Evaluation of devised piece

Evaluation

"The game of life"

Sophia Hinchliff

My groups piece was based on the stimulus we were given at the start of the term, which was an apple. Our performance was inspired by Site Specific and Site Responsive theatre. 
My group and I brainstormed a lot of ideas, and we all came up with the idea to base our performance on life pathways and choices. As the apple to me represents life, but it is not all good. As I mentioned in my research how the apple can symbolise health and purity, but can also symbolise death and poison.

We all came to the conclusion that the apple for us symbolises the walks of life, and how life can take you down different pathways. We wanted to create a raw, emotional and moving piece to portray real emotions and situations to the audience and I feel we achieved this.

Since the beginning of term we have learned about different practitioners and their methods. One method we used in our piece was "Radiating" which was created by Michael Chekhov. We used radiating at the end of our piece to connect with the audience, as throughout our piece our emotions and feelings were very depressing and sad, we felt using the radiating technique at the end would almost draw the audience's attention away from all the negative emotions and into our space, as the poem at the end was positive and was showing how there is light at the end of the tunnel and you will make it through bad times, so I felt radiating at this point was a good idea and allowed us to reflect on our piece and send out positive energy to the audience, so they did not leave our performance feeling sad and affected by what we were portraying, as I am sure most people in the audience could relate to each of our monologues, as they were all from the heart and were based on the truth.

 Another technique we used which was also created by Chekhov, was moulding. We used moulding at the very beginning, when we are all trying to escape from the space we were trapped in, and we built a fourth wall, like a barrier between us and the audience. Moulding worked very well as it appeared that we were pushing against something and trying to break free.
 This movement was very powerful and it actually took a lot of strength as when I was moulding my arms were shaking were I was pushing into the air so hard. Another technique we used almost as a structure was Yoshi Oida's "Jo Ha Kyu" which means "beginning, middle and end" we always referred back to this technique and it really helped us develop our piece. We would always be trying new transitions, movements and dialogue to move from the Jo to the Ha, and from the Ha to the Kyu. This technique motivated us all to have a strong structure in our performance.

I feel what really worked for us in creating this piece was our own personal connections with one another. Before, I had never really spent much time with Jade or Max, but as we were working together we all formed a bond with each other, and we each accepted each other and learned new things about each other. This piece was very hard hitting and emotional, and it bought out my own personal emotions, which rarely ever happens for me, as I am quite a closed person emotionally. I felt our connection as a group gave us all the confidence and motivation to keep going with our piece and to keep creating new ideas. 

Another main thing that allowed our performance to work was the space we chose. It is such a big, open and versatile space, it allowed us to have so many different ideas and it gave us somewhere we could all go to and feel free to perform, and it was very private from other classrooms. The ideas we had for the setting of our performance worked very well, the tea lights and the leaves created an enchanting and ambient feeling, which linked so well with our piece, and it really created a peaceful mood when the audience entered, and I feel as our piece was very hard hitting, having such a tranquil and relaxing set up, really worked well as it created a contrast, and allowed the audience to feel relaxed.

 If I could think about anything that could of been improved, it simply just comes down to rehearsal times. I feel our group in the last week were under so much pressure as we just were not as prepared as we should of been. We had so many good ideas, and it was such a personal piece to all of us, we just did not balance our time as well as we could of. We should of been stricter on each other with rehearsal times and should of stuck to our schedule.
I feel all the monologues we created were very strong and the poem I found for the end piece portrayed a clear and positive message, the movement was our weakness in this piece, as we just were not as rehearsed on it as we should have been. The physical theatre aspect of this piece was clearly there, it just should of had more time put into it, as our main priorities were creating the monologues and learning the poem for the end, and not the movement. 

Something I feel did not work as well as I thought it would was the "flocking" technique, which we learned in our first year. I feel if this movement was better rehearsed the turns and transistions would have been sharper and more effective, we wanted to create the idea that we were not people, we were vessels, trapped in the game of life, and by our movements inside the box we wanted to show that we did not move like people did. This did not work as well as we all imagined, but I feel it still had some sort of effect, as it was very frantic and portrayed a stressful feeling.

The audience responded exactly how I wanted them to, after the performance I received a lot of positive feedback from audience members and how they felt very emotional when watching our piece, and they could relate to the things we were saying, as every person in that audience has at some point gone through hard times and emotional trauma so it was a piece of theatre everyone could relate to. Someone told me they could tell that my monologue had came from my heart and that they felt very connected to what I was saying. This made me feel proud as I wanted to have this effect on the audience.

