Evaluation

Our opening was really strong and I felt as a group we adapted really well to the audience size and the movement of the L shapes to lock them all in. There wasn't too much fuss either times if something went wrong or not to plan in the formation of the L's, we all managed to play it out and keep the piece moving. This meant that our piece was off to positive start and I feel this really helped keep everyone going and motivated to follow the positive vibes through. One particular area I feel everyone improved on from rehearsal was staying in the moment - I felt that that every member of the cast in all three performances were completely committed to simply working in that moment. We had struggled with this in rehearsals as many people would come out of the moment or not commit enough energy into their actions but I felt it was apparent in the final shows as it ran so smoothly and seamless due to everyone being so dedicated.

One of the strongest aspects of our piece I feel is how we all kept up the energy throughout the entire performance. This is the first performance I have done this year that I feel the entire cast put their all in the entire show. This was also one of my personal strengths as I personally did not drop in energy in my performances in any of the 3 shows and was utterly exhausted once we finished - but, that's how I knew we did extremely good work. In particular I feel we carried out emotional riffing extremely well each time, no member of the cat falling flat. This was also apparent in the exercises in which we had to interact with different audience members; blowing on the hands and telling them our childhood stories. I feel that a large percentage of the cast completely committed and gave it their all to keep the piece alive and flowing as it definitely would've fallen flat if one member or so had not put as much effort in. I felt the points of interaction were extremely effective as we were able to completely involve and confront audience members, completely affecting them and engaging them into the piece directly. On a personal note, I was dreading these points in the piece due to the audiences reactions - however, I found that I was completely focused on being in the moment and getting my message across and that no matter how the different audience members reacted, I kept on track and fully committed to the piece and to the art I was creating.

One of the aspects I really liked Sarah's group was the use of multi-media. I feel it worked extremely well with the way they were experimenting with it and it provided a creative and unique experience for audience members to take part it. They completely plunged the audience into a world of darkness and sound to effectively send their messages across; it done in an almost humorous yet light hearted way, that left me as an audience member left feeling both touched and inspired. This contrasted vastly against Simon's piece which took a more direct approach to experimental theatre. Their use of scarves covering the faces was extremely interesting as it completely took the identity away from each actor, allowing them to simply be experimental bodies and actors in the moment. They combined movements and spoken word to create a world that left the audience both entertained and informed. I really liked the use of ensemble in both group pieces, every single person had something to carry out - no actor had a more prominent role than another. Without one member, the whole piece wouldn't work and would carry less effect therefore leave less impact. I thoroughly enjoyed both pieces and found it extremely interesting to observe how different every director approached the experimental term.

One of the weaker aspects of the performance was that we did tend to shift the action down stage so that the audience were only watching from one side. However, I did personally try to bring the action over to the other; for example in emotional riffing when everyone was in a huge clump on one side of the stage, I would deliberately try to pull it over to the opposite side. I didn't want any members of the audience left unaffected or uninterested due to not being able to see, so this was an attempt to keep them all engaged and involved. I feel I was partly successful in this as other people in our group did also follow over to the other side which meant we were able to bring some action over to where it was lacking, however, it also made it harder to follow the different changes in emotions throughout the emotional riffing making it more of a challenge to take part in and fully commit to.

