COMMUNICATIONS

Hello all,

I know that some of you have been trying to e mail with questions and queries - apologies that I have not been able to respond, but due to essential electrical maintenance works, the internet connection has been very intermittent, and will continue to be for the rest of the week, hence this blog post.

For extension and submission queries, if you cannot submit but have an extension form, make sure that you keep a copy of your work - you can by all means e mail work in, but we can't guarantee it will arrive  'safely' , so do please keep a copy ( as per Uni regulations) and if we have not recieved your e-mail by the start of term, you can then re-submit your work ( which is covered by your extension).

For blog queries: assessments are by the deadline stated on your project briefs, but the blog is a permanent record for you as well as your assessors, for the duration of the course - so if you still have things to say, reflections to post, or comments/discussions to start, then you should do so - because the chances are that you will benefit from them at a later point.

Finally, just to say "Well Done" for the show, and all best wishes for a grand Christmas break!

Lisa

First Impressions of the play 4/11/2013

First immpressions of the play.

I found that the play could be really difficult but worth it, I watched the trailer of the performance and i saw that they used physical theatre, using flips, and having the company support them in the movements they do, using weight transfer. I would love to do this in the show. I noticed that this show is about a character 'falling in love' but another kind of love, the love of a 15 year old,

Characters

These are the main characters that stood out to me.

Christopher - this character stood out to me alot because i noticed that the main character isnt the typical strong, brave and tough. Christopher is an innocent boy, i feel so much sympathy for this character, for example i see him as a character who couldnt stick up for himself in a fight. If i was to play this part i would do so much research into having the internal world, i would quite like to play this character. I also feel really sorry for this character, the line he said was 'is this the train to london?' and it really made an impact on me.

Mother (Judy) - I felt that i took to this character alot, reading the script i found that the line "....thats my son." really hit me, because that phrais was ment to be used for being proud of that person, but they wasJudy says it is in a way that, she would be proud of him if he changed or "got better". Although the character is quite nasty,in the sence of blaming him almost for her leaving. I could understand how differcult it would be for her, how she couldnt take it. If i was to play this character, i wouldnt make her excited to see Christopher, because i cant see that in the script. shocked, deffinatly but, after a while she decides to take him back, Playing this Character i would go through the lines and look through how it would make me feel, i would possible go through the system of Stanifslaki, in the sence of finding the 'I Want ' in the script, cutting it down into units.

My final feelings

I feel i could easily break down during the prosses, mainly because i can't watch innocent characters struggle, if i was a character in a story i would possible do anything i can to help Christopher, yet looking at how christopher is in the script, i dont think he would take my help. because he doesnt trust strangers. But i love the fact that, how simple the story is made a big impact on me.

Development of scenes

Development of scenes:

Chorus scenes: we developed the movement scenes early on using chairs and getting direction from the directors we tried to make the movement link in with the scenes. We developed these scenes by trying out new more daring movements and physical theatre. We worked a lot on what lifts we could include and how to involve Christopher. The main problem with developing these scenes was the timing and we had to keep doing extra rehearsals to make sure we were all in sync. Another obstacle we had was switching from using chairs to the blocks as they were much harder to move and were lager but the upside was we managed to try more lifts and movement involving the blocks so we got together for a rehearsal and tried out different lifts jumps and movement we could incorporate with the movement we had already been instructed to do by the directors. We showed the directors what we had created and we managed to incorporate some of it into the original movement then it took a lot of rehearsals to focus on timing and cues to make it look professional and make it all in unison.

Cameo roles: for my cameo roles to develop there scenes I focused very much on improvisation early on and trying out different ways of playing each character. As we continued to develop the scenes as a whole I added in gestus to my character to show there symbolism much more and to make them unique and stand out. I then focused on how my characters reacted with their environment and focused on movement delivery of lines and posture. Throughout these scenes I felt like I had a lot of creative freedom so I tried out many different style of playing the characters till I developed the one I liked most. Through rehearsals the scenes mainly developed round other character so I could develop my character by myself and use it improve the overall scene adding comedy of drama as I saw fit.

