The past week has been a very busy drama filled week. In lesson time we have continued studying Stans work and have been using it in Ibsen’s ‘A Dolls House’. We have focused on tempo-rhythm, this is our pace, both mental and physical, the pace of everything around us and everything we do. Once you have understood temp-rhythm then the pace of the piece in the bits it has been broken up into becomes clear to you, and so you know how fast or slow your character will move, gesture, talk or how they will hold themselves, or even what tension level they will be stood in. To start with we clapped out the beat of rhythm of the bits of the piece. To begin with I found this difficult, there is the temptation to simply beat out the rhythm of the sentence, I.e. the syllables, but after a while you notice that pace can change during a dialogue and that it is more like the characters heartbeat than anything. Our holiday homework, along with reflection for the blog, is to learn lines. I have found that I already know most of my lines simply from rehearsing with the script in hand. Another interesting point that came up in the weeks lessons is that even though I find we have become a very close ensemble and we all work very well together, we are not yet very truthful to one another. There is something that just stops you from being completely honest with one another, like the cop in the head and our idea of social manners and what’s acceptable, like what you feel you should say and are okay with saying. Richard and Maria asked Spencer and I to watch two variations on a part of their piece and decide on the best of the two. I said that I found it hard to pick and that they were both as good as each other. This wasn’t the whole truth as both of them were quite over the top for the moment, Mr Fearnehough eventually told them that it needed to be toned down a bit. But me and Spencer should have had the courage or whatever to say that. I need to get over the fact that criticism can be constructive and is not just an attack on my personal self. This should help me in accepting improvements for my work and giving constructive criticism to others.
This week we were also treated to watching a rehearsal by a dance troupe for their show, “Botanica”. It was a technical rehearsal more than anything, so while the dancers did not need to give 100 % (which they still did anyway) we got to watch the stage manager finish all the technical aspects and get them all tied together for example lighting and timing. Some of the costumes were unbelievable, and there were some great ideas for movement, props and theme that came from the piece. The piece was about life and creation and it was great tying it all together and seeing everyone reaching their different conclusions. One of the moments that will stick with me is when there were three dancers onstage, wearing black, with the lights dimmed and they used uv light to light up like their arms and legs, and made a dance out of the movement.
On our last lesson of the term we watched a video put on you tube by Guildhall acting school. It was a sort of promotional video for the school and the one thing that I found was very important and will take away from it is their discussion on imagination. As a muscle, how it must be worked and used, and how it is a very useful tool. Sometimes, as I’ve grown older, I’ve thought of imagination as less and less important. But I can understand why, as a drama student, it is a great tool and that I should use my imagination to the best of my ability.
Me and Maria were also invited to be audience members for Graces independent project. We went into Toulouse and went to a closed park, not as in we couldn’t get in as in it was like fenced. Maria went first and I sat on a bench as it was just one on one. When it was my turn Grace walked me to a fountain in the park and began telling me the story of a woman who spent every single day at the park. I was involved in the story as I was to think as if I was the woman in the story. Grace took me to different places in the park and told the story as we walked around. To help me believe in the story and think as the woman Grace had music for me to listen to at different moments, pictures, and even a scarf with perfume on it. This got all of my senses engaged in the piece, which lasted about 15 minutes. You could not help but be engaged in the piece as it was so intimate, you were completely submerged in the story and led to believe you were the woman. I think it worked incredibly well, and it was exciting to see a different kind of theatre, that was very sight specific.
This is our very own blog for the students of IB Theatre (2012 Class) Students from the International School of Toulouse.
Friday, 30 December 2011
Friday, 23 December 2011
Friday, 23rd of December
Tempo-rhythm in movement
Last week before the holidays, we worked on another Stanislavski method called Tempo-rhythm. "The tempo is the speed or slowness of beat of any agreed upon units of equal length in any fixed measure, and the rhythm is the quantative relationship of units of movement,sounds, to the unit lengths agreed in a given tempo and measure." quote form Stanislavski's Building a Character book.
I thought that lesson was really important for all of us so so we can use it in other performances in the future, in fact I think that all of the lessons we've done learning about Stanislavki's methods are important and really useful.
Our first exercise was to tap the rhythm of a certain place, first we had to do it for Covent Garden on a Friday night. We all had different views on Covent Garden on a Friday night and different tempo-rhythms which I thought was interesting to share it with the others. After a few exercises of tapping the tempo-rhythms of a certain place, I asked if we could tap out something a bit less boring and with more action in it. Mr F. said ok, so then we tapped out the tempo of a powerful dangerous river and then had to go back to a still little river. Our tempo-rhytms were different, it went up and down, down and up which I really liked; something was finally happening, there was an interesting action in it. And of course, all of our tempos were different form each others.
One of my biggest weakness in theatre is to ask to many questions when Mr F. sets a task to us. I tend to ask if we're allowed to talk in that exercise, if we have to close our eyes, if we can use a partner to do it, what kind of room we have to be in.... which is blocking the muscle of my imagination while I'm supposed to improvise the little exercise and just have a go for it, then you reflect on it and start asking questions. And I haven't got that weakness in theatre only, I have it in my other IB subject, especially in those I want to do really well. So instead of just having a go at it, I tend to ask what the teacher wants me to do, wheather I like it or not. In my old French school, you wouldn't be able to see one single student to just have a go at an exercise without asking the teacher thousands of questions. I am trying my hardest to let go of that weakness now that I'm in a different school but it's not that easy when you've been in a French school for 11 years. For our next the tare class, I'ml try to just get on with that exercise that has been given to me.
We had to tap the tempo-rhythm of our own character in a little extract we could chose. I chose one where Nora's tempo-rhythm goes up and down, the little macaroon incident. I thought I did pretty well in that exercise because I had studied here tempo in each section of our script. In our groups of 2, we had to act the rhythm out, with the lines, the movements, the sounds... Me and Richard struggled a little bit with our macaroon incident section, so we got help from Mr F. what actions we should do and how we should do it. While we did it, he was voice coaching us as well. At the end,we got a very believable scene with truth on the stage.
