WHERE LOYALTIES LIE3 Devising short scenes

BRAINSTORM

Starting activity: What is loyalty?

• Friendships 
• Relationships 
• Compromising your beliefs 
• respect and honesty 
• Family - character can't decide whether 
• Job - offered new job but have loyalties to the last one 
• Organisation 
• Religion 
• political leaders 
• standing by someone at all times 
• cheating on s/o 
• compromising beliefs to defend people you're loyal to 
• brand loyalty 
• biological family vs the people who actually raised you 

IMPROVISATION

Task - to create 3 scenes in 20 minutes, that surrounds the issue of loyalties

Tristan and Emma

• Silent entrance - showing the desperation
• Narrative enigma
• Shift of emotions from angry to wanting help and advise

Louis, Amelie, James and Hugo

• Amelie entering 
• Amelie being very controlling - parental controls on phone etc.
• Bar tender character knowing everything
• Relationship between Louis and Amelie's character
• Conflict in Louis - whether to stay in bar or go with Amelie - apparent in walk
• Wedding in the air but it never quite happen
• Possibly the morning of the wedding but doesn't go right.

Seth, Silvana and Hugo

• Betrayal of trust 
• People finding out
• Misunderstanding - Hugo not knowing and then calming down once understood - shift
• Introduction of Hugo's character

What we liked:
A new character entering the scene to create a comic affect (Meredith being controlling)
Betrayal of trust (telling other peoples secrets and then the other finding out)
DV8 style of theatre
The barman could hear everyones secrets but keeps them to himself
The misunderstanding (Silvana, Seth and Hugo - Hugo came in shouting but then understood)
Never getting to the wedding

Plot ideas:
Potential 5 plot points
Controlling girlfriend - never quit gets married -have comic scene with wife continuously walking on on him doing things he shouldn't
Barman hears everything people say
Bartender could tell the story
rehearsal Dinner party - tension begins
couples yoga - deep discussion - Amelie tells off Louis
confrontation - Louis is told that Amelie is a bad influence, goes home, tries to talk to her, manipulated into thinking

WARM UP

We did some warming up after lunch which we had planned in the previous lesson.  In our pairs we lead a warm up.  It was important to get our bodies warm and moving around as we were doing Frantic Assembly.

Seth and I lead some stretches and also used the song Roxanne by The Police.  Every time it said "Roxanne", the girls had to do a push up and every time it said "red light", the boys had to do a pushup.

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Amelie and Silvana also lead some stretches.

Hugo and Tristan made the group do push ups for 1 minute as well as sit ups for 2 minutes.

Louis and James used the song Love The Way You Lie by Rihanna and Eminem.  When Eminem was rapping, we had to hold a plank position and when Rihanna sang, we would break.

At the end, we played a hand game where everyone lies on their stomach in a circle facing the middle with their hands in front of them.  Then everyone put their right hand over the left hand of the person to their right.  Then we would go round in a circle and everyone would tap the floor in order of the hands.  It gets very difficult because you think that your hand is next when it isn't.  Whenever someone messed up, they would have to get up and run around the circle before everyone has slapped around the circle.  If they didn't get there in time, they would have to do 10 push ups.

SWINDON 5

We tried a Frantic method from Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime.  We started by having all of us walking around in a big figure of 8, trying to weave us together.  Then we added in points where we would change from walking forwards to walking backwards.  We then had Tristan in the middle who's objective was to get our attention but we didn't give it to him.  His next objective was to pick up a book from the ground but the rest of us had the objective of not letting Tristan pick it up.  This could be used in a panicky scene where the person in the centre feels like they can't get a hold of something or they're frustrated.  We also thought that this would be good in a train station, a school hallway and a busy hospital.

LIFTS

We moved on to lifts by Frantic Assembly.  The first lift we looked at was the hip lift.  One person had to have their arm around the other's waist and squat down to get their hip below the other persons.  Then they would take a step and then, with pressure applied to the hip area, would lift the other person up.

The second lift we looked at was the clipboard lift.  One person had to squat to get their hips lower than the other persons and then the other person would put their arm over their shoulder and clamp it together.

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The last lift we looked at was the one rock lift.  There were two people standing opposite each other and one was squatted down.  Then the other would go up to them and press down on their shoulders and lift one leg up.  Everyone else would then lift the person from underneath.  The person in the air could then let go of the first person's shoulders.

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LOYALTY CHOREOGRAPHY

We then had the task to create a piece about loyalty using Frantic Assembly's methods.  We could use the ones from last week as well, such as chair duets and round, by, through.
This is what we've created so far.
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Peter and the Wolf WARM-UP

SALLY UP SALLY DOWN CHALLENGE 

To warm up for our Peter and the Wolf rehearsals, we often do the 'Sally up, Sally down Challenge'. There is a song that repeats that line. The aim is to work your muscles and warm up before rehearsals.  There are several versions of this challenge, and the aim is to do the exercise on the 'Sally down' lines, and then when it says, 'Sally up', you rest. Here are some online examples...






We usually do the squat version. I struggled with this challenge the first time we ever did it, as it is a massive test, however I was close to completing it in our most recent lesson. I had one break in the middle of the song, but completed the rest.

THUNDERSTRUCK CHALLENGE

This challenge is very similar, however when the song says, 'Thunder' or 'Thunderstruck', you do a burpee. Pushups are my weakness, which is why I struggle a lot with this challenge. I will continue doing it though, as it is very beneficial for improving my physical wellbeing. Here is an example...

RIHANNA AND EMINEM CHALLENGE

In this exercise, it is the same style again, but with sit ups. When Rihanna sings, you must hold a half sit up position. When Eminem sings, you need to be doing active sit ups and then when it is just instrumental, you can rest. I was able to complete this challenge, as I have a decent level of strength in my core. Here is a similar online version...

Peter and the Wolf BLOCKING 1

In this lesson, we completed the simple blocking for Peter and the Wolf, until the procession. This is a useful step for us as it means we will be able to focus on the finer details, for example looking at adding the correct amount of dance to the play. The majority of the BTEC Performing Arts students have a limited ability on dance, therefore our aim is to communicate with our choreographer (Amelie Marchand) to come up with the best contrast between dance and movement.

This means that we simply have where we want our set to be, where we want the brief areas each of us should stand in and where we should stand based on what line is being said. The only main scene I have looked at for myself is the opening scene. In this scene, I enter the meadow and walk around. At the start, the brief plan was to walk on, have a skip around and then finish sitting down, however we added more creative movement. I now kick some grass (mime) pick up some grass and throw it in the air, check nobody is looking and eat some grass (and the spit it out) and then flick some whatever.

Previous to this blocking rehearsal, we had the idea of performing with thrust stage. We decided against this decision in today's rehearsal as we feel it will not create the same atmosphere and it will be hard to find a space large enough to fit the size audience we are looking for