Finding A Plot

Today we all decided that yesterdays plots weren't strong enough story lines and so we scrapped both ideas. We struggled with finding a plot throughout the day. We came up with the idea of our story being based on Circus Performers, who find something that has fallen from the sky. Later we thought about the idea of Superheroes, who's powers are taken away from them when something falls from the sky. These Superheroes would have to battle The Evil Lady Petronella, who has stolen their powers for herself, in order to retrieve their powers. Then we thought about a group of Circus Performers, who find 5 jelly beans that have fallen from the sky. These jelly beans would give them superpowers, which they would use to defy their evil Ringmaster.

After having a talk with Ella, we found that the idea of the characters we came up with yesterday, going on a rat race to find 'the something' that has fallen from the sky, could be something we could work with. This time the Duke and Duchess would be scientists, who would want 'the something' because it is a cure for hairy toes. The Bimbo and The Hoodie, would be sisters, who want 'the something', as it might help them to find there long lost sister, 'Susie-Anne'. A new character, The Evil Lady Teapots, would want 'the something' for selfish reasons. The Presenter would follow our characters around, interviewing them and reporting on their every move, which would become quite an annoyance for them.

'The Something'

We changed the title of our production from 'The Hairy Toe' to 'The Something' because we found that the original title was no longer relevant to our new plot. In our new plot, our characters were; a Duke and Duchess, a Presenter, a Ghost, a Blonde Bimbo and a Hoodie. 

Here are our notes:

Here is our plot 'The Something':

The story begins with the characters breaking into the haunted mansion. The Presenter interrupts them and the story rewinds to The Duke and Duchess in their house 4 hours earlier. The Duke and Duchess discuss dinner, turn on the radio and hear about 'the something' that has fallen from the sky. They decide to go on a quest to find it, where meet a Bimbo at a hair salon and a Creepy Hoodie in the forest. All of the characters head to the haunted mansion (where 'the something' supposedly is) and we return to the scene in which the characters break into the mansion. In the mansion they split up to find 'the something'. They each encounter a ghost and then they all bump into each other again. They are startled by a noise, all run away and split off again. This time The Ghost catches them all one by one and in a shocking twist, this was The Presenter's plan all along.

My character was the Creepy Hoodie. We decided that my character tries to be tough and scary, but really they are a big softy. For this reason, I introduced Mr. Dibbles into the story- an Australian teddy bear, who had a mind of his own and in ventriloquist-style, I would also be the voice of Mr. Dibbles.

We each wrote part of the script as homework. I was asked to write the scene in which the Duke, Duchess and Bimbo meet my character in the forest:

I was also asked to write about what happens to my character the first time that they split off in the haunted mansion:

We had to show our opening scene to the class. We were given feedback that our characters were good, but that our storyline was lacking as we were making it too complicated and confusing. We also needed at least one of our characters to be someone that the children could relate to. I felt that I needed to make my physicality stronger, which I could have done by better applying 'the tonic body'. I could improve on my reactions to the other characters. I also need to develop better characterisation, which I can improve on by improvising with my character.

Later we tried to adapt our story in an attempt to improve on the points raised in our feedback session. Our new plot involved the same characters, but the story line changed dramatically:
It begins with a 15-year-old Bimbo being adopted by a Duke and Duchess. They treat her horribly (live a slave), and when they hear the news about 'The Something' falling from the sky, they go off to find it without her, in a hope that it will give them enormous wealth. The Bimbo goes off crying and meets her new friend (Yasmin), who always carries a teddy bear around with her, named 'Mr Dibbles'. Yasmin and Stacey (The Bimbo) become great friends and set off to find 'the something' themselves. Yasmin acts like Stacey's conscience and reminds her to be a good person. By the end of the story, The Duke and Duchess learn to love Stacey. Stacey thanks Yasmin for all her help, but soon finds that she is the only person who can see Yasmin. Yasmin tells Stacey that Stacey wont need her anymore and disappears, leaving Stacey with Mr. Dibbles. When The Duke and Duchess leave Stacey alone, she hugs Mr. Dibbles and says, "Bye Yasmin."

Moonfish Productions- Plot 2

Today at Moonfish Productions' meeting, we all agreed that yesterday's idea wasn't working because the spy idea had been overdone. So we got to work, drafting a new plot. Here is a printed version of our new plot: 

Although, we worked on devising scenes around this new plot, peer feedback helped us to realise that the idea wasn't working at all and we felt that we were in a much worse position than that which we were in yesterday. 

We worked on looking at new ideas, with and without The Hairy Toe's involvement. This is because, we have recently discovered, what a difficult task we've set for ourselves in basing our story around 'the toe'. We looked at making a children's horror play about monsters (zombies, vampires, werewolves etc.). We also looked at making a Tim Burton style play about a strange village, with strange villagers. I will write on our group Facebook page, if I have any further ideas or research that I think might work well in our project.

Moonfish Productions- The Hairy Toe Plot

I watched these videos as part of my research for Children's Theatre:
AESOPS FABLES: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=heasnJY8HMM
NATIVE AMERICAN STORIES: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s1Mb9tsnYLU&list=PLED363ADEC6DC167C
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUxayvHzgLY&list=PLED363ADEC6DC167C
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44ZenHI6HQM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyaifWkUWr0
INDIAN LEGENDS: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3PKVTWmTco
ROALD DHAL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDWOXcrUTd4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9xr7vV40tNg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5DS2DnsJ04
THE ELEPHANTS CHILD: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buqw2bvlu2Q

I thought that 'The Enormous Crocodile' was a good example of  just how scary stories for children can be. I also thought that 'The God Ganesha' was a good example of how stories can include multiple events to keep the audience entertained, without getting too complicated. The Native American stories were a good example of how fascinating different cultural influences in stories can be, especially for children (who may no nothing about these cultures, until they listening to the stories). I also liked the idea of 'The Elephant Child', which included talking animals as the main characters, which is sure to be a hit with kids who love animals. 








