Classical Monologue

For this unit, we had to choose a classical monologue to memorize and perform, meaning we had to research a classical monologue that referred to either Greeks or Shakespeare. Since I was not familiar with any classical monologues I had to do some research and came across a woman's monologue in one of Shakespeare's plays Alls Well Ends Well for a woman named Helena. As I read through the monologue I realized that she is deeply in love with a man and I also recognized her physical movements as she says I kneel before you. Before I could proceed to perform it, I first needed to research as to whom she was talking to and also her setting as this determines her actions as well. I found out that Helena, the orphan daughter of a famous physician, is the ward of the Countess of Rousillon, and hopelessly in love with her son, Count Bertram, who has been sent to the court of the King of France. Despite her beauty and worth, Helena has no hope of attracting Bertram, since she is of low birth and he is a nobleman. So, in this scene she is in the Countess's Palace, asking the Countess for her blessing to marry her son. I went through the monologue and wrote down stanza by stanza what type of tone I would use, and also what would I be doing physically. For the formative performance, I started off kneeling down to her, and afterwards got up and started pacing around as I was talking to her, then towards the end I came back to my knees and tried to look even more scrawny, since I wanted to depict that if she does not marry him she would die, because she even mentions that towards the end of her monologue and so I thought it felt appropriate to look like that. My feedback and what I also realized afterwards was that I was too much in a state of begging to her rather than in this genuine state telling her I love her son and that I want to marry him and even Mrs. Morris agreed, she said whenever I talk about him I should be serious, and at the same time be passionate yet delicate towards her, since Helena knows that this man is out of her league and so she has to be respectful. Also what was a challenge for me was memorizing the Shakespearean language which of course we are all not used to since we don't talk like that, however I think with studying Shakespeare in English it gave me an advantage and was quite comfortable and familiar with the language, the language is quite poetic and has that feeling of intense love, I feel when a person expresses themselves through Shakespearean language it sounds more pure and honest and so I adjusted my tone of voice and articulation to suit the character. By overcoming these obstacles I first practiced quite a bit to set the tone and mood of the setting, instead of pacing around I fixated my eye at one point and made that point The Countess and as if I was talking to her so I stood still when I got back, to emphasize my love for her son rather than starting on my knees I fell to my knees as I thought this would be more effective and would see her reaction as being surprised and also that Helena has the courage to tell her this. The class also told me that my facial expressions were very good when I didn't even realize I was exaggerating them that much, but I think it's because I was so endured into my character.

Whose afraid of Virginia Woolf

For Whose afraid of Virginia Woolf written by Edward Albee which is a drama, a black comedy, my partner Suyin and I were assigned to choose a scene from the play and perform it, we chose a part where Martha was talking to her guests Honey and Nick about George, however she was criticizing George on his career and also insulting him. We chose this particular scene since it portrayed their personalities quite well at the beginning of the play where Martha was empowering over George and the audience could tell that the two people were very distinct from each other, we wanted to make this evident by our performances. Also present in this scene emerges some of the themes throughout the play such as alcohol, mental abuse and fantasy. Suyin played George and I played Martha, I thought that performing this scene would be quite easy since I already knew the characters and their personalities, and how they act. When we presented the formative in front of the class, we had to think about blocking and so what we decided was that I being Martha would be sitting down while I talk to the guests and George would just arrive and also he stands up to pour himself a drink, which adds different levels to the scene, also another aspect I liked about this scene is that it adds suspense and tension towards the end where there's a climax. I thought for the first time we did the blocking great and in my mind I thought I depicted Martha's character well, however the feedback we got was that I was not 'mean' enough or not treating Suyin (George) more as if he were nothing, it was a challenge for me to play this type of 'meaty' character, since I'm not generally an aggressive person and also another struggle I found was that every time I have to play a person who is older than me, I can't seem to get the tone correct to make it sound more of the age I'm playing. For Suyin I noticed that for the first performance she was somewhat holding back her character, George is vulnerable however he should be reacting to everything I am saying since I am insulting him. To overcome these obstacles I just had to allow my myself to be more endured into the character and have that thought of talking to someone who is useless and has no purpose in life, someone who is lazy and slacking around, that's the image I had in my mind, and for the tone I just had to pace myself and had to lower and make my voice higher at times, also I changed my gestures and always faced Suyin when I was talking to her so she can know I am always focused on her and belittling him in front of people and even at times pointing at him, and making facial expressions which looked disgusted. Also I saw Suyins character come out more, because at one time he drops his drink in a glass on the floor, and so there she lashed out really well to build the suspense in the end where we end up screaming on top of one another, so at the beginning we were quite mellow however building up the tension.