I felt my group piece with Chem and Georgia went particularly well on all three occasions. All three of us put a lot of effort into making our piece come alive and making sure our message got across and I feel we achieved that successfully. One of the weaker aspects was when Chem lost his pen on multiple occasions, however, he managed to play it out by carrying on chanting as if that was just part of our plan. It didn't throw any of us off and kept our message going on a continuous loop. We also managed to successfully adapt to the lack of paper we had taken out to the actual performance - instead of writing each statement separately on one piece each, we worked it out so we repeated it on the same page then turned it over when we changed. Not only did this mean we used less paper and was slightly more environmentally friendly but it also showed how we were able to morph our ideas to fit the performance space and adapt to our problems effectively and efficiently so that the audience did not catch on. One of our strongest aspects was our use of vocals - our use of chanting the same thing over and over again was supposed to echo the mechanics of machinery and conforming to rules; I feel this was captured as we all managed to keep in time together, meaning no impact was lost due to mis-spoken words or out of time chanting. I also felt when we turned on the audience and spoke directly at them was particularly strong as we involved them directly into the piece rather than letting them simply spectate and view, we wanted them to confront their own lives and views about society and I feel that was achieved. If we had time to improve, I feel I would've liked to explore using different multi-media within our piece as we were originally going to use a projection displayed behind us, however, we felt it would have been too much hassle to sort out and adapted our piece to fit without it.

One of the biggest strengths of our piece was definitely the ending. By ending our piece using botoh and "chasing a rabbit", I feel we effectively used two completely contrasting exercises to display a really important message. Botoh is extremely calming and demands a lot of energy to produce the correct sound, it leaves me feeling free and disentangled from everything else going on - allowing me to completely focus on my breathing and producing the sounds. I also felt focusing on the idea that it was representing the atomic bombs dropped on Japan really allowed us as a cast, and myself personally, to carry it out as effectively and honestly as possible. Though its an extremely challenge task, I believe we were really able to portray the horror of that situation through an extremely subtle exercise, yet it was able to hold so much meaning behind every movement and sound that we made. Our botoh exercise contrasted really effectively with the franticness and desperation of the chasing rabbits exercise. We were really able to end the piece on the note of how desperate and worthless humans can cause others to be and feel like; how our impact on other's lives could cause them to completely transform into an animalistic state and mindset. We treat each other like animals, rather than equals. This was shown completely through both the displaying of the Japanese atomic bombs through the botoh as well as the complete dehumanization of people during the rabbit exercise. We were able to tie up our piece effectively and thought provokingly in such a way that, I felt, left the audience questioning society, our views and the human race on a whole.

Overall, I am so unbelievably happy how our piece turned out. It was so liberating and freeing to completely allow my body to experiment with different movements and techniques that I hadn't necessarily explored in great depth beforehand. I have thoroughly enjoyed this term and being able to completely let go and experiment in everything I did. I will definitely transfer the skills and knowledge I have gained throughout these last two months into my future acting development and career.

180 Push/Hold & Female Monologues

This exercise offers a lot of beginnings for development and improvisation. Though it's extremely straight forward, the different layers added throughout the exercise - turning 180, pushing/being pushed and push hold/being pushed and held - allows different details to be added and begin to develop narrative, much like we did in the development of the performance of how we gave it the context of being in a concentration camp.

The action of pushing each other, really helps present the brutality we as race inflict on one another. We are exactly the same. We are all humans, yet some treat others like dirt. I really like exploring this as I personally don't think it's confronted enough in great detail, only merely looked upon. It also feels extremely realistic that trapped in those camps would fall to that level of desperation to survive, it's one man for themselves. I feel the action of holding someone down as you push them to the floor, really explores how those at the top control their power and status. They hold and push down those below them right to the very bottom to make sure they maintain their position.

This exercise allows me as a performer to explore different aspects of human life I haven't necessarily touched on enough through acting and theatre - it also allows me to do it in a really experimental and liberating way that just lets me and my classmates just be bodies in the moment. When the whole class completely gives themselves over to the truth of the situation we are trying to present, this exercise and section of our show, can be extremely powerful.

When we turns the exercise on it's head and give the females the power, we explore not only female empowerment but also the stories of all the men locked in Guantanamo Bay. This is done in such a all-inclusive way that all the men's stories that the boys tell can all be presented through the simple 180 push/hold exercise. They were all pushed and remain held down. I find this really interesting as it shows how you can explore so many different stories and ideas and capture the right dept and meaning through one simple action and exercise instead of having to completely act out them all in great detail.

