Kirsty had organised a rota in which she would get to work with each group for approximately 45 minutes. This was something we really benefited from today as it gave us the first chance to show and get feedback on our ideas. We all began working on Hannah and Nyakeh's scene and as soon as they knew where they were heading with the idea; their physical theatre sequence took off. For that particular sequence the aim is to portray Hannah being 'left' by Nyakeh over Matt. The music Hannah had originally thought would fit perfectly; did fit well. However, as an onlooker and Deborah had the same opinion I don't think music for ALL of our sequences is necessary. A lot of acting scenes that are tense with emotion never have music; they go on the basis of the level of acting and the way they deliver the lines and plan each movement to fit with the atmosphere. By all this I mean that even though the music fits really well ( Rhianna Unfaithful Instrumental https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjFPJJ20pf4) I think we should aim to create the same atmosphere as the music does but without the music. Silence often creates a much better atmosphere as the audience are all interpreting it differently; but nice soft music would automatically make the audience sense that they are in love, for example.
Listening to the music, at 0:07, a quick beat begins. To me, when I first listened to the song, felt like an anti-climax in a story/narrative. The beat builds tension and expectation to the audience and then it falls back into the soft piano notes; excluding the beat. Further through the song, when the lyrics begin, a underlining of drawn out notes plays which in the dance represents pure love from Hannah and then when the beat kicks in again, it is portraying Nyakehs perhaps more 'masculine' love for Matt. But with my previous pitch; I do think doing it without the music will create a more different but just as strong atmosphere and the story would come across a lot clearer without the music influencing the audiences thoughts.
After focusing on their sequence we moved on to mine and Franks relationship. Kirsty started us off with the idea that the therapist session that it once was, has turned into the time in which they have for being in love. Their weekly meet-up. But the issue with this very meet up is that Frank had let myself down on the meet up/dinner that was booked for the night before; so naturally I play very 'pissed off'. The text for this was purely improvised but at the moment its looking really strong. My aim is to come across with really blunt answers and leaving all up to Frank to rescue himself. We incorporate this in our physical theatre sequence. I really wanted the man in the situation to portray himself as though he really does love me and that he is genuinely putting in the effort to make it up to me. He leans in for a kiss as I push him away which he then does a spin out towards the audience. But with a bit of research into the music I like, I found C2C Happy song. The music follows the dancing man who turns the others into dancers (to portray that dancing makes you happy!) When watching it, I was captured by one specific movement at 0:28 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvY7Nw1i6Kw) Blink and you'll miss it but it's the movement of knocking the other guy out. It so well rehearsed and slick that is looks extremely effective. I desperately want to try this in mine and Franks sequence but changing the motions of it to look more like an act of rejection rather than knocking Frank flat out.
Listening to my music whilst doing my business coursework again inspired me, music is such a inspiration! There is a short part in Sia's Chandiler: "123, 123 DRINK"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2vjPBrBU-TM with a heavy beat. This gave me idea: Frank plays the therapist who commits suicide at the end. Frank having depression could lead him to alcohol, which is where I wanted incorporate that specific part of the song. Before Christmas we did a 'keypad' workshop; as an ensemble or individually a number would be called out and as though the keypad was floating above us, we would look at the 'number'. So as an audience member it would almost look like a group of people watching tennis going from the number 1/3. Franks could be. 1,2,3 for each number looking at say 1,5,3 to get a range of frantic head movement, and then on "DRINK" he could use his hands to represent him taking a shot or a sip of a drink.
This is just something we could mess around with and experimenting.
Wednesday was extremely productive and helpful! We were set in our separate ways to do a warm up activity; we all, in the end, lead it and contributed to what activities to do. We started off with walking and then jogging around the room. Then star jumps and just jumping on the spot. We did the 'stretch your bubble' activity Karen taught us; which basically gets you using your body in weird and wonderful ways-perfect for devising! Frank taught us a short release activity where you literally shake off your body. We also did a quick tongue twister, and breathing exercise. Doing this warm up was really beneficial because we had been taught how to do them correctly and it was almost like you could remember them and we bounced off each others warm-up activities.
