9/22/2019 (My Theater Profile)
I am in love with the theater since I was young. I went to see performances constantly every month when I'm in elementary school. When I play with my young cousin, we always made up our own characters and played them out. My first theater experience is when I was in 8th grade, I played the character 'Xiang Yu' in 'Banquet at Hongmen'. In 10th grade, I helped on setting up stage lightning for 'Almost, Maine' and performed as 'Humphrey' in 'See How They Run'. I've also learned theater skills through the intro to theater class and the theater elective. In 11th grade, I joined the Thespian Troupe and I am currently involved in the show 'She kills Monsters' as the stage manager. I think theater helps me exploring the world in different artistic perspectives and understanding others.
9/26/2019 (Urban Legend Project)
At this point, I finished my urban legend project and presented it to the class. It was a project that me and my partner make up a story and design, create the synopsis, main characters, the casting, the producing team, key creative elements, costumes, and the director's statement. The show we created is called "Phantom Hitchhiker". Also I started to brainstorm ideas of collaborative creation of theater with my group by researching devising theater companies, elaborating things that are attached to us and exploring different kinds of plays.
10/6/2019 (Exploring Devising Companies)
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This week, we kept bringing up ideas and objects that have stories and discussed them for the collaborative theater project. We narrowed down the theme from stigmas to stereotypes. Also, we each looked into a devising company that we might use. I researched 'Frantic assembly' since it is open-minded, educational, (Ignition program) and has helpful tips on choreography. Plus, the way how the company devises is creative. I presented it to the class. I also shared a theater exercise (Round-By-Through) and (Hymns Hands) from the 'Frantic assembly'.
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10/12/2019 (Stimulus Collaborative Theatre Co)
We looked deeper into the professional theater companies, compared them and chose the devising company that the collaborative project would be using. Also, we researched and played some improv games that could help us brainstorming the ideas of our topic stereotypes. For instance, we tried "Emotion Party, Talk Show Expert, Status Exercise, Gibberish Interpreter, A Night at the Oscars, Relationship Blitz and Moose!" By doing these exercises, I found out that even without noticing, we are always labeling others. And in most of the time, the majority has larger impact. Furthermore, we agreed on the idea that a person is much more than what society labels them. Individuals are far more than their race, gender, sexual orientation, social status, physical disability and mental illness, and we should not judge them by what we see on the "surface of the icebergs".
10/20/2019 (Collaborative Theatre Co)
At this point, we chose our devising company which is called "Tangled feet" for the collaborative project. We also did further research on the topic we are going to talk about. There is a video called "Three Little Pigs advert" by The Guardian that inspires us to build the frames of our project base on having different story lines with varied reactions from people and media, and reveal the main character at the end scene. I found it interesting that during the "hot seat" game for the school play "She kills monsters" this Friday, one of the main characters, Tilly, has assumptions about her sister Agnes even when it is based on the interactions between sisters. Also, we shared our own feelings while facing stereotypes, and based on our main ideas, sigmas, stereotypes, labels, assumptions, jump to conclusions, we started to brainstorm our story. We explored themes such as young people fighting for climate issues, patients that took pills for everything, a student who has depression and suicides, a not stereotypical football jock, etc. We discussed each one of them and agreed that patients that took pills is the most suitable one. Talking pills or inner voice of the patient could be added to the story and the story could be ended with all the pills lying next to the patient when the patient founds out that the pills instead of helping him/her, they combined made him/her worse or lost the enthusiasm. More ideas about the theme were dug through more "I, you, we" improv game that allows us to bring a scene quickly.
10/25/2019 (Approaches to collaboration)
This week, we started to learn more theater history by making a theater timeline collaboratively starting from 6000 BC- 2000 BC Primitive Theater to modern theater. (The timeline is focused on western theater) Through the timeline project, I enrich my understanding of how western theater developed overtime and their distinct impact and features which varied throughout history. Also, I started to read the play 'You can't take it with you' by Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman and write play reports on it to prepare on selecting plays for the director notebook. For the collaborative theater project, we discussed back and forth on the ideas and what we learned from the theater games. Then, we started building the structure of the play we are doing. We discussed and agreed on what we need to collaborate together--respectively, open-minded, organized, focused and professionally.
11/3/2019 (Week Work: Theatre History Time Line)
During this week, we finished the Theater History Timeline and discussed further into the collaborative project--we determined the messages we want to pass to the audience and some potential scene we could do. For the theater timeline, we researched different playwrights, themes, features, influence, and causes in different periods of time in the theater. We also watched 'Stage Beauty" which is an artistic portray of Edward Kynaston, one of the last Restoration theater "boy players", struggles because of the permission of women on stage and the prohibition of a man performing as a woman on stage. I also finished the two play reports, one for "The Caucasian Chalk Circle", by Bertolt Brecht, the other one is for "You can't take it with you" by Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman.
