#lemonsorlimes

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A clip from our mid-show dance

Dont Worry Be Happy

Lovebirds 2017

[lemonsorlimes-blog]

The infamous pillow fight sequence

Lovebirds 2017

Lemons or Limes

[nayantaranayar-blog]

Week 21 and Show Day

So the week leading up to the final show was crazy hectic. We started on Monday, trying to get everything in order for our second run on Thursday for Pablo and our classmates. This has included trying out more short snippets for the introduction and ending.

 On Tuesday we revisited the new transitions now that we had removed scenes and spent time on the new stories, trying to make sure we were not changing them too often.

 On Wednesday we managed to do a very low energy run, early in day. We then spent the evening setting up our lights and sound. While not complicated the number of lighting, sound and video cues do take time to set up. Setting up QLab proved to be especially annoying because for various reasons slides would not save onto the operating system of the light room computer.

 On Thursday we met in the morning to do another run. Then we performed for Pablo and the class. The feedback we received told us that we needed to cut down the material, rethink our slide titles, rethink the movie work in even more stories and fine tune certain scenes. We then sat down to decide which scenes to cut in addition to Potions. We decided to cut Tendai’s basketball scene, my defilement scene and Blanche’s shit list scene.  We then decided which scenes to run again in our next rehearsal split duties on props and tech. We also agreed to cut the movie short.

 On Friday we rehearsed some scenes in specific and choreographed others. We spent significant hours of rehearsal on getting the lines in the various parts together storytelling right. We also rehearsed the dances and spent time going over the tech script. It was at this rehearsal that we decided to do the popcorn scene with specific stories as opposed to just random miming, just to give our actions more specificity. We also agreed to entirely new titles that pointed out (a bit cheekily) that our performance while about love stories did not follow the actual narrative structure of a love story (the beginning middle and end). We also spent the morning cutting the movie down to size. Then the afternoon I spent with Josh trying to get QLab to work.

 On Saturday we had a pretty decent dress run though we were dissatisfied with the energy of the show. The rest of both Saturday and Sunday was spent tightening scenes, redoing dances, going over cues and pushing the energy of various scenes. On Sunday we did a few speed runs- Tendai’s idea- which involved doing the performance very fast in different voices, accents etc.  

 On Monday we spent two hours together in the morning going over props and lines. In the evening between 9 and 11 we ran the show very quickly in the Aphra and included a new improvised opening where Rockin’ Robin is sung and drummed too. This helped push opening energy ever more.

 On Tuesday, show day we met to do a final prop and tech check and to do two more line thoughts and practice the different dances. The show itself was exciting, and we were quite wired for it, so it passed in something of a blur. We had a good audience though- who were quite wired themselves- and it was over before we knew it. Videos and photos can be found on our blogs.  

[nayantaranayar-blog]

Week 19

On Tuesday the 28th we met early in the morning to try to wrap up what we felt were the last scenes that had only been talked about and never worked on. We first worked on Tendai’s final scene where she speaks about love and being ready for it while wrapping herself in a blanket. However the fact we did not have the actual material made the scene harder to sort out. I then worked on a new presentation of a scene talking about my first kiss. This scene I had been thinking for some time needed to be a striptease, because what it is talking about is challenging conventions of what women need to be protected from. It’s more than a little daunting considering the fact that I have the grace of a new born calf, but Tendai and Blanche talked me through it. I’m nowhere near happy with it, but it was a good start. We then worked on Blanche’s final scene which is about unrequited love and as she does it, she changes outfits. The scene is a quiet one and for me it does not always work as it should. However perhaps with more rehearsal it will develop a rhythm that works. We finished with a scene that is dubiously titled ‘Sex in the bathroom’. This scene is one that has been frustrating because of our inability to get into the rhythm of three women- three friends who are just talking about sex. We’ve been trying to improve the scene for a while now, and as Tendai suggests it may be best to just write a script for it.

