Playwriting - Chong Tze Chien

We discussed our SDEA script with Tze Chien today.
He felt that it was a bit confusing and there were too many focus points - homosexuality, religion, inferior...

1. Have different characters to bring out different points of view - Examiners? Mother? Boyfriend? Girlfriend? Sister?
- He suggested we could have different examiners of different religions.
- Right at the start of the play, we must show that this play is not happening in Michelle' real life, it's only a mental landscape. Or else, audience will be confused.
-Voices of mother, boyfriend, girlfriend and sister should be consistently appearing throughout the play
2. Let the situation speak for itself - SHOW NOT TELL
- In the monologue for Michelle, there's a part where she mentions "I don't have an identity!" or something along that line.
- Don't tell the audience that she doesnt have. Instead, you SHOW it, and the audience will know.
3. Use conversations to bring out theme
4. Don't confuse theme and story
- Story can still focus on the choice of having to live of die.
- Theme is the Politics of Identity.
Theme can still be carried out in a story of life and death via conversations.

He helped us with a few lines in the script to give us a rough idea of which direction it should go towards.

After discussion, he told us to write about any scenario happening a hotel room.
[Exposition - 2 pages, Rising Action - 5 pages, Climax - 2 pages, Falling action+Resolution - 1 page]
1. You must develop the background/history of your the character first
2. What does the character want in the play?
3. Relate to real life examples and rmb SHOW NOT TELL
4. Use of conversation and movement
5. If you're stuck, it means you have not fully develop your own understanding of your character and his/her objectives
6. Create unexpected events in between
7. Fix the characters involved - No enter/exit of new characters after exposition

Yup, thats what I've learnt! :D Hope it's of good use hahaha.

Rui Shan

Physical Theatre

We started off this session with an exercise, that was very much like Columbian Hypnosis, but is called Magician. We got into pairs, and one person would be under the spell and the other would be the magician. This exercise really helped us to be focused. To make this exercise interesting, we also got the chance to change partners, therefore we got to work with different people. Also, the exercise got tougher. We then had to choose a different body part to lead the our partner, and the partner had to follow with a different body part as well (not eyes). Therefore, we needed to work together well as partners, knowing each other's limitations (do not lead a person to a level where they cannot follow with that body part). I also learned that we had to make it clear who was leading and who was following,which meant that we had to be very focused and worked together well. On top of that, we learned to be creative with our space. We could crawl under tables, over chairs, around the scaffold etc. etc.

Next, we did an exercise where by we walked around the space and then in a few seconds, had to form a straight line as a whole cohort. We could not talk at all, therefore it was rather tough. What I did was I simply waited for someone to stop, and then the rest of us followed and formed a line beside that person. We also had to walk around the space in a straight line as a group, without looking at each other. So basically, we had to face forward, yet from the corner of our eyes, watch each other and see which direction the group was moving to. This taught me how to multi-task! (haha), and also to work together as a team, which is very important in doing theatre work.

Last but not least, we did a continuation of what we did last week, which was the text and the object. This week, however, we focused mainly on the object. As I was not present last week, I spent a few minutes panicking and wondering what object I was going to use and finally decided on my wallet. We had to explore our object, the sounds it makes, the things it could do that we never thought it could....then present it to the class. Now the trick here is not to use our object as a symbolism of another object (for example a pen as a lipstick). What I did with my wallet was shake it and hear the sounds the coins make, opening and snapping it shut (It created quite a nice beat), and emptying the coins and letting it shower down on the floor, making a beautiful ringing sound. These actions would then be used as props for our texts. The purpose of this was to ensure that we know our props, even before we used them. Therefore, exploring whatever props we had is important, as it gives us a sense of what it could be used for, and also be creative about it.

That's all. {:

xoxo,
mel the bimbo!

Playwriting Workshop

Let me apologize to begin with...


