The first contest was carrying a book on a head. We did this by walking with books balanced on our heads and looking as if we were concentrating very hard. Eventually one child (LeRhonda) lost. Then we played hopscotch using a piece of paper to represent the rock. Then we threw it and mimicked hopscotch LeRhonda won this one and I became very unhappy then she was trying to fight and I kept saying no because my mummy said I couldn’t. I don’t think this or the first one were very good improvisations because LeRhonda and I don’t seem to work well together.
The third picture I did was a picture of two children peering round a door. I did this improvisation with Matthew and Ashley. We made it like two children were peering into a room where there was ghost. Jelani and I used looks of fear to portray how we felt. Ashley swished around in a ghost like manner. I think this improvisation worked well because we used good facial expressions and body language to show how we felt.
Some of the other improvisations, which were good, were Fajr and Mark they had a picture of two children sitting together. They did this very well as they used baby talk. It was a very good piece to watch. Erica, Stefanie and Reuben performed another good one. They had a picture of a boy holding a frog. The girls did a very good impression of being grossed out by it whilst Reuben was fascinated by it. The girls acted grossed out by screwing up their faces saying phrases such as ‘ewww’ and looking at the frog in disgust. Reuben acted fascinated by it by looking at in with his eyes open and smiling and touching it.
The next stimuli we used was music. I particularly enjoyed this one because it was fun and it gave us more freedom to express ourselves. The first piece we were given was “Dance of the Knights”. This was a very free piece of classical music. In my group was: Ashley, Matthew, Jelani, Erica and Sacha. For this piece we acted out a scene at a Royal ball. Four of us danced around, then the Queen and the Princess came in (Erica and Sacha). When they entered we all stopped dancing and bowed or curtseyed. Then they took their seats Erica clapped her hands and we continued dancing. Whenever we danced past them we curtseyed, This improvisation worked well as we all had very sombre facial expressions and didn’t corpse. I very much enjoyed this piece.
The second piece of music we were given was “Tarzan”, this was a very sad piece and we all took on the mood. The piece we did was about a friend who was leaving on a train, we all pretended to cry and be sad. Then she sad good-bye to her current boyfriend and her jealous ex boyfriend came and killed the boyfriend. After this we cut to the funeral where we all pretended to throw dirt on his grave and cry. This improvisation worked well as when the dramatic part in the piece came the killing took place. We used chairs to represent the train the girl was getting on. Also we used slow motion for the killings to make them more dramatic. All of the improvisations for this piece were good and a few left the rooms crying because the pieces had so much feeling.
The third piece we were given was “Memory from Cats”. For his piece we didn’t use the music to act with, but used it to get the right feeling, For this piece I was working with Matthew and Ashley. We did an old woman remembering the days when she was in love. Then she remembered when her love was called up for the war and died. I was the old person and I had a sort of daze expression as if remembering what had happened. Ashley and Matthew were good, as they acted very happy. We did this by having the old woman remember something out loud then Ashley and Matthew would be in a freeze and do a short scene about the memory and end in a freeze. I enjoyed this piece because it was fun to do and turned out well.
The fourth piece we were given was a piece called “Up the Junction by Squeeze”. It was about a man that gets a woman pregnant, they marry and live in a grotty apartment then she leaves him for a soldier. The first scene we had to do was between the woman and her friend. I was working with Reuben for this improvisation. Reuben did a great impression of a woman and I was having trouble not laughing. This piece worked well as it was fun to do and it must have been enjoyable to watch.
The second scene we did was a confrontation ten years later between the daughter and her father. We did this well by having the father trying to make conversation and the daughter was just giving one-word answers such as: Father: ” So how’s your mother ” Daughter : “Fat” Also I (daughter) just looked around then room not looking him in the eye and being very blas about the whole thing. I enjoyed this piece as it turned out well. It came together well as Reuben and I seemed to work together well.
