SCENARIO DOWN!

Monday 17th December-
We began the lesson with Stanislavski's Relaxation Exercise that we did the week before.This was to calm us down and bring focus to the class. This time I didn't read out the exercise and instead I took part in the relaxing. I realised that it was obviously more relaxing than reading but at some points I felt alert like I didn't focus properly. This was only at the beginning but then I got into it more. It is a great exercise to help bring focus to the room and keep everything else like problems and excess energy outside of the drama theatre.

After, the group then went into the other room and we discussed our ideas for a scenario for our commedia piece. We got all our ideas out but we really struggled as a group to combine these ideas and discuss the negatives and positives of each idea. I think we did take something from this and learn that we all needed to cooperate better and also give constructive advice for other peoples ideas and try produce the best as possible. I found that in that lesson, we were able to say what we liked from eachothers ideas but not put it all together which was a task for at home. We HAD to get the scenario down before the christmas holidays!

Wednesday 19th December (double lesson)-
We did a lot in this double lesson. We began the lesson with a game and warm up. The game was called "The hug game". We had one person who had to try tag another person with their hand on the other persons stomach. The only way you can prevent yourself from being tagged is to hug someone next to you or run away. After playing the game, we reflected on how it went. Mr Fearnehough told us from what he could see when we were playing the game, a few of us just decided to run instead of hug the person next to us. Some other people were just flinging themselves on people haha. It made the group realise that we can't leave people and we have to help one another out. We have to rely on eachother a lot in theatre and I can see that the group is getting closer and closer which is good. Doing our commedia piece together will definetely bring everyone together and let us be able to trust eachother in theatre more.

After the game, we did some mask work. Mr Fearnehough talked to us about how when using masks, the audience has to be furthur back otherwise is spoils the reality of the masks. He then demonstrated using one mask. I realised that when wearing masks, you have to rely A LOT on your use of body and exaggerate moves to match the facial expression of the mask. We all realised as well that when Mr Fearnehough was demonstrating, we were producing dialogue or a story in our head to fit to the mask and body. Some of our ideas were different to eachothers which showed our specific and good the moves have to be if you want your audience to have the right story of a character.
We were then introduced to the commedia masks and put the commedia characters to the masks. This helped me remember each other the characters and the names so I found this very useful.
We then had our own go at picking a mask and putting the body to the mask infront of everyone. I picked the mask of a servent. I quite liked playing this character because it is very energetic.
We got some constructive critisicm from the people that watched us. Halley said mine was good but the hair was a little distracting, so i will have to keep it out of my face. I found the hair distracting myself and I couldn't see where I was going. Bekki said that I sometimes came across as a little scary, which didn't fit to my character. Maybe this meant that I should tone the mouth expressions and less moving of the head. Or maybe bekki was just scared of the masks haha. Its good to get some criticism so that I know what to try hold back on or add for next time. We are still not sure if we are going to use masks but it doesn't matter just yet. We learnt a lot about the characters and we learnt how to use the masks.

Thursday 20th December-
This lesson we had to get our scenario done!
So we all got together and had the lesson to come up with a plot, character roles and also tech roles for each person. My tech role is costume and makeup. We have done some research on basica commedia dell'arte costumes and there are very basic features for each character in commedia dell'arte. With our story and ideas, I am a little nervous about how I am going to create something modern but with the aspects of commedia characters and costume too.
We got everything done and we are all pretty happy with our story. We got our characters and I was surprised we managed to give characters out so quickly and everyone is so happy.
I am excited to put this piece together but a little nervous to perform it. I hope we all just get everything done and perfected in time and everyone is happy.

COMMEDIA 

Monday 17th:

In a bid to calm us down before the start of the lesson we did the relaxation exercise which i really like just to be able to close my eyes and relax for a few minutes before some lessons which then helps me concentrated and involved in the group during the lesson. We then started talking about the scenario together, we all had loads of ideas and every time we were talking about an idea someone would come up with another good idea. But because we had so many ideas it meant that we weren't able to come up with a scenario.  

Wednesday 19th:

At the start of our 2 hour we did a warm-up game which was hug tag. The aim of the game was to run around the room and not get tagged if you were tagged you were 'it'. To not get tagged you have to hug someone for 5 seconds. And you can only get tagged on your stomach. Mr. Fearnehough then talked to us about the warm-up game and said he found that it really shows how a real person is and you can see their personalty come out in sorts of games like this. I found that if the person was it was coming straight towards me i would hug the person the closest to me. 

