Evaluation

 Most effective moments

One of the most effective sections of our small group piece was the actors telling facts to the audience at the beginning. At first, the audience appeared confused by what was going on as we were all performing our short sequences portraying someone with mental health. I think that they felt uncomfortable and intimidated by what was happening, however they were also intrigued and interested to see what the show was about. I think that the words and facts were very effective as they added a clear contrast to the rest of the performance and was a simple and effective way to enable the audience to have a greater knowledge and understanding of mental health before we explored the theme in greater detail. This is effective as it shocked the audience, much like Brecht's slap and tickle effect. Moreover, this juxtaposes the character we were just playing in order to a serious undertone to the piece to help the audience realise the importance of mental health in today’s society, a problem which isn’t often mentioned or talked about. These combine with the words to reflect on the harsh mockery and cruelty towards mental health in today’s society. I think it's really effective as the words are all insults and sayings that are heard very often, however people don’t realise the seriousness of these issues, therefore being very effective in showing cause and effect. This enables the audience to reflect on their own behaviour and what they say or how they act around others. This piece juxtaposed the crazy and wild side of the play and conveyed clear and simple facts by breaking the fourth wall and talking to the audience. This relates to Grotowski’s method of creating a strong actor-audience relationship. He thought that if the actor creates a truthful connection with the audience, he would be able to change them. He brought back the fundamentals of what ‘good acting’ is. If an actor’s performance is raw and emotional, it could affect the audience. This came across very well in the facts. This was very effective as it set a clear tone and atmosphere for the rest of the piece. It emphasized how important our piece was and why we were performing it.

Another effective moment was the short movement sequences that the boys and girls did. The piece began with us all putting on several layers of clothes which completely contrasted to the girls, showing a clear divide in how different genders differ when hiding their emotions. There was a clear contrast between the girls’ movement and the boys’ movement. I feel like this was relatable to the audience as this reflects on what they will go through whenever they are at a club, party or any social event. Therefore, they could connect to the actors on stage. The boys were all acting tough and manly as if we were going on a night out and wanted to hide our emotions and insecurities so that no one would suspect how we really feel on the inside. We had to put on a mask to cover up and act overly masculine, strong and intimidating. I think my movement sequence was very effective as it conveyed the issue from a different perspective. I thought these set of moves were very successful as I was bringing together a lot of different ways that men usually use to hide themselves. This made the audience realise that men also have a lot of pressure on them in a social situation and we also have to go through these daily struggles in life. I think that we all put ourselves in an uneasy and vulnerable position which enabled to experience true and believable emotions which we could easily convey to the audience. When we performed the moves all together, and we all increased the pace of the movements and went crazy by doing it; although I could not witness how it looked to an audience member, it felt as if it looked really good and manic. I believe this made the audience feel on edge as it added tension. This effectively showed the chaos going through our heads and the mental torture that we must put ourselves through every day. Our movement was slick and clear to the audience. The timing and co-ordination of the piece was excellent as we all moved together, creating a sense of ensemble which made the piece more powerful as it showed the connection between all men in society and how we are all the same under the skin, regardless of our background or who we pretend to be. This whole sequence clearly reflected on the panic and chaos going through our heads and the pressure that society pushes onto us.

I feel like the part in which the girls comforted and calmed down the boys was very successful. Gradually, the girls would come along and hold us to make us feel protected and safe. They repeat the phrase ‘It’s okay’ in order to comfort us. I believe that this was particularly effective as it implies that there is a solution to the panic within society. This gives a positive message to the audience. This would make the audience feel at ease and happier about the situation. It created a relaxed and positive tone to the rest of the piece. It was very interesting that the girls were calming down and holding the boys rather than the other way round. This defies the social boundaries of normal or usual events and I believe that the audience found this intriguing. Furthermore, the message of ‘It’s okay’ suggests that there is nothing wrong with showing who you really are and showing your emotions. It shows the audience that they must always be themselves and try not to be enslaved by society’s expectations. It conveys a powerful message to emphasize the importance of self-expression and individuality. I believe that this will have stayed in the minds of the audience and was very powerful and moving for them.