 From this piece, I have learned a lot about myself and my own emotional feelings. It opened up a lot of emotion inside me, which took me by surprise, and I feel like this performance allowed me to express my emotions about how I feel in my personal life, without having to justify what i was saying to anyone. Performing my monologue felt like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders, as I let out a lot of deep emotions which I cannot express in my personal life, but through theatre I can. So I have learned that theatre can aid the way you feel and it can help you through difficult times. It is similar to what we learned from Stanislavsky's naturalism techniques, and how he likes his actors to involve real life situations in order to enrich the character they are playing. As an actor I am a strong believer in this technique as it works so well for me and I believe it helped me a lot in this performance.

Overall, I feel the message we wanted to portray from our piece was understood by the audience.
 I have learned from this piece that having the strength and courage to do something which at times can seem impossible, will help you through life and everybody goes through bad stages in life and you learn from your mistakes and cannot live in the past. This performance was a journey for us as a group, we learned a lot about each other and were able to work professionally and closely as a group. If I could do this performance again I would be much more strict with rehearsals and stick to a schedule, and I would also spend more time on the movement within the piece.

 We all worked equally as hard as each other and all created ideas and contributed fairly into the making of the piece. 
I am proud of myself and my group for being able to create such a meaningful and personal piece of site specific theatre. 

Photo's from show night

 Day of performance....

Modern monologues

I have chosen my Shakespearian monologue which I will use for auditions I will have for drama school and a couple of universities which will require an audition as well as an interview and group exercise.

Now, I am looking for modern monologues, which are taken from plays which were written recently, I read on-line that most British drama schools would like a contemporary monologue from a play written and published within the last 10-20 years.

This is quite a difficult choice as I am stuck on which play to pick from. I have seen a book in the library of monologues from contemporary plays, which I am going to begin reading, and I am also re-reading the play "Othello" which my Shakespearian monologue is from. The contemporary plays are usually written after 1960.

It is quite hard to find 21st century plays online, so I am going to get a book from the library on campus and study the different plays that interest me and pick out a couple of monologues from the book.

I know that Sussex UNI do not require an audition piece, and U.A.L might not require an audition, but Italia Conti and Kingston college definitely do, and I am still undecided on the fifth choice. I am finding it hard to decide whether to chose another UNI or another drama school. I am interested in Central, but I have discovered that you have to produce two songs to sing in the audition as well as a Shakespearian and contemporary monologue, and singing is not my strong point anymore, I used to sing very well as a young child and teenager, but not anymore! So I have been a bit thrown by this and am not sure if Central audition would be right for me as I have very little interest in singing and music.

  

SHOW NIGHT.

How I feel the show went....

We performed our show on Thursday the 13th last week. I feel as a whole performance it went extremely well and I received nothing but positive feedback. We all had so much energy and enthusiasm and all the pieces linked well with each other, all conveying a strong message. The finale movement piece went the best it has ever been, and we all put 100% effort into it, and it really did feel like school children running around in the playground. Myself, Sav, Chloe & Jade created a narrative between us which has never happened before, it kind of just happened. Myself and Sav were whispering and pointing at Jade and Chloe, and they were doing the same back to us. It was just like how girls were at school, all in competition with each other and pulling faces at each other. It was light hearted and funny, and added even more humour into the piece.

My groups piece I feel was really good, we all portrayed our emotions through our acting, and I was told it was very powerful and moving. Someone who came to see me from my family, said that they could tell that my monologue and acting had came from my heart, and it made them feel very emotional. Which is exactly what I wanted to hear, as this is how I wanted to make the audience feel, I wanted them to feel the emotions of our piece, and understand the serious issues we were portraying. 

The lighting and sound were excellent, and it really ehanced the feeling of our piece, it was almost enchanting, with the leaves on the floor and the little tea lights surrounding our performance box. It is just a shame that it was not filmed. In our second performance of our piece, our red flood light did not work, but we carried on as normal, and it worked very well as we had the tea lights, it was just dimmer, but it went well with the piece so this was not an issue.
At the end of our piece, we played a short 5 minute video performed  by Suli Breaks, all about education and how people should not let exam results decide their fate. This video is so powerful, and we projected it onto the walls in our space, and it had such a great impact on the audience and everyone can relate to this video and what he is rapping about. It is refreshing, modern and intelligent.

12.11.14

One day before the show....

In today's lesson we made huge progress in our perofrmance. We had 2 full run throughs with an audience and recieved feedback from our teacher. 

Our piece has became very powerful and the message we want to portray is very clear. We have sorted our music out and it is so effective and flows with our piece, it really makes a difference and creates an ambiance which we did not have before. The song is the same throughout and it does not have a strong beat, so we play it throughout our piece in the background and it creates an intense vibe and I feel it draws attention in further from the audience. 

We also went leaf picking today and decorated our room and I think it looks amazing, it gives an abandoned and mystical feel to our room. And the way the room smells now it smells old and strange which is what we were going for and the way the leaves crunch beneath our feet when we walk over them at the end of our piece creates an effective feeling and it is quite eerie too. 

