Manifesto- Chapter 1: Intro

 This post might just be the most important post that I have ever posted or will ever post. It is my theatrical manifesto. Deadlines are flowing out (like endless rain into a paper cup) yet I don't think I can suppress this much longer. Having now fully decided that my professional career will be related to theatre, I feel a deep need to write the manifesto of my beliefs.
 The first point is concerning what those of adult age are probably thinking about this so far. Writing a theatrical manifesto at seventeen? Well, that is precisely the point. I am fully aware that I have not had the theatrical or even life experience to have a solid empirically-based declaration of what my theatre should be like. But... so what? After a subtle reminder, I came to the conclusion that most of the highly praised and influential theatre practitioners and actors in the world have one thing in common: truth. To limit this to theatre is foolish, for all art forms are ways to seek truth through different means. Another foolish thing to do would be to define how this truth is to be found or even what this truth actually is. Is the Method the ultimate path for the pursuit of truthfulness in a part? Of course not. Stock characterization? Brechtian method? Meisnerian method? No, no, no.
 For along time I thought I was getting the wrong answers when I was really asking the wrong questions. Truth? What could be more truthful, more immaculately uncorrupted than the theatrical opinions of a seventeen year old? Still untouched by the pretentious curse that comes with this trade, not yet smudged by the gaudiness of the bright lights of the West Wend and Broadway. No. The importance of this post is related to the fact that it is being written by me, for me. For and directly to future me. The version of myself that will be tempted by the old traditional Shakespeare and the anarchic anti-establishement no-method method that will surely mutate into some strange form in the future. Sebas, do whatever you want to do. You and I are aware of what we think is right and what we think is important. Seventeen, twenty-three, fifty-four... God knows what we'll be doing then. For now, my RI is calling. Catch you later.

Brecht and his techniques

Dramatic Theatre	Epic Theatre
Plot	Narrative
Implicates the spectator in a stage situation	Turns the spectator into an observer
Wears down his capacity for action	Arouses his capacity for action
Provides him with sensations	Forces him to take decisions
Experience	Picture of the world
The spectator is involved in something	He is made to face something
Suggestion	Argument
Instinctive feelings are preserved	Brought to the point of recognition
The spectator is in the thick of it, shares the experience	The spectator stands outside, studies
The human being is taken for granted	The human being is the object of the enquiry
He is unalterable	He is alterable and able to alter
Eyes on the finish	Eyes on the course
One scene makes another	Each scene for itself
Growth	Montage
Linear development	In curves
Evolutionary determinism	Jumps
Man as a fixed point	Man as a process
Thought determines being	Social being determines thought
Feeling	Reason

 Verfrumdungseffekt/Alienation Technique

  This technique is based on making ordinary events epic and detaching the audience emotionally from the play. Brecht developed this in the 1920’s and 30’s because he thought that emotional attachment to a play made it difficult to see its real message. In a conventional play the production was made for the audience to feel what the characters were feeling, focusing on emotion rather than social criticism. He disliked “escapism” and thought people should be faced with real-world issues, keeping always emotional distance from the characters. The best example of this is in his play Mother Courage and Her Children in which no sympathy is created for the mother, and instead makes the audience question the actions of the characters and the performance they’ve seen. "Art is not a mirror held up to reality but a hammer with which to shape it." This sense of strangeness is also achieved through the use of placards, which reveal the events of each scene, juxtaposition, actors changing characters and costume on stage, the use of narration, simple props and scenery and using happy melodies with heavy lyrics.

Didacticism and Breaking the Forth Wall

 Brecht believed that theatrical pieces should have a moral lesson behind them. His plays were used to teach both the audience and the actors about certain aspects of society, politics or economy. Communist in his beliefs, Brecht criticism usually focused on how society was unequal and how the upper classes were evil. “The Forth Wall” is a term used to define an imaginary wall separating the audience from the stage. In realistic productions, actors do not “break” this wall by looking and acknowledging the audience, simulating therefore real events. The audience therefore is physically separated from the action, but more emotionally involved because of its story and because there is a sense that the action is happening far away. Brecht believed however that the audience should be faced with moral dilemmas on the spot and with this grip them to the narrative, despite it possibly involve a break in character. This is also used to make the audience feel apart of the action and not merely observing; being faced with moral decisions in a pro-active way.

Gestus

Brecht believed that an actor should present a character in a way that wasn't an impersonation, rather, a narration of the actions of the character. He did this because he wanted to constantly remind his audience that they were watching a play. He also believed that if the audience developed an emotional attachment to the characters, then they could not evaluate the social realities of the play. Stanislavski thought that if an actor believed he was a character, then the audience would believe this as well, and feel the emotions that the character was feeling. Brecht did not want this to happen; he wanted the audience to question, make comment and interpret what was on the stage. The Brechtian theatre does not show the human nature of an individual but reveals collective human relations. The story is the point of interest, not the characters. The story is the sequence of events that is the social experiment, allowing the interplay of social forces, from which the play's lesson emerges. If the audience does not maintain a distance between the characters and themselves then this cannot be achieved. Acting in Epic Theatre means that an actor is required to play characters believably without convincing either the audience or themselves that they are, indeed, the characters. There is an audible and visual distance between the actor and their character and the actors will often 'break the fourth wall' and address the audience, play multiple characters, and use exaggerated or repetitive actions to make their distance and social commentary known.

