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The main feature of physical theatre is that physical movement is the primary form of storytelling. Key features of this would be use of gestures, encouraging audience participation and the use of music or dance. Instead of using scripts like in a traditional piece of work, a lot of the performance is instead devised. 26 - P1

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We did many workshops on Physical Theatre, which was helpful to replicate different techniques and styles.

In a lesson, we had to create a performance based on the Arabian Nights story. We made sure to use soundscapes and choreographed gestures and motions in order to create the landscape. Creating the characters such as the different royal characters also meant that we multiroled and did exaggerated characterisation. Another activity similar to this was going in groups and creating sounds of the city through a soundscape. 26 - P2

Another workshop we did was on Frantic Assembly's technique of Push Hands, where me and another student created a routine using synchronised movements to express the story and emotion of a poem given to us. This exercise taught me how much movement can come from just two students to tell a story.

To help develop our fairytale story telling skills, we also created a performance where we subverted traditional fairy tale stock characters such as Knights, Princesses and Witches. As well as setting scenes, it allowed comedy through the subversion that came from creating an interesting piece from the characters and setting. 29 - M2

We also did a Frantic Assembly piece where we created a machine and each played different parts of it. Being part of  group and doing these repeated movements started off challenging, but it was all about finding the right flow.

We did an activity where we pretended there was a wide tv screen or device and we would use gestures to swipe it. W e created a sequence with this. Having rhythm and beats was important to make it look choreographed.

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Exploring the features of traditional stories

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Exploring the features of traditional stories

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The purpose of most traditional stories vary, as it could be to educate or to just entertain the reader or audience. However, instead of fables, which are more to teach a moral lesson, traditional stories are more fantastical. A famous example would be the Brothers Grimm's folklore tales published in Germany in 1812 that would have these features and were collected from other storytellers.  As well as published, they also were told orally.

Structure
Traditional stories are usually linear and have straightforward narration and beginning, middle and ends. They usually contain conflict, quests, discovery along the story.

Themes
Themes in traditional stories would be good vs evil, magic, quests, royalty and love. Opposites such as good vs evil create conflict for the characters.

Characters
Vladimir Propp, a Soviet folklorist observed that there were 7 repeated character types in the 100 traditional stories he observed. These character types are the Hero, the Villain, the donor (helps the hero through the quest), the magical helper, the princess, the Father, the false hero and the dispatcher.

Settings
A lot of traditional stories may take place in a fictional world. They contain settings of woods, castles, mountains and strange worlds.

Style of the stories
Traditional stories can be gruesome, such as in the original Cinderella having the ugly stepsisters cut off their heel to fit into the glass slippers. But they do usually contain a 'happy ending' or some resolution, and the characters have black and white morals. They also have a simple way of telling the story and not extremely detailed dialogue or description like a novel.

Cinderella
Based on the ancient Egyptian tale of Rhodopis, which is about a peasant who marries the Prince of Egypt, Cinderella was told worldwide in many different countries and with many different variations. The most famous version of the story was printed in Italy posthumously in 1634 and named 'Cenerentola.' The story contains the opposites of good vs evil and the importance of kindness. It also contains magic such as the Fairy Godmother.

Thumbelina
Written in 1835 in Denmark by Hans Christian Anderson, the traditional story has a similar magical element to Cinderella, containing an impossibly miniscule girl and talking animals. As well as its central character being a beautiful girl, it also has the same themes of exploring kindness in the story.

Emperor's New Clothes
Published by Hans Christian Anderson in 1834, this story is more modern then Cinderella which was told in Egyptian times. Instead of being more fantastical and magical, this story instead is more critical of society and advocates for honesty over total kindness, which may stray from themes in other stories (perhaps because it is more modern.) 29 - M1

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Complicité

Founded in 1983 and based in London, the company is known for their 'disruptive' and 'surprising' theatre, and use of projections, surrealist imagery and cameras in their work. After beginning as a group of four, they have since expanded to a worldwide company.

https://youtu.be/IGYMizsAf_A

The Master and the Margarita, 2012

The performance used narration as a form of storytelling, as well as intense physical movements. I liked how detailed the description was, as well as how well choreographed the movements were, reminding me of a dance routine. I liked how they used a wind machine to show the woman travelling, and the use of the table. The group responded to their stimuli of the Russian novel 'The Master and the Margarita,' written in the Soviet Union in 1937 and published in 1966 by Mikhail Bulgakov. They still had narration containing the novel's passages, preserving the Author's words and yet also managing to successfully bring it to life though physical theatre. 26 - P1

