and having that constant exposure to the campaign would have a bigger effect than organisational leaflets. Imogen also suggested the idea of anonymous stories, so anyone who has a problem can send them in anonymously and be able to get advice from anyone going through the same problem. I suggested even sending in experiences of helping someone else to help accentuate the fact that these things work and can be helpful to start of the conversation about their situation. SToRMs' social media platform would act as a middle man for communication between peers. We thought that using social media alongside the performance is the way to get through to our age range and actually if the piece impacts 2 people out of 300 then it worth it.

In terms of continuity after the piece, we wanted to get people to realise these signs in both themselves, but more importantly, their friends and use the leaflet in order for them to step up and start the conversation. We would sell the leaflet as "this is a guide to help someone else" and "admitting you've got problems is hard" which would appeal to the male ideas of comrades. Sue talked about friends asking for advice because some people come across a situation where they're at a loss to how to get help for them or a friend, as they don't know what to say or what to do or where to point their friend to for help. We also touched upon the idea of a counselling for friends of people who are having counselling, a kind of helpful hand to tell them how to have an open mind when regarding their friends problems and issues.

Overall, the performance to the client was a success and we don't have any major changes to make to what we originally had and we have some interesting ideas to move to piece into the right direction and start to move onto the perspective of the friend, Adam.

Week 13: TIE (Storms)

Forum Theatre Section

We started off by exploring the idea of Adam, the friend of John that we have seen in the background throughout the piece, having a breakdown (maybe even suicide) out of the blue so that we can accentuate the fact that we can all be a friend and you may not realise that someone has a mental health problem as they may cover it up with humor. We thought that at some point we could have a video of Sue, the CEO of SToRMs, talking about her own experiences with not noticing the signs of a mental health problem in her son but we then realised that it might be too horrific for her to recall the whole story.

After our full run-through, we decided that we wanted to focus on the Forum Theatre addition to the piece. A few weeks ago, we made a short scene that included John and his friends when they start drinking in the build up to the car scene, so like a flashback of when John started drinking. We came up with some suggestions that we think we may be told when we go out into the audience:

• Ask him whether he's alright
• Have a drink with him so that he's not alone
• Ask him why he wants to get drunk

We decided to imagine we had taken some suggestions from the audience and we were going to replay the scene multiple times so that the audience could have control over one of the friends and see whether they could help John express his feelings. In the first go of the scene, we said that an audience member would put forward the idea of a friend asking him whether he's alright and why is he drinking so much. We had the rest of the group answer for John by shouting "Well, it's Friday night." so we emphasised that maybe asking how he feels in a group and whilst the rest of your friends are around isn't the best idea. And so we said that when we are helping the audience that could be one of our suggestions to them that might spark some more ideas. And so we applied that to the scene and added in Adam holding back John from the group and then proceeding to ask him whats wrong.

The conversation that we came up with was:

A:Why are you drinking so much?

J: I don't know cos I'm pissed off, I don't know I just want to stop thinking for a bit

A: Pissed off at what?

J: Just...I don't know I've got a lot going on at the minute

A: You do seem really stressed

J: I am being stressed

A: Yeah being stressed can make you angry

J: I'm literally angry all the time: at mum, at school for putting all this shit on me, at dad for shouting at me, at holly for not getting it.

A: Yeah it sounds pretty tough mate

J: Yeah tough

A: Look I'll keep an eye on you tonight, yeah, make sure that you get home alright.

In previous years, we have worked with CAMHS on the Healthy Minds Launch and we found out that a good way to help someone open up to you was by relaying their feelings back to them and stating that it is clear you know they are upset and so we added that in when Adam changes his tactics and it eventually helps John explain how he's feeling.

We did think that we could also add in an extra bit of audience participation if we stopped after the first question so that we can allow the audience to have control of both sides of the conversation and know how it feels to try and communicate and also be a good friend. We wanted them to tell us what they thought John would say and we thought that they could say:

• Why do you care?
• Just want a good night
• I'm bored what else is there to do?

