Maker’s Diary: Momentum

Sharon informed me that it is Christian who will be dealing with the performance this time. He has actually responded quite promptly and sent me over some dates already…hurrah! I am going to put them to Debbie first, as she is the only confirmed performer and make a decision based on her availability.

Makers Diary: Some difficulties

Ok today I have e-mailed:

Sharon Armstrong about the availability of space...so I hope that she gets back to me soon and then I will be able to set dates.

Rob Conkie about the possibility of getting in touch with the second year drama students.

I still need to contact Joe about soundscape to see if he is interested but if not I need to find another sound whiz to aid me.

Reflective Practitioner Diary: Issues of Documentation

Have been thinking a lot over the last few days about how I can record the audience’s experiences of the performance. There are a few issues that present themselves with some of the more Cartesian techniques of recording oral histories in this way:

1. The Interview
If I interview the audience it is inevitable that my questions will affect the audience member’s response. My questions and style of asking will lead and structure their answers...it will inflect their responses. Also my line of questioning, whatever that may be will neglect to address some of the things that the audience member may have felt were important. No matter how well I plan or pre-pare this will be the case. Also this type of intimate questioning may make some people nervous or uncomfortable and thus create a barrier to our communication. There is also the possibility that they will try and say what they think I wish to hear by reading my expressions, tone and body language. For these reasons I have decided that I will not be employing these techniques to record the individual phenomenological aspects of the audience’s experience of my work.

2. The Questionnaire
There are several issues that I can foresee in this method of gathering the audiences experiences...many of which are similar to that of the oral interview. As before, the questions and their style, will structure and inflect the response...I want a much more personal and raw account of their experiences. Questionnaires can be so impersonal and again I may not hit the nail on the head with the questions that I ask. There is a tendency for people to dash off questionnaires quickly and with little thought, again not helpful. So I will not be using this method either.
I want a personal expression and response of their experience of the performance work, this means a method that allows for this to happen...I really want the audience to be able to express themselves in a personal and individual way...as I am only really interested in qualitative information this will not restrict how I gather my data.

So here’s the thing....after much thought and deliberation...as well as a long conversation with my mum (she is my muse, creative, smart and very practical!)...I have settled on a methodology that I feel will address all of these issues and it comes in two parts:

1. The Group After Show Discussion
I have been to many of these in my time studying theatre and they always have a relaxed atmosphere where the attending parties do not hold back. I think that this will create a forum with the actors; audience and director can all throw things into the mix and will be an indication of the things that affected people during the performance. I will film it as well as the performance itself.

2. Documentary Booth
At the same time as the discussion, I will explain to the audience that the documentary booth is available and to feel free to pop along at any point after the show to leave either a video diary, audio diary or textual document_ So basically the booth will be private, it will have a voice recording device, a video camera and a note book...I will put instructions on how to work everything in there...along with a notice that will ask the audience to leave me a document of their experience of the performance...and that they are free to express it in any form they like, using any of the documentary tools they like...obviously I will think of a better way of wording it....
I think that both of these methods will give me a chance to really capture the audience’s expressions and impressions of how they experienced the performance. It then makes the documentation performative in its own right...the audience will be re-enacting their own experiences of the show....the show re-enacted...remediate through the audiences perspective. This is really exciting...

I text Joe today about soundscape bits..no reply will have to call him I think.
I drafted e-mails to send to:
Sharon Armstrong-about perf space
Rob Conkie-about performers

Makers Diary: Some Thoughts 2

I think maybe the performers could enter the space all dressed up...as if characters...the women in stunning red gowns and the man in a suit...full hair and make-up done instead of in everyday clothes...no shoes on though...then they could undress from these...so from one perf state to another...questioning the idea of theatricality....identity...

Maybe instead of pictures of women about the space...pics of shoes...not on their won but being wornan..all different types of shoes...maybe projected into the space...women wearing red shoes...men wearing red shoes..ladies shoes...all different shoes, the character and assumptions that come with shoes in various contexts.

Could have the sound of shoes in the soundscape..different shoes on different surfaces..moving at different paces...mixed with the woman sounds...choral voices...wailing....

Reflective Practitioner Diary: My Role

I have to wear two hats while making undertaking the PaR section of the research:

1. Practitioner-I have to allow myself the space and time to partake in pure practice in order for the activity to be worthwhile from an artistic perspective...otherwise it will be stilted and stayed. The work has to have an independent aspect from the research in that it has to be a piece of theatre otherwise it becomes something else.

2. Reflective Practitioner-All the while I am making, working in pure practice, I have to have one eye on myself, watching myself making and another on the research concerns. This role is the bridge between my activity of making a piece of work and writing a thesis, in adopting this role it holds the two different processes within the same framework and mediates between the two. It is by adopting this role on top of pure practice and alongside pure practice that lends the activity rigour and designates it as a research activity.

I will have to move in and out of the two roles and often wear both these hats at once. It is a complicated process and one in which I will have to be aware of myself and the roles I am playing at all times.

Makers Diary: Some thoughts

The soundscape for the beginning should be made up of women's voices, women's sounds…maybe sample in some text from famous female stage characters….panting, screaming, feminine..whatever that means. I need to speak to Joe the lovely lion and se if he will be free to collaborate on making the score.
Gender crisis…can the HIM be SHE or HER…what is his role…what is his relationship….let the audience decide I think….
Need different questions, questions about trauma, questions about love…red…blood…woman…………womb.
How are the audience going to choose texts, they will not have time to read them…should we just let the text be entirely improve and devised on the night…should we have a section of the work completed before hand….?