We all know our lines perfectly now which allows us to really put 100% into our piece and I feel the emotions are so strong in this piece and the way it feels like we are sharing our thoughts and feelings with the audience. 

The movement in our piece has become a lot better and the movements have emotion and meaning to them, as our teacher helped us with today, particularly max and jades movement whilst I am saying my monologue. 

The main points our teacher feels we need work on are: 

• Changing the tempo of mine and jades back to back struggling movement
•  For me to give off the impression that I am sharing my monologue with the audience, I am letting them in on secrets I have not told anyone before, in order to make the audience feel more involved and for me to engage more with the audience 
•  slow down everything we are doing and do not rush anything 
• Max to inflect some words in his opening monologue, "racists" for example should be inflected more 
• jade to be louder in her monologue 

10.11.14

3 days until performance....

This is the poster
for our performance made
by Heta

Today my group and I rehearsed in our performance space, and made progress on our piece and have added more movement into our piece. The pieces should be between 5-10 minutes long, Sav helped us out by timing our performance, and it is about 4 minutes long. We are aiming for 7-8 minutes, as we have not quite finished our piece and we are currently creating a group monologue to end our performance. It should be around 7-8 minutes when it is completed. We are thinking about using parts of poems we have found in our research as our group monologue, as I have found some quite inspiring poems for our piece.

Start where you stand and never mind the past;
The past won't help you in beginning new,
If you have left it all behind at last
Why that's enough, you're done with it, you're through;

This is another chapter in the book,
This is another race that you have planned,
Don't give the vanished days a backwards look,
Start where you stand.

What has been has been; yesterday is dead
And by it, you are neither blessed or banned;
Take courage, man, be brave and drive ahead,
Start where you stand.

I found this poem on a website called "behappyzone.com" It is called " Start where you stand" by Berton Braley.
I really like this poem and as I found it I messaged Max and Jade to see if they agree, and they both really like it. I took verses from the whole poem and put them together as the original poem is VERY long and we would not be able to learn it in 2-3 days, but I feel the parts I picked out apply to our performance the best.
I am visualising myself, max and jade all standing in the middle of our space, facing each other and each of us saying a 4 lines from the poem, looking at each other as we say it, as though we are talking to each other. As throughout our piece we do not interact with each other through dialouge, so I feel this would be nice to end with all 3 of us coming together as a team and uniting. It gives a positive vibe to the audience, and shows that even though life is full of tough times and sad emotions, you will get through it as life simply goes on, and what was done yesterday is done forever. We want our piece to hightlight the contrasts in life and how some situations can be so awful you feel you are trapped and stuck, but then we want to portray how there are people who care about you, and you will come out of a dark place in the end and there is hope for every single person.
The movement we created today happens after my monologue, the last line is "Tell me, am I living?" when I say this we all move backwards towards the middle, as though the walls are closing in on us, we come together all back to back and link arms. Each of us one at time struggles and lunges forward, portraying how we are trapped and are trying to escape. It is very physical and looks effective, Max breaks free first and then myself and Jade are still stuck. We will break free as Max begins his monologue, or we will stay stuck and struggling whilst he is performing, we are not too sure yet, we will have to try out both ideas and see which works best.

Progress we made today....

• Created a short group movement piece after I finish my monologue.
• Found a poem that we all agree on, and will use as our ending group monologue
• Have emailed Adam the music we would like to have playing in the background throughout the piece
• Max and myself have created a movement when Jade finishes her monologue and we both push her back down to the floor
• Timed our piece so we know exactly how long it is and how long we want it to be
• WE ALL KNOW OUR LINES!!!

5.11.14

THE GAME OF LIFE: Infinity sign

1 week until our performance....
My group have made some vast changes to our performance. Since returning from half term we made some decisions about our performance and it is coming together well and has a great structure to it. We still need to put together the ending, but so far we have an interesting piece with very strong meanings and emotions. We have each written a monologue and have learned these, the monologues are based slightly on our own personal emotions and situations, and focus on the ups and downs of life and how you can get stuck within a "viscious cycle" in life, but at the end of our piece we want to come together and perform a group monologue using movement as well on how life is not all bad, we do not want our piece to be full of negatives, we want it to end on a positive note and we want our audience to relate to us and understand the meaning of our performance. Our piece explores the bad parts and good parts of life. 
We decided not to use the music we previously chose, as we felt our piece was relying too much on the music and was being too influenced by the music and the narrative, we want to use "ambient" music which does not have a strong beat, and has no dialogue involved. So it can play on a loop in the background throughout our whole performance.  I have been on YOUTUBE and have found some playlists of atmospheric music which I feel would suit our piece;