Duty sergeant: developing the scenes with the duty sergeant where much more ridged than with my cameo roles and the blocking was sorted out early on and chorus work was based around us once theses basics where out the way we adjusted the scenes to work with the blocks in a creative way using them as tables chairs etc. we then developed the relationship of the characters adding in movement and eye contact to show this. We then added in gestus and worked on vocals to improve the characters then focuses on how we could use the space more and developed ways of adding in more movement to the scenes.

Rodger: for the scenes with Rodger we followed the same principles of the way we developed the Duty sergeant scenes we got instructed in blocking and worked on how the chorus could enhance the scenes. We then focused on how to use the blocks in the scenes and quickly developed a method of using the blocks to show status in the argument scenes. We then worked on physicality of our characters and how they change throughout the scene and change with the introduction of different characters. We then worked on out vocals during the scenes and how to build up tension to show intent through our voices without relying on physical movement. I focused on how to show anger and frustration without words to try and include these feeling while not speaking to keep the aura of my character as one of the hated ones of the group and keep a dark presence in the scenes. Me and Dan then developed how our characters react around one another and on how I could throw him during my outburst at him. This went through stages first me just kicking him and having him already on the floor we then changed it to me pushing him of a block to show my higher status and it allowed us to involve the blocks then finally we changed it to me throwing him of the blocks by putting my hand round his throat but we made sure that he threw himself so I didn’t hurt him this showed status as he was on the floor and I was left yelling at him from a higher position. One thing I developed was from scene to scene adding tension in my character especially in the shoulders so that in the finally scene you could really see the tension and build up through multiple scenes.

Practitioners

Practitioners: when discussing the show with other students and the tutors I can to the conclusion that the play was being done in a Brecht style but the characters had huge amount of Stanislavski style to them to get the audience to connect where as the Brecht style came in much more during the large movement pieces and symbolic chorus work which accompanied some of the scenes.

Stanislavski: for me I used Stanislavski techniques for my characters Rodger and the Duty sergeant. I went into great detail with Rodger and trying to understand how he would react in the situations he is put into and how he will react differently with the other character he meets throughout the play. I found it very interesting to explore how his relationship with Judy falls apart after the appearance of Christopher and I spent a long time figuring out why Rodger says what he does and broke all of my text up into motives and used them to influence my movement and vocals. For the Duty sergeant I wanted to play him in a Stanislavski way instead of in a Brecht style as I felt the subtle humor of the part would be much more affective if it was less over the top but much more realistic and just let the script do its work and adding in comic timing. I looked into how a policeman stands differently compared to a normal member of the public and tried correcting my posture to match and also focuses on my movement and reactions to Christopher.

Brecht: I used a lot of Brecht’s style of performing throughout the performance some examples are the way I played my cameo roles like Mr. wise for example with Mr. wise I used some repetitive gestus to make my character stand out and make him symbolic of the creepy weirdo/druggy without having to go into great detail. I focused much more on the movement and representing the character than going into a Stanislavski style as the role was quite small and it wouldn’t have been a big enough to develop the character but was still big enough to make the role unique and stand out and become a symbolic part of the performance.

Chorus work: the chorus work was done in a very Brecht style as it was there to be symbolic of Christopher’s feelings and thoughts there was no thinking about characters for us personally but instead trying to morph ourselves into feelings and thoughts. The chorus was very much needed to enhance the scenes they were supporting we did this through stylistic movement which was designed not to take attention away from the scenes but add to it.  