 On Thursday March 2nd we worked on scenes for Pablo in the morning- a scene where Tendai talks about flings and rebounds and plays basketball. A scene where Blanche sings a Disney song, and a scene where I make chapathi. We began with my scene, which was difficult to do because even though I had brought a new version of the text Blanche and Tendai felt it was not enough. I redid the scene a few times, until finally I improvised an entirely new text that referenced the fact I was making chapathi dough and made it central to the scene. We then worked out how to move in to Blanche’s Disney song without an awkward transition, and also had a discussion about how with backing vocals her voice is too low. We then moved on to Tendai’s basketball scene, which is still difficult because it requires choreographing the game we’re supposed to be playing with her and also making sure her text is heard. We did manage to come up with a kind of choreography but the placing is somewhat awkward and needs to be cleared up. We finally worked on the potion scene which is seeming more and more superfluous.  At 1pm we showed Pablo the scenes and essentially were told:

-          To work on our transitions

-          Work on adding more action into my scene with the dough- play more with the dough

-          Consider the space we’re in and whether we should ever really leave it

-          Potions felt too weird and had no grounding moment- if we’re going for it, we should really choreograph it

-          Make Blanche’s ridiculous situations even more ridiculous

    On Friday 3rd March we began to work once again on the scenes we had shown Pablo. The biggest change that resulted from this is that in Tendai’s scene with the basketball it is just her with the ball now, while a game is projected on behind us and we pretend to watch it/her. With regards to chapathi I was still exploring new and different things to do with the dough. Blanche then had a cool idea for a transition. Having finished the game we sit on the sofa, eating popcorn and stuffing our mouths so that when we speak it is indecipherable. That proved fun to do.

 On Sunday March 5th we first completed a whole bunch on admin work- the risk assessment, and discussed the fliers. We then spent time on the order which was bother me a great deal. We worked through the scenes and settled on a new order:

Bollywood

Setting up house

Crashed

Sofa

Basketball

Disney song

Chapathi

Bruva 

Popcorn

Potion

Slow motion

Film

Coward

Don’t worry song

Water

Shitlist

Sex in the bathroom

Defilement

2 years

Tendai Wrapping

Hiphop

I’m not certain this order is necessarily any better, but it seems worth trying an entire run to out

[blanchemonjuvent-blog]

New order!! Let’s try it!

Setting up

3 short stories (fools in love)

Bollywood

Slide

Crashed

Basketball

Couch

Popcorn

Slide

Disney Song

Bruva to Bruva

Chapathi

Don’t worry

Slide

Sex in the bathroom

Birthday

Coward

Water

Shitlist

2 years/Defilement

Film

Hiphop

[nayantaranayar-blog]

Week 18

On Tuesday the 21st, we had a supervised rehearsal with Nicky, so we showed her what we had done, and received the following feedback:

·         The opening with me just speaking and welcoming the audience to our home doesn’t work. Others need to be involved as well. Suggested different ideas for what we were welcoming the audience into- a salon, maybe. Suggestion preferred by us: the term ‘love nest’

·         The opening Bollywood scene suggested gender identities to her- we use a dupatta, which is not strictly a veil, but is used as one for the purposes of the dance, so we should really play with that revealing of our persons

·         Transitions are weak, and the staging needs to be varied- she gave us several suggestions for how this could happen

·         For my opening story suggested playing it like a stand up routine- using a mike

·         We should reuse whatever we have on stage, so that each item has at least two different uses

Nicky’s session proved very useful as she helped give us some clarity on staging, and also suggested ways in which our naturalistic set (of the home) could become very contemporary and not restrict us.

Later on that same day we had a rehearsal between 6 and 9 in the Aphra. Here we reworked the opening with better transitions and felt it flowed much better. We also worked on all of Blanche’s various sections, as was planned. We worked on the section where she sings a Disney song, the one where she had water poured over her and her slow motion running section. To clarify, Blanche is using a series of cloches from romantic movies as the set up for her story. Her individual sections were all quite short, so it gave us enough time to also do the scene we have together called Potions. In it we go a bit mad and try to make a love potion of some kind. I was quite fun as we sort of improvised an incantation and then a little dance as well. We used a couple of different things for inspiration: the last few videos before the post are a few examples.