This playlist is 10 hours long!! So has a lot of choice and I think my group will like parts of the song. We just need something ambient to be playing in the background, which will flow with our movement and monologues, rather than the song leading our performance which the previous song was doing.
We have created an abadoned and eerie feel in our room, and have used fake blood and drawn a X  and the Infinity sign inspired by Yoshi Oida on the walls. On the day of the performance we are going to collect leaves from outside and bring them into the room as we want to create an urban and neglected feel to our space. And we are also going to use L.E.D tealights as our main source of lighting, we will put the tealight candles around our "box" we have created, this will create an ambient effect and will also look very effective as they will be outlining our box, and the audiencre will be in the round. 
Our piece is very abstract, but we want to portray all the different ways life can bring you down, and ways you can pick yourself up again. Basing on our own personal experiences and also exploring emotions we have not neccesarily felt ourselves, it is a mixture of fiction and non fiction. 

When I am peforming my monologue, Jade and Max have created a movement piece to flow with my words, almost like acting out how I am feeling in my mind. We are still sticking with the idea that we are 3 beings in the universe, and do not know each other or acknowledge each other. But we do work together as a team now, as at first it seemed like we were not performing as a group as we were all too seperate, but this has developed now.
We performed our whole show to the 1st years today and recieved some really positive feedback. Everyone's pieces are very deep and raw, they bring out a lot of emotion in everyone, and I feel I can relate to everyones performances as they are all based on emotions, choices, actions and human nature. It is a very hard hitting yet refreshing performance and I feel the audience will engage strongly with our pieces, and will feel at the end they have learned something about life, or feel OK about situations they may be in right now. It is an unaplogetic piece, which does not try and sugar coat life.
Today was created our finale movement piece, which will be performed in the Reception area of college. It is a small space, but we have made it work. We were working on it today for about 2-3 hours and performed this to the 1st years. It is to a playlist Siou created, which includes Bad Education and Baggy trousers. It is about 2 minutes long. It is based on school, exploring conformism, play and authority, all using movement. We begin playing as if we are in the playground, and we end playing as well. It is a good piece of movement and with more rehearsals it will be very effective and will end our performance very well. 

Below is a photo from today's rehearsal of our movement finale piece. I am being lifted by the rest of the group.
Video of our finale piece

Final Monologue for performance

In my group we have all decided that will create and perform a

monologue each, based on our own issues we have in life, using a Stanislavski approach character wise, as we want to use real life situations as inspiration for our monologues, in order to create moving and empathetic monologues, we want the audience to be able to relate to our monologues, as our piece on the whole can be quite hard to grasp and will inspire many different interpretations from the audience, but we want our monologues to be very clear, as our piece is quite abstract, we want the monologues to add some realism to our piece.
The monologue I have written is all about situations I have been in or am In currently, and are mainly based around change and loss. It is not a negative monologue as I have included some happy memories and situations I have been in this year, but I am mainly focusing on change of circumstances and loss. My monologue is not characterised or copied from anything else, it is simply just how I envision the performance and what I feel suits the piece and it has aspects of the truth and real emotions and feelings. It has taken me a long time to write this monologue as I want to express raw emotions but without the monologue becoming too lengthy or generic. 


THE GAME OF LIFE: SOPHIA MONOLOGUE (1:14:35) approx 1min 15 secs
I am not a weak person, but believe me when I tell you I have been in situations that have made me feel like I have no strength whatsoever. Things have happened to me this year that have changed me forever, I will never return to the person I was before. Did I do this to myself? Do I deserve this pain? Some times I feel like running away, escaping, breaking free. But then I know you cannot run from your problems, as they will always follow you, no matter where you go. I am in love, but it's cruel, it's a love that lingers over me like a dark shadow, I do not want to be in love, it consumes me and reminds me of painful memories. I am stuck within a viscous cycle, where is everybody? Where am I? Life is a game, every move you make and wrong turn you take, changes everything. Life to me is not about winning, it is about living. Tell me, am I living? 

21.10.14

In today's lesson myself and my group came to a point where everything is starting to fall into place. Today was quite an emotional rehearsal as we really dived into our emotions and certain things that have happened in our lives. We are using Stanislavskis method in a way as we are interpreting our real emotions into our piece to create a strong and meaningful performance. As our piece is about life and the different pathways people chose in life and the circumstances people get themselves into, we really needed to focus on how we feel about our own lives and what are the main issues we feel at the moment in our lives, and how to convey these emotions to the audience. We want the audience to understand our performance and see how different decisions and circumstances can change you and lead you into things you would not think you would do. 