We were given half an hour to work on what we had and perform to the class. Nyakeh wasn't here for the morning so we showed mine and Franks narrative and physical theatre sequence. Phoebe had pointed out that our dance wasnt portraying Frank wanting me to stay and me wanting to leave him. This really needs to come across because that is the only aim in the sequence. Frank has got to show more desperate and in love, and I need to be more persistent and angry. Our narrative wasnt clear either; which is reasonable because we really haven't got much with this new idea.Even tough we want it to be confusing for the audience and we dont want to feed them the information; we have to take into consideration that if the audience do not understand then they will loose interest! We have to give them a mixture of confusion and being fed the information in order for them to understand and Also our characters were not coming across which meant the audience had no connection with them. This is something I think we should work on a lot because whenever I go to see a show I often connect with the audience and what them to survive or get out of the abusive relationship etc. If the audience can feel a sense of sadness for Hannahs character; left by her boyfriend for Matt, then we know weve made a connection with the audience and the audience start to feel for our characters. Contradictory to this Kennedy said she got a connection with me because Frank had rejected me for his wife. To me this is an odd connection for Kennedy to have made because its both mine and Franks fault that he is cheating on his wife and that I'm dating a married man...But if we can make the other characters connect with the audience then we know that we can keep the audience attention as they'll be watching the characters progress through the piece.
When Nyakeh turned up we showed the full piece we had put together showing the relationship of Hannah and Nyakeh, and Matt and Nyakeh. The class loved it! We had such positive feedback which really boosted me personally because I think we are too behind and take to long to decide on something; but they fell in love with Hannah and felt for her because Nyakeh was cheating on her for Matt. The msuci choice went down smoothly too. Both Phoebe and Kennedy said it worked beautifully and the choice in music was absolutly perfect. ( Rhianna Unfaithful instrumental https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjFPJJ20pf4, Craig David Seduction https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5KD0PJe4go and finally Rhianna What now https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdid9kBnPEU. I agree with all the song choices and I do think they work really well with the dances...
Following up on Phoebe how the dance between me and Frank didn't work well so when we got into the large dance rooms me and Frank worked on this. We chose a song, Ella Hendersons cover of Say Something https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkZJaIMwhQQ. This song isn't set in stone but I think it works really well with what we've got at the moment. Laura gave us a started point by getting Frank to stop me from getting to the other side of the room-to portray me leaving etc. This turned out to be a really good sequence. We included spins, and weight trust exercises. I am so so pleased that we've finally got something that feels really heartfelt as well as the feedback we got from Laura which was how being in love was shown so clearly and that Frank was desperate to keep me.
Continuing on from Wednesday, today (Thursday) Me and Frank worked together. We started looking at the ending of the piece. We originally wanted Frank to hang himself; the rope being lowered down from the ceiling Frank taking hold of it, lights down as Frank jumps down from the block.I came up with the idea that the rope will be lowered a good 3feet infront of where Frank is on the block so from the audiences view it will look like a more perspective view. (By this I mean similar to the Eiffel Tower, this is a perspective image because its making the hand the same size as the tower itself.) We wanted the lighting to shine through the loop of the rope and give off a circular shadow on Franks neck and face. This is just an abstract way for the audience to clearly understand what Frank is about to do but again not actually feeding the audience all of the imformation.
I came up with the suggestion that Frank does not hang himself but instead jumps off the Tallahatchie Bridge (which is a clear link to the stimulus song) He would be stood up on the block and with his arms outstretched as he falls we (Nyakeh, me, Hannah and Matt) catch him almost like crowd surfing. As he falls into our catch the lights will do a blackout. I really like both ideas and maybe its worth us trying them both out; but in the worry of us taking too long to settle on one or the other I'd prefer to use the jumping off the bridge as this is a clear and obvious link to the song itself. If well rehearsed and timed, Frank will begin to fall and the lights will disappear by the time Frank has reached our arms. This will be the sudden ending of Frank dying that we were aiming for... Us catching him as he falls, theoretically, or helping him jump in other terms: is almost like our problems that we bring to him as the therapist and his own problems (me and his wife) have helped him commit. So us being there to guide him through the falling represents us being the cause/or helping him get to the point of death!