Just a little discovery I would like to share with all of you guys; when me and Richard had to do our little macaroon incident scene and we couldn't decide which one looked best, we asked Georgia and Spencer to watch both of them and tell us which one of them looks more believable and truthful on stage. When we had done both of them, they both sat there and told us "we like both, we think both of them look fine"
That wasn't true,both of them were too much over the top, and no one had the courage to tell us that. If were are going to spend 2 years together and making progress in class, I think that we should at least be honest with each other and tell us what does look good and what doesn't. We need to be able to criticize our selves and take it from others, other wise there is no point for all of us to have Theatre as a subject. Like Mr F. said, the studio is a place where we're supposed to experience our acting, making mistakes, reflecting... not a place where we're supposed to compete with each other and telling lies to all of us.
I hope we will be able to let go a little bit of the "I must do everything well and I don't care if the others are bad, I'll just tell them they're good" which I confess I have been doing a couple of times.
Mr F. told us this on Friday but I think this also has to come out from us as well.
Tempo-rhythm in movement
Last week before the holidays, we worked on another Stanislavski method called Tempo-rhythm. "The tempo is the speed or slowness of beat of any agreed upon units of equal length in any fixed measure, and the rhythm is the quantative relationship of units of movement,sounds, to the unit lengths agreed in a given tempo and measure." quote form Stanislavski's Building a Character book.
I thought that lesson was really important for all of us so so we can use it in other performances in the future, in fact I think that all of the lessons we've done learning about Stanislavki's methods are important and really useful.
Our first exercise was to tap the rhythm of a certain place, first we had to do it for Covent Garden on a Friday night. We all had different views on Covent Garden on a Friday night and different tempo-rhythms which I thought was interesting to share it with the others. After a few exercises of tapping the tempo-rhythms of a certain place, I asked if we could tap out something a bit less boring and with more action in it. Mr F. said ok, so then we tapped out the tempo of a powerful dangerous river and then had to go back to a still little river. Our tempo-rhytms were different, it went up and down, down and up which I really liked; something was finally happening, there was an interesting action in it. And of course, all of our tempos were different form each others.
One of my biggest weakness in theatre is to ask to many questions when Mr F. sets a task to us. I tend to ask if we're allowed to talk in that exercise, if we have to close our eyes, if we can use a partner to do it, what kind of room we have to be in.... which is blocking the muscle of my imagination while I'm supposed to improvise the little exercise and just have a go for it, then you reflect on it and start asking questions. And I haven't got that weakness in theatre only, I have it in my other IB subject, especially in those I want to do really well. So instead of just having a go at it, I tend to ask what the teacher wants me to do, wheather I like it or not. In my old French school, you wouldn't be able to see one single student to just have a go at an exercise without asking the teacher thousands of questions. I am trying my hardest to let go of that weakness now that I'm in a different school but it's not that easy when you've been in a French school for 11 years. For our next the tare class, I'ml try to just get on with that exercise that has been given to me.
We had to tap the tempo-rhythm of our own character in a little extract we could chose. I chose one where Nora's tempo-rhythm goes up and down, the little macaroon incident. I thought I did pretty well in that exercise because I had studied here tempo in each section of our script. In our groups of 2, we had to act the rhythm out, with the lines, the movements, the sounds... Me and Richard struggled a little bit with our macaroon incident section, so we got help from Mr F. what actions we should do and how we should do it. While we did it, he was voice coaching us as well. At the end,we got a very believable scene with truth on the stage.
Just a little discovery I would like to share with all of you guys; when me and Richard had to do our little macaroon incident scene and we couldn't decide which one looked best, we asked Georgia and Spencer to watch both of them and tell us which one of them looks more believable and truthful on stage. When we had done both of them, they both sat there and told us "we like both, we think both of them look fine"
That wasn't true,both of them were too much over the top, and no one had the courage to tell us that. If were are going to spend 2 years together and making progress in class, I think that we should at least be honest with each other and tell us what does look good and what doesn't. We need to be able to criticize our selves and take it from others, other wise there is no point for all of us to have Theatre as a subject. Like Mr F. said, the studio is a place where we're supposed to experience our acting, making mistakes, reflecting... not a place where we're supposed to compete with each other and telling lies to all of us.
I hope we will be able to let go a little bit of the "I must do everything well and I don't care if the others are bad, I'll just tell them they're good" which I confess I have been doing a couple of times.
Mr F. told us this on Friday but I think this also has to come out from us as well.
Friday, 23rd of December
A theatre experience
Two weeks ago, me and Georgia went on a little theatre experience Grace had prepared to us in a park in Toulouse.I was really excited about this, Grace wasn't allowed to give to much away, so she only told us that only girls could do this, it had to be in a park in Toulouse in the evening, and said that this was going to be an experience to us. I'm not going to tell you what my and Georgia's first instinct impressions were but I think you'll figure it out because it's quite obvious, but then I knew this was her IP work she had to do and just needed some help. So I thought at first that we were going to be involved in a little piece, that we were maybe going to be involved in some kind of invisible theatre, and of course I would have loved been doing that.
We had to do this experience one by one and Grace gave us out some headphones and a folder. At that moment I realized we were not going to do a little performance I thought we were. I went first and Grace was right next to me. She gave me the instructions very formally without giggling or saying them too fast. I thought that this gave her a very professional first impression. I had some french music from the 20th century I would say with violins and someone singing in the background. At that point, Grace gave me a picture of a lady who lived during the 20th century. She told me to look carefully at her, to look at her eyes, the way she was dressed, the way she smiled, her skin tone, her hair.... so I could have a big picture of her in my head.
We went for a walk around the park and then sat down on the bench. The music changed constantly and Grace gave me a scarf I had to smell and put on me. I then felt like this character, I could see what she was seeing, perhaps not what she felt but I knew her emotions, I just couldn't live them.
At the end of the experience, we went on a little bench where Grace told me her husband died, and that chocked me a little bit, I wasn't expecting a sudden death on this journey. She then told me :" When you feel ready to leave this trip, take off your headphones and give me back your folder." Somehow, I needed some time to leave this little journey, it wasn't something I could just leave like audience members do in a normal theatre and when the show is over. This was something I had to decide whereas it was over or not, I though it was quite difficult to end it my self, but I loved it because it was very different from other theatre endings were the light goes back on, people start moving, curtains are closed...
Grace then told me that this was a performance and I got really surprised that these kind of performances existed and in that case an audience member has to be very open-minded to go on these kind of performances.