11/8/2019 (Interpreting and reading 'The rivals')
This week, we read the lines and interpret the plot of the play 'The rivals' along the way from the beginning to Act IV. 'The rivals' by Richard Brinsley Sheridan, directed by Mark Lamos, is a 1770s play that is a classical example of 'Comedy of Manners'(also called Restoration Comedy). During the process of understanding the play, I observed closely and experienced the typical feature of 'Comedy of Manners'. This play has distinct types of characters and simple set design. I found it hard to understand sometimes since there are also a lot of 4th wall break of the characters(via side comments to the audience). Also, malapropism, which means misuse of words that are funny unintentionally, is invented by the play through the character Malaprop. It adds comedy but also makes it difficult for me to reveal the real meaning. The relationships of the character are complicated and mostly focused on the upper class. The character Julia represents people who want to break the class separation and find true love instead of getting a planned marriage. As far as I read in the play(Act IV), the comedy seems to be demonstrated by side comments, irony, malapropism, and monologues. There hasn't been a lot of physical comedy yet shown. During the process, I often figure out new relationships between the characters and the chaos they are building which makes the play entertaining.
11/18/2019 (Writing the 'Mini Director's Notebook The Rivals')
After I finished reading 'The rivals' this week, I chose 'Scene II Julia's dressing0room.[Faulkland discovered alone]' to do a mini director's notebook on. I elaborated the scene, put on annotations and wrote the historical, cultural, social and political context of the play. During the process, I dived deeper into the conflicts between the characters and their intentions. I feel like I have a better understanding of the time period and the issues addressed by the author that are specified at that time period.
11/22/2019(Assigning the characters for chosen scenes from 'The Rivals')
At this point, I continued writing the 'Mini Director's Notebook' and reading the play 'Rhinoceros and Other Plays by Eugene lonesco'. We also decided the scenes we each are going to direct and assign the characters to classmates. We read the scenes we are doing and each starts digging the intentions and characteristics of the characters. During the process, I realized the different word choices, traditions, and mindsets between characters in "The Rivals" and our modern world society. For example, the duels are very common at that time, they use words like "Zounds!" to express their emotion and they have planned marriages, servants and maids.
12/8/2019( 'The Rivals')
This week, I mostly finished the mini director notebook for 'The Rivals'. It is composed of "Character List, The context of the play, The stage and set, Lighting, Costuming and Disguise, Characterization, Prop list, Motivation, Through line, Beats, Blocking and Conclusion." I first read through the script with classmates and chose the scene I want to do which in this case is 'Act III Scene II Julia's dressing room'. I read the scene thoroughly and annotated the words I didn't know and the change of intentions of the characters. Then, I researched the historical, cultural, social and political background of the play to figure out the general setting and purpose of the play. Depending on the description in the script, I designed the stage and set and added props accordingly such as clothes, chairs, and mirrors to specify the dressing room. After deciding the different beats of the scene, I looked into the different motivations of Julia and Faulkland. Relating to the whole script and the interactions and developments between the two characters, I discovered that In Act III Scene II, Faulkland is appeared to be emotional, anxious and suspicious. Julia is sad, impatient and a little bit angry. After I determined their characteristics, I picked some costumes in that time period that would fit for reference. Next, I read the scene again line by line to fetch the thinking of the characters and planned the initial blocking based on the characters, audience and the distribution of the stage. In this whole process, I understand the play more and dissect, modify and develop my general idea to specific details and figure out new ideas as moving forward. After I finished blocking the scene in my notebook, I start directing the actors to learn the blocking and the stage. As we try out my blocking, I improve my stage on some details such as the table since it is not used in the scene and would not contribute to the set. I use the method of trial and error because I explore new things along the way and what I planned in my head may not work in reality as unexpected elements would pop up just like life. So when facing the challenges and changes, we should always be open-minded risk-takers with dedication and organizing.