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Complicite The Master and Margarita teaser

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Physical Theatre Research - Gecko Theatre

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Physical Theatre Research - Gecko Theatre

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Gecko theatre

Gecko Theatre is a touring British company, who create performances using physical theatre.

https://youtu.be/UXRo_nsUYJA

Missing, 2012

I studied their production 'Missing (2012)', and took note of the way that they told the story of 'a woman who's soul is disappearing.' There was vibrant lighting to express the emotions of the scenes and intricate set pieces such as a revolving stage. The ensemble members in the scene used choreographed movement to tell the story such as swinging around prop lights or doing repeated hand motions. I liked how bold these movements were, as they were clear to watch and expressive. Although the scenes in the narrative were more abstract, non-linear and less straight forward compared to 'Othello' by Frantic Assembly for instance, the physical theatre element were inspiring with how they communicated the story and utilised their space on stage. The creator was Amit Lahav, director of Gecko and devised by Dai Tabuchi and Lotan Sapir.` This devising process would have left lots of space for creating intricate choreography and also may have contributed to the more abstract plot. Good analysis Lily 26 - M1

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Physical Theatre Research - Frantic Assembly

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Physical Theatre Research - Frantic Assembly

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Frantic Assembly

This theatre company creates energetic performances with physical movements described as 'tasks.' They are one of the most famous and internationally renowned physical theatre companies in the world, and was formed by University students in 1994.

https://youtu.be/jx9CuMObPK4

Othello, 2014

The techniques in the performance like the Chair Duet or Hymn Hands empathised the intimacy and relationship of the characters in the scene, with a romantic scene having the two actors join together and perform a routine. I found that there were less ensemble work than in Gecko and Complicite, the physical theatre being more intimate between less characters. The actor's projected and enunciated their lines well, combining the more abstract physical theatre with the naturalistic Shakespeare dialogue. They had a really unique scene of doing a physical fight, with one of the cast members falling back onto the ground almost like a dance move. With their stimuli of the 'Othello' play, written in 1603 by William Shakespeare, I liked how they modernised the Shakespeare story with their costumes, accents and the setting of the modern day pub as well as having visually interesting physical theatre. This performance made it clear that you can create a piece from text that may been hundreds of years old and still make it modern and fresh.
26 - D1

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Storytelling Research - Little Angel's Theatre

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Storytelling Research - Little Angel's Theatre

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Little Angel's Theatre

Founded in 1961, this theatre company produces 3-5 shows a year and uses puppetry and narration to tell stories. It was good and informative to study this group because we would be telling a story to a younger age group and telling a story to them.

https://youtu.be/lzWZfaSiXkA

During the performance, the narration really helped tell the story. The actor's voice had clear enunciation and a clear vocal change to multirole as the different characters. The bright colours, set pieces and puppets were also engaging to watch, and exciting for younger audiences. The music was also fun, and there were good sound effect caused by audio recording. The ensemble's cast use of detailed physical movements in their puppeteering helped tell the story and made it entertaining. This production helped me see that narration is great for storytelling for children and the diversity of media you can use to tell a story. 29 - P1

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Don't Worry, Little Crab I Free Performance for Children

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A folk tale is a story passed orally among people through generations.

A legend is a story from a long time ago about a famous event or person, believed by people.

A myth is a traditional idea or story believed to be true, despite not being.

The myth of Pandora’s box

Pandora’s box is a Greek myth about the story of a woman called Pandora who out of curiosity ends up opening a box that she was banned from opening. When she opens it, evil spreads from the box in punishment. Hope, however, stays in the box.

