TSOTSC / Rehearsals / Evaluation 900

Unit 9 - Devising

Our first week back on track we set to work devising scenes. Our first scene went through some changes regarding the mysterious message we wanted to portray to the audience on the ending of the play and how it would be perceived from various viewpoints. It related to Beckett in

Scene One: Comprised of the fundamentals of Beckett's practices in telling Summer's story, we had positioned Georgia and Leonie in the center of the stage sitting next to each other as both sides of Summer. Then we had them draw a smiley face on the floor in unison and connect all of their movements into one which as you could imagine did come with some difficulties at first, then once we got all the moves down from the drawing to the simpler moves like leaning back or moving heads the team got to writing up lines for them to say.

It was set as Georgia being the 'split' from Summer and Leonie being the original, so to show a clear difference we had Georgia say the line "I hate my parents!" and Leonie's line "I love my parents!" however the twist was that these lines would be said in unison. At first we thought that this would be  a great idea in the sense of creating the 'split's' personality clearer, however after watching it over a few times all it seemed to do was create confusion and look messy. So we opted for something a little more basic in terms of the lines being repeated but once at a time and this showed out amazingly.

This first scene didn't come with much barriers as it was the easiest and most relatable to portray. After we got through the basics of the girls' bid we quickly put together Summer's parent's spotlight included into the first scene which had myself and Ruby playing the characters respectively. We spent some time wondering what to do and the remainder going back to the drawing board when the plans weren't working. For example, our initial idea revolved around  Although the whole process was frustrating because of how small the part was and we needed it to make sense so the scene could start a pave for the audience we were slowly coming to what would be the final addition to the first scene. What we had decided on was Summer's mother and father would break from a freeze frame after the two Summer's had looked at the frame thus beginning the short sequence, the parent's argued to a high point which caused the mother to get struck across the face and be left by herself. What the audience would get from the silent argument was up to them and from what was gathered from the Summer's.   (Explain use of freeze frame/staging effectiveness) The reason that we chose to leave certain instances up to the audience's imagination was because for one it was different, in the sense

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Scene Two/Three: Moving further into our piece we brought the character of best-friend Leah to life and focused on both her and Summer's relationship in school and outside of it. Scene two started with Summer being at home readying for school and Leah at her front door wanting her to get ready faster, unbeknownst to her the reason for Summer's laxness is due to her parents constant squabbles and violence in the household. It's evident in her response to Leah when she says "You know what my parents are like" She doesn't want to go into any details about her situation and instead opts for a opaque, vague statement not giving Leah much to go on. Having this in the scene we thought was a good touch as it showed Summer's reserved and defensive side going with Leah's nonchalant attitude having them be polar opposites was also a good call for us in the group. (Why we didn't want the generics of girls at school?)

The scene transitions into the school bathroom where Leah and Summer (Ruby and Georgia) are doing what girls should do i.e make up and look pretty....no...nothing? Okay fine then I'll say it then...SEXIST. (Expansion on the 'sexism') But in all seriousness I kid I kid let's get back to the topic, whilst going through the scene our tutor Rob came over and gave the interesting idea of incorporating the over-exaggerated style of Berkoff when doing the make up. For example amplifying the strokes and how big their arms would move across their face which I thought was a fantastic touch and of course with the new addition we added it in and watched the scene formulate into natural greatness. We had two stages to this scene in which the girls were doing their makeup normally until Summer's high school bully Rebecca walked in to cause some trouble. There was nothing overly different from the stages other than the second being stylized on Berkoff and the audience first seeing Summer's live transition into her split personality resulting in her pent up aggression taking it out on Rebecca. As in both stages Rebecca asks the two girls: "What're you looking at? Hello! I'm talking to you" The last sentence directed at Summer. in the second stage Summer replies with "And now I'm talking to you!" Coming off very malevolent and eerie. (Why we did the scene twice?)

It is the lightning in this scene that symbolizes her changes in the color red which was deemed clear enough to link her transitions. The funny thing is that the second stage of Summer coming out was in fact all in her head. Got you there didn't I? Well what happens after that is we see Leah shaking Summer out of the experience telling her "You can't keep doing that" indicating that this isn't the first 'swap' Leah has seen.