2/4/2020(Mini Theorist Presentation)
This week, we finished our performance on "The Rivals" and started researching different theorists. We watched “Five Truths” to see how we can use the theories of different theorists. During the researches, I understood that everything could not only be interpreted in different ways, but they could also be portrayed and performed in many different ways with our own understandings. I looked into many theorists and their theories, and finally, choose Kazuo Ohno for my Mini Theorists Presentation. He is a Japanese dancer in the 20th century who is the co-founder of Butoh dancer and promotes the Butoh theater. His theory is that while performing, it is not the techniques that lead you, it is the life that flows naturally from your body guides you. He wants to blossom the flower of primordial beauty through exaggerated actions. He lives in an era with the despair of World War 2, and his priority is to give an impact on the audience of the feelings they shared and the stories that people see differently. After I watched some of his performances, I am appealed to his unique interpretations of moves and I feel like I am watching a blank canvas with small roses dancing slightly in the wind, and the roses dance slower and slower, the background starts to change between different cold colors. Then the thorns break out of the roses and with bubbles and blood growing, shouting and flourishing. But in the end, it stops, there is no evidence of all of these happened except the canvas is broken with the tears mixed with blood. Kazuo Ohno's work is very stylized with white paint and Japanese elements, he still continued his performance through hands even he lost the ability to walk in 2001. I am impressed by his determination and his acts of expression.
2/12/2020(Finish Theorist Presentation)
At this point, I finished my mini theorist presentation. After researching Kazuo Ohno, I realized that sometimes pure emotion and collective memory could play and lead the show on their own. The two world wars gives a strong affect on Kazuo Ohno's work and his works suggest the cruelty of our minds and the beauty of the detaching consciousness. The exploration of many taboo topics discuss things with the audience that couldn't be easily communicated demonstrates Kazuo Ohno's wish of a better world and the determination to address these existing problems. By doing the project, I understand more about how to relate to a theorist in a historical scale and learn their theories along with their development in time. I found it interesting that these Butoh performers all have very distinct style and discuss varied themes. Performers from different parts of the world put different elements in their pieces but the ideology of making a better world never changes.
2/14/2020(Reflection on Theorist Presentations)
After presenting my theorist presentation and watching my peers' presentation. I learned more about Augusto Boal,
Kazuo Ohno, and Bertolt Brecht. Bertolt Brecht, a German Marxian theorist, introduces the Epic Theater which originated in Germany during the 1920s and addresses many social and economic problems. Bertolt Brecht utilizes techniques such as Alienation, Breaking the fourth wall, Didacticism, and Getus. The impact he wants to have on the audience is to have a logical appeal to seek or understand the solutions of social and economic problems that the performers put on stage. Bertolt Brecht suggests that the actors should play multiple roles and try hard not to have attachments with the character so that the audience doesn't feel like they are in part of the story. Instead, it is better for the audience to think along with what is demonstrated in the story. Bertolt Brecht's idea is novel to me since I always consider the key to portraying a story is to let the audience to have some sense of attachment to the story. But Bertolt Brecht maintains the opposite and focuses on giving the audience influence on the direct discussion and solution on the topics he brings up. I feel fascinated by his unique perspective on the intention and impact that a show should make. I also learned about the Brazilian theorist Augusto Boal is the founder of Theater of The Oppressed. He also “uses theater as a tool for social change.” Augusto Boal focuses more on developing the techniques in theater through some tools such as The Rainbow of Desire, Image of Chaos, and Cops in the head. Augusto Boal helps people to use theater as a tool to have emotional appeal to the audience and deliver the ideas on social issues. I find it interesting that all these three theorists propose social problems, but they all have different thoughts on what they want the audience to receive from a performance and how the audience should interact and engage with the story.
Kazuo Ohno, and Bertolt Brecht. Bertolt Brecht, a German Marxian theorist, introduces the Epic Theater which originated in Germany during the 1920s and addresses many social and economic problems. Bertolt Brecht utilizes techniques such as Alienation, Breaking the fourth wall, Didacticism, and Getus. The impact he wants to have on the audience is to have a logical appeal to seek or understand the solutions of social and economic problems that the performers put on stage. Bertolt Brecht suggests that the actors should play multiple roles and try hard not to have attachments with the character so that the audience doesn't feel like they are in part of the story. Instead, it is better for the audience to think along with what is demonstrated in the story. Bertolt Brecht's idea is novel to me since I always consider the key to portraying a story is to let the audience to have some sense of attachment to the story. But Bertolt Brecht maintains the opposite and focuses on giving the audience influence on the direct discussion and solution on the topics he brings up. I feel fascinated by his unique perspective on the intention and impact that a show should make. I also learned about the Brazilian theorist Augusto Boal is the founder of Theater of The Oppressed. He also “uses theater as a tool for social change.” Augusto Boal focuses more on developing the techniques in theater through some tools such as The Rainbow of Desire, Image of Chaos, and Cops in the head. Augusto Boal helps people to use theater as a tool to have emotional appeal to the audience and deliver the ideas on social issues. I find it interesting that all these three theorists propose social problems, but they all have different thoughts on what they want the audience to receive from a performance and how the audience should interact and engage with the story.
