The warm-ups went brilliantly and warmed up my cast both physically and mentally. We began to play 'That's right Bob' in which my cast improvise a short monologue about a given subject before passing it on to another person with a similar related topic. I believe that this gave my cast the opportunity to stretch their imagination and express it vocally. I tried to accomplish the same with physicality with the game 'Magic Rock'. This is where I say the name of some sort of entity, such as an acrobat or a pencil, and they have to transform into that physically. However, I found that they tended to become the most conventional version of the entity in its least physically exaggerated form when I need them to make more of their physicality. I have an idea now for a game next week similar to 'Magic Rock' where one person comes up with an idea for an entity and creates it in a physical, natural way. The next person then exaggerates it slightly, then the next person exaggerates it slightly until it is as big as it can be. I noticed during these exercises that Eleanor was having difficulty speaking about a subject, or not expressing her physicality fully, often looking to others for support. I believe that this is a confidence issue and I will speak to a tutor about the best way to help her improve.
We then went over what we had blocked the previous day. My cast remembered it with high accuracy, which suggests that it can be blocked very swiftly.We then blocked out huge sections of Scene 1 and 2 and the entirety of Scene 3. I think that a lot of this blocking will change as the process continues, and the cast think deeper into the text. Near the end of the session I tried to block out a section which involved stage combat. No-one but Lewis had any stage combat experience, which made it difficult to block out what I wanted. I may bring someone in to help teach them more about it. I ended the session by asking them to research Melodrama, as I want them to take inspiration from it's exaggerated emotions, and to read a fairy tale by The Brother's Grimm, as the tales in the story appear to be inspired by these fairy tales. I also reminded them to start learning their lines.
There is a lot of work I want to do on the vocalisation in the performance, but I don't want to get too into that until they know the lines better. I am also going to bring in my first thoughts on the music to have, which may help set a tone for the play. My feedback from Phil Green included a few key notes: 'Feed' during the exercises to try and improve specific actor's skills, highlight the purpose of the exercise, put the script down when watching the actor's perform, and bring someone in to help with lifts and stage combat.
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