Week 4 - Devising

This week consisted of developing our ideas we have by making up more scene to go into our piece to help make the scenes we have so far link. We came up with a proposal scene on Monday which shows how Bobby is forced into this arranged marriage with brother Taylor by her father. At the back of the scene with be happy Bobby and Billy watching over the proposal and when brother Taylor asks her the happy Bobby screams 'NO'.

'Arranged marriage is a type of marital union where the bride and groom are selected by a third party rather than by each other. It was common worldwide until the 18th century.'

We had a bit of feedback from Kirsty on Monday were we discussed about our piece and all the relationships and how it might be too complicated for the audience to understand it all. Then we decided that instead of having Phoebe as Bobby's sister Betty she was also going to be Bobby as well. Which meant we had to tweak some of the scenes we already had.I came up with the idea to have one happy and one sad Bobby, the happy one would always we with Billy-Joe as he makes her happy and the sad one would be with brother Taylor. Phoebe decided to be the sad Bobby and I'm the happy Bobby. Which is why we changed it so Phoebe is getting married and I just have my hand on her shoulder during the wedding scene.  

With this we would have one Bobby on the side saying all of the other Bobby's who would be doing a scenes feelings and real emotions that she's not saying. For example with the dinner scene that we have Bobby sitting down at the table and then the other Bobby behind her reacting to the things the father is saying because the Bobby sitting down isn't brave enough to say them. We had some feedback on this scene about the way the Bobby stood behind the other Bobby should express her feelings. For example I was shouting them but they said the tension was already there so there is no need to shout but maybe just have an angry tone to my voice. 

We have also worked on a dance together to show that we are both Bobby and to help the audience understand that better and when we showed the group on Wednesday they seemed to know without us saying anything. We also came up with a scene for the mother to show her relationship with the father since our play is based on the relationships between each other. We now have a scene with brother Taylor and the father talking about the arranged marriage.

With the scenes we came up with this week we now have a beginning, middle and end to our play. We have linked 6 scenes together which is what we needed to do mainly this week to make our middle of our play. All we have to do now is make a few more scenes up to link to beginning to the middle and the middle to the end and then we have our play. We have also figured out a few songs for some of the scenes but some are yet to be chosen and then we need to think about costumes which we will probably discuss near the end. I think so far our play is going really well as we have a lot of material to work with. Hopefully it will continue to go this way and it isn't long until we have our final piece. 

Week 3- Devising

During this week we had been discussing having a wedding and other ideas that we could do for our play as we don't really have a structure for it yet, just loads of ideas. At first we were going to completely scrap our ideas we had at the moment and just have a wedding. We wrote down all the things that happen at a wedding and cut them out and the picked them out so it's not in order.The we realized we couldn't do them all so we picked the important ones.

Deborah suggested a workshop for us to help us with this wedding idea by putting out 3 rows of chairs with 3 chairs in each row to make a wedding aisle.  Deborah gave us 2 rules to begin with which was, one person must be standing at all times and one person moving chairs at all time. We played around with this for a little and I could feel the awkwardness and it made me feel uncomfortable, as if no one wanted to be there due to everyone moving seats. The next rule was no eye contact so I just kept looking forward as if the ceremony was actually taking place. Then the rule was to make eye contact with someone and you had to stay on the opposite side to the person you had eye contact with then you could swap eye contact with someone else. This had the affect of family feuds, like the two families don't like each other and don't approve of this marriage. The next rule was that you didn't want to sit next to anyone so we were all constantly moving away from each other which made it feel like we all hated each other. Then we had someone walk down the aisle which caused me to actually stand and look down the aisle so it really gave the affect of an actually wedding. Finally the last rule was you had to sit next to someone at a times which definitely brought the feeling at a wedding as there is always people chatting when waiting for the wedding to actually start.

Even though we thought the wedding idea was good we didn't really want to change what we already had as we really liked it but then we said we would still have a wedding scene in it. We went back to our idea and added some scenes. We decided to have a wedding scene at the beginning of our play where at first we're all saying a feeling or emotion in cannon and then repeating it, mine is 'Forced'. Then Lewis asks if brother Taylor and Bobby will take each other and brother Taylor says 'I do' and Bobby says 'I' with now answer and then everyone says ' Do or don't' because not everyone wants the marriage to happen.  

After it goes it to a dance sequence with the girls to show the secrets and lies that me and Kennedy choreographed and then we added the boys into it. Then the boys stand behind us and the girls do another dancing show their hurt and pain in their relationships and their lives.