I was late. No hiding that fact, therefore I humbly offer my apologies and promise that it will never happen again( I hope). OK, so when the very late me walked in, this was written on the board: Dramatic Writing: create a situation. Underneath the heading were lots of words which I later found out to be an impromptu story our instructor had made up. It was about a boy's conversation with his mom at home on the morning he was supposed to go get his O' level results and he was feeling quite nervous. There were two scenarios. One was where he was in the kitchen and just before he said:" Mom... I...I don't want to go to school today..", he walked towards the window. In the other situation, he was sitting on his bed and talking to his mother the whole time. We were then asked to pick which one had more tension to it. Obviously, credits went to the first "story" for the suspense created especially when the boy walked to the window.


He then told us to imagine an everyday situation(a problem). We came up with the idea of asking a teacher for an extension in the deadline for a crucial piece of work. We were then instructed to picture this in a totally different location. I was going to say the zoo or the movies, but he gave us something much better... Zouk xD yup! There we are, in Zouk. Asking our teacher for an extension in deadline. All the while trying to ignore the constant dance beats and drunken yells. To add to this, you are, a little bit tipsy... Mmmhmm, delicious scenario! Haha, here's Donna's story(she was told to present)or the rough gauge of it:

*Donna dancing with a group of friends, spots a hunky looking guy at the back and motions to friends that she is getting a drink then dances her way next to him*

*Hunky looking guy spots her*

Guy: Donna?!?

Donna: Who?

Guy: You.

Donna*takes a double look*:Mr T?!?!?!

{i humbly apologize but I forgot the middle part}

Donna: I'll hand it in by tomorrow*flees*

Haha as for me, I was having so much fun impaling myself in Zouk in front of TheGreatOne that I completely forgot the part about asking for an extension. Thus, I shall not post that up. However, interested fellows are more than welcome to ask for the rubbish I wrote :D


After that, we looked at the situation from a teacher's perspective of meeting a student in Zouk. Here, I shall post my story up as it isn't that bad:

(Teacher checks phone in Zouk. One sms from student X: Tcher, my aunt just died. Can u gimme some extension for e hw? Teacher feels generous and says yes)

Teacher*accidentally stepping on someone's shoe*: Oh, sorry!

X: OW! What the !@#$% pain sia!

Teacher: I'm really sorry.

X*recognises teacher*: Ahhh, nevermind, nevermind!! *mumbles incoherently and walks away*

Teacher: Hey, hang on... ... X?!?

X: No! No, no, no!! Not me! I'm not drunk!

Teacher: Didn't your aunt just pass away X? What are you doing here?

X: No, no!! I wasn't... I... I was just leaving! I gotta go!!

Haha. Don't think it was that bad. Stacey's story though was rather tangled up in that it was absurd and i-dunno-what-to-say-LOL. Someone should give that girl, I mean guy, a prize. xD. I would recommend people to read Mark's scandalous story though. It's totally... Mark ;D


We were asked for another scenario and we came up with buying hot dogs from the cafe on hotdog Tuesdays. The instructor then asked us for some more details and before you know it, we had a story of the runaway kid and his last meal going on xDD. The story goes that you have run away from home because of an argument with your parents who don't want you to continue with Drama(suddenly I see my life story flash out before my very eyes). For unbeknownst reasons, you still continue with school even though you are already staying over at a friend's house and you don't have any money left. So on that particular Tuesday, you were starving and only had $1.20 to pay for THAT LAST HOTDOG. As you were savouring it in your hands, you BUMPED into somebody causing your hotdog to FALL to the ground. You look up, bewildered just to see YOUR PARENTS looking at you. Haha, and here's my story:

*BUMPS*

Me: HEY! Watch where you're going, bitch!

Mum: What... ... *takes a double look* (insert name here)?!?

Me: Huh, what?? I... *Sees mum. Stops, then turns away bitterly*

Mum: Wait! Where are you going?! Aren't you coming home??

