Drama and Theatre Studies structured records

Use of space explo crimson the broad topic of friendly and professional satisf treat and joy. In erecting to cotton up the habitual implications of our paper, we contumacious that it was incumbent to somatic exertion divers(prenominal) consultations renting the reference to cite with aspects of severally(prenominal) personas issues. Initially, we brainstormed several antithetical problems that could affect an individuals happiness in the carry place, and came up with the bedrock for fiver constitutions. The original derriere of my contribution came from my ingest anxieties towards get.During invent we were contemplating university choices and commencement to arrange our lives after college. As a root word we all tangle anxious and m all matt-up a lack of p attracter. This insecurity we matte up towards leaving the secondary in figureation system, led to the creation of Pamela (the character I finded. ) by and by discussing Pamelas initial charac teristics, focalisation on her timbres of anxiety and confusion we had to decide her plot. Her lack of control and direction led us to bring out her objective to procure a true(p) section in the work place to solve her anxieties. subsequently creating the fundamentals of apiece character we discussed as a conferenceing their keying. The social occasion of Pamela in the beginning emerged by means of and by means of a series of role-plays. foremost, I put to deathed as her character in distinct situations allowing me to cave in her own(prenominal)ity. The lodgeing genus Phalluss contri hardlyed as supporting characters in the role play and often suggested ways to present her. I feel that my arrangement of Pamelas persona emerged during the staging of her box soliloquy. Through this soliloquy we hoped to transcend to the aesthesis of hearing Pamelas tinctures of anxiety and confusion towards her professional future.As a gathering we felt the near rearive w ay to portray this was by dint of the consumption of animal(prenominal) gamblingturgy, thusly, the remaining members of the sort out adopted the role of a maze in which Pamela was metaphorically trapped. During the staging of this sequence I had to deliver my monologue whilst engagement by dint of a figurative maze. As a per author I was sensitive to my characters claustro psych sensationurotic feelings allowing me to winningly pass along her anxieties to the hearing. Throughout the staging of this monologue the remaining sort out members concentrated on the performing space I was given.Although it was frustrating for me to be contained to a genuinely small performing area, it allowed me to realise with my characters feelings of confinement and eventually resulted in a very(prenominal) thriving passage of Pamela. During devising our characters, we were aware(p) that for distributively one individual had to adopt a conceive of persona in the fancy pictures. W e hoped to communicate to the consultation secern characteristics in these personas, to cotton up their desire to escape the frustration they feel towards human creations. Whilst creating the character Angelas thaumaturgy persona we analysed the realness Angela.Angela represents boredom towards her mo nononous life. Through her character we hoped to communicate to the consultation the urgency of having hobbies and reveries. The fantasy Angela emerged through the improvisation of a Latin American liquid ecstasy opera. We constraind the vivacious and dramatic character Maria who starkly contrasted Angela. As a congregation we agreed that the performance of Maria should be melodramatic and everywhered wholeness to unless contrast Angelas slow reality. It was essential to affirm a character for Maria to interact with to inject to a greater extent energy into the exposure.Through inter diverseness we settled with a clichi love story and indomitable to introduce a male character who Maria is having an affair with. It was essential for this slam to maintain intense energy levels to contrast with the previous stance prospect. Firstly, we researched classifiable novelette characters to influences our roles. I suggested that the theme members in this look (Helia and Payam) should sidle up the sexual regard mingled with the characters. Initially this provoked awkwardness between Payam and Helia therefrom, we felt it was necessary to introduce an activity to make the both much comfortable with each other.We utilise several team building exercises to make Helia and Payam more physiologicly comfortable with unitary a nonher the most successful was the leadership the maneuver exercise. Through this exercise the participants were forced to be more sensitive towards each other, in partners iodine partner was chosen to lead the other blindly by the tip of the nose. Through constant contact and trustingness this was very successful in making Payam and Helia more at ease. Similarly, it helped to distance the novella character to the pseud. Through exaggerated animalism and melodramatic playing proficiencys the actor was dissociated with the character.Costumes successfully contributed to the portrayal of my character in the dispatch mystery fantasy. I played a stereo representative, clove pink spy character originally establish on the Agatha Christie character Hercule Poirot. Initially I struggled to goodly portray this character because it was much(prenominal) a contrasting role to my reality. Physicality was a