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Musical Theatre Worksheet

Context of the piece – The number we performed ‘Turn it off’ is from the 2011 Musical by Trey Parker and Matt Stone. The creators of South Park and in turn the South Park Musical which was nominated for an Oscar. The musical is satirical of religion and all of the negatives that come with it. Such as: preaching; war and homophobia. Turn it off is specifically about homophobia within the religion and all about repressing it, “Find the box that’s gay and crush it.”

The time the Musical was created – In 2011 this Musical was released. In 2011 a big part of America was that a candidate for presidency ‘Mitt Romney’ was indeed a Mormon. He was incredibly bigoted and this gave it a lot of popularity and attention. The musical was unfortunately not aimed at him due it being in development for seven years however, the timing of it was perfect!

What type of musical is it and what is the style of dance, acting and singing performed in it? – The main style in this musical is camp! The vocal stylings range across the board such as ensemble style ballads with Turn it off. An emotional anthem with I believe and of course, a use of harmonics and soul with ‘You and me but mostly me.’ Dance on the other hand, it ranges creatively from tap to tribal influences.

What impact did the musical have on the industry at the time? – The three most prestigious awards won include: Tony award for best book of a musical; Tony award for best original score and Grammy award for the best musical theatre album. These three awards are very prestigious due to the Grammys being the centrefold of music awards and Tony’s being the centre for performance! The musical is still being performed as strong as ever with over 7 years of fun and grossing over £500 Million. The impact was great due to the controversial topics Meaning more people went to see it and many religious groups buying out tickets so the public couldn’t see it

What skills and techniques are you going to have to focus on to rehearse and perform this piece? – For me, the main area is the ability to sing while dancing. Our choreography may be simple but it is a challenge to have a strong diaphragm while moving about frequently. I believe I understand the character of Elder Cunningham and the number itself.

Strength when learning this piece? – I found a lot of strength in standing and acting like my character. He is very hunched and excitable Which I was able to really bring to my advantage when doing a Dance move as I could be crazy with it and if I slipped a little, that would be fine as it would look in character.

Weakness when learning this piece? – Anything dance related. Dance is my weakest area out of singing, acting and dance.

What have you learnt from this piece and what skills can you take with you to the FMP? – I have certainly learned how to perform in an ensemble while standing out. I have really worked on singing in a more male octave and created some lovely harmonics with Ethan as the top Tenors. I believe I can take my strengths in singing and acting through!

Photos for Microsoft

Vitamin D

Cotton Wool accent!

Cotton wool is Scottish, the dialect is Scottish. It had to be presented in a Scottish accent, as someone who had never ventured into Scotch accents before I had to learn the differences such as the main three types portrayed in media, Edinburgh, Glaswegian and Highland.

An example of these three accents are: Christina McKinney (Ugly Betty); Kevin Bridges (Comedian) and the cast of Balamory.

Glaswegian was naturally lower, the Edinburgh accent was not exactly soft but it was not as harsh as the Glaswegian, and the highlands was incredibly high and comedic.I did use the highland accent when doing an impression of a referenced character ‘Auntie Jude.’

I spoke a lot to my tutor Hilary and I often spoke in a Scottish accent to try and get the hang of it, one big key component was to speak with a big mouth and learn how to pronounce the alphabet with the accent which is what me and a few others did to help with my pronunciation.

Close to show night the accent needed tweaking as it was stereotypical and not natural, me and the student tutor Charlie explored how to speak more naturally, we picked up that my accent was hindered by how low I was trying to speak in order to play it more straight but we came to the conclusion of that it didn’t need to be that low. My speaking voice can just feature more falling inflections in a counter to my high inflections as well just slowing down my lines.

Once the voice was finalised we then spoke about where the body should lead from. The tummy, my character is drunk and naturally being a larger person I could incorporate that into walking with a chubby slump.

Change of characterisation

The Colonel had been a shaky character to characterise due to the desire of attempting a funny but naturalistic performance of him however Dick Barton is a rather melodramatic piece that relies on big characters and over exaggerated line delivery.

As you can see the execution was rather at a low and didn’t feature a volume that would be heard by an entire auditorium so throughout rehearsal process I watched shows that featured very large British archetypal characters such as Lord Melchett and Lord Flashheart (The Blacladder TV series).

After examination of the loud and crude personas of these Burly British men I applied it to the Commedia stock character, The Il Capitano! Applying the loud volume and gigantic movements of this persona I was able to finally realise and perform the incredibly funny Colonel from Dick Barton!

Group choreography.

27/11/17

As you can see we are tidying up the the dance. Right now I can clearly see that I am slightly out of time compared to my fellow dancers. This will be improved by practice with the group.

4/12/17

My timing is improving and our group piece has been interjected into the dance piece very smoothly.

Clowning

Clowning at this moment in time is a slight struggle. Not due to a lack of understanding but with the choice of choosing a persona, this comes from how I have so many aspects of my personality… I can decide. I’m currently thinking a very stroppy clown that always gets annoyed or a very sad clown that is often getting upset and struggling to do most tasks. With the comedy being how sad the clown actually is.