The story is age appropriate, and easy to understand for children in the age range. This story would be successful for a performance because you would be able to create physical theatre representations of the things that come from the box and the box itself, and it has an engaging and effective climax of the contents being released onto the world. As a theatre maker, staging it would be a process of seeing what would work most effective, and I would focus on characterizing the gods and Pandora. The message is also hopeful, as it is that even though terrible things happen in the world, there is always hope. It also is a cautionary tale to young curious children (who have the same curiosity as Pandora) that disobeying can create complications and problems for others. 29 - M2

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First of all, we collectively decided on folk tales to do a performance based on. Our group began by looking to asian and other countries for folk-tales, fairy tales and myths of which we discovered a couple. We discussed what kids in the age range would like to watch, deciding that an action packed production would be good for a kids as they are more technology driven and have lower attention spans. We came across some key stories here:

Why the cat hates the dog - Chinese new year story (Folk tale)
Princess Kaguya - Japanese Folk Tale (similar to Thumbelina) that had a ‘girl power’ message

One that we deliberated on was Momotaro the peach boy, a Japanese tale with a lot of action and monsters . We really liked this one because of the physical theatre and entertainment we could give to kids, but after research we found that it had connotations to the Japanese Imperial army and so we strayed away from it. 29 - M2

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The second lesson we had a complete change of direction, as a member had suggested that we change our focus to doing a more native tale that we all knew, as staging it would be better as we would be familiar with it. They also suggested that we do a ‘Mischief Theatre’ style of production, which is a theatre company that make deliberate mistakes as a style of comedy. After discussing stories like ‘Coraline’, a children’s novel and popular 2008 film, an actor suggested doing Alice In Wonderland. We really liked this story and thought that it would work perfectly with the chaotic atmosphere of ‘Mischief Theatre,’ and it contained the journey and quest element of storytelling as well as fitting the age demographic. Just like Frantic Assembly, we could also modernise it even though it was an old piece of literatyure. It's an easy story to follow and gave good opportunities for comedy, as well as a more entertaining, subversive element with the story being disrupted by the mistakes. We watched some clips from some of their work and heavily discussed characters, physical theatre and staging and roughly got the idea of what we were going to do. 26 - M2

Character archetypes were also essential in telling a traditional story, such as having good or evil characters. The fairy tale exercise also gave us experience in subverting these characters and doing something new with them. It also provided comedy and made it really clear that we as actors had no idea what we were doing. Multi role would help make sure there was a wide range of characters, but the Actor characters also had to be well characterized. For instance, a character was decided to be extremely full of himself. As well as these characters, accompanying mistakes and chaos inspired by Mischief Theatre would be a fun show to give to 8-10 year olds. 29 - P3

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The Play that Goes Wrong performing at The Royal Variety Performance 2015

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We decided to model our performance on the 1951 film because of the condensed length of the film (as our performance has to be within a certain amount of time) and the iconography of it to pop culture.

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(Original 1951) Alice In Wonderland Trailer

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At the start of the lesson we rehearsed the scenes that we had staged, such as the introduction and the first scene with Alice and her sister. Then we began staging the rabbit hole scene, deciding to use physical theatre elements in it where we use exaggerated gesture to show the movement of Alice falling down the rabbit hole. This was inspired by Gecko Theatre and Complicite's tightly choreographed movement and ensemble work. 26 - D2 & M3 We made a physical ‘rabbit hole’ by making an arch out of our hands which the White Rabbit and Alice fell through. Then, we did a slow motion circle around Alice as she fell, holding different props that she reacts to. The props were picked because of their randomness and therefore it added a comedic element to the scene. I lifted up a chair and accidentally hit Alice with it as a Mischief Theatre mistake. I suggested that Nathan had the ukulele prop as it went with his narcissistic, overexaggerated character that was desperate to prove his talent to the audience. Then he improvised a song to go along with the scene, and we decided to have more song elements throughout the show as a running joke. 29 - M3

After practicing that, we staged the ‘Eat me Drink me’ scene, in which I multirole as a Door Knob. We studied the film scene carefully, and showed Alice’s changing size by physically making ourselves larger or smaller with our bodies, playing with levels. I kept in the running joke of my actor character ‘Lily’ basically playing themselves in every role they take on, making sure my characterisation of them showed their casual nature.

