Wednesday, November 30, 2005
ATTENTION ALL STUDENTS! ATTENTION ALL STUDENTS!
Apparently some of you are getting worried about your assessments. This was brought to my attention by Tony following on from the Year Reps meeting.
It was then decided we'd try to figure out a basic shape to what might form part of a director's approach to a scene/unit/play.
The first point we thought, was to go from the most obvious to the least obvious. A brief description of the scene and what happens in it. How many characters there are in the scene. Any information we can get from information like stage directions where it is supposed to be set. When it is supposed to be set (- day, night, indoors, outdoors etc).
We thought Casting might be a fairly early element in the process. We suggested that with your assessment, as visual material, you might include photos, not so much of famous actors but faces from the internet, digital photos taken of people in your year, or your friends or even people from the Rocket Bar or on the Bus. After all, a director is soon thinking about what actors she'd need to make the play work. These faces will begin to get the imaginative juices flowing - and help you - and your teachers to see if you're on the right track with your thinking about the individual scene or even the whole play.
And if you don't have the internet or a camera, then there are magazines you can cut up. Or you could draw your casting ideas. Or just do written descriptions. Is Shen Te tall, as you see her? Or petite? Is she lean? Emaciated? Curvy? Large? Motherly? Pretty? Plain? Beautiful? What colour hair does she have? How does she wear it when we first meet her? etc etc etc.
Obviously, we thought if a student comes up with a picture of Tom Cruise for Sun and Penelope Cruz for She Te, obviously their imagination hasn't been that deeply engaged. They're on remote control. And will score poorly....
We then thought that the next most logical area might be the STRUCTURE of the scene you've chosen. Does it break down naturally into any sections or units? For example: The Park Scene. One Way of dividing it is
1. Sun and the prostitutes
2. Sun, Shen Te and the prostitutes
3. Sun and Shen Te
4. Sun, Shen Te and Wang.
But another way of looking at it might be:
Sun looking up at the soaring plane.
Sun deciding to hang himself.
Sun interrupted by prostitutes and Shen Te
Shen te forgets about going to see Shu Fu and makes the decision to get involved with Sun
Shen Te asking if she may shelter under his hanging tree
Sun allowing her
The 'You don't know what a pilot is' speech and the 'Crane with a broken wing' speech. Bonding.
Shen Te getting water for Sun
Final image, Shen Te the Water Madonna...
What we're trying to do is get a better sense of the scene. Similarly we might look for the KEY MOMENTS in the scene. These might be things that mark high or low points in the scene. It may be an action: it may be a speech. Or Key Speeches.
We talked about Necessary Props and Scenery. Once again, in The Park Scene, what would it be? A 'tree'. Rope. A log to hang oneself from.A bucket or water receptacle. A cup. A handkerchief. These in turn could be described, photographed or drawn. But they are more than just things. The handkercheif, for example, is a powerful object in the scene. It's Sun's gift to Shen Te in the same way later Shen Te makes a gift of the water. These in turn relate to THE SPACE. So the space needs to be described. Shen Te might need to stand as far from the tree as possible on her entrance - so she has a real decision and a real journey to make to shelter.
Spatial compositions might be taken into consideration. Classic, Old Master type paintings might be referred to - or produced for reference. Shen Te as Florence Nightingale. Sun as a Dead Christ.
Bit by bit we are trying to enrich our picture of the scene.
Costume. We'd get examples of Chinese scenes in the 1930's period. Or we might decide that we didn't want to make it 'exotic' and that it should be set in a more 'European' Szechuan. Belt and Braces. Hobnail Boots. More LS Lowry than China. But whatever we chose we'd have to justify our choices...
Once we have space and costume, we might move on to Lighting the scene. It's dreary weather. It's about to rain... then actually raining. Do we want just 'imitate' the weather with the lighting? Or do we want to follow Brecht's ideas about doing the show in full light? Or a mixture? Maybe the Sun comes out when Sun talks about his flying? What about real rain? It's been tried recently in Mary Stuart at Donmar Warehouse to rave reviews for both play and rain... Or would we use down-lighting for a harsh prison-like effect. Or cross lighting for a surreal effect. Or up-lighting as in Pantomime or Melodrama?
We could talk about research we'd do for the production/scene. China in the 30's. The sort of aeroplane Sun would fly. Tobacco sacks. Architecture of the period in China. Costume of the thirties. Stockings, high heels, lipstick. Is Shen Te that kind of prostitute? Might it be interesting to make her that? Even if the stockings were torn, the heels broken and the lipstick smeared?
We might talk about work we'd want to do with the actors. Approaches that might reward with some characters and some that might not. For example Sun and Te might require quite a lot of TABLE WORK and close study of what is going on between them psychologically. Objectives, Obstacles, Tactics, Stake etc. Action verbs. We might encourage them to talk about the love affair in terms of their own experiences. These are psychologically quite comlex characters.
For other characters we might choose an approach using physical stereotypes; the prostitutes. Commedia Masters and Servants: Wang. We might do status games. We might do Trust exercises.
We might talk about Prep and Research we might ask the actors to do.
We might give some idea of how long it might take to rehearse this scene. Make a rehearsal schedule. Show the storyboard or a part of a storyboard for the scene.
The main thing is to really know the scene. And the best way to know it is to live, breath, eat, sleep, dream and drink the scene. So that you've thought about it from every conceivable angle and vantage point.
TO WHICH END....
We looked at all the financial transactions in the scene. And we made a little diagram of which this is a photograph.
