Our performance as a group and as a class was, overall, excellent. We competed what we set out do do, presenting a range of political issues using Brechtian Technique and creating original responses to the text. The audience were encouraged at the end to write down something that they would do after being inspired by our piece, and the board was filled with some fantastic points. Overall, we set out to make the audience reconsider these things, and therefore we were successful.
One reason we were successful was because we kept in mind that this was political term. Our pieces did not necessarily align with our personal views, but we used our passion and commitment to our own political views; our own political awareness; to influence how we presented our pieces. This meant that all the pieces felt important, as if they were were issues that needed speaking about and could not be left ignored by those presenting it. This was vital as there were topics that of not handled correctly could have lost the audience's focus, leaving the next group to pick up the slack, which would not have been good ensemble work.
Another thing that led to success was the teamwork and ensemble ability form the he entire cast. This was very much an ensemble show, for most of the performance the performers are sitting and spectating. However, this did not mean hat we switched off, as this would have led to a lack of energy that would have sapped the life from the central performances. Instead, there was continued commitment and enjoyment of each other's work, leading to the audience feeling more open and relaxed, and ready to receive new information.
A third thing we did excellently was be open. This term, both in performance and in rehearsal, there was an atmosphere that felt as if we were far more comfortable sharing our personal views and accepting other's disagreements without disregarding their opinion. This led to an attitude in performance that it was far easier to take risks and experiment, be free to explore slightly different aspects of politics and character, as there would not be any judgement - we had a significant amount of trust in each other.
A final thing we did well that led to our success was using Brechtian techniques. All of our performances included Brechtian techniques of some sort: some were more obvious than others, but it was evident that everyone had made an effort to distance themselves from the naturalistic style we had studied last term in order to fully engage with this new style, adjusting accordingly and adding elements to this performance that would have been impossible in naturalism term.
One thing we could have improved on is the audience engagement. It became obvious at the start of our show that we all found t difficult to speak to the audience as if we were not here to entertain them, and this meant that some of the original energy was lost form our opening as there was not as stark a contrast between ourselves and our characters. It is vital to have this in a Brechtian show, as distancing is what transforms dramatic theatre into epic theatre, transforming the audience form just observers to spectators who can make their own decisions and become angry or enthused by what we are prestentinrbgg. If the audience sees the actor through the guise of the character, that connection is lost to a certain degree.
Another thing we could improve on is presenting a more objective point of view on our political subject. One of the important points that I grasped form our workshop lessons is that the audience should be the ones making up their mind this term, we should not be doing that for them. That is what makes them emotionally connected, havoc the chance to decide for themselves what is right or wrong, and if we interfere with that, we stand the risk of breaking that emotional connection that the audience has, so that they feel as if they are just being patronised with information they assume they already know.
Showing posts with label The Debating Chamber. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Debating Chamber. Show all posts
Lesson 6: The Debating Chamber Final Rehearsal
We began the lesson by choreographing an opening to our show. This was set to the song "Standing in the way of Contol" by Gossip and involved our class dressed as politicians and performing a high energy routine that demonstrated our approach to the topics being covered in the show. This was followed by a mock parliament scene on which we explained the course of events for the evening as well as mentioning some of the recent events that require pieces like this to be put on. It was interesting to analyse the opening as there were a number of Brechtian techniques used here that made this very different to our first term performance. We mixed with the audience at the beginning and chatted, making a clear difference between the character and the actor. We also went through little to no character development for the opening, instead using power and energy to convey emotion. Finally, our costume contrasted with our actions, further disassociating is from the characters and their political opinions, allowing the audience a more subjective view as to what it meant.
