Blondie Evaluation!

Something i forgot to say was that is was very helpful to us as actors because it was a new way of performing and we relied on ourselves for character portrayal not on costume or anything else. Also as a group and as a performance we did push things to the limit of stereotypes and this is why political and Brechtian theatre go so well together. We push the stereotypes to the limit so that it was funny but at the same time almost very rude and racist and Brecht would have loved it.

Political Protest Evaluation

Rehearsal Feedback Video!

This is just a video of me talking about all the rehearsals we have had and the progress we have made but nothing that specific as i am saving the rest of the juicy info for my Blondie evaluation!

Political Protest

For our political protest our group have decided to do anti torture in prisons. For our protest we are going to have two prison guards, and two prisoners wearing orange jumpsuits. The fifth person in our group will stand and shout out facts to the audience and get their attention as there will be many other protest in the near area going on. Our two prisoners will be beaten up in chairs (stage fighting), have their heads dunked in cold water (slightly warm water), be humiliated and put into solitary confinement while the two prison guards and the fifth person repeatedly sing the Barney song and scare the prisoners.

Imagine this song being played for 24 hours!!

This is the other song we are using and changing the lyrics of for our Blondie performance...
The changes lyrics are:

Intro:

Nahhh nana nahhh nanana nahhh nana nahh nana nahhhhh na na nahhhhh    x2

Corus:

Here comes the prime minster, (murderer)

She’s a terrorist gangster, (murderer)                   

Move over Mr President, (murderer)

But never mind thaaat, (murderer)

First verse:

There’ll be gen-no-cide

If Britain mul-ti-plys

New born babies hear the fat lady sing

I know what you don’t know

Cause of the lies I’ve told

Then before you know (oh –ho) ba ba bang bang

Corus:

Here comes the prime minster, (murderer)

She’s a terrorist gangster, (murderer)    

Move over mr president, (murderer)

But never mind thaaat, (murderer)

Verse 2:                      

Brunette’s soo or-da-nary

Sexy like strawberries

My looks will get me voted all of the timeeee

Flick my hair and move on (did you see)

Pout my lips then I’m gone (did your see)

Like I never did wrong, but its, … cause your blindd

Corus

Outro: (same as intro Na na nahh)

Blondie - Call me (Vote Me)

This is one of two songs that we changes the lyrics to and sing in out performance.

Does Beauty = Power?

Something my absent mind forgot to talk about in the video is celebrity's. In modern day life, celeb life is what many people follow in mags like Hello and in the newspaper. When it comes to being a celebrity does beauty = power? Well yes in most cases it does, how can anybody hope to be a what we now a call a celebrity if they look like a cabbage? In the celebrity world everything is about 'What are you wearing?' and other such questions, the most important thing about being a celebrity now days is your image and how you look. The only exception i can think of is Susan Boil... and the thing is, now she is very well know and famous, but she is not in Hello magazine because she is not beautiful on the outside. So yes in the celebrity world beauty does generally = power/fame.  

Dramatic VS Epic Theatre

Dramatic Theatre	Epic Theatre
Plot	Narrative
Implicates the spectator in a stage situation	Turns the spectator into an observer
Wears down his capacity for action	Aarouses his capacity fo action
Provides him with sensations	Forces him to take decisions
Experience	Picture of the world
The spectator is involved in something	He is made to face something
Suggestion	Argument
Instinctive feelings are preserved	Brought to the point of recognition
The spectator is in the thick of it, shares the experience	The spectator stands outside, studies
The human being is taken for granted	The human being is the object of the enquiry
He is unalterable	He is alterable and able to alter
Eyes on the Finnish	Eyes on the course
One scene makes another	Each scene for itself
Growth	Montage
Linear development	In curves
Evolutionary determinism	Jumps
Man as a fixed point	Man as a process
Thought determines being	Social being determines thought
Feeling	Reason

Why does Brechtian and Political Theatre go Hand in Hand so Successfully??

VERFREMDUNGSEFFEKT

The Verfremdungseffekt is a German word that translates into: Effect of making strange. Duhhh. 