 Wednesday the 22nd proved to be a frustrating day- first because it was impossible to find a space to rehearse, and second because the space we did finally get wasn’t conducive for actually getting up and doing things. I was supposed to work on my four scenes.

 Friday the 24th saw us working on Tendai’s scenes. We began with the scene where she was talking about flings and rebounds. The idea had been to play basketball while her scene happened, but it had been pointed out that this might be hard to risk assess, so we switched over to playing with a pillow. This however did not match what we wanted from the scene. We discussed this for some time and decided that using a lighter ball, like a netball might be the solution. We’re sourcing one next week. We then had a conversation about the movie Tendai is making and she told us about the questions she would be asking. We then did some mock interviews with Blanche and myself standing in for the people she would be actually interviewing. Finally we rehearsed the hip hop dance and finally finished that entire sequence.

 On Saturday the 25th we revisited the Bollywood dance, made some small adjustments and rehearsed to improve the coo-ordination between us. We then played around with a scene that would involve all of us participating in activities that were ‘girly’- manicures, waxing, hair braiding, while trying to talk about sex. This proved to be quite difficult as it was easy and tempting to wander off point. We did however manage to create a set of actions for each of us and highlight four sections in the conversation that we would be sure to touch upon: sex is weird; first times; things to avoid; fetishes; love and sex. This section needs more work, and we hope to wrap it up next week. We also got a lot of admin work out of the way and now have deadlines for our poster, risk assessment and lighting design.

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[nayantaranayar-blog]

Week 17

On Tuesday the 14th we met in the morning to finish preparing a scene for our supervised rehearsal with Nicky, that same day at 12. We rehearsed the Bollywood dance and then worked on our individual sections on unrequited love, spending some time to rework Blanche’s section about waiting for two years. Previously Blanche had been speaking the text while baking a cake, however that bit was not flowing so we decided to try something else. I suggested Blanche put on and take of clothes- trying out of different outfits as the monologue proceeds. We only had coats and some scarves on us so the actions she could do were limited. It still seemed to be a good start. We also had a casual conversation about sex, and it made me think that within the performance our section on sex could be just that- three women talking about it. In our session with Nicky, the feedback we were given was:

1) Work with an idea of motifs for each section, and use them as a way to link the sections between us-

2) Avoid literal staging- don’t put ideas on stage. So for my section which had previously involved me running and speaking the same time she suggested that I instead use the motif that the other two girls had in their pieces- that of an absent presence, and use the text over a scene where I was perhaps waiting for a man at a restaurant.

3) We needed to establish a better relationship between form and content.

We decided to take this home and each come with motifs for the sections and work through that.

 On Thursday, the 16th we first had rehearsal from 12 to 3 in the Jarman where we mostly worked on the same section we had shown Nicky and tried to make the necessary changes and also institute some flow. So we worked on Tendai’s poem and music section, on Blanche’s dressing and undressing section and on my own waiting section. We also tried to see if the three could be connected. In our next session between 4 and 6 in the Aprha, we replayed this scene for Kyle, who happened to be around and received some feedback: the most useful being that he felt like he wanted more from each scene. That they each ended too quickly. We sat down to discuss this and to discuss our structure. Blanche suggested that it would be useful if each of us looked back again to our personal stories and what we wanted to say. Then we could bring those stories in on Sunday and try to see how they fit together with each other.

 So on Sunday the 19th, we met at Jarman 1 and spent all three hours working out the structure. We divided our stories into different sections and put each section down on strips on paper. We then tried to order these strips on the floor and see what flowed, and how things moved (You can see pictures of these papers here). This was a very good session because it gave us a much clearer idea of what different parts we were working with and allowed us to throw out parts that did not work, and keep those that did. We also then made a schedule for the next week that would allow us to have all the individual parts in hand by net Saturday.