WHERE LOYALTIES LIE12 Chair duet

Today we got straight into it, spending a couple of hours developing a romantic chair duet for mine and Amelie's characters. This went really well and we created lots of material. While this gave us lots of options, we soon discovered that not everything worked together. This meant that we needed to sort through, alter or even eliminate the parts that did not work. For instance, we wanted to include a certain move that we liked doing but it didn't go with the rest of the sequence, so we cut it. This ultimately made the piece smoother and of a better quality.

Something that we need to work towards is actually behaving like a couple onstage. We have never had to portray a very real relationship like this before, and it is quite difficult to not let Amelie and Louis' thoughts and reactions get in the way of Meredith and Harry's. However, we are becoming more comfortable with being closer - this is proven by the almost-kiss move

One other thing we found is that we like to stay put in our chairs if we can, so we tried to transition from the chair duet into a 'Round By Through' sequence. We came up with various versions, and in the end we combined the bits that worked the best.

Throughout the day we also took some photos for our display board/mind map of characters. We have one for each couple, set of siblings and group of friends. We find that seeing the connections visually helps us in the creative process.

Once this was sorted out, we took turns writing up parts of the script, and grouped scenes in terms of plot points. James took the lead on this as we were still developing physical theatre, and it helped us see where the plot needed to be simplified or expanded. For instance, we now have more detail about Jane and Dave's relationship, such as how they meet and what sort of connection they have.