After staging the opening, we had a final chance to run through our pieces and gain some feedback from our peers and tutor. We added two new scenes, including a scene where the group offer me water repeatedly to show how there is a lack of respect for the victim in the text and and another where they hand be pieces of paper with information on capital punishment written on which I proceed to screw up and throw away to represent the grotesque nature of the people asking the victim to sign someone's life away. These went down well and were understood by our peers, who enjoyed taking the facts as they were thrown as it was an interactive way to give information without bombarding the audience. We learnt hat our piece was short enough for us to add some extra pieces, including a scene where we paraded the cast around tied to a rope as if they are being shown off before the slaughter. We also learnt that we needed to change the end slightly as t was not safe to tip a table on the surface we were performing on. We instead used a chair as it was easier to maneuvre.
After staging the opening, we had a final chance to run through our pieces and gain some feedback from our peers and tutor. We added two new scenes, including a scene where the group offer me water repeatedly to show how there is a lack of respect for the victim in the text and and another where they hand be pieces of paper with information on capital punishment written on which I proceed to screw up and throw away to represent the grotesque nature of the people asking the victim to sign someone's life away. These went down well and were understood by our peers, who enjoyed taking the facts as they were thrown as it was an interactive way to give information without bombarding the audience. We learnt hat our piece was short enough for us to add some extra pieces, including a scene where we paraded the cast around tied to a rope as if they are being shown off before the slaughter. We also learnt that we needed to change the end slightly as t was not safe to tip a table on the surface we were performing on. We instead used a chair as it was easier to maneuvre.
Lesson 5: The Debating Chamber Initial Rehearsals
At the end of Lesson 4, we were assigned our groups for the final political show, The Debating Chamber. We were each given an except form a playtext; in our case 'Hang' by Debbie Tucker Green; and were told that we were being commissioned to create a response to the text that was between 5 and 7 minutes long. Our theme wasn't capital punishment, so we decided that we would each take one of the forms of capital punishment mentioned in the extract to look at. I chose hanging.
At the beginning of Lesson 5, we split off into groups to work on our pieces. The first thing we did was brainstorm how we were going to present the text. We decided that we liked the text, it was well written, so we would keep most of it in the piece. However, in keeping with Brechtian themes, we decided to rearrange a lot of it in order to tell our own narrative while still using the stimulus. The extract begins with many an explanation of different forms of capital punishment, so we decided to make these into monologue and say them simultaneously. We also decided that we wanted at least part of the piece to include some symbolic physical work, as the act of putting someone to death is very physical, so we decided a short sequence in which I was tipped back as if in an electric chair, then flipped up into the shoulders of Kaimani, then stood on a table, ready to hang. This was important as it brought the identity of the victim into question, and, one of the main philosophical debates about this subject is how much does a criminal deserve to be treated this way, so much that they themselves become the victim.
We showed our ideas to our class in order to gain some valuable insight on what our peers thought was good and what could be improved. We got a positive response from this early devised piece, our peers said that they liked the physical aspect as it disconnected the speech from the action and made them think twice about what was being said. They also liked the way we had restructured the text so it was less clear which perspective I was talking from, and what my opinion on capital punishment is, which was a nod to the not-but moments from previous workshops. The main piece of criticism, similarly to many of the groups, is that the political agenda was not clear enough so we needed to incorporate this more into our performance. We combatted this by adding another section of text from another part of 'Hang' in which a letter is read out showing the criminal's remorse. This made it clear that we were highlighting the lack of black and white circumstances that are needed to justify taking someone's life for committing a crime
At the beginning of Lesson 5, we split off into groups to work on our pieces. The first thing we did was brainstorm how we were going to present the text. We decided that we liked the text, it was well written, so we would keep most of it in the piece. However, in keeping with Brechtian themes, we decided to rearrange a lot of it in order to tell our own narrative while still using the stimulus. The extract begins with many an explanation of different forms of capital punishment, so we decided to make these into monologue and say them simultaneously. We also decided that we wanted at least part of the piece to include some symbolic physical work, as the act of putting someone to death is very physical, so we decided a short sequence in which I was tipped back as if in an electric chair, then flipped up into the shoulders of Kaimani, then stood on a table, ready to hang. This was important as it brought the identity of the victim into question, and, one of the main philosophical debates about this subject is how much does a criminal deserve to be treated this way, so much that they themselves become the victim.
