This past week, we began the process of the Director's Note, or well at least the demo. We read the IB's guidelines and decided how we were going to work until the end of the year. This will be a long process...
Looking back at the beginning of the year, i thought the DN project was going to be quite fun, and rather easy. However, now that i have seen the actual rubrics and guidelines, i have come to realize y was plain wrong. I think now that we are getting closer to the end of the year, and the start of next one, we are doing things closer to what the IB requires, which in this case is the External Assesment. I now realize that what i have been told about extensive works and countless hours of working during the IB are actually true, and it makes me feel both exited and nervous for what this challenge will be like, or well, would have been like.
Personally, i am feeling rather excited for the DN demo, because now i can let my imagination loose and just create whatever i want. I think it is the IB project that gives you the most freedom and felxibility to create and imagine, so im looking forward to it.
I do feel a bit nervous about how extensive this work is, and i'm not sure how well will i complete the 20 page project. Plus, the fact that we have to do it during the hardest weeks of school, which are the final trimester dates and end of year exam weeks, makes things a ton more difficult. I really do not know how i will manage.
I think that i have to keep on working hard, and organizing myself, because this is IB.
The closer i got to being a director was the school play. I never truly got to fully direct a scene, but acting as producer and creator gave me the necessary skills i need to complete this project demo.
One of the main aspects is the research skills, which will serve for the first part. For the school play we had to research about Kathakali and the Ramayan itself, learning about the context and traditions in order to understand and have further insight into what we were going to do. Now, the work goes a little further, as we need to research every detail that seems relevant of the context of the play, whereas is the author himself or the historical and geographical context. We have already a lot of research of Streetcar named Desire (the play we chose to work with), because of the English lessons. However, i think we need to combine both the skills we learned by doing the Ramayan and what we already know from Enlgish, to go one step further. I think that this is very important for a director to do because he needs to be aware of all apects of the play before he begins working on it, which also applies to any type of creative work that starts upon an existing work, such as adapting a play.
Another aspect is the creation of a concept and a vision for the adaptation. If we hadn't done the play at the beginning of the year, i think i would die doing the DN. This is because it took us about 2 weeks to define a concept, and we didn't have much experience to do it. But now, i can work with my previous learning and skill to shape both the concept and the vision. I even think that i can use my experience in all the plays to imagine and create upon that. Plus, i think it is important to combine, as a director or theatre maker, both the research and the creative exploration to produce a powerful and workable vision for the play.
We still haven't gotten that much into detail of the process, because we just started and have only read the guidelines and rubrics, barely begining the research work. So i think there is still a lot to learn and to explore in the near future. Still, i think this is great practice for next year at the play and at the real IB product. I think it is nice to sit on the director's chair, and let ourself be the creator's of what we want to see.
Sunday, September 20, 2015
Tuesday, August 25, 2015
Embracing the inner clown
Clown is a very distinctive theatre style, which proposes a certain aperture from within the actor, letting the audience inside the actor's mind in a fun and rather childish way. And this past weeks, we have been working towards training ourselves in the clown style, in order to use it for the One Act Play.
At first, i was not very fond of the idea of exploring clown style, and i thought we were wasting the opportunity to do something meaningful as our last play. But i guess i found myself being wrong, since this is the only style that can actually let me say one last goodbye to the stage at school.
I guess, when we first started working on clown, i was sort of thrilled by it, i felt myself being a child once again, and i even got to forget the fact that i was supposed to be acting on stage. I was just being careless and childish once again, playing around the stage along the various exercises we did. But i think that is the point right? To embrace the inner child and let it come out to play, to forget about everything else and live in the now.
I think that one of the things that i found very difficult was to be completly honest, and forget about acting and concentrate on being yourself. As a very introverted person, someone who does not show his emotions very often, then it became a bit strange for me to be myself on stage, and let all of my emotions be true and honest. I think that although it may sound incredibly easy, it might as well be the most difficult part of the clown style. As someone who acts to hide himself, it became difficult to show himself and be honest in front of the audience.
I really liked the exercise were we had to walk in a circle and then say "my name is __ and the world is round", and do it as many times as possible until there was nothing but full honesty. I couldn't really tell the difference to when i was acting and when i was not, until i felt myself get loose after several tries.
Another thing i really enjoyed was the constant space for improvisation. There were several moments in which there was a huge awkward silence, and everyone was staring right at you. Personally i felt very uncomfortable, and it made me uneasy to think that they were judging me. But i guess that's when the clown has space to actually embrace his surroundings and play with it in the most creative ways. I tried to fill the void with a few ideas, but sometimes, when there were more than two of us on stage, there were too many ideas thrown to fill the gap, and it became rather confusing and disorganized.
I think, whilst exploring the clown, i began to discover several things about myself, and it sort of freaked me out. I became scared to know that i was showing these traits and emotions i tend to hide, on stage. But i feel like there is no better way to end this journey than to be true to myself.
I think the main ideas i learned from this clown experience are the rules of clowning, and how they change you.
To be aware of the surroundings brings that inner curiousity out to play, and leaves space for creativity. In theatre it is necesary to know what your surrounding looks like, in order to use it in your performance, as well as helping to be able to come up with something when in need to improvise. Furthermore, in life, it is important to be aware of what is around you, to know if it is something good or something bad for you, to be able to explore further away from your comfort zone.
Then, to live in the now, the present, creates a sense of importance to what you are currently doing, to live the performance and forget about the rest. I think that this idea is extremely important and equally applicable in both life and in theatre. To be able to live in the present, to forget and forgive, and not look forward, just stay in the now and enjoy. To be able to see yourself doing what you're doing and be able to enjoy every last bit of the performance. Personally, that is what i feel when im on stage, how everything that used to matter, does not anymore, and the only important thing is that im standing there, leaving everyone in awe. Thus, the clown must do the same, but take it one step further, and invite the audience to live with him in the moment. For them to forget their own problems and concentrate on the clown, to laugh and relieve and experience all of these emotions that the clown is feeling.
Also, the rule of staying positive and keep trying no matter what is an essential part of clowning, and being able to stay positive and honest. In life and in theatre as a whole, there are and will be millions of stepbacks and bumps, just like the few hundred ones we hit during our production of the play. But the clown teaches you to embrace these mistakes, shake them off and keep on moving forward as positive as possible. I think that through clowning, you actually get to experience all of your insecurities and mistakes all over again, but it tells you to leave them behind, and it makes you break past them. The satirical side of the clown, helps you look at all these problems from a different perspective, in order to laugh at them, invite the audience to laugh too, and cast them away.
I feel like there was no better style that we could've chosen for this last play altogether. In a way, we learned a lot about each other and ourselves, and let everyone inside our deepest side. At first, my clown used to be very sassy and rebellious, but i began to discover that he was that way in order to hide his insecurities, my insecurities. I guess that for the last time i get to be on stage with my ensemble, as a student, it is hard to say goodbye. But the clown helps you do it, as if a child was saying goodbye to his grandma or something. It helped every one of us, to laugh at it and see it as the last time we play together, rather than the sad reality. It helped us live through the production of the play, and most importantly through the performance. To stand and forget the rest, and just know that the other five are there with you no matter what. To live and enjoy every single moment. It may sound very cheesy, but the clown helped me say goodbye. Because, in any other case with a different tradition, i would have acted as usual and just left heart broken. But now, the clown lets me live every last moment, and lets me embrace with joy my insecurity, but most importantly, it lets me be the best side of me, the most positive and cheerful, and be leave with an honest goodbye. However, my question still remains unanswered, what happens next? What happens when the clown hiddes again, is it dormant until we wake him up to play again? Can he resurface anytime? And what happens if im unable to open up during the actual performance? During class and rehearsals its easy since im with people i trust and no audience, but what if i dont get to be as honest? Will i still be clowning if im not fully honest? Will i be able to say goodbye?
At first, i was not very fond of the idea of exploring clown style, and i thought we were wasting the opportunity to do something meaningful as our last play. But i guess i found myself being wrong, since this is the only style that can actually let me say one last goodbye to the stage at school.
