21M.710  Script Analysis

Script Analysis for Tuesday, May 10

Hey Super-Cool Script Analysis Team!

I hope you are staying warm and dry while Spring tries valiantly to arrive!

A few reminders and assignments for the upcoming week!

+ Due to my rehearsal schedule, will NOT have class today. Please use this time to your advantage: catch up in your work, catch up on sleep, or, better yet, enjoy yourself by watching the amazing film version of "A Streetcar Named Desire."

+ In lieu of today's class, I'll expect that ALL of you will want to celebrate on Saturday night by attending "HAND & MIND: A PAGEANT" as the exciting culmination of the MIT Moving Day festivities.
This incredible show features hundreds of student performers, and will delight the senses with dance, music, singing, and tremendous visual spectacle! There'll be amazing video mapping, a robot, giant puppet-heads, and breathtaking fireworks!
DON'T MISS IT! REALLY!
KILLIAN COURT. SATURDAY NIGHT. GATES OPEN at 7:45.
SHOW BEGINS PROMPTLY at 8:30.
Followed by Dance Parties and Games all over campus!

+ FOR TUESDAY, MAY 10
Please READ Elia Kazan's "Director's Notebook for 'A Streetcar Named Desire." This essay is on Stellar. It isn't long, but it gives a very interesting window into the kinds of things a director MIGHT focus on when preparing to direct a production. What does Kazan think about? Pay attention to his vocabulary, his assumptions, his structure, and his particular approach. Remember, Kazan was the director of the original Broadway production as well as the feature film!

Be prepared to discuss Kazan's approach with ideas of your own -- make some notes in your JOURNAL about YOUR OWN directorial ideas and individual approach to the play. What would YOU be thinking about as you prepared for rehearsal? Since we will NOT have a final written assignment for this unit, I do expect EVERYONE to share some directorial insight about the play in our last two classes!

+ Lastly, please take a moment to use the on-line student course feedback opportunity for this class. As you know, I am teaching this class for the very first time, and am working hard to develop readings, topics, assignments, and a flow for the course. I know this first pass has been a bit bumpy, but I am so appreciative of your enthusiasm and engagement! Your honest and candid feedback about what worked well (and, of course, what might not have been as successful!) will be useful to me in preparing the course for next fall!

THANKS!
See you Saturday night in Killian Court, and next Tuesday in class.
Think good thoughts about sunny weather for our outdoor Pageant!

David

Announced on 05 May 2016  9:26  a.m. by David R Gammons

IMPORTANT: Out Sick!

Hey Gang!

Very sorry for the short notice, but I am extremely ill today.
We won't meet for class -- enjoy the beautiful weather.
We will pick up Next Tuesday -- try to finish reading ttreetcar by then.

Thanks,
David

Announced on 28 April 2016  11:04  a.m. by David R Gammons

Script Analysis for Tuesday, April 26: Funnyhouse Design Project; Streetcar

Hey Script Analysis Team!

Thank you all for such interesting and invigorating discussions about the design process and the materials and vocabulary of the designer. I hope that you are intrigued and inspired. I look forward to reading your FUNNYHOUSE OF A NEGRO Design Projects!

REMINDER:
Your "Funnyhouse of a Negro" Project will be DUE THIS TUESDAY April 26.

For this project, you will describe your design "solutions" for four challenges in the play. Your work will include a suite of specific images that constitutes your VISUAL RESEARCH for the production. These images will necessarily come from a wide variety of sources, in response to a particular set of searches that you have been conducting in relation to your particular interest in the play, its language, its imagery, its action, its interpretation. With these images you will describe your original design solutions for the play as follows:

SELECT FOUR "MOMENTS" in the script that pose a particularly interesting challenge for the designer.

Pick things that you find especially fascinating, beautiful, disturbing, or provocative. Follow your own interest and intuition.

One of your "moments" should involve a scenic (set) element; one of your "moments" should involve a costume, hair, or makeup element; one of your "moments" should involve a lighting element; and one of your "moments" should involve a sound or music element.

Using the TEXT as a guide, and your VISUAL RESEARCH as inspiration, describe how you will "SOLVE" these four unique dramatic challenges. Be as specific and concrete as possible. Your solutions can be incredibly simple or deviously complex. You might imagine the use of technology and demand a huge budget on a Broadway scale; you might conceive something that could be achieved in a tiny basement for free. Either way, your design ideas should be original, imaginative, and personal. They should reflect your reading and understanding of the text, and your understanding of the process, vocabulary, and materials of the DESIGNER.

In addition to your description in words, your design solution MAY include sketches, drawings, drafting, computer-generated renderings, photographs, or an other elements you would like to convey the idea and look of your design!
HAVE FUN!

