Uptown! - Devising Project - Blog Uploads

Blog 1 - Initial Response to Stimulus; 'Let me off uptown'

Stimulus:

• 'Let me off uptown' - by Anita O'Day and the Gene Krupa Orchestra
• https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=let+me+off+uptown+anita+o+day&&view=detail&mid=97FAEC156A418A26A84397FAEC156A418A26A843&FORM=VRDGAR

First Thought:

I felt like I was walking down the streets of 1940's New York watching a white lady talk to a black man and telling him to go Uptown which I believed to be the 'fun' part of town with cat houses and restaurants. This was the first time listening to the stimulus and I had know knowledge about it at all. For a first response, I found a story had already been created which I recorded on paper and shared with the group later on.
The idea of setting our devising piece in a cat house has potential as if the song was produced in the 1940's then it would be relative and show how there were strip joints in New York and could be used as our target to show the audience how a predominantly male bias society contained such clubs as form of entertainment that show women as sex symbols.

Secondary and Other Thoughts:

Continuing from the idea above, the more I listened to the stimulus I began to imagine the colours, smells and characters. I imagined bright oranges, pinks and greens, the smell of gasoline and smoke from cigarettes and from factories and the two characters being Anita (a white lady) and Roy (a black man). Furthermore, I pictured Anita directing Roy into a strip joint that was run by the Mafia. I pictured this club to be prestige and gentlemanly with 'sexy' jazz music playing with smoke, a bar and female strippers (cats) and waitresses. With these ideas and details in mind, I pictured many ways as a group, that we could use physical theatre to tell it. I imagined chair duets to show the woman pleasuring men, Frantic Assembly flying and Jetpack on the dance floor and around by through to represent dancing, jiving and enjoyment that the jazz music brought to me whilst listening to it.

Other ideas I thought of during my first responses were actually being members of the jazz band and being a singer and singing to Anita and having a musical conversation on stage in front of a large audience with an orchestra behind me. I thought 4 corners could be used to show the two characters acting out walking down a street in New York. I don't think this idea has any performance potential due to it only including two characters but none the less it will be discussed in the group.

Titles of the song could be Uptown, Roy!, Uptown Jazz. These were some of my initial title ideas. I found the phrase;

'You been uptown?!'

to be reoccurring and a common theme, so I will try and discuss with the group what Uptown can represent and produce more ideas.

zToo conclude my responses to the stimulus, it produced detailed ideas that I will share with my group with details such as colour, smell and characters which can hopefully be used to influence and generate some strong plots and physical theatre in our devising.  

This is the album/record cover for 'Let me off Uptown!' by Anita O'Day and Gene Krupa band. Here I can see Anita, the lady in the song I pictured talking to Roy who is the trumpet player in the band. Anita is white and Roy is indeed black. This can be used as influence when were in groups as stories with plots based on black rights, colour or feminism of the 1940's could be formed too show the audience the history of the time and how these problems compare to the present day. A massive range of physical theatre can be used such as hymns hands, chair duets, round by through, lifts, forced entertainment, Brechtian techniques such as rejecting the fourth wall and over characterisation, DV8 interaction with an object like the bed scene and mime.