Just a quick note to all of you lovely readers who follow the blog but don't know or go to Windmill Young Actors - I will be posting a few more generic articles this term about working with young actors so please do keep coming back. Thanks again.
But what a joy it was to be back! It was a bit of a shock to the system though and all of those Easter eggs have definitely had an effect on my stamina! Luckily, I spent this morning running and collapsing on Hove lawns with a bit of bootcamp so I should be back up to fitness again in no time!
With almost a full compliment and some new members, Windmill Young Actors kicked off with a bang! As always with first sessions back, it's a little disjointed. We want to make sure that new members feel welcome and that old members have a lot of fun. Remember that all of last term was pretty punishing with full time rehearsals and our most advanced and ambitious project to date so easing back into things is usually a good idea!
Therefore, improvisation was the name of the game. I don't know if any of you ever watched, 'Whose Line is it Anyway?', but it was by far one of my most favourite TV programs when I was growing up. The likes of Greg Proops and Ryan Stiles rolled out some of the best comic improvisation that you'll ever see and it launched a whole catalogue of spin offs, including being the inspiration for things like 'Mock the Week'.
The key to improvisation games is to have strict rules. As with most things in life, if we know where the boundaries are then that frees us up to explore everything within them with vigour and courage.
We began with 'Party Quirks'. This is where one person hosts a party. As each guest arrives it is obvious that they have a specific 'quirk'. These are planned beforehand by the group and can range from crazy things like, 'You are obsessed with the floor' to 'you want to murder the host but keep failing miserably'. The idea is that the host has to react and improvise truthfully around what the guests bring into the room and then guess what their quirk is. Hilarity tends to ensue!
Secondly, we played a game called, 'Whose Line'. This is where we start the scene in a very normal scenario - something very real like 'three people on a bench.' They will improvise something quite simple but in their pockets will be prepared lines of dialogue written by other members of the group. They then need to take the line out and incorporate it into the scene naturally and with truth. It's quite a hard game and often results in multiple 'corpsing' on stage.
Away from improvisation games, we played some of our favourite energetic games around use of space and then, exhausted, collapsed into conversations about this term and what's lined up.
We're still waiting to hear confirmation from the school about using the theatre for our showcase - I am pushing on this and hopefully we'll have an answer this week. Sorry for the delay!
And we're also beginning to get ideas together for the performance at The Brighton Dome.
I am hoping that all members of the club will have more opportunities to explore specific text based scenes, monologues and duologues so there's lots to do!
No comments:
Post a Comment