I guess, when we first started working on clown, i was sort of thrilled by it, i felt myself being a child once again, and i even got to forget the fact that i was supposed to be acting on stage. I was just being careless and childish once again, playing around the stage along the various exercises we did. But i think that is the point right? To embrace the inner child and let it come out to play, to forget about everything else and live in the now.
I think that one of the things that i found very difficult was to be completly honest, and forget about acting and concentrate on being yourself. As a very introverted person, someone who does not show his emotions very often, then it became a bit strange for me to be myself on stage, and let all of my emotions be true and honest. I think that although it may sound incredibly easy, it might as well be the most difficult part of the clown style. As someone who acts to hide himself, it became difficult to show himself and be honest in front of the audience.
I really liked the exercise were we had to walk in a circle and then say "my name is __ and the world is round", and do it as many times as possible until there was nothing but full honesty. I couldn't really tell the difference to when i was acting and when i was not, until i felt myself get loose after several tries.
Another thing i really enjoyed was the constant space for improvisation. There were several moments in which there was a huge awkward silence, and everyone was staring right at you. Personally i felt very uncomfortable, and it made me uneasy to think that they were judging me. But i guess that's when the clown has space to actually embrace his surroundings and play with it in the most creative ways. I tried to fill the void with a few ideas, but sometimes, when there were more than two of us on stage, there were too many ideas thrown to fill the gap, and it became rather confusing and disorganized.
I think, whilst exploring the clown, i began to discover several things about myself, and it sort of freaked me out. I became scared to know that i was showing these traits and emotions i tend to hide, on stage. But i feel like there is no better way to end this journey than to be true to myself.
I think the main ideas i learned from this clown experience are the rules of clowning, and how they change you.
To be aware of the surroundings brings that inner curiousity out to play, and leaves space for creativity. In theatre it is necesary to know what your surrounding looks like, in order to use it in your performance, as well as helping to be able to come up with something when in need to improvise. Furthermore, in life, it is important to be aware of what is around you, to know if it is something good or something bad for you, to be able to explore further away from your comfort zone.
Then, to live in the now, the present, creates a sense of importance to what you are currently doing, to live the performance and forget about the rest. I think that this idea is extremely important and equally applicable in both life and in theatre. To be able to live in the present, to forget and forgive, and not look forward, just stay in the now and enjoy. To be able to see yourself doing what you're doing and be able to enjoy every last bit of the performance. Personally, that is what i feel when im on stage, how everything that used to matter, does not anymore, and the only important thing is that im standing there, leaving everyone in awe. Thus, the clown must do the same, but take it one step further, and invite the audience to live with him in the moment. For them to forget their own problems and concentrate on the clown, to laugh and relieve and experience all of these emotions that the clown is feeling.
Also, the rule of staying positive and keep trying no matter what is an essential part of clowning, and being able to stay positive and honest. In life and in theatre as a whole, there are and will be millions of stepbacks and bumps, just like the few hundred ones we hit during our production of the play. But the clown teaches you to embrace these mistakes, shake them off and keep on moving forward as positive as possible. I think that through clowning, you actually get to experience all of your insecurities and mistakes all over again, but it tells you to leave them behind, and it makes you break past them. The satirical side of the clown, helps you look at all these problems from a different perspective, in order to laugh at them, invite the audience to laugh too, and cast them away.
I feel like there was no better style that we could've chosen for this last play altogether. In a way, we learned a lot about each other and ourselves, and let everyone inside our deepest side. At first, my clown used to be very sassy and rebellious, but i began to discover that he was that way in order to hide his insecurities, my insecurities. I guess that for the last time i get to be on stage with my ensemble, as a student, it is hard to say goodbye. But the clown helps you do it, as if a child was saying goodbye to his grandma or something. It helped every one of us, to laugh at it and see it as the last time we play together, rather than the sad reality. It helped us live through the production of the play, and most importantly through the performance. To stand and forget the rest, and just know that the other five are there with you no matter what. To live and enjoy every single moment. It may sound very cheesy, but the clown helped me say goodbye. Because, in any other case with a different tradition, i would have acted as usual and just left heart broken. But now, the clown lets me live every last moment, and lets me embrace with joy my insecurity, but most importantly, it lets me be the best side of me, the most positive and cheerful, and be leave with an honest goodbye. However, my question still remains unanswered, what happens next? What happens when the clown hiddes again, is it dormant until we wake him up to play again? Can he resurface anytime? And what happens if im unable to open up during the actual performance? During class and rehearsals its easy since im with people i trust and no audience, but what if i dont get to be as honest? Will i still be clowning if im not fully honest? Will i be able to say goodbye?
Sunday, June 14, 2015
The Curse of the Broken Left Foot
This past week we've been working on practicing the entire play in one run, specially the final battle scene, as well as working on the last stages of each design area of production. The problem is... we've been cursed.
I am desperate, we all are. We are two weeks away from the opening night, and we have five actresses with a broken foot! And worst of all, its the same foot for all of them! I am starting to get nervous about it, and even scared that another actress will suffer from the same curse. Of course, this is over exaggerating the matters, there is no curse whatsoever, but the entire problem is very concerning.
It calms me a lot that all of these actresses are giving their best, regardless of their broken foot. They are coming to the rehearsals and trying their very best, in order to avoid messing with the other actors' work. And i think this is very valuable and important, since a missing actor or an unmotivated actor messes with the entire scene, in which case the cursed girls give their best to pretend as if nothing had happened. I'm also happy to see them updating us and trying to calm the other actors, as well as remaining calm themselves, to avoid stress and the desperation and feeling of failure that comes when you hit a bump.
What worries me the most is the fact that Siu is one of the cursed actresses, and her being the antagonist, it is a hard blow. Im very concerned about her well beign, and the fact that kalaripayattu demands a lot of physical strenght, that she might not be able to achieve having this problem.
I'm trying to keep myself concentrated on the matter, but it becomes very hard and frustrating. In previous years, as just another member of the cast, i worried about the person and the play itself, but never gave to much importance to the matter, as the producer's would fix everything. Well now i'm the producer, and it is I who has to fix everything. Still, there is nothing to fix, im not a doctor or Mr. Miyagi with healing powers or something, i'm just another student. But i guess that's were my work as a producer comes in, i have to work with the injured people for them to feel as comfortable as possible, and keep an eye on them to avoid further injures and to make sure they are healing, as well as mantaining the cast members calmed and confident that things will turn out the way we intend them to, just like previous producers did with me.
I think that, one of the main things that i learned this week was that there are always bumps in the road, specially towards the end of the entire process. I've always known that, and something happens in every play the closer we get to the opening night, so it's pretty natural. But i've never really encountered it directly, because it wasn't me who had to deal with the problem. So i have been reflecting on what my role is as a producer, and i got to the conclusion that i have to be the calmest one, and the one to transmit that energy so that nobody freaks out. As i said before, if i were to freak out, the other actors would too, and same goes for the other producers. Thus, if i remain calm and transmit that confidence that things will be ok, then the actors will remain the same. Still, i have to push the actors even further to work harder, so that the issue can be avoided. And i think this applies directly to real professional production, and even projects unrelated to theatre, the one in charge has to be the calmest, and help things be fixed as soon as possible.
I've been wondering a lot about what other types of bumps we could encounter. I mean, i would love it if there were none, but we have to be realistic. And it is not because of a curse or anything, but because that's how things are. Now i do think about, could we avoid them? And how? I'm pretty sure most bumps are unavoidable, so how do we deal with them directly? And how do we precautions to avoid bigger damage? And what type of precautions?
Last week i reflected about the trust requirements of Kalaripayattu, and the concequences it brought. Well, now that my fighting partner got hurt, i can see the concequences in more depth. I think that, because we managed to control the hesitating moments, and master our mutual trust, we started to neglect some of the outer factors that could affect us. Thus, when she fell, we both knew it was because we were to confident that our work was perfect, and we forgot about external factors. Thus i wonder once again, how can we recover this mutual trust? Once someone goes through this type of trauma, hesitating appears, so how can we erase it again? More importantly, will we have to adapt the fight? Will she even be able to fight? I think that in professional theatre, this happens sometimes, but how do they deal with it?
