Development

Post-show.

Julia Curry

The Arts Council England states that ‘for arts organisations to produce the best work that they can and have the greatest possible impact, they need to be clear and confident about their mission, engage effectively with the world around them and be objective about their development needs’ (ACE 2013, online). WAKEUP is this art organisation. Stated clearly in their manifesto, 130, 000 provides audience members with information about the fatalities of knife crime in South East London.

As mentioned in a previous post, John Hester notes that ‘one of the most important truths about acting is that an actor is only ever as good.. as the other actors on stage’ (2004, p.33). WAKEUP’s final performance of 130,000 went extremely well, and this is because every member of the company united as a collective group.

On Monday 20th May (show day), WAKEUP arrived outside the LPAC theatre at 9am that morning, ready to help with any of the technical requirements and prepare for a dress run. The extra rehearsal time that we spent working on the café scenes that very morning paid off, resulting in a very successful comical sketch between Clinton and Perry. When first using the space, each member of WAKEUP had to get used to the vast distance between the box on stage right and the café stage left. Once this was overcome, transitions needed to be rehearsed to ensure they ran smoothly for the final performance. Once cue to cue’s and a dress run were completed with a few final notes added WAKEUP were ready to perform their production to a strong 112 person audience.

The final performance of 130,000 was one that I feel both the company I can be proud of. The lights, sound and script united together so perfectly and I believe this was only further reflected in myself and other actor’s performances. I couldn’t be happier to have been part of WAKEUP theatre company!

 

Work Cited

Hester, John (2004) Stage Acting Techniques: A Practical Guide, The Crowood Press Ltd.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Understanding and incorporating verbatim

Joshua Stephen Rivett

Before the module I was unfamiliar with verbatim theatre, which is an essential part of the play. I found myself having to be educated in this style of theatre by the dramaturge, who was knowledgeable about the style and was able to answer any of the questions I had regarding how I was able to edit the verbatim speeches. I learnt that I was unable to change any of the words in the speeches, however I was able to take parts from different speeches, spoken by the same person and edit them together to create speeches that were more suited to the parts of the play in which they were spoken. Every piece of verbatim within the play was sent via the dramaturge to myself. I would read each speech and decide where they would best fit in the play to have the greatest impact on the audience’s emotions, and also cut or add bits from other speeches to create the most understandable text.

My idea was that the audience would be able to follow the journey of Doreen Lawrence, Stephen Lawrence’s mother, through the verbatim speeches. I decided to split Doreen’s speeches through the play to create an effect where the audience would be sharing Doreen’s emotions, forcing them to realise what they are watching is not just a performance as this is the real words of a real woman who tragically lost her son to a knife attack. I felt that constantly reminding the audience of this would force them to reflect on the play constantly and not just forget about it. This would be comparable to Brecht’s V-Effekt as a means of alienating an audience, forcing them to realise the issues of the performance rather than ‘enjoy’ the performance.

My thoughts on these speeches from Doreen Lawrence were as follows:

Scene 2 – Doreen is informed of the attack, she describes her feelings. The audience would be introduced to the character of Doreen as well as the situation. They would reflect on their own reactions if they had been Doreen in the situation. It forces the audience to realise something they may have never wanted to think about before.

Scene 6 – Doreen reflects on her son. The speech introduces Stephen as a real person, rather than just a statistic. The audience learn that Stephen was an ordinary boy with good prospects. The speech is a way of saying that Stephen did not deserve to die, as he was a good person who stayed out of trouble. The speech makes an audience relise that Stephen was a real person, not a character. He had aspirations which were never fulfilled.

Scene 9 – Doreen reveals her confusion with the situation. This speech acts almost like a flashback. Doreen describes what happened when she arrived at the hospital, and how she felt. The speech makes the audience relaise that Doreen is a person no different from them, creating empathy.

Scene 13 – Doreen reveals the moment she first saw Stephen’s corpse. This speech is designed to be hard hitting. It portrays the emotions Doreen felt when she saw her son dead for the first time, and the audience would sympathise with her. It  shows the audience that knife crime does not only affect the victim.

Scene 16 – Doreen describes how she would want people to think of Stephen. This short speech emphasis the fact that Stephen was a good person, who did not deserve this tragic fate. It is a way of reminding the audience that he was a real person that is now no longer with us.

Scene 28 – Doreen speaks about the letter she received from the couple who were with Stephen when he died. The speech is a bitter-sweet mixture of emotions, intended to leave the audience in suspense as to what happened next, as the trial is still on-going tot his day. The audience will leave the auditorium reflecting on the performance and the speech.

There were also verbatim speeches by other characters like Neville Lawrence, Stephen’s father and Duwayne Brooks, Stephen’s friend who was with him when he was attacked. Along with these speeches, transcripts from the real police interview with the suspects were used as a way of shocking the audience, as they outline the racial hate and brutality of the attack without even referring to the attack itself.

