'Uptown' Blog Week Two
Research of Historic Events
Week two we came back and researched our ideas and found out the historical context and other facts that may help us develop a more realistic and informative piece of theatre to our audience. In turn, giving our performance more of an impact and also educating them about the events of the past and finding out and showing how these ideas relate to the stimulus, 'Let me off uptown'.
The Great Depression Quick Fire Facts
- From 1929 - 1939
- The largest economic downturn in the history of the United States of America
- Caused by the Wall Street stock market crash in 1929
- This meant that consumer spending and investment dropped
- Industrial output then steeply declined
- Failing companies then laid off their workers
- This lead to mass unemployment
- In 1933, 13-15 million Americans were unemployed
- Nearly half the countries banks had failed and run bankrupt
- The un employed turned to the 'American Dream'
- This being the dream of earning enough money so they could afford to live of their own land
- These workers found employment in farms in the country
history.com/topics/great-depression - the link to where this information is from
http://www.history.com/topics/great-depression/speeches - this is President Franklin D. Roosevelt's radio broadcast where he praises a newly adopted works relief program which would introduce retirement and pensions to the elderly therefore bringing more jobs to the youth.
This research about the great depression allowed us to start developing a scene based on the workers on a farm which was developed by Rhys and I. As a group we chose frantic assembly's Four corners as the physical theatre for this piece.
Frantic Assembly - http://www.franticassembly.co.uk/what-is-frantic/
"The vibrant and visceral Frantic Assembly" THE INDEPENDENT
Frantic Assembly is a physical theatre company founded by Artistic Director Scott Graham, Steven Hoggett and Vicki Middleton in 1994. They create 'thrilling, energetic and unforgettable' theatre using their own techniques such as; chair duets, four corners, jet pack lift, wall running and hymns hands.Four Corners and the Great Depression Scene
The technique we tested for this great depression scene was four corners. Four corners involved me choosing four points in the room and then travelling to these points, and only these points. To use this to create a scene, me and Rhys split the group into four and placed each group into the corners. Then these groups chose their four corners. Firstly we all set off at the same time and just walked to our four corners and then back to the position without any physicality or characterisation or interaction. This was very bland and had no dramatic potential so the group decided to set off in cannon. After setting off we found this added more technicality to this scene but was still lacking in dramatic interest. So, I came up with the idea using the research Rhys had completed about the Great Depression, which shows the social classes that existed around the working farms of 1929-39.
Social Classes on working farms during the Great Depression era
- There were the land owners who had the money and were in charge of all of the workers on their land. They have the highest social class as they have both money and power.
Under these are the landowners children. Especially the male child due to sexism of the time; (information on sexism during the Great Depression can be found here)-https://prezi.com/hunydkrsud9d/sexism-in-the-1930s/ - ...the male child would have the same authority over the workers as the landowner but has not inherited the money.
- Then the wives of the landowners or their sons. These would be dressed and treated as lady's and have authority over the workers but may be treated unfairly and be powerless to the landowner or their child due to being a woman.
- Then the white workers, these are the 'non black' workers that live on the farm to earn a small living. These men have no power or authority and very little money. They are lower class people and would often be left for dead once sacked of old age.
- Then the black African American workers. These men have no power or authority over anything and were treated awfully due to the racism of the time. They were often kept as slaves on cotton fields. During this period, they still had barely any rights and were often lynched or hung by large mobs of white men due to the completion for work. (Information on racism during the Great Depression can be found here)- http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/english_literature/prosemockingbird/0prose_mockingbird_contrev2.shtml
Back to the Four Corners idea...
So with this information, we assigned Rhys and I the social status of the landowner and his son, Beckie and Becca the social status of the Lady/ wives of the landowner and his son, Chloe Hearn, Chloe Smith and Mike the social statuses of the white workers and Logan and James the social class of Black workers/ slaves. We experimented with the way we interacted with each-other until it told a story and made sure our movements were very physicalized. This meant we had created a short scene with performance potential and dramatic potential whilst thinking about the place, time and events and staging.
To further develop this scene, at the end of a cycle of four corners, we all collaborated into the middle facing the audience, and formed a freeze frame where one by one, a person has to carry out a frozen action whilst making contact with at least one other character on stage in order to show to tell a story or meaning to the audience. I think this really worked because it is a use of physical theatre that is very dramatic and unique. I do believe that this whole idea we created today has performance potential and shows how as a group we have created a suitable scene for our devised work.
This idea links to the stimulus because 'let me off uptown' is a jazz song and the genre of jazz was founded during the Great Depression and influenced by the large black culture in America.
To further develop this scene, at the end of a cycle of four corners, we all collaborated into the middle facing the audience, and formed a freeze frame where one by one, a person has to carry out a frozen action whilst making contact with at least one other character on stage in order to show to tell a story or meaning to the audience. I think this really worked because it is a use of physical theatre that is very dramatic and unique. I do believe that this whole idea we created today has performance potential and shows how as a group we have created a suitable scene for our devised work.