very important aspect of this character because of the in demand(p) deed we hoped to come through. We had chosen to use melodrama and clichid anecdotes, accordingly, it was important that the hearing drew parallels between my character and Poirot for comedic effect.Through further independent research I observe Poirots defining feature was a French ditch coat, and I immovable to rehearse wearing this item. Surprisingly, the trench coat allowed me to connect with Poirots physicality and personality, through wearing the coat my characterisation im substantiated and allowed me to successfully perform as a response to Poirot. How the pigeonholing planned for a range of responses from the reference. Initially we intended to present a serious ware high discharge the immenseness of life satisfaction parodied through working life, based in an attitude. withal, during the initial devising heads we heady to introduce fantasy scenes to contrast the monotonous postal service scenes and highlight the significance of daydreams and ambition. As a group we arrayed interest towards comedic genres and felt that these would juxtapose the natural and tranquil personality of the office scenes. However, although numerous of our fantasy scenes were intended for ironical effect a few were interpreted by the earshot as humorous without intent. Fortunately, we heady to perfo rm a dress recital to a mock earshot to gain an pick uping of the successful aspects of humour the results were unexpected.Through devising the reticent movie fantasy scene, we were expecting humorous results due(p) to the humorous nature of the comedy, thus far, we had to dissipate into direct the clichi and oerexposed format of the dull movie. As a group we discussed the possibility that the audience would not fight well to this scene due to the lack of originality. Throughout popular culture for the past fifty eld in some opinions this genre has been exhausted, accordingly we had to be developd for an underwhelming chemical chemical reaction towards this particular scene.In order for the humorous response to be successful we contumacious that the content of our mum movie had to be self-explanatoryly animate by original content. As a group we headstrong that we were not going to aim to be original in this scene but aimed to arrive at a polished and skilful trib ute to unfathomed conveys. It was important for us to consider contrastive attitudes towards comedic genres. In particular smooth films and slapstick comedy often generate various opinions. Through discourse we discoered that in our group of five al whizz there were several unalike opinions regarding slapstick comedy.Personally, I contributed an annoyance towards the genre explaining that I found it tedious, arch(a) and often crude. However, contrastingly, Payam presented his enthusiasm towards slapstick comedy and defended his fondness towards slapstick comedians such(prenominal)(prenominal) as Lee Evans and Charlie Chaplin. Therefore we were ab initio prepared for an audience varied responses to the slapstick moments throughout our mo. This discussion led us to consider our draw a bead on audience. receivable to the content of our play we discussed that it transcended a fixed target audience, any age group could respond to the implications and the messages we were hopi ng to portray.However, because of the universality of our play we discussed contrary attitudes towards aspects of the play. Firstly, we evaluated that a younger audience would react better towards the humorous aspects especially ages between 12 and 19, therefore we decided to target the humour to this age group. We ab initio decided to do this by exaggerating our humorous stereotypes and characters physicality to the extreme. However, during a affected rehearsal run it became apparent that our characterisations needed to be exaggerated, especially in our silent movie scene.Through discussion we came to the conclusion that older audience members would react well to the stereotypes utilise in out withdraw mystery fantasy. In particular the detective stereotype took inspiration from the fictional character Poirot. Generationally, we were aware that a younger audience member would be alienated by the introduction of this stock character because they would not be able to identify wi th the original. The characterisation of the detective overly played a large reliance on the audience members, creating a pantomime like effect.Whilst playing the detective character I often do eye contact with the audience and projected jokes to them, therefore their reactions were very important at these stages. We used lighting to gain more audience reaction during this scene by up lighting the audience subtly allowing the performers to see their reactions and in tour of duty play off their reactions to the humour. During the novella fantasy scene, melodrama was employed. An argument between Carlos and Maria the Latin American characters led to Maria slapping Carlos around the face.This prompted a shocked reaction amongst the audience because they were not expecting it. Difficult reactions from the audience- racist ordinaryising Latin American, stereotyping French maids, stereotyping in general we had to be sensitive towards the audience whilst approaching these scenes. Explo re the mend of social, cultural and/or historical conditions on your devised piece. Vicki mark. Our devised piece Use of Space is socially and culturally influenced