After this exercise Mr. Fearnehough introduced and explained all we needed to know about Commedia Dell'Arte masks. He showed us how to put them on and how just by looking at a mask you can get into character and this is what actors do before performances. We were told that we were never ever allowed to put a mask on in front of an audience because that can just kill the character and it is not believable anymore. The body movement is very important during a performance with a mask on because no one cna see your face which is normally the main focus. We realized that as Mr. Fearnehough put more and more masks on that they were designed with animal features in them. 
We then tried it ourselves and Mr.Fearnehough told me i did the actions quite good even though i enjoyed doing that i really didn't feel comfortable looking at the masks and Halley felt the same way. 

Thursday 20th: 

We finally decided on a scenario!!! and we have thought about who will be which character and roles people have for the technical and design parts. It's getting very exciting now and i can't wait to get started! 

Week 13: Planning the Scenario

Monday

We started the day with our relaxation exercise, led by Mr. Fearnehough. We were attempting to settle down before starting on our work. I tried doing it while laying on my stomach because I find this position more comfortable. I thought it worked out okay except for the carpet, which  was very uncomfortable. We spent most of the time working on the scenario We did not get much done because everyone had so many ideas. Every time we agreed on something it seemed like someone would have another idea. There were a lot of good ideas and everyone wanted to use them all. No one seemed to understand or want to do my scenario, which  is okay because I did not explain it very well.
We seemed to be more intent on teasing Axel and discussing stock characters than deciding on a plot

Wednesday

We warmed up with a game of hug tag. This game is played just like normal tag except base is when you are hugging someone and you can only be tagged on the stomach. Base last for five seconds. This game seemed a little more personal than normal tag because you are forced to work with others and hug them, which is kind of a personal thing. In the game each person only looked out for themselves, sometimes at the expense of others. Mr. Fearnehough told us that Axel seemed to get left on his own a lot. He said that games like this, when  played right, show who a person really is. He said that we played kind of selfishly and did not look out for each other. Mr. Fearnehough may be right but I thought that each person was playing competitively and trying to win. I thought personally thought that the "consequences" for not  winning were not too bad so the person did not need help very bad.
After the warm-up Mr. Fearnehough introduced us to acting using masks, and commedia dell'arte masks specifically. He taught us how to put on a mask, looking at it to get in character, with your face, body, and actions, then put it on where the audience cannot see you. He showed us how to move slow and use our upper body instead of our face to portray the majority of emotion. This is important since the audience cannot see your face they  are looking at your body to figure out your character and emotion, they play a tape in their head of what you are saying. If the actor goes to quickly the audience's tape will not go at a pace that is understandable. He demonstrated how some of the characters act and he told us that they relate to animals. Then he let us try out one of the masks. I did one of the vecchi. Axel and Lydia told me that I needed to use more of my body when I acted and bend over more in other words I have a lot of work to do. I was glad that they were willing to be honest with me and tell me what I needed to work on because I have never done anything like this before and I have a lot to learn.

Thursday

I was not in class on Thursday because I had to go to an immigration meeting. While I was gone the rest of the group decided on a scenario. It looks really cool, but I am nervous that I am going to mess everything up and freeze on stage.



We finally wrote a scenario....

            The goal of the theatre lesson today  (Mon) was to decide on a scenario for our commedia production. However, we were less productive then hopeful and as of Monday had not decided on a scenario. To me this lesson showed me the weakness and difficulty of group projects. I was very excited to hear the other proposed scenarios but I think as an ensemble we found it difficult to combine our ideas. We definitely got side-tracked by trying to work out the character relationships. The problem wasn’t anyone’s pride, it was difficult because we had all arranged completely separate storylines and no one wanted to “step on anyone’s toes” and disregard an idea. If we’d been more focused on the actual storyline instead of the characters I think we would’ve been more successful.

            On Wednesday for our double lesson we were originally going to finish the scenario, but instead it morphed into a practical lesson on mask work. First Mr. F demonstrated the different types of masks so we could understand the physicality behind it. My first reaction= I hate masks. To me, masks distance the audience from characters and are just plain creepy. I also don’t like clowns and I recently saw “V for Vendetta”. I’m supposed to try and put that out of my mind, because that mental “baggage” obviously affects me. However the audience all has their own mental baggage and everyone takes something different away from a production (as we discussed earlier). Reflecting on the process I’ve decided that mask work can still be a valuable way of learning about theatre but I personally don’t enjoy watching it, a compromise that I think both the IB graders and the I can live with. With that in mind I fully participated in the lesson and even tested out the character of Il Capitano. The most important physical aspects I learned were the impact of slowing down the movement in general and drawing attention to the personality quirks of the character (ex..birdlike movement of Pantilone)

            Thursday we got down to business and defeated the huns. AND we finished the scenario! So far we have decided to keep the production in a high school setting, that way we can utilize cultural references and more modern pieces of humor. Over the break individual work should be getting underway to start stitching the show together. I’ll begin with a masterclass on acrobatics, hope everyone is warmed up J

Last week before HOLIDAY

Dec 17, 2012 (Monday) We started to fix our action plan so we can start immediately our comedia play.

Dec 19, 2012 (Wednesday) WE started to do our commedia we choose to start in mask, then Mr. Fearnehough started to give some information about who is in mask, and what its role and also what they physically do in performing, and it has different kind of mask, just like for example IL CAPITANO the way he move, the way he act is like having all girls are inlove to him, and after Mr. fearnehough act some of the commedia characters like DOCTURE we also try it out on how they move, then we choose what we want to express, and he gave me one of the zanni, and we express what its physical move, then they gave me a feedback about what is the right thing, i use to do it like a monkey but no energy then they told me that zanni is more energetic so i need to become more energetic.

Dec 20, 2012 (Thursday) WE started to make a scenario, the characters that included then after that we decided to do what we want to do, i volunteer to do a costume that is modern so i can now started what kind of costumes that is fit in our commedia play.

Advance Merry Christmas and Happy New Year :) x

Commedia Planning

Strangely Monday started us on a "tired" day. We were all extremely exhausted and mentally over-worked, and therefore not in any sort of creative state. Thankfully we started the lesson with a relaxation exercise. We all lay on the floor and mentally (and in turn physically) relaxed each part of our body. With the silence and darkness of the room, all I focused on was my breathing. The exercise actually is directly from yoga, and being a yogi myself I appreciated it greatly J I think in the future I will use this exercise as a cool-down exercise when working with actors or on a project. The “yes game” will start the process and this yoga exercise will end it. Afterwards it was my turn to present my acid test. I did my on Oh the Humanity and focused on the main ideas of production. The key elements that stuck out for me were the actress’s red dress, the two chairs scene, and the line “look more historical”.

                On Wednesday we began planning how to plan the action plan. Personally I think this process took too long. According to my Morrisby profile, I plan through the big ideas and thus planning out details isn’t my style… however I do understand how action plans are useful in the theatre practice and so I will put aside my differences accept the process. This day was mostly for getting the basic idea out on the table, but the next task was a practical one. We went into the drama studio and simply had to get up in front of everyone and make them laugh. Mr. F did some sort of physical comedy and we did all laugh, but maybe just because we felt awkward, haha! I tried to take a different approach and told some lame jokes. I had hoped they would either laugh at the lameness or laugh because they actually though the jokes were funny. Alas, I eventually got some pity laughs but that was all. The most dramatic part of this exercise however was when Axel refused to participate. It really brought the whole energy down and I felt somehow cheated because the rest of us had participated. When learned about the “cop in the head” syndrome where basically you don’t go all out because you are nervous about the reception and don’t want to be embarrassed. I can see how this affects in acting in general, however in this specific instance I found the reason for my failure wasn’t because I was embarrassed but because I just couldn’t think of anything funny.

                On Thursday we finalized our action plan and started throwing around ideas for the scenarios. I volunteered for teaching a class on acro, which I’m sooooo excited for. Maybe we could do a teaser today…? Most importantly however we discussed how commedia demands that we use improv and play with the story… I’m very nervous that I won’t have the security blanket of a script, but who knows maybe I’ll like the freedom!

Preparing our Commedia play:

Monday 10^th December: Halley presented her acid test. She did this in a very interesting way by including all of the questions the play raised into a sort of birdcage.  Doing this highlighted the performance concept of the play, essentially stating that we are bou8nd by the questions we ask. We then started speaking about our upcoming commedia play. For homework, we were told to come up with a story or plot.

Wednesday 12^th December: We spent the first half of the lesson hammering out an action plan for our commedia play. This took a while because we were also learning about the important steps and their order for making a piece.

 

 

Then, Mr. Fearnehough told us to stand up and make everyone laugh. Everyone found this difficult, but I blanked and just didn’t know what to do. This was explained by Mr Fearnehough. He explained the “cop in the head” concept, in which everyone has this innate fear, or “cop”, that stops us from doing something where we might embarrass ourselves.

 

 

Thursday 13^th December: We finalised our action plan and I am a little worried that we may not have enough time. WE all proposed our plot ideas. Mine was a simple idea of a man falling for his boss’ daughter. Mr Fearnehough stole Halley and Lydia’s ideas on romance. More precisely, Halley liked the idea of theming it on Valentine’s Day. Lydia wanted to focus on an exaggerated version of high school whereas Abby wanted a spoof spy sort of thing and Bekki wanted to focus it on cheating couples.  Mary came up with an ugly girl becoming beautiful, which we all agreed was funny. We all thought that perhaps a combination of some of these ideas was the best way to go. On Monday we will decide for definite what to do.