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!