Least effective moments

We incorporated the bath into our performance. Becky went into the bath while other actors poured water over her and filled up the bath. The bath was a metaphor for her cleaning herself and wiping away her sins. As she is in the bath, she realises that she cannot find herself and that she wants to rid herself from the air which represents the world she is living in. However, this wasn't as clear as it could be to the audience who won’t know about Grotowski and may not think about the bath as deeply as we do, as actors. I think the bath had a lot of potential to be a clear and meaningful symbol, however we could have made this more obvious to the audience by not hiding it or by explaining what we were doing through dialogue. In addition, the actors could have all been facing the bath to show that it was a key point to focus on futon the show. The bath wasn't as effective as I though got it would be during rehearsals because the concept of it was misinterpreted and the audience at have found it confusing or amusing. Perhaps this idea is unrealistic, but I think that if each cast member was in a bath each, it would have created a stronger image to the audience. It would show that we are all cleansing ourselves rather than just one person. This could have made our message clearer to the audience.

The soundscape was visually effective as it showed the chaos inside the character’s head due to her mental illness. The rubbish and old equipment we found was a metaphor for how she feels pathetic and worthless on the inside, like the rubbish we had found on the streets. This would have looked very interesting and intriguing for the audience. I feel like this piece wasn’t anywhere near as effective as I thought it would be. In my opinion, the soundscape was messy and unorganised. In addition, it was very difficult to hear the actor saying a monologue as the microphone didn’t work and they didn’t project their voice enough for the audience to hear them. Although, the soundscape was supposed to sound chaotic in order to represent the chaos inside her head, it didn’t sound very effective. This is because everyone was randomly hitting whatever they found and there was no build up in volume or pace which meant that the character had nothing to build up to, the sound was all on the same level which was quite boring to listen to. I think that this could be improved by having everyone slowly build up in volume and intensity. Everyone could have started by hitting their ‘instrument’ softly and gently and slowly built up to hitting it loudly and aggressively in order to show contrast and variation in the sounds. Furthermore, this would link to the movements as it starts off slowly before becoming manic an uncontrollable. This shows the build-up of horrible thoughts and how the suffering builds up until she can’t take it anymore. Moreover, this would make it easier to hear the actor saying her monologue.

Practitioners 

One practitioner we focused on during the performance was Grotowski. I spoke about how we used his technique of creating a strong relationship between the actor and the audience when discussing the effect of the facts in an earlier paragraph. We also used his idea of the ‘Holy actor’ in the scene with the bath. Grotowski believed that they could achieve this by getting rid of everything that was unnecessary or superfluous. Grotowski believed the perfect actor must sacrifice their body to acting, hence the term ‘holy actor.’ He wants actors to mentally cleanse themselves to wipe away their sin. The bath symbolised this as Becky sacrificed her body to society, this reflected on how Growtowski wanted his actors to sacrifice themselves to acting. I think that the bath is a very effective metaphor. This is clever as it shows her purity and holiness despite society’s darker side and expectations.

We explored Peter Brook’s theory of ‘Holy Theatre’ and Artaud’s theory of ‘Theatre of Cruelty’ in our sequences. Our movement was experimental and ritualistic. The audience joined the performers in an attempt to achieve a personal transformative, emotive and intelligent piece of theatre. This reflects on Peter Brook’s ‘holy theatre.’ Artaud didn’t want much spoken dialogue on stage and wanted to create a new non-verbal language for his actors when performing in a theatre. He thought that a ritualistic movement was a key feature of his productions, this often replacing traditional text or spoken dialogue. Actors often portrayed their emotions and communicated through ‘signs. These were usually formed of facial expressions and movement. Dance and gesture became just as effective as the spoken words. Often, his movement became disturbing or violent which reflects on Artaud’s negative and pessimistic view of society. This strongly came across in our piece as we conveyed our message without using any spoken dialogue. The message we attempted to get across to the audience was successfully done purely through our movement and our facial expressions. Moreover, our movement became chaotic and intense in order to show how we felt about society’s expectations and how we thought that this should change. This relates to how Artaud wanted to demonstrated his pessimistic view on society.

