The most famous person we could think of that had been a Jew during the war was Anne Frank. I’d read her diary so I had some good ideas of what life was like for her during the annex that she hid in, we also did research on the Internet and on Encarta. We decided to base our storyline on a small part of Anne Frank’s life, and adapted some of the names from her diary. We decided to base it on her life, because it is non-fictional, and would really display to the audience some of the agonies that families suffered, particularly the ones under Hitler’s ruling. We wanted our piece to display the love that goes on in families, and the staying together despite some of the evil, cruel things some people do in the world today. This is what we wanted to show the audience.
So far we haven’t come across too many problems during our rehearsing. We did have problems getting a good plot together that would last the amount of time that it needed, but in the end we managed it. We then had trouble getting it to last the right amount of time, as there was too much in it, so we had to cut a lot of it out. The whole group had difficulties in getting the right balance with scripted information and improvised acting. We wrote basic scripts for us to follow in the beginning, and now we have managed to improvise it without trying to remember lines. We had difficulties as we started relying too much on scripts, and trying to remember lines, but we started to remove scripts and tried our best to improvise it and let the whole thing flow right, and anything not mentioned could be picked up by the other characters. Overall, I feel I have worked very well with Lucy and Steven, the members of my group, we’ve been working hard to do extra rehearsals and co-operate well as a team. We are all contributing to ideas and fitting it all together so we all get an equal amount of time on stage. We have all been contributing to doing research to give more background to our storyline and been working out what kind of set, costumes and props we will need for our improvisation. Our group are getting on very well; we are all working as a team together and cooperating very well.
We have all worked well to sort out the set, costumes and props. Due to our improvisation not being set hundreds of years ago, it hasn’t been too difficult getting props together. We’ve all pulled our resources together, and used the schools’ too. Our set for scene one is our house, with tables, and props such as a wireless, (we used the schools’ speakers) and a telephone, as well as everyday house objects such as flowers. Our costumes are not too smart, but not too casual. I wear a dress, which women of that time would wear, and Lucy and Steven will wear smart trousers and a shirt, and for Lucy, also trousers and a shirt or a skirt. She will wear pyjamas in the first scene. In our second scene, the layout of the set is similar, but more basic as we then live in the annexe. Our final scene is the same as the second, as Steven comes back to the annexe after Lucy and myself have died in the concentration camp. We also use the story of Passover taken from a book we found in our library. We also include a poem called ‘Faith Is A Candle’ taken from ‘Somebody Loves You’ by Helen Steiner Rice.
We have used many dramatic techniques in our improvisation. These include a freeze frame, in our first scene, whilst Steven is on the telephone, he freezes and I move around nervously, discussing how I feel about leaving. After I have finished, Steven then carries on, on the telephone. We use writing in role, this is when Lucy writes to her diary, which she refers to as “Kitty”. She talks about her feelings out loud whilst writing in it, and it’s a good way of showing how she is really feeling. We have monologues, these are the ones when Lucy writes in her diary, as this only includes her on stage, and also whilst she is praying. Steven also does this whilst praying, and at during the last scene, when he tells the audience the story of what happens to his wife and daughter. The sound effects we use are the radio announcement at the beginning of the scene, which we recorded on to a CD. We use the ceremony of Passover, which Jews celebrate to show how God passed over their doors during the final, most important plague of Egypt, which was to kill the first-born son of each person. The Jews painted blood on their doors, and God passed over them, which is why they celebrate it. We also use naturalism, which means we have based our play on a non-fiction event, based on the story of Anne Frank, which we felt was a very emotional and touching topic.
In our first scene we have tried to make it very tense and stressful. This means as actors we need to look like we feel awkward and scared. This is because this is where we learn about the sorts of things the Jews were going to get put through. The Jews were put through having to lead a very unusual life, not being able to go out when they wish, do shopping when/where they wish, and eventually they were tortured and put in concentration camps, in extremely horrendous conditions. In our second scene we celebrate the festival of Passover. In this scene we need to try to look a little happier, as this is one of the most important Jewish holidays. However, when the Gestapo arrive, we act very terrified, as this is the scene when we are taken away to a concentration camp. In the final scene, Steven acts very distressed, and feels like he is a failure, as he gets out of the concentration camp alive. He acts very mentally ill, as he commits suicide in the end, he’s very upset, and very angry with himself.
In our improvisation, I play the “mother” character. In it I have to play quite a cold woman, who feels threatened that her husband takes her daughters side all the time. When the family go into hiding I have to be able to convey that I am a caring wife/mother, but the war is getting to me. Overall our rehearsing is going well so far, and I hope for it to be a successful performance. I feel our message is very successful, as it educates the audience of the life of a typical family, despite it being a long time ago, and displays the distress and agony a family has to go through just because of their religion.
