Devising-Week 2

Monday

On Monday, we tried to do our opening scene but we got stuck for ideas. We tried to all different openings but we still couldn't find one that would make sense to the audience and somewhere that we could go with the script. We decided that we would message each other over Facebook to see if we could go anywhere with the scene.

Tuesday

On Tuesday, we decided to scrap this idea because we decided that it is more of an idea for a film than for theatre. I really liked this idea but as soon as we tried to do an opening scene, we struggled on what we could do. We tried coming up with a range ideas like the use of strobe lighting but nobody could come up with any appropriate dialogue leading us too having to change the idea entirely. We also decided that as this is a devising unit, it wouldn't be appropriate to do this idea as it wouldn't be original as we was practically copying the film "Would you rather?".

I really liked this idea and I wanted to carry on with it but it’s not something we should do for devising because the idea is not original. We are just copying the whole concept of the film but changing the characters and the challenges slightly.

We then brainstormed the chasing pavements idea to see what we could come up with.

Thursday

We had this idea that we would do this piece which I think could be called “Jamie’s always watching.”

The whole idea of it is that it’s like big brother with the cameras but Jamie is the leader of the UK and has put up camera’s to make sure that nobody makes any fashion statement and we all look the same. The story follows a rebel group who plans to take down the cameras and eventually overrule Jamie. The twist is that the leader of the rebels is actually Jamie and is actually spying on the rebels to see what their plan is. We don’t find this out until she kills everyone at the end.

We now have this idea that the leader would also have two boyfriends at once which would lead to her having to choose who to kill and who to tell the truth to and maybe running away with. We still haven't worked out what will exactly happen to make her kill the rebel group. Throughout the whole play we would call Jamie a "he" but it would turn out to be a girl.

I really like this idea because it's much more original than the other one we had before and I feel like the storyline would make more sense. Also, I think the audience would be able to understand this one easier as they wouldn't get confused on the situation at the beginning.

Initial thoughts on piece

I think that our idea of a stagey version of "would you rather?" is really good idea because I think that the whole audience would be easily engaged and the whole storyline would easily be easy to follow because the host would be explaining to the contestants what they have to do meaning that the audience would be able to follow what the host says so that could understand the storyline and what is going on.

Challenges

I also like the idea of the challenges because it would mean that the whole piece wouldn't just be dialogue. The challenges could be a moving piece or go into a full dance piece depending on what goes on in the challenge. This would meant that the audience wouldn't get bored. This would be quite good because we have dancers in the group who could choreograph the movement and dance piece.

Plot Twist

I think that the plot twist at the end of the play with the quiet person ending up being the smartest the person and winning the game and then when the host then goes onto kill her, she kills the host instead.

Also, the part where the winner doesn't survive but goes on one to one with the host to see who will host the best game and who will die, I think this will shock the audience and make the audience more intrigued.

Devising-Week 1

This week we have started to devise for our devising unit. We have decided to go for the idea of a game show where the contestants would sit around a table and a host would go round the table making the contestants do a variety of tasks to stay alive.The idea was that they go in there expecting a game where whoever wins will get a cash prize but it turns out that they are actually playing to survive.We got this idea from the film “Would you rather?” which is what actually happens in the film but we would change the challenges and the characters to have certain traits that would be portrayed throughout the story.

The characters are:

• The Host-the person who the players think that organised the game. At the end when we find out that he was the last person to play the game and win, he didn’t get to leave. He only gets to survive for the next game before he would then have to have a battle with the person who won the current game and whoever wins this then gets to be the host for the next game. Nobody ever gets to go back outside into the open world.

Contestants-These are the people who come here who are in desperate need of money and reveal this during the rounds before they are killed off. They start off by chasing money but end up chasing survival. The characters are (we haven’t made up names yet):

1. Dom-The scared one-this is the one who refuses to do anything and doesn't think that the host will actually kill him if he refuses to do anything. He is too scared and gets shot by the host within the first round to set an example for the rest of the contestants.
2. Ashley-The funny one who tries to make a joke about everything that is going on and ends up not taking the game seriously enough which ends up with him being too slow in one of the challenges and gets killed off in round 2.
3. Carl-The quiet one who doesn't say anything unless he has to. The round which he gets killed in (round 3) is one where he is meant to be very vocal but nobody hears him leading to him losing meaning that he gets killed.
4. Toby-The one who falls in love with one of the female contestants and gives his life for her so that she can survive for him. This leads to him getting killed in round 4.
5. Freya-She is the person who starts off really innocent and doesn't want to kill anyone at the beginning in the middle there’s a trigger that makes her want to kill everyone in the game and have no sympathy for anyone. She is full of hate and doesn't control her anger in the last round leading to her getting killed in the final round (round 6). She is the person who becomes the runner-up and is the last contestant to be killed.
6. Meg-the smart one who identifies the weaknesses of everyone and ultimately wins the game. She then goes up against the host and kills him taking his place as a new host who will host the next game.

Next week we will start to devise our first couple of scenes and try to have a bigger back story on our characters.

Double drama (28th December)

This week we added more to our story by creating a movement sequence for our first story of the brother. It starts with the first person getting a job. This then leads to him going on a dance all the way home. We have decided to make the dance comedic so that the Year 7's stay engaged and also they would find it more enjoyable. He then comes home to find out that his wife has left him causing him to go on a rampage. Then the wife's lover comes round to collect her stuff as she is too scared of him to do it himself as he gets angry easily. This causes a fight to happen between the two and a black-out happens just before the husband kills the wife's lover so that the audience don't know as they find out later that it's the reason why he's one of the three Giants. We thought it would be good to put a fight scene in as Year 7's like violence and would keep them engaged for longer.

I think that we could improve by making our story a bit more clearer so that the Year 7's. Would definitely understand what's going on.