I am desperate, we all are. We are two weeks away from the opening night, and we have five actresses with a broken foot! And worst of all, its the same foot for all of them! I am starting to get nervous about it, and even scared that another actress will suffer from the same curse. Of course, this is over exaggerating the matters, there is no curse whatsoever, but the entire problem is very concerning.
It calms me a lot that all of these actresses are giving their best, regardless of their broken foot. They are coming to the rehearsals and trying their very best, in order to avoid messing with the other actors' work. And i think this is very valuable and important, since a missing actor or an unmotivated actor messes with the entire scene, in which case the cursed girls give their best to pretend as if nothing had happened. I'm also happy to see them updating us and trying to calm the other actors, as well as remaining calm themselves, to avoid stress and the desperation and feeling of failure that comes when you hit a bump.
What worries me the most is the fact that Siu is one of the cursed actresses, and her being the antagonist, it is a hard blow. Im very concerned about her well beign, and the fact that kalaripayattu demands a lot of physical strenght, that she might not be able to achieve having this problem.
I'm trying to keep myself concentrated on the matter, but it becomes very hard and frustrating. In previous years, as just another member of the cast, i worried about the person and the play itself, but never gave to much importance to the matter, as the producer's would fix everything. Well now i'm the producer, and it is I who has to fix everything. Still, there is nothing to fix, im not a doctor or Mr. Miyagi with healing powers or something, i'm just another student. But i guess that's were my work as a producer comes in, i have to work with the injured people for them to feel as comfortable as possible, and keep an eye on them to avoid further injures and to make sure they are healing, as well as mantaining the cast members calmed and confident that things will turn out the way we intend them to, just like previous producers did with me.
I think that, one of the main things that i learned this week was that there are always bumps in the road, specially towards the end of the entire process. I've always known that, and something happens in every play the closer we get to the opening night, so it's pretty natural. But i've never really encountered it directly, because it wasn't me who had to deal with the problem. So i have been reflecting on what my role is as a producer, and i got to the conclusion that i have to be the calmest one, and the one to transmit that energy so that nobody freaks out. As i said before, if i were to freak out, the other actors would too, and same goes for the other producers. Thus, if i remain calm and transmit that confidence that things will be ok, then the actors will remain the same. Still, i have to push the actors even further to work harder, so that the issue can be avoided. And i think this applies directly to real professional production, and even projects unrelated to theatre, the one in charge has to be the calmest, and help things be fixed as soon as possible.
I've been wondering a lot about what other types of bumps we could encounter. I mean, i would love it if there were none, but we have to be realistic. And it is not because of a curse or anything, but because that's how things are. Now i do think about, could we avoid them? And how? I'm pretty sure most bumps are unavoidable, so how do we deal with them directly? And how do we precautions to avoid bigger damage? And what type of precautions?
Last week i reflected about the trust requirements of Kalaripayattu, and the concequences it brought. Well, now that my fighting partner got hurt, i can see the concequences in more depth. I think that, because we managed to control the hesitating moments, and master our mutual trust, we started to neglect some of the outer factors that could affect us. Thus, when she fell, we both knew it was because we were to confident that our work was perfect, and we forgot about external factors. Thus i wonder once again, how can we recover this mutual trust? Once someone goes through this type of trauma, hesitating appears, so how can we erase it again? More importantly, will we have to adapt the fight? Will she even be able to fight? I think that in professional theatre, this happens sometimes, but how do they deal with it?
Sunday, June 7, 2015
Kalaripayattu with Master Valentina
This week we worked on the final battle scene, which puts us one step closer to the end of this process. Moreover, given that kathakali theatre, and indian theatre as such, uses kalaripayattu to stage the battles, we had Valentina come help us by teaching us the basics of kalaripayattu, and kerala acrobatics.
Ok, forget i ever complaint about my body aching due to kathakali, THIS, is the real deal. Kalaripayattu, demands a lot of physical energy and proposes difficult body movements and positions, that make your body numb. My arms are full of bruises, i almost twisted my ankle, and the skin on my feet has been torn apart.
Now, one very important thing i felt, is the confidence of wanting to do things right. This is the last school play i act in (not counting the One Act Play), and the final battle is the most epic moment, so we want to do it right. Hence, even if the positions hurt like hell, i think i was persistent and kept on trying to improve. I'm obviously not perfect at it, but i think I'm improving massively at my acrobatic and stage combat skills, which is extremely important to achieve an epic final battle. I can also see that same behaviour on behalf of most of the actors, specially Siu, who is also motivated by the fact this is her last appearance in the play. We are fighting partners, and we encourage ourselves together to try again and again, faster and faster each time, and we tend to not hold back (ergo the bruises).
I've also been feeling more relaxed about how things will turn out, because battles tend to be really dumb in plays, and they look awful. But this time, given the style, i can see a more realistic battle, with less faking and more actual acrobatics, which makes me confident and relax that it will turn out as i wanted it to.
One thing that bothers me a lot, is that some actors are not giving their best (once again), to learn and try these positions. They complaint about it being difficult, and hurting, and do not bother to try and improve. This kind of behaviour is what makes the process slower, because them taking longer to actually do things right, due to their stubbornness, slows us all down. I am not happy with these people, and i try to be more supportive to them and teach them, but they keep on being stubborn about it.
Kalaripayattu has some very important moral and theatrical bases, that i think are worth knowing and following. For starters, stage combat, and thus Kalaripayattu, is based on mutual trust; the attacker has to give his full strenght and actually punch trusting that the defender will defend himself, and viceversa; the defender has to trust that the attacker is fully punching and he has to block it. That way, no one gets hurt, and the battle can be performed correctly. I think that this knowledge can be applied in real life and in theatre in many aspects. For example, all of us as producers have to trust each other in knowing that everyone is doing their work, for us to move on accordingly to schedule. We also have to trust, as actors, that all of the other cast members are practicing their parts and lines, for the scene to actually work and play smoothly. Similarly, i believe that in a bigger theatre production, producers, directors, and actors have to trust each other to put together the entire play, as everyone has a different but necessary role to contribute in the process of creation. What bothers me is that, we don't always have a good realtion with another actor, or producer, or whatever, so how can this mutual trust be established? I mean, i believe one must suck it up and work, but it's never the same. A single hesitating moment of trust can end up in a huge mess, specially when we are dealing with acrobatics. So how do we build this trust? In Kalaripayattu, the actors work together their whole lives, and thus this trust is built. But we have only worked with our cast members for a couple of months, so how can this full trust comitment be estavlished in such a short time? In my case, Siu and i have worked together since our first play and in class, apart from knowing each other for many years, so we trust each other. However, i sometimes feel how she flinches, and hesitates because she gets scared. I mean, i aslo get scared that the acrobatic will fail and we might hurt each other, but i try to maintain and transmit this trust so everything moves along correctly. Still, we've fallen a few times, or hurt each other because of that small millisecond of hesitation. So, even if we trust each other, how can we avoid hesitation?
One of the things that caught my attention the most, is the fact that in Kalaripayattu, everyone works together as a team, and not alone. As Valentina said, everyone is as good as the worst one. And i think this concept is applicable to every type of team work. For example, if we have a scene with three great actors, and a couple of terrible ones (not trying to sound mean, ok?) then the entire scene will not work as well, because the energy might be lost, or there might be a few problems. And i think this is important because in works such as this, that involve working in an ensamble, it is important to trust and work together, to improve together and move forward, not leaving behind the worst one of us. However, i do believe that sometimes one might be better than the other one at something. For example, i was better at the back turning jump acrobatic, and Siu was better as the balancer, so we worked upon that and made the acrobatic work, even though our skills on both excercises were different.
But, the concept that was simply the most interesting one to me, was the ideal of balancing forces to work together. When working on fighting, one must balance the forces and strenght between each other, to fake the punching and make it look realistic without hurting each other. The concept of how there is a point where opposing forces meet and balance each other was striking to me. I think that has to be applied in real life a lot, in everything that concerns the balance of forces. The strenghts of one reinforce the weaknesses of the other. When acting, support is needed, and if one's energy is greater and opposes the others, then the scene fails. Thus, the energy of every actor must meet and balance the entire scene, for it to be succesful. But how can we achieve this? Some people (like me), have very strong and repelling energy, and others have very weak ones? How can we work to improve it? Siu and i balanced our body forces by trying over and over again the acrobatic, so should this apply to scenes in general?
