'13' By Mike Bartlett - Reflective Blog - Entry 2

'13' By Mike Bartlett - Reflective Blog - Entry 2

Links/Detailed Information As To What I Had Learnt In Lessons - My Weekly Blog Entry 4

Week 4: http://sdcperformancens.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/level-3-acting-extended-diploma-week-4.html

Introduction: Implementing Ancient Greek Theatre And Staging Into '13':

Above is a link to my Weekly Blog Entry for the 4th Week on the Level 3 Acting Extended Diploma Course.  In the first section for 'Monday 29th Of September 2014 Blog Entry' captioned 'Lesson 1 - Physical Theatre', I give detail as to what I covered in my lesson about the Ancient Greeks and how Physical Theatre may have originated from them.

In this Weekly Blog, I talked about one of the performance roles used in Ancient Greek theatre known as the 'Chorus'.  For '13', my teacher wanted to implement the use of the Chorus for specific scenes in which there is a crowd of people witnessing a speech given by one of the main characters in the play.  Throughout the whole duration of the 'Contemporary Theatre' lesson I had on Monday for Week 4 on the course, my teacher had thought of ways that I and other actors in this 'crowd scenario' could present the style of the Chorus for the speech scene.

The first scene my teacher had looked at to try and implement this idea was in one of Ruth's (The British Prime Minister in '13') speeches which is in Act 1 Scene 13 of the play.  Throughout the speech, my teacher was instructing me to give off specific physical reactions towards some of the things the character Ruth was announcing in her speech to go along with the research findings I had done for my character (either Martin or Paul) at this time.  When performing in this scene, I was portraying as Martin alone.

To go alongside trying to implement the physical dynamics of the Chorus, my teacher was trying to devise ways in which we could present our performance in a circular fashion.
 
Using the same link to my Weekly Blog Entry, which I have included above, in the second section for 'Thursday 2nd Of October 2014 Blog Entry' captioned 'Lesson 2 - Performance Workshop', I give specific detail as to what we did about presenting the play in a circular fashion for the prologue (Act 1 Scene 1) for '13'.  As included in my Blog Entry, I talked about how my teacher had 'The 12' characters lying on the floor, sleeping and fidgeting because they are meant to be having a nightmare, which later explained through reading the script happened to be the same nightmare.  I talked about how when me and the 11 other actors had woken up from this nightmare at 7:13a.m, due to an alarm clock going off, we suggested adding the element of physical sound being that some of the actors during this moment would make a heart beating sound whilst the rest of us would be breathing heavily and panting at a fast tempo.

Research Findings/Development On Characterisation - Experimenting With Creative Risks:

Through knowledge from reading the whole script of '13', I know that Martin is one of the political members of Ruth's party, due to this, I was generally presenting agreeable physical responses to most of the things Ruth was announcing in her speech for Act 1 Scene 13.  For an example of an agreeable physical response, I thrusted my right arm up in the air and shouted "YEAH!" to obviously show the reaction of physical agreement.  But one of the things that I didn't agree to was when Ruth had said "We don't hold up the market as a solution to everything, but unlike any currently in opposition, we're also not frightened."

When Ruth had said this in her speech, me being Martin, I backed away a little from her and disagreed because of the way I want to portray Martin in my performance.  I want Martin to be afraid as to what may happen in the world through political, economic, cultural and social reasons, even global war for that matter.  An example of how I presented this negative physical response was that I, as I said, backed away from Ruth to possibly signify that I am, in reality, afraid of what may happen. I also tried to portray a physical stance of being shy (hid myself away from the crowd whilst walking away and crossed my arms to show that I'm not opening myself anymore) to hopefully signify to the audience that I have presented a negative physical reaction towards something in Ruth's speech.

When I talked about how my teacher had implemented the use of presenting our performance in a circular fashion in the introduction to this Reflective Blog, one thing that did question me at that time was what the significance of 7:13 was?  Through reading the script, I didn't find any evidence to go along with this random time in which all of the people in 'The 12'  awaken from their nightmare instantaneously.  This resulted in me to try and research what 7:13 meant, and the first thing I thought of when I looked at the number '7:13' without the 'a.m' sign at the end was a passage from a bible.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation+7:13-17

Above, I have included a link to a search on the internet I had found when trying to find out what passage 7:13 in the bible is.  In the quotes of Revelation 7:13 from the New International Version (NIV) of the Christian bible:  

Then one of the elders asked me, “These in white robes—who are they, and where did they come from?”
I answered, “Sir, you know.”
And he said, “These are they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.  Therefore,

“they are before the throne of God
    and serve him day and night in his temple;
and he who sits on the throne
    will shelter them with his presence.

