Stage Geography

Below is a diagram showing the stage geography at a typical theater. There are several parts to the stage. It is divided into upstage, centerstage and downstage. The names for the areas are self explanatory. The audience sits in front of the stage to view the ongoing performance while the actors perform on one of the mentioned areas.

Narration

What is Narration?

Narration is the commentary describing and following the events happening in a story for the audience to understand better.

How was the narration used in our scene?

In our group we are planning to perform a play about a family of refugees that were forced to flee their home that has become a war-zone and are being escorted by a foreign military to safety. Our story starts with the narrator, who is also acting out the role of a confused child, writing down the events happening to him in a diary while walking behind his parents. We can hear him reading "the war has begun 4 days ago and we were forced to make a journey with my parents to the rescue plane". He continues to narrate the events that happen after the group of refugees reach the plane shortly after, goes on to describe how the family feels and how it is on the plane until he closes his diary.

What effect did you want the narration to have on your audience?

We wanted to make it seem like the kid walking in the desert really is the narrator but grown up now and the performance is of his memories. The story and the voice accompanying it is a flashback the kid is having as he reads what he wrote down on that day when he was journeying away from the war-zone.

How did the narration work in your performance? Was it successful?

The narrator in our group was Moody, who was also portraying the child nagging behind the refugee group. The kid was behind because he was busy writing down the events that forced him to flee his home, which he reads out to make the scene feel like a flashback. Moody pretended to scribble in his big notebook while trailing towards the rescue plane with his family. It was successful and we managed to make creative use of narration in our performance.

Video of Performance

Cross-Cutting

What is cross-cutting?

A technique used on stage where actors act out different scenes in a story that are going on at the same time but in different places.

Moment from the scene:

Our short play was about a bully trying to cover up the fact that he is bullying and and a victim of the bully. The bully comes into his dad's room with his friend (who is also a bully) while the victim is sat curled in a ball in front of a mirror at home, crying. The bully pretends that he is a victim and he only bullies because his classmates bully him. In the moment before the cross-cut, the friend of the bully whispers to him, "aren't we just doing this for fun?". Then hear see the victim asking herself, "do they really think it's fun and games?" which suggests that she is taking this as a very serious matter. We can see that the bully does not fully realise how much he is hurting his victim but does know there is a consequence and tries to deceive his way out of the situation. We used different levels when the audience could see the victim sat in a ball, representing how small and powerless she feels against the size of the bully and his friend who is standing full height on the other side of the room. 

Improvements

What we could have done better in our scene is creating a clear scene so the audience knows exactly what is going on in the play. The fact that the bully was telling his dad that he was being bullied and the victim not projecting her voice enough, there was confusion as to who was who in the play. It is understandable that the victim would be whispering into the mirror but the audience needs to know what is going on through her head. The bully wasn't able to be audible enough for everyone to hear and his crying was quite unrealistic. My group didn't have a clear script in mind and we improvised some parts. We could have made use of the skill of projection that practiced through vocal exercises in the past lessons.

Thought Tracking - Plane Crash

During this task, the class was to split into groups consisting of 4 people to act out the thought processes of assigned characters and their reactions to the Malaysian airline plane crash. The following is the rough script of what each member of my group had to say:

Journalist (Gabor): Oh yes, this is going to make for a great story! What a find! The boss will probably even give me a raise for this! But... The story is quite saddening.
Pilot's family member (Omar): I absolutely do not believe he could have done what they accuse him of! He isn't like that...
Search team members (Kalani and Ulan): We will search day and night to find the missing flight, however we are the top search team around and there is so much pressure and so many expectations on us! We can't afford to lose sight of the plane. We must find the passengers.
Wife of passenger (Ekaterina): I can't believe this happened... Now it's just me and the kids. I don't know how we will go on...

I think the most believable actor out of the 5 of us was Ekaterina as she managed to envision how her person would feel and act in this situation. She sobbed and put a dramatic pause in between her sentences. She also pretended to cry quite realistically which emphasised her sadness.

Why do Actors Need to Be Able to Control Their Breathing?

Actors may need to be able to control their breathing because they need to be in character. For example if they are acting as if they just went on a sprinting marathon they need to act like they are gasping for air at the end of the scene, or if they have a long speech during a scene they need to take breaths carefully in between so it doesn’t look sloppy and they don’t have to keep stopping to catch their breath.

Vocal exercises:

1.     -  Lie down flat on your back and hum a low steady rhythm. Stand up or roll to the side while trying to keep the same hum.

2.    -   Do a Siren exercise and hit the low and high notes while saying “eeeeeee”. Alternate the octaves.

Source: http://www.business2community.com/travel-leisure/10-warming-up-exercises-voice-actors-must-include-in-their-routines-0280069#piBWikygLHFIIWEy.97

Monologue Reflections

KALANI

A (K&U): 1/8 Barely understood what he was doing

B (DS): 1/8 Showed no emotion

C (CT): 1/8 Very creative expressions

Teacher grade: 1/8

MARIAM

A (K&U): 6/8 Good insight as to how the character might act

B (DS): 7/8 Frequently changed expressions and varied arm movement.

C (CT): 5/8 Moved around and was into character

Teacher grade: 6/8

GUSTAV

A (K&U): 3/8 Forgot what to say halfway through

B (DS): 4/8

C (CT): 3/8

Teacher grade: 2/8

MOODY

A (K&U): 5/8 More or less knew what he was saying

B (DS): 5/8 Talked quietly but was condident

C (CT): 3/8 Not much creative content

Teacher grade: 4/8

ALBERTO

A (K&U): 4/8 Mostly read from the book

B (DS): 5/8 Changed tone of voice and used some arm movements

C (CT): 4/8 Was sort of into character

Teacher grade: 4/8

SELF REFLECTION (ULAN)

A (K&U): 6/8 Knew what to say

B (DS): 6/8 Used arm movements, changed tone and facial expressions

C (CT): 6/8 Mimicked being hit by a brick at the end of monologue

Teacher grade: 6/8

Devising from Stimuli

MYP: Devising from Stimuli

Key Concepts: Creativity and Perspectives

Related Concepts: Audience and Structure

Global Contexts: Personal and Cultural

Statement of Inquiry: Drama can help a community and individuals to find a voice and communicate in a powerful way.

Inquiry Question: (CONCEPTUAL) Can we use drama to communicate across cultures?