week 4 questions

Do you think the material you have created today will be suitable for "little people"?

why is it/is it no suitable?

I think that some of the material we have created will be suitable for little people because it will be very entertaining to their imagination, for example when we made the tigers body while we sang "Tiger burning bright". It will make them intrigued because they love to think about wonder and imagination.

I think that some of the material we have created will not be suitable for little people, for example, the "tiger burning bright" song because it quite dark especially how we sing it and we may scary the children,however It may just be the way that we sing the song, not really the song its self.

I think that some of the material we have created will be suitable for little people, for example when we Fenton says "A tiger I saw one!" and the rest of the class goes " A tiger, who saw one?" I believe that this is really good type of material because it will make the children go "He saw one", like what they do in the children pantomimes, like Aladdin and Cinderella. 

I think that some of the material we have created will not be suitable for little people, for example at the beginning when all say our own special lines because there is to much going on at one time, I believe that their little minds will not be able to focus with all of that going on at the same time.

Evaluation of working in the new theatre

Working on three side and What we have done today

I feel that it is very important to make sure your in the moment because since we were basically walking without looking at where we are going, It is important that we have full concentration.

The aim of the task was to help us preform to all three side, however I don't think at the start I really could do the task because my body was going one way whilst my brain wanted to go the same way, however I had to put my body to go the another way, therefore I believe that if your in the moment you will be able to do the task. 

I think the chants was a really good idea because It helped us to not only perform to one side but to help us perform to all three side while looking at one side. 

Also the exisce of pretending to hold a sword one way and a dagger one way, helped us to look one way but not put our whole body, that way you look one way and position your body another way, this helps you to perform to all three side at one time. 

Since I found it hard, this resulted into it helping me to get use to performing at 3 side of the stage. 

H/W:The Four States of Consciousness

The First State of Consciousness

The lowest level of consciousness is sleep, which is the state you enter at night when you doze off. In sleep, you are unconscious. Your body will respond to the stimuli of your dreams, but you are still in a passive state of existence. In fact, you are so passive that you often don’t even remember your dreams.

The Second State of Consciousness
The Third State of Consciousness
The Fourth State of Consciousness
What we have done today, Are the ideas effective? Are they theatrical? 

Upon waking from sleep, you enter into a slightly higher level of consciousness calledwaking sleep. This is still a form of sleep because even though you are physically awake,you are not present. When you are not present you are literally sleep walking through life because you can go through the motions of day to day living without engaging your soul, without being present, without being conscious of yourself. Hence, you are living on autopilot. People sometimes have a problem with me telling them they are on autopilot or sleep walking through life. However, it is easy to prove.

Have you ever driven somewhere only to arrive and wonder how you got there because you weren’t really paying attention to your driving? If you know how to type, do you type without having to think about where each letter is on the keyboard? Have you ever walked into a room or opened the refrigerator, only to forget what it was you were seeking? Have you ever acted like you were really listening to someone by nodding your head, however, you really were daydreaming or thinking of something or someone else? Do you have to think about how to tie your shoes? Or how to put on your clothes? Or ride a bike? All of these acts become automatic once you learn them and do them repetitively. As a result, you can perform them and be totally somewhere else in your mind. This is how you typically live most of your days. You go through the motions, but your mind, your ego, is occupied with other things. Hence, you are in waking sleep.

The next level of consciousness is a higher form of consciousness that occurs when you make the effort to be in the Present, the Eternal Now. This level is referred to as self-consciousness because you actually observe yourself. You become conscious of your Soul, your Being.

In the second state, waking sleep, we are ruled by the ego, and we see ourselves subjectively. In the third state, self-consciousness, we engage the soul and see ourselves objectively. This is typically a huge “wake-up call” for many because once you begin to observe yourself, you realize that you really do live most of your life in a state of sleep, ruled by the ego. The ego thrives in the second state of consciousness where it is king. However, it is constantly threatened of you becoming conscious of it. Consequently, the ego will put up an incredible fight to keep you from entering the third state. Self-consciousness is the death of the ego because at this level, you awaken to your true existence and see the ego for what it truly is―nothing but an illusion and the source of all your desire, pain and suffering.

It may sound odd, but observing yourself is not natural. It requires effort. Remember all the things I mentioned earlier that we do automatically? Now try observing yourself doing those activities.

