Bertolt Brecht: Part 2

In today's lesson we were developing our piece of a Caucasian Chalk Circle. We rehearsed the performance again with the same accents as before, however we decided that the accents made the piece seem silly and immature. By reading a book on Brecht's philosophies we gained knowledge that the piece was deliberately made to be ordinary and reasonably dull in order to allow the audience to think about the action unfolding, so we adapted our accents to be more serious and play the piece more flat, after having a readthrough to see if we could understand the scene a little better. Once we had established this I decided to take charge and work out how we wanted to stage things and when we wanted to. I read through the piece making sure people knew when to come in, when to  mime actions, how to stand and where. We managed to do this relatively well, and the piece flowed a lot better afterwards, as well as looking a lot better. Hopefully, our work today will stand us in good stead to perform a good piece on Monday, if we can remember what we set, I'm sure we can.

Acting Styles: Bertolt Brecht

Background 

Bertolt Brecht was born in Germany, 1898. In his early 30's he worked as a medic in WW1, appalled by war, he decided to move to Berlin to work in theatre. However, when the Nazis came into power, he fled the country, resulting in his citizenship being removed.

After setting up in the USA, he gained citizenship in 1941. He was a strong communist and was not afraid of expressing his views, hence, was a target of the House of Unamerican Activities, who were very much anti communist.

In 1947, he moved back to Germany where he founded the Berliner Ensemble. He was vastly influenced, having lived through two world wars he was very political and expressed his strong views through the medium of theatre.

Work

Brecht's main contribution to the theatrical world was the creation of epic theatre. He was strongly against Cathartic theatre and thought that naturalistic theatre mirrored society. He wanted to change things, to use theatre to get the audience thinking. One famous quote of his " Hang up their brains with their hats in the cloakroom." emphasised his desire to engage the audience. However, whilst he wanted to engage the audience he didn't want them to become attached or emotionally involved in characters or the piece itself, as he believed this made the audience lose their ability to judge and think. He wanted them to be distant from emotions, after all they were watching a presentation of life, not life itself.

Verfremdungseffect

This term is also known as the alienation effect, however, Brecht only wanted his audience to feel distanced, of course he wanted them to be engaged and excited but not emotionally involved and this always involved breaking the forth wall.

He used a range of  techniques in his performances. They included...

• Narration
• Coming out of role
• Speaking stage directions
• Directly addressing audience
• Using placards
• Multi rolling
• Minimal props
• Symbolic props
• Symbolic lighting
• Song and dance
• Montage
• Spass (fun)
• Gestus
• Non linear narrative
• Tableau

Today, we were split into groups and asked to come up with our interpretation of A Caucasian Chalk Circle. 

We began by listing the large number of characters in the 5 pages given to us. Obviously, there were more characters than actors, so we had to use multi rolling. In addition I decided to take the role of  a narrator and speak the stage directions, as this was a technique used by Brecht, ad I thought it looked rather quirky too. We added some accents for spass! and decided to label props in the style as he did too. For example, we labelled a piece of paper with Child, or guitar, to show that we were trying to think and adopt Brechts own techniques into our interpretation. 

Devising: Evaluation of Performance

Overall, I think our final performance went very well. Our scenes ran smoothly with minimal mistakes, any mistakes that were made, we simply carried on as if nothing happened, which showed great focus and composure. Our scene changes ran smoothly and I believe that, throughout the duration of the performance, we successfully conveyed a range of skills and techniques that were carried of to a high standard.

Idea Process

Our stimulus, back at the start of the task, was the single “Chasing Pavements” by Adele. As a group, we sat down and thought hard about what the song meant to us. We brainstormed various ideas that all shared a similar theme. Such as depression, heartbreak, injury so on. We then began to look at ideas for a story. One of which being the idea that a group of soldiers crash land in the middle of a desert and we would learn about why they joined the army, all sharing the common factor that they were chasing a better life. Which was the most important message we got out of the song. We toyed with another idea of someone getting seriously injured in a car accident, and losing the ability to do what they could do form a day to day basis. However, finding characters to fit into the piece was extremely difficult. The soldiers idea, was liked throughout the group, but we conceded that it just wouldn’t work in the stage environment and that it would better suit the film screen. Therefore, we decided to go for the 1930’s gang idea that just so happened to be our first idea. One thing that we could have done better was to have spent more time in developing and work shopping our ideas, it felt like we picked an idea and had our hearts set on it, without thinking and trying to create more ideas, albeit our original gang idea was, hands down, the best idea we had, and I think the whole group would agree with that. However, if we had spent a little longer on developing some ideas, we may have come up with some better ideas. Although, in honesty, I didn’t think we would come up with any better ideas and as a group, we struggled to conjure up a range of ideas. In addition, I think we were a little worried about the time period we had to work in, hence, rushed the ideas process so we had maximum time on working on our piece as possible.