We then thought of the conversation that might come after and we thought that it may go like:

A: Why are you drinking so much?

J: I don't know

A: Come on , mate just tell me

J: (Lists some of the options given by the audience)

A: It's not like you mate

J: I've got a lot going on

We would then fast forward to the drunk scene with Holly but Adam stays with him whilst the rest of the group leave when Holly arrives. We thought that this could show the impact that having a friend in that situation could have upon John. Adam would stop John from smoking and getting on the car as the designated sober friend that is looking out for John. Adam sees the argument with Holly building and so removes John from the situation in a comedic way so that if reflects how it could happen in real life.

Moving the piece onward, we thought that we could do some small group work with the audience to unpick what Adam did for John. We would try enable them to explain the realistic situation. For example, there was no way that Adam was going to stop John from drinking but not everybody in the group has to drink so that one person can look out for him. Adam listened to what his friend had to say and identified how he was feeling and helped him understand that it was okay to talk about it. We could do small role plays and try to get them to do the scene themselves and see whether they could get John to express his feelings without asking him questions and then we could ask follow up questions like "how hard was that to talk to someone?" This would allow the audience to be put in the conversation still in a safe environment so that if the situation occurs in real life, they will know what to do.

Week 12: TIE (Storms)

Facilitation and Powerpoint

From the previous week, we noticed that in the first scene in the case study, the breakfast scene, didn't have any dramatic asides in it to accentuate how both the males in the scene were feeling at that point and so we made sure that we added in 2 asides, one for John and one for his dad, so that the audience would see what it was like to be on either side of the conversation and the two opinions about it.

We then moved onto the facilitation of John with Holly in the drunk scene where he is on top of the car and we wanted to use that to allow the audience to realise the barriers that are stopping John communicating in a way that Holly would understand and therefore be able to help. We used this as another chance to interact with the audience and so, as a cast, we came up with the 4 main barriers that we thought are the main reasons for John and his miscommunication with Holly:

• Peer-pressure- because at the start of the scene, John is with his friends and they are all drinking and so he is being peer-pressured into following what everybody else is doing.
• Alcohol- Mainly due to the fact that he is drunk and alcohol effects your ability to make decisions and also increases your chance of risk-taking. We have also had a conversation with a mental health ambassador in our own school and he said that when a mental health issue arises in someone they tend to isolate themselves and they do this through risk taking, so drinking alcohol, and we wanted to show that in our piece so that we are showing all the options that someone could take to hide their own feelings and also what could be signs, that we can pick up on, of someone with a mental health problem.
• Aggression - due to the alcohol, John becomes quite aggressive both verbally and physically as he tries to intimate Holly and this leads to him trying to communicate in a way that actually frightens Holly slightly and means that her attention has shifted from "what could make him be this way" to "is he going to hurt me in any way?" and this means that the miscommunication is both John's fault and Holly's.
• Swearing - As a consequence from all the above factors, John begins to swear at Holly and this means that this is adding to the miscommunication.

We were then going to ask the audience to rank them in the order from 1-4, with 1 being the biggest barrier and 4 being the smallest. We would go out in the audience and help them to explain their reasoning behind their answers and see whether they are picking up on the main reasons for each barrier. We would then ask them to show on their fingers which number they ranked each one and then we would remove the barrier that the majority of the audience thought was the main one. Doing this allows us to strip back all of the barriers that John had built up between himself and Holly and we are trying to show that John did try and communicate but not in the right way. We wanted to show the juxtaposition between what John thought he said and what he actually said in order for the audience to understand the difference and it also shows ways that you can communicate in a way that allows others to help you.

A small project that we did at the end was to make a powerpoint that will go up behind us whilst we are acting, with key points that we are making on the board and also questions that we want them to be asking throughout the piece. Having this behind us allows us to continue acting whilst the audience are gaining information from it and we are wanting the main points for each section of the piece to be on each slide so that the audience really understand what we are trying to say. When we go out into the audience to help them, the questions that are on the slide can be used as starting points for discussion and we can follow them up with secondary questions to further the audience's understanding of John and the piece as a whole.

