Week One 'Greek Tragedy'

GREEK TRAGEDY!

This week we started workshops for our next piece of drama, which fits under the theme 'Greek tragedy'. First we were all asked to stand in our groups in which we thought we interrelated to. I thought I would be with Electra and Orestes 4 who I have a scene with, but I was quite rightly corrected in the sense that actually I was on my own. I was on my own for a number of reasons, but an example was that I was not a local I was from somewhere different. The play doesn't actually tell me where she is from but after research I have decided to work on the fact that she was found by Helen on her journey to Troy and was taken back with her to work for her. At least I will work with that for now. I will include this in my character profile project. We were then being put into groups that went together in the play. For example I was cast as the slave who looks after Helen's and Menelaos' baby, and so I was put with the people who were playing these parts as well as a chorus member (journalist). We were asked to put each other into statue like poses which we thought would represent our character.

My poses were a lot less status than most characters as I am playing someone with no importance to the time, and so I tried showing this with levels.

The first picture shows me looking down with little grace as I wanted to show how I was the slave and was below most of the characters. So I put my head down and seemed like I had no place and was not confident. My character is not confident in a way as she is far away from her home, and her family.

 The second pose shows a sense of curiosity. I wanted to try and show curiosity as my character seems to be un important but is always there and is always seeing things. So though she may not supposed to be curious or looking around. I think it shows how she see's everything goes on between the lines.

I thought this character would be made of tin, as it isn't a valuable or elegant metal but holds just the right strength a slave needs.

An interesting part of this first week that I enjoyed most was the activity we did with chairs called chair objectives. We were put into groups again which related to our characters. I was with Helen and Menelaos, and we got asked to do an interesting activity with the chairs that I had never done before. We were asked to think of a theme each. Mine was guidance, Helen's was Seduce and Menelaos' was deny. We did a routine which showed how Menelaos was going to take Helen back from troy to sentence her to her death, but couldn't go through with it as he fell in love with her again. We fitted the character of the slave into this movement by using the idea of guidance towards Helen as if I was advising her or sticking with her while she was trying to seduce Menelaos.

Here is a picture of what other peoples themes were:

We started to look at some movement within the chorus with Kirsty. We were put into groups and given some specific lines to look at (choreography wise). We also started looking at blocking a scene with Electra and Tyndareus who is the main journalist and so has the trust of the chorus who are (journalists). I play the chorus when I am not my given character as does everyone so we all got involved and put our points across. I didn't really give a lot across this time as I was quite interested with how others were explaining there own ideas. Karen said something that really got my attention when she said how 'If you sense it, do it, because that's what the audience wants you to do, but if you don't it will look forced'. I feel this little bit of advise might help a lot with the blocking of the script.