Rehearsal Process

I think a majority of a rehearsals were extremely productive. The first week of rehearsals was taken up by trying to think abut the direction of the piece. We had the basis of a simple gang idea, but we wanted something else, something more. We thought about puppets, and this was the idea that lead to us thinking about the author controlling the gang. We worked very well together and I think this was key in how successful our piece was. When thinking of scenes, we always thought about what techniques we wanted to use, therefore, almost fitted our scenes around a particular technique, whether that be a movement, freeze frames, split screens or slow motion. However, the techniques used had to work and look effective, one thing we did nit want to do was to just throw in some techniques just for the sake of it and because the mark scheme said to. All together, it took about 4 and a half weeks to complete our piece. I think one thing we did do well was that we divided jobs up between us to save time instead of us all working on the same piece. This improved our efficiency as a group. For example. Tom and Theo would work on their monologues, whilst Ellie and myself worked on ideas for our scene, whilst Dan Mckay would write his author script or begin work on the lighting as he wasn’t in the scenes that the gang were part of and Dan Smith would be up in the drum room, devising a piece for the attack scene at the end. This saved us a lot of time in the end. Throughout rehearsal, I would say that a majority of the group were very focused and were determined to get the performance looking as good as it possibly could, we experimented with a lot of techniques and ways to stage things and conceded that some parts wouldn’t work, and had enough courage to scrap some ideas and start again. An example of this would be that we decided to scrap the rape scene, as it would be too hard to convey such a horrific act in a stylistic and sophisticated way. So we decided to switch it to an attack scene, which, after gauging audience reaction, decided that it was very successful. I think getting the rest of the group to focus was hard as, looking back, they may not have had a big a part in the performance as the rest of the group. If we were to do this performance again, I think developing the characters of Frank and Stan would be imperative. They didn’t have the biggest parts and feedback we received stated that the two characters just seemed to be there to fill the space almost. So one thing we could have done would be to develop the two characters a little more.

In terms of research for our idea, I think we all done very well. We split topics between the group to research. I researched the dust bowl and set design, while others would research costumes or stage combat. This helped us incorporate this research into our play, helping the piece look more historically accurate and more realistic. Our costumes and hair styles aided the 1930’s time period as did our music. There was a little bit of deliberation over whether we used modern music our music from the 1930’s to stay in the time period. We spent a lot of time trying to choose music, we looked at soundtracks from the Great Gatsby and on Youtube, searched popular 1930’s jazz, to which we found “Sentimental Mood” which was the song used for the dance between Tess and Finn. We also decided to use two Lana Del Ray songs in our piece. They were mainly instrumental, but worked very well for our piece, even though they were modern songs, they had a sense of antiquity about them, that worked very well. With our fight scene, I though that i had the perfect piece inspired by one of my favourite bands. We used the upbeat “There’s a Good Reason These Tables are Numbered Honey.” as it resembled that of a 1930’s piece but added to the irony of the fight scene as it completely juxtaposed the harsh brutality of the events on stage. 

Throughout the rehearsal process, I thought we behaved reasonably professionally. There were arguments in our group, but as we all took the piece very seriously, it was inevitable that some clashes of opinion would occur, as they would in any piece. However, we dealt with it professionally and didn’t let it effect our performance. We simply progressed with rehearsing as we were all striving for the same end result. One problem we encountered just before the show was that one of the dust sheets we had to hang across the performance space was not long enough. So we had to look for another dust sheet to cover the gap. We managed to do this but a few hours before the performance, we realised that the silhouette we wanted to use for the authors death didn't work. The shadow didn't fit on the dust sheet and we were able to see through. So we scrapped it and edited in a fade and a gun shot death in blackout. It wasn't ideal, as we thought the silhouette was a very valuable technique, but it simply did not work and for the sake of the performance we had to scrap it.

Finally, looking back on the rehearsal process, I think we can all agree that we should have blocked the scenes a lot quicker, as we had to extend the performance date by a week, Had we blocked quicker, we would have had a greater amount of time to polish our scenes. 