Gestus is a theatrical technique that helps define the emotion within a character and the context they are in. It is the combination of a gesture and a social meaning into one movement, stance or vocal display. It can be alienating and jar the audience, as it is an unusual and non realistic way of forcing them to see the "bigger picture" of a situation. It is sometimes referred to as the 'social gest', as it is an action that allows the audience to understand something specific about the social circumstances presented on stage.

Ceci n'est pas un post par les Parents Evening

Edward Gordon Craig

The illegitimate son of the architect Edward Godwin and actress Ellen Terry, Craig was born Edward Godwin on 16 January 1872 in Hertfordshire, England, and baptised at age 16 as Edward Henry Gordon. He took the surname Craig by deed poll at age 21.  Craig spent much of his childhood (from the age of 8 in 1889 to 1897) backstage at the Lyceum Theatre, where his mother was the leading lady to actor Sir Henry Irving. This close contact to Theatre was what led Craig to the world of theatre since he was surrounded by it most of his childhood.

 

Lighting

Edward Gordon Craig inspiration for lighting came from Hubert von Kerkomer. In on of his plays he witnessed the use of light gauzes and electric lighting, which was quite inovative since most people used sort of oil lamps for ilumination. Craig commented saying “the absence of footlights made the actors look less artificial. Side-lit gauzes placed in front of backcloths amazed audiences used to painted gauzes used in pantomine scenes”. He then decided that he would use gauzes and side-lights with different colours in his shows, and the rest of the lighting would come only from above the proscenium. Rejected footlights. concealed lights and movable spots were some other characteristics of his lighting legacy, the lighting needed to provide more than just ilumination. He was a visionary in this field because he believed that lighting needed to be a gateway to the imagination and a metaphorical symbolism to the play and not just a way to iluminate the actors and stage. 

He used these new lighting methods in the 1900’s production of Dido and Aeneas, especially the use of different colored lighting. He also used light to transform stage space, liberating the audience’s imagination. In transitions, he successfully achieved subtle shifts of light and vibrant sudden color combinations, which were used for deliberate clashes. The use of colored lighting was most successfully used in the final scene, in which a yellow light from above created a beautiful tragic ending to the play.

Stage

Slidding pannels was his most famous invention. According to W. B. Yeats, Craig told him that “That we shall have a means of staging everything that is not naturalistic, and that out of his invention may grow a completely new method for even our naturalistic plays.” These pannels stand on stage as they truly are. Opposing to naturalism, these pannels do not attempt to imitate natrure, nor are they painted with realistic or decorative designs to be taken in an evident and literal way. Once a friend of his told him that they were “a nice place” and since then he always used that expression in reference to his pannels. Rejecting realism, he disliked the expression “scene” because it looked artisticly false, while a place was real and could adapt to the actor’s movements. This invention of his consisted on a group of screens which stood up by themselves. The effects and different settings would be created by the actor’s position in relation to the pannel, and the different lighting that would incide on it.

He had a great passion for pupets, stating once that "There is only one actor – nay one man who has the soul of the dramatic poet, and who has ever served as the true and loyal interpreter of the poet," he proclaimed, and "this is the marionette.

In short, he wanted to exploit the theatreness of theatre. Using every single theatrical element ( space, scenery, lighting, costume) to better express the message of the text.

Realism and Naturalism in Theatre

Realism

Starting in the early 19th century, realism was an art movement that shifted from the unrealistic fairy-tale or fantastic situations and characters theater-goers normally found in romantic plays. The Theater Dictionary indicates that many people consider Henrik Ibsen the father of the modern realism for the three-dimensional characters he created and the situations in which he put them. People in the audience could relate to the activities occurring on stage and the individuals involved.

Naturalism

Charles Darwin's book "The Origin of Species" influenced the theatrical world through the naturalistic genre. Darwin theorized that the fittest of a species would survive and pass on its genetic material, which dramatists translated into a dramatic genre that focused on how genetics and social advancement affect individuals. The naturalistic focus in art and literature is to address subjects in a scientific manner, with the artist serving as a disinterested party who observes and studies it. Authors who attempted this daunting task include Emile Zola.

Similarities

Dramatists intend that naturalistic and realistic plays should depict events that could happen in real life, maybe even to members of the audience. Both genres focus on individuals and families, and generally relate to everyday situations. During the late 1800s and early 1900s, playwrights found ample subject matter for these genres as the sciences advanced and people struggled and fought against oppressive governing systems. These changes in society were frequently the subject of both naturalistic and realistic plays.

