Performance Evaluation

Evaluation

Overall, I feel like my performance went well. I researched the context of the play in great detail as well as including various Brecht techniques we learned in lessons. In addition, I took on the advice Ben and Chris gave me in rehearsals and made sure I made the suitable changes or improvements he suggested so that I could incorporate these in my performance. There were no major mistakes in my performance as I remembered all my lines and the relationships between the characters and objectives were clear.

I was given a number of notes in rehearsals that I needed to use in order to improve my performance. One of these included to make sure I faced the audience rather than having my back to the audience so that they could see me better. Therefore, I decided to cheat my body language so that I was speaking to the audience rather than other characters on stage. This allowed the audience to see more of my facial expressions, therefore having a clearer understanding of the emotions of my character. Furthermore, it became easier to project my voice and it was easier for the audience to hear me. A group note we received was to be more energetic and enthusiastic as the studio audience. This would make the show more exciting and would engage the audience. In order to do this, I made sure I was always concentrating on the action on stage and made sure my I projected loudly and used large gestures. I felt that this was effective as we had a lot of energy in the show.

I feel like I used my voice well in the show as I projected loudly so that everyone could hear me clearly. This was quite difficult as I had a very sore throat which meant I had to strain my voice and put pressure on it. This meant that I couldn’t use my voice very effectively or to my full potential. However, I feel like I used my voice well in the show as I projected loudly so that everyone could hear me clearly. In my opening monologue for ‘The Price’, I had excellent projection and articulation so that I was audible and the audience could hear exactly what I was saying. I changed the volume of my voice when I got angry in the scene and also changed the pitch to be higher so that I would sound more furious and disgusted in a comedic manner which juxtaposed my previous character traits of being sophisticated and calm. My tone also became harsher and aggressive in order to demonstrate that I was offended and I was accusing the cashier of being rude and judgemental. This contrasted to when my character in ‘Britain’s got benefits’ when I was calm and friendly.  The emotion of anger also affected my breath as I became stressed and began to breath heavier which showed this change in emotion. I also changed my physical and vocal relationship as I became less still with large, powerful body language and moved around a lot to show my rage and confusion.

I feel like I had good characterisation in my performance and I permanently had very high energy. I felt like this was important in this performance as we used Brecht techniques which could make the performance exaggerated or abstract. I also contrasted my characters to make them very different. I found particular mannerisms that my characters did and incorporated these in my performance. I felt like it was very hard to have good characterisation for my character in ‘The Price’ as the script was very short, therefore there weren't many given circumstances for me to work with, hence making it difficult to understand how he would react in certain situations. In ‘Britain’s got benefits, it was hard to develop a character because he was a TV presenter who was permanently on camera. This meant that his personality would come across as being fake as he would be told to behave in a particular manner. This appeared as if the character would be wearing a mask, rather than revealing his true personality and what he really thought of people. This made it difficult to relate to the character. Furthermore, it was difficult to put emotion into my performance as we used Brecht techniques which includes alienating the audience and not allowing hem to create a personal connection with the character. 

The rehearsals following the performance were quite stressful because Ben was not there to direct us. He had a very good knowledge of the play and knew the running order. It became quite chaotic as it was hard to have someone who didn't know the play directing us. This was an obstacle at first as everyone was unclear about what we were supposed to do, however we successfully managed to work our way around this.

I feel like I anticipated the lines and acted like I already knew what the other characters were going to say. Therefore, my reaction was less truthful or believable towards the audience.  I think I did this because I was too busy focusing on not forgetting my lines rather than thinking as the character. We were told to act like this was the first time we had ever said the lines, this relates to our reaction as we must react like we've never heard the words before. This affected the work as I struggled to be truly in character on stage. In my next performance, I will make sure I work on how I react to others as well as how I act when I'm saying a line. This will make my performance more naturalistic and believable.

I don’t think that the audience fully understood the political messages that we were trying to convey in our play. The reaction from the audience is not how I hoped it would be. Firstly, they didn't laugh much in the sections in which I personally found comedic or amusing. This may be due to the dark humour such as Tom playing a blind man or Michael and Grace being heavily influenced by the status and power of the criminal they were questioning. I think they may have misunderstood or misinterpreted the jokes in it and didn't think it would have been suitable or acceptable to laugh. This made the Brecht technique of ‘Slap and tickle’ unsuccessful as there wasn't enough contrast between the comedy and the hard hitting realisation of the message behind it. In addition, some of the audience didn't understand the political messages in our piece. This suggests that our chosen method to convey these messages were unclear or unsuccessful. I don’t think they would have walked away from the performance started to reflect on the political messages in the performance. The 270 words was unsuccessful as nobody had enough time to finish saying their paragraph, this meant that the audience were left being confused rather than reflective. 

Austerity

Our show is based around the theme of austerity. The gameshow in which the play revolves around is called ‘Austerity the gameshow.’ I researched this in order to develop my understanding of the key themes. The official dentition of austerity is ‘A state of reduced spending and increased frugality in the financial sector. Austerity measures generally refer to the measures taken by governments to reduce expenditures in an attempt to shrink their growing budget deficits.’ Austerity is clearly linked with wealth and the government. This reflects upon current issues in society and the issues faced within the play.