Ok, forget i ever complaint about my body aching due to kathakali, THIS, is the real deal. Kalaripayattu, demands a lot of physical energy and proposes difficult body movements and positions, that make your body numb. My arms are full of bruises, i almost twisted my ankle, and the skin on my feet has been torn apart.
Now, one very important thing i felt, is the confidence of wanting to do things right. This is the last school play i act in (not counting the One Act Play), and the final battle is the most epic moment, so we want to do it right. Hence, even if the positions hurt like hell, i think i was persistent and kept on trying to improve. I'm obviously not perfect at it, but i think I'm improving massively at my acrobatic and stage combat skills, which is extremely important to achieve an epic final battle. I can also see that same behaviour on behalf of most of the actors, specially Siu, who is also motivated by the fact this is her last appearance in the play. We are fighting partners, and we encourage ourselves together to try again and again, faster and faster each time, and we tend to not hold back (ergo the bruises).
I've also been feeling more relaxed about how things will turn out, because battles tend to be really dumb in plays, and they look awful. But this time, given the style, i can see a more realistic battle, with less faking and more actual acrobatics, which makes me confident and relax that it will turn out as i wanted it to.
One thing that bothers me a lot, is that some actors are not giving their best (once again), to learn and try these positions. They complaint about it being difficult, and hurting, and do not bother to try and improve. This kind of behaviour is what makes the process slower, because them taking longer to actually do things right, due to their stubbornness, slows us all down. I am not happy with these people, and i try to be more supportive to them and teach them, but they keep on being stubborn about it.
Kalaripayattu has some very important moral and theatrical bases, that i think are worth knowing and following. For starters, stage combat, and thus Kalaripayattu, is based on mutual trust; the attacker has to give his full strenght and actually punch trusting that the defender will defend himself, and viceversa; the defender has to trust that the attacker is fully punching and he has to block it. That way, no one gets hurt, and the battle can be performed correctly. I think that this knowledge can be applied in real life and in theatre in many aspects. For example, all of us as producers have to trust each other in knowing that everyone is doing their work, for us to move on accordingly to schedule. We also have to trust, as actors, that all of the other cast members are practicing their parts and lines, for the scene to actually work and play smoothly. Similarly, i believe that in a bigger theatre production, producers, directors, and actors have to trust each other to put together the entire play, as everyone has a different but necessary role to contribute in the process of creation. What bothers me is that, we don't always have a good realtion with another actor, or producer, or whatever, so how can this mutual trust be established? I mean, i believe one must suck it up and work, but it's never the same. A single hesitating moment of trust can end up in a huge mess, specially when we are dealing with acrobatics. So how do we build this trust? In Kalaripayattu, the actors work together their whole lives, and thus this trust is built. But we have only worked with our cast members for a couple of months, so how can this full trust comitment be estavlished in such a short time? In my case, Siu and i have worked together since our first play and in class, apart from knowing each other for many years, so we trust each other. However, i sometimes feel how she flinches, and hesitates because she gets scared. I mean, i aslo get scared that the acrobatic will fail and we might hurt each other, but i try to maintain and transmit this trust so everything moves along correctly. Still, we've fallen a few times, or hurt each other because of that small millisecond of hesitation. So, even if we trust each other, how can we avoid hesitation?
One of the things that caught my attention the most, is the fact that in Kalaripayattu, everyone works together as a team, and not alone. As Valentina said, everyone is as good as the worst one. And i think this concept is applicable to every type of team work. For example, if we have a scene with three great actors, and a couple of terrible ones (not trying to sound mean, ok?) then the entire scene will not work as well, because the energy might be lost, or there might be a few problems. And i think this is important because in works such as this, that involve working in an ensamble, it is important to trust and work together, to improve together and move forward, not leaving behind the worst one of us. However, i do believe that sometimes one might be better than the other one at something. For example, i was better at the back turning jump acrobatic, and Siu was better as the balancer, so we worked upon that and made the acrobatic work, even though our skills on both excercises were different.
But, the concept that was simply the most interesting one to me, was the ideal of balancing forces to work together. When working on fighting, one must balance the forces and strenght between each other, to fake the punching and make it look realistic without hurting each other. The concept of how there is a point where opposing forces meet and balance each other was striking to me. I think that has to be applied in real life a lot, in everything that concerns the balance of forces. The strenghts of one reinforce the weaknesses of the other. When acting, support is needed, and if one's energy is greater and opposes the others, then the scene fails. Thus, the energy of every actor must meet and balance the entire scene, for it to be succesful. But how can we achieve this? Some people (like me), have very strong and repelling energy, and others have very weak ones? How can we work to improve it? Siu and i balanced our body forces by trying over and over again the acrobatic, so should this apply to scenes in general?
Monday, June 1, 2015
8 down, one more to go
This past week, we worked on building the last scene of the play, which presents the coronation of Rama and the plot twist of our open ending. Even though we are still missing the Final battle scene, we have succesfully built the entire play.
Working with almost the entire cast in one scene is very very hard. The final scene has four main moments, the narration, the king's entrance, the toast, and the open ending. Therefore, not all of the actors were present in one of the parts we were working on, having to do nothing until we begin setting up their part. I felt a bit useless the first time we were rehearsing, as we were building the narration, which was the longest and hardest part, because it involved a dance. So i really didn't have anything to do, because even if i was directing, there were already other 4 people doing that job. So i figured, maybe we should practice stage combant and Purulia Cchau with the monkeys.
The group of the monkeys dissapointed me a lot, supposedly they had already worked these animal positions with Giselle, but none of them truly knew them correctly, which is their fault for not revising what we taught. On top of that, they couldn't hold the positions for the time we wanted them to. I understand that they are not professionals and don't have super built bodies and Hulk strenght, but we've been working for two months now on balance, holdign legs-based positions, and so on and so forth, and they still can't hold them! I'm not mad, but either they are not trying hard enough, or we are terrible teachers (NO.).
One of the key aspects we taught the monkeys about stage combat, is the idea that confidence and trust is key for it to work. Some of the kids were more excited about doing a kick and a punch, that they were probably just end up hurting others and themselves. I felt that the monkeys understood what it meant, specially as we tried a couple of slaps, and they trusted each other into what the movement meant and what was going to happen. Still, some of them kept being childish and kept on and on about them wanting to punch "awesomely".
Personally i think that the scene was built pretty quickly, and that everything went very smoothly. Now that i think about it, the entire play was built relatively smoothly, the real thing came when we corrected and improved scene by scene. I thought that the most diffult thing was to impose the disipline the actors needed, and to bring everything together.
I think that, doing this scene, the most difficult thing for me was the love dovey part, because i really don't have a heart whatsoever and my soul is as dark as the night, so i guess it was a real challenge. And because Sita, which is supposed to be my wife, is my friend, it becomes a little ackward, but i guess we've come to terms with it.
Being a director is a lot of work, specially when trying to built uo a scene with a lot of actors. It is key for each scene to know the main actions, the structure and the characters to be able to produce it correctly. In this case, we had to concentrate on each of the four moments separately, as they involved the same characters, and build up bit by bit. I discovered that when directing, and specially sketching, a scene it is important to divide it in parts and work on them one by one until they are of a good standard, before moving on into the next one, so that it becomes easier to correct later. Likewise, a director must know to balance his time to sketch all of the scenes.
Given our problem of the excess in actors, who were basically sitting down doing nothing, and us trying to teach them the bases of stage combat, i learned that sometimes it is best if they just sit and watch. This is because, some of the actors caused noise and interfered with the scene, because they were screaming during the training. I also realized that, because they were watching, they were learning and getting to know the play and the scene better, for them to analyze and work upon what they saw. Moreover, if they know how the first part plays out, it becomes easier to get the mood and tone of the scene, and to be aware of the cue to enter.