Now look, see how they're dreaming. 

The black rectories while the children dream, 

Don't go so deep in slumber, 

Where you'll shy, 

Know your wondering sleep, 

Don't you fly too far away. 

Oh look, your wings are broken. 

A wide blue sky is very near. 

Soon, soon, soon, soon, soon. 

Now sleep, close your eyes, 

and have no fear. 

A wide blue sky is very near. 

I feel this poem presents exactly the emotions and mood that we as performers should be trying to portray after the piling dead bodies section. It carries a sense of sympathy throughout the text through the delicate language, such as "shy" and "dreaming". But, I feel it is also laced with a darker, more sinister side. As we are exploring a harrowing situation, yet we carry it with such a sense of familiarity - we have seen so much death that it doesn't effect us anymore, I feel like a poem that gives off both a dark and a light sense fits it perfectly. This poem also dehumanises the people we are saying it to, "your wings" completely transforms them into animals rather than human, as well as touching on the point that the wings could possibly also portray their freedom/life (or lack of it). 

Group Piece with Georgia and Chem

We decided to use Cao Fei's "Whose Utopia?" as our stimulus point for our group piece. We want to explore the institution's system and how that effects us as a person - should we chose to follow the rules put in by those in charge to follow? or should we chose to follow our own decisions? We want to incorporate all three parts of the video, the mechanism from the first part, the expressive creativity in the second part and the statement from the last. By incorporating mechanical and in-sync actions, we are showing the rules and the system we fall into as members of this society - we are taught to conform.

We're going to show this through using paper and writing lines of "I will follow". We chose to use paper in our piece as paper is a root that creativity can grow from; paintings, stories, poetry and plays are all birthed from being written down and recorded, so we are contrasting that creativity with the systematic line writing. We are then going to confront the decision of choosing to not follow the rules and let the creativity flow - this is going to be shown through ripping up the paper and writing "I will not follow". This is to show a break in the system, the creativity behind the machines; echoing the second part in Cao Fei's video. Our aim is to move at the exact same time to truly echo the machinery in the first part by using in-sync movements.

Creating a Story From Images

 In a group of myself, Georgia and Chem, we chose 5 extremely different images and were given the task at creating a story from them. Instead of going down the route of looking at them in great detail and developing a story from perhaps the more creative aspects of each photo, we went with taking each photo as we first interpreted them and came up with quite a comical tale.

Starting with the first photo of the old woman, we paired her up with the second photo of the fox and decided that she was cunning and sly - like a fox. We decided to show this literally on the photo by cutting out two eye holes in the page - as if someone was going to use it as a disguise when the spied on someone. We then moved onto the third photo, the old man walking down the street and paired it with the photo of the dice. This was developed into the old man being the previous woman's husband who had recently obtained a gambling problem (shown through the dice) and she was spying on him as she believed he was having an affair (he was, but with their money). We then concluded it with the last photo of the different pairs of scissors which we crumpled and ripped the paper of to portray that when the woman found out, she finished their relationship and cut him out of her life. 

Though we took the exercise and developed it into a more comical and less intellectual light - it was really interesting to hear other group's stories and how they linked up their images. It was quite surprising what different things people took from all the images and how many offers 5 simple images can give you as a basis to start a piece. I really enjoyed this exercise and it was also a nice starting point to start creating in my group - who I'd be working with for our little piece during our actual show. Using images was a really interesting way to start creating and finding the beginning of the piece and I will definitely use it in development for future projects. 

Butoh

When I first saw the video of the man performing Butoh back in physical theatre I wasn't quite sure what to make of it. However, after adding the layers to the soup exercise and exploring the vocie combined with movements - it became a lot more clear to me. The sound rides the movement and the movement rides the sound - both need to be held at 100% commitment otherwise the dance would fall completely flat. 