Performance Feedback

After the performance, we received a lot of feedback. One of the strengths of our performance was our stage combat. The scene in which the gang fight Finn was a great success. Audience members said the stage combat looked very effective and aided with music and lighting, the transitions into slow motion enhanced the effect of some of the hits. Another strength in our performance was the attack scene. Instead of using recorded music we used live drumming which allowed us to tailor the attack scene to the beat of the drum and do whatever we wanted without having to fit our piece around a recorded piece. I think the red lighting used was very effective and the drumming made the scene very powerful. Our use of techniques was a huge part of our piece and I believe that they were used effectively and very appropriately. 

One problem I encountered personally was the fact that I couldn’t change quick enough when off stage. I had a very short time in which to change my shirt and do the buttons up before I had to go back on. This meant that those on stage had to fill time by improvising until I came on. They done this very well and to an audience I think that nothing would have appeared to have gone wrong. Perhaps we should have practised costume changes in a dress rehearsal as we didn’t do this and were lucky to have got away with only a small change error. Another problem we were made aware of is that the fake blood on Ellie’s face, looked very fake, as it was smeared everywhere. Perhaps we should have practised with the fake blood before to know exactly what looked believable. Another detail we were made aware of is that the movement piece involving myself, Dan and Theo. The beginning and endings of the piece were very strong, however, getting into the middle part we lost the stylistic aspect of it and went more naturalistic, looking back, we perhaps should have focused on that scene a little more than we did. One audience member said that the changes in time period from the author to the gang were a little unclear and that our storyline of going back in time to certain points was a little confusing. We agreed with that statement. Looking back, it would have been a good idea to project the date on the screen at the point where the time changes, so it would be clear to the audience that we kept coming back to the same date.

The main piece of feedback we received was the fact that it was very hard to try and fit everything we needed to in the thirty minutes we had to fill. If we had a longer period of time then we could have done so much more, namely, developing characters more so the audience would feel so attached. The difficulty was trying to allow the audience to get attached to the characters in such a short period of time. However, I think we did the best job we could and we can be proud of our efforts.

Individual Thoughts

Individually, I am very pleased with myself. I feel that I have contributed a great deal to the devising process and thoroughly enjoyed working in the group I was part of. I think the research tasks I was asked to do were carried out properly and I incorporated my knowledge to the group. I carried out a lot of individual work to help the performance, such as thinking about ideas, or looking at set, hairstyles, possible scenes and remained level headed at all times. I tried to remain open minded and was willing to listen to all group members ideas and tried not to engage in any conflicts that arose, merely tried to extinguish them.

One thing I think I should have done better was to voice my ideas better, I don’t think I articulated my thoughts as well as I could have done and feared them being knocked back. I find devising very hard and coming up with ideas is very difficult for me without being in a group where ideas can bounce off each other. So I would definitely say that I should have shown more courage when proposing ideas. Also my Oklahoma accent wasn’t the best it could have been. Whilst I successfully carried off a traditional American accent, I should have looked more at a Southern accent to make it more accurate.

In conclusion, I think we done a remarkable job. The amount of hours and effort we put in was evident in our performance and our togetherness and strength as a group was obvious in how smoothly the performance ran. I thoroughly enjoyed working in this group and would love to have another chance with them. We can be proud of our performance and take many positives from it, as well as gaining a great deal of experience that will undoubtedly benefit us for the remainder of the course.

Devising

FINISHED!! Today we finally performed our piece after many weeks of hard work. We kept everything in that we planned but did have to make a change to our ending at the last minute. All our sound cues and lighting cues were ready and having gone through the extreme hassle of attaching fish wire to the poles on the ceiling, which was incredibly painful and hard to get the line tight enough, we found out that the dust sheets we had were not long enough. So we had to look fo another dust sheet to cover the gaps. We managed to do this but a few hours before the performance, we realised that the silhouette didn't work. The shadow didn't fit on the dust sheet and we were able to see through. So we scrapped it and edited in a fade and a gun shot death in blackout. It wasn't ideal, as we thought the silhouette was a very valuable technique, but it simply did not work and for the sake of the performance we had to scrap it. The performance itself went really well, everybody knew exactly what was happening and pulled it off amazingly. The last week has been hard with a lot of rehearsing and repeating scenes over and over, but it was worth it in the end, as we gave a performance that we can all be proud of.