Differences

Naturalism approaches art in a more scientific, almost clinical, manner than realism. Both genres may have dealt with the emotional and family struggles of the characters; realistic plays often had characters to whom the audience could relate and sympathize. Naturalistic plays, which were difficult to create and rarely popular, approached every element with the detachment of a scientist, according to educators at Northern Virginia Community College. Realistic plays could show characters breaking free from difficult situations and allow the audience to empathize with their plight; Naturalistic works, on the other hand, sought only to study the situation, characters and other factors without interpretation.

Macbeth- Review

 Following the plot of the original Shakespearean story, Macbeth is a comedy interpreted by three actors using a ridiculously low amount of props and lighting. It was without a doubt, the best Portuguese play I have ever seen and I am still mesmerized by it. The performances were great, each one had to portray several characters, like Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, reporters, children… All of them done perfectly. Perhaps the most impressive characteristic of the play was the physicality. The actors used their bodies very precisely and skillfully, giving life and a lot of humor to the play. 

 The use of sound was great too, using almost always their voices to convey dark caves or cheerful dinners. One element they used quite a lot was a format that consisted on a journalist interviewing different characters of the classic play, so the story could be told more easily and creating humorous opportunities as well. Having almost no props, the creativity had to step up, and so it did. The battles for example, were reenacted using only two men fighting their microphone stands with knives and having full castle doors portrayed by two cables. The play had a very fast and intense energy throughout, and there was a single moment of boredom or stillness (unless it was used for comic effects), the transitions were perfectly smooth and synchronized, all of this making Macbeth one of the greatest plays these young eyes have ever witnessed. 

 Chapito was the company that made this play that was set up 30 years, and it works to integrate into the world young people through circus and theatre in a professional and formative way, giving them formation and the necessary skills to improve their creative ability and social formation. It was created to expand the value of social and cultural arts in Portugal, making it a national reference in terms of the performing arts.

The Woman in Black

 My experience in the production of “The Woman in Black” was quite rich and varied. Unable to help before, I could only be useful to the director the week before the play and during the actual performances. One a few technical rehearsals, I took a closer look at the lighting, helping out as much as I could. I realized straight away that it was trickier than I thought on many levels. First, the actual technology took me a while to get, having the control panel to actually be up and running with the necessary lights attached took away most of our time. Having done that, you only have to flip the switches and I found this later stage quite amazing even. On other part of this that I hadn’t seen before was the setting up of the lights, having someone on a scaffold adjusting so it had the right color and covers the right area of space. The actual play was quite tricky in terms of lighting, since there were quite a few blackouts and very particular parts of the stage had to illuminated at different times. On the days of the performance, I did front of house, where I was also able to help out on the details and last minute changes to the set and setting, stunned by all the stress. Doing front of house was quite amusing, talking to the audience both before and after the play was helpful on giving me some ideas of what worked and what didn’t and how I can fix that when I stage a play.

The play was about a man who saw the ghost of a woman (the woman in black) and the sight of said phantom resulted in the death of his son and wife. In order to fix his traumas, he asked an actor to act out his story so it could be told in an effective and slightly entertaining way so that he could live in peace. The stage was therefore very minimalistic, which is even mention on the script since the Arthur Kipps (the traumatized man) was afraid that simple objects could not portray real life structures and environments. Being a horror story, the lighting was very dim and never intense, giving a creepy feel to the story. On one of the scenes there was no electric lighting and the actor only used matches to light the stage, which I think worked really well. The performances were amazing, specially the actor playing Arthur Kipps, since he had to perform different characters with very specific personalities and accents. The pre-recorded sound was also very well used and perfectly timed, and was the prime contributor to some of the audience’s jumps and setting the space. The only thing I did not like in the play was the consistent blackouts that happened. I think that overusing that element made the pace very uneven and the play a bit less scary since the play completely stopped for a couple of seconds really often. Overall I was very impressed by the production, mainly because they managed to do a fantastic and scary performance with very little props, time and actors.

Just as a final note, I want to share a funny and slightly embarrassing incident that happened on the first night of the performance. It was a particularly cold night, and before the performance someone had forgotten to turn on the heaters on the hall, so it is needless to say the people were freezing. When people left during the break, a woman came up to me and said: “Can’t you turn on the heater? It’s freezing in there!” Attempting to make things better through a bit of humor, I stated that “it was all part of the play” making you shiver in every way. I waited for a sympathetic smile, but all I got was a serious face and a blunt: “Turn on the heaters, please”.