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Our smart target today was to create a storyboard and to create a new scene. Seeing the order of the scenes ensured that the narrative was flowing. We cut out some scenes as they were less important

We began by rehearsing the scenes we had already created, and then watched some of the film and created the ‘flower’ scene. A member wasn’t here so we got someone to fill in their scenes whilst they was away. We used physical theatre again to create a transition scene, and I mentioned how we should include more mistakes. So, we added in an actor turning the wrong way, and I improvised falling into someone. We constantly insulted Alice, creating a running joke of being mean to the actress with dialogue improvised by the cast. We discussed character dynamics, such as everyone hating her. Inspired by a scene in Mischief Theatre's 'The Play that Goes Wrong' we also staged a fall, where Alice (India) is tripped up by Katie on purpose and gets CPR from someone, who drags her away. We made sure to rehearse it so that everything worked smoothly. The actors in the Alice and her sister scene worked together to improve dialogue. We also went through the story structure and decided that each actor character is going to get one key scene during the performance. Instances such as Nathan having his moment in the introduction (which was improvisation) worked really well and would help the children identify our characters and helped open the piece. 26 - M4

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Alice (India) - Takes her role seriously
Mad Hatter, possibly Narrator (Nathan) - Angry and self obsessed
White Rabbit, Duchess, Court member (Kirstin) - Stressed
Queen of Hearts, Hare, Judge (Clara) - Vain, mean
Chesire Cat, Mouse (Lily) - Dodgy airhead
Caterpillar, Sister (Katie) - Jealous

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We began by going over what we had already done, and also adding in a formerly absent member to the scenes. We made a gag where Nathan gets angry about being cast as a a flower, and staged an argument scene with the lights down low before the caterpillar scene, where it would be revealed that two characters (Nathan and Clara) would be having a physical altercation, and I would be the distracted peacemaker. Then we continued with the caterpillar scene and took out the bit where me and an actor went out of line and started dancing as it felt unnecessary and we wanted the focus to be on Katie and India’s dialogue. I also said that the characterisation should be consistent and to make it clear that Katie was angry at India for surviving her fall in the passive aggressive dialogue. We also began on the Mad Hatter scene, where we put in a joke of Alice getting chairs pulled out under her. Beginning the scene, there was a lot of shouting and it became less characterised and didn’t work, so we made it more child friendly and ‘crazy’ instead of aggressive. 29 - M3

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Physical theatre inspiration for movement

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Physical theatre inspiration for movement

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26 - P4

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We had an important discussion about a new direction we were going to go into, which was a performance even more directly geared to our age group. We changed some things from the original performance, and took out jokes that we think they might not get. It was hard editing these jokes because we had to think along the lines of what the kids would find funny and not like what we find funny. Having less subtle performances also worked better and we found that it was more funny when we had more obvious things go completely wrong (such as the disastrous flower scene.) After watching a scene from 'Peter Pan goes Wrong'  audience participation such as interaction or fourth wall breaks were also discussed, and we wanted to incorporate that in the performance. Communicating about what was working and what wasn’t was very effective as a group, and once staged worked better then it had. 29 - D2 & P4

After the talk, we went over the first couple of scenes and changed some things. The key scene where I am a door knob talking to Alice got changed to a more engaging scene where the key got thrown around. This was also inspired by the 'Clear the space' activity where we would move around the room as a group. A running joke and character aspect of mine was that I read lines off my hand and am even more unaware of what is going on. After the lesson I watched some kids shows such as 'Adventure Time' to find how the story and jokes are told, which I found they were more random and sometimes non sensical plot wise, but with clear character archetypes. 26 - D2

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Today our smart target was to improve on characterisation. This lesson was again more discussion heavy, as we were missing a member and we had to inform another absent one on things we had changed in the performance. A student also began writing up a script for the production, which meant that we could improve on the dialogue aspect. Music was discussed, and instead of opting on a track being played we decided on having a soundscape created by us or by the ukulele in the rabbit hole scene. Instead of doing a more regimented scene rehearsal, we decided on just improvisation when rehearsing for key scenes to make the audience clear on who our characters were. This was more successful because it meant that the characters were more consistent and the characterisation improved.

Some things also were added in, such as me interacting properly with the audience at beginning, and also the rabbit hole scene changed to me holding the baby and doing a Lion King joke instead of an actor because it made more sense for my character. Costumes are planned to be simple, such as me having whiskers, wearing stripes and having cat ears for the Cheshire Cat. Because of multirole we thought it would be funny also if these costume changes went badly and people put on the wrong things. We then set the objective of working on new and old scenes next lesson.