Me* rounds on mum*: What! Aren't you happy enough that you've driven me out of your house and now you've messed up my last meal and... and... Oh for God's sake, just LEAVE ME ALONE! PLEASE!!*runs*

After that, we were told that plot NOT EQUALS story. A story is a sequence of event sin real time while a plot is a sequence of events told from one person's point of view and told in such a way to gain dramatic effect.

A good story or a plot will, ultimately, follow this sequence:

• EXPOSITION (10%)


• RISING ACTION (30-40%)


• CLIMAX (10%)


• FALLING ACTION (20-30%)


• RESOLUTION (10-30%)

The exposition is the introduction of all the who, what , why, where and when. There must be a problem to which a stake is tied to, which will lead to a situation. This problem must stem from your protagonist's unconscious want. The rising action involves the characters in the story trying to overcome the problem but, inevitably, making it worse. The "solutions" they use in trying to fix the problem will invariably lead to even more problems. Here, secondary characters are introduced to help our protagonist. In the climax, the protagonist has to make a difficult choice to continue. This is the heart of the entire play. Here, we must never judge a character but must humanize him. For instance, we cannot condone the actions of the tragic hero for making the wrong choices as that will turn audiences off. Instead, we must humanize him to show why he is what he is and why he does what he does. S/He must show conflict whether it is

1. physical(action flicks where the hero & villain fights)


2. interest(I want to do this in my best interest but my parents don't allow me to)


3. value systems(the hero & villain's value systems are different in that they fight for different reasons and hope for different outcomes)


4. emotional(an internal struggle within the protagonist)

Of course, emotional conflict is of the highest order and to attain that in the audiences being on the same page and realizing what your protagonist has to do is, of course, ultimately desired in all story lines. After the climax is the falling action where the consequences of making the wrong choices by the characters(regardless who s/he is) in the climax is shown. Finally, there is the resolution. This is where there is an internal or external change. An external change is one where the world is changed because of the actions or decisions made by the protagonist. A good example is R&J where the Capulets and Montagues realize their fatal mistake and never fight again. An internal change is one where the protagonist him/herself is changed like any of the movies where s/he walks off gloriously into the sunset. :D

Oh yes, one more thing we learnt was how to create a situation. It's really simple. Just follow this 3 easy steps xD:

1. Take a normal situation


2. Give it an atypical location


3. Change the point of view it is seen through

and voila! you have... a situation!

Finally, I would like to end this (very late) 1st review from a quote from the man himself:

*A maggie mee problem that escalates into World War II*

Let's Get Physical workshop 7/5

I came in, first thing I saw was two white parallel strips and everyone staring at me, so I sat down quickly. Today what we did was very different! We started off with vocal exercises. Not voice projection, vocals. That means we worked with vowels and consonants and the moving of our jaw. It was 15 minutes later that things changed and got a lot tougher.

Now Julius was going around humming with a high pitch and a volume so low it was hard to match the softness. He wanted to communicate to us using only physical gestures and for us to match his singing and stance. So, he called us up using his hands and used whatever means he could to give signals or propose actions to us. Only when there was no alternative would he give verbal instructions. Thing is, he wanted to form a story through the singing and the proposing, not just have us to follow him. So I managed to play along with him a bit since I had this Bollywood idea. He actually said "good"! A huge change from the "late"s and the "noisy"s that I was so used to hearing. I learnt that it's good to step out and just try something without fear of being judged or laughed at.

Our next activity was to walk/run from one end of the black box to the other, only that there was to be a wall of jelly or any thick medium in between the two strips, so we were to slow down while we were inside that zone. It was harder than it seems because we had to analyze and repeat our motion slowly, giving special attention to the timing of the arms and legs. We became more aware of our bodies and how they move.

After that we walked down the strips first normally then very slowly. We were taught to not move our upper body while keeping our feet in line. So.. we had to maintain a relaxed posture, keeping our body and head straight while slowly moving down the lines, which trained our balance and the smoothness of our motion. We were also not allowed to look at the floor so we had to use our sense of touch or some other methods to make sure we were in line.