Devising with Charlee

In Lesson today we were told to bring stimulus for a devising piece. We were all put into a group and told that these items would be the stimulus for a movement piece. I was paired with:Chloe,Anna and Jay.

I brought: a necklace; Jay brought boxing gloves; Anna brought a key ring and Chloe brought dancing shoes.

Our story tells the tale of how two professional dancers can get somewhere even further and stronger by embracing those who aren’t as strong and experienced as them.

The falls and lifts are all representations of being beaten down in a rehearsal to then be brought up and embraced, the key with this piece was clear contact and emotive differences between the characters. Chloe and Anna being more fluid and dancer like while me and Jay were slightly nervous.

Movement with Lauren. 13/09/17 and 20/09/17.

(13/09/17)

In today’s lesson we explored movement and the human string ideas of following and leading to then moving as one.

I struggled with this concept of controlling and being led with a partner due to inexperience with complete movement however with more practice and researching the likes of ‘frantic assembly’ I should be able to hone my skills.

20/09/17

https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=0-0wgX0SIf8

This lesson we focussed on the round by through movement where we focused on the world we were in: before the touch; during the touch and after the touch. We had to make every movement count and be part of a little image. Such as me and Greg using our levels and size difference to role and portray a fight.

In the video we see me and Sam using our touch in a meaningful manner to represent the love for a dead family member. Continually clinging for dear life and embracing and moving constantly by using this practice of every movement and contact being incredibly meaningful and part of the story.

Commedia Dell’Arté in modern media.

In the scheme of characters with the stock characters, there are ten who are focused on most.

Magnifico – the important head of the house hold who thinks with his brain and moves only a little (whenever he does move). Even though he is incredibly bright, he is still very dopey. A modern equivalent would be Professor Farnsworth from Futurama.
Pantalone – The Pantalone is a stock character who is money obsessed and believes that everything has a price. He is driven by his desire to be the richest he can possibly be, the modern equivalent of this character is Mr Burns from The Simpsons. (1) As you can see from the video (the link is in the bibliography) Mr Burns is trying to avoid giving money until heavily being jeered into it, despite his incredibly wealthy state. Once he starts giving away money, he starts over reacting like the Pantalone would if he had to part with even a single penny.
Il Dottore – Plenty of power is possessed by Il Dottore, despite his stupidity. The character has a lot of status for someone who knows nothing and will often embarrass himself in the process of getting things wrong in important situations. An example of Il Dottore would be Doctor Zoidberg. He is renowned as a incredibly stupid character that doesn’t know a thing about anatomy, yet he is a doctor. (2)
Il Capitano – The captain is a character that talks the talk but can never follow through. He is cowardly and very lady obsessed. A modern example of this is Zapp Brannigan from Futurama. He is constantly getting into positions where another character must bail him out. He usually gets into awkward moments with the Columbina of Futurama, Leela.
Innamorati – The innamorati are a vain couple that sees themselves as perfect and beautiful. They care only about themselves and what they want, as well as being incredibly beautiful and having a huge social class. The modern rendition of this would be Kevin Thompson & Brittany Taylor from Daria. They are the Quatreback for the high school football team and the head cheerleader as well as being insanely popular and loved by everyone. (3) As you can see in the video (down in the bibliography) Kevin and Brittany are incredibly dumb and self centred. One of them accepting flowers and the other expecting a thank you after the other half has been chased by bees.
Columbina – The Columbina is a very smart female character. She is often a maid or a important female in a family. She can always work her brain and be able to assess and deduce a situation. She usually is looked down upon by some character but adored by many others. An example of her could be Hermione Granger from Harry Potter. Incredibly smart but looked down upon by the wizard ong community for me a mud blood (Harry Potter slang for someone not of wizard blood.) However despite this, she is adored by the likes of Harry Potter and Ronald Weasley.
Brighella – Brighella is known as the servant who likes to think he is the king of servents, like: Jessie in Pokémon; Slim in Of Mice & Men and Blackadder in the said show. Jessie and Blackadder are usually quite cruel to the associates within their group, while bossing them around. While Slim is more of a respectful farm hand with mutual respect with the rest of the serve to characters. Despite the fact these characters are at the same level as others, they do see themselves as superior or are perceived as more superior.
Arlecchino – The Arlecchino is a cookey character. He is rather playful and kind hearted despite being very silly and usually getting in trouble for accidental mischief. A great example would be: Homer Simpson and Phillip J Fry. Both of these characters are protagonists of their television shows and while both being kind people they are incredibly stupid.
Zanni – The zanni is at the bottom of the characters, he is a servent and not respected. He is known to fall over a lot and or be breaking objects. He is known for creating the frustration that the Brighella will be feeling. As well as making the Arlecchino rather scared of reprocussions as the: Brighella, Arlecchino and Zanni are all servants together. A great example of Zanni is Baldrick from Blackadder. He is not seen as equal by others servants and is bottom of the barrel (so to speak). He is very unintelligent and will often be reminded of that (4)