Makers Diary: Brainstorm 2

Perhaps no clothes, make-up and wigs…just the shoes, lots of scrummy red shoes in all styles: ballet pumps, stilettos, platform heels, pvc boots, trainers, pumps…wellies…
Maybe have HIM, HER, SHE on placards that can be moved around between the performers…no, I like the inscribing.
Why are you crying?
Why is SHE crying?
What's the matter with HER?
Maybe the performers could inscribe each others bodies as part of the performance.
Love as a theme, requited love, love gone wrong, the wrong love, bad love, forbidden love, love triangle.
HER body was bruised and beaten because…………………?
SHE knew her relationship with HER was……………………?
SHE knew it was HIM that………………………………..?
At the start the performers enter with baskets of shoes and lay them all out really carefully around the space…then they strip down to their underwear…take off their everyday make-up…take down their hair….then inscribe their bodies with their performance personae of ether HIM, HER or SHE….then step up onto little wooden blocks…no piles of big medical encyclopaedias…..just stand for a while, stood together in silence….then the ring master could speak…direct address, she is the audiences guide….she will be their way into the perf.
Its all about watching them take up their perf identity.
Why does HER heart feel so heavy?
Why does SHE need HIM?
Could have the words written in the space already…projected into the space.
Perfs will play out their ideas, try out their suggestions…play in front of the audience…for the audience…with the audience…not just re-enacting their stories in a naturalistic way…we will explore the material that they supply in various and multiple ways….use it in surprising and fresh ways…not just reflect back at them but mediate the material and transform their material.
Could have different coloured lights to choose from…the audience could pick.
Create a soundscape for the opening section.
Let the actors choose the suggestions that they want to play with, try out…transform.
Why is SHE leaving HIM?
Why is SHE bleeding?
Ask three questions, make 3 sections/scenarios/scenes…negotiate them…replay them.

Makers Diary: Brainstorm 1

Woman..:
Red Shoes
Rules
Tasks
Trauma
4 performers, 3 female, one male. 3 of them in their underwear. Could get the audience to choose their clothes from a trunk, a dressing up box, choose from a plethora of clothes. Woman's clothes, red clothes.

Audience could make up stories about the performers that they have dressed, create characters. They could create stories about them as individual characters or as a group. Not whole stories but partial.

But not stories from out of nowhere, stories that are in response to questions, unfinished sentences that they have to provide the answers for. Stories in response to tasks that the audience have to find the impetus for.
The audience could also have pre-written/devised texts to choose from that they might want their characters to perform for them.
They could perform and then the audience give feedback and modify the performance through their feedback.

The characters could have HER. SHE and HIM inscribed on their bodies.
Not just clothes but wigs and make-up and perhaps some random props for the audience to choose from, to play with.

Need an overriding structure with which to pin it all together and work within.
As the audience come up with suggestions and responses to the questions, they could inscribe them on the floor in chalk, so that they become performative and are not lost. It will help the audience to choose from all the things being thrown into the mix.
Could have photos of women, real women, made up women, silver screen women scattered in the perf space.

The 4th performer as ring master, master of ceremonies…to help the audience and to bind it all together.

No formal seating plan, just cushions, bean bags, easy chairs…various things for the audience to sit in/on.

Makers Diary: And so it begins

After my meeting today with Olu and Liz I feel liberated and now feel that i can start the PaR section of my thesis research. Up until now I felt that I was not in a position to start and was approaching it in a kind of clinical way. It was almost as though I needed that permission to be creative in this environment. And so it begins, I can now start the creative process. In all reality the creative process never actually starts or finishes, it is an ongoing dialogue between me and the world, where I take mental notes, sketches and rehearse enact ideas in my mind. So it is the start of applying that process to this particular project.

I am now going to go and finish some reading that I have started and then sit down with my spanky new note book and make a start on thinking about this piece of work as a director, maker, and practitioner. (Although the academic in me will lurk in the background, taking notes all the while)

Reflective Practitioner: Notes on Run

I was really pleased with the way in which the performer’s handled the new role of the audience. The games seemed to give the performers a confidence in interacting with the audience that they did not have the first time round. Our mock audience responded with energy and enthusiasm to the games. The performer’s just need to remember to keep bringing it back to ‘Her’; they need to focus on using the games as a device to help the audience to make her present in the space though the games themselves.

We decided after the dress run this evening that we would like to give the winners of some of the games little prizes but that those prizes should be pieces of ‘Her’…so letters…diary entries and even some tapes of phones messages ect. So I now need to get on and make those before tomorrow.

Nikki needs to get a handle on her lines, as does Debbie (at points). I think that it is stamina and concentration issue rather than not knowing the lines. All the performers need to think about their stamina and try to maintain the energy and focus throughout the entire performance…it tend to lul and lag at points.

I am nervous and really excited about tomorrow and I can’t wait to see how the audience respond to the new format….eeeekkk! I will not be back until really late tomorrow so I may not get a chance to post an entry but if I do find a cyber café I will have a go before we leave. There is so much at stake tomorrow and I have some really good and close friends attending….arrrgghh…so scary and exciting all rolled into one…don’t think I will sleep well tonight!