Thespians & Ya Mum

I am a University of East London Level 6 Student and this is My OFFICIAL Vlog & Blog Series about the creation of my upcoming SitCom

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all about the coke...

Today we started our FPP lesson by performing our scenes, I decided to perform a new scene which I haven't shown before. This scene is actually the ending scene of my sitcom. I decided to change up the scene, so it would work on an empty stage instead of film and I also made this theatrical piece silent, in order to not give away any spoilers.

{22-Oct-20} WEEK 4

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I have just completed the first draft script of my FPP ‘Thespians and Ya Mum’. This process took me a total of 4 days.

{21-Oct-20}

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Introducing Timothy Hanrahan, he will be portraying the role of playboy Stephen McCarthy, one of the core 3 characters in the SitCom.

Timothy is a spotlight listed actor working out of the southwest with a BA (Hons) Degree in Theatre and Performance. Timothy has an Archetypal 'bad guy' image. Timothy and Ryan met during their first year of studying their FdA in Drama, Performance and Arts Management at Plymouth University and have worked on several theatre plays, musicals and a short films together; these include a rendition of The Rocky Horror Picture show and Timothy’s own short film ‘The Mary Jane Massacre’  a short slasher, where Ryan played one of the leads and Timothy played the imposing antagonist. The link for Timothy’s short film is below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxyF3s4v6Ng&t=657s

{19-Oct-20}

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Introducing Daniel Armstrong, he will be portraying Fred John, one of the core 3 characters in the SitCom.

Daniel has done a lot of acting over the years, mostly theatre performances. He studied Level 2 and Level 3 Performing Arts at South Devon College for a total of 3 years. He was a member of Doorstep Arts Youth Theatre Company for a 4 years (2014-2018) before going on to work alongside them. Daniel met Ryan in their first year of Level 3 Performing Arts and they have performed many shows together; Sweeney Todd, Little Shop of Horrors and Into the Woods to name a few. Daniel also played the main antagonist in Ryan’s Final Practical Project at Plymouth University the show was called 'Life of a WIN'ner' and can be seen in the link below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxCQzKJ1-ps&t=1460s

{19-Oct-20}

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Today is the day I started writing the 1st draft script of Thespians & Ya Mum

{18-Oct-20}

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The Definition of NON-ACTING!

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The Effects Autobiographical Performance will have on the SitCom!

I read ‘Making a Performance: Devising Histories and Contemporary Practices’ this reading was not only very interesting for me as an actor, but midway through I realised this relates to my SitCom in more ways than one. The characters Fred John and Stephen McCarthy are based on real life people that I know. The aspect of ‘acting’ and ‘non-acting’ is also something I found especially fascinating. The reason for this is, although the actor may be on stage or screen, is doesn't necessarily mean they are acting, they could just be portraying a heightened version of them-self.

{16-Oct-20}

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This evening, me and the other two main actors of my SitCom had our first video call meeting. I finally go the chance to tell them detailed descriptions of their character profiles (Fred John & Stephen McCarthy). The conversation lasted 30 minutes, I also told them the whole skeleton of the show scene by scene to give them a better idea of where and how their characters fit into the story. Obviously I made them aware that there is still no draft script but the first draft will be available to them in December 2020

{15-Oct-20}

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The Emotion is REGRET!

We worked on our emotive skills with Liselle today, we created a piece of physical theatre which stemmed from an emotion which negatively influenced our lives in some way whether that's past or present. My emotion was ‘REGRET’ and I performed as somebody who came home from a long day at work. He just gets into bed and goes to sleep, instead of living life and being productive with the rest of the hours he has left in the day. Forming the emotion of regret because that day turns into days, then weeks, then years, and before he knows it, he has wasted his life away. We then were put into duos and our task was to devise and improvise a scene, I was paired with Aubrey, our scene was that of a Mother and Son arguing, we then integrated our solo scenes physicality with the dialogue of our duologues.

We were shown a video of Nigel Charnock, his performance started off slow with parts repeating, then gradually throughout the 4 minute performance the movements got alot faster gradually. He had specific movements for certain words and sentences he was saying.