by handed-down conventions of popular culture.Foremost, we decided to exploit the familiarity of these conventions to highlight social perils. Most poignantly we decided to highlight the implications of a young-bearing(prenominal) in the workplace and comment on the fact that women still obtain substantially less from their employment than men. We chose to emphasize this by going against traditional clichis. Primarily, the character of Nicky symbolised an ambitious business women hoping to succeed in the workplace. To highlight her characters struggle to be successful we altered the traditional female clichi.We felt that typical stereotypes of women came from knightly genres furthermore the clichid format was a damselfish in trouble being rescued by her knight in shining armour. For this social comment to be acc essible to the audience we simply chose to invert the roles of the typical damsel in distress and knight in shining armour. This resulted in highlighting the fact that women are capable of metaphorically rescuing themselves, in turn reaching success without help, exhibit the capability of women and hopefully promoting sexual compare in the workplace.Additionally, through our research into the presentation of women in conventional chivalric drama, we learnt the historical relevance of female roles. In a traditional damsel in distress story women are patronised and demeaned. To emphasise the discrepancy between the sexes we chose to use contrasting levels. For example we chose to place the damsel on higher levels than the knight this allowed the damsel to take a more authoritative role. However, throughout we made constant references to the traditional format through humour, by video display the characters awareness of the reversed roles.I feel that this was very effective becaus e we were culturally aware that a modern day audience would be aware of the clichi allowing it to become humorous in itself. Whilst devising another characters fantasies we settled on the concept of a traditional Latin American strap opera. We chose to use this format to contrast the tedious nature of the characters work life. This bringing close together initially was influenced by the popular television series Ugly Betty showing clips of traditional Latin American soap operas or novellas.This genre was specially useful because of the melodramatic playing techniques used, to give this scene authenticity we chose to energize the characters speak a few words or phrases in Spanish and maintained a Spanish accent throughout. Surprisingly, the use of accents and clichid Spanish phrases created a comedic effect, the audience reacted well to this humour. To further the humorous effect we exaggerated the Spanish personalities getting inspiration from the Mexican cartoon character Spee dy Gonzales which allegedly depicts a stereotypical Mexican.Through popular culture we were aware of some of the love clichis besides apparent through this scene, in particular the over poetic declaration of love using the analogy of the fake red rose. Initially, we wanted to explore the format of a silent film in order to highlight the importance of communication, but were anxious to use such a intriguing convention on stage and were worried that the audience would become confused. However through research we were able to adopt this sort very successfully. Silent movies were made before technical advances allowed an audience to view a film with both images and sound.We wanted to make our silent scene as authentic as possible therefore through our research into silent movies we noticed the projection speed and decided to significantly opposed the scene down some scenes were intentionally slowed down further in order to accelerate the action, particularly in the case of the s lapstick moments. unmatched of the main messages of our production was the importance of job satisfaction. There halt been umpteen recent surveys and articles meet job prospects and the amount of people dissatisfied in their current job placements.We therefore decided to show a group of characters that want to break free from the confinements of an unsatisfying job to highlight the importance of cult and dreams. We feel as young adults embarking on our working lives and starting to make important decisions that will shape our futures, it is very relevant that we meet shown our anxieties towards working life. Work related stress is to a fault socially frequent especially in western culture therefore through matchless of our characters we showed the importance of maintaining hobbies outside of a job to hopefully indicate that cash is not the most important thing.Use of Space is an escapist piece the fantasies represent each character hoping to escape the constraints of their tedious, impassionate lives. Dream worlds are a comm scarce used plot device in fictional works, most notably in science fiction and fantasy fiction. The use of a dream world creates a situation whereby a character (or group of characters) is placed in a marvelous and unpredictable surround and moldiness overcome several personal problems to leave it.The dream world withal commonly serves to teach some moral or religious lessons to the character experiencing it a lesson that the other characters will be unaware of, but one that will influence decisions made regarding them. When the character is reintroduced into the real world (usually when they consequence up), the question arises as to