I thought this experience was very interesting, especially doing it by your self. You get different point of views and a different opinion if you watch a performance alone or surrounded with other people. If Georgia would have done this with me, my reflections would have been different to these I just wrote above. But I really enjoyed discovering a different theatre practice that might be useful and help me with my own IP or other performances we might do.
A theatre experience
Two weeks ago, me and Georgia went on a little theatre experience Grace had prepared to us in a park in Toulouse.I was really excited about this, Grace wasn't allowed to give to much away, so she only told us that only girls could do this, it had to be in a park in Toulouse in the evening, and said that this was going to be an experience to us. I'm not going to tell you what my and Georgia's first instinct impressions were but I think you'll figure it out because it's quite obvious, but then I knew this was her IP work she had to do and just needed some help. So I thought at first that we were going to be involved in a little piece, that we were maybe going to be involved in some kind of invisible theatre, and of course I would have loved been doing that.
We had to do this experience one by one and Grace gave us out some headphones and a folder. At that moment I realized we were not going to do a little performance I thought we were. I went first and Grace was right next to me. She gave me the instructions very formally without giggling or saying them too fast. I thought that this gave her a very professional first impression. I had some french music from the 20th century I would say with violins and someone singing in the background. At that point, Grace gave me a picture of a lady who lived during the 20th century. She told me to look carefully at her, to look at her eyes, the way she was dressed, the way she smiled, her skin tone, her hair.... so I could have a big picture of her in my head.
We went for a walk around the park and then sat down on the bench. The music changed constantly and Grace gave me a scarf I had to smell and put on me. I then felt like this character, I could see what she was seeing, perhaps not what she felt but I knew her emotions, I just couldn't live them.
At the end of the experience, we went on a little bench where Grace told me her husband died, and that chocked me a little bit, I wasn't expecting a sudden death on this journey. She then told me :" When you feel ready to leave this trip, take off your headphones and give me back your folder." Somehow, I needed some time to leave this little journey, it wasn't something I could just leave like audience members do in a normal theatre and when the show is over. This was something I had to decide whereas it was over or not, I though it was quite difficult to end it my self, but I loved it because it was very different from other theatre endings were the light goes back on, people start moving, curtains are closed...
Grace then told me that this was a performance and I got really surprised that these kind of performances existed and in that case an audience member has to be very open-minded to go on these kind of performances.
I thought this experience was very interesting, especially doing it by your self. You get different point of views and a different opinion if you watch a performance alone or surrounded with other people. If Georgia would have done this with me, my reflections would have been different to these I just wrote above. But I really enjoyed discovering a different theatre practice that might be useful and help me with my own IP or other performances we might do.
Saturday, 17 December 2011
Drift reflection and Snowflake errors in time for Winter
This week was interesting. While we made very little progress in rehearsing our parts, but instead spent the time reflecting. In addition we went to a dress-rehearsal outside of school that was incredibly impressive for many different reasons.
When we were doing our lines on Tuesday and Wednesday, it turned out that while we had the end and the beginning well nailed down, minus a few small problems, there was a long stretch in the middle that neither of us were prepared for. First off, we didn't really know our lines and thus slowly stumbled through the actions and emotions. This was a bit of a surprise for me as except for a few lines that I tend to transpose, I knew the lines that we had practiced before and even some of Georgia's. So when I reached a point where I barely knew what to do I was absolutely stuck, the Christmas break though will make a good time for me to fix this issue.
An extension of the above issue, is also that both of us are outside of our comfort zones. Especially me, as I'm not very romantic and thus have no idea how to make Doctor Rank's confession or the atmosphere of the stockings bit. I was worried about this when we gave out roles. The main problem with this is that it makes the acting very awkward, killing the life out of the act. While I need to fix this, it's part of having to act with true emotion.
On Wednesday, we also did another part of Stanislavski work, Rhythm and Tempo. It's based around the speed of the piece. I find this much easier to explain with a movie or a video game rather than an actual play. During a fight scene the music would be fast paced along with the events, thinking James Bond. The music in this case holds the beat of the scene. A more romantic moment, would result in a long violin piece and long moments of stillness, creating a much slower beat. Tempo is really the heartbeat of the bit. An important note about the tempo though is that while it can change over time, it doesn't change in just a quick sentence, unless it really is a dramatic change in the script. While we did this it was only because it was part of Stanislavski's actor training, the Dolls House has no action and harsh emotions tend to be hidden.
Probably the most reflective experience though was on Friday. We watched a youtube video of a pitch for a famous drama school, I should have asked for the name. Before we watched it however, we did an exercise. It consisted of talking about food while paying attention to various parts of the body. It was actually pretty hard as you had some many different things to pay attention to. 1. The conversation: Keeping the conversation going was a rather fun bit, but required both thought and attention. 2. Pay attention to certain body parts: while I know that I do various movements when I'm sitting still, I don't pay attention to them and was thus forced, and I think as part of the exercises goal, to try to behave as I thought I might. Once again this required attention and thought. 3. Control over other body parts: As we were trying to communicate with certain body parts we had to restrain others, this however, only took concentration. So the exercise was a large amount of multi-tasking which thus made it difficult.
After doing the exercise, we watched the video clip. Given that it was for promotional reason, it highlighted the good parts of the program but we were still able to gain much from it. First was the speed at which they started and the quote about "I learned from 42 other peoples' mistakes and brilliance". My version of the quote would be something like: I learn by doing. The goal of the activities is to learn and if you wait, question, and doubt than you won't reap the benefits of the exercise. The line also held a very true idea, by watching other you can learn. In short don't be afraid of the cop in the head.
Luckily, we managed to get tickets to the dress rehearsal of a dance performance. While my experience with dance is small, I was very worried that I would be repetitive and I would loose attention quickly but it was nothing like that. They kept the show constantly changing and came up with really cool ideas, would look at Richard's post as he has a better explanation (as he has done more with stage, I should look into different techniques) but they took their different ideas and combined them in to the story of life. While I didn't entirly understand the concepts, the tricks alone kept me engaged and focused. The main thing that I was really impressed by was that even when they stopped the show to fix the technical details, as it was a dress rehearsal, they didn't interact with the audience. While they made a few comments, waved, and did other silly things, the audience was completely unnecessary.
