Performances and workshop evaluation

Harris Academy Crystal Palace

Show 1

Our first show was at Harris Academy in Crystal palace, and it was definitely our most challenging show and set of workshops, for many reasons including group sizes, teachers control over their students, our own mistakes and it being our first show on the tour.

The first workshop seemed to work ok, all of the students were able to carry out the activity and although we all felt a little awkward roaming around checking what they had written and trying to help, all of the students seemed to undertake the task easily and effectively. However, as I was the leader of the workshop I felt like I should have explained what the gingerbread man actually stood for and why we were doing the activity as I felt that this explanation was lost in my nerves.  

Whilst the performance itself went fairly well apart from a few problems with actor entering the stage at the wrong moment and lines being missed, I felt that the performance in terms of the projection went too quickly and seemed rushed which ultimately left us with too much extra time in the final workshop.

However saying this, in my workshop I ran out of time for some of the tasks I had planned to do with the students, part of the reason this happened was because the class that I was given was extremely challenging and rowdy, the teacher that was assisting me in controlling the class was obviously not respected by his students as they openly mocked him as I was trying to lead the workshop. As Hannah had asked not to be left with a group on her own I made the decision for her to load the van with Simon and then join me in leading my group, as a stage manager I believe that this was the right decision to make as I believe that it is important to support team members and make sure that they feel comfortable in the situation. Throughout the workshop I tried to stay in control and eventually gained the respect of the majority of the students. Although the workshop was challenging it also allowed me to see the effect our performance had, had on some of the students watching within my workshop group as they were able to talk openly about their own experiences which lead to one boy hinting about being presently bullied himself.

Overall our first experience of touring the show went well and allowed us to reflect on what aspects worked, what needed to be worked on and rehearsed and how we felt about the show and its reaction.

La Retraite Balham

Show 1

Due to two cast member arriving late to the school, we had to improvise a 50 minute workshop swiftly, I quickly planned a workshop consisting of questions we could ask about personal identity and self-development, the creation of their own scenes based on a buzz word: identity, stereotype, school, media and relationships, a performance of their creations and an evaluation of what the scenes had taught them. Seeing as this was thrust upon us as we arrived I believe that the workshop went as best as it could have considering the circumstances, however I feel like the workshop was all left down to me which I do not mind however I felt a little unsupported by my team and a little annoyed when they criticised the workshop after the class had left.  

This first show/workshop was also difficult because we had two girls who could not speak a word of English, as Stage Manager I thought that it was important to not put my fellow group members under the pressure of having to work with these two girls so I put them into my own group for the devising task and ensured that they understood what I wanted them to do and that they were involved in the devising and performing of their groups piece.

Show 2

The following show went fairly well, it wasn’t the best as the cast and myself adjusted to the setting and “stage”, therefore it still was not a perfect run of the show partly because of the laptop needed for the projector choosing not to work outside of Brit meaning we had to think on our feet again and use the schools screens which although difficult to set up at first and a cause of confusion to the actors in the movement scene actually turned out to be an aid for the actors especially Imogen and Hannah in their Facebook conversation scene as they could use it as a prompt and also it meant that they could see when they were going to fast.

The first workshop went rather well and I ensured that the students were given an explanation of each task they undertook and the importance of the task, it also helped that I was given the large paper to make a large gingerbread man outline as it meant that the students could all see what I meant however I am not too sure that I should have let Mahmoud write what I needed to change about myself as it lead to a lot of comments about my appearance from the students. Another positive for this workshop was that it was with a group of 25 yr8’s rather than the 180 yr7’s we had, had to work with on this task at Harris Academy.

The second workshop however seemed to be a little boring for the students as it was totally  discussion based both as a whole group and then as five smaller groups, the girls seemed a little shy to answer some of the questions we asked them perhaps because they were scared encase they admitted too much personal information. Therefore in our group evaluation at the end of the day as a group we decided that it would be best to do more practical activity in the next workshop.

Show 3

This show was without a doubt our best show of the tour, we arrived determined to do a good show and workshops and indeed I believe we succeeded with this, both of the workshops seemed to go well, as leader of both I felt controlled and confident in my delivery, I was concise; exact and informative as well as being extremely positive and enthusiastic. The show itself seemed to go well from both the actors and my own perspective. We decided to use the schools screens again as they seemed to be placed in exactly the right place out of the way of the stage but in the audiences view.

Show 4 and 5

Both of these shows went exceedingly well also with only minor mistakes, the third show at La Retraite had given confidence and enthusiasm,  all of the students seemed to really enjoy both the workshops and the show and were all extremely positive in their feedback.

In our fifth show we were given two classes of yr8’s and unlike the large group experience we had at Harris Academy, it was actually really easy to work with a large group, due to their enthusiasm and energy they enthused us to work at our best for them.

Show 6

Our last show was to two yr7 groups one that had selected girls from across the year in who were all connected to the issue of bullying, friendship problems and body image, the other was the most troubling class of yr7. Due to know that this group was a yr7 class we kept the same first workshop and show which although seemed to go fairly well we had obviously lost our enthusiasm we had in the past three shows and certain elements of the show went slightly wrong with actors forgetting lines and props, however we slightly adapted the second workshop so that it did offer the forum theatre idea we had used in previous workshops however it also had more of a discussion ending were we were able to just talk as a group to the students about their ideas of body image, self-identity, relationships and bullying.

We ended the tour by taking some lovely photos with the students from La Retraite as well as a nice company photo as a way to promote our possible future events and shows!

