BTEC LEVEL 3 ACTING Ryan Blackburn: Performance workshop

Performance Workshop

Monday 9th September 2013

Idea's for my biographical piece

installation piece
tour with pictures
monologue
duologue
a song
dance

What is a Monologue?
A monologue is a form of dramatic entertainment that involves one person which can be spoken to yourself or an imaginary person but it has to be address to the audience and also engage the audience and have a purpose.

structure of a monologue

divided into manageable section with a varying in length
chronological order
clear (present tense) subheading
used fade to black to show the scene change

create character

ideal character indicators the age, social class, education and attitudes.
chose appropriate level of maturity
use similes and clichés
contraction when retake a sentence
personal idiolect, how do they speck
intensifiers e.g. really?!
metaphors

the idea that I went for was a monologue the reason why I choose that idea was so I could explore different parts o my life in a way that it was like I am talking to the audience. I thought of different themes with in my life that I could present in a monologue .

the ideas that I thought off...

my time with NCS
Television programs that I like to watch that helped me set my goals
scars
funny times of my life.
my life challenges of when I was a kid.

the first idea I went for was Television programs that I liked to watch that helped me set my goal, now this idea was set so I could explain to how I to the stage that I am at now but I was writing the monologue it was clear in my head that it was working as others who read my monologue said that I only focused on program and I didn't really explain why this help me set my goals. But also when I was writing this monologue I wasn't really thinking about how I could stage it and what would I need staging and props wise, but there was one thing that I kept from my first draft monologue it was the opening line of "you the one who is setting there thinking what so interesting about you then." I decide to use this opening in my next draft but I changed the idea to scars as this ideas I could connect to the audience when sharing my experience with scars to them who might have the same as me.

You the one who is sitting there thinking what’s so interesting about you then,

Well I will tell you, scars everyone’s got them you (point at audience members) you and even you have them all over your body physically and emotionally, we get them from accidents that we had, young or old,

But every scar has their own story on how they appear on your body or on my body with the physical ones that are all over but the one the will never fade is the emotional when my parents spilt up when having two parents with two families with me in the middle of the gap,

But I don’t think you know how this feels (point to the audience) this scar will never fade of time for the rest of my life.

But then you have the physical scar that everyone sees on your body which do fade of time but there is one that even I have never ever seen which is the one on my lip which happen when I was four years old at playschool,

Now you are properly think play school we supposed to be safe but there are not as I was able to rip me lip open on a sharp edge of a table, now you are thinking how was this able to happen but it did but I have the horrifying joy to go and see the doctor to stich my lip back together.

But the most stupid of scars that I have got was when I was washing up a baked bean tin and the sharp edge around the lid cut my hand but me being about 9 years old would have known better to wash a baked bean tin with a cloth.

But everyone (point at the audience) will have some of these scars yes the ones I am taking about is chicken pox scars when we were young and we couldn’t stop scratching the chicken pox spot until they bleed and scar up, so at some points we are in same with a scars.

So you the one who is seating there thinking what so interesting about you I think I have just answered you question.

understanding of the text.

Performance workshop part 2

Monday 4th November 2013
Looking at the technique of Joan Littlewoods.

Vaudeville - a comedy genre, popular in US and Canada from the early 1880's to the late 1930's.

Music Hall - British theatrical popular between 1850's to the 1960's, British Music Hall was similar to the American Vaudeville.

Monday 11th November 2013

to help with the topic the stimulus I chose for the theme of war which was a quote from one of Churchill's speeches ....
"We shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and the oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender. "

Parody - an imitation of the style of a particular writer, artist, or genre with deliberate exaggeration for comic effect.

The task that we were set was to create a Parody, me and Kat choose to do a parody about Kristen Stewart's facial expression with me being to director of one of the twilight film that was asking her to show different emotion.