Frank really wanted him entering stage to be really dramatic and drawn out to really show the audience his emotion. I suggested that he enters and walks around the block before standing on it, and he had decided that the rest of us would sit around the edges purely as "eye-witnesses" to the suicide. I mentioned that instead we would all follow Franks movements (mirroring his walk etc). Frank wanted his character portrayed as his thoughts were over powering his movements in this scene so he drops whatever work or books he's holding. Being in a snake like line behind, we all take a step back with our right foot and bend down and swing ourselves back up again- again abstractly to show we were also picking something up. At the next 'corner' of the circle Frank rubs his face and again we follow suit by just putting our hands up near our faces. He then throws the books or whatever it is he is holding; we stretch our arms to the right in slow-motion and bring them back in. So from the audiences view we should all look like one person moving. The second walk around the block we all take our places for when he jumps. This is all we got for the ending, and I dont think we will need to add any text because silence is most often better than words...
After agreeing on all these ideas for the ending we moved on to our dance sequence (me and Frank). The video is of the sequence we created. Laura suggested that for a few movements Frank should try to say something but the next movement comes and it stops him from saying it. "I...Plea" etc. This would verbally show Frank trying to stop me and persuade me to stay. I think our sequence has really porgressed; when Kirsty watched it she said all our aims were coming through and to improve she said we have too many "letting go of hand" movements so this will be something we go over and refine and develop to get it perfect.
As we approached the end of the day; as a group we sat and worked out a few more questions for the end interview scene which go in more depth to the situation. We came up with "Did you know Dr Joe?" "Did he show any signs of depression?" And finally "Do you feel responsible?" These questions open up alot of answers and they also open up the situation more to the audience. My favourite is "Do you feel responsible" because it could be either asking do you feel responsible for him killing himself or do you feel responsible for the mistakes ie Hannah not keeping Nyakeh, or Me dating a married man- this can all be left open for the audience.
We've had quite a few hours on this project and I finally think we are getting somewhere with it. Having a member leave knocked us back but in a way it pushed us further forward; almost unconsciously we all knew we had to prove that we can create such a piece in the circumstances, and I think we will prove this beautifully. I am really pleased with the whole process and I think we've made good progress so far...
This is just something we could mess around with and experimenting.
Wednesday was extremely productive and helpful! We were set in our separate ways to do a warm up activity; we all, in the end, lead it and contributed to what activities to do. We started off with walking and then jogging around the room. Then star jumps and just jumping on the spot. We did the 'stretch your bubble' activity Karen taught us; which basically gets you using your body in weird and wonderful ways-perfect for devising! Frank taught us a short release activity where you literally shake off your body. We also did a quick tongue twister, and breathing exercise. Doing this warm up was really beneficial because we had been taught how to do them correctly and it was almost like you could remember them and we bounced off each others warm-up activities.
We were given half an hour to work on what we had and perform to the class. Nyakeh wasn't here for the morning so we showed mine and Franks narrative and physical theatre sequence. Phoebe had pointed out that our dance wasnt portraying Frank wanting me to stay and me wanting to leave him. This really needs to come across because that is the only aim in the sequence. Frank has got to show more desperate and in love, and I need to be more persistent and angry. Our narrative wasnt clear either; which is reasonable because we really haven't got much with this new idea.Even tough we want it to be confusing for the audience and we dont want to feed them the information; we have to take into consideration that if the audience do not understand then they will loose interest! We have to give them a mixture of confusion and being fed the information in order for them to understand and Also our characters were not coming across which meant the audience had no connection with them. This is something I think we should work on a lot because whenever I go to see a show I often connect with the audience and what them to survive or get out of the abusive relationship etc. If the audience can feel a sense of sadness for Hannahs character; left by her boyfriend for Matt, then we know weve made a connection with the audience and the audience start to feel for our characters. Contradictory to this Kennedy said she got a connection with me because Frank had rejected me for his wife. To me this is an odd connection for Kennedy to have made because its both mine and Franks fault that he is cheating on his wife and that I'm dating a married man...But if we can make the other characters connect with the audience then we know that we can keep the audience attention as they'll be watching the characters progress through the piece.