I found it very interesting combining two different practitioners for one show and found it interesting how we managed to integrate the two very different style together to make the performance and felt both were needed to help enhance each other and I felt building up character from different styles helped me understand the differences between practitioners more and allowed me to explore different techniques much more than usual.  

curious incident of the dog in the nght time Christopher boone

Christopher Boone

After the Thursday of finding out what character I got I re-read the script to see if any characteristics or ideas popped out. I also wanted to try to see the book from Christopher's perspective, about how he views himself by looking at what he wrote in his book but to also to see how parts of him are explained. First thing I thought of is how his  physicality would look  and about the way he walked and talked. I then thought of which practitioner I could use of course Stanislavski entered my head and I used his teachings of naturalistic and character backgrounds. I also used emotional memory for the first time to try and see if I could tap into any feelings that I could use for Christopher. One problem was I automatically knew Christopher's feelings had to be much more intense and bigger than mine because as a person he is much more extreme in the way he does his actions and the way he thinks.  Christopher doesn't just go to slight happy or a little upset, he goes to the very end of those emotions. He either acts like 'this is the best thing ever' and then the opposite to 'nothing has ever been this bad in my life, I cant believe it'.

The way I personally feel about Christopher is that he is a curious and intelligent person who finds comfort in the use of numbers and codes. This is why I believe he goes into detective work as he enjoys the logic and systematic nature of it. I have loved the whole part of playing him from finding quarks that do and do not work for him which was part of the excitement and fun. I think I fell into the character more towards the end of the rehearsals, I feel I learnt how to say and do certain lines and movements more honestly.

I think seeing the show in London has helped because although I think I did not change my actions or words it gave me peace of mind to see how someone else portrays him in a professional performance and it was worth seeing for all those reasons. I also loved the play which was excellent, so I enjoyed seeing it performed professionally.

Evaluation

 

Evaluation:

1^st performance: this performance was our first time running everything together in one go without stopping so we knew things might not go smoothly but it was to prepare us for out later show. I felt it started really well everyone had lots of energy and the crowd was very involved with laughing which gives everyone a boost. But as the show developed we all dropped in energy levels which made the whole performance much slower and less intense this was partly due to losing the immediate buzz of opening the performance but also because key blocking was missed and lines forgotten which made the performance feel a little disjointed so when the things started to go wrong everyone’s performance dropped slightly on a positive note the improvisation when things went wrong was brilliant and we managed to complete the play without stopping and maintained stage presence and character. There were a few tech problems but we managed to adapt and finish the show.

 

2^nd performance: the second show started with the same high energy levels as the previous shows but we managed to maintain it much better throughout the performance there was still a slight dip in the middle but not much. The blocking was much better and none was forgotten this helped raise the emotions and interest in the scenes they were supporting. I feel everyone managed to raise their performance to a new level for this performance and we managed to make this performance much better than the first one. For me personally it was a bit of a struggle as I had a bad headache from the start that kept getting worse but I tried to use it to enhance my role of Rodger and think of Christopher as the headache to help me build up the anger as the scenes progressed. I tried to slow down my pace of speech with the duty sergeant which I felt I did although it was still a bit too fast and could still be improved. For Rodger I tried to build up the anger more rather than a sudden outburst which I think I managed. Overall I thought this performance was great and much improved on the previous show the focus from everyone was amazing and we managed to work well together and with the tech staff everyone took on feedback from the previous show and used the feedback to improve there performances.  

The unit: I found the unit very interesting as it gave me the chance to develop multiple characters using a mixture of Brecht and Stanislavski which I found very interesting integrating the two different styles. There were lots of challenges through the unit mainly chorus work which I struggled with but I felt I managed to master it by the end. It was a great first show to do to work with people I had never done a show with before and I felt in the end we created a show we could be very proud of. I felt as we got closer to the show I kept managing to develop my characters and constantly tweak and improve my performance before the final show.

The Curious Inncident of the dog in the night time

• what are the themes of this play?

The themes of this play, I feel is love and trust mostly, although the play is about a boy with disabilities there was never a line said in the script or, any source of stage direction to suggest that he had social difficulties, but it was very clear in the sub-text. I strongly feel the show is about trust because looking at the characters and how there are around Christopher, they all care for Christopher, except for Rodger. It’s all about Christopher growing up, and Siobhan leaving his life, so by the end she leaves him to live his life, like forgetting an imaginary friend.