Please PRINT OUT all of your research, writing, and other support materials to include them with your Project packet.

We will begin our next and final unit of the course, looking at A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE by the great American master Tennessee Williams. I will bring copies of the play and will post it electronically on the Stellar site as well. You do not need to begin reading yet, but are welcome to if you wish!

Enjoy the rest of this gorgeous weekend!

David

Announced on 24 April 2016  9:31  a.m. by David R Gammons

Script Analysis for Thursday, April 21

Hey Script Analysis Gang!

I hope that you are enjoying the long weekend! Happy Patriots' Day!
CELEBRATE this gorgeous weather! Go outside and play, my children!

FOR THURSDAY:

We will continue to discuss the "vocabulary" and "materials" of the designer, sharing our short imagined designs, and exploring both the process and practicalities of the designer's work in response to a play.

FOR THOSE WHO MISSED CLASS ON THURSDAY:
In your journal, please complete the brief in-class imaginative writing project that we did on Thursday. This writing is NOT directly related to "Funnyhouse" or even necessarily to the theatre in general. It is simply an opportunity be creative and to "think like a designer." These should be fast and fun. Don't overthink.
SO:
In WORDS (a couple of specific, highly descriptive sentences for each), DESCRIBE your original design for:
+ A Wall
+ A Dress
+ A Chair
+ A Drinking Vessel
+ A Quality of Light
+ A Piece of Music

We will be reading these aloud and discussing how designers use various elements to conjure a world!

LOOKING AHEAD:

Your "Funnyhouse of a Negro" Project will be DUE NEXT TUESDAY April 26.

For this project, you will describe your design "solutions" for four challenges in the play. Your work will include a suite of specific images that constitutes your VISUAL RESEARCH for the production. These images will necessarily come from a wide variety of sources, in response to a particular set of searches that you have been conducting in relation to your particular interest in the play, its language, its imagery, its action, its interpretation. With these images you will describe your original design solutions for the play as follows:

SELECT FOUR "MOMENTS" in the script that pose a particularly interesting challenge for the designer.
Pick things that you find especially fascinating, beautiful, disturbing, or provocative. Follow your interest and intuition.
One of your "moments" should involve a scenic (set) element; one of your "moments" should involve a costume, hair, or makeup element; one of your "moments" should involve a lighting element; and one of your "moments" should involve a sound element.

Using the TEXT as a guide, and your VISUAL RESEARCH as inspiration, describe how you will "SOLVE" these four unique dramatic challenges. Be as specific and concrete as possible. Your solutions can be incredibly simple or deviously complex. You might imagine the use of technology and demand a huge budget on a Broadway scale; you might conceive something that could be achieved in a tiny basement for free. Either way, your design ideas should be original, imaginative, and personal. They should reflect your reading and understanding of the text, and your understanding of the process, vocabulary, and materials of the DESIGNER.

In addition to your description in words, your design solution MAY include sketches, drawings, drafting, computer-generated renderings, photographs, or an other elements you would like to convey the idea and look of your design!

HAVE FUN!

See you on Thursday!

David

Announced on 18 April 2016  11:37  a.m. by David R Gammons

Alien vs Predator at Northeastern University

Hey Friends!

This semester, I have had the exciting opportunity to collaborate closely with the brave and talented arts students at Northeastern University's College of Arts, Media, and Design, in a new course in devised & experimental theatre.

We've been exploring the process and creation of non-narrative, non-linear, site-specific, immersive, collaborative, interactive performance work!

At the center of our exploration has been the remarkable book of poems by Michael Robbins, "Alien vs Predator." Using these radically beautiful and provocative texts as a springboard, we've generated a series of original performance compositions that use language & movement, bodies & space to explore themes of personal identity and cultural alienation.

Audience members are invited to wander freely through the space -- three levels of the central staircase in Ryder Hall's central Atrium -- to encounter these strange and beautiful performance art experiments!

We'd love to share this weird, wild, wonderful work with you!

Alien vs. Predator
Open Rehearsal:
Thursday, April 14 at 12:00 noon
Open Final Dress Run:
Thursday, April 14 at 9:00 pm
Performances:
Friday, April 15 at 9:00 pm
Saturday, April 16 at 7:00 and 9:00 pm

Ryder Hall Atrium, Northeastern University
Totally Free. 1 Hour.

Poetry + theatre + art installation = astonishment. Combining Michael Robbins' poems with their own original creative writing, the cast of Alien vs. Predator invites you to experience a shape-shifting, radioactive pop-culture swirl of sound and sense, meaning, and mayhem. Devised by David. R Gammons and Northeastern students.

drg

Announced on 13 April 2016  8:02  a.m. by David R Gammons