Finding the energy, The Good Thunder and Urashima

Today we used movement and sound to create simple gestures that could be magnified, in order to find a quality for the energy of each character.

On stage, each character has to be full of energy.  Even the most quite, simple role, must be full and vital, so that the audience will feel drawn to it.  Otherwise, there is no point it being there - it may as well be  a piece of scenery.  So each person decided on a role that they would explore in this way, to find how they, with the help of the group, could discover, create, forge, a specific quality of energy.  We had Rai Den and Rai Taro (Thunder Gods), the Peasants Wife, a Child, Urashima the Fisherman, A Sea Maiden and the Moon.  

In turns, each actor described their character, and the particular element that they would like to work on today.  For instance, Rai Den and Rai Taro both worked with elements of the storm the Peasants Wife worked with nurturing love.  A simple gesture was found by the actor concerned, and then they, with the group, would find ways to make the gesture bigger, and add sound, so that the final gesture, played out by the actor accompanied by the group, was rich and dynamic.  The Moon what the only character that did not have sound.  Nor did she have movement.  Rather, she embodied 'neutrality'.  In the rehearsal session, we found that this neutrality imparted a lot of power to the role, through the eyes of the audience.

The concept of Neutrality was taken a stage further by the group, as each actor stood alone in one area of the room, and helped by the rest of the group, stood in a neutral position, with no facial expression, completely relaxed.  Then, they were told to maintain that position whilst the rest of the group in turn described the character that the actor was playing in detail.  It was very interesting to see how even though the actor had been told not to move, very small physical changes where visible - a filling up of the chest, drawing back of the shoulders, maybe a small hint of a smile.  Several times the actors could be seen to be visibly refraining themselves from moving, as they embodied their character.

Part of this excercise was in finding out just how very small physical changes can impart so much to an actors presence, and also in getting the actor to fully focus on their character without having the ability to move about, so that they could be really aware of how their body wanted to move in order to become the character.  There were two other benefits to this exercise, which were in the way that the actors viewed their characters.  Firstly, they discovered that they all really liked their characters.  Some were surprised at this, as the roles did not initially seem to be all that interesting.  It is very important that an actor likes the character that they are playing, no matter what particular characteristics they are conveying.  This empathy makes the character believable, and enjoyable to watch.  From a therapeutic point of view, exploring a character is exploring a part of the self, and the next step in the challenge may be not just to like the character that one is playing, and to percieve it as important and vital, but to like ones self, and to see ones self as important and vital.  This is the second benefit.  As each actor sees their character to be an important and vital part of the the story, they are able to impart the energy into playing the character that really brings it to life, and makes it larger than life, and as the character, the actor takes on a 'magical', 'extrahuman' quality.

During the rehearsal session, the group divided into two, so that we could work on two stories, allowing everyone to be able to further explore the character that they had been working with in the early session.  The exception was the child character in Urashima, who we will work on more at the next opportunity.  However this actress was able to stand in as a Narrator, as did I, because all of the narrators were working on other characters.

We worked more on Urashima, and The Good Thunder.  The character work that people had been doing had visibly beneficial effects, in the way that each actor was able to convey the characteristics of the role they were playing, with only a few simple moves.  I won't describe the rehearsals in detail, as they are now mainly working on building up the sculpts within the story.  The following pictures describe some of the performance section at the end.

Intro to Urashima, Actors are present on stage, in fairly neutral positions, prepared to
engage in the physical telling of the story.

Whilst the Narrator reads, an actor focusses on his role and
how he will enter the stage area

The actor playing the moon maintains this position throughout the piece.
 Although the stance is very neutral, the role becomes very powerful,
as it remains unchanged, unaffected by events that unfold.
There is the idea that maybe the moon has some controlling influence?
Is there a relationship between the moon and other characters?

The power of the Moon and the Sea Maiden are conveyed by the
fact that their moves are extremely minimal, whilst the Fisherman, who
in this story is the prey, initially does most of the moving.

The vulnerability of the Fisherman is increased as he lies, unconscious, on the sea bed,
stared at, passively by  his predator.

As the two characters battle, their positions change,
showing the various manipulative or defensive interactions that are used.

Finally the two characters are in agreement,
and one of them has lost more than they bargained for.