Just going to make a list of what they did:
Mirror Dancing: Using the mirror to create different shapes and affects. (Had a woman lying on the mirror, who would roll and stretch to have the above affect)
Bushes: Manipulated "Bushes"(like a big hula hoop) to create trees, bushes, birds, and other things.
UV paint or something: Created a situation were only the painted parts of the body were visible due to the light being given off. This allowed them to manipulate the amount that was shown by wearing another layer of clothes and form different shapes.
Oh, anyone know how to get square light effect from a rounded light?
When we were doing our lines on Tuesday and Wednesday, it turned out that while we had the end and the beginning well nailed down, minus a few small problems, there was a long stretch in the middle that neither of us were prepared for. First off, we didn't really know our lines and thus slowly stumbled through the actions and emotions. This was a bit of a surprise for me as except for a few lines that I tend to transpose, I knew the lines that we had practiced before and even some of Georgia's. So when I reached a point where I barely knew what to do I was absolutely stuck, the Christmas break though will make a good time for me to fix this issue.
An extension of the above issue, is also that both of us are outside of our comfort zones. Especially me, as I'm not very romantic and thus have no idea how to make Doctor Rank's confession or the atmosphere of the stockings bit. I was worried about this when we gave out roles. The main problem with this is that it makes the acting very awkward, killing the life out of the act. While I need to fix this, it's part of having to act with true emotion.
On Wednesday, we also did another part of Stanislavski work, Rhythm and Tempo. It's based around the speed of the piece. I find this much easier to explain with a movie or a video game rather than an actual play. During a fight scene the music would be fast paced along with the events, thinking James Bond. The music in this case holds the beat of the scene. A more romantic moment, would result in a long violin piece and long moments of stillness, creating a much slower beat. Tempo is really the heartbeat of the bit. An important note about the tempo though is that while it can change over time, it doesn't change in just a quick sentence, unless it really is a dramatic change in the script. While we did this it was only because it was part of Stanislavski's actor training, the Dolls House has no action and harsh emotions tend to be hidden.
Probably the most reflective experience though was on Friday. We watched a youtube video of a pitch for a famous drama school, I should have asked for the name. Before we watched it however, we did an exercise. It consisted of talking about food while paying attention to various parts of the body. It was actually pretty hard as you had some many different things to pay attention to. 1. The conversation: Keeping the conversation going was a rather fun bit, but required both thought and attention. 2. Pay attention to certain body parts: while I know that I do various movements when I'm sitting still, I don't pay attention to them and was thus forced, and I think as part of the exercises goal, to try to behave as I thought I might. Once again this required attention and thought. 3. Control over other body parts: As we were trying to communicate with certain body parts we had to restrain others, this however, only took concentration. So the exercise was a large amount of multi-tasking which thus made it difficult.
After doing the exercise, we watched the video clip. Given that it was for promotional reason, it highlighted the good parts of the program but we were still able to gain much from it. First was the speed at which they started and the quote about "I learned from 42 other peoples' mistakes and brilliance". My version of the quote would be something like: I learn by doing. The goal of the activities is to learn and if you wait, question, and doubt than you won't reap the benefits of the exercise. The line also held a very true idea, by watching other you can learn. In short don't be afraid of the cop in the head.
Luckily, we managed to get tickets to the dress rehearsal of a dance performance. While my experience with dance is small, I was very worried that I would be repetitive and I would loose attention quickly but it was nothing like that. They kept the show constantly changing and came up with really cool ideas, would look at Richard's post as he has a better explanation (as he has done more with stage, I should look into different techniques) but they took their different ideas and combined them in to the story of life. While I didn't entirly understand the concepts, the tricks alone kept me engaged and focused. The main thing that I was really impressed by was that even when they stopped the show to fix the technical details, as it was a dress rehearsal, they didn't interact with the audience. While they made a few comments, waved, and did other silly things, the audience was completely unnecessary.
Just going to make a list of what they did:
Mirror Dancing: Using the mirror to create different shapes and affects. (Had a woman lying on the mirror, who would roll and stretch to have the above affect)
Bushes: Manipulated "Bushes"(like a big hula hoop) to create trees, bushes, birds, and other things.
UV paint or something: Created a situation were only the painted parts of the body were visible due to the light being given off. This allowed them to manipulate the amount that was shown by wearing another layer of clothes and form different shapes.
Oh, anyone know how to get square light effect from a rounded light?
Richard Spencer
Friday, 16 December 2011
Cheesy photos and Macaroons
12th - 16th December 2011.....OUR LAST 2011 THEATRE LESSONS!
This week started off like any other week, rehearsing and going over again and again A Doll's House trying to burn those lines into our memories. Naturally we had things thrown in over the week which turned out to be one of the most enjoyable weeks for Theatre Arts we've had so far (in my view). I feel this maybe a long blogging so KEEP READING it's semi important...ish!!!
Tuesday (13th December) like previously stated it was a bog-standard lesson of rehearsing bits of our extract. Me and Maria decided to... WORK OFF SCRIPT -add dramatic 'dun dun duuuuun' here-. We worked off script to try and get our actions more believable and fluid (since we looked more like acquaintances than Husband and Wife). This I actually felt was better than working with the script (OMG) since we could explore possible actions towards each other to the max. An hour seemed to fly by, with us only getting a few actions done, nevertheless we seemed confidant that those few seconds looked believable. SUCCESS!
Cheesy Photos (Left to Right): Bekki, Spencer, Izzy, Lydia, The Hough, Natalie, Maria, Me and Georg |
<----- Now who is that amazing year? (not year 11)
On the same day, us 4 year 12 IB Theatre Arts students (and some GCSE ones too) went to go and watch a rehearsal of Botanica (a dance show at the Oddysud, video in link) created by the theatre company Momix. I have to say I had my doubts, however I literally sat through the whole performance with my mouth open. The two things that stuck with me were the usage of the UV reactive costumes and lights, I often had to remind myself that these were actual people doing this, you just couldn't see then at all (if only we could do this at school....maybe in the cupboard?). The second thing that stood out was the presence all of the dancers had on the stage. How they held themselves and just their physical presence. One person was able to hold the presence whereas I've seen things where 30 people can't even hold it. The ability to sit on those front row seats were amazing (saying the rehearsal was free to watch and tickets were some 50 odd euros). This just goes to show that walking around and saying words isn't the only type of theatre. Botanica had no words or dialogue, only music, AMAZINGLY EPIC costumes, some good ol' projections and pretty darn good dancers. Goes to show how dancing theatre can make an enthralling show (well rehearsal).
