#for context i had to turn the lights off to reduce electrical noise during an experiment

[squeakadeeks]

Have you done the family guy death pose irl yet?

no but ive done this

[meshamariawright-blog]

Week Two

3rd May We discussed further ideas for our performance in this rehearsal as we all bought in different ideas and tasks to accompany them.

I decided to look into urban myths/conspiracy theories and despite seeing a number of bizarre stories, I focused on one which was that Elvis Presley isn’t dead. I found and watched a documentary on this and I questioned why it is that people would believe such a thing. It bought me to discover the use of social media, which plays a big part in a lot of these stories. I found a Facebook group in favour of Elvis Presley still being alive, the page had 21,212 likes which to me is a vast amount.

I continued to look at the world of Facebook and Twitter and noticed the way people ask for likes and retweets in order to get something, for example; ‘if I get 2 million likes my wife said we can get a puppy’. Therefore for my task I decided that I wanted everybody to pitch an improvised monologue asking us to share/retweet their story/challenge. My reason for this being that I wanted us to explore the social media based age that we live in. I also shared a poem with the class which gave my opinion on this subject. I think that looking into technology and the way in which we get caught in it within today’s society could be an interesting aspect to explore because its suitable to our generation and we all have experience with it.

I really enjoyed Beth’s idea. She was looking at a similar thing to me in the respect that we both focused on things relevant to our generation. She had taken inspiration from ridiculous fads and crazes that people get caught up in, such as taking a vodka shot in your eye to get drunk faster. She had written a poem which I loved, it had a really gritty approach and our of all of the ideas I had heard I liked where this one was going the most.

I also liked the exercise Angela led which was exploring The Little Mermaid story, she took us on a journey from land to sea, imagining that when we were on land we had spikes underneath our feet. I found that from imagining this, it created a movement which could be applied to being in a drugged/drunk state.  I thought this could be integrated into character development if we went for an idea like Beth’s.  

Later in the rehearsal after working on everybody’s mini-tasks, we all seemed to enjoy the feel of Beth’s idea- a gritty, teenage piece. We ended up deciding that the piece could potentially be set within the context of a house party, again this being relatable for most of us.

I feel excited to be working upon this idea, I think that the gig-theatre style we have opted for compliments the idea for the content. I feel the piece could be extremely fun to work upon and I am looking forward to immersing myself in it more.

4th May Within the rehearsal we began to experiment the musical aspect of show. We all bought in a selection of songs- whether we liked them or not. The task was to distinguish what stood out from the music. This was a useful task as it allowed us to all think musically and as somebody who is not particularly musical, this exercise allowed me to become critical about music, discovering my likes and dislikes. Something that stood out particularly was my hate for computerised music, however I am not sure this will be an issue with our performance. Although the task did reiterate that I would love to use as much live music as possible. We furthered this exercise by finding a variety of objects from around the rehearsal room and we then toyed with noises each object could make, alternating the rhythm and pace of which we did so. I used a bottle of Coke which I had in my bag. I experimented with shaking it and allowing it to make a fizzing sound by opening and closing the lid. Whilst this made a fun, interesting sound to start with, the drink quickly became flat and its noise reduced. Therefore, I sourced some paper which I tore in intervals to add to the soundscape. I really invested myself into this experiment and despite the soundscape not working at first, we tried to orchestrate it more so which I felt helped to create a more unified sounding piece. I really enjoyed this experimentation and I feel that if we discover the appropriate materials this kind of soundscape could play a part within our performance.

Some of the group felt that the use of our voices would benefit the performance and for that reason we worked upon creating a soundscape with our voices and by using body percussion. Again, I really enjoyed the exploration of this and I definitely believe that it has a place within our performance, especially as we are a group who predominately are not musicians.  

We also spend the rehearsal time writing fifty-one things about our character which helps with creating a better sense of this. We then went on from this to write a monologue about getting ready for a party. At first this was a challenge, however I managed to get into the task and found that I quite enjoyed it. After reading our monologues aloud to the group we were given a range of songs from varying genres to underscore the text. I really enjoyed performing with a musical underscore and I am excited to explore this further within the project. It did come with difficulty however as some of the songs were difficult to perform to. Although, surprisingly my text seemed to work well when accompanied by the Indiana Jones theme tune; I think it was more of a comedic effect however. When at the NSDF and partaking in a workshop in gig theatre, the workshop leaders explained that using a known song to underscore the text at first worked for them as a way into deciding what kind of song needs to be created for the text. In some of the texts workshopped today, it seemed that a rap or grime song may be best to accompany them which was an interesting discovery. I feel that this rehearsal was a success and I really enjoyed the experimentation, not only with the music but also with the scriptwriting aspect. I am looking forwards to continue working in this productive, experiential style.