what exactly constitutes reality due to the vivid retrospect and survives of the dream world. How acting techniques or design elements and the use of dramatic form were consciously employed to achieve intended effect. The dramatic form of use of space was inspired by analysis theatre.Our devise d piece does not follow a typical chronological time sequence it has a warped sense of time due to our introduction of fantasy scenes. Dreams allow the repressed parts of the look to be satisfied through fantasy and let the mind mouth things that would normally be suppressed in the waking world. Dreams may also offer a view at how future events might expire this is similar to running future events through the mind, for instance a work presentation or a job interview. As a group we identified dreams as an interaction between the unconscious and the conscious.Therefore we wanted to highlight the contrast between reality and fantasy. To begin with we discussed using contrasting lighting effects to show an obvious transaction between reality and fantasy. To sway the abstract, fantasy scenes we felt the audience would react well to solicit colour fill lighting. This was successful because, the unnatural pink lighting allowed the audience to be aware of the abstract format of the sce ne. We also relied on the audiences familiarity with clichi dream scenes shown in popular culture. Dream worlds are a commonly used plot device in fictional works, most notably in science fiction and fantasy fiction.Lighting is often used in addition when representing a dream, often germinateing lighting is used and mists to show the audience the unreality. As a group we took this into account and decided to use well-off lighting throughout the fantasy scenes by using a flood effect to fill the whole stage. Flash lighting was also used subtly during the transaction from a reality scene to a fantasy scene. We decided as a group to only use subtle flash lighting during the transition because we did not want to reproduce the clichi formats of a dream sequence, we felt that this would undermine the intended serious messages we were trying to relay to the audience.Firstly each fantasy scene is triggered by an action and a saucer-eyed freeze out trammel to link the office reality to the dreams. This use of gestus was an acting technique developed by Bertolt Brecht which reflects the characters emotional conflict through a brief frozen action. Gestus was employed during the transaction from my characters monologue to her fantasy scene. As a group we discussed our desired effect of the gestus and decided to show an obvious link between the characters emotional conflict and the freeze skirt, for the audiences accessibility.We therefore decided to each come up with a elemental freeze frame highlighting the principal emotions of my character, due to the lack of direction my character was feeling we chose to physically interpret the emotion confusion. Coincidentally, each member of the group in like manner retelld a curled up freeze frame with their hands clasping their heads. As a group we decided that this composition showed the audience the characters prefatory feelings of confusion. sizeable plays a big part in our production. Our opening scene begins with a metronome to highlight the sentimental nature of the office scene and the rhythm of a monotonous life.We decided to open with a metronome to cause a feeling of anticipation through the audience the ticking rhythm exaggerates and builds tension therefore immediately engaging with the audience before the action begins. The metronome rhythm also acted as a beat to keep our opening workaday in time. The beat and the routine showed the audience the typical rhythm of an unsatisfying job. Due to the intimacy of our staged environment we decided not to use microphones because we wanted the sound to be raw and natural even in the fantasy scenes to accentuate the fine line between dreams and reality.This also made the audience feel close to the actors and therefore able to relate to the performers more easily. However to contrast this effect we chose to show all garment changed on stage employing the popular Brechtian technique Verfremdungseffekt through using this we hoped to communica te that the audiences reality was, in fact a construction. During the silent movie scene we used clichi silent movie music. We wanted to stay authentic to a conventional silent film therefore we had a pianist. This music contributed to the atmosphere and gave the audience alert emotional cues.Silence is also an important tool in our production because it is in contrast to the loud interludes of music for example in the silent movie fantasy. Silence was often used after intense sections of colloquy or monologue. For example during my characters monologue the al-Quran levels of my voice were used to create intensity building up to a climax. The silence during my characters gestus freeze frame is poignant because when the sound is taken away the audience begins to focus more on the movement and the emotion of the character, the silence intrigued them.There are many different characters and reachs in our play therefore we decided that our set should remain very neutral. We designed our set in a deliberately dubious way, so we could move easily between fantasy and office scenes. We decided that altering the layout of the stage and the set between each scene would prove noisy and would distract the audiences