Wednesday (14th December 2011), for the first hour of our double period we learnt yet another Stanislavski technique....Tempo-rhythm which basically is (well what the bubble says) "Our pace, both mental and physical, the pace of everything round us and everything we do". Which in Richard terms means the pace of the character, the piece and the metal pace of a character. We then did a few exercises and what-not on it to show what it is (loving the face Spencer :-P) then we had to show the tempo-rhythm of a certain bit of our extract. This didn't go so well, I seemed to be showing pace/tempo of speech not character and piece. After this and fixing what needed to be fixed, during the second period we identified the tempo-rhythm of certain areas of the script and got to work pacing out a certain bit. During this we got stuck on what to do for a movement during this bit, we asked the other 2 (Georg, and #2) they said each action was equal and it doesn't matter which we used. We then asked Mr.F which told use about the subtlety of the action instead of a big huge reaction. I could see where he was coming from, subtlety and the things no one notices are believable whereas clear and big actions are well Panto.
On Thursday last break, (not sure if the other two know this) Maria and I went to see Mr. F about what we need to do to achieve a 6 in our next report. Naturally he said to me what I had already identified (more than once and I am fully aware of this, as I was by the end of last year). What is pretty much something like, "Don't take negative feedback to heart, don't beat yourself up about it. Embrace the feedback, instead of casting it aside and getting annoyed. Don't see it aimed as negative instead see it as a building block or foundation to add into your piece to make it as structurally sound as possible." Yes that was a metaphor. But I knew before I even asked him what I had to do to get to that 6.
But whereas on our last day of school for 2011 (16th December). We pretty much sat down, ate the scraps left off from the year 13 party and had a macaroon (NOW DO YOU GET MY TITLE?) which didn't seem to stick to the side of our mouths, Nora's these days. Anyway we did a small exercise where we had a partner (I had Spencer) and we were told to talk about food. Easy enough right? Wrong! We had to use gesture through parts of our body, such as the feet, stomach area, heart and head. So I was wiggling my feet and trying not to use my hands, it was easy, fun, hard, and difficult at the same time. We then watched a small video about Guildford school of acting and we discovered that the Imagination Muscle is the most important and that we need to learn to control the cop in the head.
Been a great start to the year, Mr. Fearnehough you are a great teacher (even if you do speak a little too much) lets hope next year is even better. Also I will probably blog near the end of X-mas.
(Sorry for the Republish it seemed to have become a draft again!)
!Happy Christmas!
Richard #1
Location:
Cornebarrieu, France
Monday, 12 December 2011
Rays
I am going to try my hardest to make this post better than the last, which won't mean I have to try too hard, my last post was dismal. but I find I do struggle quite a bit with the reflecting side of drama.
Right, so this week we focused on Stan the Mans "Rays". I don't think it possible to be able to explain this in one concise sentence, so I will just have to try my best to explain it. In my opinion what Stan means by "Rays" is a connection felt by the actors on stage with one another, and also a connection between the actors and the audience. these rays create a special relationship between actors and actor and audience. They help to make a piece more believable and real. This was very important to Stan.
The exercise that we did as a class to experiment with rays entailed sitting next to a partner, on the same level at about 6 inches apart, and using "rays" to tell your partner to do something, e.g. scratch their nose. One person was the sender would use "rays" to tell their person what to do, the reciever would try and keep an open mind and be susceptible to the "rays" the sender was giving and fulfil their task. This was to show that humans have this sort of sense in that they can sense to some extent how someone else is feeling/thinking etc. It is an actors job to acknowledge and use these rays, as well as emmitting the right rays that their character would to another actor or to audience members.
While the rest of the group where successful at sending and recieving rays, I didn't find myself able to do either. To begin with, I'm not 100% happy with keeping such eye contact for a long period of time, I find it disconcerting and the longer it lasts the more I feel I need to move or do something. With sending rays, and recieiving a bit, I found the longer it went on the more exasperated I would get, I got so annoyed with myself for just not really getting anything, and when recieving rays the only thought I really had in my head, other than why can't I do this, was what am I meant to be thinking?
I'm in two minds as to why I sort of failed at this task. One the one hand, some of my friends see me as quite an open person, and I do think of my self as that sometimes. But I think a lot of the time I like to have people always think of me as happy/doing well, so I will try and act a certain way. I don't know whether this affected how much into the exercise, like whether or not I closed up on recieving rays. This was sort of touched upon in the lesson, that maybe I didn't fully fail at the task, but instead did not reach my own expectations of what I expected to do. I know I do set myself high expectations, I want to do well, but in this task I was also frustrated that i couldn't do something everyone else managed. What did come out of the discussion with Mr Fearnehough was that I shouldn't take constructive criticism to mean I am doing something wrong. I should take on other peoples ideas better, and if I am stopped just take on someone elses ideas and try the part again.
We also had a spot test on friday about Stan, this helped to clear up some of the work done and gave me clear definitions on things like the magic if and given circumstances. It also helped me to get to grips with the ideas properly.
Hope this is an improvement on my reflection.
Georgia
Right, so this week we focused on Stan the Mans "Rays". I don't think it possible to be able to explain this in one concise sentence, so I will just have to try my best to explain it. In my opinion what Stan means by "Rays" is a connection felt by the actors on stage with one another, and also a connection between the actors and the audience. these rays create a special relationship between actors and actor and audience. They help to make a piece more believable and real. This was very important to Stan.
The exercise that we did as a class to experiment with rays entailed sitting next to a partner, on the same level at about 6 inches apart, and using "rays" to tell your partner to do something, e.g. scratch their nose. One person was the sender would use "rays" to tell their person what to do, the reciever would try and keep an open mind and be susceptible to the "rays" the sender was giving and fulfil their task. This was to show that humans have this sort of sense in that they can sense to some extent how someone else is feeling/thinking etc. It is an actors job to acknowledge and use these rays, as well as emmitting the right rays that their character would to another actor or to audience members.