As a group all 3 of us discussed our lives and the main situations we feel passionate about and how they have changed our lives. Jade focused on being a teenage mum and what it meant for her and how hard the decision was for her to make and how it has made her a better person , this conversation really touched me and we have became much more close as a group. We each listen to each other and understand what we all want to portray from this piece. Max was focusing on drugs, and how drugs have affected his life and how they have changed him and not negative reasons but positive reasons, but I was not present for the whole conversation. And the main point I wanted to focus on is loss and change, I am not a very open person and I tend to bottle my feelings up inside myself, which I try very hard not to do. I did not go into too much detail as it is hard for me to talk about certain things which have happened but this year I have suffered loss, which has predominately led to change, which is something I personally do not like too much! I want to portray how life can lead you down a pathway, but sometimes that pathway changes and everything that you thought was going to happen, actually does not happen and how loss changes  you as a person, and changes the way you view things in life, Even if you do not want to change sometimes it just naturally happens. I want to portray my raw Emotions and express myself to the audience as a being in the world who has suffered loss and has been pushed into a corner and has had to just accept the way things are, even though things are not the way I would like them to be at this present day. This project has so far helped me to portray my emotions and just try to understand that life is not fair and even though it is my life, it's not always about what I want and I have to sacrifice feelings I have for the sake of others. 

This lesson today allowed me to be become closer with my group as I was quite upset in front of jade and max today which is nothing like me, and was able to tell them what was on my mind and how I was feeling about it. I trust my group and I know that I find emotions very hard to deal with so coming out of myself and letting my feelings be seen was hard today, but worth it as I feel a lot more calm now that I have let some emotion out, and it has helped me a lot performance wise as I now know what my monologue is going to be based on and how I am going to show these emotions to the audience on the night of the show. 

As a group in our next rehearsal time we need to begin to devise the second scene of our performance, which involves Max rolling the dice and the game of life beginning. When max does this me and jade will take it turns to "move" on the game board and each roll of the dice takes us to different parts of our lives which have affected us the most. So the audience are seeing snippets of our lives and how the decisions and situations we have made have taken us to where we are today. We do not want to have specific  characters, we do not want to create a personalised character with a name and objectives, but we want to portray 3 beings all trapped in the same universe, who have all been through something in their lives which has caused them to be where the are today and we want the audience to be able to relate to our piece and to understand how we are trying to portray life in an abstract way rather than creating too much of a narrative. We do not want our 3 characters to interact with each other, we will physically as we are working as a group and it is not just a one man show, but we do not want to talk to each other, we want to create the illusion that we are 3 vessels, trapped in the game of life, all in similar situations, but do not know each other exist. Myself and Jade need to create a monologue each, or a few mini monologues, to portray to the audience what stage of life we are in after the dice have been rolled, when performing my monologue I want to use movement as well, gestures to show my emotions and how it is effecting me, rather than creating a narrative and a storyline, it is almost like we are individually sharing our memories  from our own minds with the audience, UN aware that we are being watched.... 

14.10.14

Progress on devising

We came up with the idea to include rolling dice into our piece
After Max' monologue, me and Jade will come out of the
side room in our performance room, and Max will roll
the dice and the "game of life" will begin....

My group and I have made massive progress for our devised piece. We performed the first 5 minutes we have put together on Wednesday to our class mates and recieved postive feedback.

We have found 2-3 pieces of music we are going to use for our performance. We are still staying with the "game of life" idea, and are also incorporating the "abadoned school" theme to it as well, we want to create an eerie, circus feel to our performance, we have together founmd 3 very creepy and edgy pieces of music..

This video below, is the piece we are using for our movement piece at the beginning when we begin with a movement piece we have devised from flocking, grid work and mime. And we also use the bamboo stick exercise we have learned, the movements are very flowing when beginning the mime, we want the audience to be able to see that all 3 of us are stuck inside a box, the mime is showing how we are trying to break free. All 3 of us push off the invisible wall and move into the middle. This is when we start our flocking and grid work exercise, we use very sudden and almost robotic movement, so the movement varies a lot which will keep it interesting for the audience. We want to create the feeling that we are trapped vessels inside a box, and we cannot escape, whilst at the same time using the school theme. This first song contains speech from a young girl, which sounds very creepy and effective, she talks about playing tag and hide and seek. Myself and Jade begin to chase each other, using the cue from the song, so we are included "le jeu" the game into our piece as well. When the little girl in the song says "tag your IT" Jade physically tags me and we both go running into the side room in our performance space, showing the audience that we have broken out of the box, whilst Max remains to begin his monologue, about life and how it is a game and everyone is welcome to play.

The second piece of music is a creepy version of " Pop goes the weasel" which we all really like and were going to use for Max' monologue, but we ran through this and the music did  not match the pace of his monologue, so we have decided to use the last video for this monologue. We will however use this piece as it is an effective piece of music which matches the theme of "abadoned school" we might use it to open our piece as the audience are arriving , or maybe towards the ending. We are going to have the audience in the round, and we have made a rectangular shape which will act as our stage in the middle of the audience.