We don't know the structure of our play, we only really have loads of scenes that need to put in order because the only order we have at the moment is the first and second scene. The first scene is the first scene but it's a flash back because it will also be the last scene but in the last scene Bobby will actually say 'I do'. The scene after that is the dance sequence. We have a lot of scenes that we just need to link together so hopefully we can do that next week and maybe make some new scenes to link them.

Week 2 - Devising

Characters:
Billy Joe: Joseph
Bobby: Me
Father: Lewis
Mother: Kennedy
Brother Taylor: Luke
Sister Betty: Phoebe

After speaking about what we've already discussed for our play we all agreed that it was probably best if we didn't all play Billy Joe and Bobby as the audience might get confused since we were confusing ourselves. Before we began deciding on what we're going to do instead of what we originally planned we decided on our characters. Then we started linking everyone and thinking about their relationships between each other which is when we decided that Bobby was going to have an arranged marriage with brother Taylor the priest even though she is secretly dating Billy Joe who her father doesn't approve of. Bobby doesn't get on well with her father as he is very aggressive and violent to her mother who she does get a long with. Bobby is close to her sister  Betty. Betty and brother Taylor love each other but Betty is too young to be with him and he is suppose to be marrying Bobby.

There is a lot that we want to happen throughout this play but we have to see what works and what doesn't and we can't have it too complicated. We do have a lot of ideas like having the mother poison the father but then with everything else we need to happen we realized that was too much. I think we need a scene to show everyone's relationships and feeling towards each other. For example we was thinking about having a scene with Bobby and Betty to show that they are close sisters and during this scene have Betty confess to Bobby that she love's brother Taylor. Then we thought it would be a great idea to have a scene with brother Taylor and Bobby to show how they don't love each other and the awkwardness between them. We thought it would also be a good idea to have a wedding scene with them getting married but then I suggested why doesn't Billy Joe come in, even though we all thought he was dead. I also was thinking because we decided to not have the mother kill of the father maybe we should just have her leaving him as in a divorce. Our group has a lot of ideas we just have to play around with them and figure out which ones will work the best.

We then discussed our first scene and agreed that it would be good to do our last scene as our first scene and then do a flash back and then do it again as our last scene. This scene was going to be Bobby, Betty and their mother and father having dinner at the table. Even though you don't see it, Bobby had just been told that Billy Joe has died so she isn't eating her dinner and her father get's mad because she doesn't. During this scene we put a lot of  Berkoff movements in it to keep it physical. We don't want this scene to show too much because we want our play to be mysterious and secretive. Our second scene is going to be very physical, the mother and father are going to show the father abusing the mother. Brother Taylor and Betty will show they love each other but they can't be together. Billy Joe's and Bobby's are kinda the same as he's asked her to run away but they can't so they're also showing their love for each other.

Joe and I tried to make our physical little dance as cute and romantic as we could by having him rest his head on my shoulder and holding me close. We also added in a lift that Kirsty had showed us and had one or two moments where we're really close and looking into each other's eyes. We want it to show so much without saying anything as we don't want to give too much of it away.

During Kirsty's class on Wednesday she asked ask to do three freeze frames to show the story-line of our play. We decided to also do these at the beginning of our play to show a bit of mystery but also give a little bit away. I see our play a lot like a love story, like Romeo and Juliet where they want to be together but they can't due to their families feud.

This freeze frames shows the love between Billy Joe and Bobby as they're kissing here and then brother Taylor is on one knee with his arm reaching out for her because he's suppose to be marrying her. Betty is also reaching out but she's reaching more for brother Taylor. On the opposite side it's showing how violent the father is towards the mother because he is punching her belly.

This freeze frame is showing how they don't want Billy Joe and Bobby being together so they're both being pulled apart. We have come up with quite a few reason's why they don't want them being together. One because Bobby is having an arranged marriage with brother Taylor and the second is that her father doesn't approve of Billy Joe.

This one shows the father strangling the mother, brother Taylor with his arm around Bobby as they are too be married but Bobby is still thinking of Billy Joe which is why we put him on the floor and holding her hand. Sister Betty is holding brother Taylor's hand because she loves him but she's looking down because she knows she's too young to be with him.

