This week the first thing we did was go through our grading criteria for the Greek project so that we knew what was going to be expected of us. Doing this also gives us an idea of what we want to be included in the performance to get our grades to a very good position, it also means that we are trying very hard to work to the project to get it to the best possible standard that we can. After we looked at the grading criteria for the project we went on moodle as a group to look at some links to videos on the national theatre website giving some information on the way Greek theatre can be set and used it also gave a lot of detail on the background of Greek theatre and how it began in Greece, it also told us about how theatre was used in politics to address many issues and bring some to light, it was a great way for politicians to influence the public. The main reason we were looking into this is because we are doing a project on Greek theatre and these were to give us a few ways to go about creating these presentations in our respective pairs. For Movement we went and watched some monks from Tashi Lhunpo temple in India, they were visiting the college to demonstrate some of their ritual dances and our leader Kirsty decided we could go and watch them and see if we could find influence and ideas from the traditional dances that were being demonstrated to us in the main theatre. In voice we worked on a pop quiz on our vocal anatomy to see how we were doing on our revision and remembered information for the final test on our knowledge of our own voices this proved a lot of fun as a task as we were working in pairs for this and we just had fun trying to remember what we could and learned from each other in the process.
On Tuesday we got straight down to business and went onto mine and Dan's scene together. In this scene Orestes and Electra get a lot closer as Electra is trying to comfort Orestes and tries to get him to go to sleep as he hasn't been able to sleep well since he killed their mother. We used this scene to show the connection between the two characters and the close bond they share even after only having seen each other for the first time in around ten years. After we worked on how we wanted to stage this scene we were led in some exercises by Alex another of our team leaders who got us to work on status. To work on our status we went around the room trying to imitate the sort of status we thought our character had and this turned out to be quite interesting as some did a lot lower status to show their character at a certain part of the play. And then we watched some videos on how to further this study of status between characters, and lastly we worked on the scene after the one we did in the morning which is a scene mostly between Orestes, Menalaos and Tyndareos and showing the status between the characters that was where I found that the morning activities working on status helped a lot and you could quite clearly see the difference in status in the scene.
Overall the weeks work went well and we developed a lot of scenes which helped a lot with our characters and how they are progressing, we have also worked on our status levels and i've found that particularly helpful in how I represent my character on stage.
Tuesday 26 November 2013
Tuesday 19 November 2013
Greek Blog 3 (11th - 16th)
This week be began by looking at the themes of the play and how they contributed to not only the characters but the play itself and how it eventually ends. To do this we looked at drawing five pictures from scenes in the play that to us were important mine were of:
On Wednesday we began with Alex again and did the breathing concentration that she does, I find this very helpful as it allows me to focus and concentrate on what lies ahead on the day. From there we looked at some videos from the national theatre website on greek theatre and how staging is the first thing you should think about in greek theatre and to have an argument within the chorus is both interesting and causes conflict within the performance. Status is also an important part within Greek plays because it shows who is who and where everyone stands within the play, such as the difference between royalty and the gods and the royalty and the chorus, these help to show where the necessary tension within the play lies. During our time with Alex we also worked on using words from the play and creating movements that worked with the words and then saying the words to the actions in different ways, my way was to whisper it which gave the overall feel to it a bit of an eery feeling.
On Thursday we began by starting on certain scenes, I wasn't a part of these scenes so Bradley, Dan and myself went off and read through the scenes that we were in, by doing this we also discussed how we could stage this, most of the staging for the scene that Bradley and myself were in had already been blocked so we knew what we were doing with that and were happy with it. The scene that Dan and I were in we hadn't blocked yet and so we discussed ideas of how we would stage this, in the scene I am talking to Dan and telling him to sleep and talking to both myself and to him, the scene is staged on a bed and then Dan travels around the room talking to Menelaus who comes in and talks to him. For this scene we felt that we would need the entire cast of the scene to create it as it seemed a very much instinct needing piece.
- Agamemnon dead in the bath
- The people of Argos
- Baby Hermione
- Clytemnestra's hair
- Agamemnon's grave
To me these were quite significant, the first one was because in the script it is an incredibly descriptive scene and a horrific one at that, it describes how Electra and Orestes' mother and her lover kill their father in an attempt to gain power over Argos for themselves, the second one I chose because the people of Argos are represented by our chorus who are a big part in the play and explain a lot of the story to the audience, the third was because although baby hermione is not as featured in the play as the other characters she does become the object of attention with the ending when Orestes jumps off the cliff with her in his arms, the fourth one was because of the scene between Electra and Helen when Helen is bating Electra and I chose this from the moment when she picks up a bit of Clytemnestra's hair and turns to Electra and remarks "is this her hair?" and Electra nods "her hair was so much softer than mine but it never shone so well" to me this was a very tense scene and needed to be included in this, the fifth one was because i felt this was almost a symbol of the play itself and was a big yet small part of what goes on in the performance. In Movement we worked on the chorus again, we used the bath that we have been given for the performance from the design department. We also began using what we had done from the week before of using the thought of an emotion with each movement and using that as our movement in the scene where Clytemnestra and her lover kill Agamemnon.