We showed our ideas to our class in order to gain some valuable insight on what our peers thought was good and what could be improved. We got a positive response from this early devised piece, our peers said that they liked the physical aspect as it disconnected the speech from the action and made them think twice about what was being said. They also liked the way we had restructured the text so it was less clear which perspective I was talking from, and what my opinion on capital punishment is, which was a nod to the not-but moments from previous workshops. The main piece of criticism, similarly to many of the groups, is that the political agenda was not clear enough so we needed to incorporate this more into our performance. We combatted this by adding another section of text from another part of 'Hang' in which a letter is read out showing the criminal's remorse. This made it clear that we were highlighting the lack of black and white circumstances that are needed to justify taking someone's life for committing a crime
Lesson 4: Final Protest Rehearsal and Evaluation
We rehearsed our protest in the few hours before we had to publically present them. We had decided after our initial run through that our piece would be most effective in the canteen, so we practiced setting it up in a similar space with similar environmental qualities, including a tables and benches. We then ran through each of our "moments", as this is what we had decided to do after our test run last week. My moment stayed the same as it had worked well in the test, but we came up with more distinct ones for others, including a moment that demonstrated the effects of autism and a moment where a prisoner passes on information via drawings. This was effective in the protest as the multimedia meant that the audience continued to be engaged.
We also worked with our props and costume for the first time. We all had white overalls on to symbolise prison jumpsuits, and we wrote information about our illnesses on them to passively convey more statistics to the audience. If we did this again, I would have waited to put the overalls on as they got slightly damaged before the beginning of the protest.
Our protest went well because we engaged the audience constantly, both shocking them with bold spots that left them wanting to continue watching as well as giving them information meaning they had learnt something. This relates back to our first lesson when we discussed what theatre's purpose was, so because we were successful in doing this we can be sure that we created an innovative, exciting and important performance. We were well rehearsed, so everything ran smoothly, allowing us to play and bring some of the original plan to improvise back on the day. We also were well prepared in terms of knowledge, which is vital when touching on subjects such as this as it is easy to offend people without proper knowledge.
If I was to redo this protest, I would not change much, but one thing that I would change was the involvement with other prisoners, as often it felt quite isolated, that we were not engaged with each other so the group aspect did not seem as important. I would also make an effort to make time for audience interaction, as the brief spells that there were during the piece were some of the most truthful acting moments, as well as the most harrowing for the audience
We also worked with our props and costume for the first time. We all had white overalls on to symbolise prison jumpsuits, and we wrote information about our illnesses on them to passively convey more statistics to the audience. If we did this again, I would have waited to put the overalls on as they got slightly damaged before the beginning of the protest.
Our protest went well because we engaged the audience constantly, both shocking them with bold spots that left them wanting to continue watching as well as giving them information meaning they had learnt something. This relates back to our first lesson when we discussed what theatre's purpose was, so because we were successful in doing this we can be sure that we created an innovative, exciting and important performance. We were well rehearsed, so everything ran smoothly, allowing us to play and bring some of the original plan to improvise back on the day. We also were well prepared in terms of knowledge, which is vital when touching on subjects such as this as it is easy to offend people without proper knowledge.
If I was to redo this protest, I would not change much, but one thing that I would change was the involvement with other prisoners, as often it felt quite isolated, that we were not engaged with each other so the group aspect did not seem as important. I would also make an effort to make time for audience interaction, as the brief spells that there were during the piece were some of the most truthful acting moments, as well as the most harrowing for the audience
Lesson 3: Brechtian Technique continued
This lesson we continued to develop Brechtian technique. We began by exploring the idea of Spaß, or 'Fun'. We did this by doing an exercise called 'Servants and Snobs' where we were assigned the role of "servant" or "snob". The servants had to go about their daily lives, while also making sure to attend to the snobs. the snobs could decide when they liked that they needed to sit down, which they announced with a yawn. They then go to sit, and the servants must catch them. The most playful part of this exercise was the creation of characters and the difference in levels between the snobs and the servants. It taught us more about the use of stereotype to convey clear character, and that, much like in last term's Stanislavsky style, playfulness can sometimes be the best way to create interesting new scenes.