An exercise we did to understand the Verfremdungseffekt was to get into pairs and create a naturalistic scene with dialogue that had some form of deep emotion in it for example: Harrison and I were two small children playing but then he tells me his mum is ill with cancer and I don't understand what that is but he tells me its bad, really bad and I hold his hand. Then when you have got your scene and can perform it, share it with the rest of the class one pair at a time and then get feedback about how they felt watching it. The feedback that was generally given was things along the lines of 'that was really powerful' or that was really sad'. The next step of this exercise is to take the scene you have created and pick the section of it that has the climax, once you have done this rehearse the scene a few times so you know the stage directions very well. Finally when you are sure of your stage directions, when performing your scene speak the stage directions out loud while still doing the dialogue, what this does it it makes it strange, unnatural and it reminds the audience that it is a performance and keeps them from becoming to connected and you becoming your character. This exercise is very good and extremely helpful when learning or teaching the Verfremdungseffekt. As an actor the hardest part of learning the V effect was being able to perform in the style of Brecht and make it look good. I believe the easiest part of learning the V effect and the Brechtian style was representing a character in an extreme and stereotypical way rather than becoming the character completely. 

Is All Theatre political??

Isn't All Theatre Political???

Gesture + Attitude = Gestus

Gestus

Gesture + Attitude = Gestus 

So we understood 'Gestus' in the way Brecht would use it we did the following tasks.

Task 1:  Everybody gets into a pair and labels themselves A and B. A's then go to one end of the room and B's go to the opposite side standing opposite their partner. Next all the A's have to think of a nursery rhyme they can say and to all at the same time try and shout it to their partner and for the partner to here it. when everybody was shouting at the same time from one side it was very difficult to understand what your partner was saying. The next step of the task was to not shout the words of the nursery rhyme but to do gestures to act out the song as if they were in a crowded party and your mate cant hear you at all. This time is some ways it was clearer but in others it was difficult to understand when your partner was gesturing 'baaaa baaa black' from Ba Ba Black Sheep. The final stage of the exercise was to not only shout but to gesture at the same time. This out of all the stages was the easiest to understand. The lesson we learnt from this was that in Brecht gesture and over the top acting is important. I found this exercise fun and helpful as it helpfully explained one of Brechts acting styles in the form of a game.

Task 2: Task 2 was about discovering 'Gestus' but also looking at stereotypes. This was also a paired exercise so to start everybody was to get into pairs. Once in pairs the leader (Saz) would say two things that would go together, for example Romeo and Juliet, Cat and Mouse, Sweet and Sour, War and Peace and Rich and Poor. What we discovered was that in all of the pairs still images the gestures were large, obvious and the stereotypical representation of the two things. It was not just gesture though it was also in facial expressions and attitude. When the words rich and poor were called out a strange thing happened indeed; everybody did the same or very similar still image... but why? All of the rich people would have there faces looking with pompous arrogance towards the poor who were all on the floor or lower level, hunched over and sad looking. What we learnt from this was that in Brechtian theatre everything is played to the stereotype and in some ways overacted. What we learnt about 'Gestus' was that with large and stereotypical gestures and attitude it is very easy to represent a character in a Brechtian way. 

Task 3: In Task 3 an actor (Paris) was told to walk into the room as a soldier and then out again and for the rest of the audience to just watch what he does. What we noticed is by playing the stereotype of a soldier he used gestures and movements that a stereotypical British officer might make. Apart from this he also had the attitude and stature of a British officer. This demonstrated 'Gestus' because to create the character the actor had to use both the attitude and gestures of a British officer. The next part of the task was the same as the first but this time the soldier has to walk through a field with seven dead bodies in it (seven dead actors). When this was done the attitude and gestures of the soldier changed to make it more clear who he is, what side he is on and if he cares about the dead. 

Task 4: Task 4 was a group exercise. The class splits into two groups/teams and one group goes on one side of the room and the other group on the other side. Each group had to create two contrasting still images; the first, 'War the maker of heroes' and the second 'War the taker of lives'.Both these contrasting image were Gestic because the gesture and attitude were the only two things showing you what was going on and when the image changed s did the gesture and attitude.

In conclusion i felt that all of the above tasks were very helpful and fun when learning about Gestus.

First Impressions

First Impressions

When in our first lesson of the term we were introduced to Brecht i was excited about the term ahead. I thought as a style of acting Brecht would be very simplistic and fairly easy but in fact as the lesson progressed i discovered that Brechts teachings offer us as actors an opportunity not to just 'become' a character but to 'represent' one.  

Because in the last term we had studied Stanislavsky and naturalistic acting, this made my first impression of Brecht different to how it might have previously been is we had not done Stanislavsky. The reason for this is that when looking at brecht for the first time it is very different to any serious acting most people have ever done as in some ways it feels like we are back in primary school in drama. 

In the first lesson when we did some of the exercises to help us understand the verfremdungseffekt, exaggeration, narrative and 'gestus' my impressions were of a form of theatre that was going to be really fun and over the top but at the same time we understood that it would be to get a across a serious and political message.