• how is it structured and how does that communicate meaning? The show is to show what is in the book he writes, so it’s mainly about what is going on in his head, and looking at the stage directions, it is mainly mathematical and well thought about, whatever Christopher says how every odd, there still a reason behind it. This show, because of Christopher’s mentality, all cast would have to have a reason for every movement, physicality, lines. It defiantly goes into the style of Brecht .


• how do the casting decisions affect your group's interpretation

It was clear that everyone had there own interpretation for the show, we all had our own idea of the characters, but yet its quite useful because everyone can help with each other to create the character everyone can see bits of their interpretation in.

• how are you approaching rehearsals so far?<br />  During rehearsals I mostly tried to think about the things you could do with the boxes, or physical theatre, I think during this unit I took to the physical theatre side to the show. I like to bring the boxes into the show more and extend the use of weight distribution.

Development of my characters

Influences for my character’s

When looking into my characters I researched similar characters that I could take elements from and gain inspiration from. I did this for my cameo roles to gain a sense of how I could physically show these characters with minimal props so I looked at posture stance and delivery of lines for each of my roles to try and make each one unique and stand out.

Mr. Wise: I based Mr. Wise on Jessie Pinkman in the early development of the character from the TV show Breaking Bad. I looked at the change in posture from when he is high and when he is sober and look at the change in voice and eyes.  

 

 

Duty sergeant: for my role as the duty sergeant I wanted to originally play him quite serious but then as I looked over the script several times I felt like the character could be quite funny with some subtle humor so I decided to look in to several different policeman characters but the biggest influence was the two Andy’s from the film hot fuzz I looked at their style of delivering humorous lines and toned it right down and made it much more serious but still tried to keep the essence of what made them funny characters as I continued to develop the character I also added in a feeling of superiority over Christopher as if he was a child who was just wasting my time to do this I focused a lot on posture and the positioning of my hands and added in sighs and focused on some of the pronunciation of words to show my frustration at him without making it seem like my character was being unprofessional. To also work on the humor of the character I worked with Jackko who played Ed who was Christopher’s farther on subtle reactions we had with each other based of what Christopher said for example when he says the he meant to hit the policeman we both look down at him before looking at each other awkwardly I felt these subtle pieces of the character made him stand out and allowed me to play around with the character and make him my own.  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rodger: for Rodger I took a different way of developing him from the way I normally look at characters often I will create a backstory and look into the characters backstory and I still did this to see how my character would react to other characters and different situations but I was listening to a song called forgive me by Proof: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SmQ0awd7-U and I felt that it would be the kind of song that resembles Rodger a couple of months after the events of the play so I looked at what would it take to make someone feel like this and worked backwards creating a nice character with a hundred problems thrown on top of him then making the entrance of Christopher the one problem that send him over the edge and from there create the dark angry side the audience see in the play. I tried different postures and different stances as the scenes developed and tried to get more and more tense and my scenes went on till I exploded in my last scene with all these problems finally getting the better of me and realizing it all in one angry speech aimed towards Christopher. I tried building up the anger in my voice slightly in each scene to show how fed up my character is getting and it just seems in his point of view that there is no end to the annoyance that is Christopher’s presence.

 

 

 

Park scene

Orginally, the cast would shuffle along the stage, then shuffle back in a different position. I felt this was good because it spaced out the stage and opened it up. It also gave variety to the park scene. Yet having this variety made the stage too busy and took the focus off what the actors were saying. I also felt that there was an increasing proplem with blocking each other and the speed of which the chorus goes, our goal was to be staggered and going the same speed. Turned it into the single tree. Must keep a straight face. Move in unison. I feel that the this is much better cause its simple, when we developed the scene, it gave the actors so much more energy and enthusiasm. and made the scene fresh again. if we were to do the show again, i would keep the tree. the only thing i would change is the only lady part, because that was devised by the actors and although it was a brilliant idea, i dont think we spent enough time on it to make it more stylised.

Letters Scene

Arranging the blocks

These were some of the ideas that we had for the blocks.
The first one was of someone flipping over the box it just looked like it could be a stylized way of getting the chorus out of the scene.
The only problem was that it was really tricky to do, also looking at it, it would take the emphasis off the emotion of the scene.