The fourth state, and highest level of consciousness, is objective-consciousness. In this state, you become objective to the world. You see the Absolute Truth to All and Everything just as our Creator intended. You see everything in its true form, as distinct frequencies of vibrations of energy. There are multitudes of layers within this level, too. While this state of consciousness is within reach to everyone, achieving it and remaining there is quite rare. Typically, for one to enter into this realm, you have spent years of accumulated, hard work in the third state becoming conscious of yourself, living in a state of Presence.

We finished off the human pyramid and tried to make it safe for people to climb in. We have worked in unisent and performed to a rhythm of a beat, for example the Chinese dragon that we have turned into a tiger. 

Our ideas are very theatrical because we use our body's lots, to show objects, for example, pyramid, Tiger Dance and hunting for tigers at the start of our production. 

Some of our ideas are effective for example when we are going to make a tiger version of the chineness dragon. This is going to very effective towards our audience because little child love to see crazy exciting things, like what we have done with the tiger 

Lesson questions week 1 and week 2

Questions

What is children's theatre?

I feel that the main objective of children theatre is to help them think outside the box and to wonder. Also children's theatre is all about using different creative art techniques, for example, dance, music, art,musical theatre ect. 

In my evaluative opinion It explains things to children in a creative way, it teaches them lesson about life or just lessons in general in a fun educational way. 

Everything is eye catching and very vibrant. The colours help them to imagine , for example in when I went to watch Aladdin , and the villain jaffer came out the lights turned all dark and there was smoke feeling up the stage and it felt like suffocating feeling throughout his entrance. 

It helped the children to know this is bad and this is good, therefore lighting is very important in children's theatre productions.

What skills does it take to be excellent children's theatre 

To not care how you look and how silly you are to people. Live in the moment and dont try to act and commit to discovery because if you don't commit to discovery you will not know what to do , therefore you need to not feel but think.

Uses sounds to effluence your body, let the sounds and the body become one. Make sure you use non critical self awareness. You have to commit fully. Make sure you have 100% energy, if you are doing level 10 do level 10, if your doing level 1 do level 1 not level 10. 

Makes sure you know your audience , know that this is my audience, and this how they are, for example little kids are always engeitic . More you body, make sure you experiment with vocal placement. Make sure you improvise and don't keep do the same thing because that means your not in the moment , which means your not committed. 

You need to be able to your space, even if you are on three side.make sure ou understand the audiences perspective. Make sure you neutral and make sure you always ready to more. Make a connection with the audience, make sure you involve the audience. Make them feel like they are in a another world or in a different place. 

Make sure you connect with your inner child which is creative and free, has no worrys. Be controlled and engaging 

An evaluative comment 

In my option if you do not try make eye contact and truly connect either the audience they will get bored and zone out. Epically children because they find it hard to stay concentrated. 

The star of tension helps you to bring people into the zone. 

Homework: How would you adapt an issue for a audience for 2-3 years about facts about tigers

Someone could be saying the facts and people could be acting it out as they say it . So the children don't lose focus from just listing to the facts. 

I have noticed that children find it hard to pay attention, therefore I believe that if we have creative pictures or tiger mask that maybe arts strand could make to keep to keep are audience engaged. Also to give them something to look at to lower the chance of them being distracted or zoned out. 

In addition, I think if we have picture of tigers and masks, we don't make them to scare because they are only 2-3 years. 2-3 years old get scared really quickly and cry over almost everything. 

Therefore, in my opnion I think we should have a research class to analyse and evaluate the key point of performing children's theatre to very young children of the age of 2 - 3 years old. 

I think we should all have are only little groups and think of ideas for little peoples day, when we have throught of ideas our groups should suggest are ideas to the rest of the class because this way we find the best ideas quickly and more effectively and for the benefit of the audience. 

Video on Patte smith 

Research Patte smith and William Blake. Patte smith was inspired by William Blake. William Blake was inspired by his younger brother Robert, Robert died at a young age, William kept Roberts sketch book and wrote his most amazing poems in it. 

The words and poem is to difficult for a 2-3 year old to listen too. It's to scary for little children, they may feel scared, also there should be more them one person saying it. It need to not be so rhetorically. 

We could layer in some sounds like a triangle because this could make the audience more engaged.

The rhythm is not modern, also the tiger who came to tea is also not modern at all. 

•Make sure you Don't think, you feel that's being a good children's performers. 

•Energy needs to flow through the performers 

•Each movement and word need to express,for example like "am a slimy frog"

•We need to make sure we actual play to all sides of we are playing to all sides. 

•You need to remember singing is just speaking with extended voules. 

The song is like a dark hymn. The most of the whole song is about Gods creation of animals through a dis-embody sprit.

