Today, everyone in my class performed their own moment of theatre, suing the architecture of our room and one prop. I decided to walk into the frame with my backpack on, throw it down, and flop onto my bed. Then, we were put into groups where we would combine our moments of theatre using one common emotion. My groups common emotion was frustration. I really enjoyed this activity, as it allowed us to make one story.
We also were told to imagine a few scenarios. We were told to first- imagine a place where we (individually) felt the most safe and comfortable, I imagined a place on a trail that I really like. And then we were told to imagine that whatever we had in that room was stolen, and I imagined that my phone was stolen, as it would have been the only thing on me. We were then told to tell the cops about it, but only say what was taken. Next, we were told to find a detective, and explain how you found that it was missing, nothing more. Then, we were told to tell a counselor, and explain how it affected us. This project helped me learn the difference between listing (the cop part), outlining (the detective part), and explaining (the counselor part) so that we could be better at explaining things and know when we weren't.
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My class has been studying Stanislavski's Method, a method used by actors in order to better portray an acting role. The actor imagines themselves in the character's shoes- the place, time period, historical events, events within the play, the character's background, the characters surrounding them, etc., of course in our own homes because of COVID-19.
The purpose of this method was created as a diversion of Russian melodrama, and offered a more convincing way of acting as a character. This would put the actor in the mindset of their role. For a few exercises, we were told to imagine ourselves in different scenarios. In the first exercise, we had to imagine ourselves in different places, such as a desert with the sun bearing down, the edge of a waterfall, a field at night, etc. In the second exercise, we had to first imagine it was 2 in the morning, then we had to imagine ourselves in modern Moscow at 2 a.m., and then Moscow during the Revolution at 2 a.m. This exercise was really interesting, as it was easy for myself to imagine what it was like at my own house at 2 a.m. I also easily imagined myself in Russia; I had on many layers, it was snowy, and I was in fear of being beaten up for who I am. Imagining myself in Russia as a student during the Revolution was also relatively easy; I was wearing mostly wool or tweed clothing, and I was conflicted about the proposed new government, as it went against traditional Russia, but also a better Russia that actually cared for its citizens. During the third exercise, we had to imagine ourselves as a popular band person from the 70s while on a walk, and how they would be put together- how would they walk or carry themselves? What would they be thinking about? This was kind of difficult for me, but I imagined them as walking very confidently (big strides, head held up high) and thinking about their future, as well as having the fear of paparazzi in the back of their mind. We were also assigned to chose a monologue to memorize, and as a way to prepare, we were given a sheet to find out more on the play the monologue is from, as well as what the character wants and what their goals are. This is also one way of getting into the characters' head. Today we started a new project where we read through a play and design a costume for a certain character. We chose to design costumes for characters in "You Can't Take It With You" by George S. Kaufman. Today we read through Act I, which introduced the characters, I read for Penny. My first impression of the play is that most of the Sycamore family is very chaotic.
I would like to compare Henderson and Grandpa Vanderhof because of how different they are. Vanderhof knows nothing about the government, the United States itself, laws, and how things work, while Henderson is a government officer visiting the Sycamore family because Vanderhof didn't pay income tax because he didn't know it existed. While questioning the family about not paying their income tax, Henderson is bombarded with nonsensical questions or comments, so much so that he gets overwhelmed and flees the house, while Vanderhof, as well as the rest of the family, didn't understand why he was there. I think comparing Essie and Kolenkhov because they are similar, but very different. They are similar in that they both love ballet, practice ballet, and are content. But Kolenkhov takes all of these characteristics to the extreme. Kolenkhov is very passionate about ballet, so much so that he writes off ballets he does not like as terrible. He is also very transparent, you know what he is thinking at all times because of how open he is about everything. Essie, on the other hand, is very well-mannered when compared to Kolenkhov. She also obsesses about making candy. While reading for Penny, I have formed a first impression look at what her appearance would look like; a dark orange dress (not quite brown) with cat hair visible on it, an obnoxious hat with pencil tucked into it somehow, pencils tucked in behind her ears, frazzled hair with something tangled in her hair that she forgot about, and typewriter ink on her fingers. I chose to make her all over the place in appearance because that's how she is in the play. I chose to have typewriter ink on her fingers because she would easily get caught up in her plays that she wouldn't realize that her hands are dirty. I chose to have her dress be some variant of a darkish orange because, according to color theory, orange symbolizes energy, excitement, and creativity (all of which apply to Penny). I chose to have it be a darker orange because then car hair would be visible, and cat hair would be expected because of how many cats she has. For the past week or so, my class has been devising a piece about immigration. Within the piece are skits, heralds, and monologues. The skit I'm in is meant to be a comedic skit in which an ICE agent is attempting to enter a human trafficker's house. My role is the human trafficker, who is doing anything they could to keep the ICE agent away from their pantry, which includes making up excuses, which are at times nonsensical. The way we've devised the piece is based off of an improv starter and made up dialogue on the spot, revised the dialogue, and then acted out the dialogue and add actions, and then revise and repeat.