 

Evaluation of the process

We started the process by sitting as a whole group and discussing the different target audiences we could work with, first looking into primary and infant productions within the theatre in education sector, however as this age group can be quite difficult to get the right information across in an attractive and engaging way to the vast range of ages of children in primary school settings, we then went on to discuss the younger years of secondary school education focusing especially on the 12-13 year olds, as we found from our own experience that this is an age group that often misses out for the opportunities with visitors especially drama/theatre groups. We also found that after discussing the different topics they cover focusing on their PSHEE work that the issue of personal identity and self-development was a subject that needed to be addressed within their yr8 curriculum therefore as we wanted to address an issue that the schools would be covering anyway as not to take valuable teaching time away we chose to work with this issue of personal identity and link in other issues such as bullying and relationships making our piece engaging and relatable to all of the students watching.

As a group we tended to spend a lot of time discussing the piece especially within the first few weeks which was probably due to us not ever having a full cast, and the fact that we did not know exactly how we wanted the performance to be structured. At first Mahmoud as the director said that he wanted the piece to be very contemporary styled and not to be naturalistic or realistic, however we soon learnt that this style would not work for our target audience due to their age and lack of theatre training which is when the idea of a linear narrative came and we chose to use Hannah as the main character that the whole performance would be based around. We then had our first production meeting chaired by myself where I gave each member of the creative team a chance to discuss, then the actors an opportunity to add their opinions and idea and finally an any other business section where the whole team was able to add anything that needed to be said, or that needed to be done over the holidays. Whilst on holiday each member of the team had a whole list of things they needed to do related to their role which was explained and discussed during the production meeting, I also added all of this information to the Facebook page I had previously created and emailed out the typed up meeting notes. Unfortunately, not all of the team fully completed their list of tasks which had needed to be finished and ready for after the holidays so that we could start the rehearsal process therefore we spent the first week and a half after the holidays with two members of the team writing the script, with the help of everyone else who was there, myself keeping the schools we had agreed performances for up to date and informed about the performance and its content and boking other schools. I have felt that over this process I have delicately had to keep myself and my team organised to the point where I was organising exactly what train each person needed to get on to get to one of the schools.

Although the process of creating and touring our theatre in education production has been one of the most amazing and wonderful experiences of my life (and I mean that truthfully), it has also been extremely challenging and frustrating at times as well as absolutely tiring!!! As a group we have had such a laugh and it has been brilliant being able to work with so many talented individuals in the class that I would not ordinarily have chosen to work with enabling me to see the skills and abilities of the 6-7 other individuals in my group. However, we have also had a few low points much like any other group that is working so closely together for such long amounts of time, one challenge we had to work around was Octavian’s lack of attendance to rehearsal which unfortunately ended in a small argument between Jess and Octavian to which I went straight to Simon as professionally as I could and explained the disagreement that had gone on and felt that it was best to leave it to him to sort as he has the authority above us as his students which we do not have over each other.  This then left us with one less actor so as a group we decided that we would swap around the roles a little, Mahmoud would take over a lead male actor, Shannon would become Mahmoud’s character, and Hannah Marns would learn both her own and Shannon’s old part. However this decision was a little last minute only two weeks before the first school on our tour so it was down to the actors to work overtime on learning their lines and attending extra rehearsals set up by myself to get the production to a ready stage, however we even had problems with his as actors had other commitments rehearsals were often not fully attended or cancelled due to peoples availability. Other problems we faced came with set, equipment, costume, props and technology both before the tour had started and during:

·         The set was not completed until a week before the performances because of the time it took to make all of the boards, the sticking of the mirrors and the painting.

·         The lending of the projector from Shannon’s mum’s workplace not happening and then the bulb in the projector rom Simon dying

·         Certain props not being brought by the person who had agreed to buying them, leaving it to myself and Hannah to mad buy on ebay some 99p mirrors
 

·         Costume being forgotten on the way to performances

·         The projector not being packed for one performance, then not being able to log on for the others

·         Cast being delayed for the first performance at La Retraite so us having to think on our feet and create a workshop on the spot

As part of this process I have learnt a lot about different individuals and their opinions and emotions teaching me what to do in certain situation and at what point in time it is best to gather as a group to discuss and how to make certain decisions without upsetting other people within the group. As an overall group we had many different and varying opinions on many areas of the production and the contacting of schools. At times many people in the group found it challenging either to not voice their own opinions or to be heard over others opinions and voices. Personally making my voice heard and taking lead of many situations within this project was an individual challenge that I needed to overcome and work on, however after looking back on the process I believe that I started to overcome this challenge and that I am now a stronger contributor and leader to this type of task.

Although this process has been wonderful I do believe that it became stressful because certain individuals brought in their own outside emotions into the rehearsal space which at times meant that people did not feel willing to work leaving the rest of the group at a loss because a lot of our piece relies on the whole cast being there the whole time because even the duet scenes run too quickly for the rest of the cast not to be ready for the next scene. However this only helped to enrich me of this experience which if I was to run my own TIE Company in the future individual’s outside/private life could affect the rehearsal process or the performances themselves.

I created a Facebook page where I posted all the relevant information for the whole group to see with all of the group added to the Facebook page it meant that we could all stay in contact easily and it was really easy to discuss and ask and answer questions as we found that many of us were either not lovers of mobile phones or of email. As Shannon does not have Facebook everything written on Facebook was sent by me to her on email, all of the documents needed which were created by myself were also sent to all of the member of my group via email as were instructions of how to get to the different schools, information about the times and dates and any other important details.