Physical Theatre

29/01/15

Today we started our first Physical Theatre lesson. We received a box from the Barbican containing several props such has a military hat, fake money, masks, etc. We also had a ball for a warm up game. We started by the warm up game, the goal was to send the ball to another case without letting it bound more than once. 
Then we did an ensemble development. We had to walk around the space, stop, look at a point
reach it and then go away from it all as one.
It is a really interesting exercise as no one exactly knows who is going to move and when. 

Complicite

Complicite is a physical theatre company created by Simon McBurney Annabel Arden and Marcello Magni in 1983. They performed their first show that same year and won the Perrier Comedy Award two years later for their performance at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. The company is based in London even though they are actively touring through the UK. 

The new type of theatre they created is Physical Theatre. They base their performance on straight acting and as all a lot of physical movements to express their characters' feelings and emotions. They have a huge use of technology such as projections and camera but base their plays on serious and philosophical themes. 
They describe their work as "seeing what is most alive, integrating text, music, image and action to create surprising, disruptive theatre"

Their production of Shun Khin first opened in 2008 in Tokyo and then was transferred in London. It was revived in those two cities one year later and opened in Paris and Taipai in 2010. ""Superficially," you begin, "it describes a sadomasochistic relationship between the lovely Shun-kin, a dominant, blind player of an evocative stringed instrument, the shamisen, and her submissive servant lover, who blinds himself in an ultimate act of love. Yet, just as the performance has several narrators, and several actors to play the key roles, so there are several layers of meaning and feeling, as the frame shifts between a noisy, apparently heartless modern Japan and the pre-western values of Shun-kin."

Their production of A Disappearing Number opened in 2008 and received several awards including a Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Play. The play was performed in London (Novello Theatre & Barbican Theatre) and Plymouth (Theatre Royal). Afterwards it opened in New York (Lincoln Center Festival) and toured in Mumbai and Hyderabad. It was also broadcasted in over 300 cinemas all around the world  in 2010. The play is about mathematicians studying the concept of infinity and string theory.
Their production of The Master and the Margarita opened at the Barbican and sold out its run from 2010 to 2010. 

24/02/15

Today we opened the box from the Barbican. There was masks, a ball, newspapers, a military hat, an umbrella, a briefcase and fake money. We also read several article, based on women's right, vote and segregation. Now we have to pick up which topic we want to base our piece on. Afterwards we chose to do it on women's right. I'm really pleased with that choice because I have always had a lot of interest for this topic.

26/02/15
Today we did a workshop with Joyce from Complicite, we played a few warm up games.
We did a group exercise, we were walking in a square, then everyone had to look at something at the same time, reach for it, and suddenly go away from it. It was really interesting to do as we have to be really aware of everyone around us and be flexible to what they do.

Warm up Games:

9 Square: 9 people are placed in 9 square, 1 is the bottom and 9 is the top. Everyone must let the ball bounce once in their square and then quick it to another person's square.
The grid: it is a focus exercise. People are placed around the grid. First, one person must go to the opposite group, then two people, three and finally four. Then four, three, two and one. The point is to finish all together.



After the warm up game we started working in groups with a ball. We had to create a short piece about bullying/rejection. What I learnt is that, to me, physical theatre is based on choreography as much as improv. Our group tried to plan what we were going to do but it didn't really work, so we just improvised our piece. But that only works for the scenario idea, so to make it a really nice piece of physical theatre, it has to be choreographed very precisely.

We played Simon says, which is closely related to our topic choice. One person says "do this" and everyone does it without any question, which reminds us what happened with men and women not so long ago.

We also did some freeze frame images. The whole piece was based on the number five and its component. (5 / 4+1 / 3+2 / 2+2+1 / 1+1+1+1+1 / 3+1+1 / 2+1+1+1) We used three people and two props and had to create a piece using the different combinations of five.



12/03/15

Today we created a few groups to work on a case study and create a piece on it. I am working with Deneille and Isabel on discrimination at work. We reversed the roles as we only have one man in our team, we decided to work on men's discrimination. Our piece is based in an office, Isabel is the boss, Deneille and I are employees, doing the same work. We arrive at the same time in the morning and start working, we are using a table for our piece which works really well. At the beginning no one can really tell there is any kind of discrimination but after a little bit, the boss asks Deneille to get her coffee and gives me money while he's gone. Afterwards we go on a break but the boss sends Deneille back to work and let me have a break. At the end of the day, Deneille and I go to get our pay and I end up being more paid than him.

23/03/15

Our work on women's right has improved a lot. Our scene is really nice and really makes sense now, it also looks way nicer now we started choreographing it but we still need to finish.