It says "Did he who made the lamb make thee?" This Is talking about God or a spiritual being and how the spiritual being created life and the earth. This song maybe boring to children's theatre because it's kind of sad and dull, therefore we should try to make it more happy. 

1)what task did you do in the lesson today to with the tiger who came to tea? 

Learning about a poet called Patte smith. We also looked at a poem about a tiger by Patte smith . We learnt to sing and to turn something evil into something for little children. 

If you want to sing high think low and if you want to sing low sing high.

We started to make a human pyramid , therefore i learnt that I need to have trust in other people and they need to have trust me. This help us in the process of "The tiger who came to tea" because it taught us we need to have trust in are fellow actor and also that we need to make we work calm and slowly because it's dangerous to just jumping or off somebody's back or spine, It could result into a big problem.

Written Evaluation of Beautiful Thing

(considering the strengths and weaknesses of the performance)

Written Evaluation of 

Beautiful Thing

Research on the director

Nikolai Foster was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, and grew up in North Yorkshire. He trained at Drama Centre London and at the Crucible, Sheffield. He has been a director at big venues such as Sheffield Crucible, the Royal Court theatre and National Theatre Studio. 

His work has been seen in many of the UK's leading regional theatre, touring houses and working internationally. Foster has been director on attachment at the Sheffield crucible, the Royal Court Theatre and National Theatre studio and served as an Associate Director at the west Yorkshire Playhouse, Leeds. As you can see Nikolai Foster is a very experienced man in the world of Theatre and performance.

Recently, Foster has directed acclaimed production of Jonathan Harvey's Beautiful Thing at places like the 20th anniversary production - Arts Theatre,London, West Yorkshire playhouse Leeds,Brighton Theatre Royal & Liverpool Playhouse Foster is just only a professional Theatre director not a Theatre and film Director

Research on the Theatre Company

The company name is " BEAUTIFUL THINGS LIMITED", the company is made of a group of creative leads, that are the creative team. This team consist with 

Author – Jonathan Harvey

Director – Nikolai Foster 
Set & Costume Designer – Colin Richmond 
Casting Director – Kay Magson CDG 
Lighting Designer – David Plater 
Sound Designer – George Dennis 
Associate Producer – Alexander Wang
Producer – Tom O'Connell for QNQ 

As you can see to make the productions work everybody has their only little part that needs to be played to result into a excellent performance. This also suggest that a strength in the performance is that they have good organisation skills because they have their own lead-ship team of the people who are in charge of the whole production.

Beautiful Things Limited cast/ Actors With

• Suranne Jones as Sandra
• Zarah Abrahams as Leah 
• Oliver Farnworth as Tony
• Jake Davies as Jamie 
• Danny-Boy Hatchard as Ste 
• Nancy Sullivan (Understudy)
• Luke Baker (Understudy)

Evaluation of the play considering the strengths and weakness of the performance 

Strengths of the performance 

It was very amusing at the start of the play. The attitudes of the characters was obvious from the start of the play, for example how life is like for them and the setting helps to add this image.  

They are very specially aware, for example when Leah was standing on the chair she made sure she was not right in the corner so that her back will be shown to the audience and you won't be able see her face, just her back. 

The sounds effects help give the effect of the kind of area they live in for example a housing estate may have a lot of children around and there is sound effects suggesting children are running in the background or around where they are acting. 

You could see the feelings and emotions of people without them saying anything for example when Jamie was talking about all the men his moms been with, you could see through he's eyes, face and body language that he doesn't like that fact that his mom has been with so much men. You could suggest as a Result of anger he called his mom(Sanda) a "slag". 

The actors show the relationships of each other through actions and simply moves , for example when Jamie's mom came back and kissed Tony , Jamie looked away suggesting that he doesn't like the fact they are together, so much that he could not even bare to see them together because the way he looks away slow suggests that it kills me inside to see then together it truly hurts. 

They show two different side of each character for example Sandra, she's a bad mom because she doesn't really care about her son but she's also a good mom because she help out her sound friends and toke some responsible. 

The play is very funny. You can see that Jamie and Ste have a special connection because they are the only people that truly look into each other's eyes through out the first and second part of the play. 

The slang they use suggests how they feel about things for example Leah says "good for her and bird,", " you better watch  your self"  she says it sarcastically because she doesn't like the book. 

The way Leah and Sanda talk to each other shows you how they feel about each other. 

They are really good at showing relationship for example, Sanda and Jamie are more like friends then mother and son. For example, Jamie says "shut up" to his mom a lot. Sanda calls her son Jamie "Bugger" a lot. 