Documentary

For theater class we were assigned to do a documentary on a traditional dance, since that was the unit we were covering, I was partners with Su and Amal and we decided to do a documentary on the Bhangra which is a type of Indian folk dance. Before we could start we needed to do some research, we divided it and I did research on the instruments and dance steps, Su did research about the history and Amal did about costumes and the characteristics of the Bhangra, we decided to make a Google doc and that way each of us could read what the other person has put down. When I learned about the instruments I learned that the Bhangra consists of many instruments and each is used for a different genera in the Bhangra. I didn't know that there were different sub generas I thought the Bhangra was just one dance, however I learned there were many different types like the Daankara is a dance with sticks, the Gatka is a dance performed with swords and daggers, the dance and dancers are very ambitious. Bhangra used a lot of string and drum instruments to give the dance a rhythm. Whilst researching I learned that the Sarangi and Ektar are stringed instruments which almost look like a violin and the Dhol and Dhad are commonly used drums, they normally combine the string and drum instruments together. I never knew that the Bhangra originated in the Punjab region in Pakistan and that workers who worked in the fields celebrated the harvesting season and cherish the last seasons fruit bearing. I somewhat knew that this traditional dance would be celebrated at weddings or festive events as I've seen a couple of Indian dances before on the television, the one thing I loved about the dance was all the vibrant colors associated with the costumes, it brings so much life to the dance, I learned that there was a certain traditional dress that both women and men had to follow,the men had to wear a Chaadra which looks similiar to a Turban and the women had to be dressed in a dress called the Ghagra. Interestingly also the lyrics in the Bhangra deals with social issues such as marriage and love which I didn't know about. I really loved doing this documentary, my partners and I worked great as a team, at first I was hesitant that it wasn't going to be fun but a lot of work and stress, however it turned out the opposite, it was an amazing experience, I always love learning about other cultures and so this is one thing I can keep in mind. Also the most fun part of it all was actually getting to learn how to Bhangra, we searched for some YouTube tutorials and we watched a couple of moves and created our own combination of moves, but wow it was so tiring like a workout but I enjoyed it a lot, I think also the reason why doing this type of dance was fun is because it is very vivacious and I never got bored of watching people dancing the Bhangra since there's so many moves. We asked a couple of people on UN day if they could come do the Bhangra, mostly people from Pakistan and India came to help as they were familiar with it, we showed them the dance moves but wow I was so mesmerized by how much they loved doing this dance, they never got tired and they also incorporated their own moves, I could see they genuinely had fun and loved doing it.  And I have to thank Amal for putting together such an amazing video, as I wasn't good with technology but overall we really thought out the process and what to include such as voice overs and a step by step dance for a person to easily follow, we kept that in mind. The other two groups in our class did their documentaries on Gum Boot dancing and the Maori. Gum boot dancing originated from South Africa, since I am from South Africa, I remember as a kid always watching people perform it on the streets and it used to be so appealing to me but I never really understood the meaning behind it, until now. I learned that Gum boot dancing originated in the mines where black people would work, however their boss who is a white man would tell them that they can't communicate, and so they would tap their boots they used to wear, certain taps meant certain words or they would chant words, usually it would be about their frustrations and issues, the boss and the conditions they used to live in, however the boss did say that they could perform these dances as a way to vent outside the mines. They would drink and dance and just chant about their issues, this dance became so popular not only in South Africa but in Namibia and Zimbabwe, also it is currently being shown on broad way, I think it is such a powerful dance with so much meaning and emotions, the miners would also use beer caps and wire and tie it around their boots to make a jingle noise for it to be more effective. I also learned some steps from the group, it was quite fun and I think the dance looks really amazing when it's done fast. Another dance I learned about was the Maori a dance that originated from New Zealand. I knew about this dance before since I always used to see it during Rugby when the All Black would perform it before a match, the dance would always look so intimidating and I'd think to myself.. what is the other team thinking? Moreover the dance is the Haka, I always thought that the dance could be only done by men however, mixed groups or women were allowed. This dance was originally performed by warriors, I learned the dance includes facial contortions such as showing the whites of the eyes and the poking out of the tongue, and a wide variety of vigorous body actions such as slapping the hands against the body and stamping of the feet. As well as chanting, a variety of cries and grunts are used. It's very entertaining to watch they use their hands, arms, legs, feet, voice, eyes, tongue and the body as a whole combine to express courage, annoyance, joy or other feelings relevant to the purpose of the occasion. It was really fun learning this dance however I get quite shy I think because it's like no other dance I've ever done or am used to. I'd be embarrassed because of all the facial expressions used, however it is a forceful and might dance. For Arsenic and Old Lace Su Min and I did Travis's makeup the first time we did it we had no clue what to do with his face however has we practiced, we became more experienced and got better, it developed my skills to make his face look realistic as possible with the wax especially, our job was to make him look ugly, however it does take time if the person is good looking,however the end results we could not be more happy about, we really focused on the wax to blend it into his face and make it brown to really enhance it for the audience to see, it was challenging but worth it.