I saw the ultimate goal of using verbatim is constantly reminding the audience that the performance was more than just entertainment, it had the potential to change lives of people affected by knife crime.

 

Editing and devising scenes

Joshua Stephen Rivett

At first the process of editing the play seemed daunting, as not only would I have to change the language of the play, but also I would have to cut scenes to ensure our play ran between forty-five minutes to an hour. I also had to add devised scenes and add verbatim at appropriate points of the play. To begin, I read the play through, in it’s entirety.  I read the directors notes, which were directions as to what scenes were important and which weren’t, as well as which parts of scenes needed to be kept. As I read through the play, I added notes for myself regarding what the scene showed, why it was important for Fallout and how this could be adapted to be important for our group’s purposes.

I made a lot of decisions regarding our final edit of the script. Through the process of writing I would often upload drafts of the script onto the WAKEUP Facebook group, asking the company member’s opinions of how the script had been edited. I took on board the feedback I received from all company members, especially the director and dramaturge as they would be the last port of call before the script would be sent to all cast members. However the majority of the creative decisions were mine in regards to the script.

As I began to type up the play, I first focused on adapting the language from the Carribbean dialect in which Fallout had been written. This was simple for some parts of the play, an example being the use of the word ‘bwoi’ or ‘dread’ which I altered to ‘mate’ or constructed the sentence without the use. However, some lines required me to do research to understand their meaning, an example being the line said by Emile ‘Come like her bwoi, well, he find out, innit’ (Williams, 2003), which was edited into ‘She’s like him. She’ll get it too’ (WAKEUP, 2013, p.14).

It was a long process of going through the play line by line and distinguishing which lines were significant for our purposes of portraying the impacts of knife crime whilst merely suggesting racism and injustice, as we had decided that the focus of the play would be on the actual act itself. I also had to make decisions as to where verbatim would fit. The dramaturg would send me extracts of verbatim fro the Stephen Lawrence and Damiola Taylor trial transcripts and it would be my decisions as to where to to places the extracts.

I also devised scenes and speeches which were discussed with the director to emphasise certain messages which the theatre company wanted to highlight. These scenes included a scene between a middle class couple discussing a knife attack they had seen on television, a speech introducing Kwame, the victim of the play, a speech where Ronnie admits to what she saw and a final scene suggesting a possible reason as to why Kwame was murdered.

In regards to the final edit of the script, it will be the directors decision as to whether certain scenes are kept, and also if lines are not being delivered as effectively as they should be, certain lines may be further edited to ensure that the message of the play is appropriately clear.

 

Works Cited

Williams, R. (2003) Fallout, London: Bloomsbury

Finding ‘Fallout’

Joshua Stephen Rivett

Shortly after we had decided on the Theatre Company name and created our manifesto we threw about ideas of performances we could create and what the focus of that performance could be.  Knife crime was suggested early on and we all feel the issue is so current it suits our manifesto, and also it fits the company’s mission statement. We also feel that the influence of verbatim on the performance is able to really have an impact on the audience, as it should realise the issues raised by forcing them to listen to first hand accounts of people directly affected by knife crime.

During our class the idea of merging an existing play versus devising an original piece was discussed briefly. The original idea was in regards to the contemporary verbatim play The Riots created by Gillian Slovo. The play seemed to suit our company’s purposes,  however at that point in the process the actual performance was not being focused on severely as we had yet to come up with a theatre company logo or a final draft of our manifesto.

The discussion on knife crime made me remember a television film I had watched, which had been based on a play.  In the film knife crime was dealt with rather explicitly. I posted on the group’s facebook, informing them about this program as I felt it may be worth watching, however I could not remember the name of the program, all I remembered is that it had been on channel four within the last two years.

Luckily one of the other group members was able to source that film on channel four’s on-demand television website, and it was named Fallout. In the next session the company were all told to watch the film as it would be useful for ideas for the performance piece. In discussions after watching the film we all agreed that it was something that appeared to suit our purposes, as knife crime was still a very current issue. The director was able to acquire a copy of the original play script by Roy Williams shortly after we had all assigned roles in the group.

My role as scriptwriter/editor gives me the job of changing the language from the original play script to a form which would be more accessible to any audience, as the original play is written in a London Caribbean dialect which we feel our audience may struggle to understand. I am also required to edit the play, which heavily focuses on racism. Our adaptation will focus on knife crime and the effect of it, and rather hint as racism and issues in the judicial system in this country. Along with these roles, I also have the task of strategically placing verbatim speeches within the play text as well as devising original scenes and speeches, differentiating our piece from Fallout and making it more an original performance.

The director will give me a copy of the play with notes on what she would like changing, however many of the decisions will be my own.