Elements of Great Composition and 7-minute play

 Using the Black Box as the stage, we were asked to pick up different elements from the space, be it a heater or a light, a turn it into something different. For example, having one plug hanging from the ceiling is a piñata. Having done that, we were told to a 7-minute performance with the elements we chose to modify. Each person had to direct and invent a one-minute performance and I chose to use the heater being a dog. In this scene, I was trying to save my dog from a dystopian future where humans had to eat dogs to survive. After each one of us did something different, we were told introduced to Zen Zen Zo’s elements of Great Composition that are:

-Extremity

-Contrast/Juxtaposition

-Broken Expectations

-Surprise Entrances and Exits

-Revelation/Transformation of - Space/Object/Character

-Moments of Simultaneous Action/Unison

-Moments of Stillness/Silence

-The Elements - Earth, Air, Fire, Water, Metal

-Sex, Death, Food

-Humour

-Interesting Relationships with the Audience

-A Journey

-The 'WHOOSH' Factor ('wow moments' that combine and roll on)

-Articulate Use of All the Viewpoints

-Metaphor/Moments that use Theatrical Poetry

 We had to use one of these elements into our part, and I choose to have a moment of stillness and silence. I believe it had the effect I want, which was to build tension right after the survivors of the post-apocalyptic world attacked me. This exercise was useful for us to get used to work in a very short amount of time, and feeling the stresses of a director and performer. It was also a good opportunity to use stillness from the Suzuki training and at the same time learn about these elements that will, without a doubt, come handy in the future.

House Plays

The Lady and the Lion- Excellent shadow work, effective and interesting way to tell the story. Great performances and creative way to play with levels when the Lady was talking to the sun and the moon. The use of shadows made it hard for the audience to understand some parts of the dialogue, plus the expressions of the characters couldn't be seen at most times.

Hansel and Gretel- An interesting contrast between dark moods and comic reliefs. Trees and other natural elements were played by actual actors, which were coordinated with each other like clockwork. The lighting was used very effectively changing the mood of the play throughout, and the old woman in the original tale was modified into a much more interesting and intriguing character. Great use of space and very good audience awareness. The climax was perhaps a little too relaxed, spoiling the rest of the play.

Little Red Cap (my play and experience)- The final outcome of our play was pretty weak. Even though our play was the shortest and we only had one month of practice, a lack of commitment from the whole cast made it very hard to generate something worth watching and comparable to the other two. It did serve to teach me a hard lesson about theatre. Not to expect any miracles. If a person is too afraid to give ideas, isn't not motivated and lacks interest in the play, one can not expect a good result. Playing the wolf, I decided to make them part more humorous than intended, and it got a couple of laughs. But it was pretty evident that it was below the average that night.

 By watching the other plays rehearse and perform, I learned about the importance of group chemistry, hard work at rehearsals and commitment. In the technical point of view, I discovered new and more interesting ways to play with shadows, architecture and lighting. By making our play, the only thing that made it all worth it (besides the harsh lessons) was something that happened after the play. When a little girl came up to me and made a howling sound, thinking I was actually the wolf. And although this may sound incredibly cheesy, the fact that a girl that was no more than ten was entertained by something I did, made everything single practice worth it, and the moment is sure to stay in my memory for a long time.

Chinese Theatre

 In the Song Dynasty, there were many popular plays involving acrobatics and music. These developed in the Yuan Dynasty into a more sophisticated form known as zaju, with a four or five act structure. Yuan drama spread across China and diversified into numerous regional forms, the best known of which is Beijing Opera, which is still popular today. It generally involves very elaborated wardrobe and the acting is quite exaggerated and evident.

 Several forms of shadow and puppet theatre have flourished in China during the centuries. The history of shadow theatre in China may indeed be very long. A legend from the 1st century BC tells about an emperor who has lost his beloved and how a shaman brings her back to the emperor in the form of a shadow. On the other hand, it may be possible that shadow theatre in China was born during the Tang Dynasty (618–907), when the Buddhist monks and missionaries visualized their didactic storytelling with shadow puppets. Textual evidence of the shadow theatre is available from the Song Dynasty (960–1279). During that time, it is known that the shadow puppeteers formed their own guild.

 The execution of the puppet’s faces (which are usually shown in profile) is normally most delicate. They follow the conventions of opera make-up. Thus the faces of beautiful ladies and handsome scholars are usually cut so that only a narrow outline of the face is left from the leather to reflect the shape of their faces on the screen. The faces of the painted-face characters and the clowns are done so that their reflections carefully imitate the colourful facial make-up of the opera actors. The heads of the puppets are usually movable so that the costuming of the characters can be changed according to the needs of the play.

 The puppets also include many fantasy figures and animals. Just as on the opera stage, so also in the shadow theatre there are props, also cut of leather, such as chairs, tables, bushes, pens, mirrors, pipes etc. Special effects were created by pieces of coloured glass or mirrors. With a piece of red glass the spurting blood of a brave warrior can be projected while the cool moon with its rays can be projected onto the screen through a metal cylinder. 

Theatre of Cruelty and Theatre of the Absurd

 The events of the Second World War were held as the main trigger to originate Theatre of the Absurd and Theatre of Cruelty. The disregard for human life and dignity witnessed in times of war made the appearance of a new type of theatre almost inevitable. The disappearance of religion in contemporary life might have also influenced the birth of the Theatre of the Absurd, since it attempted to restore the importance of myth and ritual to everyday life and heart, focusing on the sense of cosmic wonder and supernatural anguish. The Absurd Theatre hopes to achieve this by shocking man out of an existence that has become trite, mechanical and complacent. It is felt that there is a mystical experience in confronting the limits of human condition. Some of the characteristics of this Theatre form include the parody of language, no dramatic conflict, no logic and strange scenic effects. 