Week 1 - Devising

This week we have been given some tools to help us get started with our devising pieces. We played quite a few games to help us get active and get our brains working. Deborah also said that we should make sure we stretch before we do anything and don't just walk into the class room and sit down. If we play a game it will get our energy pumping and could help us come up with some idea for our devising piece. Deborah introduced this stalking game to us which was where you pick someone in the room and stalk them without them knowing and then we gradually got closer until we got as close as we possibly could. Then she had us write for 4 minutes about how it made us feel and then we had to start cutting it down to we had 3 words. With these 3 words we made up 3 movements and then 3 sound effects to go with it. Deborah numbered us after and then called us up and made us walk to the performance area using our 3 movements and then freeze on our last movement. She then got 3 of us at a time to do it and move around in the space whilst making the sounds and then we all did it. Whilst doing this we all started to become face to face with each other as we moved around the space and then it started to tell all these different stories.

On Thursday Kirsty gave us our stimulus which was a song that's called 'Ode to Billy Joe'. We all listened to the song first and wrote down our first responses. At first all that came to my mind was that this sounded like a country song and brought cowboys and farmers to my mind. I then began to listen to the lyrics and a heard the date which was '3rd of June' which made me think maybe something actually happened on this day which is why it's in the song.  It also speaks about a boy called Billy Joe who jumped off Tallahatchie bridge and how this girl is being told this by her mother. From the song I could tell that this girl was upset, almost as if she had a relationship with this boy but her family doesn't seem to care so I got the feeling it was a secret relationship.

After we came up with our own responses and listened to the song a few times and looked at the lyrics we went into our devising groups which are three groups of six to see what their responses are and come up with some ideas on what we're going to do. I'm in a group with Phoebe, Kennedy, Joseph, Lewis and Luke. We had quite a few responses which we're mostly all the same and then with that we came up with some ideas. We decided to focus our play more on the relationships between the characters instead of the death of Billy Joe. Our first decision was to have all three of us girls as Bobby and all three boys as Billy Joe and then show the relationship between Billy Joe and Bobby in three ways. The first one was how they were in love, second one was after they had killed someone and the last one was after Billy Joe had died. We decided to make this our prologue scene in order for the audience to see into their relationship and we're going to have Luke as the narrator to explain the different couples. I'm interested to see how this scene goes and how we develop our play even more next week. I think it's going to be very interesting and that it's going to turn out really well.

Personal Assessment - Voice

I feel as if I have many weaknesses when it comes to my voice as I fail to show emotion in my voice when on stage. I have also noticed that I speak with a fast pace which makes it hard for people to understand what I'm saying and have to ask me to repeat myself. To help me to improve this when reading from a script I can put a forward slash at the start of a new subject and make that a pause before I carry on with the new subject. For example I want tea/ I'm very cold. I also mumble sometimes when saying words and don't pronounce them properly. To improve this I will work on the words I find hard to pronounce and practice saying them correctly for when I perform on stage.One weakness that I would love to be able to do is accents, I'm not good at them and I think it would be a great skill to have if I could. I also find it hard to develop a characters voice, I think it's because I've never really been taught how to use my voice properly. To help me with this I could use the techniques we're using in voice and use them to help me change my tone in voice and maybe look into an accent and try and pick it up.

I don't have many strengths when it comes to my voice but I think one of my strengths is definitely projection as I speak quite loud anyway which is great for when I perform on stage. I would say my voice is very confident which is a good thing because it means I'm not going to get nervous when speaking and it shows I've learnt my lines.

Vocal Health Poster

Portfolio Articulation

The third element of speech production is articulation. Articulation is the term used for all actions of the organs of the vocal tract that effect modifications of the signal generated by the voice source. This modification results in speech events which can be identified as vowels, consonants or other units of a language.

The passive place of articulation is the place on the more stationary part of the vocal tract where the articulation occurs. It can be anywhere from the lips, upper teeth, gums, or roof of the mouth to the back of the throat.

* The speech organs used to make the sounds are the tongue, lips and palate.

The human voice produces sounds in the following manner

1. Air pressure from the lungs creates a steady flow of air through the trachea (windpipe), larynx (voice box) and pharynx (back of the throat).
2. The vocal folds in the larynx vibrate, creating fluctuations in air pressure that are known as sound waves.
3. Resonances in the vocal tract modify these waves according to the position and shape of the lips, jaw, tongue, soft palate, and other speech organs, creating formant regions and thus different qualities of sonorant (voiced) sound
4. Mouth and nose openings radiate the sound waves into the environment.