Evaluation of preparation and improvisation based on a section from ‘Confusion’ by Alan Ayckbourne.

Work on characterisation

After we got into groups and read a story from the book we took it in turns to go in the hot seat and be asked many questions about our character. These questions could be about anything like their past, their present or what happened at the restaurant. This worked very well as we all got into character and we could understand the character more. We got to establish other characters as well as our own.

Improvised work on naturalism

Improvised work on naturalism and expressionism was used in our groups on Monday 4th, this worked quite well. We got into groups and acted out a normal scene but there was a small twist. This scene was a normal family day out having a picnic, but the daughter revealed to one person that she is pregnant. When we acted it out again everything was over exaggerated; it was as though she was having a nightmare. Nothing was clear as we were all shouting and it was extremely hard to understand what we were saying. Voices were distorted so the speed of speech got faster and slower. The tone of voices changed as some spoke high pitched and some spoke low. Everybody was going around her so it was as though she was trapped and we were all looking at her and pointing as though she was worthless. She then snapped out off her thought and everything was just normal again.

Final improvisation

Our final improvisation is from 'Between Mouthfuls'. We did pages 55 and 56, where

Mrs Pearce suspects that Pearce was having an affair and where Polly tells Martin that she had an affair with Pearce. I am the waiter so the whole play is just bits of what I heard. We act it out by the waiter interrupting what they were saying, when I move to another table the table before carries on talking but miming so it moves the attention on to the other table. Mrs Pearce gets extremely angry with Pearce so she stands up and shouts she also points her finger at him as this emphasises that she is extremely angry. The waiter is just serving the food and gets in the couple's way. We chose these two pages to act out as everybody was involved and it had the main parts of the play in. For dramatic techniques we showed how angry Mrs Pearce was when she got up and started shouting. Also how upset Martin was when Polly revealed that she had an affair, we showed this by him putting his head to the table. We used space well, as the two tables were not that close to each other and the waiter had to move. In our performance we tried to achieve anger the most. I think we achieved this quite well as space was being used and voices were distorted.

Harpreet Sekhon 10.1