Day 8 & 9

These last two days have been all about polishing our performance.

We also decided on the light fixtures.

We're going to be using the lights to help us emphasise our message. E.g. the toy room will have pink lighting, to symbolise the young girl's dream unconditional fun room and the clown room will have red lighting, to symbolise the evil.

Since we've figured out our light fixtures, we've mainly just been practicing and rehearsing. What we really need to concentrate on is synchronisation of characters (Such as in the contortionist room) and we need to make sure that the performance's transitions are smooth and not choppy.

Unfortunately, that's all we've been doing for the last two days so there isn't much to talk about. On Friday lunch time and Monday lunch time, we'll be practicing and rehearsing too.

Day 7

Last week!

Today we worked on our last scene!

The Clown Room

We wanted this scene to symbolise the young girl turning into an adult. We've progressively made the clown become more abusive throughout the play.

The clown room is going to start with the clown coming into the room, dragging the girl in with it. The girls pulls away and refuses, she'll say something like, "Let me go! I'm not scared of you!"

That's when the clown slaps the girl and she falls to the ground.

The clown says bad things to her whilst circling around her, such as, "You're not brave enough! You're not strong enough! Everything is wrong with you!"

At that point when I kick her, the lion (Peta) comes out and attacks me (the clown). As we've already seen in this performance during the Lion Room, the clown is quite scared of the lion. So, when she comes into the room, I'm already nervous. The lion scratches me on the face and I fall to the ground. Then, the lion pulls me up and throws me to the other side of the room. I hand over the teddy bear and run away.

Personally, I feel that the clown running away symbolises that growing up is not inevitable, and we can always stay young at heart.

Once the lion is gone, the lion becomes timid and gives the teddy bear to the young girl. The lion is timid because as we've already seen earlier in the performance, the lion is scared of people because of his bad trainers.

The young girl loves having the teddy bear back, but then she realises something. This whole Dream World journey has taught her that she doesn't need a teddy bear anymore, because she's not afraid of the real world, and she's not afraid of growing up.

She will make a speech along those lines (We're not exactly sure yet what she's going to say) and then she gives the teddy bear to the Lion.

The End.

Personally, I wanted the scene to end with the lion trying to save the young girl, but it's too late and the clown throws her off stage, and that was the end, symbolising that she's made her transition into adulthood.

But, I still think that this idea was good.

The next two lessons will be about polishing our performance and showing it to Miss Burley.

Day 6

Only 3 lessons left until the performance!

So, today we finished off our contortionist act. It was difficult to rehearse today because we couldn't use the other classroom so we worked on the balcony.

We worked on the end of our contortionist scene, the mirror scene and the toy/unconditional fun scene.

Mirror Room

So, after we finished our contortionist scene (Which I talked about in the last blog post) we started working on our Mirror Room scene.

The mirror room represents the different emotions that the young girl goes through in order to grow up.

When she enters the room, the others actors are in a semi-circle facing the audience, just like in a fun house crazy mirror room.

Bridget Bur is the young girl in this scene, and she starts off by going to the first mirror. The first mirror is the 'normal' mirror played by Bridget Bos. The young girl and the mirror just reflect normally.

She goes to the next mirror, which represents Happy. Happy is played by Sarah. In this mirror, everything is overdramatic. The young girl tries to do a small turn and it is reflected by an overdramatic twirl by the happy mirror. The happy mirror is always smiling.

The next mirror that Bridget Bos goes to is the Angry mirror, played by Allie. Bridget puts her hand up to the mirror and it aggressively puts its hand up against hers. The young girl gets scared and goes on to the next mirror, which is fear.

We decided to make the Angry Mirror before the Fear Mirror because the Angry Mirror scares the young girl, and so it's very appropriate that since the mirrors are reflecting her emotions, the next mirror is fear because she is scared.

The Fear mirror is played by Peta. When the young girl goes up to the mirror and tries to touch it, the fear mirror moves back, afraid.

The last mirror is the clown mirror. The young girl expects the clown mirror to reflect her actions, but instead the clown comes out and slaps her across the face with the teddy bear that it still has from the start of the performance when it stole it off her.