Monday 25th November
Audio

Using the theme of war we explored the audio part of our stimulus thought the different songs that was selected and thought of ways we could present that song or speech as well of thinking of what is made us feel when we listen to it.

we listen to

This Is War by 30 Seconds To Mars

Love Like War by All Time Low

Jesus Walks by Kanye West

Earth by Michael Jackson

Man In The Mirror and They Don't Care About Us by Michael Jackson

Winston Churchill 1940 Speech

Time To Say Goodbye by Katherine Jenkins

Stand Your Ground by Within Temptation

The Ideas we created

From listening the songs we took 6 of them a focus on creating a scene,dance or movement, the main song to start with that we looked at was "They don't care about us" from this Ryan Y took a more of leader role when creating the movement piece with the rest of us helping to create an effective scene.

From this created a movement with our phones torch's an look at a lighting effective of soldiers marching in darkness then one by one as the beat developed more light would be uncovered. to start with we had Amelia go around shining a light in our face and miming the line that the girl on the song was singing which was "all I want to stay is that they don't care about us" also at the same time we had one light on which was showing Ryan's face as the beat change that when we came in one at a time to the beat marching.From the start of creating this idea I feel that this idea could be developed further in to more of effective because more can be added to what have so far as we have other songs to add in yet as well as looking at the messages that we were trying to present on what happen to the people who are left behind by war.

Monday 2nd December 2013

Continuing Audio and Starting Text.

For the first have of the lesson we looked continued to look at what we had created last week and adding new parts on the develop the first idea and trying out a new idea which was to have a another song and use our shadows projected on to the celling telling the message of the scene but from the early stages of this idea it was clear that it wasn't working this was because of we were all trying to have our own say in the matter and that we weren't listening to each other as well not having the right resources to make the idea work. so we went back the first ideas but also adding Natalia in to what we had creating to make this possible we have two people Amelia and Natalia shining torch light in to our faces mining " I want to say is they don't really care about us", After we went run thought what was already created we used the music to help with our creativity as the sound effects from music were the sound of bombs exploring we used Amelia and Natalia who were already on their knees after falling to them after shining the light turn to face us solider in a line and mined throwing bombs at us killing off four people which left me and Ryan the idea we that would turn on each other showing the two sides of the flight, from this we were showing to different parts of war to the audience in two different ways.

Text

We moved on to text and looked at a poem that Sasha bought in as well as a newspaper article and also looked at the Churchill speech. The poem was called "Young Solider" which we linked to the news paper article about Britain youngest solider.

Young Solider

Stay calm soldier

Do not panic
Stay calm soldier
And think of what you were taught
You're too young to die
My soldier
You're too young to leave

Run soldier
From the danger ahead
Run soldier
Don't be brave
You're too young to die
My soldier
You're too young to leave

Fight soldier
The enemy that fights you
Fight soldier
And make it though the day
You're too young to die
My soldier
You're too young to leave

Come home soldier
I miss you terribly
Come home soldier
To me and your family
You're too young to die
My soldier
Don't ever leave me

Churchill Speech "We Shall Never Surrender"

We shall not flag or fail.

We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in France,
We shall fight on the seas and oceans,
We shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air,

We shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be,
We shall fight on the beaches,
We shall fight on the landing grounds,
We shall fight in the fields and in the streets,
We shall fight in the hills;
We shall never surrender

From reading both of these we came up this a range of ideas and themes inspired by the text, a couple of ideas that we looked at was having a scene with a family who have a young solider off at war and another idea was to have a Grandparent telling his Grandchild stories of the war to them then having flash back of the war with other acting out what had been described. the main idea that we went for was a comical one and we look at a "Dads Army" style theme this was inspired from the Churchill speech when Churchill state " We shall defend our Island" by creating a scene at looks at the Home Guard in a Dad's Army style, we experimented with the idea by having Sasha being the Sargent and the rest of us having different problems, the only problems we were having was trying to keep a straight face trying not to laugh at what was being said as well as trying not to go to far fending someone which some of the comments being said. From this I felt that this idea wasn't work well and that we need to think about a different idea.