Week 11: TIE (Storms)

Adapting the sliding scale

This week, we started by making a slight change as we are noticing that we are mainly saying that boys don't communicate at all so, we wanted to add a positive side to the piece by saying that things like non-verbal communication, like in the morning after scene, is still a positive way of communicating even if it doesn't involved words. The morning after John's argument with his dad was the pinpoint of our negative connotations to non-verbal communication as we were originally saying that John wasn't communicating verbally with his father and therefore it was his fault for not expressing his true feelings to his dad but, we wanted to change this to show that communicating in any form is better than not communicating at all and even in small gestures, there are still feelings behind them.

After this, we decided to adapt our sliding scale and expand on the options that John has. In the previous week, we had defined the key points on the sliding scale but we narrowed those down to three major points: break-up with her, do nothing and beg for her forgiveness. We did this in order for the audience to explore the ranges in between the options when we go and facilitate the scale. We said that when John is walking down the scale, we would pause when someone in the audience raised their hands at one of the 3 main points and we would ask them for the reason why. Asking the audience follow up questions allows us to understand how much they are understanding and it also allows us to help them understand the messages that we are trying to convey in order for our main point to be backed up at the end. We would keep going until John was at the end, and the narrator, depending on the audience's choice, would identify the point that most people voted for. Making the audience vote for which outcome they think should happen engages them with the piece and, also allows us to see whether they have picked up on the key points that we have been hinting at throughout to help in the build up to the main point.We made it so that, no matter what the majority of votes was, it would always lead to the same lines of this was because John tried to communicate but Holly didn't listen to him.

We began extending this into John arguing that he did explain his feelings, or tried, to Holly as this reflects the reaction that many boys would have when asked whether they tried to explain how they felt. We added in a replay of all the scenes between John and Holly to accentuate the times that John did try and communicate how he felt. We thought that, from our previous workshop, we could add in or move our piece towards the Forum Theatre direction so that the audience could take control of one character and see how John reacts to different approaches from different people or how he responds to different acknowledgements of his feelings. We then discussed that we wanted to move away from the girlfriend as we wanted the whole audience to feel like they could connect with John's situation but not everyone has a girlfriend or even had one so we wanted to involved the whole audience and so we moved onto the idea of John communicating with his friends as, we hoped that everyone in the audience had at least one friend that they could talk to. We devised a scene that would be set before John is drunk on top of the mini cooper and it would show the build up to John getting drunk and included a big group of John's friends to highlight the fact that you don't necessarily need to tell everyone in your friendship group. We gave John some lines about wanting to get drunk so that he could forget what was going on and majority of the group cheered and thought of it as just another excuse to get drunk but one friend was concerned about John and why he was acting this way and so when we were going to leave to "go to the park" that specific friend pulled him aside and asked him what was wrong. This section was then going to be our Forum Theatre part as we thought that the audience could control the conversation that was about to happen and see how there are different ways that you can ask about how someone is feeling and there are different ways of telling someone how you feel.

The friend noticing the difference in John's mindset also links with the wise talkers element of SToRMS which was about noticing other people's emotions and how to talk and respond to their feelings/behaviour.

Week 10: TIE (Storms)

Refining the Case Study

At the start of the lesson, we had a discussion about the main features of the piece and which focal point we wanted to address in detail this lesson. We decided that the case study of John Doe was the main point of our piece as it put all of the ideas that we had highlighted earlier on in the piece, into context: a real life situation. We went through the case study as we already know it and added in small sections that would be said by the narrators to introduce the different scenarios that John would be put in.

Because the case study is the turning point in the performance, as we moved into the more serious topics and start moving towards the aim of the piece, we need it to be clear for the audience so that the key messages at the end will be in context for them and they will be able to make some connections to their own life.