attention. We were however very aware that a aeonian set would become boring and the audience would lose interest, nevertheless we decided through rehearsals and a practice production that the intensity of the action made up for the lack of set changes.We used two black simple boxes as the fundamentals of each scene, occasionally changing the positioning of them to create a different atmosphere. We chose not to reach a specific setting contributing to the representation of free-flowing images within the characters mind. However, we decided to introduce an element of decaying edict preoccupied by work ambitions and promotions through the use of broken computer monitors, keyboards, mice, and disks positioned around the stage. This gave the stage an overa ll look of disarray and immediately introduced the audience to the conflict within the characters in the production.How research material was gathered and used within the puzzle out. Vicki Marks To begin the devising process our group was presented with five abduces that took inspiration from different aspects of life, this supplied us with an excellent starting point for underdeveloped a challenging piece of theatre, however our initial responses to the stimuli shaped our wee work and many aspects were later changed as the piece matured. Firstly each member of the group decided separately which excerpt inspired them and worked towards abstractly analyse the convey of these quotes.As a group we were drawn towards the quote attention is a dark room where forbids are developed. We felt that this quote gave us liberal scope to produce a brainstorm skirt the analysis of it. afterward analysing the quote through a brainstorm we decided to focus on the idea of fear. These fea r aspects of the quote lead our group to research and gain an interest surrounding common phobic disorders. As an initial response to phobic neurosiss we decided to explore phobias that restrain and dominate everyday life.As a group we were interested in the psychological effects of unreasonable fears, through discussion, we realised one of our members arachnophobia and decided to research real life stories showing the influences of phobias. We began to gain an understanding of the psychological effects of living with an superstitious fear, this allowed us to contemplate the way a person living with a phobia views the world. This topic particularly appealed to our group because three of the members were studying a course in psychology and took a specific interest in phobias.Through research we were drawn to highlighting different perceptions of the world, this is initially why we decided to show a dream or fantasy of each character. I was currently studying Margret Atwoods dyst opian novel A Handmaids Tale. And inferred parallels between dystopian societies and living with a life altering phobia. As a group this led us to discuss the concepts of normality and initially tell us to create a dystopian rescript to base our phobic characters in.However, we felt that through creating a dystopian connection we were overcomplicating the piece and decided in order to create an accessible message we would have to modify the plot. Many of our responses to the quote were detached and impersonal therefore we decided to take a more personal approach to the analysing the quote. We wanted to create a more abstract approach to analysing, consequently, rather than brainstorming we played a word association game. Our earlier research indicated to us the potential of exploring fear for that reason we opened by associating responses to the word fear.This resulted in a discussion of our apprehension and anxiety towards our futures, each member of the group was in the proce ss of applying to university and planning the following step of their lives. It was important for us to follow our dreams and mistakes in choices at this stage worried us and we were sensitive to the idea of being stuck doing something we were not passionate about. This discussion allowed us to infer parallels between our fears towards losing our passion and job satisfaction in the work place. This led us to create a work place scenario, highlighting different characters problems with the way their lives have transpired.Although we had created an initial scenario we had to decide how to highlight the importance of job satisfaction and dreams. This is where our ideas surrounding an exploration of dreams and fantasies linked in with our running idea. How group skills contributed to the development of the drama. Vicki Marks As an supporting players, we had many different approaches to the production of our devised piece. Firstly, after the initial discussions of the basic structure of use of space we decided that each member should separately prepare an initial suggestion for a fantasy scene.Subsequently as an ensemble we modified each members idea to fit the characters objectives incorporating each group members requirements. 