act 1 scene 1 and 2

So today we showed Andy all the scene's we've done so far and he gave us back a lot of feedback and things we could do just to make the show even better.

Scene 1:

The first scene is where Mina and Lucy are talking about Jonathon and other things. Overall Andy said that this scene is pretty good, however, it just needs some polishing up. Like for instance, to two actresses who play Mina and Lucy need to think about their blocking on the stage and they also need to get more confident with their lines so the can act without their scripts.
Some of the blocking they should focus on is Mina's entrance, because at the moment Mina is standing in front of Lucy, when Lucy is looking in the mirror, thinking about who she should marry. I think Mina should just say her first line- "Catch her death!" when she first walks onto stage, because that makes Lucy turn around to face her then they are not blocking one another, also by doing this, it will show who's in charge, because the audience should know that Mina is like a mother to Lucy because it helps explain why Lucy is the way she is.

The chorus also need to stop taking away the focus from the actual scene, too. Because even though it's good what we're doing, it's like we're creating a scene of our own, when we're meant to be complimenting what's actually going on, on the stage between Mina and Lucy. So what we need to do is tone it right down and stay looking at Mina and Lucy so then the audience's focus will be on them, too. It is hard though, because we're meant to be crazy, and we want to show the audience that we're crazy without stealing all of the limelight. However, what we did to solve this, is instead of all of the crazy coming out of our mouths, we put it into our body and face so the audience can see we're crazy without us having to be really loud.



Scene 2:

This next scene was so much fun to do, because all of the chorus could be as loud and as crazy as they wanted to be. It was the first Renfield scene, it starts off with him saying/singing "I once knew a woman who swallowed a fly.." the actress who did this first tried saying it normally-(still crazy) but then she added a little tune, which sounded a lot better because this line is a like a nursery rhyme. The line after that "Perhaps she'll die, perhaps she won't die" was said in a very fast, in a questioning type of way. I thought it worked really well with the first line being sung, almost and then the next line questioning what's going to happen to this woman next.
Andy said the line "To die or not to die, that is the question" is a quote from Hamlet, so the actress had to bring out her Shakespearian in a crazy manner.

Part of the chorus work for this scene is to shout out or just say crazy words at random, there were some words that we had to say together, too. such as "Bed-lam", we had to shout this out all together and we also had to repeat the words "screw Lucy's".

When Renfield says "time to get yourself into something warm and double-breasted in a whorehouse, my son", it is aimed at Seward because he's making a joke about sex and Seward not getting any-(we find that in the next scene).

When Renfield starts getting agitated by Seward not listening and calls him a "bastard", the chorus have to repeat that and shout it.

Words that describe Dracula

We've just finished reading the script and have been asked to do a mindmap or write down of all the words that pop into our heads when we hear the word "Dracula"

Dracula;
. Blood
. Death
. Lust
. Gothic
. Fear
. Anger
. Wolves
. Lucy
. Danger
. Shapeshifter

These are some of the things that come to my head when I hear the name "Dracula".

1st Read Through - Interpretation

 

So far we have read from scene 1-8 of Liz Lochhead's version of Dracula. Comparing it to the film we have just watched, I feel that the two main woman-(Lucy and Mina) have stronger personalities in the script compared to the characters in the film. I think it may have something to do with the film was made in the early 1900's and woman were not seen as equals, so they made them a lot more meak, whilst in Lochhead's adaptation she made them a lot more powerful, this could have something to do with it being written in 1989. Another thing I noticed when reading the script, Lochhead has sexualised the woman a lot more, by using innuendos "leg or breast, Mr Jonathon" and "I said, meine Wilhel-Mina.... come and gawp at me in my drawers".
I believe that the film is old fashioned and that in the script, although it is set in the Victorian era, it has been written from a modern point of view, because the woman are a lot more strong minded.


 

Tuesday's lesson;

Today we were at Pelham and we set the stage out exactly how we're going to have it on show night.
This was so helpful because it gave us an idea of how/where we're all going to be and where we need to stand for certain bits etc.
It also got us used to having so much space and to get more comfortable with the stage and how we're going to move round it and on it.