Curl Up And Dye

 Recently we started a new unit South African Plays; we read a play called Curl Up and Dye By Susan Pam Grant which also explores Workshop theatre.  The play was set after the apartheid had occurred in South Africa, where black, white and colored people started to live together, as the setting of this play Curl Up and Dye was set in Johannesburg in Joubert Park, where originally it was a white area and started to become a grey area, the main reason being is that people from Soweto had to drive all the way to Joburg to work for the white people in order to make money and provide for their families, however all their money was being spent on transport, so they moved closer to their workplaces. The focal theme in this place is racism/discrimination since it is set in a grey area and in a salon where there is a lot of tension between the races, how they interact and their status. Susan Grant and her colleagues would collaborate and try to brainstorm ideas on social issues that they could portray and put on script and they would also use props. When Asceal and I were performing our formative, she was playing the character of Rolene and I was Mrs. Dubois and Max was our director. Max really took this play seriously and he did not allow us to waste a minute, we had to practice until it satisfied Max, he was really good at coming up with ideas that may be suit the plays intentions, the stage directions and blocking.  Rolen who Asceal is playing is a very sassy and tacky girl and who is also the owner of the Salon, she lives with an abusive husband which is why she always takes out her frustrations in the salon and especially at Miriam who is her assistant because she is black she is always discriminated against by Rolene and Mrs. Dubois who are white people. We started the first scene of the play where Rolene and Mrs. Dubois met outside the Salon and couldn’t get in since Miriam is not there yet. Rolene starts complaining to Mrs.Dubois about how horrible the black people are, Mrs Dubois who is in her mid 50’s couldn’t care less, she just wants to get into the salon and get her hair done, and she acts very higher class and demanding when really she is poor, she is selfish and whenever someone is actually trying to vent to her, she either walks away or pays her attention to someone else. Eventually Rolene finds the keys and enters the Salon, Mrs. Dubois critics the salon and how filthy it is and how Miriam must come clean, Rolene is angered to see her salon being such a pigsty, she complains about how she doesn’t want to be the sweeping girl. Eventually Mrs. Dubois just leaves to give in her lucky numbers her Six Picks. Rolene get’s constant phone calls from Denzil, and every time the phone rings Rolene gets excited thinking it’s a customer, when it’s just her abusive husband. The area is very poor, and so the salon does not get very many customers, the only customer might be Mrs.Dubois just because she likes to hear Gossip. After we performed our formative the class said that our blocking and atmosphere was really good, the mood of the scene, however our characterizations needed some improvement, Rolene who is Asceal could have been more dirty, tacky and girly but not too the point where she is a teenager, for example look in the mirror fiddle with her hair a lot, and chew gum and my character Mrs.Dubois to act more her age, my tone of voice and her gestures. We took their advice into consideration and rehearsed again. For the summative, we made improvements and it was a lot better than the first time we performed. My character though Mrs. Dubois still did not seem her age and as an old auntie. I don’t know I seem to find it difficult to play older characters; playing younger characters are much more easier and comfortable. For me though in my mind it seemed as though my gestures and tone of voice was better however that didn’t seem to portray to the class. Maybe I should have asked my mother for advice on how to be an old tannie, I mean I have aunties, I just don’t see them very  often, so I lack some of my south african culture as in how to act as a stereo typical grandma or auntie. Also whilst we were reading the play it was funny to hear other english speakers speak in Afrikaans, at times I couldn't stop laughing and also with the way the pronounce the swear words, it was hilarious.

I am also doing the makeup for Arsenic and Old Lace, the first time I did makeup, things were really hectic and I didn’t know what character to do but then I saw Travis who is an Einstein and I started to click, I knew his face had to be full of scars and he had to look ugly. It was a challenge though, finding his foundation was easy but making his face ugly was pretty hard since he is very attractive haha. Morcom helped me draw a line through his eye and make a line across his nose as if it were broken, and then I asked Amal whether she has gummy scar things we can maybe stick on his face to make it seem as if he has plastic surgery, which we found, however it was really hard to stick on his face.. in the end though the results were great, he looked very ugly, scars, a bit of blood, brown patches and brown lips, now I know what to do for him next time.  