3/24/2020(Learning about Commedia dell'Arte)
To learn further about the world theater traditions, we learned more about Commedia Dell'arte through researching it and composed presentations to share the ideas. We divided the research into different aspects such as the influence, the origin, and the purpose. We also dive into the characters, masks, and acting techniques of Commedia Dell'arte. This learning process helps me to have a better understanding of deconstructing world theater traditions and how they are interconnected with each other. It is quite interesting to see how theater progresses through time and in different areas. Theater, as a tool to express and exchange ideas, could reflect society or individuals and move it forward. For instance, the Commedia Dell'arte is the first time in history when female actresses are allowed to performon stage which is a step forward for achieving gender equality. Commedia Dell'arte also portrays characters in every social status and sometimes criticizes the current events which are signs for people trying to build the world with peace, reflection and harmony. The masked stock characters is a clever way to provide a formula for demonstrating people we interact with. The babble speech and improvised interactions are ways that they developed to bring out the art form to the world and free people's imagination. Although each theater tradition has its historical, political context and its origin and influence, the story of theater is not linear. It is dynamic with people prospering with ideas and sprinkle their ink on the canvas of emotion and discussion.
3/31/2020(Further learning about Commedia dell'Arte)
After looking into the origin, purpose, and influence of Commedia dell'Arte, we research forward into the characters, masks, and movement of the tradition. I presented the acting techniques in the convention. This process gives me a deep sense of what actors do to get into the characters and the world of Commedia dell'Arte. In short, characters are acrobatic with slapsticks, dancing, and singing. They express emotion big and out-front and have distinct acting styles for different types of characters. The performance is interactive, fast-paced and uses a lot of physical comedy. The masks help define the characters and withdraw the actors themselves from the roles they are playing. It impresses me that the tradition seems to break the social and status boundaries and bring lively interactions among Masters(Pantalone, Dottore, Capitano), Lovers(Young ladies and young men), and Servants(Zanni, Harlequino, Brighella). I also researched and created two characters(one is an Arlecchino/Harlequino and the other one is a Pantalone) to learn how they act. I discovered that their energy, intentions, gestures, and voice varied a lot. From exploring Commedia dell'Arte, I also improved my ability to improvise with other characters using babble speaks and keep the traits of the same character all the time.
5/4/2020
As time past, I read different scripts each month and write play reports about them. This month, I read Absurd Person Singular by Alan Ayckbourn gives me views of how the middle class during the 1970s in Britain is fragile and how life is so unpredictable. The play has a pretty clever design on three consecutive Christmas for three acts. Since we are all at home because of the pandemic now, our musical Once upon a mattress is extended and we can't watch shows in theaters. However, the online theater resources expanded and I watched different theater shows on National Theatre such as One man two guvnors that has Commedia dell'Arte elements and Twelfth Night, a Shakespeare play with incredible set designs. Recently for IB theater, I'm mostly focused on the Research Presentation. I chose out the scene I'm doing for the moments of theater, marked the script as well as learning the context. I brainstormed varied ways to approach the physical making of the screen and the puppets and looked at examples. At this point, I managed to collect the materials I needed and I have got to a point that I know well enough of the tradition and the scene to merge them together. Moving forward, not only will I be making the screen and scenery, I will also dive into the research of the voice aspects that I chose to specifically explore in my theater tradition. These experiences widen my horizons on the possibilities of theater.
5/18/2020
This week, I continued putting up my research presentation. I practiced the moment of theater with my peers and gave feedback to each other. I realized that my voice between the two characters can be more diverse in terms of pitch and speed. Also, I should be careful not to bring the voice of one of the characters to the other one. This is because sometimes I didn't adjust my voice right after the line of one character so that the beginning of the other character still sounded like the previous one. I also tried putting up the screen and the lights as well as studying the script. I continued watching shows and reading plays, and they gave me a lot of different ideas in terms of the stage, costume, and the applying of theater traditions. For further research, I will start working on my reflection part and connect my theater convention to another convention.