Research on " Old School"

On Friday, we all had the idea to have another theme as well as the apple, a school theme. As this college used to be a high school, " Stanley Deeson" and Marina High. Our teacher asked us all to research the previous schools and why they were in special measures, and any other history about the schools.
We want to create the idea that the performance is in an abandoned school, almost with a ghostly feel to it, we want it to be eerie and to keep the audience guessing and being drawn in.

http://www.theguardian.com/education/2005/aug/09/schools.uk ( this link I found very interesting to read)
STANLEY DEASON
"The school that died of poverty"
Stanley Deason opened in 1976, and was Whitehawks main school. The school closed in 2005, and all the pupils aged 11-16 were re located in schools around Brighton and Hove. Stanley Deason was under special mesaures as the school was not achieving targets and had very rebellious students, mainly all from Whitehawk. This is partly down to the postcode rule, which only allowed students to attend schools local to their area. Which amounted in S.D taking on Whitehawk children, which were notorious trouble makers, however this has changed today as Whitehawk is very different. 
S.D was closed down and renamed MARINA HIGH in 1997. They changed the uniforms, name, logo and teachers. Believing that this will make a massive difference, and their student numbers would increase. Then in 1999, the name changed AGAIN to East Brighton College of Media Arts, as it specialised in art, drama and dance. This only lasted a few more years and it was completely closed down in 2005.0

Research Report on Stimulus

Research Report on APPLES.

The Stimulus we have been provided with for our first show since returning for our second year is an Apple. This stimulus at first impressions seemed very simple and un inspiring. However, after brainstorming and researching I have discovered the depths and deep meanings an apple holds as a stimulus for a performance. As a group we each had an apple, and a piece of paper. We all started to write down everything we thought about when looking at the apple. After this, we all had a group discussion  and the meanings of the apple sparked a very interested discussion and all the interpretations of the apple were really interested and a lot deeper than I thought.

Biblical meaning of the APPLE
In biblical terms, the Apple represents temptation, and almost has a negative symbolism. The apple in the Garden of Eden tempted Eve, and resulted in dire consequences for Eve. The apple is seen as a mystical and forbidden fruit in biblical terms. When Adam held the apple, it was portrayed as a sin, but contrasting, in the bible when Jesus holds the apple it is seen as "bringing life" as Jesus is represented as the "second adam" In the old testament, the apple is seen as a sin and a fall from man, but in the new testament it is seen as a redemption. This shows exactly how much the bible differeniates over the years. The term " adams apple" came from Adam swallowing the forbidden apple, and it becoming stuck in the middle of his throat.


Artistic meanings of the APPLE
Particularly in art, the apple usually represents seduction, sexuality and love. In many paintings including apples, it is usually held by a naked lady, which gives the idea that the apple, particularly red apples, represent temptation. They are portrayed as an alluring fruit, o tempt men to women. 

Tribal meanings
The apple from ancient times up until now is very significant in tribal families. When a couples first child is born, they are given an apple by their paternal grandparents. And if this apple is rotten and has a worm inside, it means a  very bad omen is coming for that child, and on the childs 21st birthday, the child will have to perform a tribal ritual dance to the fruit gods in order to spare the lives of their future children.  It is taken very seriously and many tribes still do this today. The apple symbolises life to them, and the lives of their children are based around the condition of the apple randomly picked from a tree. It is a very important fruit.

Greek Mythology
In ancient greek times, the apple was also a very important factor to the lives of the greeks.
Hercules, the greek hero, was told to travel to the Garden of Hesperides and to pick apples from the Tree Of Life, right at its centre. Atlanta, who was a female goddess from greek mythology, raced all her suitors in an attempt to avoid marriage. She outran all but Hippomenes who defeated her by cunning, not speed. Hippomenes knew that he could not win in a fair race, so he used three golden apples to distract Atalanta. It took all three apples and all of his speed, but Hippomenes was finally successful, winning the race and Atalanta's hand. So the apple was used as a weapon in some aspects, as everybody knew just how tempting they were, so they were used to other peoples advantages. This backs up my logic of how apples are not always a symbolism of health, goodwill and life.
Technology 

As everybody knows, Apple Inc is one of the most successful technology company in the world and has bought us iPhones, iPods, iPads and Macbook computers. All these devices have the half eaten apple symbol on the back of the screens. The founder, Steve Jobs chose to name his Corporation Apple because he felt the name was very friendly, fun and not intimidating. He had also just came back from an apple farm after undergoeing an apple diet, it is his favourite fruit and he simply thought "why not?" 

I agree with Jobs in the sense that the name apple seems very wholesome and friendly. And as the "apple" is recognised internationally, it has enabled the branch Apple to become so successful and popular as everybody can relate to an apple in one way or another, it is a name you could not forget.