The narrator appears absorbed by the story, and as much is relayed by facial expression
and body language than by words.

Whereas the sculptactors maintain inanimate facial expressions, 

the narrator is able to create many different expressions and ways of moving, 

hopefully giving a sense of a lively and dynamic presense.

The narrator uses body language to draw the attention of the audience to herself,
and onto the story that she is telling.

Characters are choreographing their movements to fit in with each other so that the
performance is seamless and fully connected.

We constantly looked at ways to make the picture more interesting by
characters moving on different levels.

We worked for some time finding ways of portraying a certain image in a way that would be physically comfortable to hold for reasonably long period of time.  In mid position, resting the arm on a bended knee worked rather well.

One of the techniques used by the narrator is to
physically interact with the sculpted image portrayed by the sculptactors.

18th July 2011 - The Group Grew!

What a session!  Got there late, French exchange student and reluctant daughter in tow, had lost key, rushed home, found key, rushed back, a new face arrived, "great"  I thought.  Barb called - could she come along?  "Yes of course! Welcome!"  I replied.  A few minutes later another new face, and then Josh, an old face.  By the time Gabi and Chris got there at 7pm we had a room full to the brim.  And what an exciting session.

Performances and being in the audience are both important
parts  of the processes we work with

The initial part was not spent in role development as we usually do.  I changed the plan because there were so many new faces that I felt rather self conscious and didn't feel confident in my ability to absorb the group in the process of me enrolling the three narrators, as I had originally intended.  Instead, we played a game in which everyone very slowly walked around, keeping the distance between them and the people around them at all times the same.  Being aware of where everyone in the room was.

We facilitated the awareness by the fact that occasionally would shout someones name, and everyone in the room had to turn and point at the person whos name I shouted and they had to die in the most dramatic form they could.

Whilst doing this I was also reminding people to remember to move very slowly, and to be aware of any tension in their shoulders, and their centre of balance in their pelvic are, and keep their knees pliable.  This was to prepare the bodies for the next stage of the game.

New people bring new ideas to the group

In the next part of the game, I asked everyone to close their eyes, and keep moving very slowly around the room.  To try to keep the awareness of where other people were, and if they did brush against each other, they were to shake hands (this is to counteract the possible effect of brushing against each other feeling incorrect or wrong, and distracting from the point of the game).  I watched in growing amazement, as in this extremely full room, the group walked slowly around for over a minute, and for the great majority of the time there were no physical contacts made at all.  

We then carried the game onto another stage.  Members of the group each became a tree, and a few people took it in turns to move through the "forest" with their eyes closed.  One group member suggested a "pinball game", in which people got pushed around by the trees.  This was a good idea, but conflicted in practice with the original point of the game, which was to get people to be very aware of the physical sensory experience that you get just by being close to another human being.    Some people think of this as a sort of sixth sense - like when you are aware someone is behind you, though you can't see or hear them.  The group members spoke of the awareness of this feeling, though wether it is actually a sixth sense or whether is it an awareness of subtle changes in light, or sounds occuring outside of our conscious awareness, or the heat, or even subtle smells of others, we could not say.

For the benefit of the newcomers, we showed a part of each story, with Urashima being shown in it's entirety. Chris  played the drum, so that he could become more aware of the particular scenes and characteristics of each performance from the musical standpoint.  Also - we have agreed that Chris should recieve a recorded copy of each story so that he can start creating the music over this.

Lauren works in the kitchen
 area with some new members

Following this, we continued to work on each story, creating between one and three more sculpts  for each one.  The new arrivals took the Badger Kettle, and brought some lovely new angles to the performance, which is always a benefit to the group.  As always, we finished with performances of the new material.  Part of the instructions when getting into  smaller groups were that the narrators should be working on their characters and movement.  As time goes on they are becoming more confident with these, to the point where they were starting to come quite close to the audience, engaging intimately with them.

Next week - we are going to start working on very dynamic physical movements.  There are two places in the stories where these are needed - firstly in the Badger Kettle - the Badger is very active and I would go so far as to say athletic.  Secondly, in the Good Thunder, the storm scene.