On Wednesday we began with Alex again and did the breathing concentration that she does, I find this very helpful as it allows me to focus and concentrate on what lies ahead on the day. From there we looked at some videos from the national theatre website on greek theatre and how staging is the first thing you should think about in greek theatre and to have an argument within the chorus is both interesting and causes conflict within the performance. Status is also an important part within Greek plays because it shows who is who and where everyone stands within the play, such as the difference between royalty and the gods and the royalty and the chorus, these help to show where the necessary tension within the play lies. During our time with Alex we also worked on using words from the play and creating movements that worked with the words and then saying the words to the actions in different ways, my way was to whisper it which gave the overall feel to it a bit of an eery feeling.
On Thursday we began by starting on certain scenes, I wasn't a part of these scenes so Bradley, Dan and myself went off and read through the scenes that we were in, by doing this we also discussed how we could stage this, most of the staging for the scene that Bradley and myself were in had already been blocked so we knew what we were doing with that and were happy with it. The scene that Dan and I were in we hadn't blocked yet and so we discussed ideas of how we would stage this, in the scene I am talking to Dan and telling him to sleep and talking to both myself and to him, the scene is staged on a bed and then Dan travels around the room talking to Menelaus who comes in and talks to him. For this scene we felt that we would need the entire cast of the scene to create it as it seemed a very much instinct needing piece.
Tuesday 12 November 2013
Greek Blog 2 (4th - 8th)
This week brought us back from half term and so from being used to lie in after lie in we had to get back into routine which wasn't necessarily easy. I found that a lot of people were un focused as a result of having time off of college and being out of routine which did make life a lot harder to get down to work, I myself found I was a lot more tired that i usually am as I had possibly slept in a lot over the half term.
On Monday we began the week by looking at the themes of Blood and Light, finding out what sort of themes we all thought could be included in this category, these included
On Monday we began the week by looking at the themes of Blood and Light, finding out what sort of themes we all thought could be included in this category, these included
- Forgiveness
- Honour
- Violence & Revenge
From these we looked at what sort of things we could draw from it and which parts of the play they related to. Forgiveness I felt related to the ideal in the play the overall goal of the piece, Honour related to Electra and Orestes killing their mother for killing their father because it was what the gods wanted and would protect the honour of the family. Violence and Revenge relate to the main goings on in the play, the violence for the killing of family members and the revenge for doing so, the description of their mother killing their father with her lover is horrifying and incredibly violent.
On Wednesday we had Alex as a new team leader for the morning she got us to look at working as a group, as one this was to help us develop ourselves as a chorus. First we led on the floor with a book holding our heads up, from there we concentrated on our breathing and working our diaphragms to get ourselves warmed up. After we were warmed up we did lots of different ways of working as a team to get different emotions across to do this we particularly worked on "The Bath" scene working on our character's that work around the actors as the chorus. We worked around the bath that Agamemnon was being killed in and did our own actions to what was happening as journalists which is what we are considering the chorus to be.
On Thursday we mostly covered a certain scene which is the one between both Electra and Helen and how Helen is accusing Electra of killing her sister Clytmnestra, she carries on bating Electra in a series of accusations. Whilst this was going on I went off to the cafe with Bradley and we went through our scene between Electra and Tyndareos and made notes on performance on the script discussing what we thought ought to happen between the characters on stage during parts of the scene and including the chorus in this and tossed around ideas with what they could do.
I had some ideas with the staging of the play, my ideas were to use a thrust staging and move the chairs from the platforms to around the curtains of the stage area leaving exits to behind the curtains in the two corners of the staging area. I then thought we should put the bed at the base of the tiered area and still have some audience on the tiered area looking down at the bed that Orestes lays on, I then felt that the mirror that Helen uses should be near one of the exits in the corners of the staging area to allow Helen to move in, out and around the stage area. I also felt that we should use the main exits to the theatre to be the main ways to get off and on the stage, that way it would be not only more clear to the audience but also lets the characters come off and on in their own way and give them time to bring the character to life with the changing of people as the characters.
Overall I felt that this week was far more beneficial to both myself and the group as we learned a lot more about what we wanted from the characters and the play itself it also gave a lot of us ideas as to how we wanted to stage the play and how we wanted the audience to feel about it and it's themes.
Tuesday 5 November 2013
Greek Blog 1 (21st - 25th)
This week began to look at our new project, this project is about Greek theatre and the play that we are studying and performing is Orestes from the Oresteia by Euripides. Over the past weeks before we started the project we had been doing essays on Greek theatre to help us increase our knowledge on not only Greek theatre but the play itself.