Never again will they hunger;
    never again will they thirst.
The sun will not beat down on them,
    nor any scorching heat.

For the Lamb at the center of the throne
    will be their shepherd;
‘he will lead them to springs of living water.’
    ‘And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.

When I had looked at Revelation 7:13 and witnessed this quote, I was amazed by what I had thought initially about the number '7:13' during the course of the lesson and by what I had discovered from researching it.  When I looked and read this quote fully, it did make me think of John building his revolution of protesters against the British Government.  

The whole idea of Johns fight against the British Government is so that the general public will be free and don't have to be afraid anymore.  Me saying this makes me believe that John is 'The Lamb' in this passage, leading his army of protesters to also believe that (thinking that the words 'they', 'them' and 'their' in the passage is a reference to the protesters/the general public) "Never again will they hunger; never again will they thirst.  The sun will not beat down on them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; 'he will lead them to springs of living water.  And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.'  

Through analysing this part of Revelation 7:13, it makes me confident that this is the significant evidence as to what the number '7:13' means in the play '13'.  If I were to change some of the words in Revelation 7:13 to create a quote to coincide with the events of Johns revolution against the British Government in '13', I would replace the words 'hunger' and 'thirst' with 'fear' and 'worry' since, in my opinion, the general public in the play, even my character Martin, is afraid of the events occurring at the time and would follow those who will fight and solve the problems to create a brighter future, which is what Johns intentions are throughout the whole of the play.

Exploration Process/Further Development On Characterisation - Ideas For Personality:

During the exploration process, I had the idea that I should research more about both my characters, Martin and Paul, to see if they dislike any other character in the play so I can give a more truthful, naturalistic performance.

For the time I had put into reading the whole script of '13', I didn't discover any negativity between my characters and others.  I'd obviously have to go back and read through again more thoroughly to make sure of this, but the fact that I had come up with this idea is a good one as it is one thing that could help potentially boost my performance and it'll show that I have put the time into researching both my characters just like a professional actor would.
 

Evaluation/Aims For Later Rehearsal Sessions:

With physical responses in mind, it does allow me to work on my physical reactions towards some of the lines presented by other characters in my scenes, to signify any positive or negative reactions towards their ideas to improve my quality of Physical Theatre overall within my performance for '13'.  This will be one of the aims I will strive to achieve for later rehearsal sessions, I will accomplish this by reading through my scenes in the play, either as Martin or Paul, and try experimenting with ways of showing my physical reactions towards their ideas to, again, increase the quality of my performance.

Independent Input Into Rehearsal Session - Trial And Error:

Act 1 Scene 4:

Me and the other actors for Act 1 Scene 4 had gone back to look at this scene as to how we could improve it even though it had already been blocked by our teacher.

We performed the scene multiple times with me, including others, suggesting ideas as to how we could potentially move more in this scene since all the characters are mainly sitting down for the whole of it.

For an example, I thought of the idea to have one of the characters in the scene, Ruth (the Prime Minister in '13'), look out of the window more during the end of the scene since there are protesters trying to knock down her door and she could give off an aggressive gesture towards them to signify them that they should stop.  But I'd reached the conclusion that adding this into the scene may have been unnecessary and wouldn't contribute anything more about the character in this scene at that moment so I scrapped the idea entirely but I was complimented by my group for giving an idea as to how we could potentially improve the scene.

Further suggestions as to how we could improve the scene got to the point where it wouldn't really make much sense as to where the characters end up throughout the scene along with what they were saying in terms of lines, so we just went with how it was originally blocked.  Doing all of this though did give me more time with one of my characters in '13', Martin, and made me think more about how I could present him in terms of costume.

Act 1 Scene 4 (Feedback Edit):

Effects Of The Blocking For The Overall Scene:

Having performed this scene in a previous encounter with the group of actors for this scene, before the blocking session with our teacher, we all had a hard time deciding how we were all going to present it in terms of physical activity and vocal production.  