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To make sure what we had already done was perfected, we went over them (also due to the holidays perhaps making our memory more fuzzy). We also worked on including our new member in some scenes, and even decided on his character being obsessed with another as it would be a good chance for comedy. Due to me not being present last lesson I also made sure that I caught up on some changes made, such as a actor's dance scene being cut and a new dance scene being added for comedic effect during the caterpillar scene. We choreographed this, and our aim was to have as much energy in it as possible to entertain the kids. An upbeat song would be best for the routine, so we discussed some music and decided on 'Want You Back' by the Jackson 5. 29 - P2

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We had a discussion about what we wanted to make a priority this lesson, which we decided would be the Mad Hatter scene. We had found it lacking and hard to stage as we had to balance the chaos with the dialogue. We then restaged it, deciding to add more narration from me to help introduce scenes and let the audience clear what was going on. To make the scene more clear, we also discussed the order of things to happen, such as the Rabbit arriving and how the scene ends. Improvising the scene worked smoothly, and we decided to make there be a passive aggressive 'fight'  between Clara and Nathan, as it consistently carried on from the scene from before. An actor suggested using coronavirus reference jokes, as they saw that in a children's production they had reacted well to them. So, we included the Rabbit's character to say the joke 'guys social distancing' throughout as she was quite anxious, or to include masks. We also were inspired by Frantic Assembly's use of chairs in their productions and so had actors interact with them and create levels and movement on them. After staging the scene, we also ran through the entire thing to perfect it. Narration was decided to be a key element throughout the show as well as the physical theatre, also because the theatre company 'Little Angel's Theatre' used it to tell the story to children and it was used in traditional storytelling. 29 - D2

When running through the performance we also timed the performance, which we found helped us place how long the performance was. We also audio recorded the Mad Hatter scene so that we could write it up in the script.

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We were asked to set three smart targets for the lesson which were:

1. Catching members up who had been absent
2. Focusing on characterisation
3. Staging the Cheshire Cat scene

We then caught up the members who had missed some staging, and set again on improving the Cheshire Cat scene. We perfected the physical theatre element of the trees through exaggerated physical movement inspired by Frantic Assembly, and I was suggested to do a laughably bad French accent for comedy for the Cheshire Cat. Me and India worked on adding more dialogue in the scene to increase the length of it, and I also made sure to make 'mistakes' with my lines as it was consistent with my character.

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Today was the day when we were going to be assessed on our performance, so we rehearsed it and then performed it to our teacher and received feedback. It was helpful performing it to an audience as we could assess the reaction and feedback.

- The actor and Wonderland characters were becoming 'merged' so we needed to make the differentiation more clear.

- Soundscape in opening scene

- Nathan turn down the shouting and make his character have a more subdued 'evil villian' performance, character needed more of an arc. Less shouting from Kirsten too in Mad Hatter scene. Less shouting overall.

- Physical theatre made more of a priority over verbal narrative

- Kids may be lost with actor story, need to go back to Alice in Wonderland

- Characters having different voices to Alice characters

- Narration

From there we decided to make some decisions and apply this feedback. Dialogue was going to be cut, actors were going to have different accents to the characters, physical theatre would be applied more and we would add more soundscapes. 29 - D3, 26 - D3 & M4

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We decided to focus today predominantly on incorporating more physical theatre in what we had already done. Instead of beginning with Nathan introducing, we made all the actors go in a line on the stage and introduce themselves as it clearly distinguished the actors from the characters for the kids and the synchronised movement. In the scene where Alice is reading a book, me and two other actors were inspired by the movements of the Gecko theatre group as well as our Arabian Nights workshop and staged ourselves becoming the creatures described in the book. To create these movements we choreographed movements such as spinning and raising the arms. We made sure to visually communicate the 'Jabberwocky' and bird described in the narration. We felt that the scene added to telling the story physically and was engaging to watch. When performing, we noticed that the rabbit hole scene was too quiet and lacking in music or sound, so we decided to rehearse with a student making a song on the ukulele again, a soundtrack or a soundscape to the scene.

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26 - P3 & P4

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As a group we set objectives to add another scene, work on our physical theatre and catch absent students up. We added to the flower scene, changing the blocking to make us more spaced out and flower like and adding more motion in knocking Alice out the way. Like the Arabian Nights and city activity, we also incorporated more soundscape. We also had more dialogue between the flower group as they ganged up and spoke badly of Alice together. I decided that my character was going to be a criminal just released from prison as they were already a shady character. It would be a running joke, beginning with someone mentioning that the props had gone missing which is why we don't have many (I have secretly stolen them) and at the end I would beg not to go to prison and go off with a sack full of props through the audience. The lack of props created comedic effect and also meant we had more opportunities for physical theatre.

