Illness,saturday,monday and performance! and my EVALUATION

It has been a hettic week (crazily so)


i couldnt make monday or wednesday rehersals last week as i was struck down with as terrible cold, however i was well enough to make the saurday 3 hour reharsals, this was the final big 3 hour rehersal before the show on wednesday.


I started by warming up the kids and doing a focusing exercise |(known as select and delete which i gained from a frantic assembely workshop) we then got straight to work,working on finalising the transtions between the scerns and then running it to see if it fits the 30 minutes we were given, after a few people forgetting there lines (not filling me with the greatest confidence) and with the newly transitioned scenes the shw was running at 48 minutes which was 18 minutes over.

this left me and Miss the very difficult job of cutting certian lines to make sure we do not go over our time, after a lot of thought we removed several lines here and there and were ready to try and perform it all the way through AGAIN on monday.

outside of this, i had to finally prepare the music and send it off ready for the Georgian Theatre Royal's technical people to add it to the system. after converting the songs into MP3 (which seemed to take for ages) as well as making a pyschical copy for practicing on monday.


MONDAY

Monday rehersals went well,with me working on the music and finalising where it would go, we timed it again and with people still forgetting there lines (which made me fear for Wednesday even more!) it ran at 32 minutes and we couldnt do anymore.

WEDNESDAY

After having an early lunch and loading the various props into the bus we were off to the theatre, when we arrived me and Miss worked on seeing how the lighting came into play on the actual stage, and after quite a few tweaks we were runnign behind time, we then had a dress rehersal, and there were still a FEW forgotten lines but all in all it ran quite well, we gained an audience from a primary school performing for this rehersal,which meant the cast could get a feel for the laughs they would get.

because thechildren were young they didnt get as many laughs as they expected which left some of the cast dejected however at dinner i made sure everyone was aware that int he actual performance, the adults would get a lot more of the refrences, which reassured them.

THE PERFORMANCE

After months of  rehersals, and directing and music, and food and laughs as well as sweat and tears!
we finally arrived at the performance AND it went perfectly! all faults were dealt with (such as a hat falling off when it shouldnt) brilliently they even fused it into the show, and each laugh they got they worked harder on the next joke to get a bigger one.

All in all i am incredibly proud of all of them, and it has been an amazing journey co'directing.


EVALUATION
It has been a long, fun and at times arduous proces, which has tested skills i already had as much as teaching me new ones, i would firstly like to thank Miss Eastwood and everyone at The Royal Shakespeare company for all their help.without them it would not of been half as interesting as it was. I of course would secondly like to thank all the students who (although at times hyper)  showed me respect and took my ideas on board.

Sadly as you could of seen circumstances made it impossible for me to JUST do light and tech however, this process has helped me learn a lot more about them than i did when i first begun. for example i know have more in depth knowledge about the various fazers and well as technical programs used for preparing and Queing music for performances, and the timing and precise detail which is needed to get soudn effects and music spot on ina performance. I have also learnt a lot about set and how the use of exits and entrances can create dramatic effect and timing, not only for the audience but effective for helping the actors. without this skill i would still be lsot how shows can be so fluid and pacy.

My Directing skills where also tested, and i have learnt how to not only correctly warm up, teach and  control a large group of exited children but i have better understanding how the director has to work with every minor detial fromt he costume to where the props are set on stage as well as kept. Because of this my organisation skills whyere put tot he test as i had to keep a large amount of lists on me to check that all props were where they were meant to be. I also learnt how showing through movements rather than jsut "raise your arm more dramatically" can really clarify what you want from an actor.

I really think i gained the new skills of, learning how to properly direct a large group which as i have mentioned a few times before is chalanging but yet very rewarding. As you get see the full proccess of worried actors forgetting their lines to fully polished and brilliently entertaining actors! I also think the skills i have gained are how to make a comedic scene as well as how to direct the actors to build on certian moments to get more laughter out of the  audience. this is an incredibally useful skill as i get to see how scenes are developed and worked on, and how once you know a scene like the back fo your hand you have that wiggle room to improvise slightly and get more laughter out of your audience.

If i was to do it again, I would practice learning more director terminology as I had to have lots of conversations with many different,actors,light techs as well as those from the RSC and I think I could of better got over my overview to them if i know more specialised terminology and I wouldnt of been thrown in, in the deep end and had to quickly pick up quite a few terms. However this challenge i thought although difficult was all part of my journey.

so to SUMMARISE, an amazing production well done to all, and thanks for these new skills!



HERE ARE SOME PHOTOS ALSO!

Monday 21/10/2013 Rehersals

We are getting very close now to the big show!, which means we are running through scenes very quickly, scenes themselves are already blocked however we still need ideas for the scene transitions.