During the beginning of this scene, there is meant to be a hoover sound effect to be going off due to the character of Shannon, who is the cleaner lady for Ruth.  Me, as well as the group of actors for this scene, were wondering how we could show this without the sound effect, just pretending it was there.  I had suggested that all of the actors should try to be a little bit louder when announcing their lines to counteract the loud sound that the hoover is producing.  We had used this idea in a practice run before the blocking session and it had seemed to work very well, but what we didn't grasp from the script was when we should start speaking normally again since their is also a protest going on in the background of this scene.

We had left this out of the scene until we had entered the blocking session with our teacher.  During the blocking session, we had implemented this idea of producing a louder voice once more and it had seemed to be an effective way to deliver our lines in the scene to, again, counteract the loud noise that the hoover is using producing in this scene.

Our teacher had planned, and blocked, that we would use this production of voice from the very beginning of the scene where Ruth says the line "If you're flagging Martin, I'd get some coffee" until we reach the point where it says, in the script, that Shannon turns off the hoover once Ruth says the line "Just switch it off. Alright?"

This is when we could then start hearing the protests going on outside of 10 Downing Street and also this is where we didn't know if we should still be producing a louder voice to counteract that.  Our teacher had planned and blocked that we would all use our normal voices again once Shannon had turned off the hoover.

For the character of Shannon, our teacher had included the addition of having a sense of comedic value towards her lines which she presents in this scene.  This particular way of presentation was to happen when Ruth starts to say "Excuse me! Do you need to do that now!?" to Shannon, to which she replies by saying "Oh hi! You alright?" and then goes to say "Well - not being funny, but you look a little bit...".  Her saying this goes along with what Ruth is wearing within this scene, presenting her opinion towards it in a sarcastic humor.

Along with how we should all present our lines, our teacher had also sorted out how the characters Ruth and Shannon should use more movement within this scene overall.  

Before the blocking session, Ruth had come into the scene, said her line to me about getting some coffee, to then sit down straight after.   My teacher had fixed this by having the actor, who was to portraying Ruth, to remain standing for a little while before she sits down to go along with the line she says to Liam: "Is this skirt working?"  It is only, until then after, that Ruth would then sit down once the sound the hoover is producing becomes an annoyance to her.

When looking into how Shannon could move more around this scene with her hoover, our teacher had made it so that she would walk through the center of the stage and then start hoovering under our chairs to make it seem as through, when we are all announcing our lines, have a louder sound that is blocking what we are saying to result in Ruth to not hear anything that both Martin is saying about where Andrew is and Carol complementing her choice of clothing.

Our teacher had also asked me, as well as a few others, that we should work on our physicality more within the scene since it was looking a little too plain and static to her.  I can improve my performance within this scene by bringing on one of my props, being a notepad, and while Liam, Shannon and Ruth are talking, I'll be there writing in my notepad.  I'll also have some more physical actions for when the hoover has turned off and we could all hear the protesters more in their riots, being that I would try and look out of a nearby window to witness how many protesters there are and if they are being stopped by the local authorities at all.

Evaluative Judgement For Scene - The Outcomes Presented (Feedback Edit):

• When we had successfully fully blocked Act 1 Scene 4, I could see how it seemed to be portrayed much more smoothly, compared to when we had gone through it alone before this session.  
• The way that my teacher had asked certain characters to move around the scene more, such as Ruth and Shannon, did create more of the sense of naturalism within the scene.  
• Adding the comedic value towards some of the lines being presented did make this scene in-particular stand out to me more over the others, before and after, in Act 1.  

• And, finally, it did make it more interesting to watch overall since, at first, Ruth came in and had sat down for the whole scene and Shannon was not really moving around the scene much as she was mainly hoovering in one spot.

I had come out of this blocking session with our teacher feeling much more confident in how we could all present this scene when it comes to later rehearsal sessions and eventually the performance in November.

Act 1 Scene 12:

Once I had some time with my group for Act 1 Scene 4 to help improve and further develop it with my contributed suggestions, I had moved on over to the group of actors I was to be performing with for Act 1 Scene 12 as my second character in '13', Paul.

This scene had also already been blocked by our teacher, so we tried to come up with suggestions as to how we could include more movement or work on our vocal production.  After a few minutes of discussion before the lesson would have ended, we didn't come out with any improvements for this scene, but it is good to try and go back to develop an already blocked scene to help potentially make it better.