I've been wondering a lot about how to convey feelings, specially those which we don't know. Personally, i've never been in love like Rama was with Sita (i don't even have a heart so...), which makes it difficult to me to relate it with a past experience, as there is none! I can have a certain approach, but i think is up to the actor to explore in different ways to make it more convinving, given that there is no past experience to relate and use as reference. So i wonder, how does the actor look for stimulus, if there is no personal reference? Will an external reference be enough? Or will the actor lack that special something that makes it more believable?
Working with almost the entire cast in one scene is very very hard. The final scene has four main moments, the narration, the king's entrance, the toast, and the open ending. Therefore, not all of the actors were present in one of the parts we were working on, having to do nothing until we begin setting up their part. I felt a bit useless the first time we were rehearsing, as we were building the narration, which was the longest and hardest part, because it involved a dance. So i really didn't have anything to do, because even if i was directing, there were already other 4 people doing that job. So i figured, maybe we should practice stage combant and Purulia Cchau with the monkeys.
The group of the monkeys dissapointed me a lot, supposedly they had already worked these animal positions with Giselle, but none of them truly knew them correctly, which is their fault for not revising what we taught. On top of that, they couldn't hold the positions for the time we wanted them to. I understand that they are not professionals and don't have super built bodies and Hulk strenght, but we've been working for two months now on balance, holdign legs-based positions, and so on and so forth, and they still can't hold them! I'm not mad, but either they are not trying hard enough, or we are terrible teachers (NO.).
One of the key aspects we taught the monkeys about stage combat, is the idea that confidence and trust is key for it to work. Some of the kids were more excited about doing a kick and a punch, that they were probably just end up hurting others and themselves. I felt that the monkeys understood what it meant, specially as we tried a couple of slaps, and they trusted each other into what the movement meant and what was going to happen. Still, some of them kept being childish and kept on and on about them wanting to punch "awesomely".
Personally i think that the scene was built pretty quickly, and that everything went very smoothly. Now that i think about it, the entire play was built relatively smoothly, the real thing came when we corrected and improved scene by scene. I thought that the most diffult thing was to impose the disipline the actors needed, and to bring everything together.
I think that, doing this scene, the most difficult thing for me was the love dovey part, because i really don't have a heart whatsoever and my soul is as dark as the night, so i guess it was a real challenge. And because Sita, which is supposed to be my wife, is my friend, it becomes a little ackward, but i guess we've come to terms with it.
Being a director is a lot of work, specially when trying to built uo a scene with a lot of actors. It is key for each scene to know the main actions, the structure and the characters to be able to produce it correctly. In this case, we had to concentrate on each of the four moments separately, as they involved the same characters, and build up bit by bit. I discovered that when directing, and specially sketching, a scene it is important to divide it in parts and work on them one by one until they are of a good standard, before moving on into the next one, so that it becomes easier to correct later. Likewise, a director must know to balance his time to sketch all of the scenes.
Given our problem of the excess in actors, who were basically sitting down doing nothing, and us trying to teach them the bases of stage combat, i learned that sometimes it is best if they just sit and watch. This is because, some of the actors caused noise and interfered with the scene, because they were screaming during the training. I also realized that, because they were watching, they were learning and getting to know the play and the scene better, for them to analyze and work upon what they saw. Moreover, if they know how the first part plays out, it becomes easier to get the mood and tone of the scene, and to be aware of the cue to enter.
I've been wondering a lot about how to convey feelings, specially those which we don't know. Personally, i've never been in love like Rama was with Sita (i don't even have a heart so...), which makes it difficult to me to relate it with a past experience, as there is none! I can have a certain approach, but i think is up to the actor to explore in different ways to make it more convinving, given that there is no past experience to relate and use as reference. So i wonder, how does the actor look for stimulus, if there is no personal reference? Will an external reference be enough? Or will the actor lack that special something that makes it more believable?
Tuesday, May 26, 2015
"Non, je ne regrette rien" Piaf and her music
"Chanter est un moyen de sortir. C'est un autre monde", said Edith Piaf, the celebrated French singer, who inspired the world with her voice. Piaf, an adaptation of Pam Gems' play, was presented in Teatro de La Alianza Francesa de Lima, staging the story of the famous singer, and her life full of addictions, love affairs, and most importantly, music. Singing was always present during the entire play, to portray and support the story and what the characters felt, and further evoke the memory of Piaf and her songs.
To begin with, the characterization of Piaf brought to life the singer, and through the use of the voice, the character presented the most important aspect of Piaf's life. The actress majorly focused on the use of the voice, imitating a french accent yet maintaining the street like tone, to set the audience in France but also present the fact that Piaf began as a street beggar. However, there was a major contrast in her rough accent, with her voice in the songs; she maintained very high notes and used a more clean yet distinctive french accent. This idea evoked the memory of Piaf herself, who was recognized for her distinctive voice and accent, which the actress tried to copy. Also, the cleaner side of the voice in the song also gave the effect of Piaf being her real self, instead of the street beggar she was. As the play continues, her accent stays the same, but the street like tone begins to slowly disappear, into a more classier and sick one, to portray her addiction and her sickness. It is also noticeable that Piaf was a very rude character, in the sense that she was always swearing and had a very grotesque vocabulary, which created the effect of her street life, of her not being civilized or educated enough to behave and have a proper vocabulary. Similarly to her voice, she progressively fixes her language and has a different register, to emphasize her progression as an artist and woman, but still keeping her use of swearing, to create the effect of a connection with her past, of being true to oneself and not changing. In contrast, the lyrics of her songs are quite poetical, in fact beautiful, when singing about love, youth, loss, among other themes, which evokes the effect of how music liberates her from everything that ties her, just as she said in her quote; it is another world on its own. Regarding other characters, they all maintained a standard french accent to evoke the setting of the story, and was cleaner and more sophisticated depending on the character's social status, to mark the difference. The other characters had a more standard french accent, which differed from Piaf's, creating the effect of Piaf's different voice, and emphasizing her distinction from other Frenchmen and even singers.
One of the most important acting elements in the play was the energy and the stage presence the characters maintained. The play itself was pretty dynamic, with a lot of different actions filling the scene, however the focus was always on Piaf, and thus she had a very driving and powerful energy. The audience obviously recognized her as the main character, however mostly in the first part of the play, she does not have a lot of stage presence, and maintains a very dull energy, to explore the side of the street and homeless Piaf. However, when she sings, the actress achieves a major stage presence, and projects an amazing amount of energy, to evoke the effect of her expressing her feelings through the art of singing, and taking all the focus towards her, mirroring what was said of Piaf herself and her abilities as a singer. On the other hand, other characters maintained more stage presence, but lost it all completely, as if they weren't even on stage when Piaf sang, to evoke the power of her songs and reflect Piaf's idea of singing being another world, isolated. Still, some of the characters, such as Lepleé, who sang on their own, took focus from the scene and achieved full presence in the scene, similarly to Piaf, to give importance to what they were trying to say, which even though was in french, it was later supported by the dialogues explaining.
As for characterization itself, one of the most notable ideas regarding the songs was the contrast of Piaf's character and her persona when singing. Piaf was portrayed as a very grotesque character, being very vulgar and rude, as she did a lot of cruel jokes, swearing, and sexual implications. This characterization gave a new insight into the life of Piaf, and how her life was full of addictions. However this is image is built parallel to Piaf's persona when singing, which was kind-hearted, lovely, and beautiful, in contrast to the grotesque characterization. This creates the effect of Piaf's insecurities as a person, trying to be accepted in the world, a theme she explores at the first part of the play. Moreover, the audience is set to feel disgusted by her character, yet moved by her singing, creating the effect of how music breaks you out from reality.