I (the clown) slap her and she falls down. I then run around in between all the mirrors. The young girl has to get up and break through all the mirrors, representing her breaking through the main emotions that keep people from progressing on in life. Happy, Angry and Fear. When people are happy and content, they don't want anything to change, and they are scared to try to improve, in case it fails and they are no longer happy. When people are angry, they can go through a path of destruction, and break everything that they love because they don't realise what they're doing when they're angry. The main emotion, though, that keeps people from progressing in life is fear. Often people are too afraid. That's why it's important for the young girl to break through all the mirrors that represent her emotions, keeping her from getting through the door.

Whilst the young girl is breaking through the mirrors, I run to the middle of the audience and jump around crazily with the teddy bear. Our group right from the start decided that we wanted the clown to slowly turn abusive throughout the performance. Me slapping Bridget Bur with the teddy bear is the first sign of this.

I run to the next room, and the young girl follows.

Toy/Unconditional Fun Room

In this room, the young girl getting through to the next room after this one represents her maturing. At some stage in our life, we all have to stop having fun and grow up to make important decisions about our life. Choosing to grow up represents maturity on our behalves.

The clown enters the room and runs through to the next one.

The young girl, now played by Bridget Bos, enters the room.

Peta, who is playing the robot, is standing at the front of the entrance. The young girl winds the robot up and it comes to life.

The following is a rough dialogue of the scene. We have also used Levels in this scene to emphasise the message.

Robot: Hello.

Young Girl: Hello. Where am I?

Robot: Welcome to the Toy Box.

Robot walks over to where the Doll (Allie) is sitting on the ground lifeless.

Robot: This is Dolly.

Young Girl: She's so pretty!

Young girl picks up a brush lying next to the doll and begins brushing the doll's hair. Immediately, the doll comes to life and turns it face to look up at the Young Girl.

Doll: Hello.

The young girl is slightly scared and takes a step back.

Doll: I love you, Mummy.

The young girl continues to take a step back until she accidentally bumps into the Cow Girl (Sarah)

Cow Girl: Well, Howdy Partner!
Cow Girl skips around the young girl.

The young girl walks over to where a princess stands and the young girl taps her on the shoulder. Princess comes to life.

Princess: Well, hello Darling. Where have you come from?

Young Girl: I don't know. I'm lost.

Princess: Well, you're home now.

Princess takes her crown off her head and puts it onto the young girl's head.

Princess takes hold of young girl's hand and takes her over to Dolly. Dolly stands up and they all start playing 'Ring-a-Ring-a-Rosy.'

Everyone is laughing, clapping and singing along.

They all fall to the flaw and Cow Girl helps the young girl up. They start doing a cow girl dance, still laughing.

Then, Young Girl goes over to the Robot and starts pressing all the buttons. It starts dancing in a robot fashion.

Princess brings over a giant Teddy.

At first, Young Girl accepts it, but then she realises that she shouldn't and that she needs to get her old Teddy Bear back.

She drops the bear and takes off the crown and throws it to the ground.

Robot: You can't leave us now.

Everyone: Don't leave us. mummy.

Everyone puts their hand out at the same time. The clown re-enters from the exit door, clearly trying to see why the young girl hasn't followed it through the next door.

The clown grabs onto the young girl's wrist and roughly pulls her along. Both exit through the 'exit' door.

So, that's roughly what happens in this scene. We wanted this scene to have a lot of dialogue in it, because we wanted each scene to be completely different to each other.

Because the clown roughly pulls the young girl along, this also shows a step-up in the stages of its abusiveness. Even though the clown comes in to collect her, it wasn't saving her for the young girl's benefit. 

Also, through out the scenes, the clown's makeup will be getting worse and worse. By the end, it will all be smudged and watery, because I'm going to be spraying water on it backstage after each scene. This shows the downfall of the Clown which is supported by its abusiveness.

Day 5

Day 5! How exciting!

So, today we worked on catching Peta up on what she missed last lesson, and we also started and finished the 'contortionist' room/scene.

Contortionist Scene:

So, the contortionist scene is a big scene in a performance, and probably the longest scene. It takes a lot of effort for the scene and it's all about timing, because as one of our dramatic techniques, we've used synchronisation. Peta M will be the young girl in this scene. The young girl changing in each scene represents her growing because it starts off as the shortest girl in our group being the young girl and the tallest girl in our grouping ending the performance as the young girl.

