You can see a lady is crying with her head in her hands, she is crying with grief and another lady is praying for the two sisters. The lady stood on the table has been ordered by the mayor to hang them.
This still image could be improved by angling some of the characters differently so you can see their facial expressions more clearly. But apart from that I think the still image is very good because levels are used extremely well.
Thought Tracking
Mrs Massey then thought tracked us Mrs Massey did this so we were more involved with our character.
Mrs Massey said to me: who are you and why do you look so pleased?
I replied, I am the mayor of the town and I want the two sisters to be hanged, as they dance together all the time and I have heard a lot of strange stories about them. This is why I am so happy because they are getting what they deserve; I want all the witches in the town killed.
From here the still image was then produced into a small play to produce our role-play we added onto the image. We improvised in our performance, which went quite well, to end the role-play we used this still image that worked well. In our performance we had a lot of strengths such as having a clear plot, good techniques such as marking the moment and having a good climax at the end of the performance.
My Role on the Wall
We then chose a small section from act one of the crucible, we did this by staying in the same groups as our still image and choosing a role each from the script. After we had decided on who was playing which role, we all devised a roll on the wall of our character.
My name is Mrs Ann Putnam I am married to Mr Thomas Putnam, who is a wealthy farmer have to admit that I am a bitter woman, I have lost seven children in childbirth. I am always looking for someone or something to blame for this and I am more than willing to believe that witchcraft is responsible. This makes me feel resentful to the nurse Rebecca who is happy and has a large family
Mrs Massey then hot seated us so we could learn our character better.
Mrs Massey asked me" how old are you, and why do you think you are such a bitter person?"
I replied "I am forty five years of age, I think I am such a bitter person because I despise a lot of people because I am jealous because they are happy and have large families. Which is something I don’t have because I lost all my children in childbirth."
Hot seating is very good because it helps you understand your role and character a lot more. We developed our performance by using explosive strategies such as role-plays, hot seating and marking the moment. We performed very well to the class even though we didn’t have long to practise together. I think we can adapt quickly with each other because we are used to working together. We used levels well; our voices and we also had a good use of space. At the end of our performance Mrs Massey asked us what we thought our strengths and weakness were .We then evaluated other peoples performances in our class on their strengths and weakness. The whole lesson was recorded, which we can watch as a reference in the future.
About Act One, And How It Is Brought Across To Us
The Crucible has a true historical background. It is set in 17th century Salem, Massachusetts. All the characters were real people who took part in real the witchcraft trials. Miller has created their personalities using his imagination as well as historical notes from the time. This makes the characters seem like real people with real lives. To allow the plot to go ahead, Abigail's age was changed from twelve to seventeen. The whole story between John Proctor and Abigail would have to be omitted from the script if Abigail was to remain as twelve years old.
The inclusion of the Abigail and John sub-plot story shows the audience that John regrets his mistakes and feels guilty about what he's done. It makes him seem more human and makes Abigail seem more manipulative and devious. The way John acts towards his wife, aware that she knows what's gone on, makes him seem like a more benevolent person
The use of narration throughout the play is extensive, but in Act One, particularly, it is used in abundance. In fact, approximately twelve pages out of the forty in Act One are narration. The Act begins with five pages of narration. There is then another page to describe Thomas Putnam, half a page on John Proctor, one page on Rebecca Nurse, four pages about Mr. Hale and half a page about Giles Corey. This is very unusual as most plays include hardly any narration and to use twelve out the forty pages of Act One for narration is quite a risky thing to do as the audience may become disinterested. However, Miller pulls this off well and the narration adds atmosphere to the Act. Miller includes so much narration because he wants the audience to know the characters well before they feature heavily in the storyline. He gives the reader enough information about the characters' strengths and weaknesses to from there own opinions of them and make their own speculations. We are given information about the characters' pasts and how they behave rather than how they look, we were also given a script in class, which told us about the characters. We were told how they could feature in the story and their good and bad qualities. By this I got the impression of a biased view of the characters because it is Miller's own point of view. -If he wants to say that the character is a bad person he does this. He says of Parris; 'In history he cut a villainous path, and there is very little good to be said for him.' Miller gives us his view because he wants us to see the characters the way that he sees them. Narration is used to set the scene and to introduce new characters to the plot.
Most of the main characters are introduced in Act One. Showing that right from the start they are important to the story and that the audience should not forget about them.