After workshoping a few ideas which me and Miss Eastwood had come up with, this encouraged the children to come up with some great ideas (one of my favourite being brook who lassoos himself offstage) the rehersals are 2 hours long now which means i have to be escpecially vigilant on keeping the kids active and interested in the rehersal. However so far they have been doing very well at concentrating.


Injecting comedy into the scenes is another element i have been concentrating on, such as a "fight" scene with swords, after experimenting with a few ideas the children and us came up with the idea of the sowrd being thrown and a character in the background being effected by it ( which left me and Miss in fits of laughter, which is always a good sign) one more rehersals before holiday and after that its scripts down and trying to run it fully!

Wednesday and Monday rehersals

IT HAS HAPPENED!

We have offically blocked all scenes and now we are running it, i came up with a brillient and funny way to end the show on wednesday which we workshoped and it worked perfectly, the script says how the character is burnt with hot tapers, and i thought it would be very funny if they "burnt" him into doing a jig, after trying this out we found out it worked BRILLIENTLY.


On Monday i started with a very NOISY and rowdy crew a warm up and most of all CONCENTRATION exercise which helped them to focus before we moved on to running scenes togethor, they went through scenes 13 through to 16 with only a few hicups but after we explained to them that there is only "7 REHERSALS LEFT" they ran it again and it was perfect, the power of attitude ey?


also towards the end of Monday rehersal we finalised the look of each character (finally deciding on a modern countryside look) as me and Miss said it "7 REHERSALS LEFT" it sunk in for me to, we are getting very close and rehersals are now 2 hours long instead of 1, WOW exiting times.

Royal Shakespeare!

ive lost internet recenly -_- upside is last monday we too the cast to where we will be putting on the show at the lovely richmond theatre!


The royal Shakespeare company performed a workshop where they took the children through exercises which helped them to develop their voices and also how to speak shakespearian. While they did this i helped to finialsie the details as well as work out how themusic would be uploaded so it will be ready for the big night. i then returned to see how the workshop was doing, the way they motivated and encouraged the kids while also helping them gget to grips with the shakesperian language was great, and i took insparation from that to use when i next run a warm up. also the games they did to help them use their voices in difference ways also influenced me.

its getting closer now!

wednesday to wednesday

Wednesday the 11th went really well and things are begining to really shape up, one group worked on the big scenes while i took a smaller group and worked on there specific lines pulling out funny things as well as helping them to understand shakespeare a bit more.


i started to do this by a few improv games where they had to use shakespeare words in response to the other character, this seemed to work really well.


Sadly i was ill on monday and couldnt make it :( (dam my cold) BUT i was well and rearing to go on Wednesday.


this Wednesday we worked on a few of the smaller scenes i warmed everyone up with a few warm up games and then a few concentration games to get everyone focused. the accents of a lot of the characters are coming on well and we have had a few role changes (so fingers crossed they will learn their new lines in time)

But all in all everything is ticking along nicely 10 more rehersals to go till the tech rehersals though!

Monday Rehersals

Monday rehersals went well and the scenes are shaping up really well,


I started by doing a warm up exercise to get the children focused, it used walking in sync as well as a new game one of the kids suggested (which i enjoyed so much ive remebered it for next time)

i helped to direct one of the opening scenes and one of my points about the three characters realising the other character is at the other side of the stage would be more funny if they all turned one by one, seened to work really well and we are now using.


On review,i also think we should try replacing the wine with perhaps a drink like umbongo, but i will bring this up next time we do the scene.


All in all its getting there!

Holidays over!

The summer holidays are over and so are the big rehersals,


me and Miss eastwood have done a lot of work on the big end scene, and i have coreographed a large section of it, we started with warm up exercises which got the children to work in teams and then we used the game grandmothers footsteps to find interesting and funny ways for the kids to stand as they approach the front of the stage.


my other job of finding music has come along well, the first rehersal in the holiday, saw me try songs such as the Maryln Manson cover of "sweet dreams" to jux oppose the funny events that are taking place. this idea of jux opose worked well however, that particular song was a little to dark for what we are trying to achieve. we then tried it the other way round with the kids bhaving them do more violent moves while there was silly music on but this created too much of an eerie effect.


at the second rehersal we tried a few songs and we have finally found it, it is Omen by the badn Prodegy and can be heard here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSGUcwNNu5g



Another activity we tried, was breaking down the shakespearian words so that the kdis understand what they are actually saying, this was achieved by saying the shakespearian word and then asking the kdis tot hink of a modern day way of saying it. this worked really well and helped the kids to really get an understanding of what the words mean. i decided to try and make a short scene with this and make it funny by having the kids talking through text and text speak. this was very funny, but also worked incrediabally well so much so that we have decided to use mobiles in the production.

we are doubling up rehersalsd now, on Mondays and Wednesdays so full steam ahead!
also we have the exiting workshop with the royal shakespeare company coming up soon as well!