We then went over the caterpillar scene as we didn't feel confident with it, perfecting the dance number and our hand motions as we 'made' the caterpillar on stage in a Frantic Assembly or Gecko Theatre style way be clearer here. A dance circle was added where we all freestyled our dances. This scene worked really well for the energy of the piece and we felt the kids would enjoy it. Then we began to stage the 'Painting the roses scene', beginning with Alice chasing the rabbit through a maze. Inspired by Frantic Assembly, the cast created parts of a maze with our bodies, rotating and blocking Alice as she tried to get through it. The croquet scene also involved physical theatre as we synchronized to kick the croquet ball together like an ensemble would form movement in a Frantic Assembly or Complicite piece. At the end of the lesson we discussed characterisation, deciding that Nathan's character should be less aggressive and more scheming and cartoon evil villain like. We went over props, bringing out the prop list and also deciding to use a tray to 'hit' Alice in the face with in the mad hatter scene for some slapstick as children enjoy it. We arranged an extra rehearsal, discussed having more verbal humour and also discussed costumes where I decided to have badly drawn on whiskers in for my Chesire Cat scene. 29 - M3

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We had to update an actor on updated scenes like added scenes and physical theatre. We went over the Mad Hatter scene again as we found that it was too long due to its dialogue. We went over the maze scene and taught them it, timing it and perfecting the movement of the ‘maze pieces’ so they rotated at the right time precisely. As a group we worked on physicality, adding some more into the Mad Hatter scene such as levels etc using a chair and getting someone to stand on it. Always moving and not sitting down gave the opportunity for physical theatre to tell the story and was also more engaging for children to watch as they may be bored by a lack of movement. We also read over the script for the recorded scene to rehearse it, as we wanted the recording to end up flowing well and with everyone saying the right lines when recorded.

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To make sure we were on task and that we had made enough content, we performed the entire show and timed it, which we found it was about 16 minutes. From there we decided that dialogue for the scenes could then be extended. We perfected and rehearsed the maze scene, making sure everyone turned the right way. To have a good example of physical theatre that engaged the audience and told the story, we took inspiration from Frantic Assembly and added a motion of holding up India as a group as she fell back from the rabbit hole. We would lift her body, hold it up safely as a group and then she would get down and end up on the edge of the stage. We made sure we supported her body to keep her stable and safe, and also added some fluidity to the movement to make it look smooth. We received some feedback from a group member that they told some jokes to a younger child that fit our age demographic and they found the jokes funny. After the rehearsal I decided to go over my Cheshire Cat dialogue many times to make sure I got my lines right for the next rehearsal. 26 - D2 & D3

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We were near the performance stage today, so going over our performance and blocking on stage was an important goal today. We practiced the lift scene, and made sure that the rabbit hole launch scene was safe and we were doing it in a position where the actor didn’t fall off the stage. We also staged the final rabbit hole scene, having Katie punch India in the face and us then us performing the lift. We planned for someone to splash her in the face with water for a prolonged time for comedy as it added to the chaos of the scene. After writing the script myself for the recording, the required actors rehearsed and then recorded it on a voice memo for it to play on the speakers as we reacted and stood in a pose during the Court Room scene. We had to do it a couple of times because the cast were reading off a script and they had to pronounce and say their words right when being recorded. We then were inspired by Frantic Assembly again and created a throne for Clara as the Queen of Hearts, where two actors create a seat for her to sit with their hands and me and another stand as guards. This visually looked really good and showed the Queen's power through levels, whilst also working well in the narrative as the three people were also the ones talking badly about me and the other actor.

To stay on target we create a bullet point list of things to complete:

- [ ] Block the cat scene
- [ ] Bock the caterpillar scene
- [ ] Block and script the court scene
- [ ] Script final scene
- [ ] Work on transitions
- [ ] Work in more physicality to the piece as a whole
- [ ] Research music
- [ ] Add soundscapes more confidently to most scenes
- [ ] Look at lighting
- [ ] Find costumes
- [ ] Make prop list.   29 - D3 & M4 26 - D3 & M4

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We wanted to have a very vibrant and visually colourful and fantastical appearance to the production, inspired by Complicte Theatre's use of surreal and bold multi media, lighting and sets. 26 - D1 Although we didn't want lots of props, we wanted to make the costumes and background very clear that it was 'Alice in Wonderland.'