The second one, having two people pulling away from the box. I found, if this movement was in the right place it could be really inhancing to the scene. If we ever did this show agai. Or anything like this I would consider using it, Exspecially for the scene with ed admitting to killing Wellington, the movement shows what ed did, how his lies pushed them apart.

The third one was just an extention of the second but with two more people, I was hoping that possibly the four actors could walk round the box using the pull.

The forth one was someone leaning over the box on their back and have their arms and legs dangle from each side.
This I thought could show the exhaustion from Christopher, as he makes his way to his mothers.

All four movments I would consider using if we every did this show again or any show that potrays that meaning.

well done

Well done all, really enjoyed your show. I hope you had lots of fun and i cannot wait to work with you next term. Happy Christmas and a very happy new year full looking forward to the new year and our new project.

Mrs. Alexander Scene 11

Mrs. Alexander Scene 11

At the beginning of this scene I feel she is rather upset by the fact that Christopher went away the other day but I feel it is not in her nature to ask more in depth about why he left. She is concerned that maybe she has got Christopher in to trouble as he says “I’m not allowed to talk to you” (p.26), but she settles him by telling him that she wont tell anyone that they have been talking because in her eyes “…there is nothing wrong with having a chat. Having a chat is just being friendly, isn’t it?” (p.27). She changes the convocation because to keep him entertained but more improtantly to make him stay with her longer, talking to him about computers. Since their first meeting in the play I believe she keeps a close eye on him to make sure he is alright and to make sure that he doesn’t get into any trouble, so this is why it is odd for Christopher to hear that “I can see you sitting at your computer in your bedroom sometimes when I look across the street”.

She is highly fascinated by the fact that Christopher is doing A Level Maths a year before anyone else his age, this might be down to that maybe that she was a teacher herself (that’s how I see her). She is extremely apologetic when she gets something wrong as she does not want to upset anybody, which is very sweet of her.

Mrs. Alexander is very hesitant about saying anything to Christopher that might upset him when it comes to telling him about the affaire, but in her head I think she feels that its her duty because if he doesn’t find out now he will soon figure it out as she realizes as he is very intelligent. The way she breaks the news is in a very gentle way as she takes him to the park, which is quite and peaceful, but she doesn’t say exactly what happened because Christopher fills in the gaps for her.   

After telling him what happened between his mother and Mr. Shears, Christopher almost puts up a barrier and doesn’t want to speak to anyone which is very understandable if you just hear some terriable news. He almost treats her like a stranger again, as I feel that maybe he cant trust her as she and everyone around him has been lying by keeping this a secret all this time. “I can’t be on my own with you because you are a stranger”, “I’m not a stranger Christopher, I’m just a friend” (p.30).

I feel at the end of this scene Mrs. Alexander is feeling dreadful because she never wanted to say anything that was going to upset him or put into any trouble. 

my opinion of how the casting decisions affected the group and me

 

 •how do the casting decisions affect your group's interpretation

I believe everyone was fairly happy with the casting so were prepared for their main roles the thing that made everyone think about the roles they had were those people with multiple roles who only auditioned for one of them. Midway through there was a change in casting because someone was ill but I feel everyone reacted well and managed to cope with the change with not too much hassle. For me I looked into some of the characters I hadn’t auditioned for but had got and made them my own adding characteristics and trying out different ways of playing them and seeing how far I could take them while still making them realistic. I also looked into my main role Rodger and how I would physically play him as I hadn’t played someone of his age before so I researched into it and looked up other actors who played a character of similar age and adjusted my posture and vocals to suit the role better. I feel the casting decision aloud us as a cast to develop an understanding of how the play will look and has allowed each actor to develop their characters and experiment with different ways of portraying there characters. I looked at my characters in a Stanislavski way but adding in Brecht styles to show characterization such as gestus (repetitive movements for my character the Duty sergeant) but I also created a back story to develop an understanding of my characters relationships with other characters and figure out how they would react in certain situations.    

