Pajama Game - History Lecture : Mr Kent

1950s - WWII
2 emotions - Darkest period, happiest period
Hope/Despair
America during WWII
 America was previously a country of isolation
          - Resilience
          - Belief that they can solve their own problems
America ends up fighting Germany
       - Germany declared this war

Their victory was a tainted moral victory for US  
           Compromised victory because they aligned with communist Russia.
                - The US fired bombed cities
                - The US lost their moral compass through use of nuclear bombs and propaganda

Despair - had a sense of hope for African Americans
- WWII raised that blacks were needed by the americans. They spilt their blood with white people
- They dealt with tyranny abroad and at home

Women were in charge of themselves to a new degree - Propaganda embraced the equality of women
1945 - country town between despair and hope
Months after war victory, a new fear of communism .
This fear of communism starts to erode their hope.
Hope for blacks and women stop followed by a sense that their hope was misguided.
- Cloud of fear of communism and fear of the nuclear war (fear was even bigger because of their lack of technology and communications unlike our world now)
Nuclear war was the big downer for the 1950s


Labour unions - protect the rights of the workers
- became politicised
- collective bargaining (communism)

Moguls of industry had political power and had a fear of communism which was logical.
Russians declared "their objective for the whole world to be communist"
- US were agitated by work unions

Industries at that time had gone from producing domestic products to war machines back to domestic products.
Women's rights in the 1950s were the women saying "You owe us" to the men for taking over their role during the war.
- became angry that they had been expected to go back to their previous role
- their access to money had changed
- women decided how to spend money
- issues of domestic violence was highest in the 50s
- voters - politicians started listening to women

Despair
1. Men won't change - the patriarcal idea of men's control was under threat
2. some women gave in, some fought, some fled (divorce)

They actually fought the war to preserves what it meant to be american (this social unfairness comes with this)
Communism - men and women were equal

Despair that so little is changing and the change is taking so long.

Blacks weren't treated equally after fighting with whites

1945- everything seemed happy but deep down there was despair

Mother Courage movie

-       Kevin Kline (actor)

-       Jeep was a great way to bring it into a contemporary time period

-       “Man equals Man”

-       He changed the way German sounded

-       Once he became famous and “made it” he spent years studying Marxism

-       Research is in everyday new papers

-       “She’s looking for the war”

-       War’s good business “If it’s business, it makes sense.”

-       Fear was existent in the city, helicopter, actors were exhausted,

-       Everyone was constantly spoken about war

-       Fear of the atomic bomb

-       The only way to protect her family I to make her business thrive.

-       Her bargaining killed her son but by paying all that money to save her life would’ve condemned her whole family to death

-       Was afraid that his plays would never been seen by a German audience

-       McCarthy Trials – pretended to be bad at English so that he wouldn’t be asked as many questions

-       Enormous attention to detail
- Brecht had the emotional moments but has other elements to draw the audience away from the audience
- Brecht always have a tragic hero who is always killed by their virtue.
- He doesn't blame the characters.
- it's not the characters' faults. It's the society that they are in
- We're all gonna die unless we come up with a solution together
- Has the image that we see everyone "image of mothers over the bodies of their children saying why"
- She knew that she would lose her children
- Duality that occur in his plays (in everything: theme, character, plot, etc.)

Mr Black's letter response

"I choose to write my feedback in the form of a letter as opposed to utilizing a numerical scale because I intend this to be a tool for you to further reflect on your artistic choices and the work of putting on this production."
I found it awesome that Mr Black chose to write his response this way because it just means a lot to all of us that he would put as much time in his response as he did and through giving us suggestions and explaining these to us seems a lot more personal. less of a critique and just generally nicer and more helpful than some of the other responses that we got.

Firstly, regarding his responses to the costumes, I completely agree with the fact that some of the costumes seemed more westernised and could sometimes confuse people. I realised this too once all the costumes were put together but unfortunately it didn't seem to me that we could've done much because of the time restraints and our access to costumes that would've suited better. I also think that his observations about the makeup (gods not being different enough, people not being dirtier enough, etc.) were completely true too. That was one thing that I was kind of upset about because I was so excited to be able to use the makeup and stage effects to how we explained in our pitch. Unfortunately many of these things couldn't happen, again, because of time and also because of the lack of care and cooperation from some cast members.