While the rest of the group where successful at sending and recieving rays, I didn't find myself able to do either. To begin with, I'm not 100% happy with keeping such eye contact for a long period of time, I find it disconcerting and the longer it lasts the more I feel I need to move or do something. With sending rays, and recieiving a bit, I found the longer it went on the more exasperated I would get, I got so annoyed with myself for just not really getting anything, and when recieving rays the only thought I really had in my head, other than why can't I do this, was what am I meant to be thinking?
I'm in two minds as to why I sort of failed at this task. One the one hand, some of my friends see me as quite an open person, and I do think of my self as that sometimes. But I think a lot of the time I like to have people always think of me as happy/doing well, so I will try and act a certain way. I don't know whether this affected how much into the exercise, like whether or not I closed up on recieving rays. This was sort of touched upon in the lesson, that maybe I didn't fully fail at the task, but instead did not reach my own expectations of what I expected to do. I know I do set myself high expectations, I want to do well, but in this task I was also frustrated that i couldn't do something everyone else managed. What did come out of the discussion with Mr Fearnehough was that I shouldn't take constructive criticism to mean I am doing something wrong. I should take on other peoples ideas better, and if I am stopped just take on someone elses ideas and try the part again.
We also had a spot test on friday about Stan, this helped to clear up some of the work done and gave me clear definitions on things like the magic if and given circumstances. It also helped me to get to grips with the ideas properly.
Hope this is an improvement on my reflection.
Georgia
Sunday, 11 December 2011
DRAMATIC RAYS FROM OUTER SPACE!!
Did you feel those rays from the title? huh did you? I know you did! Anyhow onto the reflection.
5th - 9th December 2011
5th - 9th December 2011
This week in class we were studying Stanislavski's hidden world of Rays. Which when looking back onto it is a very hard topic to explain. It could be explained as a 6th Sense, mind-reading or some kind of supernatural force that us drama students process.
Whatever you call it I found it good fun and rather easy to pick-up. What we did was we sat down with a partner (I had Maria first off) and we just looked into each others eyes and tried to give of rays/vibes to our partner to make them do an action you were thinking of without any indication to what it is. Maria was the sender first of all and she wanted me to scratch my ear which unbelievably I did get on the first go, how I knew she wanted me to do this? I will probably never know. Then we swapped I was the sender she was the receiver, the first try she got it wrong then BAM! She scratched her nose. Ray successfully sent and received, over. Sometimes I do feel it could have been more trial and error than Rays of a greater Dramatic beyond!!!
However naturally I feel that the more trust there is between 2 people the easier it is, as if somehow trust is the link that connects us all together and allows us to feel and understand the rays that people give off. I would have liked to have too have seen how said exercise would have worked between someone you don't know well and someone you know very well (e.g Yr 12 Drama Class)
So, looking back upon the week I felt that these rays (for me) where rather easy to get a grip of and relatively easy to integrate into our work on A Doll's House. It's adding that extra depth and subtlety to the character this then makes the audience believe this is a real person not just some actor trying to represent someone. Giving the character that bit of flare. Naturally even looking into each others eyes caused the class to giggle but that seems like a natural response to do when looking directly into someones eyes.
What Mr. Fearnehough said to us I felt really rang true to us as actors and us as people too. It was something along the lines of "90% of all emotions experienced through everyday conversations between people in real life are not taken/identified by the dialogue but rather by the Rays people give off". Overall really I felt it an easy concept to grasp and integrate into or class work. I've just got to remember in the future to use them.
Side note: We had a small test upon what we had learnt so far this term. One question was Circle of Attention which me and Maria (from what I know correct me if I am wrong Maria) hadn't really be taught about. I was aware that Mr. F had been talking to Georgia and Richard #2 in their class work but in the background and we were I think focusing on our bit. I had back in November (13th) come across it on the Internet and the example given was focusing on a certain and specific sound in the room (which could be seen as focusing attention). Just a little side note for myself really.
I also like how everyone seems to be using my bolding key words technique, its useful isn't it? Your welcome guys!!!! (-:
Richard #1
Location:
Cornebarrieu, France
Rays
This week we've been working on Rays. An exercise that can be really hard and at the same time really easy. When we got paired up into groups of two and that we were supposed to only look each other in they eyes, I knew that this was going to be a challenging exercise if you want to get it done properly.
I had read the book "An actor prepares" from Stanislavski and I had been writing down lots of interesting quotes in my journal. An interesting quote who would suit this exercise:" An actor, like an infant, must learn everything from the beginning.To look,to talk, to walk, and so on"
That's why I knew this exercise wouldn't only be about looking i each others laugh. Of course i thought it was a challenging exercise, you weren't suppose to talk, or to laugh like a retard, you just had to look in each others eyes. All of us were giggling for the first exercise, which showed that we all had a lack of concentration. Or maybe it could be the nerves who were taking over, but for me it was the lack of concentration that was missing.
For the second exercise I made a huge effort for concentrating and not laughing while looking into Richards eyes. With that huge amount of concentration, I wasn't even laughing when my partner was laughing a little bit and smiling. I was staying concentrated. One of us had the be the sender, and the other one the receiver. The sender had to send a telepathic message to the other one who had to demonstrate it. Strangely, it did work for our group. I was in chock and I was really impressed that we had succeeded this exercise.
For the third exercise we had to use the rays and improvise a little scene. We were aloud to talk and to move around the room.But the second time we did this exercise, we just had to stare at each other, without talking and moving around a little bit. The second time was more interesting than the first time and me and Richard thought it went better than the first time we tried it.
I thought that this double session we had on Wednesday was very useful and helpful and will definitely help me in other performances in the future.
So lines and movement aren't the most important things on stage and for an actor, and an actor should never use the excuse "oh, my lines were bad that's why my acting sucked" because rays is what make a performance good an believable.
This week we've been working on Rays. An exercise that can be really hard and at the same time really easy. When we got paired up into groups of two and that we were supposed to only look each other in they eyes, I knew that this was going to be a challenging exercise if you want to get it done properly.
I had read the book "An actor prepares" from Stanislavski and I had been writing down lots of interesting quotes in my journal. An interesting quote who would suit this exercise:" An actor, like an infant, must learn everything from the beginning.To look,to talk, to walk, and so on"
That's why I knew this exercise wouldn't only be about looking i each others laugh. Of course i thought it was a challenging exercise, you weren't suppose to talk, or to laugh like a retard, you just had to look in each others eyes. All of us were giggling for the first exercise, which showed that we all had a lack of concentration. Or maybe it could be the nerves who were taking over, but for me it was the lack of concentration that was missing.