We took this idea of Snobs and Servants further when exploring gestus. Gestus is a technique that shows the audience a side of a character's personality in a way that is easy to absorb and understand. We split into pairs, and our tutor gave us various scenarios that we had to freeze in and find a way to show the power struggle. We ended with the rich versus the poor, and there was an obvious use of different levels throughout the room, which was interesting.
We then got into groups and explored a third Brechtian technique - the "not but" moment. This is a breakdown of a text or scene that shows a different course of events by exposing a new perspective on the scene. To test this, we used a part of Brecht's 'Caucasian Chalk Circle' and played the opening scene twice, first as it was depicted in the play and then afterwards from a perspective that allowed us to see the mother's moral dilemma regarding her lost child. This allowed the audience to empathise more with the supposed antagonist, distancing the audience and causing them to spectate instead of watch.
We then put all of this into practice as we toyed with a scene from 'Mother Courage'. The text was irrelevant but the story of the scene had to still come across the same. We used Spaß is my group as we had songs throughout the scene, and they followed the genre/tune of songs from the present day. This is also V-Effekt as it pulls the audience out of the setting and makes them compare to present day.
Lesson 2: Initial Protest Rehearsals and Brechtian technique
This lesson we formed our groups for our performance protests and began working on some initial ideas. After discussing what we felt were current topics and what could be protested against successfully, we settled on the maltreatment of mentally ill prisoners.
We came up with a narrative and assigned ourselves characters. Each of us were decided on a mental illness that we would do some research into, meaning we would have a wide range of mental illness being covered. Benji decided that he would play the guard, so instead he did research into the lack of experience and training for the guards relating to mental illness in particular. I decided to research anorexia and bulimia in prisons, as it is a topic close to my heart and I felt I could become impassioned during a performance related to this, while also being able to find sufficient information.
Our structure was originally a lot less rigid, we were going to focus on character development and then let a scene develop through improvisation with a few key rehearsed moments. One of these key moments was the opening, in which we all lined up to receive medication, and it is discovered there is not enough to treat everyone. Another key moment was when I became aggressive towards Benji and he gets violent, hitting my head against the table. We did not rehearse any more than this in the first lesson.
After this, we performed our initial protest ideas to each half of the year to get feedback and to test our ideas. From this, we discovered that far more people were engaged to our rehearsed scenes, as they were bold and eye catching as opposed to nuanced work that requires attention, which is something our improvised work leant more towards. In an environment like this, where a lot of information has to be portrayed quickly and in a short space of time due to a short attention span from the audience, it is more beneficial to use more rehearsed movement as it is more likely to hold the audience’s attention.
Brechtian Technique
In the afternoon, we worked as an entire year group to start to play with some Brechtian techniques.
The first exercise we explored was Verfremdungseffekt, Which is the idea of defamilarisation or alienation from a character - it means strange-making.
We explored this by walking around the room and then getting into groups of a certain number when told, creating an inanimate object from our bodies. When we finished, we were then told an emotion and had to somehow distort our creation so that the object projected that emotion. This disassociates the surroundings from the idea that they have to be just that - the surroundings. It is possible to take anything in a Brechtian play and present it with life, distancing it form its original or real-life purpose.
In the second part of the lesson, we continued to walk the room and were given simple adjustments to our body stance, be that by leading with a certain body part or repositioning ourselves to walk in a particular way. What was important was that they were only physical instructions, making it so any character decisions were entirely created by the performer and what the new body positions mean to them in terms of character. This led to the formation of stereotype and very caricature-like personalities, something much associated with Brecht's style. This exercise was useful as it taught us the importance of bold, lucid characters in Brechtian acting, as there is often fast pace changing of character's in Brecht so it is vital that there is a clear distinction between different personalities.