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Scene Four/Five: Going towards the construction of the fourth scene we had it bleed into their teacher Ms Love's class after the bathroom fiasco. Leonie takes the mantle of Love and we left it to her to build the character and integrate it into the scene, there wasn't much that we needed to do regarding the fourth touch up as it was a regular class scene. The fifth scene was made to be by complete improvisation on the spot that we instantly attuned to and loved 110%. What had started with a simple hot seating to explore the characters of Leah and Summer somehow transitioned into a very intricate counseling scene between my character of counselor and the girls' respective roles. So with our construction of this beautiful improv we added this as as fifth scene partially because it would go as a continuation from another higher up taking the girls out of their lesson due to the bathroom issue that had happened some time ago, as well as it providing the audience with a deeper connection with the characters from what was said in the session. See the links there? Yup...my groups impressive I know. (More expansion, the whys?)

Nearing the end of the scene Summer would have another shift/swap/episode the difference from before obviously being that my character as the counselor alongside Ruby's Leah would be there to witness Summer's stare into oblivion as we as the audience/reality watch in awe as she transitions exposing her true feelings from the questions the counselor had given to her. After the episode ended I dismissed Summer with a smile and had decided on keeping Leah to ask more questions as there was something I had to discover if I was to help her, two questions to Leah had ended the scene leaving me as the counselor sitting down wondering what on earth this little girl had gone through in her life to cause this. If only I had time...

We had played around with the comedic aspect dishing around ideas on how we could incorporate something light-hearted into such a deepening scene and thus the character of Miss Wilson was born. A quirky/awkward relationship grew between the counselor and Miss Wilson as we experimented through improvisation on the numerous options, an insight on the character can be found on the character's player Leonie's blog.

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Scene Six/Seven:  Lasting on the two final scenes here, scene six folds into the girls (albeit with Leah bullying Summer to make an appearance) arriving at a house party hoping to bring Summer out of her shell and to relax moving away from the negativity at home. I played the dashing, confident and brazen flirt Brandon. Initially I had written through some interpretations of Brandon instantly taking a dislike and being sour to Summer due to her being branded as the 'weird girl' at their school and when we rehearsed the scene with this in mind there was something that wasn't working, because of the macho womanizer Brandon was he simply wouldn't turn his nose at this girl but be wary of her if anything welcoming but open about his opinions. This was clear when introducing him into the scene he walks up to Leah and Summer with open arms saying his smooth 'Heeeyyyyy' to the duo and having a light flirt with Leah eventually asking her to dance before asking Summer if in fact she was that 'weird girl' with a lovely sheepish smile indicating his bright innocence.

All in all we came to the point of determined that this scene would be Summer's realization into knowing that it's okay to be weird or quirky or odd as she was herself and would soon learn to love herself no matter what, in her monologue for this scene she repeats the phrase "I get it" multiple times smiling to herself soon breaking the mold and knowing everything was going to be okay.

Our final most pivotal scene is short and sweet. With this one as actors and from an audience's perspective we'd finally get that glimpse into the relationship of Summer's parents. It begins with myself and Ruby's father and mother characters arguing then I console her trying to apologize but yet she doesn't accept it, when she sees the rage building in her husband's eyes her poor attempt at defending herself melts as she comes back to sit down. However Summer bursts into the room watching this take place catching the attention of both of her parents, she then highlights her mother's black eye and wants an explanation for this and all the times she's been beaten. This is the breaking point for the girl as all of what she's experienced and been through is finally shaking and being brought out, her mother jumps to defend the father saying it was her fault telling Summer to get out of the room and that it would "be alright". In this instance the father walks around the room gruff and irritated as ever even threatening to hit Summer.

The scene blackens and freezes with Summer moving over to the center of the stage sitting down resuming her drawing from the first scene. Everyone's characters have a part in this going from me playing Brandon, Father and the Counselor. Leonie's Miss Love/Wilson, Rebecca and Summer. Ruby's Leah and Mother as well. Each character has their own separate piece to say about Summer coming behind her saying various things yet all but the mother and father ending in the words "a bit mad" The twist is we don't really know what happened to Summer at the end of the play as there weren't any clear indications to whatever happened, as a final homage to our creation we left it completely to the audience to decide it's end. All I know is, whatever happened to our Summer, was a bit mad ;)