Coriolanus P1

Recently, we have started on the creation of our next production; Coriolanus. The basic synopsis of this Shakespearean play is as follows. A great roman general (who's name escapes me) defends Rome from an invading army and manages to take their whole city, quite literally, single-handed. Because the city was called Coriolis his official title becomes Coriolanus. He is then put forward for something that would give him even more power, but to do so he would have to plead for the votes of the plebeians ( the commoners) whom he openly despises, for one reason or another. His friend and father figure, Meneus ( sorry, I am butchering these spellings) manages to convince him to go through with. Astonishingly, it actually works, the people backing him because of his recent triumphs. All is well and good, until at the ceremony, after being convinced to do so by two corrupt tribunes (fairly important people who's job is to make sure that the senate has the peoples best interests at heart), the people riot at the gates. Coriolanus is absolutely furious believing them to be traitors. He rants at them for a couple of minutes before being exiled for good. He spends a few nights sleeping rough and feeling sorry for himself, before hitting upon an idea. He presents himself before Auphidius, his arch-nemesis who he defeated when he took Coriolis, and offers up his services as a soldier. Auphidius is unsure at first, but is eventually very happy that such a mighty warrior is now on their side. They immediately start campaigning across Roman land, it not being long before they were at the gates of Rome itself. They lay siege, while inside Rome, the people take the tribunes and presumably kill them. Meneus goes to Coriolanus and demands to speak to him. He attempts to reason with him, but Coriolanus is now honor-bound to follow Auphidius. His family then speak to him, he ignores his wife and his son threatens to kill him when he grows up. But it is his mother who he has the strongest bond with, so she successfully makes peace. Coriolanus knows that when he returns to Auphidius he will be killed so he attempts to be humble. However,  it isn't really his thing, so when accused by Auphidius of being a traitor he goes very mad indeed before being set upon by a team of assassins. After their work is complete, Auphidius actually feels remorse for his actions, so agrees to give him the proper warriors burial he deserves.

To get started on this mammoth project, we had a whole day of drama with someone from Open Minds theater, who's name, I'm afraid, I've also forgotten. We did a lot of things centering around Shakespearean text mostly, including doing read through's of the text. We also practiced lifts and fight routines, which was about as much fun you can have outside of a roller-coaster. Me and Nikki worked through a whole routine including kicks, dives and elbows. The trick was to always find space and just move into it, although in a fairly aggressive and energetic way. We experimented with certain scenes, including a riot, and managed to choreograph them well. The riot scene mainly revolved around running and miming throwing, but it was done in a repeated way that, in my opinion really worked. I'm also particularly excited about the prospect of modernisng, not the langauge, but the way people act and dress. The rebels will be an amalgamation of infamous terrorist groups like the Al-Quaida and the IRA. I think we will also draw inspiration from the Riots across England a few years ago and the various rebellions and riots we have seen in the past couple years e.g. Syria, Libya, Ukraine.

All in all, I think the skills we learnt were the one's necessary in order to move forward with our act. It is never easy reading Shakespearean text and now I actually know what is meant by the words I know what kind of feeling is to be put into them. The fighting and the lifts are both integral to the performance we will be doing and thus are meant to be known by the class so anyone can play anyone. The day has made me very optimistic about the play and now I really look forward to be a part of it.

Trestle unfinished

Trestle theater is another workshop we did recently. It is mostly mask work, but our work on it was entirely mask work. The masks we were given were a multitude of emotions which we had to try and match. We were made to do bits of improvisation backed by music, before a scene at a wedding. This was helpful to distance ourselves from faces and focus on our physicality. We were then put into groups; mine consisted of myself, Luke, Zach, Lydia and Nikki. We were quick to decide our scenario, that of a late night in a bar. We assigned ourselves characters; me and Zach as two drunken mates, Luke as a barman, Nikki as a creep trying to hit on Lydia who was a girl on her own in the bar. We slowly choreographed a scene around these characters to the tune of  Chelsea Dagger. This came together until we had utilised both crosscutting and mime to make what was, in my mind, a effective performance

Brecht

A bit back now, we did about Brecht. Brecht is very different from everything we have done before. It is supposed to be thought about, rather than just taking everything as it comes and accepting it as it is. It is meant to challenge you, make you think about what's actually going on. It's meant to distance you from characters and focus you on what's actually going on. It means you have less of an opportunity to do plot holes, meaning you have to think harder about what you are doing. You have to focus on your ability to tell a story, rather than your characterization skills.

Me and Luke, who I was working with for this particular project, decided to use a genre which we had already modified to relative success; detectives. We set up a vague plot and the rest just kind of got invented along the way. I especially enjoyed the constant narration. I'm not sure why, but it appealed to me. We encountered some problems along the way, for instance we had some difficulties with having to keep one eye on the other pretty much all the time, so as to narrate the important things they did. This was dispensed with quite easily, as we found that if we get some choreographing we know whats going to happen before it actually happens.

Our end performance was quite good. I think we embodied what Brecht was saying rather well and got across something that would make an audience think. It was very interesting to be a part of this and would love to do Brecht at some time in the future.

My special CV

Drama things I've done, like.
Been in a couple panto's, lot of fun and learning experience
I've been to a couple drama clubs and whatnot
I've been in a couple of Derek and Enid's finest
Other than that, I'm not entirely sure why I bothered making this

Stanlavasvavsvavasvsski

In drama, over the past few lessons, we have been doing Mr. Stanislavsky, the first guy i'd kinda heard of. We did his objective thingymabob, which was interesting, to a certain extent. We watched a presentation, which talked about all sorts of things from his life to his teachings. How splendid. After we got these scripts we had to interpret which was rather fun. But then came the highlight, which was working with Luke and Alisha on a great performance. I played a kinda geek, who is trying to get his reluctant friend, Alisha, to play dungeons and dragons with his rather obnoxious friend Luke, who is trying to make Alisha leave to get me to himself. I feel flattered. In the end it was very entertaining to do and I hope it was entertaining to watch. We used our objectives well, mine being to make everyone happy, which was impossible to do. All in all Stanislavsky was very good to study because his teachings can make acting more believable.