Rent involvement and evaluation

In Rent my characters were; homeless person, bohemian and Vendor in Christmas Bells. The numbers I was involved in were; Rent, Out of Town, Christmas Bells, La Vie Boheme, seasons of love and Finale B. We helped out a lot with set for the year thirteen's such as sorting out the chairs and going through and making the homeless sections more accurate by adding newspaper and bottles to the mise-en-scene so the audience can link it better. 




Within Christmas Bells I played a Vendor for this I had to pretend to sell dodgy/stolen coats this part also required me to sing a few lines there was also two other vendors, We had to base ourselves on the scaffolding stairs in Rogers apartment section so that all of the audience could see us clearly as well as have big enough gaps so that you could differentiate between the druggies, vendors and characters. I liked where we were as when we had to perform our lines it was easier to perform to each section of seating and not just one.




In La Vie Boheme I was a bohemian, this was a more physical number as it had movements to the song, for the majority of the number we have to stage talk with one another so that it gives the vibe of a normal bar. When the main chorus comes in we have key movements like a shoulder shimmey these were good as they complimented the choreography as well as keeping with the atmosphere of the number this also highlighted that my character was upbeat and fun loving. I like the movements within the song as it involves everyone and not just so the characters are doing it and as a result making the audience feel more involved and like they are in the café with us.

Dance - Unit 32 Developing Physical theatre

1/12/15


Unit 32: Developing physical theatre


What is Physical theatre?:
Physical theatre is a cross between dance and drama. Its proper defintion is a form of theatre which emphasizes the use of physical movement, as in dance and mime, for expression.

Practice and practioneers of physical theatre:
- Steven Berkoff
- Trestle Theatre Company
- Frantic assembly
- Antonin Artaud
- Jacques LeCoq

Physical theatre:
 'Faultline' by Shobana Jeyasingh

Themes- Youth culture, Gender stereotypes and Identity(ganags, pack mentality)
 Faultline uses gestures and footwork from Bharatanatyam( style of indian dance)
it is influenced by martial arts, contemporary dance.

We learnt a routine from Faultline which was really fun and interesting. Within the dance there were key movements especially using our arms and hands which you could tell were inspired by Bharatanatyam. The Identity theme was also shown through movements in which we were being aggressive. Once we learnt the routine we went into small groups and changed the dynamics of the routine, Megan and I made the routine more heavy to give it more of a threatning feel to add to the themes. To add to this we made some of the sharp parts slower to give it a different feel.


What is a Gang?
A gang is a group of people usually associated with crimes, as a group we came up with words which we associated with Gangs these were: Unity, crime, money, hoodies, Guns, Knives, Brand identity, violence and intimidating.


We created material using some of the words in which we came up with, my chosen words were: money, brand identity, guns, knives and unity. So for one of my moves I do a clap to symbolise a gunshot, for Brand identity I use my hands over the lower half of my face to represent a handkerchief which is usually linked with gangs.


Contact Work:

Contact work is a common aspect within physical theatre, this is when two people work together to do moves and lifts that need two people. Contact work is always very effective within dance as it can add many different elements to the piece whether it be dynamics, symbolism or level of difficulty. Contact work can be quite demanding at times so it is vital that you take all safety precautions, trust is a big thing towards this point so you always have to make sure your partner is comfortable with what they are doing and prepared also that you both know exactly what you're doing and have a someone near as a fail safe.

Lesson 3- 17/9/15

Lesson 3- 17/9/15

Unit 9: Devising Plays

ACCEPT+ADD:
Accept the idea and then add to it.


Types of Devising:
- Spontaneous- On the spot, developing skills and team work.
- Prepared- ready for the audience.
- Polished - polished to perfection



Improvisation rules:
1. Keep it simple.
2. Refreshing the facts - choosing a complete new direction when needed.
3. Get to know characters
4. Establish location/setting






We started off talking about the devising criteria and then the devising rules. After this we did some warming up excersizes before doing an improvisation excersize called what are you doing, I enjoyed this as it was more interactive then a exercise like traffic lights. Once we did this, we did  tag impro which is a fun game using improvisation and the add and accept rule, this was also effective as it helped us memorize/understand the add and accept rule more. We then spoke about the top tips for devising which were make sure you have contrasting storylines/narratives with some shared ideas, also to have relatable problems and to make sure that they are appropriate for the target audience. After this we recapped on our characters from Crabapple which was a good idea as some had forgotten them. We got into small groups or in my case a pairing with Jess. In our groups we discussed our characters and then refined them so my character is now Emma Charming she is ten years old, has magical powers and is a orphan as she lost her parents in the wizard war. She lives in the rose cottages by herself, has purple hair and she has an invisibility cloak so when people come looking for her or someone she can hide from them and won't get taken away, her biggest fear is confronting her problems.


In our groups we then had to devise small scenes with our characters. Jess character was called Maggie and she is 21 her fear was that she is scared of crossing roads as she has been hit by a car before so our scene was about Emma helping Maggie cross the road using her invisibility cloak to show no one was watching but in the end Maggie does it by herself. Our characters went together really well making our storyline quite effective as sometimes stories can be too random. At the end everyone did there pieces one by one but continuously, we included music in the background between scenes and then once everyone had performed we all moved around the room to the music and back to our starting positions to make it a full performance. The adding of music was really effective as it tied it all together creating more of a performance.

