We then carried on with the scene which leads straight to chaos me and my mum get into an argument as she is not willing to compromise and accept my white girlfriend, however I am also a stubborn man and swear not to marry any one but her. The scene ends with me walking out in a rage with my girlfriend shouting I will no one but her and my mum shouting at my dad for not saying anything.
I personally felt that this scene went really well as it reflected the opinions of different people from different religion with different views and approaches to weddings. This scene was based on reality, as being a Pakistani girl myself I know that there would not be many Pakistani parents willing to accept a white girl as their daughter in law because of many reasons such as the society, their religion and many more.
In the next task we had to develop a character or monologue once again based around the weddings. We could do this individually or in two’s. Me and Amira decided to work together and develop a scene which had something in common with the previous one. This time she played a mother who had agreed to her sons wedding which was taking place in a couple of days however she wasn’t really happy with it from the bottom of her heart. I played the father who was happy with his son’s decision.
In the scene I try explaining to my wife that it’s too late to change anything now and it would be in everyone’s best of interest if she happily went along with the wedding. I reminded her that since our son was a child we gave him what ever he wanted and now that it was the time for him to make one of the most important decisions that he will ever make, we had no choice but to fully back him up and show to him that we were happy with the wedding in order to make sure his special day went the way it should and left him with no guilt for us and our views on the wedding.
As our final piece we had develop an explorative work based on weddings once again into an effective piece of drama. Our starting point was “the apache wedding blessing”
Now you will feel no rain,
for each of you will be shelter for the other.
Now you will feel no cold,
for each of you will be warmth for the other.
Now there is no more loneliness.
Now you are two persons,
but there is only one life before you.
May your days together be good and long
upon the earth.
When I first read the blessing I was quite amazed. As it got me thinking, each and every word had a very deep and true meaning behind it. It showed the real meaning behind weddings. The line which I liked best was “now you are two persons but there is only one life before you.” It really touched my heart and showed that weddings mean a lot, they bring together not only two bodies but two souls, they give a very important name to a relationship and give the people involved more responsibility as they must now care for another person as well as themselves.
In this scene we had to make use of this wedding blessing and had to include as much of the following to make this an adequate piece:
- The use of costume and or makeup
- The use of sound and or music
- The use of lighting
- The use of space and or levels
- The use of set and or props
- The use of movement. Mime and or gesture
- The use of voice
- The use of spoken language
In this scene I played the role of the bride, I had a very important role and had to spend a good amount of time on my script, costume, use of voice, movement, and gesture. I had to consider every movement that I made.
The main story behind our play was, a girl who is marrying a guy purely for his money, she tells the best women this secret and expects her to keep it to herself however when the wedding is nearly done and the bride and groom are to make all their vows the best women spills the beans!
The scene starts of with me the bride walking down the aisle with the best women. Two people are sat in the church to play the role of the audience one who acts as a total nutter who added a comical touch to our scene, and the other a old women who is just sat there for some rest. As would happen in any wedding the vicker is at the front on a higher level to everyone else with the groom waiting for the bride. The vicker then announces the wedding and asks if anyone has any objections the nutter shouts “ME” and then says “only joking” to show the audience what kind of role he has, the wedding then carries on. At this point I am facing the groom with the vicker infront of me and the best women to the left of me. The vicker then announces that the best woman has asked to read the wedding blessing. I am shocked to hear this as I am fully aware she has feelings for the groom. She starts reading
“Now you will feel no rain,
for each of you will be shelter for the other.
Now you will feel no cold,
for each of you will be warmth for the other.
Now there is no more loneliness…”
She stops half way and screws up the wedding blessing I am really confused and start to shake wondering what she is to say next. She then turns to the groom and shouts “she’s only using you for your money” I am bewildered and start to argue with her denying what she’s saying. We then freeze to tell the audience our thoughts at this point as this is the climax of the scene. First speaks the old woman in the audience of our scene she tells the audience that she had a feeling from before that I was using him for his money she says “a pretty girl like her, a rich man like him, I always knew that she was only in there for the money” Next speaks the vicker he tells the audience he doesn’t know what’s going on and he’s just concerned that this special day doesn’t go wrong and bring down the reputation of his church.
Next the groom tells the audience that he’s puzzled and hopes that what he’s hearing is not true, even though no one knows but he’s soon to be bankrupt! Following up I tell the audience that I cannot believe my own best friend has wrecked my wedding day how could she let my secret out that too infront of everyone! Then the best women tells the audience she can’t let this wedding happen when she herself loves the groom she cant see a girl betraying him. The nutter at the back then tells the audience he normally hates weddings but this one is unique and is interesting him!
The scene then carries on which leads straight to a stage fight between me and the best women, everyone tries stopping us, mean while the groom runs out shouting “ I don’t want this wedding” I run after him babbling that he can’t leave me. The best woman follows on swearing and throwing comments at me. The vicker also walks off stage saying “calm down people this is the house of god you don’t fight here” The wedding scene ends here with the old woman and nutter left on stage.
Our scene was based on the wedding day and we managed to get the moral of our play through to the audience which was to show deception in weddings and show a more understanding of all the possible reasons behind a wedding, they don’t all have to be arranged or love there could always be a very deep plot behind a wedding.
COSTUMES
Set and costume designs play an extraordinary part in a play. The costume reflects the character in many ways, it shows the age of the person the personality can also be shown to a certain extent with the clothes worn. For example me being a bride with an evil plot in mind but trying to show an innocent impression I would have worn something like this:
The groom would wear something traditional like a black suit and tie with black polished shoes and would stand straight with his neck high to show his character of a rich handsome man something like this:
To show that we understand our characters properly and could answer anything that we were asked regarding what was going on in the characters mind we did a short hot seating exercise where sir asked us all some questions. This way I could express more of the feelings in my mind as a bride who was using someone for money but more importantly I got the chance to understand other people’s characters and how they felt about certain problems.
EVALUATION
I felt that I did a good job in delivering my opinions views feelings and cultural differences across to the audience. With the first scene we did I got the chance to show that weddings don’t always be just about the approval of the girl and boy involved, the wedding brings together not two people but two families and so the approval of families is important and can be a big issue when there’s religious or cultural differences. The next scene we did showed that I had an understanding of how to convince as convincing people around weddings can be a difficult job, I showed that sometimes parents have to compromise just for there child’s happiness. The last scene showed that weddings aren’t always a good thing and people do have evil minds they go to any extent for money, things like the wedding blessing have a true deep meaning but if used in a wrong way the blessing can turn to a curse!
As a whole I got to learn a lot of things whilst working on these scenes. I now look at weddings in a more mature way and always wonder how many things will have gone wrong in lead to this one day! Weddings are important in a persons life and now I understand this whole issue to why people plan their weddings out months in advance! I also got the chance to work with different people and see what their views were towards marriage! The whole coursework was difficult but a fun at the same time which left me with a lot more knowledge on weddings!