On Monday we talked about the world’s different walls, such as Morocco and Melilla’s, China’s, Russia and Norway’s, and communities of Northern Ireland. We mainly talked about Morocco’s walls with Melilla, Spain. I think that the way Moroccan immigrants are treated on that border is horrible. The immigrants are shot at, cut by the blades on top of the fences, and some even drown while attempting to swim across the sea’s natural border. Most times if the immigrants manage to cross the fence, the soldiers unlock the border’s gate and force them through to Morocco’s side, their starting point, and then lock the gate again.
On Monday we played MacGyver and Announcer. I really enjoyed announcer because it was interesting to see how the announcers could completely change the situation, turning it i to either dark scenes or just funny scenes. Most of the time it was dark scenes. MacGyver was interesting because I got to see how some of my classmates problem solve. On Friday we played a game where everyone wrote 3 different ideas or sentences on different note cards which would then be put into a pile. 2 people would go up and act out a scenario, using the notecards as prompts. Most of the time it was arguments or fights.
I really liked the "I, You, We" game because of the scenarios that you could go with what the original situation was or change the direction of said situation. I also like it because you get to create a character by incorporating voice, job, animal, prop, and verb and act as said character. One thing I found difficult, though, is that it's difficult for me to make up things on the spot. Another game I liked was an instant character game where you're given a name, adjective, and job. From there you would create a character and part of a scenario. I disliked it for the same reasons I disliked "I, We, You," which is that I find it difficult to come up with things on the spot.
I really like to watch emotion party because it’s funny how different people portray the same emotion differently. We played stop, go, jump as a warm up to wake ourselves up and to be able to act out silly stuff in front of people. In quick change we payed attention to someone’s appearance and pointed out what changed about them after they left the room to change some aspects of their appearance. Conductor is similar to one word story, but with full sentences. I really liked this game because we came up with two very different outlandish stories. One of which was a chimpanzee named Ivan who had a horrible habit eating gumballs. I like slow motion emotion because I gain experience of acting out an emotion I don’t usually feel as well as identifying emotions. I think it’s very interesting how someone can create a totally different and unique story just based on a photo. For example, extracting ‘murder mystery at a dinner party’ from a photo from a prom. Last year in the theatre elective, we did a similar activity, but as a whole group, not two different groups. In real life scene, we acted out a scene that someone had experienced. The person telling us the story was our director. In my group we acted out a scene at a Wendy’s where a small teenager got mistaken for a kid and was given a kid’s cone instead of a single scoop cone, like he asked for. I find television channels interesting because some people act out a television channel without words, but you can guess what it is. I found the twin interview activity entertaining because my partner, or ‘twin,’ were mostly on the same page. We talked about eggs a lot. Also my ‘twin’ and I threw a boiled egg party.
On Monday our theatre group played Lemonade, One Word Story, Machine, Hitch Hiker, Park Bench, and Quack Diddly Oso. Lemonade was pretty interesting, one time the other group imitated a fan, something which I never would've guessed. When you play One Word Story, you start off with an idea of where the story could go and you just hope that it would go that way, but it never does. You learn a lot about the people of the group you're with. We ended up having a person decapitating a child and a different person sacrificing a leaf to herself. I'm very big on contact so Machine was a bit awkward for me. I liked Hitch Hiker. You could just make up an absurd story and sometimes the driver would go with it. I'm pretty good at annoying people, so Park Bench was fun. It was also amusing to watch other people play this game. I've never heard about Quack Diddly Oso before, so playing it was an experience.
On Thursday we played Status, Monster, and a game I can't remember the name of. Status was interesting because you had to act like different classes. You would walk, talk, laugh, etc., as a certain class. Like one word story, you have no idea where Monster could go when you play. At one point we were a monster that chomps and plays tennis with a dragon named Steve. We played a game that I can't remember the name of where one person lead the others in a motion and sound that everyone would copy. I'm not very creative so it was difficult for me to lead. |
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