 French surrealism acknowledged the subconscious mind as a great, positive healing force as well. However, its contribution to the sphere of drama was meager: indeed it can be said that the Absurd Theatre of the 1950s and 1960s was a belated practical realization of the principles formulated by the Surrealists as early as the 1930s. In this connection, of particular importance were the theoretical writings of Antonin Artaud. Artaud fully rejected realism in the theatre, cherishing a vision of a stage of magical beauty and mythical power. Antonin Artauds’s Surrealism and Theatre of Cruelty was probably the use of theatre that took me most off my comfort zone. With this type of theatre, Artaud hoped to unleash unconscious responses in audiences and performers that were normally inaccessible, plus he wanted audiences to find in the theatre not an area for escape from the world, but the realization of their worst nightmares and deepest fears. In the exercise we did on this, we had to lie down with our eyes closed and make surreal noises, and that was exactly what happened and I kept fearing that I would eventually get attacked at any moment. Although this quite a terrifying experience for me, it helped see the darker side of the theatre that I wasn’t aware of. 

How has studying theatre and performance change my way of perceiving theatre and its impacts on every day life considering the different uses and types of theatre learned so far?

 Before entering the course, I considered myself to have a fairly good understanding and perception of theatre. At the time, to read the classic plays (such as Death of a Salesman, The Threepenny Opera, Oedipus etc…) was to me, a considerably solid knowledge of performance and play. Back then, performance was to me the simple displays of entertainment with the stereotypical Hollywood’s purpose of “make ‘em laugh” or “make ‘em cry” that I was exposed to. I honestly (and naively) expected that in these two years, we were merely going to learn the basics of acting and performing, like voice-projection and elementary body language for example. In terms of texts, western pieces were my prediction and thought that I had a pretty solid basis to start the year with. However, I was in for a shock. 

 The very first play we watched as a theatre company was called “Cadavre Exquis” and was my very first contact with experimental theatre which deviated a lot from the conventional form that I was accustomed to. In this theatrical experiment, there were four actors and four directors and each director assembled a 10-minute piece with one rule: they were only allowed to see the last 60 seconds of what the previous person contributed. Though I was familiar with the concept of Cadavre Exquis on paper and with words, this theatrical version was completely new to me and some of the scenes were quite surrealist. The part that I liked most, not only because of its visual impact but mostly due to the fact that I never saw anything like it, was a scene were the stage represented the sea and all four actors were standing on a small floating piece of wood and acted for 10 minutes in that minimal amount of space. The plays that I saw up to that day always followed the conventional and ordinary stage use, by this I mean that the actors were able to use almost the entire stage at all times. I believe that that scene worked very well, because their common goal and cooperation was greatly enhanced by their extreme physical closeness (which could have symbolized their psychological similarities and purposes) and was palpable to the audience.

 We spent quite some time researching and learning about different rituals in different cultures and the impacts they had on the lives of indigenous people. Regarding this topic, I found defining performance, ritual and play very helpful. I found out that ritual, play and performance have a similar history, and often are mistaken for being the same thing. However, each of them has a different set of characteristics that makes them unique. Performance is probably the hardest one to define, since it is included both in play and ritual. It can be stylized/congruent to everyday behavior/ improvised... According to the Performance Studies Textbook, performance is "ritualized behavior conditioned and/or permeated by play". Play and ritual are similar in purposes, however it’s the duration that varies. In both cases, the objective is to change the audiences and/or the actors either permanently (in the case of rituals) or temporarily (in the case of play). Play also gives the audience a change to experience something out of the ordinary and that they wouldn't normally experience in their lives. Rituals can be secular or sacred (non-religious and religious) and date back to 20 000-30 000 years ago.  This changed slightly my perception of performance because I never knew how similar ritual and play really were in terms of concept and impacts. My knowledge on indigenous rituals was quite shallow, and this topic gave me a chance to research in depth a specific ritual (which was the Aboriginal initiation ritual).

 An element that I found was more important than I thought to a performance and/or play is the unity of the ensemble. I confess that I didn’t expect the unity of our theatre group to be a big issue, but it turned to be one of the most important components of these last few months. On most performing projects I’ve been in, there was always a need to unite as a group and do some trusting exercises before the rehearsals actually began. But most of the time, the actors would usually forget that and ignore the remaining ensemble group, and would care about their time on the spotlight. I was quite pessimistic and expected the same with our theatre group, but I was wrong once again. In order for our (and any) ensemble to work, there is a need to work on our unity on a continuous basis. I honestly never thought that we would get along so well, and that definitely had an impact on stage (which I will discuss further on). The composition of the ritual was a big stepping-stone to out unity as a theatre group because that was the first time we ever stressed together and needed to actually cooperate to get something done. And even there were some missing elements on the actual performance of the ritual, it was the journey that counted. And that journey ultimately did what a ritual was supposed to do, which is to change someone or something permanently and we experienced that first hand. Not in the way that we expected it to be, but in a different way, that shaped our unity as an ensemble nonetheless.