Ailing Characters, Paper bag masks and The Good Thunder

12 June 2011

The second of the three hour sessions.  We are keeping energies up by:

1) a variety of sessions within the three hour period.
2) different people facilitating workshops or experiments.
3) using both physical and creative elements to keep peoples bodies and minds active.


Well done everyone for keeping up with it.



Today's sessions were:
Role development

This fisherman found a fairy with arthritic wings.
She recalled with sadness and longing the days when she
could fly.
He was reminded of a mermaid he once knew.

Careful what you find at the end of the garden!
 And beware the perils of  'helping'.

- improvisation using roles that people play in the stories, acted as if they were much older or had become disabled, or carers.  Everyone in pairs, working out characters/relationships, then meeting up "in the park" (we used the garden), and improvising as a group.  Different elements came out in the pair work to the group improvisation, and in the pair work especially, I found myself thinking this would be a very interesting thing to do with a dramatherapy group - perhaps with families or other systemic groups, even team building exercise for professionals.

Finding a gesture to describe an element of the character.
this  physical play is an essential part of the  role development

The exercise gave the group members a chance to look at the character through different eyes, through the imaginary eyes of the characters future self.  This gave a different insight as the imaginary future self had some interesting observations to make of themselves in their younger form, just as we do in real life!

A 1st Experiment with Masks


One of the group has been reading Lecoq and Callery, and worked with us on a group experiment using a paper bag as a neutral mask.  The mask gave a feeling of anonymity and freedom, but often this followed an initial inhibiting factor as people realised that they could only communicate with their body.  People enjoyed using the mask, sometimes not wanting to take it off.  Next week we will do another mask experiment, looking more at the dynamics of 

People enjoyed wearing the paper bag mask,
it afforded anonymity and freedom.

Being an audience member, or a witness,
 is a big part of the training, and sharing of what we are learning.

movement - Callery speaks of our own potential for movement and expression and exploring this.  There isn't a set technical way of moving in this work, rather it is for the actor to explore and develop their own range of expressions.  The role of the audience in this experiment was to inform themselves, and the mask wearer, how they experienced the masked action.  






We sometimes found it was very hard to give a clear image of the theme we were trying to convey.  
A sign that a good group cohesion is being formed is that people are becoming quite honest with each other.  

The Good Thunder


Because it was into our 3rd hour now, I led a vigorous physical warm up.  Each person started with a fairly small gesture, which the group reflected.  In stages then we made the gestures larger and larger until the whole group was jumping in the air, swinging their limbs, and rolling around on the floor.  At the end we finished with a very tiny set of gestures, also based on the first, accompanied by a sound.  I was amazed by how energetic the group was in doing this, and will certainly use this again - maybe even forming it into a sort of dance.


Anyway - onto the Good Thunder

After an initial 'blocking' session,an actor stands in for the narrator,
whilst she rehearses in another room.

I do believe that we have finally started to actually choreograph this piece as it will finally be seen.  This includes the part of the narrator.  The group divided into two, with half of the group working with the narrator on the movements and expressions that she will use in the performance, and the other working with Rai Den and Rai Taro.  Right at the end, we bought the two together  and the separate performances became one dynamic piece, with one performance taking place around the other, and the two performances describing each other.  This worked very well to my mind, and I think we will work like this more often.

4th July - Faries, the Elements, Thunder Gods and Peasants

Most of the group turned up at 6pm, which was great as we had time to focus in detail on one of the characters.  We focussed on one of the narrators, the fairy, who will be reading "The Good Thunder". 

It is amazing how as time passes the connection that people get with the role sometimes fades.  The choice here is to develop a new role, or to try to re-connect with the original.  It has been a long time since we worked on the 'fairy' narrator, and even longer since we last read "The Good Thunder", and the time we spent re-making contact with the role was needed.  Now we have cast the roles, it is up to each individual to ensure that they keep some connection with their roles between workshops, and also up to myself, and the rest of the group, to ensure that we have time during workshops to keep working, developing, refreshing the themes of the stories.

The props used during the 'elements' workshop.  Discussed later. 

I have found it useful in the past to cast the whole group in roles that support the one that is being developed.  To this aim, as a group, we created a scene, a clearing in a forest, by a stream, in which we all became fairies.  I chose to become a fairy in this, and I'm not sure whether this was the best way to facilitate the experience.  Would I have been better staying out of role and coaching the actors into role, helping them to develop them from 'outside' the scene, facilitating the play, or is it better to join the actors, and to draw them into role from 'inside' the action, being a part of the play.  feedback from the group would be useful here.