New York
As everybody knows New York is internationally known as the "big apple" this intrigued me to find out more, and find out why it is nick named this. The name "The Big Apple" was popularised in the 1920's by John J. Fitzgerald, who was a sports writer for the new york NYC Morning Telegraph. Since the 1970's the name big apple has became even more popular due to advertisement and promotional companies. It seems to me that anything associated with the apple, means that it is very popular and successful. New York is the city of opportunities, whether it be for work, travel or love. New York is always seen as the best place to live, as it is so alive and fresh and always getting better over the years, which is similar to Apple Inc. The apple is also used as a promotional sales object. For example, the designer DKNY, has a perfume brand named " Be delicious" and has used the apple as the main selling point. It is portrayed as very fresh, trendy and successful. It also links to the "big apple" as DKNY stands for " Donna Karan New York" as DKNY's main fashion office is based in New york and was created there in 1984. Apple symbolises wealth I feel, and is used to business owners advantages as they know the Apple has became extremely popular throughout the years, and most businesses who incorporate the apple mostly are very successful. It is seen as a good luck charm to businesses, and I can see why.



Poison
This is a prime example which shows that the apple is not always symbolised in a positive way. In the disney film "Snow White" the witch gives Snow White a beautiful deep red apple, which on the outside appears to be tasty and tempting. But actually on the inside it is poisionious and deathly, and it will send its victims into a "sleeping death" and the victim can only be revived if kissed on the lips by someone who truly loves the victim. Although the apple seems  very wholesome and friendly, this can be used to an advantage, as eveybody will just naturally feel the apple is good and will be tempted into taking a bite, just like what Snow White did. But the apple, usually red apples, symbolise death and temptation. This was my first thought when brainstorming about apples, and I want to use this idea in my devised piece. 

Shakespeare Monologue's

That I did love the Moor to live with him,
My downright violence and storm of fortunes
May trumpet to the world: my heart's subdued
Even to the very quality of my lord:
I saw Othello's visage in his mind,
And to his honour and his valiant parts
Did I my soul and fortunes consecrate.
So that, dear lords, if I be left behind,
A moth of peace, and he go to the war,
The rites for which I love him are bereft me,
And I a heavy interim shall support 
By his dear absence. Let me go with him.

This monologue I have chosen is from William Shakespeare's Othello, 1603. The monologue is by Desdemona in Act 1, Scene iii.
I studied Othello at Bhasvic when I took my English Literature AS Level and I always really enjoyed this play and studied it in depth.
This monologue I will definitely use as 1 of my Classical monologues for auditions for drama school and Universities. I am mainly applying for Universities but I am applying for Italia Conti & possibly another drama school, but I have not decided which one yet.Othello is typically a Tragedy, and Desdemona is very much the centre of all the tragedy as she is Othello's wife!
As I have been made aware of, I should pick at least TWO Classical monologues, and have to be a tragedy AND a comedy, so I cannot pick two Shakespearian tragedies or comedies. 
Othello is a definite choice for me and this is my favourite monologue by Desdemona, I feel I can relate to Desdemona, as she is a strong woman, although she is stereotyped as very meek and obeying, there is a depth to her persona that really interests me as I can relate to this, and I have just always found myself drawn to her character, even when i was only 16 years old at Sixth form college I related to her, and even more so now as I am 4 years older and have developed a maturer understanding of her motives and objectives.

For My second Shakespeare choice, I am contemplating reading the play "The Tempest" I have never read the whole play, but I have read little parts of it when studying English Literature and Drama at school and sixth form. It is a romantic comedy, which contrasts highly with Othello as it is such a serious and political play, so I feel this contrast will be interesting, and will show how I have studied two completely different plays, and carefully selected a monologue after reading the play and getting to know the characters.
I am aware that there are only 1-2 female parts in The Tempest, Miranda, who is the daughter of Prospero, Miranda has never been around any men other than her father and Caliban(her fathers servant) Miranda has a very innocent and naive nature, and does not make judgements on people and is very genuinely kind and caring. I am not sure if this character is the best choice for me, as I am always more drawn to female characters who have more depth to them and have a darker side, like Desdemona. When I have read the play I will make a decision whether to use a monologue from this play.
I was always under the impression that Ariel, who is a spirtual figure in this play was a female. But during my research I have learned that Ariel does not actually have a gender, Ariel is commonly referred to as a "he" as he is Prospero's servant who he saved from imprisionment.
"Ariel -  Prospero’s spirit helper. Ariel is referred to throughout this SparkNote and in most criticism as “he,” but his gender and physical form are ambiguous. Rescued by Prospero from a long imprisonment at the hands of the witch Sycorax, Ariel is Prospero’s servant until Prospero decides to release him. He is mischievous and ubiquitous, able to traverse the length of the island in an instant and to change shapes at will. He carries out virtually every task that Prospero needs accomplished in the play." (Sparknotes)
This monologue by Miranda, draws my attention, I have been reading all the monologues by Miranda, and this is the only one that I feel I could perform well as I understand it to a degree, I am goign to have to research further and when I have read the whole play I am confident I will understand it further:
One of my sex; no woman's face remember,
Save, from my glass, mine own; nor have I seen
More that I may call men than you, good friend,
And my dear father: how features are abroad,
I am skilless of; but, by my modesty,
The jewel in my dower, I would not wish      (DOWER is a provision accorded by law, but traditionally by a husband or his family, to a wife for her support in the event that she should survive her husband (i.e., become a widow)
Any companion in the world but you,
Nor can imagination form a shape,
Besides yourself, to like of. But I prattle  (to prattle is to chat idly, or to " babble" foolish babbling or rambling)
Something too wildly and my father's precepts
I therein do forget