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.

Absurd Theatre

After we performed our Comedia De'll Arte play for the next two weeks we focused on absurd theater and started to read the play Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett which included two men called Vladimir and Estragon who reveal they are waiting for a man named Godot. However they are stumbled by the thought of if they are waiting in the correct spot for Godot by the tree or if it's even the right day. Personally when I first started to read the play it was very peculiar and when things are strange to me, or something I'm not use to reading then sooner or later I'd find it boring, which I did. The thought of trying to understand why they are doing certain things in a certain why or saying them is frustrating when the answer is not right in front of you. It required me to analyze the characters, I realized that Vladimir was more of the dominant character who would take the lead in actions or dialogue. Just like at the start of the book the two characters repeat lines from one another and does so throughout the play, which I think is some type of general aspect they habitually do with one another. It is also evident from reading the play that Estragon is dependent on Vladimir, he always wants to be close to him. They have a very strong bond and embrace each other a lot and almost act as a married couple which gives the impression they might be gay. At first when I read the title the name 'Godot' in my mind created a connection between him and God since they do sound similar, Estragon and Vladimir do look up to Godot as being a religious type of figure. One important repetitiveness that struck me was how Estragon wanted to leave, but Vladimir refused to do so and told him they could not go because they are waiting for Godot. With the same lines being repeated reinforces the idea that the same actions are occurring over and over again. What we did in class though to make it more entertaining and lively is that we created accents for the characters and acted out their parts really well to get a sense of what they are like as characters, they were boring individuals when I look at their conversations but the actual gestures and stage directions, there are really a lot of active moment taking place. We also discussed the idea of existentialism which I never even knew about until we talked about it, I learned it is a philosophical movement which emphasizes on individual existence freedom and choice, meaning man can wander between choice and freedom. Existentialism is seen as determining our existence, which leads to the concept of choice making between bad or good is what defines ourselves, without confirmation of our acts we would not know what is right to choose from. The conclusion I found quite good, the play finally reached a point where Estragon and Vladimir realizes that Godot will not come and that they were both just living their lives on repeat and also because Godot never arrives by the tree gives me the impression that Godot might not be a real person and that maybe he is God, maybe he was there with them all along just not literally. I was not very fond of this type of theatre it did not really grab my attention or interest although it challenges your thinking skills and analyzation of things. 

We had to perform a scene from the play Waiting for Godot and I worked with Morcom who played Vladimir and I played Estragon, we decided to do a scene from the start of the play to show the significance of the characters relationship between Estragon and Vladimir since it portrays how dependent Estragon is on Vladimir. Even at the very beginning there is the concept of repititiveness that's reocurrng when Vladimir says And they didn't beat you? and afterwards Estragon says Beat me? Certainly they beat me (2)
Vladimir then says The same lot as usual? right after Estragon says The same? I don't know (2)
This to me depicts as though this is the way they have been communicating in general for most of their life time, this seemed strange to me at since since we normally don't speak that way to one another, but rather give a direct answer instead of repeating. In this scene in particular Vladimir plays the role of a 'bum' someone who acts as though he has been drinking since the saying 'a drunken mind speaks sober thoughts' applies here when Vladimir tells Estragon When I think of it... all these years..but for me.. where would you be, you'd be nothing more than a little heap of bones. (3) Vladimir belittles Estragon without Estragon having to realize it or it might be that he is already use to what he says and doesn't mind it since I expected Estragon to say something back at him for saying such a cruel thing. Morcom did a good job on playing the character of Vladimir he performed his role really well as a 'bum' and sometimes even mummbled when Vladimir was just blabbering things that didn't make sense. It was quite hard playing Estragon since I come to find him to be such an innocent character compared to Vladimir who's so demanding and 'a know it all' it seems as though whatever Estragon attempts to do will never be enough for Vladimirs satisfaction. Estragon says Taking off my boot, has that ever happend to you?(3) Vladimir then says Boots must be taken off everyday, I'm tired of telling you that! Why don't you listen to me? In this scene though however sometimes I did not understand what messages the characters were trying to convery, it felt as if they were just talking about random things all over the place. There was not much action taking place in this scene but rather focuses on clearly establishing the connection between the two with their dialogue. It was difficult for me to be Estragon as to not knowing what he was saying half the time sometimes I couldn't make sense of it. I did though try and maintain my character from being so aggresive towards Vladimir especially in this scene and the things he says to Estragon, I did not want to overpower the character and to let the audience percieve Vladimir as the superior one. One thing I could have improved on was the tone of my voice and the gestures. All the sentences are mostly all short, so when I would say something it would go by quicker than I anticipated and it all just felt like such a rush and despite that there were not many gestures, when there was I think I could have exagerated them a bit more since this aspect of absurd theatre has a connection with Comedia De'll Arte in expressing their gestures in an entertaining way to have an ongoing of the audience's attention and also to reach a humour climax to make the audience laugh. In both cases the two types of theatres are different and similar, different in the way that the Comedia characters all have a stereotypical and recognizable character to portray in their scenario and also have to wear masks to help identify to the audience who they are, in abusrd theatre the audience doesn't know right away who the characters might be acting as in Waiting for Godot for example Estragon and Vladimir who when you come to know of them eventually the audience will realize they are two tramps that have repititive dialogue back and forth making this absurd and having no point. The two are similar in the way that the characters act as clowns through their physical movement and tone of voice to prevent losing the audience's attention. In Comedia the laazi and zaini who are servants or even Brighella and Arlechinno act as clowns and jump on eachothers backs, swing eachother in the air to make the audience look at something aswell rather than just listening to their dialogue. Estragon especially does peculiar things inorder to make the audience giggle, such as smelling his boot, airing it and nibbling on it which might be odd but exposes humour. Honestly I would not like being the audience of watching an Absurd theatre play when I realize that in the end, the story doesn't even get anywhere and that there was no point to begin with. If it wasn't for their gestures to keep me entertained I think I'd fall asleep.
 