Following which we were to think of a simple action, play it out in real time, then deconstruct the actions and after that do it in slow motion. Mine was opening a corked bottle and then drinking from it, spilling some of the wine on myself. Deconstruction I found was very very hard. We have to isolate every separate movement as so: reach out, grab, pick up, insert, twirl, and so on. Also there was one point where I "finished" but no one said anything or continued the lesson so I was very confused and ended up doing some extra actions and left everyone slightly amused. Julius told me that I have to sure where my end point is so when I end, I'm just gonna stone and if no one says anything, so be it.

The two hours went surprisingly fast, our last exercise was simply having to say whatever script we chose, which was about four lines. We were also told to take out our item we were supposed to bring and think of an action to do with it while saying the lines. Personally I didn't prepare that well, so I ended up with a bible quote and an umbrella. I'm not sure how I'm going to link bible verses with an umbrella but I'll surely think of something. Training my improvising skills ah.

Wish me luck.
Isaac Wong

Absurd workshop!!! -Priscilla

hey hey..
well i thought it would be rather unfair to ask Melvyn to post up stuff and then not do so myself.. so yeah, here goes-
I met with Mr Low too, but just 2 times. The first time we read through the first play and i explained to him what i thought of the character, and what i expected of her.
It was a challenge for me to play the part of the minister, because women in general aren't really as cold hearted and severe as this minister.
I tried portraying her as a very confident, cold hearted, emotionless and strict woman.
I thought of using a very bored, cold and direct and sometimes threatening tone for the whole piece. But realized that if i used that method to tackle the piece, it would become monotonous, and kind of boring.
Mr Low taught me to vary, and to use the monosyllabic words to bring out the power of the piece. So using his feedback, i tried to mold my character into shape.

The other problem that i faced was the fact that I had the habit of wavy my hands around in a very 'graceful' manner. This was inappropriate, as the character was supposed to be strict and stern. So i had to keep my hands to myself, and only move them when making certain statements. They also had to be swift, stern, severe and powerful.

My second session with Mr Low was kind of the same stuff. We just went through the rest of the play, and he helped to pick out the parts that he thought i needed to improve on. And then we proceeded to try and correct them. Also, I had to brainstorm over the issue of what costume and props i was going to use. There was a huge problem of me being unable to find the right costume, since i did not know of any way that i could get an army uniform that fit me. I also wanted to add in a scar on my face, but could not cause i don know how to!

Well anyways, on the day of the performance, i managed to get a full set of the army uniform!! THANK YOU KHAI!!!! I OWE YOU ONE!!! well he was such a sweetheart, and got me one that perfectly fit me! So with that, a tight pony tail and eye liner on, i entered the battle field :P.. he he he...
I did talk to Mary before the start of the programme, and she gave me a few headers as to how i could go about playing my character so that i could create more tension, fear and respect from the audience. Things like going up to them, standing beside them, looking them up and down, suddenly pointing to them, giving them the 'your so so so dead' look and everything else. And then after the session that i had with her, i went to be locked up in the storeroom.

The performance was ok, cept for the fact that i kept forgetting my lines! (silly me!) but the tension was there i guess (hope so). Well the audience giggling and smiling at me SSOOO DID NOT HELP!!! thanks Afiqah, Saad and Nishal, you guys really tested my skill of keeping a straight face! Well other than that, I guess it all went well.

Did not stay for long after that, so my learning point i guess was how to play with the audience, and their feelings, and using things like lighting, tone., pace and all sorts of other things to create the environment needed.

-Priscilla Jamir

Political Theatre Workshop.