5th May Following on from the previous rehearsal we had agreed we needed to source as many instruments as possible for the performance and we therefore started by bringing in any instruments that we had at home. Unfortunately, I do not have any instruments at my student flat however, it appears that we have access to a keyboard, guitar- bass and acoustic, violin and a ukulele. The next step is using these instruments to create interesting music. I feel this will be a challenge for me seen as I’m not a musician, however it is one I’m ready and particularly excited for.

The rehearsal started by experimenting with an exercise led by Hayden which looked at us being a vault of electricity. We were asked to move as the vault would, taking into consideration factors such as how the fault would move through a tube, how it would be when meeting a dead end and when the vault fizzled out. When undergoing this exercise I struggled to get anything from it but upon reflection was when I found the task most useful. I noticed that the way in which I moved as a vault was differed to how others moved, there was no right or wrong way but the differing approaches were an interesting discovery. I feel that these movements could be worked upon and perhaps used within the piece, especially if we are looking at the use of substances at the house party. This is a very similar outcome to one that I had discovered previously in an exercise led by Angela at the beginning of the process. Again, the differing ways of moving can be applied to being drunk/high as one’s movement from being in these states varies from person to person.

This exercise also helped to energise me, I feel that the active nature of it allowed me to be alert and focused which was great, going forward with warm ups I would benefit from having a more physical element to my warm up, therefore I will raise this with Tom.

We were set a writing task by Beth and we were all given objectives for the piece of writing; mine was that I was at a party trying to find my boyfriend (as below). I found that having an objective was useful as it gave me an aim for writing and sense of purpose for my text. With future writing tasks, I feel that an objective is helpful for me to factor in as it allows me to be concise and it gives me a clear focus point.

“The room is full of smoke and sweat, You can't see fuck all through the mess. Then just when I thought I saw his face, The lights went off and darknesses came to play. The wifis not working, I've got no signal, This party really is a fucking shambles. Just wana go home and eat McDonald's. Got to scroll through insta to see if my selfie is banging, Less than 50 likes and I'll do myself in.”

We were toying with ideas for what the major turning point could be within our piece. We thought of perhaps having an arrest at the party. Therefore, we all took five minutes to think about why our character could get arrested. For my character, I decided that the arrest could be for possession and or selling of illegal substances. I also had discussed the idea of unknowingly having a sexual relationship with somebody underage. Often, I feel that this kind of story would be pinned on a male, however this kind of thing could happen to either sex. Looking at reasons for arrest was a good starting point, however we now need to make some decision or play around with this idea more so in order to see if it’s interesting and if it works.

During this rehearsal, we were still struggling to find a theme which would help us to narrow our ideas down. We seemed to have many ideas and knowledge of the style and how we wanted to approach the piece, however there was no definite plot that we could decide upon. Hayden and myself were scheduled for a phone call with Alice in the afternoon of the rehearsal which was very beneficial and helpful with regards to the plot for the performance.

Many ideas were discussed over the phone, however the reoccurring theme seemed to be the use of technology. Hayden had the idea of using phone lights from the audience within the piece to create ‘gig theatre by phone light’ which seemed to tie in with looking at the theme of technology nicely. Alice encouraged us to think about our audience and to see how we could interact with them more so. This was of importance as the audience in relation to our action was something that we had not considered too carefully up until this point. With regards to audience interaction, I felt that using technology within the piece could be a way to do this. For example, a laptop synced to a projector could be used to access members of the audience’s social media pages and then from this could come an improvisation around the information on their page. The accessibility of such vast information is worrying but it is also interesting to me because within the given context as it gives scope to be able to connect with the audience and not only in a humorous, light hearted fashion but there is also the ability to illuminate the ease of which it takes to explore such personal information.

Once we had spoken to Alice we went back into the rehearsal room and discussed ideas that arose from the conversation. Upon reflection, I feel that this was not the wisest move as it disrupted the rehearsal and we spent the remaining rehearsal mulling over the ideas discussed. Not everybody seemed too keen on the technology strand that we had discovered, nor the audience participation aspect. I feel that we spent far too long discussing the ideas that were illustrated from the phone call and instead we should have continued with the rehearsal as it was and then looked at ways to explore the ideas over the weekend so that we could come in to the next rehearsal with a focus. Whilst we initially thought that feeding back to the class was the best idea regarding the phone call, it is with hindsight that I realise not everything needs to be shared; perhaps we should have picked specific areas to talk about with the group. I have also learnt that some things are best when discussed outside of the rehearsal room in order to maximise the use of rehearsal time.