In our first real session on the project we did casting for the parts, because the play didn't have enough characters, but also because it is rather long Karen our team leader split the roles of both Orestes and Electra into four separate roles in different parts of the play. This meant that most of us got to receive a good role and even if we weren't cast as a role we were able to be in the chorus and the chorus in Greek theatre plays a much bigger part than the characters do as they narrate and tell the story. To do the casting we went through various parts of the play and tried out a few characters each just to get a feel for what each character was like and weather we would like to play them. Being able to get a feel for different characters has also helped in my understanding of what each character is feeling and gives me a reason for their actions within the play. After roles had been cast I found out that I had been given the role of Electra 3, I did want to play Helen because I could easily see what I would do with her character, but in a way I am glad that I also did not get the role of Helen because Electra 3 challenges my skills as an actor as it is not a role I would normally play. As an actor I also enjoy trying to figure out new roles that are unlike ones that I have never played before, Electra gives me a way to look at someone who is being put in a situation where she has to stand up and really mess with someones emotions and try to get to them through that.
We ended the week on working on a scene between Tyndareos and myself as Electra 3. We used the scene where Electra stands up for herself in front of Tyndareos and tries to get him to see why they killed their mother. To stage this we used two blocks, mind you this was only an experiment as to how we would work the scene, we placed one block on either side of the room and I stood on one and Bradley as Tyndareos stood on the other. Around us we had our other cast mates as the Chorus and Orestes 3 (Dan) and Menelaus (Zach) on the other sides of us two on the box creating a diamond type shape. This scene is a confrontation between Electra and her grandfather, It is where Electra finds her voice to tear down her grandfathers built up walls and his pride. To get the effect that we wanted we used the Chorus to tell us weather they believed what we were saying and weather it was full of enough emotions that went with it. This was a brilliant way to get what we wanted out of the scene and although it meant we would sometimes have to go through one line ten times, but it worked and even I as the person performing it could feel the difference, I could feel Electra's hatred for her grandfather and her longing for justice as she had been promised this by the gods.
This week proved challenging because we were thrown into a new play and Greek theatre is not as easy as contemporary theatre as it has so many differences such as the chorus playing a bigger part than the characters of the story. The nature of the story as well with the gods and the revenge that is exacted in the play is not so commonly seen in contemporary plays or at least not in the same way. I so far am enjoying this challenge of a type of theatre that i have not yet done before and am looking forward to learning more not only about the play itself but also about the type of theatre that it lies within.
In our first real session on the project we did casting for the parts, because the play didn't have enough characters, but also because it is rather long Karen our team leader split the roles of both Orestes and Electra into four separate roles in different parts of the play. This meant that most of us got to receive a good role and even if we weren't cast as a role we were able to be in the chorus and the chorus in Greek theatre plays a much bigger part than the characters do as they narrate and tell the story. To do the casting we went through various parts of the play and tried out a few characters each just to get a feel for what each character was like and weather we would like to play them. Being able to get a feel for different characters has also helped in my understanding of what each character is feeling and gives me a reason for their actions within the play. After roles had been cast I found out that I had been given the role of Electra 3, I did want to play Helen because I could easily see what I would do with her character, but in a way I am glad that I also did not get the role of Helen because Electra 3 challenges my skills as an actor as it is not a role I would normally play. As an actor I also enjoy trying to figure out new roles that are unlike ones that I have never played before, Electra gives me a way to look at someone who is being put in a situation where she has to stand up and really mess with someones emotions and try to get to them through that.
We ended the week on working on a scene between Tyndareos and myself as Electra 3. We used the scene where Electra stands up for herself in front of Tyndareos and tries to get him to see why they killed their mother. To stage this we used two blocks, mind you this was only an experiment as to how we would work the scene, we placed one block on either side of the room and I stood on one and Bradley as Tyndareos stood on the other. Around us we had our other cast mates as the Chorus and Orestes 3 (Dan) and Menelaus (Zach) on the other sides of us two on the box creating a diamond type shape. This scene is a confrontation between Electra and her grandfather, It is where Electra finds her voice to tear down her grandfathers built up walls and his pride. To get the effect that we wanted we used the Chorus to tell us weather they believed what we were saying and weather it was full of enough emotions that went with it. This was a brilliant way to get what we wanted out of the scene and although it meant we would sometimes have to go through one line ten times, but it worked and even I as the person performing it could feel the difference, I could feel Electra's hatred for her grandfather and her longing for justice as she had been promised this by the gods.
This week proved challenging because we were thrown into a new play and Greek theatre is not as easy as contemporary theatre as it has so many differences such as the chorus playing a bigger part than the characters of the story. The nature of the story as well with the gods and the revenge that is exacted in the play is not so commonly seen in contemporary plays or at least not in the same way. I so far am enjoying this challenge of a type of theatre that i have not yet done before and am looking forward to learning more not only about the play itself but also about the type of theatre that it lies within.
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