The scene starts with me (the clown) entering the room, I still have the teddy bear that I stole from the young girl at the start of the performance in my hands, and running behind a black wall. Then, Peta (the young girl) runs in after me, but before she can run behind the black wall, music starts and a contortionist performance starts.

I, along with Bridget Bur, choreographed the contortionist scene so that it looks in sync and it looks eerie and cool at the same time.

I can't really explain the contortionist scene, but I will try to upload a video of it on here. The scene is quite long so the video might be too big to upload on here.

Whilst the performance is going on, the contortionists are saying mean things to the young girl such as, "You'll never make it to where you want to go." and "Why even bother trying?"

As you might have already guessed, this room symbolises the young girl's thoughts that are blocking her from growing/escaping. Once she breaks through and overcomes these thoughts, she gets through to the next room.

That's why this scene was imperative to have and is paramount.

The contortionist scene is probably my favourite because shows our talent and our acting abilities.

Day 4

Today was the first day that we started working on our performance. All the ideas have come together and we know what we want to happen from the performance, the message of the performance and how  we want our characters to be portrayed. Another great thing that I think will make our performance stand out from others is that our group has decided to use our dramatic techniques that we've learned, such as levels and symbolism.

Peta was away today, so it was quite hard to be as productive as usual. We started working on our first two scenes.

The opening scene (Where the Lion character is first introduced into the story so that it makes sense towards the end) and the Lion scene.

The Opening Scene

The  opening scene/lion tamer scene is the first scene of the performance. Once the audience is seated, they are transported into the world of a circus. Bridget Bos will say "Welcome to the Amazing Circus!" (Or something like that) "Our last trick for this evening will be the lion and his assistant, magnificent Melanie!" That's when Peta (the lion) Bridget Bur (The lion tamer) and Sarah (Magnificent Melanie) will come into the middle of the audience and Peta will jump through a hoop. We decided to start with this beginning scene so that it not only introduces the important lion character and portrays him as scary, but also so the audience knows that they're at the circus.

The lights will go out and when they turn on I (The clown) will be in the centre of the audience. I will say, "I need a volunteer" to the audience. We're hoping that lots of people will put their hand up, but Allie won't, so I, being the clown, will choose her. She will say, "But the show's over." And I reply, "Oh, no. The show has only just begun." I snatch her teddy bear and say, "See you in the Fun House." and I run out through a door with Allie following a few steps behind.

Through this scene, all the key characters are introduced, the lion, the clown and the young girl. It also gives an idea to the audience for what they might be expecting.

The Lion Scene

The second scene starts with the clown entering through the other door (The idea of the two doors is that one door will always be the one that characters enter through, and the other door being the door that they need to leave through in order to get to the next room.) I, the clown, run in and see Peta (the lion) sitting there tied up to a rope with a hoop beside her. The hoop is the thing that she jumped through earlier in the performance. I'm scared but I quickly run through the next door, symbolising that I'm going to the next room. Allie, still being the young girl, runs in and is scared of the lion. The lion detaches itself from the rope that it's tied up to and starts going toward Allie. Allie is scared but she picks up the hoop for self defence, and that's when she realises that the lion is scared of the hoop. Allie gets to the other side of the room, drops the hoop and escapes through the 'exit' door (The door that characters go through in order to get to the next room.)

This scene symbolises the way in which people might think that others are perfect, but there are always flaws. One might assume that a lion isn't scared of anything, but because this lion has been forced to jump through this hoop, it is now scared of it. This room also shows how the young girl is breaking through her fear and showing courage. Through the use of the lion and the hoop, it represents the young girl being anti-conformity and standing up for herself without the help of a superior person.

These two scenes are what we worked on today but there are still plenty good scenes to come!

Day 3

Day 3

This lesson we continued to work on and expand our ideas from the last two lessons.

We decided that our audience should be in a donut-type shape. There will be room in the middle of the circle for the 'ring master' and the lion at the start of the performance. The drama cabin will be our stage, and outside the drama cabin will be backstage. So, we'll be running from one door, going around the outside of the room, and enter through the second door.

This is the style we decided on as a team:

The audience will sit in a donut-shape

What we discussed this lesson:

Since I was at a music lesson, I missed half of the lesson and most of the notes we discussed, but I am now caught up. We wrote a detailed response to exactly what we want to happen in the first three scenes.

