Session 8 - 27.01.12 - First Rehearsal and Dramatising the Script.

Check In
Check In was a little different this week; each choosing a body position that reflected our mood. We all seemed a bit deflated and tired after a busy week, nothing like a good warm up to get our energy levels up!

Warm Up

We kicked off with a physical version of Zip Zap Boing, an exercise to assert our body language to your peers around a circle at a competitive speed, one wrong mistake and you're out!
We then replaced the actions with quotes from Eastenders. A reminder that when you're speaking to a crowd, you have to use your body in your language. "Sort it out!" "''ave it!" "Shut it!" "Where's Peggy? Get out my pub!"



Dramatising the Script

We were all assigned a character while Tunde narrated. After each scene, we reread the script as a different character. This proved to be a very successful technique to give a full insight of the whole picture. Each character gained a huge amount of strength because of this.

A few lines felt unnatural or rushed, Tunde recommended that we could alter the prose so it sounded more natural if need be. Or if we found it difficult to read, we should just slow down and take a breathe...The line will not disappear!

The script shows a lot of interruption between characters, which is hard to put into practise. The secret is to improvise the line onwards, giving plenty of opportunity to your opposition to intervene!

Next week: We need to go through the last scene and make sure everyone is there!

Check Out
We all checked out with much more energetic body language, hands in the air and eyes looking up, which proves a successful session!

Session 7 - Looking At The Script And Choosing A Name - 20/01/12

Check In
We all checked in using a number between 1 and 10 on how we were feeling. Generally everybody checking in at 6-7 (1 being bad and 10 being great).

Looking At The Script
Tunde wrote up a script for us all to give feedback on. The script is a great idea in case anybody is absent, then somebody else could step into the role.

We all agreed that the script looked really good. Tunde had used some of the quotes and ideas from the last session's scenes.

We all thought that the script didn't need any changes except the first part of the assault in the park scene. We wanted to change the word 'Hey' to 'Oi' or 'Yo' as this is more likely to be said by a young person.

Quotes From The Script


Assault in the park script:
"Relax man, ain't nothing gonna happen. What you getting all shook for"

"We just wanna make sure you're safe, you get me. So if you live round here, then you one of us - like family innit. You do for us, we do for you.

Suddenly Dan brings out a knife and without thinking stabs y3. The others are shocked...

Police visit script:
"I'm afraid it's a bit more serious than that. It's a stabbing."

"Danny's a good boy. There's no way he'd be part of that."

Mum's mind is racing. She barely hears PC and is too distracted to speak.

Mum and Dan script:
"Danny, tell me what happened. Why didn't you buy-"

"Mum, stop. It's not my blood."

"You couldn't talk your way out of it - or if need be use you fists."

Paperwork
We went through the proposal for the project and finished it all off.

Choosing A Name
We all discussed a name for our play. We chose ten names that we all liked and had a vote. We voted by writing our top three on a piece of paper and throwing it into the middle. The results were all put together and we had a top two, which were the ones with the lower numbers and more votes.

1. Knife or life
2. The trouble with knives...

So the main name for the play is now 'Knife Or Life'.

We discussed that:
- We were now going to just take the play into schools
- That we want to make it more interactive so that the schools can be involved with the play to
- That we can freeze the play at certain places and ask our audience what they would do - give them three options

Check Out
We all checked out with higher numbers and the session ended.

Session 6 - Putting Some Scenes Together - 13/01/12

Checking In
We started the session off by checking in. We all sat in a circle and gave how we felt a number out of 10 (10 being really great and 1 being bad).

We had a recap of the last Wednesday's session. The aim of the session was to put together the scenes that had been thought up already.

- 2 scenes - parent and child
- 1 scene - parent and police officer

Warm Up
We did some warm up activities to get us active. The first one was where everyone had to walk around and when 'stop' was shouted, everyone had to freeze. Then it was made harder by making stop mean go and go meaning stop. It was a little tricky but was great to see everybody taking part.

The second warm up that we did was a points of contact game. We had to walk around until Tundai told us how many parts of contact we had to have with the floor. It was really fun to see how creative everyone was with the different numbers.

Finally we all did a paired points of contact activity where we had to work in teams of two connected to make points of contact with the floor. Tundai called out numbers and everybody had to touch the floor with that amount of parts of their bodies.



Group Activities
We all split into groups to act out the three scenes that we had planned out together, to give our interpretations of them. It was good to see how everybody acted out their's differently.




Finish
We all checked out with higher numbers than at the beginning of the session.