For the second exercise I made a huge effort for concentrating and not laughing while looking into Richards eyes. With that huge amount of concentration, I wasn't even laughing when my partner was laughing a little bit and smiling. I was staying concentrated. One of us had the be the sender, and the other one the receiver. The sender had to send a telepathic message to the other one who had to demonstrate it. Strangely, it did work for our group. I was in chock and I was really impressed that we had succeeded this exercise.
For the third exercise we had to use the rays and improvise a little scene. We were aloud to talk and to move around the room.But the second time we did this exercise, we just had to stare at each other, without talking and moving around a little bit. The second time was more interesting than the first time and me and Richard thought it went better than the first time we tried it.
I thought that this double session we had on Wednesday was very useful and helpful and will definitely help me in other performances in the future.
So lines and movement aren't the most important things on stage and for an actor, and an actor should never use the excuse "oh, my lines were bad that's why my acting sucked" because rays is what make a performance good an believable.
Saturday, 10 December 2011
Rays
Rays is the easiest and hardest thing that we have done all year. The main issue with Rays is the aspect of intangibility, its impossible to prove that you were actually transmit or receiving rays. All you could do was trust that you were. The lack of contact also makes rays very hard to accurately describe and I am rather interested in how other group members will describe them. For me though, their rather like strings that connect the area together, tying everything together, and the manipulation of these strings results in Rays. Thus when the entire audience is gripped, the rays being broadcasted are from all the string in the room, creating the all encompassing emotion.
I did find, however, that it was much easier to broadcast an emotion rather than individual thoughts or actions and they tended to have more of an impact. We did an activity were we first did an improve of the moment, I kept smiling through out, and then after that we did it with only rays. The tension of the second attempt was far more than the first despite the lack of speech. Based off of this I also believe that everything in the world, including music, emits rays.
We also had a "Test" on Friday, it was a pop quiz. I knew most of the answers but it accomplished its goal and showed me what I didn't know and that their is a difference between being able to apply it and knowing it.
Richard Spencer
I did find, however, that it was much easier to broadcast an emotion rather than individual thoughts or actions and they tended to have more of an impact. We did an activity were we first did an improve of the moment, I kept smiling through out, and then after that we did it with only rays. The tension of the second attempt was far more than the first despite the lack of speech. Based off of this I also believe that everything in the world, including music, emits rays.
We also had a "Test" on Friday, it was a pop quiz. I knew most of the answers but it accomplished its goal and showed me what I didn't know and that their is a difference between being able to apply it and knowing it.
Richard Spencer
Tuesday, 6 December 2011
Active Analysis
Last week, we all worked on Active Analysis and a little bit of the method of physical actions, which is in Stanislavski's system. Stanislavski thought that by teaching/improving actors to become professional actors you had to go through several steps which are all in his System, and last week we all tried out the active analysis one.
I thought it was really difficult, strange and pointless and I am going to be honest, I hated it and it was the first time when I wasn't motivated about doing a new exercise in Theatre Arts. Me and Richard had done the Role in the Wall for our characters and the Round table analysis (which was also in Stanislavki's system) so I already knew a lot about Nora, I knew how she would work, her personality, her relationship with her husband Torvald... and when I heard that we had to improvise a bit of our script I found it pointless, and so did Richard who worked with me.
I sat there and didn't take the exercise seriously at all, however I tried to stay open-minded and think that challenging exercises would come along during these two years. I was also getting pretty worried about me not finding that theatre lesson interesting. When me and Richard looked over to the other group, we saw that they were getting on pretty well and I really didn't get why they found this exercise relatively easy whereas me and Richard found this pointless. Just like what Richard thinks, I think this might be because we both started to do the Round table analysis and because of our Theatre experience. We have been built up and we have learned to approach a script in a certain way, so that might be why we found this strange and unhelpful for us. We both approach and studied the script in our own way we've been taught, like the Round table analysis, sitting down and talking about your character and its objectives for ages, and then you get on with it WITH THE SCRIPT. When I admitted that to my self,the active analysis started to get more interesting and I stopped worrying that I wasn't going to succeed this exercise properly.
Like Richard said as well,(don't worry Richard I'm not steeling all of your ideas if that's what you're thinking) if I would get another script with different characters and without doing the Round table analysis, I think the active analysis would be really helpful because now I understand clearly what this is about, not about showing off all of your Theatre experiences and how you've been "built up", but to understand the meaning behind each line.
However, I thought that the physical exercise was much more easier and better to get what your characters objectives and meaning of the line were. By doing it with other scenes that we didn't know, I though it was easier to approach an unknown scene and just go for it, instead when you already think you know a scene perfectly and you've gone through it several times at home and school. For example, me and Richard did Spencer's and Georgia's scene, and they did ours. We could pick up some important acting details and use it for our bit.
Last week, we all worked on Active Analysis and a little bit of the method of physical actions, which is in Stanislavski's system. Stanislavski thought that by teaching/improving actors to become professional actors you had to go through several steps which are all in his System, and last week we all tried out the active analysis one.
I thought it was really difficult, strange and pointless and I am going to be honest, I hated it and it was the first time when I wasn't motivated about doing a new exercise in Theatre Arts. Me and Richard had done the Role in the Wall for our characters and the Round table analysis (which was also in Stanislavki's system) so I already knew a lot about Nora, I knew how she would work, her personality, her relationship with her husband Torvald... and when I heard that we had to improvise a bit of our script I found it pointless, and so did Richard who worked with me.
I sat there and didn't take the exercise seriously at all, however I tried to stay open-minded and think that challenging exercises would come along during these two years. I was also getting pretty worried about me not finding that theatre lesson interesting. When me and Richard looked over to the other group, we saw that they were getting on pretty well and I really didn't get why they found this exercise relatively easy whereas me and Richard found this pointless. Just like what Richard thinks, I think this might be because we both started to do the Round table analysis and because of our Theatre experience. We have been built up and we have learned to approach a script in a certain way, so that might be why we found this strange and unhelpful for us. We both approach and studied the script in our own way we've been taught, like the Round table analysis, sitting down and talking about your character and its objectives for ages, and then you get on with it WITH THE SCRIPT. When I admitted that to my self,the active analysis started to get more interesting and I stopped worrying that I wasn't going to succeed this exercise properly.
