We had 2 hours today to sort out our opening for Titus Andronicus. Today was purely based on physical theatre and not lines, which I was thankful for since I still was unsure of my lines.
Maggot Pile
We began by on the floor, overlapping each other, to look like a pile of dead bodies (the image of 'after the war') with Lavinia standing, looking at the pile. There is a drum beat that makes us all start to move around, slowly at the beginning. As the drum beat gets faster, our movements become more stylised and expressive. According to Ben and Sybil, it looked like a 'Maggot Pile' and it looked really effective. Although it may have looked good, we were all hurting one another by stepping on each other's hair, lying on each other's heads, etc. It was very hard to move as my hair kept getting caught. I've taken this on board and I now know I need to tie my hair up and become more cautious for next time.
Lavinia then begins to take people out of the pile by holding her hand to their face and we follow with our faces as if she is using some kind of energy that our faces are attracted to. We also tried it if Lavinia held people's hands and took them out of the pile however the idea of the hand in front of the face looked a lot more effective as it added to the surreal-ness of bringing dead bodies back to life.
The last people to be taken out of the pile are the two actresses playing Titus Andronicus. While they improvise movements in the middle of the space, we all keep walking around the space. While we walk around the space, there is the idea of people slashing people's throats from behind, forcing them to fall backwards and then get back up. We did some work on how to fall backwards beforehand.
Slashing Throats From Behind
To safely work on falling backwards, we got into partners of a similar size to us and we worked on ways to fall backwards.
I was partners with Amber however I don't have any strength or trust in myself to catch anyone so I just fell backwards. Ben said the key so a successful fall is to have a strong core but bend your knees when you're close to the ground. This was a very good way to fall since I also had control so if there was any danger of me falling then my knees were bent anyway so I could just bend them more so I could then go into sitting position therefore minimising the pain I would experience.
We began by me falling backwards and she would hold her hands slightly behind my back and catch me. I was very scared about this catch because there was not much support. We then tried to do a trust exercise type of fall but Amber found that harder to catch me therefore we had to find another way.
After coming back from getting my measurements taken by TTA, Amber had found a new way of catching me. She would swipe my forehead slightly, to signal that I should go backwards, and I would fall while she had her arms cradled close to the ground. This was a lot more trusting and safer therefore I was not scared to fall backwards.
We then worked this into a group so we would all walk around the space and do a similar type of fall. Because anyone could do it at anytime, I had to make sure I was always on the ball so I could ensure I would fall safely each time.
Circle Around Titus
Moving on, we then created a circle around Katie (Titus), huddled tightly creating an 'ahhhh' sound. We would continue this 'ahhhh' until Katie rose up and we would make a 'hee!' sound and drop down to the floor. This movement was mainly just a transition as we then all move into the space, ready for our tribal movements.
Tribal Movements
Once Katie finished her prolonged sound, she would then say 'HA' and in response, we would all do two stomps in front with one foot, as if we were trying to scare our opponents (audience). We then took did one small, quiet step forwards and then another loud stomp after. We then hunched over, with our hands on our knees, and made our way to the floor We then rose upwards and began to quickly clap and stomp at the same time, coming closer and closer to the audience each time we stomp.
From this, we then lift our right arm up in a diagonal, using our left arm to slap our forearm below and above twice, which then brings us down to the ground and slowly (scarily) taking our hand to the floor (getting the mud) and putting it on our faces, with a dead look in our eyes as if we were staring out the audience. We then repeated the same diagonal arm movement as before however only slapping our arm once in each direction this time, bringing our right arm down to the ground slowly while saying 'heee' with a low voice.
This led onto rising up to standing and stomping twice. Straight after the stomps, we then, with both arms, slap the inside of our thighs, our chests, and then raising our arms to the sky, twice though. Following this, we then lifted our left arm in a diagonal, reaching underneath with our right arms, as if grabbing something, and then doing the same on the other side, and then gesturing the slitting of our throats while making a slitting noise and scary facial expression.
This was inspired by the Haka (traditional ancestral war cry, dance, or challenge from the Māori people of New Zealand) , which is used to scare their opponents.
I feel like, together, this will be very effective as a start to the play as it sets up the situation of the play, as it is set 10 years after a war, instead of just telling the audience, as we show them instead by instantly throwing them into this world.
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