Rehearsal 20-24

The role of the woman?
17/3/11 to 24/3/11


So for me these last rehearsals, have posed the question what  is the role of the woman in the space? we have developed our roles of the children and we have all looked at there history. i am victoria one of the middle children she was 26 when her father died.
Oona's wiki sight helps fill in the numbers
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oona_O'Neill

 in some way w are all trying to act as we think the children would have in the funeral, which is very odd as normally in our performances we try to avoid 'acting' so to speak. now however we have this new scene where the girls all try to woo a symbol of Chaplin ( as a comment on his popularity with the ladies). This is problematic though as now we are both sex interests and children to him... witch is straying into some what rocky territory. although we could justify it slightly as al ot of the women Chaplin married and or wooed were a little to young for comfort.

I suggested we steal an image i seen in another performance to show how much Oona missed the man she loved.

here is a trailer for 'Slava's Snow Show' where i took it from. its the part where he makes the coat come to life (sort of).
http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x1fit6_slava-s-snow-show_creation

we are continuing to play around with the texts ect.. we now have around 20mns of material. all just little snippets.

Rehearsal 16-19

Finding the beginning


13/3/11 to 17/3/11


this week we were really focused on getting a beginning for the piece i think we are all (possibly foolishly) hoping that when we have the beginning the rest will just fall into place. That will not happen but still it is encouraging to think that way. from what kevin suggested we need to work on the way we used the chairs. we are thinking possibly all be in a line sitting and greeting the audience as they come in. Sort of resembling what really happens at the end of a funeral when the close family thank the guests for coming.

One questing we need to address is who are we in the space... why are we eight random people at Chaplin's funeral? we we thought and researched and i think we are going to try and all be one of his eight children he had to his last wife and love of his life Una.

I must admit i am slightly worried about this as it will be difficult not to 'act' in the traditional sense. but maby done a certain way this would not be a bad thing. we need to look at how we use the buffet table, i think even with this we still may need some kind of off stage area. but we will see.

I am very surprised at how well we are working together, i can honestly say there is no problems. we always have our out side eye. and if we suggest an idea we always try it, to try to see if it will work. we are lucky in that we all understand not to be precious about or ideas.

we also have been looking at a set structure for the piece. we are thinking it will have two world's or realms... the wake and the silent movie, our idea is that at first the two zones are very separate then as the piece develops the performers get lost and the two worlds join. we want the piece to start off calm and then gradually get more frantic... as frantic is something we all enjoy, (myself, Richard and Gary) more than the rest but I'm sure we will successfully compromise.

We also like the idea of the silent movie actor finding his voice, as a metaphor for Chaplin (the man) being lost to the 'tramp' character.  

A little note

I think now im going to do weekly entires or two a week i think it will be better because they will be more in depth. also it will stop me from falling behind.

Rehearsal 15

Second Showing
10/03/11


So we showed kevin what we have developed we have started using chairs in a formation so that we have direct contact with the audience and we have the buffet table at the back. Im feeling a little lost at the moment but i can't quite put my finger on what i think is wrong. its very early days though so for now I'm just going with the flow as a have no real constructive criticism, i just don't know what the piece is suppost to be yet.


• Been sat at the buffet table is problematic. (Doesn’t read)
• Distance From Audience
• Generally a nice image
• The Smile music is ‘lovely’ could be the frame of the whole piece. Smiling is a way of hiding, could develop this in a way that could bring in the audience.
• Avoid the symmetry
• Need to establish a relationship with the audience. The ‘thanks for coming’ line was too soon.
• GET REAL COFFIN (I have a number I will ring on Monday)
• Anna don’t go under the table
• Objects on the table need to be looked at. (They must reference Chaplin)
• The table needs to establish itself as a table for a wake.
• “I love you” doesn’t fit. What is this about?
• Don’t give time to get in the coffin. It becomes a bob sledge 
• The darker side of the piece must resonate more.
• Anna’s suicide could be built up. What is this investment.
• Need to find the line between performer and audience.
• Who’s wake is it?
• Define the rules of performance space and audience space.
• Are we thankful that the audience are there? And what are we thankful for?
• Idea of legacy and dying in our life and chaplins life is important.
• We are looking back at history to plan our future.

Things To Do – 

• Make a structure
• Try out opening image
• Its Dark (go with it)
• What is our relationship and position in the piece.
• Look at the worlds reaction to chaplins death
• Add ‘emergency chairs’ everyone at different heights.

Rehearsal 14

Buffet??
8/3/11


So we looked further at the long improv we did around a week ago. its hard because it was so long there was alot that we lost. but we have got a few things from it that we are trying to work wit. for example the Chaplin mannerisms and also silent move actions and gestures. we also are really liking the idea of having a buffet present through out. we all enjoy (rather oddly) the look of people eating on stage. also because there are eight of us it would give a good, almost of stage area because eight performers all on stage doing actions, may just be a little too much.

Although we are now thinking of always rehearsing with food... This will not be good for the diet.

Rehearsal 13

I suck at dancing
7/3/11


after watching the silent films and talking with kevin we all agree that the vaudeville style should warrant a place in our piece. and I'm happy about this. Today we found a vaudeville dance routine and we took on the task of recreating it. we thought that as well as silent movie snippets in our our piece we could have sort of vaudeville style performances too. i don't think we will accurately reconstruct great dances of vaudeville though as today showed... sadly most of our group (myself included) have two left feet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SA6wYvVnq4g

Rehearsal 12

Planned a Movie session
03/03/11


We know that if we want a silent movie theme throughout our performance, we need to watch some silent movies. Especially silent Chaplin films. So tomorrow we are having a Chaplin Pizza Party... Who said that students don't work hard.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nH6pSLC3SyM

The above video is a section of a film with Chaplin, and one of his wives Lita Grey. Chaplin had alot of Women i his life... i think this is a fact we cannot ignore while making this piece.

Rehearsal 11

First showing
3/3/11

We are still all researching Chaplin, through out I will put in my research as its own entry soon.

Today we used some of the material from our long improv and made a short five minuet section to show Kevin. It was all centered around a table at the back of the room. And we kept the idea of a coffin and a wake evident through out to see if Kevin like the possible fictional setting we were leaning towards.

Notes from Kevin’s Meeting;• Something interesting about the ‘gays’ dancing together.

• Anna sat under the table is redundant

• There needs to be value in what Jess and Lisa are doing

• Rufaro spelling out Tobacco was nice

• The interruptions become annoying

• The Charlie Chaplin material isn’t there

• lacks the dominance of silent films

• Rufaro ‘pumping’ looks odd

• Hugging Anna and the break being disrupted is nice

• Kevin didn’t know why he was feeling awkward

• Look into Vaudeville, the material feels like it is a group of vaudeville sketches

• The Chaos is not clean enough

• Setting the scene isn’t important

• The Jazz dance is really nice but didn’t go on for long enough and it is significant for that era

• Chaplin walk is odd but likeable and rather interesting

• Trying to hard, treat the material with a bit more respect

• Work on the shifts between the foreground and the background

• Skits (punch lines without the context)

• First ventures into film were Vaudevillian

• Recapture the early era of films

• Glens walk is good but after a while looses its impact, was better when he was doing it in the background.

• Look at the live and the mediated space

• Look at the story of the train in the cinema

• Look at how to make noise effects

           

The idea, of Chaplin’s walk being incorporated would be really great. I think it would subtlety lace the legends presence through out it.

Rehearsal 10

I Missed it


1/3/11

I missed this rehearsal. Work was done on the improvisation though. I think the group discovered that it can be difficult to re-create a moment that came from an improvisation.