Other
- makeup is important in the blackbox because of how close it was to the audience
- Reca's point that we don't notice what we did right

Nancy Kim

• Based in Canada - Glengold celebration
• Started in drama with Mrs. Moon
• Studied English Lit, introduction to drama
• Professor was drama director
• Knew that she wanted to be involved even though she didn’t act
• Le Page (start doing music videos)– one of the greatest visionaries in theatre
• Undergraduate in drama – similar to IB theatre (University of Toronto)
• Herbelt Alshock (look up name) – Berlin Ensemble
• Not an actors’ director. Perfects first scene before moving onto second scene.
• Productions would take a year
• Don’t have a feeling on continuity but have a scene of perfection
• As an actor you have to understand what’s happening, understand, breath, voice and movement. Our production lacked the connection
• Knowing what your character is feeling/doing really shows throughout the performance
• It’s bad to compare to the best but why not? Since we’re learning about them.
• Most production only go for three weeks (everyday, without the daily conflicts that we have in school)
• It’s not just acting.
• Being on the production side makes you meet more people giving you more of their time. Stage-managing is where you can make money.
• Try everything and then find what fits you.
• A lot of great practitioners didn’t even start in theatre
• Robert Wilson – loved in Europe, disliked in canada
• Importance of stillness – Came out onto stage walks slowly, looks around for 5 minutes, (previously walked on stage and stood there and left without saying anything), spoke about a time when he was in Thailand at a zoo, near closing time, stared at the cat for about 10 minutes and found so much movement in the stillness of the animal.
• 9-5 making them walk from one side to the other in a room, trying to get rid of the little ticks that are unnecessary, stillness with spurts of energy.
• Not about movement, but purposeful movement. Not about action it’s about purposeful action.
• None of the visionaries are never actor directors. Actors are just one element of the entire production.
• Jacques le coq very harsh to his actors.
• Create purposeful action that always goes back into the text.
• Now everyone is combining all these different types of acting and theatre and performance that interconnect with each other.

Opinions of Brecht’s plays

• -       In between hate and love of Brecht
• -       Theatre always evolved.
• -       No one does Brechtian theatre anymore. Elements of Brechtian theatre.

• Having set pieces with purpose for being there (taking things on and off instead of having them constantly on stage)

4 More Days Until the Good Soul

Christian and Kevin being daredevils
and adjusting Lights

This past weekend we've made some incredible progress on the set. Especially considering almost half our cast was away or sick.

I'm proud of how far we've come but I can't help but be so paranoid that we haven't done enough or even feel like we haven't accomplished anything at all! And I know that's not true because we've all worked super hard!! Shout out to Annie for being an amazing artist and leader in Mrs Moon's and Joel's absence!!! And lighting for getting all their stuff together so well!!

I'm also very, extremely afraid to see how well I'll be remembering my lines this week as I know it is vital for me to have them down. The idea that this is the last week is terrifying me to a point that I feel like not going to school in order to just memorise my lines!
I am also kinda worried for the costumes because we can't really do much with them until everyone's here and brings in all their individual pieces.

Tabacco Shop as of Saturday

Our incredible artiste: Annie!!!

I just hope everything will fall into place in the end and I'm able to perform my best on opening night. I've had a lot of support from my friends, from people in our class and, surprisingly the most comforting, people from the IB yr 2 class.

Chis and Kevin being men and putting up shelves

I can't wait to see how this all ends up in the end. It feels so far away yet so close at the same time.

All helping Annie the art room during lunch time

Georgia painting

Costume Design (reading packet notes)

Costume Design

Character-Actor Dressing Lists

-       List used by actors and dressers during dressed rehearsals and performances

-       Lists what the actor wears in each scene and what accessories

Costume Calendar

-       Helps costume designer budget time

Costume sketches for Sweeney Todd

-       Visualisation of how much time to be devoted to each phase of costume design and construction process

·      Accessories that are agreed upon during design phase maybe need to be changed once seen onstage. Costume designers need to plan for these changes and adapt as necessary

Visual Presentation

-       Designers need to codify their thoughts about the costume design

-       Sketches should: show the nature and personality of character, time in the play, evoke the mood and spirit of the play

-       Preliminary Sketches: first visible results of the creative process on paper, first tangible result of the synthesis of the costume designer’s thoughts, ideas, impressions, and research. Costume designers will cover one or more pages of a sketch pad with variations of the same design as they try out different ideas and concepts. Designers may have to “go back to the drawing board” and continue making new designs based on input from production design team

-       Costume Layout: small, simply and clearly drawn, group figures that illustrate the costume design for a number of characters. Characters are normally grouped in some logical sequence (e.g. dancers, leads, extras, etc.). Provides an overall view of the costume concept for the entire production and to give an indication of how the various costumes will look and work together.

-       Costume Sketch: full-colour drawing that should give a strong indication of character, should look like it is being worn by the actor playing the character. Large and clear enough to provide accurate information about the line and detail of the garment yet not cramped on the page. Research material about construction details can provide more accurate information for the cutter/draper than sketches. And information that will help construct the costume as the designer envisions it can, and should, be provided with the costume sketch or rendering. Each plate should identify the play, the name of the character, and the scene that the costume is worn. Sketches are also used by scenic and lighting designers to provide information about the costume palette and fabric.

·      You must be imaginative, be able to draw with ease and authority, have an understanding of fabrics, and knowledge of the history of clothing.