Texts and Society- Week 1

Lou started today by introducing us to the module and then putting us into groups and giving us a section of 'Dr Faustus' which was about the seven deadly sins which we will perform in a few weeks. I was given envy to do along with Nat and Lauren. Afterwards, Mike took over and was teaching us different breathing and voice exercises which would help us to perform on stage. I felt that these techniques were hard to do but I think that with practice, and I mean with A LOT of practice, I will be able to use these techniques effectivly to help make my performance better on the whole. They ranged from different breathing patterns to help emphasise an emotion, so anger would have a deeper heavier breath, while pride would be deep also, but long controlled breaths out would be the difference. We also worked on projecting our voices without yelling, just making them louder, a useful skill, especially on stage. I will try to apply these techniques to different pieces of practical work that I do.

Improv and Ensemble: Extra rehearsal 2

For todays rehearsal, the main focus was staging the play and trying to find how it would end naturally (the original idea that was touched on in the last extra rehearsal was a socialist song, but that to me didn't seem a good way to end). With bits of improvisation, we were able to think of what to say in retaliation to each other and were still able to stick to the structure of the play that we planned in the previous session very well. It took a few run throughs as, with many political debates, it got of hand and, to put it one way, we went off on one, so after a while we got back on track. It was hard to figure out where some people should go as we noticed that some had more to say than others, but we managed to shift them into the play by the fake audience (aka us) having more to say in between what the political leaders had to say. Rachel plays the representitive of those who are undecided on what wing they are and agree with policies from both Hannah, the right winger, and Laurence, the left winger. This allows for their to be more of a student voice in the audience as her character is someone appliying for university. The ending we came to was that there would be a big creshendo where many of the characters in the audience end up just arguing and storming to the representitive of the party they support, and the right wingers leaving to have a more private discussion. Tammie also plays the BNP supporter from the audience who is booed out by everyone, audience and representitives. Thansk to this extra rehearsal, we are all aware of what we need to do for the play and from now on it seems that all we need to do is to rehearse this over and over to make it more polished and slick, so it is more entertaining and engaging for the real audience.

Improv and Ensemble: Week 3

Todays session was very good as we had, with Griff's help developed, not only a structure for the play, but the mentality needed for the play. I think it would be more realistic and interesting to watch if you, as an audience member, can see the characters involved actual have a heated debate. For about 10 minutes, Griff let us continue to debate once one had naturally broke out and encouraged those who were sitting and watching and when it seemed to come to a natural end he noted how there were several arguments happening that lasted for that amount of time, and if we were to script and structure it with more development, the Agit-Prop play would be very promising. On the white board in the red room, Griff helped develop a simple structure that the play could take on. We then created characters that we will perform as potentially in the play. Mine is a parent in a stable financial state whose daughter failed to enter university due to budget cuts in her course, while she recieved excellent A-Level results. My character would support the right-wing Tory Party and question the left-wing's free uni policy. I'm happy with my character as I created it on a real life friend of mine who was told after being accepted that she could not go to the uni due to budget cuts, and that the political beliefs of my character are very much different to mine, making them a generally different person than me and I look forward to developing the character further to understand what they do and do not agree with politically. I was pleased with how much progress we made today in terms of developing the play and the next rehearsal will focus on actually running through the piece sticking to the arguements, characters and structure that we have been working on over the past few weeks.

Improv and Ensemble: Extra rehearsal 1

I came late today due to having an english seminar clash with the beggining of the meeting. I wouldn't have called it a rehearsal as such as it was more some of us planning how we could possibly stage a political debate. We wrote different left and right wing arguments on paper and spoke about how these arguments could be presented. Different ideas, such as a Jeremy Kyle-esque way were presented but we decided as a group that such ideas would not work for a political debate and something related more closely to Question Time would better suit. We also discussed how it would be controlled, without the typical host asking members of an audience and the party leaders question after question, and so we decided that if the party leaders themselves were to give statements and the audience openly showing their interest or digust at the statements, the piece would be more interesting for the real audience to watch and be a part of.
In terms of developing the idea into a more structured and presentable piece, we progressed well, yet it would have been better if more of the class showed up for the rehearsal as we could have gathered more ideas and arguments that we could use for the piece, however, I do think that the things we came up with will be good and are worth while using and developing.

Improv and Ensemble: Week 2

This week we got focused on the first practical exam, and AGIT-PROP type piece. Griff, suffering from a cold, split us up into 3 groups and gave us different tasks, which would end up with us creating a plan and staging an Agit-Prop play. For my group, we had to research different policies, beliefs and differences of the left and right wings. We originally thought we would go to Aldham Robarts and research the given topic, but luckily, Laurence told us he has some strong beliefs and a lot of information he personally gathered and compiled on, surprise surprise, left and right wing pieces of information, mostly from a left wing perspective due to his beliefs, but nonetheless, we understood what both sides stood for. With that in mind, we went to the SU Bar and debated about the left and right wing, talking about all the relevant information we needed, with the aid of Laurence's self-made file of Socialist Polictics. We spoke about Cameron's plans to rise budget cuts and tax, upon other things, and what the Socialist Party, a very left wing party, stood for and their beliefs on the right wing. Afterwards, we went back to the Red room in Joe H Makin, and the 3 groups swapped information.
I think that, thanks to Laurence, we were able to easily discuss all the relevant information and process it with little difficulty, always a good thing. I think that the play that we have to stage will be a lot easier for me to understand, as politics can often be difficult to fully understand. I was pleased this week that we were able to have more independant study, so I could follow the information easier, with Laurence's deep understanding, and being in a smaller group that we were able to talk at our own pace a lot more, therefore getting more and clearer work done.

