Workshopping

Personally I really enjoyed the unit we did on work shopping, specifically Poor Theater because as we studied it more in depth I never knew that people are able to use minimal props to put on performances especially for social issues. I honestly always thought the directors had to spend millions of money to create a production, when in Poor Theater the opposite has to be done and use as little props as possible in order to convey the issue through the play, I never knew a small prop could make such a huge difference for example using a pen for a syringe in a case of drug abuse.I learned that it's not so much about what prop you use, it's how the character chooses to use it and how well they demonstrate their actions using the prop, that's why I learned gestures have to be exaggerated so do facial expressions, because that's what the audience pays most attention to when watching, so if the gestures and facial expressions are evident then the audience won't have any trouble trying to figure out what the character is trying to depict. I think with Poor Theater one can get very creative and it challenges your thinking abilities and also helps people develop skills to work in an ensemble, it allows for people's imaginations to first expand and brainstorm various concepts but afterwards the group has to collaborate and choose only one topic that would be the most important and to make the audience more aware of. With me, Mrs. Morris made us work and draw ideas from a stimulus which in this case was a picture of a fetus. The process of work shopping I realized does take quite some patience in putting together a play the theory and practical aspects, things won't simply come together by themselves I really have to sit down with my group and think things through before performing it, making sure the information that we brainstormed doesn't overwhelm our play and draws away from the actual social issue that we are trying to convey, we had to think about ways to portray good evident transitions for the audience and to make the play episodic, also in poor theater because they did not have many people acting we would switch between characters for example in my group we were only three people but two of the three characters played different roles and genders, my group and I always found ourselves making adjustments to the play mainly working towards what could we do to make it better and more realistic. The social issue we strongly believed how unsafe sex is bad,alcohol and drug abuse and abortion, we thought this was perfect since all three were in some way associated with one another and it's a major situation that occurs during teenage years. Our play was about a irresponsible girl who decides one day to party all night and have unsafe sex with a male and getting drunk. A few weeks later her attitude alters completely and she was not as innocent as she once was and becomes a whole different person by using drugs, her friends confront her of how much she changed and she did not want to accept it. Later she gets pregnant and her mother and her fight but later go to the doctor for an abortion. The doctor insinuates that it is not a good idea and after talking with her mother they both agree to keep the baby however once they return the doctor says that too much alcohol and drugs have been used and the baby is gone. I really genuinely loved doing this topic since it's very educational for people our age not to have unsafe sex whenever and wherever they want to and how  it can lead to being pregnant and because of all the stress of being so young and having a baby, stress kicks in and drugs become involved and in the end it teaches people how unsafe sex sometimes leads to abortion depending on the ethics of the person which can kill a person but at the same time because of the use of so much toxins the baby dies. I feel like the audience really feels for this girl getting pregnant at such a young age and would teach their children or even themselves not to ever do that. When it was time to perform the formative we were all nervous but at the same time we were keen to show what we produced. At the end of the formative, we got really good constructive feedback on what we can really improve on and make better, which we always appreciate. What we had to work on the most were transitions, to us the transitions seemed clear but to the audience it weren't as much and we had to respect that, the characterization of some characters were not realistic and the conversation that they were having sometimes, Mrs Morris told us that if one character did not have any lines to say they could hold up signs to describe the emotions in that moment for example if the mother and daughter were fighting one character would hold up a sign saying disappointment or despair which is an alienation device and adds more visuals, also the audience told us that our sound effects were good like when time was passing other characters would say tick tock tick tock in whispers to add suspense and build up tension to reach a climax.We took all the feedback into consideration and transformed our play a thousand times better than it was the first time round, the feedback from our peers really made a huge impact on the play and by the end of it we could really differentiate between good and great. Our summative went much better than we expected and I think it's because we practiced so many times that we got attached to our characters emotionally and physically, we were all in that state of mind. I can speak for myself because at first it was honestly really difficult trying to play a girl who had unsafe sex got pregnant used drugs and wanted an abortion, because I know I would never be that type of girl it was out of my league but trying to prove a very essential point I had to do it, I had to face challenges outside my comfort zone and by the end of it, I was more than happy that I did it because the whole experience was life changing in a way, I got so attached to this person that I felt her emotions in my gut, it was as if in the moment I was actually this person for a few minutes and playing along with the character also hits me in the stomach of what really could happen if I were pregnant, it ruins relationships and lives especially at a young age, it taught me a good lesson. We made sure our transitions were more clearer, by using music as a source of passing time and also the switching on and off of the lights gave a great effect, the second time I could sense that we were more prepared for our characters, we knew what was expected of us and to be honest we did an amazing job I would not have performed it any other way, we really did do it to the best of our abilities, we might have had a few faults here and there like rushing, blocking etc. but it was really good and at the end of it, I was so soaked into this character of mine that I even began crying when the moment was right and that was when I lost the baby because of my lifestyle by doing drugs and also I thought of how this girl is going to have scars for life, the memory will always be with her and for such a young person to live with such pain is just dreadful so I really put myself in her position and how I would react to the situation and even though this never happend to me before I think overall I did a great job trying. At first I could say we were not as serious minded about the play but as we progressed into our characters and practiced more we really did take it seriously, because if we were not serious then the audience would not take it seriously as well. We used minimal props such as for the syringe we used a pen, for chairs we used black boxes not many props were incorporated or even had to be used to send out such a powerful message, it was all about the acting. What would have been interesting and I wish I would have done is maybe interviewed someone or looked on the internet as to how people felt especially teenagers when they get pregnant, it would have given me even more to think about and take into consideration however I did watch a program called sixteen and pregnant and I was just shocked at how hard life really is for them especially finance and some boys are not even supportive so it's just the mother alone who has to go through all the pain which is really heartbreaking.