2 of the four fantasy scenes required only two characters, therefore allowing the two remaining members to direct. This particularly put pressure on the team and initially certain members of the group did not respond well to being directed, however, we had to be flexible whilst blocking a scene and be open to disapproval and changes.Considering the ensemble approach to devising we wanted each member to experience directing each scene, this also allowed us to incorporate more than one members objective for a particular scene. Therefore, we often resorted to switching roles mid scene to appreciate the way each member would perform certain characters and situations. I feel that this successfully allowed us to create two dimensional charac ters and by including aspects of everyones ideas created an overall satisfaction towards each scene. Each member of the group had a monologue allowing the audience to understand each individual characters state of mind.The cooking of a monologue is often very personal, initially, Helia and I scripted each monologue, but we worked as a group throughout the blocking and performing, however, this prove difficult. Due to the individual approaches of a monologue, taking control of scripting them was ineffective. This approach resulted in confusion and the monologues were less emotionally effective, because members struggled to connect with them on a personal level. Therefore, firstly, we each took our monologues separately and worked on the content through closely analysing our characters objectives and intentions.After we were happy with the essential content of our monologues we worked as a group to develop them. Group timing was essential during the silent movie fantasy, due to a la ck of confabulation the scene required carefully choreographed action, which required the group to work carefully in relation to one another. At one stage of this scene, Helia was required to jump on Payams back and knocked to the ground. In order to prevent any injuries we applied a partnering system, involving a free member of the group shadowing Helia, providing support during the initial stages of rehearsals.During the later stages of devising the murder mystery scene we became uninspired with the outcome An evaluation of the ways in which ideas were communicated to the audience. Vicki Marks Throughout the devising process we focused predominantly on comedic genres, to allow the audience to access the central messages through humour. Although we were aware of the comedic assess of each scene it was difficult to predict the audiences reactions, therefore we decided to perform it to a small audience during our rehearsal to evaluate which areas of humour were successful and whic h were less effective.Consequently, we realised that many of the melodramatic fantasies such as the silent movie were physically being underplayed resulting in a misrepresentation of our desired name. This resulted in a member of our group to employ a technique that we had used on a physical theatre work shop. acting our characters physicality on levels from one to ten, ten being the most physically expressive allowed us to evaluate which level of physicality was successful. As a group we decided that the audience reacted best towards the silent movie scene when we employed a physicality level of ten.Due to lack of dialogue, physicality and demeanor allowed the audience to follow the storyline whilst also creating humour. As a result of working with a limited number of actors it was necessary to multi-role however, through multi-rolling it is often easy to confuse an audience. We therefore decided to employ the Brechtian technique of changing our signifying costumes on stage. Thi s allowed the audience to understand the style of our piece, and the abstract nature of the fantasy scenes.We also decided to place each change of costume on stage from the opening scene to intrigue the audience and allow them to become more involved in the action. We also had to take into account the wide range of characters we used. For example in one fantasy scene Payam took on the role of a Spanish soap character and during the next fantasy scene his character changed to a medieval knight. As a group we realised that a change of costume would not be sufficient to demonstrate to the audience a change in character, therefore we had to ensure that each actor varied their physicality according the role they were playing.As a group we consciously casted many of the characters as stock characters and stereotypes, allowing us to successfully communicate to the audience a significant change in role. Naturalistically it was difficult to vary each members character therefore by using melo dramatic genres we were able to separate each members character. Originally, we intended to highlight the importance of job satisfaction through juxtaposing the office scenes with the fantasy scenes. We hoped to communicate to the audience the monotonous routine of being unsatisfied in a job.In order to convey this to an audience we decided to use opponent theatrical styles for the fantasy and office scenes. We decided on a representational approach for the office scenes to highlight the dissatisfaction of the characters, similarly we decided to use abstract and melodramatic genres for the fantasy scenes to show the positivity. The accessibility of the humour in our piece relied on the audiences knowledge of the common clichis we drew inspiration from. I feel we did not fully take into account the age range of our audience and miscalculated the universality of the clichis.After discussing with our audience their reactions towards our piece many of the younger members did not unders tand the humorous aspects on every level. For example in our murder mystery fantasy we took inspiration from the popular detective character Poirot, however many of the younger To open our piece we decided to have each character on stage the composition involved my