Many cuts have been put in place due to Austerity. This includes the cut of Disability Benefits. This relates to our devised scene and demonstrated why it is currently an important political issue and puts our piece into context. There was recently an article about disability benefits which I read, I found that this was very useful when trying to understand the scene and why it has such a huge effect in the lives of the characters. Here is the link: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/features/austerity-cuts-are-causing-mental-distress-and-are-linked-to-rise-in-suicides-health-professionals-a6712651.html

I also found a game called 'Austerity: The Game'. This is based on the board game ‘Monopoly.’ However, the cards show the differences in status between the ‘Bosses’ and the ‘Plebs.’ They show how money and power can affect lives and the constant between the two lifestyles. The Bosses are allowed to buy any property at any time, however the Plebs are only given this opportunity after one full rotation of the board. This shows the differences in how they are both treated. Here is the link to the board game:

http://usvsth3m.com/post/austerity-the-board-game

Political Play rehearsals

TV show

We started to rehearse for our political performance at the end of term. We started off by devising scenes based around the seven deadly sins we had created. Our scene was about disability benefits. Some disabled people have their benefits taken away from them as they are required to be fit for work. Working can be extremely difficult and stressful for someone with a disability and we wanted to demonstrate and portray the effect this may have on them. We decided to use the Brecht technique of 'slap and tickle' in which we would start our performance as being comedic and humorous before suddenly introducing the deep and hard hitting message to the audience. We started brain storming and experimenting with different ways in which we could convey this to the audience. We finally reached the idea that we could have a sketch based of a talent show such as 'Britain's got talent' or 'The X Factor' in which two contestants would compete to receive disability benefits and only one of them would be able to win. We then wanted to show the major negative effect this would have on the contestant who didn't win and how they would struggle to live their life. There was recently a news article in which someone sadly commit suicide because their disability benefits had been taken away from them. We thought we could use this or a similar story to show how dependant they are on their benefits and how important and crucial they are in their lives. We called our TV show 'Britain's got benefits' and the slogan was 'Are you disabled enough to receive benefits?' I played the role of the cheesy, blunt and obnoxious presenter. Georgie and Clay played the parts of Cheryl Cole and Simon Cowell, the two judges, and Tom and Adjei played the parts of the two contestants. We tried to make our performance funny without being offensive in any way. Tom played the part of a blind man, we added comedy as he couldn't find his way over to the presenter, then couldn't find the microphone and couldn't find his way over to the cross. He then went on to sing 'I can see clearly now the rain has gone' before Simon commented 'You remind me of a young Stevie Wonder.'  This contrasted to him speaking about why he was there and why having benefits was a crucial part of his life and how taking them ways from him would be awful. The next contestant was Adjei, originally we thought he would be a contestant with cerebral palsy who performed a dance. However this could potentially be considered offensive or cruel in the perspective of the audience. Instead, we decided that he would have a zimo frame. He also told the judges about how working was extremely difficult for him and how the disability benefits are a crucial part of his life. The judges then asked him to dance for them, this is very cruel as he is clearly both unwilling and unable to dance for them. However, the presenter took away the zimo frame and forced him to dance. This shows how disabled people have a lack of control and status in society and can be controlled by the government who have little respect or consideration for them. They treat him like a puppet. Furthermore, it shows how people with a disability will struggle to do everyday tasks, especially without any benefits or support. From the government. At the end of the scene will ask the audience to vote for which contestant should win. Only one contestant would receive disability benefits, leaving the other contestant devastated. We would have a monologue about how upset they were and how they would struggle to work and life would become very difficult for them. I think this could be very hard hitting and emotional for the audience. Hopefully, this will change their perspective of the issue and make them realise the importance of the issue. 

The Price

We rehearsed for the scene that I was in with Becky and Grace. The scene was about how poverty or squalor can affect our everyday lives and the scene was an extreme version of this. We have the ending of The Price where the idea of a dead child being cheaper is introduced. The woman decided that it would be a good idea if they bought a dead baby, this is very shocking for the audience. Firstly, we rehearsed this by ourselves before going in and being directed by Ben. He blocked it for us so that the beginning of the piece takes place on top of the table; this idea works very well because it grabs the attention of the audience as we are above everyone else Furthermore, it emphasises the significance of the issue we are raising. Our piece is on a higher level than the others, this shows that the argument has reached its climax after escalating in previous scenes. The uses of visual levels demonstrates clearly and effectively demonstrates their current state of mind as well as their status. At the end of the scene, the characters scan through their items while being on the floor, this shows how low they have emotionally sunk, as they are paying for a dead child. The realisation of what society has become sinks in. I thought it was important to show the contrast between my character at the beginning of the scene where he comes across as calm, arrogant and selfish compared to the end of the scene where he is extremely angry and raging, losing any sense of pride or dignity he previously had. I always think of Will from 'The Inbetweeners' at the end of the scene and. I relate my characters rant to him when I’m trying to make his anger comedic rather than intimidating. Another very funny part is when I physically lift up Becky and scan her through the ‘beep-beep machine.’  It is very comedic for the audience. Furthermore, it raises the social issue of gender inequality or sexism because it implies that men are still seen as being in charge of women and having power over them. By showing this in a comedic fashion, it makes the message more memorable to the audience. 

TV adverts

Our adverts were based on anger and passion. We created two scenes based on this which were light hearted and comedic in nature. Firstly, we created an advert about anger. Adjei started the piece by shouting ‘I am angry!’ before punching Georgie, Clay and I in slow motion while we had little reaction to this. This made it funny for the audience. Tom came along and held out a chocolate bar before saying ‘Try this.’ Adjei then ate the bar before suddenly and miraculously becoming calm and peaceful. Ben decided that it would be funny to base the advert on an old Japanese advert in which other people would speak for them. This is funny as the speaking would be very different to their usual voice and would be completely out of time. Our second advert was about passion. The scene started with a girl walking past three very awkward and geeky guys. Suddenly, Adjei came in and offered us ‘passion pills’ which would suddenly make all girls fall for them. He threw them in the air and we all caught them. We shouted phrases such as ‘Sex is the best!’ or ‘I love vagina!’ before all the girls suddenly came towards us and were swooning. This portrays how the media and adverts can mislead customers or portray their product in an unrealistic light.