Research for Debbie Tucker Green :

Me Saskia and Kj found different sources for our presentation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debbie_Tucker_Green

http://www.blackplaysarchive.org.uk/explore/playwrights/tucker-green-debbie

http://www.theguardian.com/stage/2005/mar/30/theatre

Saskia found a really interesting fact which was in the play 'Hang' the character THREE has to look at a letter and every time they did the show she didn't know what was written on the paper so she reacted in a real manner every time and so every time they did the show her reaction was always different, I found this really interesting and also a really good idea because then it makes the reaction real.

She spells her name in lower-case letters because she dislikes the look of a capital letter. if you notice how in all of her plays start in this way. We think this is because it looks more dynamic. Softer start to an intense play.

The plays we took inspiration from and included into 14 by 14:

Motortown:

This play is by Simon Stephens and is written around the time of the London bombings of 2005. Danny returns from being in the army and is unwell. It is dangerous because he can be very violent. Danny comes across people he has a past with called Marley, Jade, Lee and more. Marley used to be his girlfriend, he kills Jade and Lee is his brother who has autism. I did like this play and I had a scene with Michael with him playing Danny and me playing Marley.

Hang:

This is written by Debbie Tucker Green, and involves three characters and one of them is wanting to kill her husband and the reason why she called the play Hang is because she decides to hang him. I loved this play and I did a scene from this play too. The character THREE is meant to be played by a black woman and ONE and TWO have to be either two boys, two girls, or one boy and one girl.

Shopping and Fucking:

This was basically the first play that we read and I wasn't overly keen on this play because I didn't quite understand it but I think it was a good play. It is the first full-length play that Mark Ravenhill. It involves a lot of sexual violence. It involves drugs, phone sex, sex, gay scenes and is really mainly about that sort of origin.

One for the road:

This play was written by Harold Pinter and is about a man called Nicholas who is torturing a family. OneOne for the Road, considered Pinter's "statement about the human rights abuses of totalitarian governments",^[1] was inspired, according to Antonia Fraser,^[2] by reading on May 19, 1983, Jacobo Timerman's Prisoner Without a Name, Cell Without a Number, a book about torture on Argentina's military dictatorship; later, on January 1984, he got to write it after an argument with two Turkish girls at a family birthday party on the subject of torture. The play is set in a room the whole day throughout the morning, afternoon and night. 

Sing yer heart out for the lads:

This involves racism, this show was written by Roy Williams and involves the match of 2000 England vs Germany football game. It involves supporters coming to watch the game at the pub with Gina and her dad, Gina has a son called Glen who messes around a lot and gets in with the wrong crowds who also has a dad that does nothing for him.

Confirmation:

This was the play where Saskia used her monologue from which was written by Chris Thorpe and is performed by Chris as well which is about politics and can be seen as some racial issues brought in too. We watched the play of this and I really liked it because he interacted with the audience and really made you think.

The colour of justice:

This is by Richard-Norton Taylor. Kj did her monologue from this play which was a lady giving a speech at a court case. It was produced in 1999. In 1993 Stephen Lawrence who was a black teenager was stabbed to death in a racist attack by a gang of white youths. The police investigation failed to provide sufficient evidence to convict. Based on the harrowing transcripts of the public inquiry, this is a dramatic reconstruction of the first hearings which reflected the national outcry at the police's mishandling of the case. First seen at the Tricycle Theatre, London, this remarkable production received instant acclaim and subsequently transferred to the West End.

Extra evaluation:

I think us performing in the round was very different and very challenging for us because we have never done anything like it. I really think we pulled it off and did well, Although I did feel we stuck to facing more sides than others. That could just be how we set our scenes or just where the props were for us to pick up from other people.

I think it was really good for us to hold up signs for which show we was doing scenes from. Although I think it still confused some people in the audience, it helped a lot more otherwise I reckon people may have thought it was just one show.

Being so close to the audience was very nerve racking and the fact we had to sit there with a straight face and not being able to talk to anyone was very difficult as some people got confused whether we was audience or performers, some people asked the actors if the seats next to them are being used or when does it start/how long we had been there for etc. That was hard because we had to ignore them and I felt so rude at the time but it had to be done. I had my dad sit next to me in the six o'clock show and my mum sit next to me at the 8 o'clock show, I wish they didn't do it, but it was a good chance for me to challenge myself in ignoring them. The show seemed to go on really quick. I was really nervous to perform the shows but I was so excited to show it to the audience because contemporary is something I haven't done before and nobody in my family had seen me act in that way before.

I loved my scenes, my favourite was definitely the one I did with Daisy because it was so different for me, I felt like the character development was so good in that scene. I was so happy with how it went and I'm glad we changed it to me moving around more so people could see Daisy more. I felt like me and Daisy worked really well together and you could really feel the tension in that scene I felt.

I think my weakest scene was my scene with Michael in Motortown purely because I had no idea how to act Marley, I had less knowledge about Motortown even though I had read the play. I just felt like out of my three scenes, this was my weakest scene.

Overall I'm really proud of myself and everyone else and gutted that was our last show together. I am going to miss working with my group so much.

14/14 Evaluation:

This was the poster for our show, it's pretty clear why it was called 14 by 14. It was a mix of different contemporary shows and doing scenes with either two or three people all together and we involved Kj's and Saskia's contemporary monologues as well.

