Again this Workshop was really important for me to attend because as Assistant Director I will need to be able to understand and communicate with the Actors on set. Also this project has made me realise that I actually feel like Directing and Assistant Directing could be my specialism in the future as I like the creative side of this process and I feel like in this project I have done a good job so far.
In this workshop we began by doing a physical exercise with the whole class involved were by we were told to walk around a space but everyone was only allowed to walk in straight lines. We were told to experiment with different speeds of walking as well around the space. We were then told to do the same exercise again but this time we were only aloud to walk round the space in curved lines. This was much more hectic than before and I found this quite stressful and also a little bit funny. We then stopped and discussed as a group how these different ways of walking made us feel. When walking straight your saw a lot more of the space and were able to judge were people were and would be a lot better. When we walked in curved lines it was much more chaotic and you couldn't see the space as well and it was hard to judge where anyone was.
After discussing this idea of straight and curvy lines it was then explained in terms of how it reacts to characters. A actor can play a character in either a straight line manor which means they know what they want and are straight to the point etc. And then if an actor was to play a character in a curvy lined way then they would be much more neurotic and random in their decisions and unpredictable. These two types contrast very interestingly and can help you to direct the actor on what approach you want them to take to the character as the can influence how they act a lot. Straight lined and Curvy lined characters can also help a lot in terms of status because it can define how a person thinks. For example straight line characters can have the higher status just because of how driven they are and how controlling this can make them. Where as Curvy lined characters can risk falling towards lower status because they are so unpredictable it makes them seem weak in terms of the way they think.
A film in itself can also be straight or curly lined. A straight lined film would be very narratively structured heading towards an end goal were as a curvy lined story will not fit a narrative structure and will instead jump from one scene to another with no certain end goal for example 'Pulp Fiction' and how non-linear it is could be classed as curvy lined.
We then took this theory and applied it to a scene from a script which we had previous looked at the week before. It is all about a man called Simon who cheated on his wife by accident with their house made who they look after because she has travelled here from a war torn country. The house maid is adamant she is keeping the baby but Simon's wife doesn't know anything about it yet. The scene we studied is all about Simon trying to bribe Anya the house maid with money to leave with her unborn child and never return so that his wife won't find out. However Anya won't leave till he promises to give her that money every year for the child. We began by applying the straight lined and curvy lined theory to each character in many different variations and getting the actors to play out the scene many times in these different ways so we could observe how much of a change it made. We then used this to try and work out how they should actually play it to suit the script/scene in the best way. My opinion is that Simon goes into this scene as a straight lined character ready to get rid of Anya. However when she refuses he turns into a Curvy lined character and begins to loose control. Then Anya is the opposite because she is taken by surprise with his bribe so begins in a Curvy lined manor and then she she gets her thought together she become a straight lined character refusing to leave till she gets what she wants. I found this way worked the most effectively in terms of the script as it was believable knowing the characters from the script. This exercise was very helpful to see how much these different approaches could effect the piece.
Another point that we were told was not to base someones straight or curvy lined attitude on their objectives and goals because all character should have these anyway as we learnt last week. This straight and Curvy lined is more about how relentless they are in getting to these goals and objectives.
We then spoke about an interesting theory by 'Walter Benjamin' in which he said there are two types of artist and they can differentiated into Foxes or Hedgehogs. A fox knows lots of different skills and ways of doing things to get what it wants where as a Hedgehog only knows one big skill or way of doing things. This can be applied to characters because its all about how they reach their objectives. For example referring to the scene we studied today and last week Anya is a Fox because she has adapted to the situation and finds many ways to get Simon to do what she wants. This also could apply to her in terms of why she is actually more of a curvy lined character because she adapts and changes her tactics as needed.
We then moved on to do another physical exercise as group all based on walking round the space again but this time we had to follow different actions given. We did it with our chin in to ourselves and then our chin out. This changed our status immediately because chin in made us feel much more vulnerable and reserved where as chin out made us feel more intrusive and bolder. We then did shoulders back opposed to shoulders forward. This again effected us because shoulders back made us walk with more confidence where as shoulder forward made us look down and feel inferior. Lastly we did hips forward and hips back. Hips forward made us feel over confident and sleepy and then hips back made us feel more awkward and uncomfortable. This exercise was to help show us how posture is so important when it comes to creating a character because one simply moment can make you feel and therefore act in a different manor. It can also have again a lot to do with status so you have to develop what status and approach you want a character to have by working with the actor in terms of body use too.
The last exercise we then did was to choose three poses for a character based on a photo given to us and then we let the actors transition between these however they thought best. Then we took 5 words and wrote some dialogue which was very basic and gave this to the actors who had to use it in some way while still incorporating there three poses and transitions. This was to show us how actors can interrupt things so differently and how this means you have to be precise but also open to interpretation from the actors. This exercise also gave us a chance to work with the actors one on one to practice our Directing techniques which helped. Its not always about how you want the scene to look and feel but instead about the goals and directions you give which need to be clear.
This workshop was again very helpful and let me practice my directing techniques a lot more with professional actors which I actually really enjoyed doing.
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