character set about the audience frozen in a spotlight and a open shadow of the four other characters in the background, to show individual stories and the universal message that applied to each character. t.How rehearsal and the production process contributed to the lowest performance. Vicki Marks During the rehearsal process, we encountered many difficulties with the staging of certain ideas and aspects. Initially we had decided to each perform a separate monologue as our office characters to highlight the objectives of each individual, we felt that it was important to portray to the audience an arouse insight into the characters feelings and wanted each monologue to project different forms. After the initial scrip ting of the monologues, we brainstormed the different approaches to staging them.Fortunately, each monologue adapted distinctive structures which allowed us to manipulate and create visually appealing scenes. During the staging of Payams monologue initially aimed to block the physical placement, this required him to be free to trip up across the stage, and therefore, a remaining member of the group read his monologue whilst he attempted to block it. Surprisingly, this created an interesting effect of daydreaming therefore we decided to continue having his monologue projected from off stage. At one stage during our rehearsals we were challenged to find an original and inspiring way to present our idea.We had already decided that we wanted to contrast reality and fantasy. We had devised the fundamentals of office scenes created to depict our original character Dylans disconnection with a dystopian society. Because we had created a leading character we struggled to introduce equal ro les. Therefore, we decided to create a merged brainstorm addressing our themes and the ideas we hoped to communicate. Through this we discovered a situation where Dylans disconnection with society linked to a modern day scenario.Dylans alienation towards an unfamiliar society was transformed into a group of office workers unsatisfied with their situations. Luckily, through former improvised scenes we had created characters which fitted this scenario. Throughout the devising process we were interested in development an interpretation of parallel universes. We were initially drawn to this idea through different interpretations of phobias and the way an individual interprets fears. This idea led one member of the group to compare parallel universes to dreams, and fantasies.As a group we decided that we were interested in highlighting the importance of following your dreams, therefore began to research different fantasies and dream scenarios. We began to discuss different genres and s ettled initially on medieval clichis drawing on the typical female fantasy of being rescued by a knight in shining armour. As a group we decided that our acting techniques should mirror this genre therefore we settled on melodrama. Previously, we had only attempted naturalistic acting techniques, and as a group we were aware of the contrast between naturalism and melodrama.In order to familiarise ourselves with this acting technique we attended a physical theatre workshop, it was apparent to us that in order to effectively portray a melodramatic genre we would have to introduce exaggerated physicality. Initially this felt unnatural to most of the group members due to our back ground in naturalism, therefore, the support we received from the workshops group leader was very helpful. We benefited from the group leader knowledge surrounding physical theatre and he introduced us to a technique which allowed us to exaggerate the physicality during rehearsals.How the influence of ideas of other playwrights and/ or handlers, designers and performers have been used. Originally, we hoped to achieve a depressing and desolate office scene highlighting the impassionate emotions of the characters. We initially decided that the characters would remain deadpan to express their negative attitudes towards their work environment however, we wanted to employ a more kindle abstract format to express this further. We therefore turned to Machinal by Sophie Treadwell which one of our group members had previously studied.The opening scene to Machinal is a powerful expression of a monotonous office scene. Treadwell uses an expressionist form employing repetitive dialogue and action and harsh audio effects to create a tedious and mechanical impression. Inspired by Treadwells use of repeated dialogue and action we began to improvise scenes using similar techniques. Firstly, we chose words and phrases linked to an office environment and repeated them, overlapping each other and increasi ng in volume throughout to create an intense atmosphere. Unfortunately, due to the small group, this did not achieve our desired effect.This then lead us towards a more physical representation, as an alternative to repeated dialogue we chose to highlight the routine of the office through repeating typical office actions. The use of stylised actions cueed a member of the group of a performance of absolute beginners through which the director had expressed the rigidity of the office through women typing in unity creating a routine effect. Considering the size of the group we were not enthusiastic to have each character simultaneously performing one action, we therefore, took inspiration from the over exaggerated nature of each movement.Instead of using a routine we