Assignment - Unit 1 principles of performance Part 1 - 'Developing a well formed character'

Task 1 - Warm ups

Ninja - The game ninja is a game where you try to get your opponents out by tagging them from the elbow down, the last standing wins. How to play - whoever is playing stands in a circle and in the group you decide who moves first. The person who moves first will step in any direction they want trying to get the person next to them out by tagging their arm. However if you see that someone is trying to get you out you can try and move out of the way. If you are tagged on your arm you are out. This carries on until there is only one person left.

Why I think we play - I think we play this game because it means we can bond as a class but also so we can learn to watch others facial expressions and body movements to try and stay in the game as long as possible.

What I've learnt from the game - I've learnt a lot about my classmates, what tactics they use during the game and who they usually go after first. And also to watch what everyone around me is doing to make sure I don't get caught out.

Wink murder, mafia boss - This game is played by winking at someone in the circle, if you are winked at you go and ‘kill’ someone in the circle in a mafia boss type fashion. There is also someone trying to guess who is winking. How to play - Whoever is playing stands in a circle and you pick someone to be the mafia boss (the person that winks) and someone to be the detective (the person who guesses who the boss is). If you are chosen to be the detective you will stand outside while a mafia boss is picked and when you come back in you will stand in the centre of the circle and have three guesses to try and figure out who is winking at others. If you are winked at you can kill whoever you want apart from the detective and mafia boss. If you are killed you sit down. If the detective doesn’t guess it right within three tries the mafia boss wins. 

Why I think we play - I think we play this game because it is all about trying to keep a straight face in front of the detective so you don’t give away who the mafia boss is, especially if you are the mafia boss, you want to seem as calm as possible so the detective can’t tell. It also helps us with improv trying to think of new creative ways to kill someone since shooting someone isn’t very creative when 5 people have already done that.

What I’ve learnt from the game - I’ve learnt why facial expressions are so important in acting because without the facial expressions in the game you can’t tell who is mafia boss which also relates in movies and plays because if you have a blank face during a performance no one in the audience will be able to tell what emotion is meant to be shown. 

A game I think we could play - a game I think we could use as a warm up is ‘eye spy’. I think this would be a good game to play as a warm up because it gets you to think about your surroundings in the room. Looking around trying to guess what the person is looking at will get you to be familiar with what’s around you. I think there would also be a funny aspect to the game which would make everyone happy and ready for the lesson ahead. 

The rules of ‘eye spy’ - Someone is selected to go first and says “I spy with my little eye something that begins with the letter…” and they would look around the room and look at something they think people would struggle to guess. For example, the person playing first may see a leaflet so they would say “I spy with my little eye something beginning with ‘L’ ” and everyone else playing would try and look around for something beginning with L and guess what they think the person has chosen. Whoever guesses the word “Leaflet” plays next and it is there turn to pick something. 

Character development we have learnt in class - Lonely hearts characters and No context scenes.

Lonely heart characters - the skills I used to get into the head space of this character was to learn about what her past would of been like and how she would of grown to be who she was today as I acted her. I did this by creating a back story. My character Moira was described as “a young looking attractive women in her mid 40’s looking to meet a man for no strings fun.” Because of this description I learnt that Moira would be a confident women because she knew she was attractive. I then used that to help me think of a back story. I decided that she would be divorced because she is looking for no strings, I did this because my first thought was that she would have been in a serious relationship before and it didn’t work out so she is now looking for something simple. I also decided she would be the CEO of her business because I also think to look for nothing serious shows she is independent and doesn’t need any money from someone else. Overall the skill I used for my lonely hearts character was to give her a full back story to help me get to know her better. 

No context scenes - For the No context scenes we were able to pick a partner to read through them with. however when it came to developing the characters, unfortunately my partner was off so the method I used was listing everything I thought the characters would do and act like, when my partner was next in I could share my notes. I did this by reading through the script and going into depth on each line. For example our No context scene was about an interrogation. So I went into depth about how the suspect would be innocent or guilty, how they may be feeling anxious or calm and then gave feed back to my partner and explained to them about how we could act all of these emotions out using facial expressions and body language. 

Task 2 - SEE HALF TERM BLOGS

Task 3 - Character Study

Halloween tour piece - My characters analysis 

Beatles fan - For my first character I am going to be playing an insane Beatles fan who has ruptured her stomach and still begging to see her favourite band member Paul McCartney. 

My character only says one line but I think it will have a great impact in the tour and leave people still thinking about the character. The line is “Let me back in! I need to Paul! Please please… please”. I know for this character that I am going to scream my lines to add dramatic effect. The actions I am going to use for this character is trying to push passed the nurse as if I’m trying to get through the doors to the stage to see the Beatles perform. We have practised that my character is also going to fall into to a chair due to an usherette trying to keep me calm, this is where my character almost gives up and realises how badly they are hurt so my character is going to slightly cry and beg that all she wanted was to see Paul. I think this will grip the audience because it will make my character seem insane but then when she starts to cry the audience will feel sorry for and make them question whether my character deserved to be hurt as she never got to have her dream come true.

Macbeth witch - For this character I am one of the three Macbeth witches. I use this character to creep out the audience with the way I move and speak. The way I look and act.

My character had a mini paragraph that Shakespeare wrote. “Fillet of a fenny snake, in the cauldron boil and bake, eye of newt and toe of frog, wool of bat and tongue of dog, adders fork and blind worms sting, lizards leg and owlets wing, for a charm of powerful trouble, like a hell broth boil and bubble.” 

I knew to perform this character I was going to put a high pitch voice on and move side to side almost swaying as a bump against the chairs. I am going to do this as I know it will put the audience on edge. I am also going to go onto the stage halfway through my lines and start to go up to audience members, bumping into them and freaking them out. I think doing this will make them want to move on in the tour and make the experience even more scary.

Task 4 - promenade / immersive theatre meaning.

Immersive theatre is where you can interact and physical become apart of the show you are watching.

Immersive theatre can be used for many different reasons and it is done all over the world in many different styles. For our performance we took our audience around the globe on a tour where each new place they entered gave them something to watch and be apart of. For example the vaudeville performance allowed the audience to catch a hat and try to throw it back onto the clowns head making them apart of the performance themselves, another example may be the witches as they got onto the stage where the audience was and could interact with them as they scared them and ushered them off. 

These tactics are used to keep the audience entertained as they are always moving around to find new things out about what they have gone to watch always being apart of what they are seeing never getting bored. 

Immersive theatre uses a blend of different sound and visuals to constantly keep the audience second guessing what is about to happen making them want to stay in the moment and see as much as they possibly can. 

Task 5 - Evaluation 

The globe performance - Beatles fan -  i think my performance of the Beatles fan was effective because i was sure of what i wanted for my character, how she acted, how she would express herself, what her body language would be etc. i knew she would act scared, upset and be shouting. i did this because i knew it would get the audiences attention. and it did,  i was very happy with the audiences reaction because they were shocked and scared that my character may blame them for not being able to see the Beatles, This is what i wanted out of this performance, to scare people since it was a Halloween tour. i also used this to my advantage when choosing what body language i would show, jerking my body about like i'm dying and trying to run passed my nurse who is helping me, i did this because i wanted it to make the audience feel conflicted about the fact that my nurse was trying to help me and i was just ignoring her help and only thinking about the Beatles show and how much i wanted to go back in.

However i think for next time i know to get my group (the people i was in the performance with) together at least 30 minutes before we need to go on because we did struggle with staging and where to go to make the performance even better and make more sense. 

The witches - Witch 2 - i think performance of one of the witches from Macbeth was effective because i really got into character making sure my entire head space was with this character and no where else. i focused on movements, how i walked making sure every few seconds i would bump into things to show i was unaware of my space to make the witch seem unpredictable. i also did the on the stage where the audience was, slightly bumping into people and sneaking up behind them. This gave me the reaction i wanted because i know it scared the audience. i even had someone try and run away. i knew that everything i did helped with this reaction but so did the makeup so i made sure that when i was staring at people i would mess with hair so they would look at what i was doing and they would see my makeup again and remind hem of what they are experiencing. 

However in the first performance of the witches i forgot my second line so i decided to make the decision to stay in the seat area instead of getting on the stage because i wanted to get the rest of my lines right. i know for next time that i just need to carry on even if i make mistakes because it wasn't  as easy to freak the audience out if i wasn't near them.

my family came to see me do the witch performance and the feedback they gave me was good but they did point out that they didn't get to see me on stage and up close. this also shows me that i need to be more confident even if i mess up a line.