Points that need developed

What do you think?

What do you think?

This Is a video that was taken during the rehearsal in the theatre yesterday. In this scene we focused mainly on the chorus work.

looking back at the scene where Polly taught about doing the movement before the line was said, this is so that the movement looks more defined. We decided to import that advice to all the other chorus scenes. My only concern is that during the ‘Four’ line when the chorus turns their heads, do you think it should be done before Dan’s line is said, or after, cause I don’t know about during? What do you think?

Mrs. Alexander Scene 8

Mrs. Alexander Scene 8

During our lesson with Shaun on Tuesday, Dan and I worked on our first scene where Christopher first talks to Mrs. Alexander. We wanted to work on this scene to discover better ways of introducing Mrs. Alexander and her relationship with Christopher. We started off by showing him what we had already done but we realized in order to make this scene more believable we both had to have a background story, for example Christopher is coming over to ask questions about the death of Mrs. Shears dog, Wellington. Whereas I did not have one, which for me, looking back on it made it harder to relate to the scene as I didn’t know what I was doing as my character before Christopher enters. I decided to be playing with my dog in my front garden, which I believe was her normal day to day life, as soon as Christopher enters, the order of her day has been displaced but she is happy that someone is talking to her no matter what the convocation is about as I feel she gets rather lonely. Christopher’s questions are quick and fast about the death of Wellington, but when he finishes his questions she immediately tries to create another convocation starting with her grandson (whom I am guessing she does not see a lot, because she forgets how old he is). She is taken back by the fact that Christopher answers back and in some way she is drawn to him as he is around the same age as her grandson. I feel she wants to connect with him better so she finds things that they have in common, that they both like and have pets, they both drink squash and like biscuits. She wastes no time asking him “Do you want to come in for tea?” (p.19), but when his reaction is “No”, she completely understands and finds a better way of making him stay with her by telling him “Well maybe I could bring some tea out here. Do you like lemon squash?” (p.20), she almost seems to be making such a huge effort for him to stay by trying to cater to his every need. She is shocked by the fact that he doesn’t know what Battenberg is, because its probably her favorite but is fascinated by the way he describes it in such an interesting way, I think she then realizes that this young boy is very intelligent.  

Next I shall be analyzing scene 11, where Mrs. Alexander tells Christopher about the affaire. 

My individual challenges for this project

My individual challenges for this project:

One thing I found challenging at the start was having to play multiple characters I have done this in the past but not to the same extent as in this performance my main character Rodger doesn’t appear till the second part of the play and before then I play a variety of very different characters. I normally like to go into a lot of detail into my characters (backstory, intentions, and relationships) but with some of my characters only having one line or no information I had to go another root to make them stand out using gestures and different types of characterization like animalistic’s  gestus and work on my vocal skills to make my characters unique from each other and stand out to the audience. After working on each character I have managed to develop them into their own unique parts. Now looking at playing multiple characters I can see that it has given me lots of freedom to try out different acting techniques and work on completely different characters and what was a problem has now become a positive allowing me to make characters that can stand out even with only small cameos before going into my main character Rodger.

Another challenge I found was ensemble chorus work.  I have done ensemble chorus work in previous performances but were as before I was leading the chorus now I am part of it and there is no one leading it. I have found this difficult as I am involved heavily and that meant there was loads of ques to remember and as we developed the movement people where still learning lines and missing out que words which made it hard to learn the blocking. The main difficulty I found was getting my movement exactly the same as everyone else’s and at the same time if this is not done it looked sloppy and didn’t add anything to the performance. The chorus work is hugely important to improving the scenes and has to be spot on. One difficulty was swapping from chairs that we were using in lots of the blocking work to blocks which were larger and needed two people to carry this meant we needed to re work lots of our blocking and find ways round certain problems like switching positions quickly, stomping on the floor but the best way I found to sorting this out was just to keep going over it which was another problem as we needed everyone to do these scenes so practicing was hard as we had to get everyone involved and available at the same time.