 Suzuki and View-pointing were the first topics we focused on. I had never heard of them before, and I was surprised that we didn’t start off with a western classic and instead we began with an alternative oriental method. The method of Tadashi Suzuki was designed to centre de body through the use of the feet, through a series of exercises to through the body off centre.  The exercises used in this method are made to recalibrate the way the actor moves, and my first impression of these exercises was that they were very physically demanding. I initially thought that being an avid sportsman would help endure the cardio that Suzuki training requires, but I then discovered that it was the walking and stomping that was the most demanding. Having a good sense of stillness was another big part of the Suzuki method and I believe we all struggled with keeping our body position strong and perfectly still at the same time. This was quite in showing that a still image could have a big impact on the audience, even more so if the actor is actually physically struggling and being still at the same time. Controlling breath, enhancing focus and reflecting struggles into movements are the basis of Suzuki’s training. In class we often used these three elements at the same time, which was very difficult at first. One of the exercises with those three was reciting text while on a strong position. We were already quite exhausted and we had to maintain a still position while reciting a passage from the Divine Comedy, which was arduous due to our trouble breathing.

  

 Along with Suzuki, the SITI Company’s View-pointing training was another method we focused on in the beginning of the year. The very basic definition of the Viewpoints is to help the actor deal with time and space. We have mainly focused on topography, spatial relationship, tempo, duration, kinesthetic response and repetition. This was the topic that really showed the evolution of our ensemble. Whenever we trained view pointing, we spread across the hall and try to create interesting stories without any dialogues. Individually, we could only work with stillness and extreme fast (sometimes extreme slow) in terms of tempo, and we were free to choose our floor pattern and repetition to make have an interesting spatial relationship. What really showed our development as a group was the Kinesthetic Response. If the exercise involved music, then we needed to react as a group to the different musical changes (using mostly our hearing to control our movements). But after being told that the music was for the audience, we did the same exercise without the music and then we needed to communicate as an ensemble to know when to stop and when to move. In beginning, we were completely disorganized and uncoordinated but as we began to know each other on and off-stage, our group reaction to Kinesthetic Response was much better and it seemed like we could almost telepathically talk to each other.

 Recently, we’ve looked at the different uses of theatre in different times. I focused on Greek Theatre, and I found it very interesting to learn more about the origins of modern theatre and the actual structures of Greek tragedies and comedies for religious purposes. Another use of theatre we learned about was one based on the work of Augusto Boal that went from town to town using theatre to help people get through social problems (like alcoholism for example). By using the whole community in a series of role-playing exercises, a person or group would be confronted with their problems and everyone would try to find a solution to the issue that affected him/them using theatre. We did a similar exercise in class focusing on the inferiority complex that a member had towards her siblings, and I then realized the impact that reliving those episodes really had and how theatre was indeed a powerful weapon that can both hurt and help. Antonin Artauds’s Surrealism and Theatre of Cruelty was probably the use of theatre that took me most of my comfort zone. With this type of theatre, Artaud hoped to unleash unconscious responses in audiences and performers that were normally inaccessible, plus he wanted audiences to find in the theatre not an area for escape from the world, but the realization of their worst nightmares and deepest fears. In the exercise we did on this, we had to lie down with our eyes closed and make surreal noises, and that was exactly what happened and I kept fearing that I would eventually get attacked at any moment. Although this quite a terrifying experience for me, it helped see the darker side of the theatre that I wasn’t aware of. 

 Lastly, we are currently working on a piece of Documentary Theatre written by Lola Arias that focuses on the deaths and lives of 5 teenagers that committed suicide. I was completely unaware that this type of performance existed and I quickly became excited about this project. Being an enthusiastic of biographies and documentaries, the thought of making a piece of theatre with a similar form was a breath of fresh air regarding a concept that I thought could not evolve more.

 I believe it is needless to say that my perception of theatre has changed a lot during these last few months. I had a very narrow and shallow understanding of performance, and now it seems that the more I learn, the more I see how big and different the world of theatre really is. Even though I became more open-minded and more considerate of the different uses of theatre, I know see performance everywhere and how theatre is all around us, without us really noticing it. As a theatre student, learning about documentary theatre and theatre of the absurd has made me become more attentive to different sounds and possibly news that could inspire a play or even a scene. As an individual, learning about the work of Augusto Boal made me aware of how theatre could possibly help me and others get through hard times, and my ensemble experience has made me realize how unity and cooperation can really make a difference when working with a group of people. What amazes me is that all this information was gathered from (not even) a term of Theatre classes. What other uses and types of performing arts future holds for me to learn, only time will tell. 