The next video shown to us didn't have a name but it started off with two people sat opposite each-other. Similar to the first video, it started off slow but this performance was even slower. The lighting they used was incredible, because it only allowed the audience to see what the company wanted you to see. Every action one performer made was met with an immediate reaction. [Click Here For The Video]

{15-Oct-20} WEEK 3

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NO MORE UNTITLED SITCOM, I GIVE TO YOU THE WORKING TITLE!

Oh also whilst I’ve got you all here, IN TODAYS NEWS I have also got a co-director on board of the project, his name is Luke King Abbot, that's all the information for now...

{14-Oct-20}

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New Ideas of Writing a Script!

Today professional playwright Esohe Uwadiae come in for a workshop and Q&A.

During the workshop we had devised a story out of old newspaper headlines and then created an advert, promoting the story we created. We had to convince the rest of the class ‘why they should watch our show’. Our story ironically turned out to be me as a News Station Anchorman, revealing terrible headlines and then cutting to the adverts. Then the other actors in the group would perform sketches of the different adverts, which were also found in the newspapers.

The Q&A was very interesting because I have been struggling on how to start writing the script for my Sit-Com. Esohe gave us examples of the 1st and 2nd drafts of a play which she is currently touring. This was very helpful because it showed me that the script doesn’t have to be perfect the first time round. as long as you have the ‘skeleton’ of a show, then you can keep adding flesh to it in the later drafts.

{8-Oct-20} WEEK 2

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This week Clare gave all of us a giant piece of paper and a sharpie to write down any new ideas we have about our FPPs’. I decided to create a mind-map with all of the key aspects which I personally feel, go into creating a great production. As you can see some areas, such as ‘plot’ haven’t even begun to develop yet, but hopefully by next week I will have some idea of the direction I would like my story to go. The title of my SitCom is still ‘Untitled Sitcom’ because I haven’t thought of a good working title I would like to go with yet, I have thought about calling it ‘Thespians’ because the core three characters are drama students, but I’m not 100% sold on that name yet. 
{8-Oct-20} WEEK 2

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WEEK 2 of developing my sitcom!! I have created a video from the idea that I came up with last week. I developed the script and asked my girlfriend to read it, so I was able to have an outside eye of what it could look like once edited.

{8-Oct-20}

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We were shown this today, this was to give us a wide range of ideas of what we could create for out Final Practical Performance. Many of these genres attracted me, such as;

Theatre, Improv, Stand Up, Walking Tour, Sketch, Film, One Person Show, YouTube Show, Immersive, Play, Musical and of course the idea I have now stuck with, SitCom.

{1-Oct-20}

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BEGINNING THE LAUGHTER!

Today Liselle told the group to get in a circle and explained the layout of module and the different ways we can present our projects. She then mentioned certain things that stuck with me, such as;

‘Don’t let your ego take control’

and

‘The form of the show is about the subject matter that is deals with’

We were then asked the question ‘Why do you want to create this piece’?

I want to create this piece because I love storytelling, entertaining and moving the audience emotionally whether that's happy or sad

You probably know this if you have read this far but the theme of my piece is... COMEDY

Who's story and I telling? This is not my story, but there are aspects of autobiographical theatre, in the piece as I have taken character traits from people I know. This was to start the development of the core three characters of the sitcom.

THE BIG QUESTION I WANT ANSWERED IS!!!!!!!

SHOULD THE LINE BE PUSHED BACK FOR COMEDY IN PERFORMANCE COMPARED TO REAL LIFE?

Liselle and Clare wanted us to begin to develop or pieces by creating a 20 second performance.

I decided I would portray an anchorman for a TV News station, this is the script I wrote;

‘Can you really make a joke about something that's a real issue in someones life, just to gain the acceptance of the majority.

 I have posted a video of this performance...

{1-Oct-20} WEEK 1

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WEEK 1 of developing my SitCom, I have decided to create a news report which will go at the start of the Pilot Episode 

{1-Oct-20}