My view of what the main themes are in our play:

 

My view of what the main themes are in our play:

I feel the main theme in the play is the battle for independence and this is shown mainly through Christopher. I feel that as he is experiencing what most teenagers do the need for freedom and independence and this is clearly shown through his relationship with his farther Ed as the play develops he continuously ignores Ed’s orders and runs off on his own. This theme greatly influences the change and development of Christopher through the play and I feel is the main and most important theme as it is looked into in almost every scene. At the start of the play he can’t handle difficult situations often breaking down and trying to block out his problems (curling into a ball and moaning) he eventually with guidance from Siobhan manages to get to London by himself and take his maths A levels showing that he has become a much more independent person. I feel the play revolves heavily around Christopher so his development is the key to the whole play making this theme in my view the most important.

Another key theme in my view is: Loss as every main character in the play has suffered some kind of personal loss (Christopher has lost his mother and the dog wellington) (Ed has lost his wife through her affair) (Judy had lost Christopher) these losses have a huge impact in the development of the story and shape the whole play. These losses from before the play is set are the main turning points of the play when they are uncovered and as Christopher goes through the play investigating he discovers all these past losses and sets in motions the key events of the play. Looking into this theme also helped me a lot with the development of my character Rodger as he is linked into the losses of all the main characters this helped me develop how my character would react with the events and other characters in the play.

One site that helped me understand the themes of the play is http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/the-curious-incident-of-the-dog-in-the-night-time/themes.html hope this helps you all.

My Experience of The Curious Incident of The Dog In The Night-Time

When I first learned that for our first drama performance we would be studying "The Curious Incident...Dog In The Night-time" I initially thought it sounds dull but my opinion changed when I started to read the book play version. The novel was a best seller and because of the huge success it was adapted into a script and performed in the West End. When I read the scripted version of the book I thought it very interesting, I enjoyed it and I completely changed my views on the book. I felt amazed and proud that we were performing this and I couldn't wait to get started.

The Themes  
The themes I gathered in the play were Curiosity, Tragedy, Love, Hate, Independence and Ambitious.

I say these are the themes in the play because even though it's in the title a curious incident did take place but also to find out the way the dog had died is a tragedy. To find a garden fork stabbed inside of a dog is not only sick but also unnatural. Love and Hate varied throughout the story, I say the main themes is independence and ambitious. The character Christopher found himself to be independent when he went to carry out an investigation of the dog all by himself. Ambitious because finding out who killed the dog Wellington was his goal and he had nothing else on his mind until he achieves that goal.

I think the play was structured very creatively. I say this because the story is very strange and full of surprises and it was so unexpected. The character Christopher Boone really stood out to me not because of his Asperger Autism but the fact that he is 15 years old and wants to take the matters of the dog's death into his own hands and find the culprit. It makes an incredible storyline.

Castings
I think everyone were fairly happy with their role in the production and wanted to work as soon as possible.

Rehearsals
In terms of rehearsals for the first 2 weeks we only rehearsed in class for a couple of hours. It didn't give us enough time to work on all scenes. We were given feedback each time from our teachers and classmates for improvements. For this production to even stand a chance we came to as a group decision to decide to stay after hours to work on the production. Altogether after hours we have had approx. 4-5 rehearsals but it has been difficult since not all casts were present.

Challenges
Using my own previous experience of rehearsals, I know it is not easy it's very difficult because there are always obstacles in the way. Such as lack of commitment, lack of motivation, appropriate communication, rehearsal priorities are not always number one on the list. In this production I have seen some familiar obstacles which has occurred.

In Conclusion
I think the production will be a great success not only for us but for the audience as well but in order for this to happen "Commitment" needs to be number one! 

Shivam 'Shivvy' Modessa

Movement scene

This is part of the letters scene, I think creating this was brilliant because it developed into the movement Peices, before it was quite dull, the only thing that needs sorting is keeping it in unison. Also possible to make the bit with Siobhan and christopher in the letters scene

What are the themes of the play - in depth

 What are the themes of the play?