When Nyakeh turned up we showed the full piece we had put together showing the relationship of Hannah and Nyakeh, and Matt and Nyakeh. The class loved it! We had such positive feedback which really boosted me personally because I think we are too behind and take to long to decide on something; but they fell in love with Hannah and felt for her because Nyakeh was cheating on her for Matt. The msuci choice went down smoothly too. Both Phoebe and Kennedy said it worked beautifully and the choice in music was absolutly perfect. ( Rhianna Unfaithful instrumental https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FjFPJJ20pf4, Craig David Seduction https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5KD0PJe4go and finally Rhianna What now https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdid9kBnPEU. I agree with all the song choices and I do think they work really well with the dances...
Following up on Phoebe how the dance between me and Frank didn't work well so when we got into the large dance rooms me and Frank worked on this. We chose a song, Ella Hendersons cover of Say Something https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkZJaIMwhQQ. This song isn't set in stone but I think it works really well with what we've got at the moment. Laura gave us a started point by getting Frank to stop me from getting to the other side of the room-to portray me leaving etc. This turned out to be a really good sequence. We included spins, and weight trust exercises. I am so so pleased that we've finally got something that feels really heartfelt as well as the feedback we got from Laura which was how being in love was shown so clearly and that Frank was desperate to keep me.
Continuing on from Wednesday, today (Thursday) Me and Frank worked together. We started looking at the ending of the piece. We originally wanted Frank to hang himself; the rope being lowered down from the ceiling Frank taking hold of it, lights down as Frank jumps down from the block.I came up with the idea that the rope will be lowered a good 3feet infront of where Frank is on the block so from the audiences view it will look like a more perspective view. (By this I mean similar to the Eiffel Tower, this is a perspective image because its making the hand the same size as the tower itself.) We wanted the lighting to shine through the loop of the rope and give off a circular shadow on Franks neck and face. This is just an abstract way for the audience to clearly understand what Frank is about to do but again not actually feeding the audience all of the imformation. I came up with the suggestion that Frank does not hang himself but instead jumps off the Tallahatchie Bridge (which is a clear link to the stimulus song) He would be stood up on the block and with his arms outstretched as he falls we (Nyakeh, me, Hannah and Matt) catch him almost like crowd surfing. As he falls into our catch the lights will do a blackout. I really like both ideas and maybe its worth us trying them both out; but in the worry of us taking too long to settle on one or the other I'd prefer to use the jumping off the bridge as this is a clear and obvious link to the song itself. If well rehearsed and timed, Frank will begin to fall and the lights will disappear by the time Frank has reached our arms. This will be the sudden ending of Frank dying that we were aiming for... Us catching him as he falls, theoretically, or helping him jump in other terms: is almost like our problems that we bring to him as the therapist and his own problems (me and his wife) have helped him commit. So us being there to guide him through the falling represents us being the cause/or helping him get to the point of death!As we approached the end of the day; as a group we sat and worked out a few more questions for the end interview scene which go in more depth to the situation. We came up with "Did you know Dr Joe?" "Did he show any signs of depression?" And finally "Do you feel responsible?" These questions open up alot of answers and they also open up the situation more to the audience. My favourite is "Do you feel responsible" because it could be either asking do you feel responsible for him killing himself or do you feel responsible for the mistakes ie Hannah not keeping Nyakeh, or Me dating a married man- this can all be left open for the audience.
We've had quite a few hours on this project and I finally think we are getting somewhere with it. Having a member leave knocked us back but in a way it pushed us further forward; almost unconsciously we all knew we had to prove that we can create such a piece in the circumstances, and I think we will prove this beautifully. I am really pleased with the whole process and I think we've made good progress so far...
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