The play was divided into two acts, presenting the audience with the story of Piaf's rise to fame in the first one, and her decay in the second one. During the first part, the audience gets to meet Piaf as a homeless survivor in France, and watches her go through the different steps and obstacles in the road to fame. In this act, the songs Piaf sings are a lot more joyful and about love and desire, specially when she sings about Marcel, and their relationship. It is interesting to notice that there are a lot of conflicts around her, such as Leplee's death, the world war, and the abandonment in her life, but still she continues to sing about the joys of life and love, creating the effect of her being persistent about her dreams and enduring the harships of life, and supporting the story of her fame. Most of the songs for this act are done for the sake of a presentation, to Leplee, to the club or even a stadium, with the exception of the songs to Marcel. The last song of the first act marks the definite change in Piaf's life, her turning point into decay, which was the death of Marcel. Piaf sings about his death and her grieve, and expresses her powerful emotions, breaking the goofy Piaf into a broken one, for which this is the turning point of the story, and the first climax. The second act, explores mostly her life as a stablished singer, and her attitude as a diva persuing to do as she pleased, and trying to find new talents, as well as someone to love given Marcel's death. In this act, her songs become more emotional, and more concentrated on her loss and her addictions, supporting the story of her decay and eventual death. It is interesting that during the first act, only Piaf sang, with the exception of Leplee's demonstration, whereas in the second act, three other characters have solos, for which they are the new talents Piaf discovered. This idea of more characters singing invokes a sense of weakness and decay of Piaf, due to her health and mental conditions, which did not let her sing as much as she did before, thus the use of other characters provides the audience with the idea that Piaf is looking for someone like her as she will not be able to continue for long.
One of the most interesting aspects of the structure, is the repetition of the first scene, in which Piaf is supposedly about to perform "Non, je ne regrette rien". The first time this scene is presented is at the begining of the play, when the presentor enters the stage and announces her, thus she comes in and begins to sing, but she fails, and is interrupted by the presentor, who she insults and the scene ends. Towards the end of the play, when Piaf is extremely sick and unable to work, she decides to sing to recover her fame. The scene is repeated just like the first time, but with the presence of his follower and mentee. When it finishes, it is repeated again, but now she interrupts herself due to pain, and the scene is repeated again two more times, until she falls unconcious to the floor due to the pain. The repetition of the scenes creates the effect of Piaf's failure, specially the first time when she fails but then the story tells how she conquers and stands up again. On the other hand, the other repetitions, the continuous ones, give a sense of defeat, as Piaf is trying to sing and pushing herself to do it, but failing at it, repeating as if the crowd would understand her condition. Therefore, the repetitions are progressive and further explore her defeat, and makes the audience feel worried and sorry for her. This moments are the only ones in which Piaf is unable to sing, regardless of any other factor, which emphasizes her struggle to keep fighting.
The play begins with her attempt to sing her most famous song "Non, je ne regrette rien", which contrasts with the ending of the play, in which, even though she had died, she sings the entire song and pours her heart out, even crying. This idea of ending with the succesful attempt to the song brings together the effect that Piaf's life was indeed an inspiration, and even though the path was rough, she achieved the fame and greatness she was destined to. The audience is set to be inspired by the song, and the final successful attempt. It is notable that the song itself says "i don't regret a thing, not a single one", which in retrospects the life of Piaf full of suffering and hard choices, in which she expresses " i don't regret it", creating the effect of the message of being proud of oneself. Also, the fact that the song, the attempt for Piaf to sing it, is successful after she dies evokes the sense that her music is still alive nowadays, and hence brings her memory to life.
In terms of design, the use of the lights was of major importance to the story, the portrayal of the characters and the delivering of the songs. Lighting was pretty simple on its own, and there weren't many changed patterns, by maintaining the standard amber lights with a medium intensity. It was interesting to notice that the entire scene was lit, however there was a main focus on only one element of the scenery, in which most actions happened. For example, when Piaf and Toinne chatted in their apartment, only the bed and the bedside table were focused. This design helped to give focus to the most important aspects of the scene, yet keeping the other parts lit to be seen. During the songs, especially the major solo's in which Piaf expressed her feelings, the light of the entire scene was shut, and only the singer was focused, in order to bring the character to major importance, and to concentrate on their singing. The focusing helped not only to illuminate, but also to help express the effect as if the character was thinking and feeling through singing, and the isolation from the world into another one.
Music was present live in the play, with the help of several musicians who where on the back of the stage. The main instruments used were an accordion, a piano, and a cello, which are traditional french instruments, further evoking the setting of the play and helping to create the atmosphere of it. The presence of live music helped to evoke the effect of a more pure music, instead of using pre-existing recordings that would not sound as good, and would take away the power of Piaf's singing. Being live gave more power to Piaf's songs as they sounded more personal, as if her emotions were creating the melody and she was singing on top of it, supporting her ideal of music being another world. It was interesting that in several songs that Piaf sang, there was no music played whatsoever, which seeks to emphasize more on the words and what she was trying to express, creating the effect as if she was talking and expressing her discomfort as a monologue, but singing it to escape from the tragedies.
There are several connections between our play and Piaf. For starters, the use of the live music and the traditional melodies is quite similar in both plays, as they imitate the French style, and we imitate the India one. Also, the use of the lighting to focus the main parts of the scenes, specially when singing, is similar to our focus on the royal dancers during the prologue and the ending to emphasize their narration, and take focus off the other elements on stage. Likewise, the idea of repeating part of the beginning in the end is also present in both plays, as we intend to repeat the first part of the prologue to bring together the timing of the play.
In conclusion, we can see that the play used singing and songs to portray the story and evoke the character's feelings and ideals, supported by the acting, design and structure of the play. Edith Piaf was greatly celebrated by her talent and amazing music, but she is also recognized by her tragic life full of suffering. Thus, the play intends to tell the story of her life, giving all aspects of it, and uses her most notable characteristic, her singing, to support their message, and thus bring her to life, bring her memory along with the play. The use of the singing succesfully brings the entire play to achieve its goal of bringing the memory of Piaf to live, because she is a singer, and what best way to do it by singing. Piaf used to say "death is the beginning of something", and in her case was her legacy as the French legend, which the actors intend to homage in the play.
"Je tiens à faire pleurer les gens, même quand ils ne comprennent pas mes mots"- Edith Piaf
To begin with, the characterization of Piaf brought to life the singer, and through the use of the voice, the character presented the most important aspect of Piaf's life. The actress majorly focused on the use of the voice, imitating a french accent yet maintaining the street like tone, to set the audience in France but also present the fact that Piaf began as a street beggar. However, there was a major contrast in her rough accent, with her voice in the songs; she maintained very high notes and used a more clean yet distinctive french accent. This idea evoked the memory of Piaf herself, who was recognized for her distinctive voice and accent, which the actress tried to copy. Also, the cleaner side of the voice in the song also gave the effect of Piaf being her real self, instead of the street beggar she was. As the play continues, her accent stays the same, but the street like tone begins to slowly disappear, into a more classier and sick one, to portray her addiction and her sickness. It is also noticeable that Piaf was a very rude character, in the sense that she was always swearing and had a very grotesque vocabulary, which created the effect of her street life, of her not being civilized or educated enough to behave and have a proper vocabulary. Similarly to her voice, she progressively fixes her language and has a different register, to emphasize her progression as an artist and woman, but still keeping her use of swearing, to create the effect of a connection with her past, of being true to oneself and not changing. In contrast, the lyrics of her songs are quite poetical, in fact beautiful, when singing about love, youth, loss, among other themes, which evokes the effect of how music liberates her from everything that ties her, just as she said in her quote; it is another world on its own. Regarding other characters, they all maintained a standard french accent to evoke the setting of the story, and was cleaner and more sophisticated depending on the character's social status, to mark the difference. The other characters had a more standard french accent, which differed from Piaf's, creating the effect of Piaf's different voice, and emphasizing her distinction from other Frenchmen and even singers.
One of the most important acting elements in the play was the energy and the stage presence the characters maintained. The play itself was pretty dynamic, with a lot of different actions filling the scene, however the focus was always on Piaf, and thus she had a very driving and powerful energy. The audience obviously recognized her as the main character, however mostly in the first part of the play, she does not have a lot of stage presence, and maintains a very dull energy, to explore the side of the street and homeless Piaf. However, when she sings, the actress achieves a major stage presence, and projects an amazing amount of energy, to evoke the effect of her expressing her feelings through the art of singing, and taking all the focus towards her, mirroring what was said of Piaf herself and her abilities as a singer. On the other hand, other characters maintained more stage presence, but lost it all completely, as if they weren't even on stage when Piaf sang, to evoke the power of her songs and reflect Piaf's idea of singing being another world, isolated. Still, some of the characters, such as Lepleé, who sang on their own, took focus from the scene and achieved full presence in the scene, similarly to Piaf, to give importance to what they were trying to say, which even though was in french, it was later supported by the dialogues explaining.