Though there's a lot less of a range of movements performed during Butoh, I believe it's just as expressive if not more, than the soup exercise. Neither the movement nor the sound dictate one another; the sound rides on the movements and the movements ride on the sound. I feel this made the exercise easier and more accessible as I was able to think of the sound and movements as on, rather than trying to perform them separately but at the same time. By grouping the movements and sound together, it was easier to stop my mind from interrupting what my body was producing as I could look at them as one thing and easily remained focused on my breathing. It was really interesting to see what my body was capable of when I didn't let my thoughts interrupt and I felt surprisingly confident in what I was creating, rather than worrying about the things around me. I was able to completely switch off and simply be a body making sound and movement in that moment, I was able to let go of everything else crowding my thoughts and just feel were my body took me. Like the soup exercise, centralising and focusing on my breathing definitely helped me succeed at letting my body go and leaving my anxieties behind as I found it much easier to just feel the movements as I focused on my in and out breathes. 

 

As we all came together in the center of the room, we were able to develop a group piece on the spot without any comment or instruction. Simply by all doing the same exercise, but carrying it out uniquely, we were able to create a huge barrier of movement combined with sound. Even though we were all in a group carrying out the same exercise, everyone had an extremely individual experience. It was extremely powerful to be part of and I feel that if we had taken time on developing our movements and being bold with the sounds we made, we would've been able to create a really effective piece of experimental theatre. 

Soup

By completely isolating movement in the first step, it really requires to work and focus on your breathing. I found the more I stopped thinking about the movement in my hand and the more I focused on centering my breathing - the easier the exercise became. Though it's slightly harder when you bring the movements into the rest of your body, beginning at the gentle level of movement really helped me become more confident and less held back in my movements, I was able to completely move freely without thinking about what other's in the room were doing or what they may think.

Then developing the exercise into communicating with your partner one at a time makes the exercise slightly easier as you have something to respond - you don't have to simply rely on your body to make movements without starting with an offer. However, this is also harder as you're working with another person so you're more than likely to begin to think about the movements and let your mind over take. I found stopping moving for a second and focusing on centralising my breathing really aided me throughout the exercise as I was able to remind myself to let go and stop thinking - focusing on my breathing really helped the exercise become easier and more natural.  

Moving onto contact came generally quite easy to me after all the work we have been doing on contact improvisation in Physical Theatre, however, letting go in the movements is still quite a feat. Though it was only simple contact, still one at a time, it helps ease you into the full responding to each other's movements at the next stage. Maintaining eye contact with my partner, Chloe, really helped us build the connection that we worked and created offers from. The connection was really important as it helped make our movements flow more naturally and intertwine creativity - without it, the whole exercise would be in vain.

Naturally, I was quite nervous at simply letting my body make noise without adding any movements whilst my partner observed - however, it came easier than expected. After I got past the initial hesitation, I found letting my mind leave the noises I was making and simply let go, quite easy to achieve. Then, when both of us began working together in making noises, it was really easy to let loose and just begin to respond to one another. I was a lot more confident than I expected which I definitely feel wouldn't have been achieved if we hadn't have eased into the exercise gently at first.

At the last stage, combining both the movements and the sound was surprisingly freeing. I was able to completely let go and let my body move and make noises the way it wanted to, without letting my mind get involved. It was easy to centeralise my breathing and commit to the exercise. Letting the noise happen whilst moving felt extremely natural as I didn't have to hold back in what my body was producing, I didn't have to conform to the normalities of movement and making sound.

By the end of the exercise, I genuinely think I was a little bit closer at reaching complete and honest truth in my movements, I didn't need to prove anything to anyone. That exercise could have been done in any place and at any time as it completely detaches you from all sense of time and the outside world. You completely unify your emotions with your physicality whilst trusting completely in your body and your own capabilities. I really enjoyed looking at all the levels of this exercise and building it up bit by bit, it really highlighted the layers and details the human body is capable at achieve. I feel I will definitely be using it in both development of roles and my theatrical future.