Enrolling and derolling the actor playing the fairy narrator involved, as in dramatherapy practice, choosing a space in which she would take on the role, and before she entered the space, asking her some characteristics of the role, and what was different between her 'self', and the role she was about to take on.  By focussing on the differences, the person is able to choose elements of action and behaviour to modify in keeping with the role, and also, the risk of 'overinvolvement' with the role is reduced.  In addition, I am using a ritual during the enrolling process in which the actor enters the space after circling it, gradually taking on the movements that the role would produce.

( nb This would be very important in a clinical population of, for instance, people with certain mental illnesses that make their own role boundaries hard to maintain, such as schizophrenia or some personality disorders.)

A group member gives a workshop on the 'elements'

Tiredness is occasionally an issue for people who have been working all day and travelled to the session in the evening.  Warm ups that facilitate increased energy would be very useful before the practical work, and this is something that I will want to incorporate into future sessions.  Space limits the physical work we can do at present, however we can be creative here because there are several spaces, and though small, warm ups could be done between the spaces, making the physical element of the warm up more dynamic.

Today one of the group gave a workshop, and her chosen subject subject was the elements.  She introduced the session with a table of props, which are photographed above.  The session took the shape of 5 guided visualisations, in which the subjects were the colours, time of year, time of day and physical properties represented by each element.

http://www.compassionatedragon.com/five_elements.html

Astrological symbols could be seen as archetypes, in that they have meanings that are embedded in our cultural zeitgiest.  Today we were introduced to symbols that were slightly different to those we are used to, which added an interesting slant to the experience.

Spiritual symbols or themes, including astrological symbols, bible stories, tarot cards, are all rich in personal and collective meaning, which makes them great for arts workshops.  For dramatherapy practice, however, I would not use them.  For two reasons - firstly, vulnerable people may be seduced by the percieved power held in the symbols, (which are in fact merely props), and may see them as being the vehicle of some transormative power of the session, or even frightened by the percieved spiritual properties - (one person's go(o)d is another person's d'evil).  Secondly, some people think that dramatherapy is much more mystical (or tries to be) that it is (does).  Dramatherapy is based on some pretty firm academic and practical foundations, but it would be a shame to encourage the idea that there is some magical element to it, and using these props may encourage this idea.  Saying that, I am very happy to use these symbols in a drama workshop, and we certainly got some interesting ideas through the visualisations.

In the final part of the session, we returned to The Good Thunder, and began our extensive reworking of the sculpts.  We did some shuffling of roles - due to having possibly lost one group member and gained a few others.  We also, having learned from the developmental techniques used in the other stories (which were still being worked out when we started with The Good Thunder), have simplified the approach that we use to portraying the stories.  The idea of this is to make the performance smoother, less laboured.  There are also less characters, as we did not feel the need to show every element of the story and some parts, that were just mentioned, did not need to be shown.

All of those who were present in our early days liked these changes.  However it was acknowledged that some of the dramatic intensity that had been previously contained in the sculpts had been lost, and we need to return to some of the earlier exercises in movement, balance and focus in order to regain some of this.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/15693951@N00/4330226831/

Because some people will be playing roles that are quite similar in 'feel', we will also need to do some exercises in distinguishing between the roles, to ensure that they do not leak into each other, creating confusion of purpose in performance.  This is what happens when people become typecast, and they end up just playing one role, which is boring for the actor and to the audience confusing and lacking in authenticity.

http://patrickmccoy.typepad.com/jic/folklore/

This is one of the representations of Rai Den, the Thunder God, that can be found.  There are various depictions of Rai Den, which reflect to some extent the cultural views of the time and the artist.  This one appeared to be the one that suggested the era and the ideas of Japan when the stories may have first been written.  I don't know when these stories were first told, but they were first translated into English in the late 1800s and early 1900s.  This meant that many of the illustrations available to us tend to be from England during this era.  Whilst they are very beautiful, I wanted to try to delve a bit further back in time, to see how the Japanese people would have depicted the characters at the time the stories were first told.