I feel the themes of this play are: The struggle to become independent:

The novel is based around Christopher who is becoming of age, to become more independent which is a challenge for him as he has Asperger’s Syndrome, which means he has trouble understanding people, dealing with new situations (train station/tube (p.68)) and making decisions. If at any time he feels frightened he shuts downs, curling himself into a ball and making noises or counting numbers (p.93) to help him concentrate. Even thou he has this he is a typical teenager who wants to take care of himself and to do his own thing, for example in the play you see him arguing with Ed because he has been lying about doing investigation to see who killed Wellington (pp.33-35). By the end of the play you see Christopher being more independent, planning for college and wanting to live by himself.

Subjectivity:

The book is based on the murder of Mrs. Shear’s dog, Wellington but half of the book is Christopher’s thoughts and feelings on physics or the supernatural. When Christopher finds the letters his mother has written to him, he almost immediately believes that the letters maybe for a different Christopher when he discovers the date on the postmark (p.39, 16^th October 2011), whereas the reader would see that Ed has been lying to him and that his mother hasn’t died. Although he does say “I decided that I would not think about it anymore that night because I didn’t have enough information and could easily LEAP TO THE WRONG CONCLUSIONS” this shows the reader that Christopher is thinking for himself and does not want to get himself into any more trouble than he already is.

Science, Technology and Math Problems:  How do the casting decisions affect your group's interpretation:

Throughout the play Christopher’s life has to be structured and logical, for example at the every beginning when he’s at the police station he empties out his pockets and every item he has with him is for a specific reason (p.7). He refuses to take off this watch as it’s in his nature to know what time and date it is so he can recall on what happens and also gives him a peace of mind “I need my watch to know exactly what time it is”. The scene before he is recalling on the when Siobhan when she says

“I want to do sex with you.’ I never said that.”

“Yes you did.”

“I didn’t use those words Christopher.”

“You did on 12 September last year. At first break.”

Shows the audience just how Christopher relies on his watch and how well he remembers certain issues.

I believe everyone, no matter who you act out; everyone has his or her own interpretation of each of the characters. Some people see Christopher as a rather dumb child that cant understand and cant interact with other people whereas I see him as a very intelligent young boy who tries to become overcome his condition and loves the simple things in life like achieving his goals (A-level Math’s, discovering who killed Wellington and likes learning new facts about science) (p.8 “For a long time scientists were puzzled…”) (p.27 “I’m going to do A Level Math’s next month. And I’m going to get an A*…” and making sure everything is in it’s place.

Even right at the end of the play when he is taking his A Level Maths paper he reads out his favourite question about triangles and Siobhan tells him "You don't have to tell us how you solved it."... "if anybody wants to find out how you solved the maths question then they can stay and you can tell them at the end." When I read this, I can just see Christopher's face light up when this question comes up as he loves knowing the answer and showing people that he can do it. Although when he comes out of the test he questions himself as he believes that he didn't get all the questions right and then comes up with reasons why he couldn't think properly. By the very end of the play he is incredibly happy with his results and feels like he can take on anything.

How are you approaching rehearsals so far?

I believe that I am putting all I can into making this play, the main reason why I love acting this play out is that I feel like my character; Mrs. Alexander suits me really well. I feel like she’s an old lady who doesn’t have many visits apart from when her family sees her on special dates like Christmas, Easter and her birthday. So when Christopher comes investigating she pulls out all the stops to make him stay and chat to her, (p.19 “Do you want to come in for tea”?) (p.20 “lemon squash”, “what about Battenberg”, “Perhaps I should bring out some biscuits instead. Do you like biscuits?”) as sometimes she’s rather lonely by herself with only her dog to keep her company.

What are your individual challenges for this project?

I feel like one of the challenges we have as a group is listening which does sometimes become a problem when we do out of time rehearsals as we don’t dedicate someone to direct us, but this is something we are working on as a group.

My recent challenge is pronouncing my words and syllables with the accent I have chosen for my character. I feel adding this accent/voice has almost created more of a personality for Mrs. Alexander, so every time I do the accent I am immediately into my character, which helps me tremendously.