By using large amounts of narration in the play, Miller can control the appearances of the characters in the reader's mind. Because the characters are introduced properly, before they feature heavily in the plot, Miller's idea of how they look and behave is fixed in the audience's mind. If narration was done later, it would be harder to change the mental images that have already been formed. For example; 'Proctor was a farmer in his middle thirties...with a quiet confidence and an unexpressed, hidden force.'
Pagan Ritual in the Woods
We performed an adaptation of the Pagan Ritual in the woods; we rehearsed before we performed. We performed in white and red clothes to resemble innocence, purity and the danger. White resembled innocence and purity and red resembled danger. Emma Collins, Lucy Eccleston, Lucinda Miller, Carmela Manta and me worked together.
We used different techniques such as spoken thoughts, freezes. And marking the moment. Some of these techniques worked better than others, we also used levels
Quite often through out the performance. I personally thought that the spoken thoughts worked the best. Are ritual was based on Lucy being poessed by the devil, but she was actually pretending. This made Emma scared and she did not want to take part. But Carmela who played Titiba was in charge of the ritual and persuaded Emma to join in, and showed her how much fun it is.
Emma fainted at the end of the ritual because Reverend Parris arrived. Emma is scared of him because Reverend Parris is her Dad and she will get into trouble with him, for getting involved with witchcraft.
The appropriate atmosphere was finally produced, when we performed the ritual to music, which was Tribal style.
Here Are the Differences with Music.
♦More tension is produced
♦Space was used a lot more efficiently
♦Levels stood out more dramatically
♦Our voices were projected more therally
A Little About Abigail
Abigail is at the age of seventeen; she is frustrated and over restricted. Also she is been accused of witchcraft which is frustrating her. Abigail's affair with G.Proctor was discovered and because of this her family threw her out of the family home.
Abigail is a strong-minded young woman, she is determined and scheming and will sacrifice anyone to save her own skin. Also she is a sensual person and still has a strong physical desire for John. When Abigail is in court she defends herself and puts others on deaths door. Abigail likes to have power and in court she seems to be a genuine person .In this quote of the script Abigail is trying to defend herself and Betty.
"Uncle, we did dance, let you tell them I confessed it - and ill be whipped if I must be. But theyre speaking of witchcraft. Betty's not witched."
Eventually Abigail is driven away by her problems to run away, not only does Abigail run away but she takes her uncles savings with her. Abigail does not return.
My First Impressions of the Blair Witch
After the class had looked closely at the Crucible, we moved on to the Blair Witch project. Mrs Massey played a small section of the film, to let us find out how it effected us and made us feel. A lot of techniques are used at the beginning of the film to gain a realistic atmosphere. They change the colour to black and white and the filming is very unprofessional. They talk from behind the camera to make it look as if they are actually filming the documentary themselves. It makes us feel as though we are there with them and builds up tension between the documentary and the audience. It keeps the audience on edge permantely and stops us from wanting to stop watching. Which is obviously the whole aim of the project being produced.
My first impression of the film is that it is extremely realistic, and this is how I think the producers wanted it to be. The facts at the very beginning of the film instantly lead us to believe that the film is based on a true story. The fact that Heather is taking her role very seriously, and that there are books and articles on the Blair Witch. This makes us think that the Blair Witch is not just a legend.
Role on the Wall of Heather
My name is Heather as part of my college course my professor has asked me to research on the Blair Witch. Myself and two friends on my course have decided to go out to the woods and spend a few days filming.
I am very excited about the situation but also scared, I am prepared haven't told my two friends, who are joining me on this trip a lot about the Blair Witch. I do not want them to be worried for no reason. I have put so much effort into this project and I do not want them to spoil it. I hope the trip will be a great success.
Class Role Play
The whole class performed an improvisation together. In this performance we were acting out a meeting. Everybody played different roles some people were villagers and some people were supporters. I played a villager; Emma Collins had the main part she played the role of the village chief. Emma was asking the whole class questions on what they thought about the situation of the missing students.
The children have being missing for five days and have not returned from a college project. After the whole class had performed this task we talked about are emotions .I felt very sad and wanted to search for the missing children.
Mrs Massey then put the class into groups of fours. My group consisted of Lucy Eccleston, Lucinda Miller, Carmela Manta and me. We all performed short monologues pretending we were related to the characters. Once we were confident within our roles, we joined with another group who were Emma, Georgina, Stephanie, Charlotte, Emma Marren and Joanne.
This group was performing a short role-play, demonstrating the scene before the college group had gone into the woods. We joined our performances together by cross cutting.