We then looked at a scene with the women of war working in the factors talking about their loved ones out in war each one of the four women which were Sasha, Amelia, Natalia and Tasha each had a different relative in the war, To show to the audience that they were in a factor all the girls did a synchronised movement which was sewing something together then Kat was the newsreader on the radio talking about soldiers deaths this was repeated four for each women starting with Sasha everyone else froze apart from her listening to news then behind her Ryan played her relative who was shot down then everyone unfrozen then the next set of news start this time Amelia was the only one not frozen which Tom playing her relative who had been captured then we moved on to Natalia which Tom again played her relative which this time was killed by an exploration then the last was Tasha who I played her relative who was killed by a gas attack. This idea worked as it was showing what life was like back at home during war and what effect it has on people at home.

The other idea was a verity show which different acts the first act was Sasha and Ryan which was called the Dummy which Ryan was the dummy and Sasha was the controller and they were talking about the first world war trenches and talking about what it was like in the trenches, then we moved on to Kat and Natalia which was a mime which Kat represented Germany and Natalia represented Untied Kingdom and this was looking at the two sides showing one side was better then the other with the UK winning, the last act was Tom and Tasha which was a song which was based on a solider missing his wife back home. this idea worked as well as it showed different parts of war in different techniques.

Visual

We moved from text on to visual and watch the opening of "Saving Private Ryan" that Kat suggested once we had watch the open then started to create a scene that we based on the Jews in a concentration camp,

The start of the scene started with everyone in the dark with morning music playing in the back ground with a family waking up talking to each other then the scene moved on with the lights on which showed the characters in a the concentration camp with having the lights on a the start we tricked the audience by making them think that the character was at home when really they weren't the scene moved to show that the characters we scared as one member of their family had already been killed then later on another character was shot, from this scene we found it hard as we had improvised the whole scene with some people not talking and others leading the scene.

we then character anther scene which starts with everyone around a table celebrating an event but with out food then one of the characters walk in after being tortured with the other character worrying about her an alarm sound with the grandparents leave then scene end with the child asking to go outside to play with her parents and siblings turn around after watching the grandparent walk to see the child shot. this scene worked better then before but it did still relied on someone leading.

Monday 27th January 2014

we watched back all the pasted weeks of material that we created and said what we liked about them and what need to improved for each item then created the running order for each piece.

Poem Sketch - A man's words

Split scene with the man in the trenches and his wife back at home going by her normal life.
The man in the trenches with other soldiers writing a letter or poem for his wife.
Could use a table to show the trenches and could show a solider holding a gun.

2. Enemy across the pond (The Mime)

Make it longer
Needs to be bigger with the gestures to show which nation each person is representing.
At the start needs to be in unison.

3. The Dummy (The Puppet)

Needs bigger movements.
Need to talk louder.
Needs to be cut down.
More snapper jokes.
Needs to be more slapstick.

4. Memories of Family

Chop out all of the unnecessary dialogue.
Add sound effect when the audience see the soldiers and helps to set the scene.

5. Dad's Army

Relies on Sasha to drive the scene as it relies on Sasha improv to keep the scene going.
Offencive very offencive and it is not taken seriously.
Way to long needs to be cut down and made shorter.
To heavy dialogue which needs more energy and have more vocal energy.

6. The March ( Michael Jackson's "Don't care about us" backing music)

Needs to have more energy.
Work on the lighting effects
Pause with the soldiers and repeat it at the end then end the play with the soldiers fighting.

After watch back every idea and talked about each one on what needs to be improved the make the idea work more effectively we talked the final running order the ideas for the final performance we each gave our own running order and reason why were put it in that order but the final order we went with the running order that I had suggested with what the ideas reminded me of war.

