Unit 1 - identity Reflection

For this unit we were working on the topic of identity and then made a devised performance based on the topic. Devising is based on a stimulus or object which you build your performance around on. It starts back to 16th century Italy where commedia dell'arte, a new form of travelling theatre that would show players, acrobats and street entertainers, became more popular.Commedia dell’arte (Comedy of Art), means unwritten or improvised performances. This new form of theatre focused more on the performances of the actor than the subject matter of the plays. 

First off we got into groups and made a mind map on identity and listed all the things that make our identity. Using the mind maps we created and watching a short film based on identity we then used and created our own monologues on our identity. After writing our monologues we then chose a few monologues to put into our devised piece. With the mind map it helps us as actors with teamwork and being able to communicate with one and allow us to express ourselves and open up to others and be vulnerable. Once we chose the monologues, on one of the monologues we split the lines and were put into groups and created a scene of our own and put them into one performance. This as actors helps us get more involved and work together and being able to cooperate with each other and being able to work together to come up with a scene for the performance. We also have done some vocal warm ups and exercises as well as tongue twisters at the start of the lesson as warm ups before we get into the lesson. The warm ups help us be more relaxed and feel more comfortable when performing and for the vocal warm ups helps relax our vocals as well as help us pronounce words better and clear our voices and project more so the audience can hear better. 

We also had a look at verbatim theatre. Verbatim theatre is theatre based on real events. It is a form of documentary theatre, it allows theatre makers to explore events and themes through the words of people. This type of theatre was a big influence on political theatre at the beginning of the 21st century. Verbatim theatre is created from the transcription of interviews with people who are connected to a common event or subject. The interviews are then edited in a performance text. The actors are also participating in the research and then feeding it back to the writer. In lessons when working on verbatim theatre we watched a video on what verbatim theatre is about and then after that got into pairs and one of us was voice recording ourselves while the other had to reenact what the other person has said in the voice recording and vice-versa. This helps us as actors improve on our listening skills and paying attention to the details on the voice recording on how the other actor is feeling and what emotions they display on the voice recording and how the other actor listening can show to others and portray how the other is feeling.

During rehearsals I would say we weren’t very sure what we were doing at first and weren’t very focused but over time we were able to focus a bit more and work together in coming up with more ideas for our performance. During rehearsals we also added a few more monologues and worked on them during the rehearsals. What I could have done more in rehearsals was to participate and speak up more when it came to coming up with ideas for the performance. As well as that I feel like I should have payed a bit more attention during rehearsals other than that rehearsals went generally okay.

The actual performance in my opinion was okay and I think it went well despite not rehearsing much. I think during the performance we were vocal and projected our voice on to the audience. Another thing that was good was our focus throughout and we weren't getting distracted or getting out of character during the performance. However, despite our focus throughout, what I thought we could improve on is the energy on stage when performing because it didn’t seem like we weren't actually trying. Overall, I thought the performance went quite well.