Before the Show:

Before the show starts, the 'Introducer,' the lion and the lion tamer will take people's tickets and show them where to sit. This makes it seem more like an actual circus than just a drama performance. Allie, who is going to be the first actor to play the young girl, will sit in the audience whilst everyone else is backstage.

First Scene:

The show will start off by the 'Introducer' (Bridget Bos) saying "Our final act for tonight is..." and that's when Bridget Bur (Lion Tamer), Sarah (Helper) and Peta (Lion) come into the middle of the audience. They do their act (We're still undecided on exactly what their act will be) and then one of them will say "Thank you for coming and watching the circus! Goodnight!" and the lights will turn off and they will exit. Then, a spotlight turns onto the clown and it says "We need a volunteer." The young girl (Allie) says "But the show has finished." and the clown responds by saying, "No, we've only just begun." The clown will snatch the teddy bear from Allie and will run out of the room with Allie following.

Second Scene:

The second scene starts with the clown running in past the lion and hides near a cupboard. The young girl runs in and will be scared of the lion. The lion will growl and the young girl will freeze. She runs out the door with the lion chasing her.

Peta will then become the girl instead of Allie.

Third Scene:

In the third room that the girl runs into, there will be contortionists (Bridget Bur, Bridget Bos and Sarah) behind a scene. The young girl (Peta) tries to go back the way she came, but that's when I come out, blocking her way. The contortionists will gather around her, doing all these tricks and saying bad things to her which represent her thoughts. The young girl breaks through the mean thoughts by breaking through the bridge the contortionists will make. Peta exits with the contortionists and clown following her.

Bridget Bur will then become the young girl instead of Peta.

Day 2

Day 2

This lesson we started to explore and develop our performance. We have already decided on a basic idea as a 'fun house' with a young girl, a clown and a lion. 

We started off by furthering our ideas from the last lesson.

Quick sum-up from last lesson:

The idea is that a young girl has a teddy bear which a clown steals. She follows the clown into a Fun House, exploring each room. Each room has a theme, and every time she gets through one, she is maturing.

What we discussed this lesson:

Rooms (In order of appearance):

1. Everyone (Including the audience) is at a circus. Once the circus ends, the girl's teddy bear is stolen and she enters the Fun House

2. Room where there is a scary lion which represents courage and fear.

3. Contortionist room. All the contortionists are blocking the girl. They are saying bad things to her and represent her thoughts.

4. Mirror room. The girl explores the different emotions she goes through and how they affect her.

5. Fun room. This room is full of unconditional fun and real toys, but the girl learns that she needs to move on in order to mature.

6. Clown room (End scene)

Character List:

- Lion (Peta)

- Ring Master (Bridget Bur)

- Person whom opens show (Bridget Bos)

- Clown (Me)

- Young Girl (Shared between Allie, Peta, Bridget Bur, Bridget Bos and Sarah)

- Contortionists (Sarah, Bridget Bos, Bridget Bur and me as the clown)

- Mirror People (Sarah - Happy, Peta - Fear, Anger - Allie, Bridget Bos - Normal, Me - Sad)

- Toys (Bridget Bur - Princess, Peta - Robot, Doll - Allie, Sarah - Cowgirl, Me - Clown)

My ideas:

- The young girl is played by different actors, not just one

- The girl gives the lion the teddy bear near the end of the performance

- At the end of the performance, the clown comes back and the girl is an adult

- The toy room should have tiny objects so it looks like all the toys are over-sized

- We should gradually make the clown scarier by making its make-up run more and more throughout the performance

Peta's ideas:

- In the Fun room, the girl should leave at her own will. Leaving unconditional fun shows the maturity that the girl has developed.

- There should be soft 'Jack in the Box' music in the transition between the first and the second scene.

Bridget Bos:

- The contortionists should block the young girl from getting out of the room which symbolises the power of her thought.

- In the fun room, the actors should be toys such as toys, dolls and robots.

- There should be a person who opens the show a part from the ring master.

Bridget Bur:

- The clown teases the girl with the teddy bear.

- In the uncoditional fun room, the people give the girl a new teddy bear as a bribe.
- In some rooms, we won't need everyone.

Sarah:

- The clown actor doesn't change
- Clown should take the Teddy bear at the start of the performance