She is explaining how she has never been around a woman, as she was bought to the island at a very young age, she has been so isolated from the world, and as she is only 15 years old, she has very naive perceptions of people, allowing her to be violated by men, in particular, Ferdinand who is set to marry her, and as well Caliban, who has admitted that he once tried to rape Miranda, both men would like to take Miranda's " virgin knot" so she is very wanted by both men, but in different ways. I feel Miranda sounds older than a 15 year old girl, I was surprised when I learned her age.
This is a modern version of the monologue I am interested in I found on Sparknotes:

     I do not know

One of my sex, no woman’s face remember—

Save, from my glass, mine own. Nor have I seen

More that I may call men than you, good friend,

And my dear father. How features are abroad

I am skill-less of, but, by my modesty,

The jewel in my dower, I would not wish

Any companion in the world but you,

Nor can imagination form a shape

Besides yourself to like of. But I prattle

Something too wildly, and my father’s precepts

I therein do forget.

This monologue is aimed at Ferdinand, as they are expressing their love for each other. The more I depict it, the more I actually really like this monologue. It is quite deep, and it is showing how Miranda has never been around any of men other than her father and Ferdinand, and servants of her father. 

8.10.14

Today in rehearsal myself jade and max were in our room we have chosen for our performance and began the first steps in physically devising our piece. We have made decisions about how we are going to open our piece. In our room there is a separate small room which we are going to enter from once the audience are inside the room. We are going to use a piece of music at the beginning of our performance to open it, we have decided on using an acoustic instrumental piece, with a slight eerie vibe to it. We want the lighting to be very dim and flickering, Siou gave us the idea of holding lights below our faces, and when we begin our monologues to turn the light on, this would instantly grab the audiences attention and would create a very intense feeling. We want to make our room look abandoned and neglected, to create a rural feeling. 

We have been beginning to plan out our movement piece, I feel it would be a good idea to open the piece with some music and devise a group movement piece in unison, whilst travelling around our "set" we have created, which we refer to as the game board, because it is like a chess board and we are the chess pieces, moving through life individually but we are all in the same world. 

7/10/14

Today we all went off into our devising groups to the location we have all chosen for our performance. Myself jade and max have chosen an abandoned class room which is on the top floor and is very big. It is an open space with a lot of room for ourselves and an audience. We have made excellent progress today for our piece and brainstormed ideas together and also created a set with some black wooden surface tops we found in the classroom. This symbolises "the walk of life" visually and metorphorically and the different pathways individuals take in their lives. We decided together that all 3 of us will be playing individuals who do not know each other and do not even acknowledge each other in anyway throughout our piece. We want to create the idea that we are just "vessels" who are choosing their own pathways in life, we want to show that life is not always as good as people see it to be, and using the apple stimulus we want to show how an apple does not just represent life and health and rebirth, it also symbolises poison, temptation, destruction and death. 

Red Earth

http://www.redearth.co.uk/chalk.html
RED EARTH ENVIRONMENTAL THEATRE COMPANY.
In fridays lesson we all showed our group presentations we had created on Site specific, site responsive and theatre companies who use this.
Our teacher told us about Red earth and we were asked to research them.
They create theatre by using the environment, their aim is to transform the way we think about where we live and how our environment contributes to how society is today. They are quite policital, similar to the theatre company I researched called KABOSH. 
A particular piece they have created is called CHALK. Which was perfomed on the South downs in 2011. This performance explored the Archaeology and ecology of the Souths downs national park. This included perfomance journeys for the actors and audience, experiential walks over the downs and creating site specific installations. This performance was all based on the nature of the site, the history and the meaning it holds. It was quite spritual and invited peformers and audience members to collaborate with the land by walking through it, singing, performing and building on it. 
It is all about understanding and appreciating what we have and how the environment is so important for us, and just exactly what we can create from the environment through performance.