Wolf scene

Act 1, beginning part;

In this scene, we had everyone hiding in the audience, off stage and on the sides of the stage. Then after ten seconds of the heavy breathing, I run onto stage in a night gown covered in my own blood, scared out of my head, looking for a safe place to hide. I run to the middle of the stage, look at the audience, I then run to stage right, look at the audience again then I run back to the centre. When I get back to the centre for the second time there's a noise of werewolves howling. When this happens I'm slowly start walking up the steps, when I get to the top step I turn around and see all of the werewolves circling around me from the bottom. I then run to stage left, where I have two werewolves jump out at me then I run to stage right where I have two more werewolves jump out at me, I then run to centre stage, where I am completely surrounded. I collapse to the floor with a loud, quick scream with everyone is clawing me and "eating" me. After about 10 seconds we all stand up, clock the audience, then run at them, then there is a blackout.

I had a lot of difficulty with this scene, even though it's a quick scene, I found it really hard to act so terrified. We spent quite a lot of time working on this scene, one because I wasn't acting scared enough, and two because everyone else wasn't entirely sure when they should start walking out from the audience.

In the end we decided everyone should start coming out when I start walking up the steps, and when I turn around at the top step everyone should be halfway on the stage-(except the people on the stage hiding just behind the curtains), then I run to stage left where I have two of the werewolves jump out at me, then I run to stage right and have two more run out at me. When this is happening, the werewolves on the floor are coming closer and closer until I reach centre stage and they're all around me and I collapse to the ground and then they start ripping at me, making it look like they're ripping me to shreds and eating me, from the audience's pov.

To help me act so scared, before I run onto stage I started heavy breathing, and making myself shake and make my eyes water a little. Then I'd run onto stage as fast as I could and look around everywhere.

Antonin Artaud. - Starter exercise - Instruments in a circle - Basic Ritual. 

Today we kicked the lesson off with the ritual, using musical instruments and our hands only. 
We started off all in a giant circle in the room-(which was all dark) and we all picked up a musical instrument (or if there wasn't one infront of us, we used our hands) and stood up and someone from the class would start making a tune/rhythm and the rest would copy the "leader". Even though we did a similar thing the week before, it was slightly different as we didn't a specified leader as we did last week who was Andy. Instead we had to decide among us who was going to start it off without talking. So we were sat awkwardly for a while, but then Yunusa started and we all copied him.
I think the reason it took a while for someone to start it is because they were not sure if everyone would copy, this is where you have to have trust in the other members of our class.
Once we had done this ritual for a while we all sat down afterwards and compared this time to last time. Personally, I felt that this one was a lot more "free", because I knew I could take over any time I wanted too, whilst last week we all had to copy what Andy was doing, so I felt that one was a lot more controlled.


Emotion through breathing. 

For this exercise we all sat really close together in a circle and we had to try and portray different emotions through different ways of breathing.
Andy would choose someone within the circle to start the breath off and when an individual agreed that's how they would breathe with that emotion they would then join in with the breath. The emotions we had to do were; sad, angry, scared and lust. For me I found the lust one quite an embarrassing one to do because it's such a personal, intimate thing I felt uncomfortable.
I think Andy chose these emotions because they can easily be portrayed through words, but through breath it's a lot harder. Also, these are a lot of the emotions-(especially lust!) are in Dracula quite frequently.

There was more to this lesson, but I went to Glad Rags wit Sue

Renfield!!!!

Renfield, my character is a fictional character from Bram Stoker's "Dracula".
Renfield is Dracula's "puppet" through most of the play.

Renfield is a "poor" lunatic from Dr. Seward's asylum.
He is a "paranoid schizophrenic with alternating homicidal and suicidal phases..."

In the play, he is known for eating living creatures, starting with flies, then spiders, then birds. He starts getting a taste for living creatures after his encounter with Count Dracula. The resultant belief that he can extend his life by draining the life of others-(like a vampire)- (this can link back to the research we did a few weeks ago about vampire myths. Lochhead could have got this idea of "external life" from Elizabeth Bathory's belief of killing virgins to keep herself young and beautiful forever).

Even though you don't see Renfield as a sane person in the play, I know he was a lawyer. I'm not entirely sure how Dracula managed to drive him mad, but my theory is that Renfield was always scared of death. So I think Dracula used this against him, and convinced him that by eating living things, it will give him life, that is why in act 1 scene 2 when he eats the fly he says "it's fat with life, strong life and gives life to me", so I believe Dracula somehow made him believe that. Lochhead could of got the idea of eating living things giving you external life from Elizabeth Bathory's theory, which is explained up above.