5/24/2020(Polishing the moment of theater and starting on comparing theater conventions and personal reflection)
This is the last week of regular school this semester. I am continuing to practice my moment of theater and take peers' advice into account. I also start researching other shadow puppetry and world traditions to figure out my potential options of the last category which is to compare the voice aspects of Karagoz shadow puppets to another convention. I also started to write the impact of exploring this research presentation on me as a learner and a performer. This includes my gain of knowledge of other cultures, shadow puppetry, and using voice better in performances. I watched a play written for the Zoom platform specifically targeted to this pandemic situation called What Do We Need To Talk About? written by playwright Richard Nelson recently. The play is really innovative on how they manage to connect the audience with the current circumstances with these seemly casual Zoom conversations, and explore the themes of the effects of the COVID-19 on people's lives, and how we can help each other getting through this. The show is divided into many scenes that change with blackouts and a breathe. The scenes are divided into different conversations in a Zoom meeting with interesting little stories discovered through their interactions and narratives. Plus, I started to read Twelve Angry Men by Reginald Rose which discusses the morality of the people and the laws.
1/29/2021(Solo Project Journal Exploration and Rehearsing)
This week, I focused on writing my practical exploration part for my solo project, and keep rehearsing my solo theater piece. I plan to remember my lines roughly by next week. I met with my mentor and followed up on my process of pursuing my solo project. We discussed some devising choices for the solo project. In my explorations on interpreting my characters differently, I found it interesting that how the ways I deliver my words can lead to my movements and facial expression in the performance. The tension between my characters can also vary depending on the energy I endow the two characters in each rehearsal. Next week, I need to enhance my performance on my solo theater piece and be ready for some feedback for the next part of the project.
2/7/2021(Solo Piece practice and revision)
At this point, I finished writing my intention and impact parts of how I explored my solo theater piece. Before performing my piece and getting feedbacks for the next parts, I did some major adjustments to my solo piece: I realized that my original plan of having the two characters conducting the conversation on stage at the same time is impractical because I have to shift my physical position very often which disrupts the fluency of the solo piece. So I have to one of my character being virtual in order to have my two characters interreacting with each other. My solution is to make my "night show" a zoom meeting interview, and the host would be pre-recorded and casted on the background. While recording the piece, I can have my computer in front of me and portraying the interviewee(Aguirre) character.
It is a quite new and interesting learning experience to me, because I get to interreact with "myself". I thought now that I have only one character to do at one time, I wouldn't need to remember the whole script I wrote. It turned about that it is not the case. In fact, when I am recording myself as the host character, I have to recite in my head as the interviewee character so that I can get the reactions and timing just right. It is a difficult process and I tried many times to be able to perform the host, and react to the voice in my head as the interviewee at the same time. Once I get better on doing that, I also found it challenging to do my interviewee character too. No matter how precise my timing is as the host, each trial is slightly different timing wised. The video self as "the host" cannot pick up my lines or cues, so I have to be able to pick up "his". I have to observe "myself" in the video carefully to know if I am delivering my lines too slow or too fast.
I think this process is actually a very good practice for me to observe other character's expressions and emotions, and react to it. It is kind of weird how "me" in the video can teach and deliver cues to me as the one performing another character. The next step to me is to practice the scene and finalize my background, costumes and so on.
It is a quite new and interesting learning experience to me, because I get to interreact with "myself". I thought now that I have only one character to do at one time, I wouldn't need to remember the whole script I wrote. It turned about that it is not the case. In fact, when I am recording myself as the host character, I have to recite in my head as the interviewee character so that I can get the reactions and timing just right. It is a difficult process and I tried many times to be able to perform the host, and react to the voice in my head as the interviewee at the same time. Once I get better on doing that, I also found it challenging to do my interviewee character too. No matter how precise my timing is as the host, each trial is slightly different timing wised. The video self as "the host" cannot pick up my lines or cues, so I have to be able to pick up "his". I have to observe "myself" in the video carefully to know if I am delivering my lines too slow or too fast.
I think this process is actually a very good practice for me to observe other character's expressions and emotions, and react to it. It is kind of weird how "me" in the video can teach and deliver cues to me as the one performing another character. The next step to me is to practice the scene and finalize my background, costumes and so on.
3/20/2021 (Weekly journal, Director Notebook)
Over the past few weeks, I have been mainly working on my Director Notebook. It really seems like a giant task, but I noticed later how interconnected they are. After a close analysis of my play Rhinoceros by Eugene Ionesco, and its background of the Theater of the Absurd, I catch the main elements of the messages in the play and tries to present them in my own way and endow new meanings to the piece. Performance and production elements from other plays inspire me as well in my road of brainstorming the potential possibilities of the play. When I finally have to decide the plans of directing the play, I find myself in another mindset of working on the practicalities of each element and consider how effective the audience is impacted by my directorial intentions. Each aspect of the play shall ties together in its style, theme, storyline, and deliveries. I also developed new skills in the process of helping to bring these characters to life and staging the whole story. My biggest ah-ha moment is the realization of where the rising tensions and absurdity are throughout the play and the ways to execute that.