Individual Piece

I feel like this piece went very well. I kept in character, my voice was loud and clear with a menacing and eerie tone and my physicality and body language reflected the mental health problem of schizophrenia. My sequence was abut schizophrenia and escapism from the harsh reality surrounding my character, therefore I chose to be by the window that appeared to have bars over it. This represented my character’s aspiration and dreams of escaping the harsh reality he is in, however he cannot escape and feels trapped and lonely within society.  This was very experimental rather than naturalistic as my movement was ritualistic and in a routine. I feel like this was effective in some ways because it set an eerie tone to the performance and intimidated or scared some audience members as I intended. My sequence of moves was strong and clear to the audiences, making it very apparent that my character was suffering from hallucinations and having depressive episodes as well. I felt like the lack of space to move around in and the set movements inhibited me from creating a captivating and exciting piece. I felt like my piece didn’t stand out as I didn’t push the mental health problem to an extreme which would have shocked or frightened the audience and had a significant effect on them. Moreover, my piece was all on one level which didn’t allow me to build up my emotions and release them in an intriguing and experimental way. I feel like this piece was effective and interesting for the audience. However, I feel like I didn't have enough time to connect to the audience and help them create a wider set of interpretations of different mental illnesses. I think this could have been improved by getting the audience to stay there for longer and making the actors more spread out. This would have allowed to audience to absorb more of our piece and respect the artistic quality of it. Furthermore, we could have had the poems behind us so that the audience would realise that all of our spoken dialogue was taken from poems written by Sylvia Plath. 

Ending

I feel like the ending was very effective. We all worked together as an ensemble which was very powerful. We all had good posture and were in neutral which must have felt very intense and powerful for the audience. I feel like the least effective part of the ending was the part with the cellotape and torches. We all slowly raised up our hands which looked visually strong as an ensemble, creating a sense of purpose. After this, some actors rand around with cellotape, creating a chain/connection between all the actors. This wasn’t very clear to the audience and I don’t think they understand why we needed to use this or the effect of this. After this, the lights were dimmed and some more actors ran around with torches and shined it on the cellotape. I think it was very aesthetically pleasing when the light shone on the tape and created a sense of serenity and calmness. However, it wasn’t clear how this related t mental health or any of the previous scenes and the dramatic effect was unclear. The strongest part was the balloons. This was a metaphor for facing your fears and overcoming of them. The message behind this was to face your fears and eventually overcome them, therefore making us emotionally stronger and braver. The audience wrote down their fears such as failure of heights etc. onto a note which we would attach to a balloon before popping it. This was effective because it was so personal to the audience and puts them in a vulnerable position which may make them feel uneasy and it is easy to connect to their deeper emotions. Furthermore, it allows us to connect to the audience on a personal and emotional level, therefore creating a strong relationship between the actors and the audience. This was a great way to end the show as it was so powerful and meaningful. I think that this is very effective and was very moving for the audience. In addition, we were all in neutral and were very still which made all of our movement stronger in contrast to if we were fidgeting or talking or looking around the room. The audience were very shocked when the balloons popped at first, however they eventually realised the message that we were trying to convey to them.

Conclusion

In conclusion, I feel like the piece was very effective and we conveyed a very strong message to the audience about the significance of mental health in today’s society and the various different interpretations of madness. I really enjoyed the experimental side of theatre as a lot of theatre can be too naturalistic and boring rather than creating strong images and finding creative ideas to portray a story or message. I have learned a lot this term and my own personal knowledge and previous misconceptions of mental health have changed dramatically. I feel that I have worked hard and that my performance has showed that. Overall, the piece and the term have been very enjoyable and I am looking forward to what next term will bring.