Personally I think the show went well considering we had to switch the dates up a lot. I really loved the fact we didn't go on the stage and that we performed it in the round, with us sitting in the audience, I felt like that was way more powerful than the audience watching us on the stage. I felt the tension in the air and the awkwardness that the audience felt in certain scenes for example subjects involving race. I really think we drew the audience in really well and I'm glad we held up signs saying what play we was doing the scene from, otherwise I don't think the audience would have understood at all.

Overall evaluation:

Our set was very basic, it was based in the round with black curtains on a stand around every face of the square. We had very limited seating with us actors in the audience as well. I feel like the set worked really well with the show, it brought so much more tension into the audience and made them feel really uncomfortable. We always sat in the audience, so the audience never knew who was going to act next which I thought was good in the way that they was always guessing who would be next. Being in the round was challenging for everyone I think personally, this is because we have never done it before and you constantly have to move around so that everyone is the audience see's you.

The costume was very basic. It was a modern period of clothing which included black jeans, white t-shirts and then people would add costume for the characters such as cardigans or blazers that was meant just for that character, for example Lily wore a cardigan for Marley's character and I then had to wear that next as I was playing Marley and so it didn't confuse the audience. The costume definitely worked with the set as it was as blank as the set & lighting was. It didn't make us look like outcasts, and it made everyone look the same.

We used sound as the audience came in, it was the same song on repeat and then we used music before every scene and at the end of every scene when we was finishing the scene and it went into a black out. Ella had a directors vision for the show, she wanted us to feel the music and breathe the music in and out to really become the piece and the music to be part of us. I felt like it really impacted the piece because the music was quite eerie and I felt like if it was performed with no music, it wouldn't of had the same vibe.

The lighting was very natural, it was one bright light in the shade of white and we used slow blackouts with still some dimmed lights so that we could see and that was the only lighting we used as we didn't want to overdue it purely because of the set and our costume, it all needed to be neutral and linked together. There was no moments when it really impacted apart from when it was going into blackouts and the end of the scene was quite serious.

The characters were all different shows so there was no same characters and stuff. But the characters were from contemporary plays. But we all did developments of the characters in different ways, so for example Lily played Marley a lot different to how I played Marley. I didn't use an accent to be honest. But I did play my voice down a little bit because I am quite a well spoken person and Marley is not a well spoken person at all so I had to play down my diction a lot.

My character of Nicolas developed so much. i already had to change it around as the character is originally a male. I made the character come across so evil but in a subtle way because I didn't want my character to almost come across like a panto villian.

To be honest, I could not really do much for my character of 'ONE' in hang because it's almost completely normal.

There was definitely some moments of impacts such as when there was explicit scenes/when political issues such as racism, and rape made it really impact on the audience. There were certain subjects brought up or shown in these scenes which you don't really hear people say out loud and I think it made the audience uncomfortable being surrounded in it. There was no way that our show would have been as affective without it being in the round because it kept the tension throughout and made the audience be drawn in more.

How I developed the character of 'Marley'

Marley:

At first I really wasn't sure how to play Marley, I didn't know whether she was nice, unkind, chav style, polite or what her voice was like. I would say I am a well spoken person most of the time and I felt like I needed to bring that down in this scene with Michael.

After a few times of us doing the scene in front of Ella, she felt like I needed to come across as if I'm almost about to reach out to the character of Danny, but he almost pushes me away even though in other scenes it comes across that Marley is all he wants. We added him holding my hands at the end when he asks me to go back inside.

So when I first started playing Marley, I was playing her as if she was really cold towards Danny, with slight concern but she doesn't really care. Some of my lines came across like she was teasing Danny, so I played with that. Eventually I started to play her a little less cold, bit numb towards Danny, but also showing concern for him, and showing that I still care even if he is really unwell.

Working with Michael was great, I felt we created a great connection with the relationships of the characters.

HANG - SCENE WITH LILY AND SASKIA

Ella asked me to do a scene with Lily and Saskia in the play of 'Hang' by Debbie tucker green.Hang has three characters in it called 'ONE, TWO AND THREE' Three is usually played by a black lady and one and two can be either both male, both female, or one of the other sex. In this scene, I play ONE, Lily plays TWO, and Saskia plays THREE.

In this play, in some of the scenes you will see this '/' which basically means whoever is talking will get talked over by the person who has the next line. I have never seen this before I read this play so I found it interesting but this can be difficult because sometimes the overlay isn't done at the right time and can be quite difficult. This scene is definitely a challenge for me and I like the scene itself.

Our particular scene is when THREE finds out when ONE AND TWO have a letter from THREE'S husband from six weeks ago and she is not happy. ONE is basically lying saying that they had only received it a few days ago and then TWO comes in and basically tells the truth which is that they read it five weeks ago.

REHEARSALS :

I have done a read through with Michael:

This was done before we ever showed it to Ella. When Ella watched it she said Michael needed to be a bit more of a weirdo/crazy/mental. She thought he was being to soft especially at the end when he tells my character to go back inside, Ella said he needed to sound more threatening then sad. Also that I needed to be a little bit more blunt with him but also stunned at some of the stuff he says too my character.

Due to the commedia workshop we haven't done many rehearsals and have had to move our show which we are now doing on the 17th & 18th of March. We are performing in the round and we will be sitting in with the audience. I am really excited to perform this way as I have never done it before.