You could see Jamie and Sanda relationship, she's tiring her best but it's just not good enough. 

Jamie and Tony's relationship looks the most real, for example they have the deepest relationship even deeper then his mom they connect , they help each other. 

They are very good at adding tension, they do this by posing a lot, therefore there is positives and negatives of them posing for a long time. Also a another time they added tension was when Jamie's mom found out he went to a Gay bar and she was upset because he didn't tell her, he was Gay. In this moment they shoulded even though they have and relationship , the mom will always be there for her son, no matter what people say about her son or her. 

A strength is they make what is seen a negative situation into positive situation. For example, Jamie says "am not quer , more like gay". 

You could see the real emotion in the actors eyes, for example when Leah saw Jamie and Ste sleeping in the real bed and when they told her to go away and she told them she knew about them and how she really cares about them so much she lies to everyone even Ste Dad. 

They know how to really connect with the audience, they make the audience feel how they feel, for example, when a moment is deep and important they help the audience kept in the zone. 

Weakness of the performance 

The beginning of the performance is not really effective. It looked quite boring and un-entertaining, It was a bit confusing to follow. 

Some of the actors wait for the audience to laugh, therefore it looks not as smooth and it is a bit off putting. 

Their movements moving around was not as smooth. It looked way to planned , it looked like they were acting in the moment not living in the moment. 

Some parts of the play look like they were just filling space and it may or may not be improvised. When Tony laughed but it felt like it just felt like he was just acting to laugh and not truly laughing and understanding what is truly funny. 

They take to big poses, therefore it feels like the scene is just dragging on, however it may just be that the moment was very intense moment. 

The houses don't really look like real houses for example Jamie and Sanda house, however that may have been meant like that because they were meant to be seen as not so wealth. 

When Jamie and Sanda were fighting It looked just way to fake and boring. It also looked planned like they said I hit you , you hit me go and it didn't look real at all. 

There beginnings are really bad, it makes the audience feel like it's effort to watch them at the start of the Acts, Act 1 and act 2. 

Sometimes, they let the setting over power them, for example, the ball and then looking around a lot, making sure they don't touch anything. 

Jamie's houses doesn't really look like a house so you could suggest that the setting is unrealistic. 

What did you see?

(Covers the visual aspects of the performance) These could include: ·       Set/staging Naturalistic/Non Naturalistic? Stylised? Colourful? Atmospheric? Simple? Complex? What affect did it have? Did it add to atmosphere? How? Give examples. The stage was set in a style of a house to house normal street, however Jamie's house did not really look like a house, therefore it kind of toke you way from the normal real house. The colours of the door were all blue but they had old dirt on them, which made me feel that it was set in a poor, rundown neighborhood. You could suggest that the setting was simple because it was door to door house, however you could also suggest it was complex because they made the front of the stage look like it was a street curb. This was really good because it made the audience and I feel like we were not in a theatre atmosphere but we were at a normal street and we were just across the street. ·       Costume Period? Colour? Detail? Did it add to the effect of the set? Contribute to character? The costumes looked like they were from a modern period, for example just normal school uniform and jeans and a t-shirt. Also they were all wearing white, black, red and blue throughout the production. The costume did add an effect to the set because straight from the start you could see that the play was set in everyday 21st century life and not in west times when they will probably be wearing tight jeans, boots and cowboy hats. The costumes did contributed to the characters, for example, Tony , is meant to be seen as a loser or someone that has no life. The costumes help to show this because hes clothes look tattered and like he has not changed them in months or days.  ·       Specific effects Lighting Was the lighting natural or dramatic? Bright, dim, spotlight, darkness, use of colour? At what points did lighting add to the impact of the play? Give examples. Smoke, wind, projection?  How were they used? How well? The lighting was natural because it looked like a normal sunny day in real life, not fake lighting effects on Theatre stage. The light was bright but it was not dim, making it impossible for you to see what was going on. The lighting added the impact of the play when Jamie and his mother were arguing after she found he was gay, the lighting really add tension to this scene. The light was very dark and dull when Jamie's mum was talking about all the things she did for him that Jamie never remember. The darkness suggested that she felt hurt and broken, like her heart had just been taken and ripped apart. ·       Specific work by actors(s) at specific moments Any double casting? How was this done? Females playing males and vice versa. There was double casting Nancy Sullivan (Understudy) and Luke Baker (Understudy) were understudy's. This meant they were going in case one of the actors were sick or could not make it or if something happen to them.