Lesson 3 & 4 - 12/1/16 & 14/1/16

In this lesson we helped out with production roles by doing set for Rent the year thirteen's musical, this was to help out the year thirteen's. This was good because it showed us more of an insight  to what we may have to do for our musical. We also did this so that we could support the year thirteen's and get familiar with Rent and our different roles within it. It allowed us to get a feel for the proxemics and the staging. I think that it was a bit tedious but we got a system going so in the end it wasn't too bad.


In the next lesson we did set once again for Rent, however we were setting up the homeless zones this was a good task as it helped character building as it gets you into the feel of the piece and your character. This also helped us with our spatial awareness within the show.

Dance - 12/1/16

In this lesson we went through the numbers in which we are involved in within Rent, these include La Vi e Boheme, Rent, Christmas Bells and Finale B. In this lesson we focused on La Vie Boheme .

La Vie Boheme is a song based on bohemianism and in our version based in a bar of some sort, in this number we were just simple bohemians. We start the number sitting at a table just slightly dancing to them singing before doing choreographed movements to the chorus section. Then a small group of us run across and start doing more choreographed movement to the song before just dancing.

I quite like this number as its quite groovy and fun, I think that our coordination and musicality as group worked really well in this number however we really need to improve on our focus and sometimes we got a bit silly we also need to work on our spacing however this will come with practising with the set so we need to come and practice it in our lesson times every week until the show so that we have it by then.

Dance 20/10/15

In this we lesson we started with a warm up for safety reasons. We then ran through the dance just to give everyone a little recap. After this we changed around the routine so that it had a more fluent composition this impacted my character within the dance as I had to change my transitions around so that I could get to each section without running into anybody else. After this we had to teach the main phrase to Jordy as he didn’t know it, we thought it was a good idea for everyone to know the phrase because then it adds whole cast unison which is an effective technique to use within dance choreography. Also one of our key words that links with our theme is unity therefore this represents that key aspect.

Next we continued changing elements of the dance so that we could add more dynamics within the piece so that it linked with our themes of gangs more also toad to our characterization, I think that using dynamics works really well within a dance as not only does it make it more interesting but helps dancers within the piece to use the certain dynamics to portray emotions their character may be feeling in that moment, e.g.: a heavy stamp could be used to show anger.

We then performed to a small audience so that we could practice for the show as well as help us focus on our characterization to make it more of a performance.

Targets: I need to improve the dynamics in my solo section to do this I will go through it and decide what kind of emotions/dynamics I want to show and practice by next lesson, also to know the whole dance off by heart to achieve this I will practice it at home before next lesson.

Dance - Performance evaluation - Group

Dance Performance Self Evaluation – Group Performance

Our group performance was a physical theatre based piece, Physical theatre is a cross between drama and dance using physical movements to convey expression or an object. Our pieces theme is Gangs and was influenced by a physical theatre piece called Faultline, Faultline uses gestures and footwork from Bharatanatyam (style of Indian dance) which is influenced by martial arts, contemporary dance. We did this routine within a dance show held at our college, in which we performed to a large audience which consisted of teachers, dancers and parents.

In this dance we had a lot of key movements, Symbolism was a big thing for our piece therefore the majority of movements were gestures, as that is a key thing used within gangs and is also included in Faultline, a lot of gestures we incorporated in our piece were linked with a word, for example we had a movement in which we lifted our hoods to represent how gangs are known for their clothing, which also links with another movement we did where we covered out lower half of our face like a handkerchief to symbolize brand identity which is another key factor of Gangs in these times.


 Another technique we used was unison, unison is where all dancers do the same movements as the same time, we used this as firstly it represents unity which was another one of our words linked with our theme, however we also used it because it gives the dance more dynamic so that it isn’t too crazy the whole dance there are moments where we are all together and slow.


Lastly characterization was big in our piece as it helped us convey our theme and the small story line within our piece it, a lot of the characterization elements were helped by the use of dynamics in which added to certain movements within the dance to reflect what our characters were feeling.

I think that one of my strengths within the performance was facial expression I used this to show the emotions of my character and my characters story line for example at the end I showed that I was scared to help the audience understand that something bad was going to happen to my character, I think this is one of my strengths as it helped me get more into character, helped out the story line and made the piece more of a performance. Another strength of mine would be co-ordination and spatial awareness, I used co-ordination by knowing the routine well therefore being able to focus on other aspects whilst executing the dance, I used spatial awareness well as there are a lot of movements where the movements get quite dramatic and people can bump into to each other for example in the fight duets max kept bumping into Ashley therefore I made sure that we started further down stage so this would not occur in the performance.

I think one of my weaknesses for this performance would have been musicality I think this is because it was quite a strange and unique piece of music and because it didn’t really have any timing to it I couldn’t get into it, therefore If this occurs again in a dance I need to listen to the music and put my own timing to the music so that I can get into it more, It is is important that you have good musicality in dance as it shows in your movements it also adds to the atmosphere and emotions of the dance because if someone doesn’t feel they can fit with the music they can look stiff or a bit awkward and musicality links with timing they both come together. Another weakness was my flexibility, lacking flexibility can really hinder your dance ability and therefore overall performance, for example when you need to be low and need to lunge to help portray character flexibility can help. As a result I need to improve it so that I can dance with more fluidity and ease it also helps improve my skills within dance.

In conclusion, my targets for my next performance would be to improve my stamina and strength to do this I need to start doing more cardiovascular exercises such as running and aerobics I will try and achieve this in three weeks. Another target it to improve my balance so that I can dance with more control to improve this I need to improve my core control by doing exercises like sit ups and crunches, I aim to do this a few times a week for three weeks. My last target is to improve my flexibility so that my dance level improves to do this I will do stretches every other fay for three weeks.