The Final Running Order

Key

Idea

Reason

The March Michael Jackson "Don't care about us", This shows soldiers marching off at a start of a war which pause at the part when soldiers die.
Enemy across the pond mine Britain Vs. Germany, This shows the Propaganda of the time of war as we show the propaganda of Britain is better than Germany at fighting by doing this we are being stereotypically British.
Memories of Family The women in the factories, This was showing what life was like back home during war whilst the men were off fighting and also shows the worry of the women when the radio mentions of a soldier's death.
A man's word, The shows of a soldier fight in the trenches missing his wife by writing her a letter or a poem by doing this it shows what life was like for the soldiers in the trenches.
The Dummy The Puppet, This shows the aftermath of war on the soldiers that fought and relives what life was really like in the trenches which was not as it was made out to be.
The March continues From the pause death scene, This shows that war can make or break a nation with new nations forming from the effects of war.
Churchill speech, This is to show that war can still continue after the fighting has stopped as one war ends another can start the churchill speech represent the end of the First World War to the start of the Second World War.

We started to rehearse this order to work on what we had created but when it came to the following lesson which I wasn't there for they had released from the running order that was created that there wasn't a story there to tell and it would have been boring for an audience to watch so the ideas was change to make more an enjoyable story to performing to an audience to have more fun watch it.

Evaluation of Final Performance

Our task was to create a performance that was based around the theme of war to get to the stage of creating a performance we had to research different topic that we related to war which was broken down to three main topics that we could workshop and create a movement or a scene with the material that we which gave to create the final piece.

The three main topic we looked at was audio, written and visual for each we look at the material that we all brought in that we related to war the material that i brought in was the Churchill speech which comes under both audio and written, for each source we looked at we said what we like about it and what we could create from it, once we had looked at all the source and created a movement or a scene we looked at everything and talk about which ideas we like and why and which ones we didn't like we then looked at what needed to be improved, from this we were able to create the final storyline from but we realized once we started to rehearse the running order we realized that the idea wasn't working and that there was not really a storyline to the performance.

For the final performance we started with Michael Jackson's "they don't care about us" which is set in mild lighting with everyone apart from Ryan and Amila in a straight line with a straight face this was to show that we were soldiers once the music beat drop one by one starting with me we raise our hands to suitlet and turned towards Ryan who was standing on a child to show to the audience that he was a leader, to keep to time we waited for a hand signal from Amelia so we when to move and keep in time as one of the problems we had during rehearsal was that we couldn't stay in time with each other, we used the mirror to help us know when to face a different direction when Ryan turned the scene develops more as the beat drop again as we back towards Ryan then move out away from in a in a movement that showed that we wasn't sure about our surroundings to end the scene and help with thre transition to the next scene Ryan characters starts to shot everyone apart from Kat and Nat which lead to Kat and Nat turn on each other then the scene end "time out " which show that the scene has gone from some serious to a childs game which shows the two characters to be evacatees when the character Mrs Oaks comes out shouting asking the children what they are doing and telling them off for playing games about war, the scene then changes to two other kids played by Amelia and Sasha which both have a brummie accent the they play pirates as they finish the game that when two more children enter played by Tom and Tasha thats when Sasha character suggest about playing a game on war but Amelia character said that there wasn't enough people to play that when Sasha character suggest about inviting Berty my character to join which Amelia character leave to knock for Bertie the two characters return with the entrance of Kat and Nat the rest of the characters pick on them because of what Mrs Oaks said about playing war games Kat and Nat character decide to play any way and the scene develops when music and movement is added to build depths to the scene but start to play their games me and Kat were after Nat and she was after us aswell Nat kills me, at the start the war games scene Ameila and Sasha were using the style of Joan littlewood which added to the scene depth, the scene end with all the children apart from Amelia being killed which we linked to a bombing which killed the children.

What would I improve about the performance to have more rehearsal time so the moves are right and sharpe and on time to the music, also another thing I would improve on is to have more descussion on the final piece so we can work out earlier if there is a story behind the material we created works in a story, also we could have brought in more sources to use to give more material. But from the improvements the final piece worked well it was funny and followed the style of Joan Littlewood.

BTEC LEVEL 3 ACTING Ryan Blackburn

Monday 3 March 2014

Performance workshop