It was brought up that it is very easy for the audience to lose who is playing which character when we move into the case study and so we wanted to make it easier to see who was each character by formally introducing them to the audience. This makes it clearer and establishes each character separately. We thought that the narrator's could say a character and one of us steps up towards the front and looks towards them as though we are asking them what they want us to do. In addition to this, we also added in some slightly Goberesque stereotypical movements for each character. For example, as I am the mother who is pregnant, I have a hand on my stomach when the pregnancy is dropped in, the friend has a cheesy gesture and the girlfriend has a hair flick. It adds a slightly humorous tone to the characters which is juxtaposed with the scenes and creates a bigger impact as the scenes are about quite serious topics.  We thought that the idea of us not knowing what we were going to be ask to do, was a good way of having a small connection with the audience as it would appear to be new to us as well, adding in the ideas of Forum Theatre and making connections with your audience. To reaffirm this, we added in looks between the narrators and us, and also between the cast members, when we were being told what to do so that we were reiterating the characters that we were playing and it also added clarity about what each person was doing in the scene.

Next, we thought about a scene where we could add in a small section of Forum Theatre and the first idea that we came up with was a text scene between John and Holly, his girlfriend. The scene that was just before this was the morning after John has come home drunk and the tension between John and his father. We thought that the first text would be sent from Holly as the two had left off on a really bad note in the scene she was in before and, we thought that she would be up all night worrying about what he had done and whether he had got home safely or not. We would have Holly text, and read out loud, a big emotional paragraph about how worried she was about John and we would have John just reply with a sorry, and we would see the reaction to both messages from the characters onstage. There were a few problems that we had with this scene and the major one was that we don't know how boys would react to text messages and if our reply was correct or too stereotypical and if we were to make it up and it was wrong, we would lose the connection with the audience that we have been building up from the start as they would become defensive and shut off - a reaction that we have been talking about and trying to avoid since the very start of the project.

We then thought about a school situation as both of them would have to go to school and could pass each other in the hallway and so we made Holly's body language reflect how angry she was with John and we would show a conversation that would happen between the two of them in the corridor. It would get to a point where Holly would be so upset and angry at John that she would just walk away which would leave John by himself on stage and we would see the anger work up inside of him as he knows that "he has missed something" (a line that one of the narrators says) - an opportunity to apologise to Holly and truly express how he feels to someone who cares about his well-being. We would then show this anger through John punching the wall - a response that we learnt can be quite typical of men when they are angry as it is an easy outlet for them to express how they feel.

At this point we would ask the audience: What should John do now?

We think we could use a thought scale to address the different options that John has and we would allow the audience sometime to discuss where they think that John should be on the scale.

Here is a picture of what we think the scale should look like:

We would then walk John along the scale and ask the audience to raise their hands where they think John should be. We would acknowledge these people and ask them why they think he should go down that route and this would allow the audience to engage with the piece more and also allow us to make some positive comments on what they have said and also get other people involved. We would have a person at each point representing what he should do so that the audience would have a visual aid which we could help them make their decision. For example, if someone said "I think he should dump her," we would ask the follow-up question of "why?" We thought of some responses that we might get and we thought of things like "She's not listening to him" and "She's not taking into account her own feelings that might be confusing how she might react." We would then ask "Well, why would she be feeling this way? Shall we replay what John said?" and we would get John to repeat the lines that he said to Holly at the end of the drunk scene before she walked off. Asking follow up questions is the key to getting the audience involved and also getting them to understand what is going on.
The answer that we really want them to say is "Explain," as this is what Storms want more men to do: express their feelings. If we find that majority of the audience is giving us the answer that we want then we know that they understand and the main message is getting through, but if we don't get that answer we need to help get them to it which is where the follow up questions come in and we can guide them into the right direction of the correct answer. I think that we just need to clean up the sections next week and possibly try it out on a few people of the age range to see how they react and whether it would be what we were expecting.

Further SToRMS Research

We have been given some information about a leaflet that we will be handing out after the performance and it highlights some of the main points that we will have highlighted throughout the entire piece.

These show the main points that we are trying to convey throughout the whole piece and it will be a good reminder for us throughout the rest of the rehearsal process as they are clearly pointed out and we will be able to see them when we rehearse.