MUSIC PLAN

RABBIT HOLE #1

Curtain-Raiser - Alan Braden

CATERPILLAR DANCE SCENE

I Want You Back - The Jackson 5

MAZE SCENE

Run, Rabbit Run! - Flanagan & Allen

QUEEN BEING HELD UP

Recording

RABBIT HOLE #2

Green Hornet Theme - Al Hirt

LIGHTING

For lighting, we wanted a key differentiation in the wonderland and normal world scenes, perhaps using colourful lighting for this wonderland world to appeal to your target audience of 8-10 year olds and a more subdued lighting for the normal world. Projections were also planned with a fun background of wonderland for the performance. We also needed blackouts for key scenes.

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This skit by Saturday Night Live was a good example of creating comedy about a bad theatre production, and had the same concept of terrible actors doing a terrible performance. I was inspired by the way the comedians performed their lines as it was so overly acted.

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High School Theatre Show with Emma Stone - SNL

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Although we had first decided to have a more 1950s and 1940s style of clothing, we decided then to make it more modern and relevant as it was more relevant. why

MAKEUP/HAIR - Smoky eye with eyeliner, cat whiskers for Cheshire Cat scene, tear ‘face tattoo’, hair tied up

CLOTHES/ACESSORIES - Stripy hoodie, denim skirt with belt, leather jacket, trainers, cat ears, sunglasses

PROPS - chair, storybook, bag of props, cat ears

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We watched the Chesire Cat scene in the Disney film, and made key notes on the order of events to happen in the scene. To create the atmosphere of the woods, we created a soundscape with sounds like birds or wind, and created the shape of trees with our bodies as a way to tell the story. Me and India (Alice) went away and created dialogue for the scene and I decided to have a 'cat-like' type of movement in my portrayal of the Chesire Cat. reference your audience I made a note of the dialogue so that I could go away and memorise it. When performing I wasn't completely happy with the audience reaction to my portrayal, so I worked in my own time at my characterisation and thought of ways to improve such as dialogue and added jokes. When I went away I also felt like the characterisation didn't completely align with my 'Lily' character, so I made some changes and added in that I was reading from my hand and also that I wave at someone in the audience as if they are my friend watching it. I felt that this helped the comedy in the scene.

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Our aims for today were finishing the performance and clearing up the maze, court scene and lift. We went over the court scene, and staged the climax of the performance. We worked on the lift for the Red Queen, making sure we were lifting her up securely for her throne. We also worked on transitions between the lift, making sure they were smoother and that everyone was in the right place. Lines and timing needed to be perfected, so we went over key scenes together. The staging of the court scene needed to be more regimented in order to look better, so we rehearsed that again. We added some more comedic dialogue and perfected where everyone had to go during transitions. Taking cue from a scene in a Mischief Theatre show, we decided to add an actor being ‘set on fire’ (they would safely go offstage and run on screaming ‘fire’) which would then propel into them pushing Alice and her getting knocked unconscious. This scene ended up being really funny and chaotic, and worked best when done snappy, crazy and over dramatic.

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Our smart targets were to do an entire run though, and re-choreograph the Caterpillar scene as it looked a bit messy. After an emphasis on the storyline, we also wanted to continue developing the characters and our characterisation as the characters were a big part of the show. For example, an actor gets hit multiple times and forgets to carry the pain of the injury in the scene after which was important to show. Or for another character, we thought it would work if they looked at the audience frequently as she is very vain.  For mine, I need to get the suspicious elements of my character across. Being able to do this run through was very helpful as it meant we could focus on transitions between scenes and work out proxemics of each other on stage effectively. 29 - P5

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Having some University students come in today, it was a good chance to have a different audience react to our performance and give feedback. After a successful run through, we then performed the second part of the production as it hadn't been performed as many times as the first half and needed some work. Because we were missing one person we made sure to have other people perform their lines to avoid any awkward gaps.