As for characterization itself, one of the most notable ideas regarding the songs was the contrast of Piaf's character and her persona when singing. Piaf was portrayed as a very grotesque character, being very vulgar and rude, as she did a lot of cruel jokes, swearing, and sexual implications. This characterization gave a new insight into the life of Piaf, and how her life was full of addictions. However this is image is built parallel to Piaf's persona when singing, which was kind-hearted, lovely, and beautiful, in contrast to the grotesque characterization. This creates the effect of Piaf's insecurities as a person, trying to be accepted in the world, a theme she explores at the first part of the play. Moreover, the audience is set to feel disgusted by her character, yet moved by her singing, creating the effect of how music breaks you out from reality.
The play was divided into two acts, presenting the audience with the story of Piaf's rise to fame in the first one, and her decay in the second one. During the first part, the audience gets to meet Piaf as a homeless survivor in France, and watches her go through the different steps and obstacles in the road to fame. In this act, the songs Piaf sings are a lot more joyful and about love and desire, specially when she sings about Marcel, and their relationship. It is interesting to notice that there are a lot of conflicts around her, such as Leplee's death, the world war, and the abandonment in her life, but still she continues to sing about the joys of life and love, creating the effect of her being persistent about her dreams and enduring the harships of life, and supporting the story of her fame. Most of the songs for this act are done for the sake of a presentation, to Leplee, to the club or even a stadium, with the exception of the songs to Marcel. The last song of the first act marks the definite change in Piaf's life, her turning point into decay, which was the death of Marcel. Piaf sings about his death and her grieve, and expresses her powerful emotions, breaking the goofy Piaf into a broken one, for which this is the turning point of the story, and the first climax. The second act, explores mostly her life as a stablished singer, and her attitude as a diva persuing to do as she pleased, and trying to find new talents, as well as someone to love given Marcel's death. In this act, her songs become more emotional, and more concentrated on her loss and her addictions, supporting the story of her decay and eventual death. It is interesting that during the first act, only Piaf sang, with the exception of Leplee's demonstration, whereas in the second act, three other characters have solos, for which they are the new talents Piaf discovered. This idea of more characters singing invokes a sense of weakness and decay of Piaf, due to her health and mental conditions, which did not let her sing as much as she did before, thus the use of other characters provides the audience with the idea that Piaf is looking for someone like her as she will not be able to continue for long.
One of the most interesting aspects of the structure, is the repetition of the first scene, in which Piaf is supposedly about to perform "Non, je ne regrette rien". The first time this scene is presented is at the begining of the play, when the presentor enters the stage and announces her, thus she comes in and begins to sing, but she fails, and is interrupted by the presentor, who she insults and the scene ends. Towards the end of the play, when Piaf is extremely sick and unable to work, she decides to sing to recover her fame. The scene is repeated just like the first time, but with the presence of his follower and mentee. When it finishes, it is repeated again, but now she interrupts herself due to pain, and the scene is repeated again two more times, until she falls unconcious to the floor due to the pain. The repetition of the scenes creates the effect of Piaf's failure, specially the first time when she fails but then the story tells how she conquers and stands up again. On the other hand, the other repetitions, the continuous ones, give a sense of defeat, as Piaf is trying to sing and pushing herself to do it, but failing at it, repeating as if the crowd would understand her condition. Therefore, the repetitions are progressive and further explore her defeat, and makes the audience feel worried and sorry for her. This moments are the only ones in which Piaf is unable to sing, regardless of any other factor, which emphasizes her struggle to keep fighting.
The play begins with her attempt to sing her most famous song "Non, je ne regrette rien", which contrasts with the ending of the play, in which, even though she had died, she sings the entire song and pours her heart out, even crying. This idea of ending with the succesful attempt to the song brings together the effect that Piaf's life was indeed an inspiration, and even though the path was rough, she achieved the fame and greatness she was destined to. The audience is set to be inspired by the song, and the final successful attempt. It is notable that the song itself says "i don't regret a thing, not a single one", which in retrospects the life of Piaf full of suffering and hard choices, in which she expresses " i don't regret it", creating the effect of the message of being proud of oneself. Also, the fact that the song, the attempt for Piaf to sing it, is successful after she dies evokes the sense that her music is still alive nowadays, and hence brings her memory to life.
In terms of design, the use of the lights was of major importance to the story, the portrayal of the characters and the delivering of the songs. Lighting was pretty simple on its own, and there weren't many changed patterns, by maintaining the standard amber lights with a medium intensity. It was interesting to notice that the entire scene was lit, however there was a main focus on only one element of the scenery, in which most actions happened. For example, when Piaf and Toinne chatted in their apartment, only the bed and the bedside table were focused. This design helped to give focus to the most important aspects of the scene, yet keeping the other parts lit to be seen. During the songs, especially the major solo's in which Piaf expressed her feelings, the light of the entire scene was shut, and only the singer was focused, in order to bring the character to major importance, and to concentrate on their singing. The focusing helped not only to illuminate, but also to help express the effect as if the character was thinking and feeling through singing, and the isolation from the world into another one.
Music was present live in the play, with the help of several musicians who where on the back of the stage. The main instruments used were an accordion, a piano, and a cello, which are traditional french instruments, further evoking the setting of the play and helping to create the atmosphere of it. The presence of live music helped to evoke the effect of a more pure music, instead of using pre-existing recordings that would not sound as good, and would take away the power of Piaf's singing. Being live gave more power to Piaf's songs as they sounded more personal, as if her emotions were creating the melody and she was singing on top of it, supporting her ideal of music being another world. It was interesting that in several songs that Piaf sang, there was no music played whatsoever, which seeks to emphasize more on the words and what she was trying to express, creating the effect as if she was talking and expressing her discomfort as a monologue, but singing it to escape from the tragedies.
There are several connections between our play and Piaf. For starters, the use of the live music and the traditional melodies is quite similar in both plays, as they imitate the French style, and we imitate the India one. Also, the use of the lighting to focus the main parts of the scenes, specially when singing, is similar to our focus on the royal dancers during the prologue and the ending to emphasize their narration, and take focus off the other elements on stage. Likewise, the idea of repeating part of the beginning in the end is also present in both plays, as we intend to repeat the first part of the prologue to bring together the timing of the play.
In conclusion, we can see that the play used singing and songs to portray the story and evoke the character's feelings and ideals, supported by the acting, design and structure of the play. Edith Piaf was greatly celebrated by her talent and amazing music, but she is also recognized by her tragic life full of suffering. Thus, the play intends to tell the story of her life, giving all aspects of it, and uses her most notable characteristic, her singing, to support their message, and thus bring her to life, bring her memory along with the play. The use of the singing succesfully brings the entire play to achieve its goal of bringing the memory of Piaf to live, because she is a singer, and what best way to do it by singing. Piaf used to say "death is the beginning of something", and in her case was her legacy as the French legend, which the actors intend to homage in the play.
"Je tiens à faire pleurer les gens, même quand ils ne comprennent pas mes mots"- Edith Piaf
Sunday, May 24, 2015
Monologues 101
This past week, we worked mostly on correcting and improving all of the scenes from act 1, plus the first scene from act 2. We've also been working on production, as the we've purchased make-up, props and light filters. On the other hand, i've also worked mainly on Rama's monologue in scene 6, which was my main task for the past days.
When i first began working on the monologue, by writting it, i had the main idea and the purpose of it, but i had no idea what to say! I felt completely blocked, and it was hard to put my ideas into words, and most importantly, it was hard to let translate the characters feelings. I wrote several lines a few times, but none of them seemed to fit what we were trying to express, which was the idea of Rama being lost and weak, and asking for the gods to help him. Sometimes the monologue seemed a bit too disrespectful to the gods, which is completely out of place. Other times, some of the lines didn't really make sense, or weren't connected to our story. But the worst was when some lines simply sounded too cheesy, or too weird (spanish is weird, english is better...). I felt really frustrated, and it took me a while to construct the monologue and the scene itself.