Improv and Ensemble: Week 1

Today were more general exercises so the group became more comfortable working with each other. Different pairs were formed and did the classic task of 'A moves, B mirrors', to help with improvising. We also did the task of walking around the room and stopping all at the same time and starting again, one that helps with both improv and ensemble skills. Personally, I felt that this particualr exercise did not be as effective as it has been in the past as, not naming names, but some people in the group were trying to lead the actions, pretty much defeating the point of the whole thing, but after a while it was getting there.
Also, we started the session by telling jokes. I don't think Griff liked mine as it was quite simply "Manchester United", and much to my surprise, Griff wasn't best pleased with the joke.
We did not focus on the syllabus too much this week, but with good reason. I felt that this session did help the group get used to working with each other and settled me in well to the class.

Greek Theatre

The Actors

• One main character follwed by characters called 'Follwers'. The leading characters were referred to as 'Hypocrits'. The Followers were part of the orchestra and were referred to as playing the 'dumb' characters.
• Women were not aloud on stage, the Hypocrits wore Prosternidas' to imitate breasts when palying female characters. To look tall and impressive they wore Cothornous' with were wooden shoes with high heels, called Kothomois.


• Masks were always worn. They had big holes for the eyes and mouth and were necessary for the Dionysian religion that they followed. Actors who played the protaganists were seen as high profile members of society and seen by some as ambassadors.

The Chorus

• Sophocles made a chorus of 15 people and they entered in rows on stage in 3 rows of 5. Coryphaios was the leader of the chorus and was in the middle row at the front, and was a professional dancer and singer. The rest of the chorus were amateurs chosen by the poet.


• They were considered the mouthpiece of society in morality and suffered along with the hero of the story.

Costume

• Early on, body paint, fur and animal skin was used to make costumes but later on Chitons and Hamateons were used, which were made of silks and linen, and wool for the latter. They were very decorated for the theatre and were overly done as they were clothes of the time and so the theatre was very exhaggerative with it.

Comedy

• Derived from the Dionysian cult when the pheasents sang hymns. During festivals they sang vulgar and offensive hymns to the God of Comoi, which was the origin of the word comedy.


• Comedy was a mockery of people and situations and criticised morality and corruption.


• It was not seen as vulgar then as that was the culture.


• Only 11 comedies have been saved and revived from Aristophanes, including 'Lysistrata', 'The Bird', 'The Frog' and 'The Wasp'.

Satiric Drama

• Abandoned the Dionysian cult attitudes, to be separate, but it didn't dismiss the belief system, and told stories more about heroes. During festivals, a writer would write 3 tragedies and 1 satiric drama.


• Similiar to tragedies but lighter in tone and shorter in length, led by Satyrs. It was so the audience could relax more after watching 3 tragedies. They mocked the lives of heroes rather than praise them.


• Only 2 plays have been recovered: 'The Cyclops' by Euripidies, and 'The Scouts' by Sophocles.

Tragedy

• Defination by Aristotle: An imitation of an important and complete action, with specific length and embolished language, with separate parts in specific order, in active and narrative form, tending through pity and fear to the catharsis of passions.


• Catharsis: the process of realising strong but repressed emotions so as to be relieved by them.

Theatre layout




Play structure

• There are three forms of performing in a Greek play: Prose, Lyrics and Dancing.


• The prologue helped the audience understand the background to the story, the chorus were absent for this part of the play.
• The Prologue, Episodes, and the Exodus are written in Iambic Trimetron, with 3 beats.


• If there was music for a song, it would comprise of a flute, phormigx, drums and sometimes a guitar known as a kithara.


• Part 1: Prologue (in prose). Part 2: Parados (Lyric). Part 3: First Episode (Prose). Part 4: First Stassimon (Lyric). Part 5: Second Episode (Prose). Part 6: Second Stassiomon (Lyric)............ and so on........... Final part: Exodus (Prose).

Deus-Ex Machina (Stage Craft/ Machinary)

• The Aeorema: Used to present Gods on stage. Wrongly referred to as Geranos, which translates as the modern Greek word for 'crane'.
  

• The Periactoi: Two pillars on wither side of the scene that rotated to change the scene.
  


• The Ekeclema: A platform on wheels on which dead bodies were presented to the audience, as deaths never occured on stage.

All of this information is courtesey of www.greektheatre.gr