Like Richard said as well,(don't worry Richard I'm not steeling all of your ideas if that's what you're thinking) if I would get another script with different characters and without doing the Round table analysis, I think the active analysis would be really helpful because now I understand clearly what this is about, not about showing off all of your Theatre experiences and how you've been "built up", but to understand the meaning behind each line.
However, I thought that the physical exercise was much more easier and better to get what your characters objectives and meaning of the line were. By doing it with other scenes that we didn't know, I though it was easier to approach an unknown scene and just go for it, instead when you already think you know a scene perfectly and you've gone through it several times at home and school. For example, me and Richard did Spencer's and Georgia's scene, and they did ours. We could pick up some important acting details and use it for our bit.
Examples of IB Theatre blogs
Hey have a look at some examples of other blogs to help you see how ours could look:
All these blogs are different but they all work, we just have to discover how to make ours work the best it can. Several of these blogs have some very useful info on that will help you with your IB (see how many names/titles you recognise already!)
- http://kateibtheatre.wordpress.com/
- http://sites.google.com/site/georgegrahamibtheatreblog/
- http://taposna.tumblr.com/
- http://melissatongue.wordpress.com/
- http://taleahbrown.wordpress.com/
All these blogs are different but they all work, we just have to discover how to make ours work the best it can. Several of these blogs have some very useful info on that will help you with your IB (see how many names/titles you recognise already!)
Active Analysis
I found it relatively easy to do active analysis, which I was surprised with becuase I thought I would find myself to worried about sticking to the script to do any improvisation off script. I found the activity helped me to understand the meaning behind the lines, like the subtext, becuase you didn't have the script in hand I felt myself going off more what I thought my character should say rather than what I knew they were saying in the script. The more times Spencer and I repeated the exercise the closer we got to the lines and the easier and more natural the bit became. Instead of just reading out the script, you more had to think about it.
Georgia
Saturday, 3 December 2011
Active Reflection
This last week, we have been working on a new way to learn the script, Active Analysis. Its interesting as rather it doesn't focus on the lines but instead works with the objective of the line. Learning the lines than trying to find the objective tends to develop a fault, even if the lines are just read over and over, the actor tends to get a mental picture of how the line should be said and has a hard time changing it radically. Working without the script, though, throws the actor into the characters position and objective. This causes the actor to develop their own lines, and thus events, that reflect the normal play. Thus they identify with the characters and lines.
It was rather difficult as a technique, for several reasons, but created useful results. The main issue was improving but not straying from the text and changing the bit too much. It was also hard to say every line. Especially in our bit there were lines that we would accidentally skip over and cause the bit to end suddenly, this didn't cause any issues though. The hardest bit though was developing it in the right fashion. At first we simply evolved on what we first did with the piece, but later we evolved off of several different forms of preforming it. This worked much better than before but also caused issues. The changes that we wanted proved to be mutually exclusive and we were forced to choose what we liked best from the different ideas, and we had a hard time deciding which to include.
Richard Spencer
It was rather difficult as a technique, for several reasons, but created useful results. The main issue was improving but not straying from the text and changing the bit too much. It was also hard to say every line. Especially in our bit there were lines that we would accidentally skip over and cause the bit to end suddenly, this didn't cause any issues though. The hardest bit though was developing it in the right fashion. At first we simply evolved on what we first did with the piece, but later we evolved off of several different forms of preforming it. This worked much better than before but also caused issues. The changes that we wanted proved to be mutually exclusive and we were forced to choose what we liked best from the different ideas, and we had a hard time deciding which to include.
Richard Spencer
Active Analysis - Reflect
Active Analysis.....Enough Said!!!!
28th November - 2nd December
The past week we have been studying and putting into practise Stanislavski's method of Active Analysis. I'm going to say now, it definitely was not my favourite thing we've done in Theatre Arts this year. It involves the actor putting down the script and improvising a certain "bit" of the script, letting the actor discover, given circumstances, objectives, actions, super objectives and is supposed to help with line learning.
I found it hard to put into practise this could be for a majority of reasons. Me and Maria did Round-table analysis (as well as a role in the wall for our characters) of the whole script and we felt it was very thorough. Meaning that active analysis helped much less than it would have been on a script we had never seen or studied before. But also something that I think that could have been a contributing factor to why I found this difficult was because I have done Panto for some 6-7 years now and the way we go about learning lines and "finding" out character is through round-table analysis and re-reading the script over and over again, 'formatting' me (as Mr. F says). One last thing that I felt that made it difficult was working off-script (improvising a scene). To me I felt why should we improvise a scene that we already have on script (and previously practised and studied) and are just beginning to get used to it. I mean I can see Active Analysis' benefits to certain actors (as well as certain scripts) but not a script that we have been practising from previously. If you were to give me 'A Doll's House' script (when I have never read or studied it) and tell me to do an Active Analysis of Torvald, I think this would have been much easier that doing this after Round-table analysis and role in the wall of this character.
However, when we started to do The Method of Physical Action (with the script being read to us and we have to show and do actions of our character) this felt soooooooooo such easier and much quicker to acquire your characters actions and objectives or lines. I had no problem with this and would be happy to use The Method of Physical Action again for another script.
On a side note, when we all sat down to discuss how we felt about Active Analysis and highlighted certain problems, I felt as if I could understand it better (just ironic it was through a round-table analysis) but by the end I felt slightly more comfortable about it. Lets just see what happens in the future and see whether I can try to use it to a greater extent on another script.
Richard #1
Thursday, 1 December 2011
Welcome to IB Theatre Blogger!
Hey guys! This is our new blog - hope you like it! We will keep a weekly blog on all our Theatre work and this will compliment (not completely replace) our written journals. Weekly updates will enable each person to reflect on the ensemble's work and progress, identify and comment on significant challenges and discoveries and interact with the ideas and thoughts of others in the class. Remember all your comments are shared and we should be remember to keep a polite and respectful tone. You can use this work, along with you journals, later to help with your formal assessments (especially the TPPP). Remember to post in here is a part of your weekly and ongoing homework (and, of course, you can post even during holidays!) Enjoy.
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