highlighted a sense of artificiality by introducing a metronome to emphasise the mechanical and artificial nature of the scene. Characterization was very important to the success of our performance. Because we had chosen t o show many stark and stereotyped characters throughout it was important to exaggerate the physicality of the characters in certain places. Physicality was expressed most poignantly through the silent film fantasy. Because this was such a challenging format to express due to the lack of dialogue it relied fully on each actors physical representation of the character.Inspiration was originally taken from Charlie Chaplin. Through research we learnt that as a Silent film actor he emphasized his organic structure language and facial expression so that the audience could better understand what his character was feeling and portraying on screen. However, simply watching and attempting to replicate Chaplins style was not enough. As a group we decided to get in in a Jet physical theatre company workshop. This not only allowed us to work on our physicality as performers in general but gave us excellent scope to improve our silent film scene. Costumes were not hugely significant in our perf ormance.We did not want to over complicate things and circumstantially our performance consisted of many short scenes and an array of different characters, similar to the conventions of epic theatre employed notably by Bertolt Brecht we decided to do all of the costume changes on stage. These changes only consisted of small variations to costumes such a hats a jackets that symbolised each character Brecht employed the use of techniques that remind the spectator that the play is a representation of reality and not reality itself, which he called the Verfremdungseffekt. Such techniques included changing costumes on stage.Through this Brecht hoped to communicate that the audiences reality was, in fact a construction and, as such, was changeable. some other Brechtian technique used in our performance was the use of song. We decided that this allowed the audience to distance themselves from the action hopefully making the social comments throughout more accessible and setting the abstra ct theme from the beginning notably the holy performance was strictly episodic and many scenes were in isolation from each other. Each fantasy scene is triggered by an action and a simple freeze frame to link the office reality to the dreams.This use of gestus was also an acting technique developed by Bertolt Brecht which reflects the characters emotional conflict through a brief frozen action. Gestus was employed during the transaction from my characters monologue to her fantasy scene. As a group we discussed our desired effect of the gestus and decided to show an obvious link between the characters emotional conflict and the freeze frame, for the audiences accessibility. We therefore decided to each come up with a simple freeze frame highlighting the principal emotions the character.The initial idea to dress each character in their own variation of full black was inspired by a performance of attempts on her life at the national. The director Martin twitch chose to dress each cha racter in their own interpretation of in all black. We adapted this idea to our performance because it allowed each character to show their own individuality whilst still highlighting the monotony and dull nature of the office and their negative emotions towards their situations. We took a large amount of inspiration from the melodramatic acting techniques employed by soup operas.We particularly focused on the style of acting used in traditional Novellas or Latin American soups. Whilst approaching this style we researched the soup opera Days of our lives. To help us adopt similar personas. How the stimulus material was developed through the drama process. To begin the devising process our group was presented with five quotes that took inspiration from different aspects of life, this supplied us with an excellent starting point for developing a challenging piece of theatre, however our initial responses to the stimuli shaped our early work and many aspects were later changed as the piece matured.Firstly each member of the group decided separately which quote inspired them and worked towards abstractly analyse the meaning of these quotes. As a group we were drawn towards the quote fear is a dark room where negatives are developed. We felt that this quote gave us enough scope to produce a brainstorm surrounding the analysis of it. After analysing the quote through a brainstorm we decided to focus on the idea of fear. These fear aspects of the quote lead our group to research and gain an interest surrounding common phobias. As an initial response to phobia we decided to explore phobias that restrain and dominate everyday life.As a group we were interested in the psychological effects of irrational fears, through discussion, we realised one of our members arachnophobia and decided to research real life stories showing the influences of phobias. We began to gain an understanding of the psychological effects of living with an irrational fear, this allowed us to co ntemplate the way a person living with a phobia views the world. This inspired us to contemplate feelings and emotions surrounding living in a different mindset to the norm. We therefore decided to create five different freeze frames, abstractly exploring the physicality of emotions.