Rehearsal process

During the past two months we've pretty much been working on our devised piece about everyone's identity. We have all worked together to come up with a couple of scenes and in this post I will be explaining the scenes and the purpose of them.

First Scene - Frame
Before the frame scene was created I wasn't attending Uni as often as I should have which resulted in me being a little bit more behind than everyone else. When I first watched the scene being performed I instantly liked the concept and the idea of it all.
The frame is divided up into 12 segments with 12 people behind them. Everyone in the frame has a word that best suits them and describes their identity. For example, Mario = Afraid, Lea = Animated, and Makeda = Detached. Some of the people in the frame then get asked questions from everyone else in the frame to get more of an in-depth understanding about themselves. However, they'd get asked questions relating to their word and the other persons word to find out if they have some of the other persons trait or identity. For example, if Kate (Unsettled) asks Mario a question it would be along the lines of "Do you think you're afraid because you are unsettled?".
The people are are being questioned are Rosie (Bitch), Mario (Afraid), and Chris (Semi-detached). While the three of them are being questioned the other people behind the frame would have to react to their answers but should also stay in character throughout the whole scene. For instance Lea who is animated should maintain her animated persona. Another important point that we considered in this scene is the pace of it. We have to make sure the questions and answers are not too fast or slow but just at a reasonable speed otherwise the scene could either feel rushed or drag on.

Running Scene
This scene consists of a selective number of people to run at the front and some people to stand at the back questioning them about anything and everything really. But the main goal is to try and aggravate them as the running and answering questions at the same time would be testing their patience as it is. After testing the scene out a couple of times the runners and questioners were picked. The questioners would ask the runners questions that have relevance to their identity.


The runners and questioners were:

• Runner: James (Thinker), Questioner:  Mario
• Runner: Cass (Emotional), Questioner: Tenda
• Runner: Christina (Useless), Questioner: Lucy
• Runner: Liza (Selfish), Questioner: Ruth

All the questioners would ask questions to the runners. The runners would then gradually have a hard time answering them as the questions get more personal which significantly affects their tolerance as they would get tired and out of breath with the running. 

James the over thinker would talk about how he thinks too much and dreams about his parents being involved in a car crash. Cass talks about these lies she has told someone important to her. Initially Christina talks about her faith and religion but we decided to keep the idea of identity therefore Christina now talks more about how useless and worthless she feels sometimes. And Liza talks about how she is striving for independence. The scene ends with the runners reaching to a breaking point and collapsing on the floor and transition to the next scene then follows.

I wrote a script to this scene which will be on another post.

Song

The song will then be sung by Shakira, Rosie, Dom, Kate, Chris, Tenda, and Christina. While they sing the song we all suggested we get into a line and walk around the stage in unison. Kind of like a snake?

The song is about the journey we're all going through to find ourselves.

Shakalaka's Prediction and Boom

In this scene Shakira recites a poem to the audience she wrote herself. The poem is about her prediction and mentions the identity of the people in the frame. While all that happens Boom (her sidekick) is by her side playing around with a bell. Every so often Boom would press the bell by accident interrupting Shakalaka. The purpose of this is to add comic relief to the scene. 

However, Nick suggested that Boom is removed from this scene and comic relief here isn't really needed but maybe Boom should be added in other scenes such as the frame just to add some humour to it, teasing everyone's identity. We have yet to try that suggestion out yet as we only got the feedback recently.

Ritual Scene

The ritual scene has most of the class in different positions and on different levels. Some are laying on the floor, sat down, knelt down, stood up etc. Music is playing in the background and all of us are in our own world and imagination. We all then reach out to something trying and struggling to find our identities. I personally like the fact that this whole scene isn't choreographed or synchronised. I believe it brings out more of a rawness and authentic feel about it as if we're deciding our "ritual" or "journey".
After a while Mario, Chris, and Christina have a bit of a meltdown. Mario starts screaming, Chris starts laughing hysterically, and Christina also screams.

Forest Scene
This scene is similar to the frame. Six people are behind a green camouflage next with fake leaves attached to it. We all then pop up holding signs with the word that describes our identity. The initial people that were in this scene were:

• Mekeda: Detached
• James: Thinker
• Kate: Unsettled
• Lucy: Paranoid
• Chris: Semi-detached
• Mario: Afraid

However, I felt that 'detached' and 'semi-detached' didn't really fit in with this part of the scene as they were too similar. I suggested 'animated' and 'uncomfortable' to be put in instead. However, Rosie felt that 'sarcastic' could work so we tried it out and improvised it all and since then the line up changed to;

• Ruth: Uncomfortable
• James: Thinker
• Kate: Unsettled
• Lucy: Paranoid
• Me: Sarcastic
• Mario: Afraid

The beginning of the scene starts off with each of us popping up from behind the net one by one describing ourselves to the audience. Although we're holding up signs that has our identity on it we tell the audience the exact opposite. For example, Lucy pops up and tells the audience that she doesn't care about what anyone thinks for her even though her sign says 'paranoid'.

After each of us explains ourselves to the audience we all interact with each other. Me being the sarcastic one makes snide remarks mocking everybody whilst Lucy questions everyone, looking around. Everyone pretty much plays up to their roles. The scene ends with a spotlight going off each of us and turning our backs to the audience one by one. When we showed this scene to Nick recently he felt that it should take place in the frame as it has a similar concept to it. He also thought Dom should be added to mock everyone again like in the beginning.

Labelling Scene

This is the most recent scene we've come up with. The notion of this scene is to create the perfect male and female. This scene is also one of the few that adds humour. Lucy and Chris are the models that the doctors write on. The doctors that work on Lucy was James and Mario and at first Kate and Rosie were the ones working on Chris but that has changed to Me and Sabrina. 

Dom managed to write a script for this scene. Each doctor has their own persona's and characters in this scene. James and I are the "clever" doctors while Sabrina and Mario are a bit more dopey and dim-witted. This plays in with the comical side to the scene. The doctors discuss what kind of person they want to be such as intelligent, materialistic, funny, sexual, tight etc etc. If we agree on a trait then we'd write it down on their bodies. 

When we recently showed this scene off to Nick he said it might be better to write down on their bodies first then discuss and analyse the model we've all decided on.

These are all the scene's we've all come up with at the moment. Our play is approximately 25-30 minutes and are hoping to start on creating and devising more scenes to be added to our devised piece in the upcoming weeks.