As Aventuras e Desventuras do Capitão Ventura e do seu Criado Gijon- Review

  The play we saw, roughly translated to “The Adventures and Misadventures of Captain Venture and his Servant Girón”, is a good example of Educational Theatre. This type of theatre is more commonly performed to young people, and tends to have a message of morals and basic civic principles as the play develops. Like this play, it has a very simple storyline (usually with a twist) and uses stereotypical characters. This comedy is set on the house of Captain Venture, who is going to propose to his loved one that day. Along with his servant and companion Girón, they set out to the princess’s castle only to find out that an evil prince has kidnapped her. They then set out on a quest to find her, coming across many danger situations like facing a bear and an evil witch. After rescuing her, we find out that the princess wasn’t really kidnapped and that it was her uncle that set this test to see if the captain really loved her. The main messages of this play were to be courageous and to help the innocent and weak; that there is no problem in being afraid sometimes; the importance of friendship and intelligence; and the classic “love conquers all”. The setting was quite minimalistic, and there were very few props as well. The horse riding effect was produced only by sound (the actors mimicked the hooves) and a small plastic swimming pool constituted a river. There were four actors that played various characters, and the acting style was very over-the-top and exaggerated (common in Portuguese children’s plays). The forth wall was broken repeatedly, and there were some parts were the character would come off stage and start addressing and asking questions to the audience right beside them. This plus the introduction of familiar characters (such as the little red ridding hood and the bad wolf), managed to achieve a great level of audience interaction. In the end, even though the play lacked in visual beauty and actual theatrical value, it managed to achieve what it wanted: the play arose the audience and there were moments of a good audience-actor interaction that made it fun to watch.

Documentary Theatre and Lola Arias

Documentary theatre is a form of theatre that uses pre-existing documents and factual material (such as newspapers, government reports, interviews, etc.) as a source of material for the script. It can be used to give different sides to a specific story or event, and its impartial tone is also used not to enforce any bias against one character or element. The use of official documents has a more powerful impact on the audience since they realize that the events spoken about or performed on stage did actually happen. Documentary theatre has existed as a genre for as long as theatre itself has existed. The first dramatic documentary impulse dates back to 492 BC when the ancient Greek playwright Phrynicus produced his play The Capture of Miletus about the Persian War. The genre can be traced back to the European medieval mystery plays, Elizabethan England and Shakespeare's historical tragedies, French revolutionary patriotic dramas, British and American 1930s Living Newspapers and German plays about the Holocaust.

 Lola Arias (born in 1976) is a playwright, songwriter, and director and her plays are based on documentary theatre. Most of her theatre work has some elements in common. One of them is the frenetic action moments and interesting use of space and setting. The restless action can be seen in “Mi vida después” were the use of rock music, pattern movements and intensive energy (more specifically, when they’re tearing clothes apart). In “Revolver”, the setting consists of only one bed, and the only lighting we can see is a strip of light that can only illuminate a small segment of what is happening. The two characters talk in a pre and post sex manner in a poetic way and they are in their underwear, creating a higher level of intimacy. In “Striptease” the setting consists of a crib on the center of the stage with a baby in it, while there are two characters on opposite sides of the stage. Her plays are usually not very clear in form, however they usually consist on moments and intense acting (like in “Striptease). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vx-psE4RFVM&feature=player_embedded

We are now working on a play written by her called “The Suicides” which focuses on the lives and deaths of 5 teenagers from a village in Argentina called Rosario de la Frontera. Following the standards of documentary theatre and Lola Arias’ work, the play is driven narrated by the teenagers telling their story in the after life, reading newspaper articles about themselves. We’re are still in a primary stage of this project and I will be updating as the story develops.

Stratford upon Avon- detailed

 Devising and structuring playable actions was one of the main components we focused on. We were told there were three elements a person must consider before acting/directing/writing a scene: what’s happening, what should happen and what’s going to happen.  We divided into different groups and we had to create a scene. Our scene consisted of a pregnant woman about to go into labor and trying to catch a taxi to get to the hospital. Another woman that turned out to be her wife joins her, and a dilemma arises because the old fashioned cab driver doesn’t want to let them in. A businessman (me) then enters the scene and argues with the women to get the cab. He fails to do so, and the women finally get in the cab only to find out that the cab driver is died of a heart attack. We were told that the way we devised the play (the normal form) was linear, and we were then challenged to devise it in a non-linear way. We split the scene into four different actions and randomly juggled them around to have a different effect. Then, we did it in reverse, which turned out to look very strange, and difficult to understand (though fun).  Parallel was the next structure we had to follow, and we achieved that by having two discussions happening at the same time: the pregnant woman with the old-fashioned taxi driver and the wife with the homophobic businessman. Finally, we learned that a cyclical plot consisted on the final scene being almost exactly like the first one, in order to make the audience feel like the story loops for eternity. We applied that to our piece, we achieved this by making the taxi driver simply passing out and not remembering who the two women were. Then another businessman appeared and scene would just go on and on.