Lesson 1: Epic Theatre and Theatrical Philosophy
We began lesson one by discussing in groups why theatre exists and what is it’s function. My group took a piece of paper and created a mind map, contributing all the reasons we believe theatre exists for. Some of our points were that it exists to give audiences a chance to spectate different lives; that it allows artists a chance to spread new ideas ad thoughts in an easy to digest format; and to explore the bounds of the human body and what is capable to portray and become. There were common threads running throughout all the conversations in the room: that some of theatre’s main purposes are to teach and to entertain
We then had an entire group discussion on whether or not these two things are possible simultaneously or if there was instead a double pronged approach to creating interesting theatre. I personally think that there is no way of entertaining without teaching, as an audience has come to a theatre with an open mind, expecting to see something new. After all, if an audience learns nothing, what is it to say that the piece of theatre is in any way innovative; could it be the same as every other piece of drama that they have seen previously? At the same time, an audience will learn nothing if they are not engaged by the piece, so it is equally important to make a piece of theatre entertaining in order to open the audience up and make them susceptible to the message of the play.
Our next task, this time in our smaller groups again, was to create a piece of theatre based on a news article we found. We were then given a sheet detailing the differences between dramatic theatre, the style we have previously studied, and epic theatre, the style Brecht was fond of and the one we were beginning to study this term. We were then challenged to create a piece based on the article, first in a more dramatic style, then using epic theatre. Our group decided to use an article based on government cuts leading to a lack of medicine in wards, pictured left.
For our Epic performance, we adapted our piece so that instead of speaking, we used the sound of heart monitors to express the tensions that our voices would normally make clear.
Brecht Fact File
Bertolt Brecht was born in Augsberg, Germany in 1898; part of a middle class family in a small farming town at the turn of the century. Brecht was not a typical bourgeois German citizen, however, and his political attitudes were revolutionary even at a young age.
When Brecht was my age, World War One began. Brecht did not believe in war, holding many pacifistic views, but was eventually conscripted into the army in 1916, where he served as a medical orderly - this was what he had been training toward in his education at home, studying medicine at university. While serving, he witnessed awful injuries while having to attend to the horrors of military injuries. This led to him reevaluating what was most important to him politically and ethically, as he continued to let pacifism lead much of his creative and political work.
In 1924, Brecht moved to Berlin, where he wrote a number of plays. He was influenced by a major theatre maker of the time, Erwin Piscastor, and the two collaborated on many projects
Brecht lived through the rise of Fascism and the Nazi regime in Germany from 1933 to 1945. He fled Germany to Austria in February 1933 and was officially exiled soon after due to his left wing views. He then travelled the world to create new theatre, including a visit to the USA.
He returned to Berlin in 1948, putting on his play ‘Mother Courage’ and creating a new theatre company, ‘The Berliner Ensemble’, which toured Europe.
Brecht died in 1956, having shaped the world of theatre through his combination of a seldom expressed communist political view with a dynamic and innovative approach to devising and directing new works.
Fact File
In addition to our own research, we pooled our knowledge in lesson 2, assembling a quick-read fact file
Bertolt Brecht
* German practitioner
* Born 1898 died 1956
* Lived through both World Wars and Nazi Germany
* Worked as a medical orderly in the First World War
* Saw horrifying war injuries at a young age
* Exiled from Nazi Germany in 1933
* Travelled the world and observed the Second World War, visiting America and Scandinavia
* Studied drama at Munich university
* Acknowledged the artificiality of theatre
* Inspired by Charlie Chaplin the silent film star
* Was a poet, playwright and director
* Called in front of the Un-American Activity Committee to investigate his "communist like" activity
Exercises
* Verfremdungeffekt -Strangemaking/distancing/defamiliarisation/alienation
* Simple character creation
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