10th March

In this lesson our main focus was to work on the Brittany scene. We had worked on it previously but it was a good chance for everybody to work on it again with everybody knowing their lines and with there being more chance to work on the movement as this is a very important part of this scene. Because the idea of the scene is the characters confusing Lisa, it means that if it has a fast pace and lots of confusing movement, then it is easier for Lisa to be confused.

We worked on some movement in this scene in times where there is lots of confusing, one of the main points is when I am on the floor and Biffer trips over me and then we proceed to run about in lots of confusion, but it has to be with the intention of confusing Lisa, not just random running about. Also at the end of scene, when everybody goes off to battle, because I have to come back as Vince very shortly after, I leave on my line "We don't stand a chance" where I run up through the audience and can then come back down dressed as Vince.

In this scene the thing I need to focus on is non-verbal communication because I don't have that many lines but I still need to show how my character is feeling. Using the states of tension is good in this scene because there are times when the mood of the scene changes very quickly and so to be able to show the change in mood through my movement is vital.

March 24th

In this lesson we looked at act 2. It was only the second time we had looked at this act since the first lesson we blocked. Becuase we had mainly been focusing on the first act up until this point I was really struggling with my lines. Because of this I didn't feel that I could as much into my acting as I would have liked. Because we went first in this rehearsal, it didn't give me an opportunity to observe my opposite. Although I felt that my acting took a backseat for lines, I did get the opportunity to look at different ways of moving around the space. In the section where I get quite angry we had it so that I would stand up and walk away from the bed with a tone in my voice that showed I was angry but was subdued in volume because I would still be in a hospital so wouldn't be able to shout. This worked really well, and I felt that it was easier to deliver the frustration that Vince is showing when adopting this tone. What I will be working on for the next time is making sure I am line perfect so I can focus on voice. In this act and part of this act especially, I think that movement isn't as important as voice, because this is a naturalistic scene and people tend not to move so much and it shows good contrast between acts.

Thursday 26th March

In this lesson we focused on the oath taker scene. Because me and Luke aren't in this scene it gave us a good opportunity to run some lines for the goat scene. It was really helpful to have this time to ourselves as it gave us the chance to try out different ways of portraying our character and having the other person there to get feedback from and to work on ideas that they may have had. In this time I decided that I wanted to play the Goat as a sly character being very shady. This means that I will have to think about my posture as a sly character will tend to be hunched over for example. I would also focus on voice. I think that my choice of voice will be smooth and slow paced.

Variety

I started my devising process by practicing juggling balls and working on a couple of tricks that I can do during the performance. Once I had had looked at that and was comfortable with juggling balls I looked at juggling rings. They were harder than balls but once I had got the general technique it was just about practicing until I was happy with being able to juggle rings. After I was happy with juggling rings and balls, I started to think more about the magic side of the performance. I looked into some more tricks which I could do in my performance and how I would link them to the juggling. I worked out how I would do this and so it was just practicing both my magic and my juggling so I would be able to do it in front of an audience and with confidence. 

The week after I looked at juggling clubs, it was the first time that I had juggled clubs so it took a while to get used to it as it is a lot harder than both balls and rings are. By the end of the lesson on monday I was really happy with the progress I had made and knew that by the performance I would be confident enough to juggle clubs as part of my act. I spent a bit more time working on the magic, as it takes some slight of hand and so I want it to really slick for the performance.

After I had knew the layout to my routine I started to think about things like music. I am still undecided about the music for the start of the performance. I am either thinking about using a remix of 'Enter the Circus' which I can use the comedy side of because the music really wouldn't fit my performance. Or 'Welcome Back My Friends' by Emerson, Lake and Palmer. Both of these songs are good because they mention about shows in their lyrics and they both have a circus feel to them which fits my juggling.

The overall layout for my routine is going to be some music to start then me doing a magic trick will will go 'wrong' I will then do some juggling with different objects and then the magic trick will go right.  

For my costume I have been looking at lots of different magicians and jugglers to see what kind of thing they wear. It does vary dramatically but mainly they dress smartly, so I will probably wear a something not too different from this.

Homework Task About Pace

'Why is pace so important to the delivery of the play'

Pace - 'Move or develop (something) at a particular rate or speed' '

I think that pace is important to this play because although it does have some serious parts, there is lots of comedy moments and so timings and pace become very important. The first act of this play I think should be fast paced throughout, there shouldn't be any lulls in pace and there should be constant movement. On the other hand, act two is a lot slower, there are blackouts, as well as parts with little to no dialogue. Because of the very sudden change between the two acts, as a cast we have to make sure that the speed from the first act, doesn't carry on into the next.

The play 4.48 Psychosis is a play written by Sarah Kane. It explores the subject of mental illness through a very Brecht like way. There is no setting or no real characters and the dialogue varies from naturalistic to almost poetic. The lack of setting is similar in Dissocia because although it vaguely mentions settings, there isn't any real description of them. Although Dissocia doesn't use any Brecht techniques, it still has a very fast pace matching 4.48 Psychosis.

An example of a slow paced performance is the production of Electra we saw. I felt that although there wasn't any cuts, I didn't feel that it went anywhere in excitement levels. which is similar to the second act of Dissocia. Although there is lots of things going on, there isn't anything particularly thrilling or out of the ordinary.

Lesson 12th February

In this lesson we read through act 1 of the play. We did not have Rachel in this lesson so we took it upon ourselves to do a read through. It was the first time we had read through the whole of the act together as a class. It was quite challenging because it was double cast so it was hard to split the lines up. However my opposite wasn't there for the lesson so it gave me a good opportunity to read all of the lines. What i found really helpful about the read through was having other cast members around to say their lines instead of having to imagine them being said like I had when reading through it alone. The thing that surprised me with the read through was how some people delivered their lines differently to how I imagined them in my head and this sometimes meant that I had to change the way I delivered my lines and it gave them a completely different meaning. The part that I found the most helpful to read through was the voice over parts. Even though they aren't long passages of speech, in the actual performance they will only be voice and no movement so it gave me a chance to try out different ways of delivering the lines so I could put plenty of emotion into them.

It was useful doing the run through before tacking the large chunks of blocking because it gave us all an overall feel for the play before picturing it on stage

24th Febuary Lesson

In this lesson we looked at the goat scene. Before we looked at it we looked at sorting out a level from one to ten on our characters social status. Me and Luke both had different ideas so we did not end up on the same level. I put the goat as level 3 because of his bad intentions in this scene and that the way he treats Lisa is poor and becuase is is almost sly and secretive, it has an element of sleaziness about it. Luke put the Goat at around a level 5 because he felt that although the Goat is sleazy, it isn't as bad as I thought it was. 

I felt that as well as this is my biggest scene in the play, is is also the most challenging because it has my most lines, which I am finding hard to get in the right order, and also needs the most movement. Another challenge in this scene is the mature content and it touches on some very adult ideas that I personally haven't had to portray on stage, so we all had to make sure we dealt with it in a grown up and respectful way so that it comes across to the audience in a professional way. We all decided that we would not show anything explicit on stage but just to suggest it. 

When blocking this scene i was making notes in my script so that I know where on stage I need to be as well as what movements I need to do. I start off on one of the stage blocks on the corner of the stage, when we rehearse this further I will think about the different ways I can react to Lisa being there and how I can be subtle about it as not to draw attention. Because I am going to be high up at the very back of the stage I will need to make sure that I am projecting properly so that I can be heard, this is something I can work on outside of rehearsals whilst running lines, and doing projection exercises. 

I was really happy with what we managed to run through today and I am not comfortable with being able to put movements to my lines when learning them.