The feedback we received was to:

- Make the characterisation clear between actor and characters to avoid confusion
- Slow down for certain jokes (like nonsense jokes)
- Take out some lines that use not appropriate words

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Today was our tech run, which allowed us to go in detail on the technical aspects of the show. On the stage, we discussed what colour the lighting should be, the different backdrops for the scenes and the different music and sounds to be played. Our aim was to make the show as fantastical, crazy and vibrant as possible visually. Actually playing the ‘Want You Back’ song in the Caterpillar scene really helped the energy of the scene as it was louder then playing it on a small phone. We cut out some sounds as we wanted to include more physical theatre soundscapes. When rehearsing, we measured how to get on and off stage, even changing some staging so that the audience could see us better such as the door scene being moved to the side of the stage. Props were important to use during the scenes, and we made sure we put them in the right place backstage. During the Cheshire Cat scene we went over it to make the physicality more relevant and precise. Although we didn’t manage to get through the whole thing due to time, the tech run was successful and we managed to get a lot of extra touches finished as a group.

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After discussing an understudy for a character due to absence in case they would not turn up to the performance, we decided to go over the flower scene as we had received feedback from audience members that it was boring and too long. To make the scene more interesting and incorporate more physical theatre, we made our flower movements bigger and made a joke of rotating and crashing into each other. To get across more of the ‘bad actor’ performance, I made sure that I said my lines very loudly and with no expression for comedic effect. I also had found that I preferred playing my character as more street smart then completely clueless and stupid. Rewatching some of the Goes Wrong show and the SNL skit helped with our characterisation and potential jokes to add in. We did a run through again, adding and ad-libbing in more jokes that we found funny such as another funny line during when me and another actor play the Queen's guard. 26 - P4 & P5

Alice's costume was sorted for the dress rehearsal on Thursday, and the rest of the group pieced together their clothing items.

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Me and the cast members forming a throne for the red queen, with me and another student acting as guards on the end.

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On the day of the performance, before a quick rehearsal, a key student didn’t show up for the performance that meant that we had to act fast and get someone to play their role immediately. The pre performance rehearsal ran smoothly despite the absent student, but we did receive feedback to change the recording scene as the absent student’s voice was on it and it wouldn’t make any sense. As the other two groups rehearsed, our group quickly changed the scene to having the conversation happen offstage behind the curtain loudly so that the audience could hear it. Despite the last minute change, we managed to restage the show without the student.

It was interesting watching the other groups performances before we got on, as I could analyse what made the children laugh and what they enjoyed. I noticed that because of their age, the most over the top comedy and characterisation were the moments that made them laugh the most. When performing, we found that there weren’t any breaks or gaps due to things being taken out or the actor filling in the role, and they did a really great job in our group to take it on. Our physical theatre was also smooth and well rehearsed, although we did have to take out some lifts due to there being an absent person which affected it. After the performance, we were asked questions about our costumes and whether the performance was real. I think that our performance was different then the others due to the element of the fourth wall being frequently broken and the chaotic nature, and I made sure during the performance to make my characterisation almost cartoonish. Even though the audience didn’t find everything funny perhaps due to age and also there was some confusion about whether the mistakes were intentional, I think that our show was interesting for them to watch and enjoyable. 26 - P5 & P6 29 - P5 & P6

Audience review #1

Comedy aspects were well received by audience as it was a fairy tale, they could understand the simple structure. Clever how we used the upbeat dance number as it was the last performance and the audience were more tired and it got their energy up, the clapping worked well. Story went well because of my role as narrator that also provided comedy. Characterisation really good, all the characters were very different The of props were good as we could mine and it created comedy. The physical theatre such as chasing me in maze was really rehearsed. Improve on projection, but the replacement for the recording scene they could hear and went well. Could have waited a little bit before making a joke, comedic timing slow down. Pace change. Other people on stage in Mad Hatter scene or music playing to create atmosphere. 29 - M4

Audience review #2

At points during the chaos, it sometimes felt too chaotic and hard to get, and didn't feel like controlled chaos. Scenes like when Nathan came on on fire could have been more controlled (this may have been also due to Nathan being absent and us not being able to use a specific charred t-shirt.) Mistake with 'pesto' line, Clara said my line. Bigger movements with the trees in the Chesire Cat scene. Narration lines said too fast and projection.