Week 9: TIE (Storms)

Expanding and Forum Theatre

We ran through the whole piece so far and we made a list of things that need to be added in:

• When Hannah is John Doe, we need her to reference the characters that are onstage in her first dramatic aside so that the audience don't get confused about which characters the different people are playing. For example, we need her to say this is my family, my mum, my dad and my brother.
• We need to add in a more fluid way of going into the John Doe case study as it seems to go from quite a jokey manner to quite a serious one too quickly so we gave the narrator's an extra few lines that established the idea of a case study and how it allows us to see these reactions in a real life situation.
• After the case study we also need another fluid transition that allows us to interact with the audience through some of the devices that are used by Forum Theare. For this we wanted the narrators to acknowledge the fact that we aren't men so we don't actually know what it's like to be one and reference the fact that everyone in the audience is male and  so we can find out from them.

We thought that the scene we could explore with the input of the audience could be the morning after John has come home drunk and been caught by his dad. We could make it quite stunted, with a lot of pauses for potential thought as both men are going through a rough period of time and also if we make these pauses clear enough, it would indicate to the audience that that would be a good part for them to start thinking about the thoughts that are going through the two characters heads. We then had a discussion about where these reference points could be in the scene and so we ran the scene and people shouted pause when we think there could be a moment and explained why it was a good place for the audience's input.

Part 1 - https://youtu.be/g8eTysKLn1g
Part 2 - https://youtu.be/MfRVLm5A-ck

These are some of the points that we picked out during the video.

In the actual performance, we would run the scene through once and then facilitate the asking of the audience. We would then go into the audience and ask what the characters were thinking - taking them through the thought track step by step and mention the different points as it would help them think of what to say. After, we would regroup and show the scene again but we would pause the scene and mention what people in the audience had said making sure that we defined who said it and include them in the piece.

Because we wanted this part to reflect Forum Theatre we did a small hour long workshop in the style. We were introduced to two characters through teacher in role and we were going to choose one of the characters and their situation to make better with help from us, the audience. We then took part in a small role play, where we made the set for a NHS waiting room and we were asked to stand in a place that reflected a person going through dialysis or someone who’s family member was going through dialysis. We then did another role play for the second character as well. Thought out the whole workshop we were picking up on how our teacher was talking to us and what things we could use in our piece. Some things we found were:

1. Pausing when the audience gets lost.
2. Repeating scenes so that they can ask the audience whether the scene is going the way they want it to.
3. Simplistic characters and storylines
4. Positive reinforcements of ideas at the people onstage things like, mentioning their acting boosts their confidence and also increase the chance of them joining in.

We could use all of these aspects in our piece as it would increase the amount of interaction we get from the audience which will, in turn, benefit their understanding of our piece and the message that we are trying to convey.

Week 7: TIE (Storms)

Discussion

This week, we had a shorter lesson than normal and therefore couldn't create any new drama to add into the piece but we decided to have a class discussion about where we wanted the piece to go from the societal pressures on boys. We all said that we wanted the piece to take a slightly more serious route from here and we have done the comical sketches that hook the audience into the piece but now we need to start feeding in the ideas about the focal reason why we are doing this piece: to enlighten y10/y11 boys on the way that they communicate or the ways that they don't communicate and what dangers can come from this.

We all said that we wanted to start snapping out of the stereotypes that we have made and the comical situations and actually see what would happen if we put these people in a real life situation. We started then, to come up with different situations where a boys lack of communication could have some major repercussions on himself and those around him. In our pair we came up with 4 different scenarios:

• Bereavement  - Someone in a boys family has died and this boy has a younger sibling. He doesn't want to tell any of his friends in case they are insensitive or don't understand. We were saying that the boy might want to bottle his feelings up inside so that he could be there for his younger brother or sister and this would have a major strain on the boys emotions and also his mental state which could lead to him taking the grief that he feels and reproducing this into anger. Meaning that there is tension with himself and his peers. But if we were looking from our target audience perspective we said that not everyone would know the feeling directly because not everyone has lost someone but majority of people know someone who has, so we decided that it could work but it would have a bigger effect on some people than others.
• Relationship - A boy has a girlfriend and he also has a close girl who is just a friend. Would the boy feel comfortable in talking freely about his friend to his girlfriend? This sparked an interesting conversation as our teacher said that no male and female relationship can just be platonic and we said that it could. We said that maybe it's because of the gender difference (do girls only view the relationship as platonic but the boys think otherwise?) or maybe it's because of the age difference. I think that our generation has many more friendships that are platonic but we only have the perspective of a girl so we don't know what a boy views the relationship as. I looked on this website (https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/men-and-women-cant-be-just-friends/) that said that the results they found "suggest that men, relative to women, have a particularly hard time being 'just friends'." Again if we look from our target audience perspective, our question was would they all have a friendship with a girl? And we wouldn't know the percentage of boys that do so again it may effect more boys than others.
• Friends - A boy has a grandparent who is in hospital and his friends have asked him whether he wants to come outside to play football. He doesn't tell them the real reason why he doesn't come and eventually he stops being invited out. We thought that this could take a massive strain on the boy's life as he now only has his family around him and some boys don't feel comfortable telling their family how they feel in case it puts more stress on them. We said that this might be hard to do especially showing the passage of time from the first time being asked to the last. We didn't think that this would be relevant to the majority of our target audience either because not everyone has experience the loss of friendship regarding a serious issue. Also we talked about a different issue that some boys might want to hide instead of an ill grandparent, and we came up with things like social anxiety at parties and not getting along with the group of friends any more.
• Exams- A boys friend asks him to come out but he has to revise and he doesn't want to say that he is stressed with all of his work load and so doesn't go out. We thought that with this age range, everybody is going to feel that stress at some point and it may affect some more than others but everybody is going to feel at least a little anxious about exams.

We then casually interviewed 4 y11 students and found that all of our assumptions we correct. We then decided we would now add in a scene that introduced one of these situations and establish the scenario in which the stereotype would be put into. We didn’t decide which one we wanted, because we decided that we would go away and next week come back with an idea about one of the scenes and we would then decide which ones we were going to put in the piece.

Week 6: TIE (Storms)

Adding Statistics

We first did a walk through of all that we have done so far and went over the order of what we have done and went over the reasons why we were doing it in such a way. "Banter" is quite an easy way to get an audience to relax and we want the audience to relax in order for them to open up to us about their feelings and how they view their communication skills. We then decided that the biological imperatives that boys are told they should have, need to be challenged on stage by us and we thought that the best way for us to do that would be for one of us to actually step out of the group and challenge what we have presented earlier on. For example, at the start we are stereotyping boys and exploring the ways that they are communicating, and almost criticizing that, but we thought that if we get some facts that compare the amount of boys to girls in different situations, it could propose a good pathway into introducing facts about suicide and the ideas that boys actions are caused by societal influences and not "just because they are boys." We wanted to unpick the stereotyping that we have presented onstage and show how each of them is a societal or peer influence instead of instinctual.

We researched some facts that we could use and we decided on these facts:

• Men are 40% more likely to speed.
• Men are 4 times more likely to lose their hearing.
• Men are 5 times more likely to go to prison
• Men are 3 times more likely to be diagnosed with ADHD.
• 80% of all suicides are men.

We thought that on the last one, we could have someone step out and challenge that statement by saying, "so you're saying that being a boy is bad." And we would then move into the explanation of the societal views on men. We thought that we should highlight the expectations that are presented and forced onto boys from birth and see how they progress throughout a boys life.

We started experimenting with the expectations that are set upon boys and men throughout their lives. Here's what we came up with: https://youtu.be/gkvsHJ1FHy8

I liked the idea that we added some Goberesque style titles in for the audience to understand the age group that we are showing and also we are adding in the sharpness that Gober adds to performance, like when you snap in and out of different scenes. I think that we do need to work on the speed of the lines and the gaps in between the different scenes so that we keep the audience interested and engaged.