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My artistic intention for this unit is to create a successful performance using total theatre but what is total theatre?

It is a belief that all elements of theatre are equal. Elements such as, physical theatre, soundscapes, the replacement of the props and furniture with the actors' bodies...

The main idea of Total theatre that Berkoff created or helped create was to give an overwhelming experience to the audience and create extreme, visceral moods.

My personal intention is to impress the audience and give them an "overwhelming experience". To do this I will work to make a total theatre performance including all the different aspects of total theatre that I learned from the drama classes and from the videos shown in class by Ms.Malone: physical theatre, soundscapes, human props, exaggeration of movements, exaggeration of facial expressions, non-naturalism, symbolism, repetition, transitions...

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We started off the lesson by discussing what we did last lesson and started thinking of the storyline in more detail. Our main idea was to have one construction worker who finds a treasure and another worker finds out and they both fight over it, however their boss finds out, takes the treasure and fires them both.

Now that we had our story straight we thought it would be a good idea to think of all the different aspects of total theatre and think how we would add them to our performance.

1. Physical theatre:
physical theatre is a form of theatre which emphasizes the use of physical movement.
Working in a construction site is a very repetitive and tiring job so to give that message to our audience we thought all the workers would line up and walk back and fourth carrying rocks.

We started acting it out. Our first scene was me (the boss) in my office and we had Barbara as a door and Pravin as a coat hanger. Ollie and Gaurav (construction workers) come in get their helmets and go out into the construction site to work. Barbara and Pravin then become workers and all 4 of them start digging and carrying rocks back and fourth. While they work I walk behind them and tell them to keep working, at one point Ollie feels very sick and goes into my office for a while, then he sees Gaurav hiding something, so he goes out to ask him what it is. Gaurav says its nothing, Ollie doesn't really believe it but he keeps on working. After everyone goes home Gaurav stays to check on the treasure and Ollie follows him then he finds the treasure and they both fight over it until I find it and take it away from them and fire them.

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As always we start the lesson by remembering what we did last lesson. Then to warm up we decided to act out what we had so far. After that, we continued going through the elements of total theatre to see what we could add to our performance.

2. Soundscapes:
With soundscapes we mean sounds that will help the audience understand the environment. In a construction site the soundscape would be noisy and monotone. To do this we first thought it would be a good idea if we just played a recording on our phones but later on when we tried actually acting it out with the phone playing the sounds we found it was annoying having to play it and stop it so we decided to make the soundscape ourselves by stomping our feet and our hands.

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At the end of this lesson Ms. Malone gave us a task in which we will have to make a performance with total theatre. Our theme was construction workers that find a treasure. Our group was me, Gaurav, Barbara,  Ollie and Pravin. We didn't have much time in the lesson because but we started discussing the roles.
- Gaurav and Ollie would be the main workers
- Barbara and Pravin start as objects and then they become workers or other props
- I would be the boss

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We performed what we had so far. And again, reviewed the different aspects of total theatre.

3. Human props

We had quite a few props but to add to this and take it to a higher level we thought it would be a good idea to give the props the ability to talk. This way it adds symbolism and non-naturalism as well to the performance.

When Gaurav and Ollie knock on the door to my office Barbara (the door) tells them that I'm busy and won't open, then I go to the door and open it and yell at them for being late, then when they go in and go to hang their coats the coat hanger (Pravin) says "late again!!?" they tell him that they were not late and go on to work.

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Today we had to perform in front of our classmates and get feedback, but because Ollie had been absent 20th and the 26th he was not ready to perform and we had to catch him up to speed, sadly we didn't get to see most of our classmates' performances.

We rehearsed a few times but it was still a bit confusing for all of us so we didn't perform everything that we had, only until the part where everyone goes home except for Ollie and Gaurav. The feedback that we got was that it was a very literal performance and it didn't have a lot of symbolism or transitions and we needed to improve that

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This lesson we tried to focus on the feedback we got the previous lesson and we tried to improve it.

4. Symbolism
Symbolism is using symbolic images to represent and express mystical ideas such as emotions and states of mind.

To add symbolism to our performance we thought that when Gaurav finds the treasure he could have an angel(Barbara) and a devil(me) on each side of his shoulder, one telling him to take the treasure for himself and not tell anyone and the other one telling him to give it to his boss, and not get in trouble then behind would appear a judge(Pravin) that tells Gaurav to tell the angel to shut up and listen to the devil, then Gaurav hides the treasure and doesn't tell anyone.

5. Transitions
Transitions are just a way to make the performance look pretty and make it clear to the audience when something is moving or changing,

We added a few transitions into our performance. When Gaurav and Ollie come into my office and go to the coat hanger they slightly tap him on the shoulder and he spins and bumps into Barbara(the door), then she becomes a worker and Pravin becomes the door, then when I go out to check how the workers are doing I close the door (Pravin) and he spins and becomes a worker as well.

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Today Ollie wasn't here either and we didn't know if he would be there tomorrow so we started planning our back-up just in case he isn't here.

Our plan was that I would be doing some of the boss' part and Ollie's and the other parts Pravin would be the boss, so we came up with an idea to make it clear to the audience who the boss is. We picked up a jacket an whoever wore that jacket would be the boss, Me and Pravin would switch the jacket around when we swapped characters.

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Great but don't forget to explain the theme of your performance e.g. the treasure. Also, you must cite your sources; you should have a bibliography.

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This is a nice insight into the story but try and give details on how you developed the scene and how you explored ideas.

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What did you want the soundscape to do?

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How does this connect to your artistic intention?

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Maria, you show a good understanding of the techniques. There are times hen you could be a little more specific about how you applied them. Also, you must show that you have explored ideas and developed them in order to meet your artistic intention. You need to be more specific at times.