Today Moonfish Productions wrote on our part of the wall in The Black Box. Here are some images of our work so far:

We wrote a plot summary- including a beginning, a middle and an end. We then got to work, devising some of our scenes. I still need to focus on my physicality and character development, but the scenes are coming together quite nicely. I tried to improve my characterisation, and will continue to do this by practising in front of a mirror and recording myself  while "in character".

Moonfish Productions- The Hairy Toe Development

Today, we were given the task of developing our 'Children's Theatre' pieces and performing a scene from it. We spent a long time thinking of ideas for the storyline and eventually came up with a scene to perform to the class.

We all discussed our thoughts for the storyline and everyone put their ideas forward.  However, we found that they all differed tremendously. We handled the problem in a very productive way- each of us was given a piece of paper to write their version of what they thought the story line should be and then we took it in turns to read out what what was written on our pieces of paper. Eventually we chose to incorporate the best ideas from each of the pieces of paper (as everyone came up with something really creative). So we set out to devise one of the scenes and rehearsed it.

We chose to do a scene in which The Giant and Flo (his young friend), were attempting to break into Lady Petronella's hideout, in order to get The Hairy Toe back. I played Lady Petronella's Guard, who was meant to be a mean, scary and an excellent swordsman. 

The scene became quite comical and the idea of doing a James Bond spoof came up. I was given feedback that my character was too scary, that I could not be on the same level of evilness as Lady Petronella and that, as a minion I needed two sides to my character (possibly even, a sob story). Therefore, I need to work to further develop my character, which I will do by researching Evil Henchman and creating my own character using these ideas:

The Emperor's New Groove- Kronk:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MNllfr6wVY

Peter Pan- Mr Smee:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkQt6wRGhbU
 

The Lion King- Hyenas:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhZ0TKdgJGg

Source Material For 'The Children's Theatre Project'

Today we focused on looking at source material, which would give us ideas for our 'Children's Theatre' project pieces. We read a text about various ideas that we could incorporate into our pieces, including Fairytales, Myths, Quests and Old Wine in New Bottles. I felt that it included some very useful information and so I have taken photographs of the text for my blog. Here is the text:

We had to pick random pieces of paper, which would decide the title, theme, setting, a character and the opening line of the first 3 minutes of our performances (however, they did not necessarily have to relate to our previous ideas or or final project piece):

Title
The Magic Traffic Cone
Theme
Gang warfare
Setting
A boat, in the middle of The Sea
Character
Lady Petronella Janie Roley-Worthington
Opening Line
"I'm sorry, but I can't take your call right now. Please leave a message after the tone. BEEP!"
Something silly
Six toes

We decided to use these random ideas to expand on one of our previous ideas- the tale of 'The Hairy Toe'. As we were allowed to discard some of the pieces of paper, we chose a different title and opening line. Due to our setting being in the middle of The Sea, I suggested  that we make the gang warfare between pirates. Lady Petronella would be the villain of the story, who was to hold The Giant captive, in the hope to sell his toe for gold. I was the Narrator, who I suggested should come in and out of the story.

Script (Used for this performance, but is likely to change for the final performance)

The story begins with a freeze frame. On a pirate ship, in the middle of the sea. 4 pirates stand, ready to fight. At another location, Lady Petronella taunts the captured giant. One of The Pirates steps out of the freeze frame.

Narrator/Pirate: Why hello there, and welcome to the story of 'The Hairy Toe'. A tale of a giant who had 6 toes. One hairy. Our story begins, on a stormy night.

The Narrator/Pirate goes back into their frozen position. The Pirates plot to find the giant and his toe for themselves. They go offstage.

Lady Petronella continues to taunt the giant, reducing him to tears, begging her to let him go. The Pirates return, demanding that Lady Petronella gives them The Hairy Toe. She refuses and spites them all by cutting off his toe. They all freeze. The Narrator/ Pirate steps out of the freeze frame.

The Narrator/ Pirate: And that my friends, is only the beginning.

End of scene


We were given feedback, where we were told that; it was a good starting point;  that they liked the idea of The Narrator coming in and out of the story; that they liked the idea of the evil Lady Petronella; but, that there is room for much improvement, i.e our stage positioning and the characterisation of The Giant. I felt that my physicality needed further developing, which I will work on by practising in front of a mirror.

Moonfish Productions' Spider Diagram

Today a Professional Actor was brought into The College to talk to us about The Performing Arts Industry. He had been in Cirque du Soleil in Las Vegas, Les Miserables in The West End, Pantomime and Children's Theatre. He spoke to us about the importance of a good Agent, by explaining the hardships he had had to face with the business side of his acting career. He also told us about Repertory Theatre.

Here is a web page about Repertory Theatre:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repertory_theatre






My 'Theatre For Children' Group have written a 'Code Of Conduct', which we all had to sign. Our company name is 'Moonfish Productions'. We also made a spider diagram of some new ideas. Here are some of our new ideas:

• Fairy tales

-The Hairy Toe- Antonio (The Giant), Nana Geraldine (The Old Lady) , Flo (The Granddaughter of The Old Lady), Bobby Green and Wend Greene (Husband and Wife Comedy Duo)
http://americanfolklore.net/folklore/2009/10/the_hairy_toe.html
-A twist to a classic fairytale- Red Riding Hood turns out to be The Wolf.

• Scary Stories

- Scary Music- Could also be funny, could get The Audience Involved
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZpf0SIO-sY

• Music

- Themed music
- Live singing
- Pop music

• Set

-Back drop made of sheets- painted to represent different settings