Ms. Monsod

Email me a link to a video or historical article that helps/inspires/informs your character development.  Below the link, explain in 70-100 words how the video or historical article helps, inspires, or informs your work. Email by Wednesday, please.

Watch another internal or external play and answer these questions:

Questions to answer. Mail to me asap.

­BLOCK H

Realism in the theatre was a general movement in the later 19th century that steered theatrical texts and performances toward greater fidelity to real life. The realist dramatists Henrik Ibsen and August Strindberg in Scandinavia and Anton Chekhov and Maksim Gorky in Russia, among others, rejected the complex and artificial plotting of the well-made play and instead treated themes and conflicts belonging to a real, contemporary society. They dispensed with poetic language and extravagant diction, instead using action and dialogue that looked and sounded like everyday behaviour and speech. Realism had no use for the declamatory delivery and the overblown virtuosity of past acting and replaced this style with one demanding natural movements, gestures, and speech. Realist drama also used stage settings that accurately reproduced ordinary surroundings.

“realism.” Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2012. Web. 09 Apr. 2012. <http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/493052/realism>.

The Boor/The Bear

Assignment: Write about an AHA Moment from the two month process of devising your original melodrama.  The “moment” is a detailed aspect of acting or production that you learned as a doer or an observer. Please submit this by Thursday, March 29.

Remember: Put the experience under a magnifying glass! Elaborate with specifics so that a person who was not involved in staging or as an audience member will understand how you learned what you learned.

Here is a sample from my own experience as director:

The “AHA Moment” I choose to put under the magnifying glass was directing the 40-second dance sequence in the scene of Indulto where Lidia and the gypsy Toño begin their romance. Toño has just made her smile after she suffered a tongue-lashing from her teacher. She agrees to dance with him and, by the end of the short sequence, they look at each other with new eyes.

It was early February. The actors had already spent hours learning the sevillanas, an Andalusian folk dance.  But, from a director’s point of view, the most important aspect of the dance was not the steps…. it was establishing the growing attraction between the two characters. This was crucial to plot development. In the first run-throughs, Toño looked like he was dutifully reviewing dance steps for a children’s program. There was no interest, no erotic attraction yet. Lidia, at the start of the dance, did this beautiful movement with the shoulders, with no reaction from Toño. They were dancing but, at that point, nothing was happening.

So I tried instructing N., the actor, to watch Lidia. She moved her shoulders, hands, and hips in ways that were quite feminine.  I asked N. to identify those moments she did especially well…where she looked especially pretty…and to acknowledge them with a verbal response like “ole!” or “guapa.”.   This technique externalizes the interior monologue, after which it is internalized again, leading to clearer body and facial expression. It usually works.

Strangely, it didn’t.

A week later, I was still mulling over the problem.  Then I suddenly remembered December rehearsals where, randomly, N. would practice his double and triple pirouettes.  I realized he needed to feel as much passion for the sevillanas as he did for the pirouettes. So I told him, “Look…. why don’t you personalize the dance.  Just add a turn or double turn somewhere. And take a look at this Youtube video entitled Sevillanas Maria Jose y Oscar, where the guy projects so much masculine grace.”

Lidia and Tono. Photo by Basil Tahan, ISB Photography

It worked like a charm.

Approaching the scene first and foremost as a dancer, N. was finally motivated as an actor.  He found a perfect moment to incorporate a breathtaking double.  But the most important thing was, suddenly, he was now approaching the dance with aggression.  He was opening his arms.  He was circling Lidia. He was exhorting her, daring her to impress him with the word,”Venga!”.  And by the end of the dance, as the sound of the lone castanets faded in, he was smiling, looking into her eyes.  Their rapport was so noticeable in Bangkok that one of the critics told them, “We want you to get married and have children.”

All in all, it had taken about three hours to perfect a 40-second portion.

Lesson for me as director: don’t just go for the established acting techniques.  Look at the actor’s passions and start from there!

Here’s the rubric by which I will assess your reflection: