Movement in performance - Continuing with our 'torch-ography' piece

We made some changes and progress to the piece today, we wanted to add in more lyrical/contemporary movement/dance in because a lot of our performance so far has been very much more physical theatre than movement. We also wanted to add in more dynamics (RADS) because so far we have none in our pieces. The atmosphere created by the music and the low-lit setting gives us a great opportunity to create some free-flowing dynamic movements, that also fit under the lyrical dancing category. At 0:52, there are free flowing movements, flicking motion, sustained time movement and it is all light weighted movements (all of which come under dynamics).

In our previous lesson, I brought in my recording equipment and we began recording the voices for the piece. We discussed two different ways of recording, both of which we decided would be effective in different ways. We began by recording one line at a time individually, and as the song progresses and picks up we merged and mixed them together so that everyone was talking over each other. We then started to record 3 people at once saying multiple lines over each other to create more 'background' dialogue during where all the voices overlap each other and it doesn't sound so empty, it creates more of a busy atmosphere, and helps to show just how many people are affected by body dysmorphia. The idea at the end is have Will say live 'I love everything about me' to contradict it all, show positivity and the light at the end of the tunnel that most people with this condition fail to see.

Movement in performance - Working on Alice's idea/piece

Alice's 'character' represents girls who feel they have to conform to society's ideals of being deemed beautiful, wearing excessive make-up, body exposing photos, and just generally actively trying hard to look more 'attractive' than they think they are. The idea we discussed prior to this lesson was a piece based around Alice being half-naked and we all write comments on her that would make someone like her insecure, and showing this idea that even with lots of make up, people still pick flaws and stab at you showing that you cannot win. We drew this from this video:

We decided to use the song 'We don't have to take our clothes off', but a stripped back acoustic version that myself and Alice will record.

I found this piece particularly hard to keep up with, possibly because there was a lot of small simple movements which was hard to remember. 

Analysis 

• 0:56 - An example of a free flowing sway (dynamics) which represents how girls want to feel free of judgement, and be free of this social construct of having to look what society deems as 'beautiful' all the time, and just have time to be themselves.
• 1:05 - Surrounding Alice could possibly show the relationship girls have with social media and society - they feel trapped and confined with an ideology where they feel they must always try hard on their appearance to impress others, but they feel trapped because they fail to even impress themselves; and to others sometimes their effort just isn't enough.
• 1:12 - Moving fast/acting normally around Alice whilst se takes her clothes off represents how society expects girls to openly expose their bodies, and ready for judgement. 
• 1:39 - Writing comments on Alice's body - this is quite an unexpected and very different part to the piece and to any other piece in theatre, and we hope that it will make the audience feel slightly uncomfortable but intrigued at the same time. The way she stands there, letting us judge her and comment on her shows the other side of the story: how these girls expect to be judged and the comments they receive aren't always what they hope for, which in turn crushes their self esteem and confidence.

For the part where we walk round Alice at normal speed, or to Alice seeming like everyone is moving round her really fast, we were inspired by the London underground sequence in 'The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time' and the music video to 'Numb' by Linkin Park.

Overall in this sequence, we wanted to show what girls go through and what they are willing to do in order for others to deem them as 'beautiful', and show how it is as if their appearance is controlled by society and social media.

Movement in performance - Research on body dysmorphia

Movement in performance - Exploring 'torch-ography' and verbatim theatre

Verbatim theatre is a form of theatre based on spoken words from real people from real events (like interviews, for example). We really like the idea of this, and thought it would work very well with our theme. We thought of having recorded voices (I suggested we use my multi-track recorder to record each of our voices through one track, just to make things much easier for ourselves) saying words or phrases related to common insecurities to have in the background of our 'torch-ography' movement piece. We thought of some phrases that could be included:

'Torch-ography' piece:

We used a instrument version of Bastille's 'Oblivion', which works really well with the piece because it sets a nice and mellow atmosphere, but also has provides lots of opportunity for stylistic movements and visuals, and also helps to create the hard-hitting message we wish to get across. 

For this piece, we were inspired by the musical number 'Blackout' in the musical 'In the Heights', where the only lights are from lighters and phones from the cast:

(A clip from the professional production couldn't be found, so this an amateur dramatics company called Spirit Young Performers Company)

The part where we shine our lights on the ground and we walk around the spot light shows that we don't to be in the light - as young, insecure, and media-controlled young people who suffer from body dysmorphia, we wish to stay out of the centre of attention, out of the light because we don't want to look at ourselves and we believe we do not look good enough for others to us too.

In terms of RADS, we hit a fair few aspects of it. We cover: 

• Canon, with the lights (Relationships, 0:40-0:47, done poorly here)
• Meet and part (relationships, 0:30-0:33)
• Side by side, waiting (relationships, 0:40-0:47)
• Levels (space, 0:40-0:46)
• Pathways across the floor (space, 0:17-0:28)
• Travelling in a group (Actions, 0:34-0:39)
• Travelling as a transition (Actions, 0:38-0:40)
• Pivoting turn (Actions, 0:32-0:33)

Movement in performance - New final idea

After a few lessons workshopping our initial idea, we decided that trying to present a storyline within a 5-10 minute movement piece would be quite hard, and would require a lot more time than we have. So we looked at the stimulus again, and began to brainstorm alternative ideas:

I particularly liked the idea of gun crime, and showing how the matter is viewed very differently in different countries, and recent gun crimes in the USA - also possibly showing Donald Trump's views and then have an underlying message of how he is damaging the country with his views.

However it the majority went towards the idea of social media and how it is damaging the one's self confidence, increases insecurities, makes young people think they have to advertise themselves to be someone they're not in order to 'fit in', and the general impact it has on our lives. This is a very interesting idea because there are many aspects of the matter than you can incorporate and tie in/link together to form one big message. We researched issues such as body dysmorphia, using make up to cover up what you really look like, and feeling like you can't win no matter what you look like.

When discussing ideas for movement, we watched the following clips for inspiration:

From these, we decided we wanted to use mirrors to show how girls constantly look at themselves and judge how they look, believing they are 'ugly' or 'fat' etc...We wanted to present a girl suffering from body dysmorphia. We used the song 'One more light' by Linkin Park, because it set a depressing atmosphere and the lyrics really help tell what this person is going through.

This mainly focuses on using space and actions, but also possibly the relationship the girl has with who she thinks she sees in the mirror.

Movement in performance - Devising our final performance

Group 1:

• Cameron
• Will
• Alice
• Owen
• Chloe

Group 2:

• Henri
• Warren
• Taylor
• Tyler
• Joe

Stimulus:

Ideas drawn from stimulus:

For our opening movement piece, we wanted to show Alice giving birth and how Chloe's character (who is, ironically, a mid-wife) obviously longs for that moment of her own. 

Thinking of RADS and other stylistic and abstract movements, so far we have included the following:

• Answer and reaction (relationships, shows that we are all friends)
• Canon (Relationships)
• Round-by-through
• Waiting (Relationships)
• Elevation (Actions)
• Free flow (Dynamics)
• Travel (Actions)

Movement in performance - Slapstick comedy routine

Today we moved away from RADS and looked at applying slapstick comedy to a movement routine.

We watched a clip from the film 'Singin' in the rain' where the character Cosmo (played by Donald O'Connor) leads his number 'Make 'em laugh' which is simply about making the audience laugh in a performance. We observed that through his song/routine, he throws himself about a lot and he is very silly (which is the art of slapstick comedy), and all his expressions and movements and body language were very big and he committed to everything with massive energy. This made it all the more fun to watch.

This was the song we had to use for our routines. We put into groups, I was with Taylor and Owen, and we decided to do a 'love-triangle' themed routine where Owen likes me, I like Taylor and Taylor likes Owen. The initial comedy coming from the fact that Taylor is after a gay person, Owen is after a straight person and I am after a girl who wants a gay person. We also played on and made comedy out of the fact that the person each of us are after doesn't want us back at all.