 Voice for me was one of the most interesting components we covered there.  I think I really liked this area because the exercises we did were amusing and the tips were very helpful for some one like me who struggles in speech. To begin with, we were given the famous line from The Tempest: “Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises/ sounds and sweet airs that give delight and hurt not”. We played with tone and volume for a while using this quote and we were taught a way to facilitate finding new ways to say a line. This consisted one a person being between two people, and they both have the same text. Someone begins by whispering one line two the middle person’s ear, and then the other one whispers the second line, and so and on. Every time they whispered a line, they had to change the way they said it. We also spoke about duration, basically the time we had to say a line. We played with extremes (extreme fast and slow) and discussed how it affected the impact of the line. In order to say a line very quickly without interruption, we were taught how to breathe deeply and store our oxygen in our ribs (known as rib reserve). Finally, we spoke about projection and how to direct our voice to different sections of the audience. We placed four people one the corners of the room and the objective was to direct our voice to a single person. If the person thinks the line was directed to him, he turns around. It didn’t always turn out so well but it was fun nonetheless. 

 To my happy surprise, we were taught the basics of miming. These basics (based on the work of Etienne Decroux) consisted on understanding that the human body movement can be divided into three parts: rotation, inclination and translation. We performed the classics of miming such as walking on the spot and exploring an invisible wall. Afterwards, we were taught how to act as a robot and the techniques were to isolate and re organize the three movements. With a balloon, with had two perform in duos a final performance based on any of the things we learned on the course. My partner and I decided to make our performance with the robot and miming techniques, which was a 2 minute scene of a robot couple celebrating their dating anniversary. The male-robot offers the balloon to the lady-robot who forgot to bring a present. She makes a failed attempt to quickly fill up a balloon, and when she gives up, the scene ends with them hugging.

A Tender Thing- review

 A Tender Thing is a play written by Ben Power, based on Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.  In this adaptation, the two characters (Kathryn Hunter as Juliet and Richard McCabe as Romeo) are an old couple in their golden years. Juliet then is faced with a serious disease that tests their love and climaxes with the death of both. The stage was relatively small in this theatre compared to The Tempest, however it succeeded to create a more intimate relationship with the audience.  There was also a cyclorama in the middle of the stage, used to project images of their youth and of their deceased child. It also facilitated the mood swings of the play, since its color and intensity changed accordingly. The set and props were minimalistic and all the elements of the play were contemporary to our time, except for the language. The lighting was cleverly used to suggest the passing of time and the dramatic intensity of the scenes. Since there were only two characters, the lighting focused (in dramatically heavy moments) in a specific place on stage where the two characters were close together, not letting the audience look away from what was actually happening. This was much more stressful for the audience because it presented no possible escape form the harsh reality that many people could relate to, and this was what essentially captivated most member of the audience. The sound also had a strong influence in the audience. The minor scales and melodies used in intensively dramatic moments helped to bring the general mood down and were sometimes responsible for many tears of the audience. In lighter moments, the music was joyful and this generally happened whenever Romeo was addressing the audience pre-disease. Both performances were highly believable and successfully went from extreme happiness to extreme despair in a “natural” way. Kathryn Hunter’s physical performance was very effective on transmitting the psychological condition of Juliet to the audience, which was challenging since most of her performance occurred either on a wheel chair, or lying down on a hospital bed. Richard McCabe's performance was also very well achieved, and I do believe his portrait of a joyful and likable old man was very convincing, even in heavily dramatic moments. Overall, it ended up being very much above expectations and proved that great tragic moments can be achieved with very few props and characters (but good luck finding actors of this caliber). 

The Tempest- review

 The Tempest by William Shakespeare is the story of an over thrown Duke of Milan (Prospero), who isolates himself on an island and crashes a ship in order to make his daughter (Miranda) noble again. The stage was thrusting and that created a better connection with the audience. It provided effectively a world for the play to exist, since the setting was a deserted island and the props were minimal. It was contemporary to the play however there was an element of the setting, which was basically a large cube at the back of the stage, which was sometimes visible (transparent) and other times not. This was used in some cases, as I kind of gateway between reality and imagination (for example, the spirit that only Prospero saw always entered through the cube), but it was also used to enact a situation that was happening at the same time as the main action. The lighting was used very effectively, I could not see the source of illumination and they played a very important role in the play. It was used to represent time passing and created very dark moments every time there were soliloquies and when Prospero was talking to Ariel. When the mood was more relaxed and there were comic moments, the lighting was brighter and not as intense as in dramatic scenes. Most sound is recorded (the thunder in the storm, for example) and is mainly used for the dramatic moments, to accumulate tension. It is mainly naturalistic, but in abstract moments, such as when Ariel appears with wings and falls from the ceiling to scare the nobles (my acid-test scene), weird and heavy noises are heard. The costumes are contemporary to our time and Shakespearian time, and they do tell some things about the social order of the people that crashed on the island. Prospero and his daughter have obviously ripped but at the same time, quite formal clothes from living in the island for so long; the noblemen that crashed have suits on; the slaves have barely any clothes besides pieces of cloth torn apart. Being this play by the Royal Shakespeare Company, the performances were all quite good. Each actor portrayed effectively each character and was able to make a believable performance. However, the ensemble as a whole seemed to be not working fully and as part of the audience I felt that it could have been better if only the ensemble would have had more chemistry.