Now writting the monologue was the simple part, acting it was the worst. At first, we staged the monologue as pretty straight forward; Rama speaking and then kneeling before the gods. The problem is, i didn't like it, there really was no movement whatsoever, and it didn't feel Kathakali enough. I felt like were weren't exploring the psicology of the monologue enough, and i was dissapointed. That's were the hardwork came in... We remade the entire monolgue (keeping the lines), and added a lot of mudras and acrobatics. In total i was using at least 30 mudras!
It really took me a lot of time to remember the sequence plus the words plus the mudras, and it was really hard. The first time i did it, i finnished exhausted, i could barely breathe or walk (my legs ache...). I guess now i can truly acknowledge how incredibly difficult and exhausting Kathakali is. Previously, i had done a lot of acrobatics, but not in a long sequence.
Learning lines is one thing, learing a sequence of actions is another, and learning a mudras sequence is another. But learning them altogether, that is an entirely different story. I feel very frustrated when i forget a line, or a movement, or even a mudra, because i'm trying to concentrate on doing it right, and bringing the three elements together, that i sometimes forget what comes next. I really need to work on it, and i think this challenge is good to push me even further.
I now know how screenwriters feel. I think that now that i've written from scratch a scene, with the monologue, i can certainly say i know how much work screenwritting is. In theatre, these guys have to write entire plays, whereas i only wrote one scene. Still i guess it was a great thing to experience what is like from the other side, instead of just learing the lines and acting. I think it gave me a new insight into the theatre making process. When we adapted the play, we never wrote any script, we worked within a structure and improvisations, so it was completely new for me to write. I think this is the moment were english literature class comes in handy, because i employed all of the knowledge i had on poetry and plays to construct a rich dialogue (or as rich as a Form V kid can), and give actual meaning and power to the words.
One key thing i've come to realize is that, the collective creation process is present always. I never really thought about it, but even the writters of play go through this process, because for example, the production team helped to correct some of the lines that sounded odd, and the base ideas to construct the script where brainstormed by the entire team. Now, concerning the staging of the monologue part, even though as an actor i proposed the first part of the sequence, it was Siu the one who helped implement the mudras, and the rest of the team to implement the acrobatics and other movement sequences. By the end, it was all of us the ones who shaped the entire monologue, not only me as the writer and the actor. Which has led me to wonder about how this works in real life with actual plays (like Broadway and stuff), because there are many scenes or even entire plays composed of monologues or single actor stagings, and more than one person helps to develop everything. It also happens when creating characters, for example; Gonzalo told me that it was the entire cast and a few extra helpers the one who helped Patricia Barreto with her Piaf accent and to enact her monologues and songs.
There is one thing that i have definitely improved in, and that is the intonation. I always follow the same rythm when delivering long lines, and thus monologues. But i think that the use of acrobatics and mudras have helped me to give different intonations to the lines so they fit the movements and mudras. I think that all elements on their own are very difficult to improve, because they never work alone. So when we put every element together, it all becomes magnificent.
I've also been wondering a lot about our own approach to kathakali, and i think this is as close as we have actually come to the tradition. We always use mudras in the scenes, but it's always a few, in this case we are using more than 30, and we're using them to tell the story and Rama's feelings. In Kathakali, the mudras supposedly tell the entire stories, and this is what we are doing. Also, the fact that we are implementing a lot of acrobatics and kalaripayattu movements puts us even closer to the tradition. But this is only one scene, so how can we improve the other scenes of the play to make them closer to the tradition? Should we implement more mudras, or even acrobatics? Should we dance more? If so, how will we be able to learn the choreagraphies in such a short time? Should we sing, and who would sing?
When i first began working on the monologue, by writting it, i had the main idea and the purpose of it, but i had no idea what to say! I felt completely blocked, and it was hard to put my ideas into words, and most importantly, it was hard to let translate the characters feelings. I wrote several lines a few times, but none of them seemed to fit what we were trying to express, which was the idea of Rama being lost and weak, and asking for the gods to help him. Sometimes the monologue seemed a bit too disrespectful to the gods, which is completely out of place. Other times, some of the lines didn't really make sense, or weren't connected to our story. But the worst was when some lines simply sounded too cheesy, or too weird (spanish is weird, english is better...). I felt really frustrated, and it took me a while to construct the monologue and the scene itself.
Now writting the monologue was the simple part, acting it was the worst. At first, we staged the monologue as pretty straight forward; Rama speaking and then kneeling before the gods. The problem is, i didn't like it, there really was no movement whatsoever, and it didn't feel Kathakali enough. I felt like were weren't exploring the psicology of the monologue enough, and i was dissapointed. That's were the hardwork came in... We remade the entire monolgue (keeping the lines), and added a lot of mudras and acrobatics. In total i was using at least 30 mudras!
It really took me a lot of time to remember the sequence plus the words plus the mudras, and it was really hard. The first time i did it, i finnished exhausted, i could barely breathe or walk (my legs ache...). I guess now i can truly acknowledge how incredibly difficult and exhausting Kathakali is. Previously, i had done a lot of acrobatics, but not in a long sequence.
Learning lines is one thing, learing a sequence of actions is another, and learning a mudras sequence is another. But learning them altogether, that is an entirely different story. I feel very frustrated when i forget a line, or a movement, or even a mudra, because i'm trying to concentrate on doing it right, and bringing the three elements together, that i sometimes forget what comes next. I really need to work on it, and i think this challenge is good to push me even further.
I now know how screenwriters feel. I think that now that i've written from scratch a scene, with the monologue, i can certainly say i know how much work screenwritting is. In theatre, these guys have to write entire plays, whereas i only wrote one scene. Still i guess it was a great thing to experience what is like from the other side, instead of just learing the lines and acting. I think it gave me a new insight into the theatre making process. When we adapted the play, we never wrote any script, we worked within a structure and improvisations, so it was completely new for me to write. I think this is the moment were english literature class comes in handy, because i employed all of the knowledge i had on poetry and plays to construct a rich dialogue (or as rich as a Form V kid can), and give actual meaning and power to the words.
One key thing i've come to realize is that, the collective creation process is present always. I never really thought about it, but even the writters of play go through this process, because for example, the production team helped to correct some of the lines that sounded odd, and the base ideas to construct the script where brainstormed by the entire team. Now, concerning the staging of the monologue part, even though as an actor i proposed the first part of the sequence, it was Siu the one who helped implement the mudras, and the rest of the team to implement the acrobatics and other movement sequences. By the end, it was all of us the ones who shaped the entire monologue, not only me as the writer and the actor. Which has led me to wonder about how this works in real life with actual plays (like Broadway and stuff), because there are many scenes or even entire plays composed of monologues or single actor stagings, and more than one person helps to develop everything. It also happens when creating characters, for example; Gonzalo told me that it was the entire cast and a few extra helpers the one who helped Patricia Barreto with her Piaf accent and to enact her monologues and songs.
There is one thing that i have definitely improved in, and that is the intonation. I always follow the same rythm when delivering long lines, and thus monologues. But i think that the use of acrobatics and mudras have helped me to give different intonations to the lines so they fit the movements and mudras. I think that all elements on their own are very difficult to improve, because they never work alone. So when we put every element together, it all becomes magnificent.
I've also been wondering a lot about our own approach to kathakali, and i think this is as close as we have actually come to the tradition. We always use mudras in the scenes, but it's always a few, in this case we are using more than 30, and we're using them to tell the story and Rama's feelings. In Kathakali, the mudras supposedly tell the entire stories, and this is what we are doing. Also, the fact that we are implementing a lot of acrobatics and kalaripayattu movements puts us even closer to the tradition. But this is only one scene, so how can we improve the other scenes of the play to make them closer to the tradition? Should we implement more mudras, or even acrobatics? Should we dance more? If so, how will we be able to learn the choreagraphies in such a short time? Should we sing, and who would sing?
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