Final Monologues

 Kam:

https://youtu.be/7Vg83I6KvNs

Osajie:

Aishlinn:

Jackson:

https://youtu.be/6nTB-u9gsCA

Millie:

Geffen:

Monologue Unit

A monologue is a solo performance (like a speech) given on stage. Unlike a speech, it is not simply recited but acted out. It will be important to think about how to add deliberate movement and deliberate voice to your monologue performance.

Here is an example of a monologue that tells a story. This one is directed to an unseen listener (probably a parent?), so she speaks out to the audience as if speaking to the parent:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WIiFWTBsK4

Here is one that is not directed toward a speaker. It doesn't tell a single story but is more of an exploration of a theme or an aspect of her personality: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFU3ac9fysk

And one final one tells a story and incorporates a little movement (because you don't have to just stand there when delivering a monologue -- remember that it is still acting although it feels like a speech: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHnkZUAJfW8

Uta Hagen's technique for monologue preparation


In her book, Respect for Acting, Hagen outlines 9 Questions Actors Need to Ask Themselves when preparing for a role. Many actors use this technique and it supplements the work from our textbook.


1. Who Am I?


Who is your character? Identify all the details: name, age, physical traits, education, personal opinions, likes, dislikes, fears, ethics, beliefs, etc.

 
2. What time is it? 

The year, the season, the day, the minute. What is the significance of that time?


3. Where am I?


Identify the country, the city or town, the neighborhood, building, room, or where in that room are you?

 
4. What surrounds me? 

What is happening in the environment surrounding you? What's the weather? Landscape? People? Objects?


5. What are the given circumstances?


Identify events in the past, present, and future: What has happened? What is happening? What is going to happen?

 
6. What are my relationships? 

More than just your relationship with and to other people, it's your relationship to objects, characters, events, etc.


7. What do I want?


What do you want right here, right now? What does your character want overall: an ultimate want?

 
8. What is in my way? 

What obstacles keep you from getting or achieving what you want?


9. What do I do to get what I want?


What actions do you take - verbally, physically, both? What tactics do you implement?

Some student solos using various theorists

 Olivia's Glass Menagerie based on Artaud:

https://youtu.be/xpFGP3_5Nmc

Caroline's Les Mis based on Grotowski:

https://vimeo.com/536590170

Same Scenes, Different Interpretations

 Here are the various examples we are exploring in class that illustrate how scenes can be interpreted different ways in theater and film:

How Sound Changes a Scene:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rn9V0cN4NWs

The Five Truths Series -- one scene from Hamlet imagined through the lenses of five different theater theorists: Stanislavski, Brecht, Artuad, Grotowski, and Brook:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL1WKARV4AmThMp0LSLgTVBnvNczVJkUHd

Open Scenes to Use with Genre Exploration Activity

https://www.wlwv.k12.or.us/cms/lib/OR01001812/Centricity/Domain/1290/OPEN%20SCENES-Vocal%20Interp.pdf

Penultimate yet also Final Draft

https://youtu.be/yq2oPGX5lOA

Collaborative Draft

 Here is the latest draft of the Collaborative piece you have begun to create -- it needs a title!

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1L6lodtj-xci-VhwcBN3w9EgHdjsk3uxW

Movement Videos

 This file contains all the videos created in class during the recent movement unit:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1-1tavyf1zKCAspj5u7XuqTgEIPl-E_O8

Viewpoints

Viewpoints is focused on storytelling using the body and movement, and I found it interesting to see the stage pictures you created outside and think about the stories they were telling.

Here is  link to the photos I took from the outdoors viewpoints session:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1i3z9-BkWGjbQskUwXg4dIuyZhd1FH5_K

Here are some quotes about theater and viewpoints (from viewpoints creator Anne Bogart) to consider in your reflections:

“Innovation is made possible by the width and breadth of a person’s rummaging around the world…It is by transgressing the boundaries that separate us that we begin to find solutions to the world’s present complexities because inclusion and incorporation of “the other” creates the conditions for innovation.”

— Anne Bogart

“Limits are a necessary partner in the creative act as well as in the crafting of a successful life. What matters is the ability to look around and accurately recognize what is working for you and what is working against you, adjusting to the realities of the situation and mining the potential of the limits with invention and energy.”

— Anne Bogart

“Deep practice is slow, demanding and uncomfortable. To practice deeply is to live deliberately in a space that is uncomfortable but with the encouraging sense that progress can happen.”

— Anne Bogart

“We are debris arrangers. Equipped with what we have inherited, we try to make a life, make a living and make art. We are assemblers. We forge received parts into meaningful compositions. This state of affairs is our plight and our destiny, but it also offers the opportunity to find meaning as well as to find communion with others.”

— Anne Bogart

Shared Terminology

 For the first two weeks, we spent some time just dipping our toes into theater experiences and talking about some of what we already know. We are working on building up a shared vocabulary to use in the class and a way to get to a similar starting point. This post is my reflective notes on those sessions with a list of terms that we can begin to use in class and in our theater journals.

First, we discussed the concept of "Theater Moments" used by the Tectonic Theater Project (https://www.tectonictheaterproject.org/) in their book Moment Work. They stress how audiences remember and are impacted by so many small moments that go beyond the words or the plot. Yes, the story is important, but theater makers use more than words to craft the important moments, including technical elements, stage design, costuming, color, positioning of and relation to the audience, an actor's commitment to the character/scene, surprise, contrast, immersion, and more. 

That brought us to considering the four elements that the IB looks for in theater: TEAM -- tension, emotion, atmosphere, and meaning. These elements can be found in many moments, and they often work together or overlap in theater works. They are created by actors, directors, designers, and tech elements as well. Tension is created through a building of emotion, through suspense, through the rising action of the plot into its climax, through character relationships, and through conflict and change. Atmosphere is created through tension but also through set design and production elements; atmosphere can help audiences understand setting, and it can help create emotion. There are a few different kinds of emotion in theater: those that characters feel and express, those created in the story, and those felt by the audience. And finally, meaning is the overall interpretation of the elements, but can also be different for audiences than for actors than for directors, etc. Theater creates a shared experience between the makers and the audience, but that does not always need to require everyone to have the same feelings or meaning about a piece. 

This week we will experience how various elements can impact TEAM and how large meaning can be created through small moments. We will begin a unit using a technique based on Anne Bogart's Viewpoints theory, and add layers and layers onto a simple exercise. I will ask you to walk, think, feel, respond, watch, and notice -- and then reflect and record your ideas in your theater journal. 

Some terms covered in the first two weeks:

Moment work

Immersion or Immersive theater (also called audience immersion)

Lighting design

Sound design

Digital projection

Set design

Blocking

Plot: setting, rising action, climax, resolution

Off-stage

Tension

Emotion

Atmosphere

Meaning

Welcome to IB Theater -- Year 1!

 

IB Theater is one of my favorite classes to teach because it goes deep into theater in a way that you can't really accomplish in an elective class or even in working on a play or musical. It asks you to look at theater as it is made all over the world, to see from the perspective of actors, directors, designers, and theorists, and to create original theater pieces. Above all, it is a fun and collaborative experience! To begin this journey, have an open mind, respect each other's process, and don't hesitate to ask questions.