It's MAYDAY people!! =D

Hah. And yes, I shall get back into topic.... Political theatre huh...
In the form of a press conference (since it's best to portray political contrast between people of power [minister] and commoners [in the form of journalists / press] themselves), we discussed about how Pinter wants to portray the "lost" freedom-of-speech of the general public in theatre.
We were also asked to "explore the irony between the different characters" during the duration. Yepp.

We started off the workshop with a surprise. Wow!! The pro personally demostrated her own idea of "the Minister" for us as a sneak preview. x) The tension that she created was so swift! At one blink of an eye, she's transformed into a scary woman in power, creating the tension that she wants to present, and getting all the attention she wants. First comment given by WenZhen was, "Wah! She power man!!" HAHAHAAA!!!

Okay. Now into the real one.
She invited our first presenter, MELVYN!! x)
Ohohhh!! Not forgetting his bodyguard (MARK!) and his (I mean Mel's) expensive western suit. xD

We discussed about Melvyn's confidence level in play. Despite his character's politness, he still portray a sinister threat to the audience (the press). And yes! His western suit presented a twist in the story. The western suit makes people think that he's on our (the general public represented by the press) side and that he won't be any form of a threat to us. The pace of one's speech makes a difference too. Melvyn's presentation was rather "melodious" and more charismatic in a sense. It captures people's attention by presenting an eagerness to answer the press's questions.
Before I forget, the things that he does (takes someone's phone) also creates some sort of tension and fear between the press. =) What master of deceive he was and still is. ><

In comparison, we've another Minister with a completely different personality to come up. Yes! Pris and her NCC uniform. Hahahahahaaa!!!! - Thou shalt not grin at other's appearance no matter how weird. =x

She doesn't have a bodyguard. Well, but the use of the NCC or Army Uniform immediately brought forth tension to the space. Pris choice of speaking tempo was so much slower and yet monotonous. This choice so much enhanced the reluctancy to answer questions. Her demand for respect was shown from that fact that she only allow questions from people who raise their hands. This totally diminished the press's "freedom-of-speech". FIERCE ah pris. ><

We moved on to experiment on the usage of lights, and the different use of bodyguards.
Let's save the best for the last and talk about bodyguards first. x) Mark was asked to choose idon'tknowhowmany body guards to stand among the crowds. Well, it was immediately shown the contrast in the tension levels created by different bodyguards. Their standing posture makes a difference! That one.... The T.H.O.S.E aspect came in. Guards that are taller demands more attention. Guards who are still and not open at all presents a very stressful atmosphere (I'm not making much sense so please help yourself to make sense of it.) Also, we've found out that the closer the bodyguard is to the press, the higher then tension level was. What logic; but it works. >< The people in power may want his / her bodyguards to step forward to the crowd so as to get his / her will done. The reluctancy in the audience may be seen and felt and it too, creates tension among people. The choice of bodyguards are important too!
Normally it'd be a guy person of power with all guys bodyguards, or a female person in power with female bodyguards, or a female person in power with all male bodyguards. No mix bodyguards. x) WenZhen take note yeah?? xP

Now for the exciting part. LIGHTS!! xD
Front lights that are nearer to the Minister gives him the attention that he wants, while back lights allow him to create the tension that he wants. Diagonal side lights are also angled at an angle nearer to the person in power to create tension (If you guys don't know what am I saying... Refer to your memories of how kevin set the lightings that day).
Enough for the lightings on the Minister. The most impactful use of lightings will be the other spotlights angled and focused directly on the audiences themselves (in this sense, the press). The more uncomfortable the lighting is, the higher the tension level would be. It'd be good to have moving lights so as to focus lights on people who speaks. Other general lightings can be used to focus on some random area that the crowd gathered in. All these, to create tension.

Yadayadayada... All about tension. Hahahaa...
Yes it is ALL about tension. D;

So much for my personal reflection of the political theatre workshop. There's just too much to it that I thought will be worth us exploring ie; the use of the smoke machine! =D
Figure it yourselves yeah?? =)

Cheers,
Chenxing.