This idea links to the stimulus because 'let me off uptown' is a jazz song and the genre of jazz was founded during the Great Depression and influenced by the large black culture in America.
http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/modern-world-history-1918-to-1980/america-1918-1939/america-in-the-1920s/ - Jazz in the 1920's
Mental Asylum Idea
This idea was formulated by Sir James Welland. He told the group that 'Let me off uptown' made him picture a mental asylum where the stimulus was playing from a radio with static and mental patients laying on ill stated beds or the floor. So with this in mind, some research was done on what a mental asylum looked like in the 1940's:
https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6hR2l7CH5Iv-d2HaWR0ivvmw9UTKk8RIIsJ-bJV6hg0Lm4oRRFIXlgrlcnOvV9rs5QbPUMBzKujk32639Oi_yk9Vq66JgNtFcznqLxDQXWrHx_-mh5LFBlvdjzPBV3Tfs9n760Rdipvk/s1600/ww2hospital_c1940.jpg
-(link to image)
Here is an abandoned mental asylum. This gave us more inspiration on what our set could look like and fits in with the darker tone we were thinking of. - Clinical depression - a low state of being to the point of ending your own life, causes such as low self esteem and loss of interest in activities or pleasure.
- Schizophrenia - the failure to recognise what is real, hearing voices, fast beliefs or confused thinking.
- Bipolar Disorder - periods of happiness quickly into sadness or anger or depression.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bipolar_disorder - (link to information)
Links to images above:
- http://www.apesantsandancestors.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/causes-of-schizophrenia.jpg
- http://www.subconsciouslythinking.com/uses/depression.jpg
- http://bustingout.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/bipolar.jpg
Physicalization of this scene
As a group we decided we should take a Forced Entertainment approach, using repetition and physicality and over expression to create a tense atmosphere and to make the audience feel they were actually in a mental hospital. We did this by finding a position on one of the blocks or on the floor and laying down. We used energy states to experiment with a feeling of waking up and slowly increasing the amount of energy until it got really loud and the tension could be created.
once at the optimum energy to be sat up and moving, we found three movements that, for me, were based on the bipolarism disorder. I had a coin that I was flicking and I was smiling and then frowning to really physicalize my character.
Our feed back from this scene was that the energy needed too increase a lot more, and that we should experiment with sound effects and larger movements and make it really over dramatic so that it could be really powerful and impactful to the audience. After this feedback, we tried some of Karen's ideas but it didn't really seem to work as I don't think certain individuals were convinced about this idea which lead to the energy lacking and therefore a lack of improvement of the development with the scene. We added the stimulus and used static to add to the scenes potential but as a group I feel we decided that it was too long and lacked the dramatic potential we had hoped. Also, this idea was called a 'cliché' idea and we decided we waned to steer clear from clichés and be more original and inventive.
Forced Entertainment - http://www.forcedentertainment.com/
Forced Entertainment are a group of 6 people that are based in Sheffield and make physical theatre performances. They explore and question aspects of life and art and improvise scenes by throwing ideas out between each other and devise 'until something starts to kick'. They use nudity, masks, costumes, create a mess on stage and use repetition, interact with the audience, break character and improvise whilst on stage.
This company is a great inspiration and educational gift for our group because as a devising company themselves, their techniques can be used to improvise scenes with performance and dramatic potential and that is the aim for our group. By researching this company we have used some of their techniques to create a purpose for our scene, and for our idea to have performance and dramatic potential.
Conclusion
Overall, this week has been a very productive week in terms of ideas being invented and brought to life with the use of physical theatre, acting and music which has shown our imaginativeness, insightfulness and teamwork and positivity even when an idea may not have worked for us.
As a group we decided we should take a Forced Entertainment approach, using repetition and physicality and over expression to create a tense atmosphere and to make the audience feel they were actually in a mental hospital. We did this by finding a position on one of the blocks or on the floor and laying down. We used energy states to experiment with a feeling of waking up and slowly increasing the amount of energy until it got really loud and the tension could be created.
once at the optimum energy to be sat up and moving, we found three movements that, for me, were based on the bipolarism disorder. I had a coin that I was flicking and I was smiling and then frowning to really physicalize my character.
Our feed back from this scene was that the energy needed too increase a lot more, and that we should experiment with sound effects and larger movements and make it really over dramatic so that it could be really powerful and impactful to the audience. After this feedback, we tried some of Karen's ideas but it didn't really seem to work as I don't think certain individuals were convinced about this idea which lead to the energy lacking and therefore a lack of improvement of the development with the scene. We added the stimulus and used static to add to the scenes potential but as a group I feel we decided that it was too long and lacked the dramatic potential we had hoped. Also, this idea was called a 'cliché' idea and we decided we waned to steer clear from clichés and be more original and inventive.
Forced Entertainment - http://www.forcedentertainment.com/
Forced Entertainment are a group of 6 people that are based in Sheffield and make physical theatre performances. They explore and question aspects of life and art and improvise scenes by throwing ideas out between each other and devise 'until something starts to kick'. They use nudity, masks, costumes, create a mess on stage and use repetition, interact with the audience, break character and improvise whilst on stage.
This company is a great inspiration and educational gift for our group because as a devising company themselves, their techniques can be used to improvise scenes with performance and dramatic potential and that is the aim for our group. By researching this company we have used some of their techniques to create a purpose for our scene, and for our idea to have performance and dramatic potential.
Conclusion
Overall, this week has been a very productive week in terms of ideas being invented and brought to life with the use of physical theatre, acting and music which has shown our imaginativeness, insightfulness and teamwork and positivity even when an idea may not have worked for us.
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