During class we also played some improvisation games one was where we had to divide into two groups and stand in two lines opposite one another and the person had to ask a question to the person in the other group and that person has to also then answer with a question for example. Kyla: Have you heard the song Maria Maria? then Asceal would have to answer in a question form aswell and say Oh is that song from Carlos Santana? And once you hesitate you have to go to the back of the line. This was a fun but challenging game to do since you have to think of what your question is going to be right on the spot without producing it into a statement or just repeating the same question over again but having the answer but questioning it. This exercise really made you think, I enjoyed it, I could tell everyone was heavily drawn into it once you get the hang of it. We also played another similar game which was more easier than the previous. It was the same concept just that the teacher would announce a topic lets say Fruit and then the two rows have to name fruits without repeating what the other group said. It required a lot of thinking and listening at the same time, you had to listen to what the other group is saying but at the same time think of your answer. The game just continues until someone runs out of a fruit to say then they are out. For me this game went by a lot faster since while I was waiting in line I could think of a fruit to name and when it was my turn I wouldn't have to think as much, this game had more of an advantage to it than the other one. The other one you wouldn't know what type of question they would ask you.

Day With The Arts

When it was the day with the arts, I wasn't as nervous as I expected myself to be, I think it might have been because we practiced our Comedia De'll Arte play various times that I got so comfortable with the scenario and also got used to playing my character's role as being Colombine, who is a character that's very witty, fashionable, she has no bad attributes and she's very flirtatious, all the men admire her. I loved playing her character as she was the only girl and it was easier for me to relate to her, than all my peers who had guy characters. When it was time to perform as the audience were sitting down, I could sense back stage the nervousness and everyone including myself hesitated while getting into costume and putting on masks. Once you where your mask it's as if you transform into a whole new being, someone you normally don't see yourself as being. Overall I think we put on a great show and since it was our own creation we decided to incorporate a lot of humorous climaxes, to make the audience laugh, which was a good feeling. It gives you a sensation knowing that you are playing your character well. There's always room for improvement and I thought our expressions and vocals were excellent according to the characters we played, just maybe the gestures could have been more exaggerated, this aspect was difficult since we don't normally use such big gestures in our daily lives, so to portray it, is strange to us. But as long as we portrayed the stereo typical character we were assigned and that the audience could recognize what type of person you are straight away then that's very good. I even forgot some of my lines at the beginning and to make up time, I improvised. I really enjoyed this theater genre as it was very different, using masks and producing large gestures, there's a lot one can do and be creative with it. All you need is a scenario and an ensemble work to put on a humorous climax in the play. My parents really enjoyed the play, they were smiling the whole way through, as for my costume I tried to be as fashionable as I could more than the other characters. I thought in this unit Max was really committed towards his character of Arlecchino, it really showed a different side to him and that he could be a really comical character if he tries.