#table work

[stank-00]

prekiln beauties

[theplanningstage]

[donottouchtheclown]

Notes on stumbling run 31-07 and group discussion

DANI'S NOTES

Great text, but it’s too much. Ballet into political scene works very well because it alternates movement-based with text-based scenes

Be specific with what our text-use convention is

Beginning is great, but first few scenes feel like a summary of scenes. Text-less scenes in between would give it more air (i.e. have Ari and Vera meet and fall in love in a separate scene)

Transitions need to be clearer: politician scenes need to have a clear moment of transition, of collectively putting the coat on, transforming, manspreading. Introduce those conventions better. 

Beppo can be guiding the scene. It’s nice, but there’s too much text.

The run was way too fast and the arch of the scenes was therefore not clear

Best man speech can be more about the interaction with the text. You need one or two scenes with full arches before you fall into a politician scene. Take your time!

Convention of the text and of the characters was unclear. Translate some of the text to actions to make it more understandable. 

GROUP DISCUSSION

We need more space to see the repercussions of the politicians’ actions on the town people.

We need to see more reactions of the people on the bans (like the Peach/Chip response to the canned meat), whether positive/negative or off-handed

Carrot banning = opportunity to introduce Lau’s character. Have her needing to hand in all of her carrots as the carrot blending scene happens. 

First market scene must be lively, we see how much we love vegetables. Lau may feel affected but the rest must actively love all else she sees. Then we’ll see the contrast with the second market scene

We need to embody our play, breathe the text, feel the actions instead of anticipating the text. Back to technical basis. When we embody the play, the information is going to come out.

Bring back moments from the first sharing. First ban can be just Laura giving up the carrots (threefold). Then we reprise that after the second scene, with the whole line of us giving up different vegetables one after another. 

Exercise: do the scene without text and see how much it needs. 

We need contrast with quiet scenes, minimal scenes, like how the Keir Starmer speech worked in our first sharing

What is our objective in actions per scene?

Really choose the lines that need to land: ‘No animals were harmed in the canning of this product.’ 

Do we need to bring back a domestic scene to emphasize the impact that the banning of carrots has on the smallest unit of life (the couple, the domestic life)

Go back to the play as if we were running it without the clown. Track the plot points. Put on the play as if we were not clowns. Really understand what it is before we bring in the clown and muddy the storyline. 

Do we want to introduce more clearly who we are as clowns, before we start the tale of Cropshire? The first frame could be us playing around as clowns who cannot speak, try to welcome the audience. Ask them to turn their phones off without speech etc. Then the challenge hits us from the left: to perform this tale. 

Is the scene providing the audience exposition to the clowns or to the world?

What is the straight play trying to say to the audience? Tragic story of impending doom and what happens when fascism takes over. Clowns put on this play but don’t want to perform these terrible parts. There then needs to be a moment of distance between the clowns and the play. 

Are the rebels (Lau, Ali, Vera) just clowns who are trying to put on the play, but then our clowns get punished for it?

How are we going to make this way? What is this play about?

Bring in the sound of the curtain rolling for all scene transitions so that the sound can then start to dictate what we need to do later on in the play (sound comes before movement)

[donottouchtheclown]

Table work: new dramaturgical structure

17/07/25

In the afternoon, we hashed out a new dramaturgical structure. On orange post-it notes, we wrote down the progression of rules to be imposed on the people of Cropshire:

Carrots get banned

Phallic vegetables get banned

All vegetables get banned

All depiction of vegetables gets banned

All fruits get banned, as well as the speaking of fruit/vegetable-related words

No one can speak without gesture facilitation through the hand mechanism

On yellow, we wrote our major plot points, and on green, our recurring transition gimmicks (weather reports, politician scenes, the use of cue cards).

The resulting structure:

In our Friday rehearsal, we rewrote the first politician scene, and used the set-up of this scene to write an initial version of the second and third politician scenes. Over the course of the play, the politician scenes are to get increasingly absurd (think unprompted salsa-dancing and cat imitations!). Society derails. To be continued.

[donottouchtheclown]

Figuring out the role of clowning in our show

In order to come to the answer to the question of what the function of clowning is within our piece (besides just pointing at the world's descent into fascism), we made a list around the following:

What separates the clown from being human? What does the clown allow us to do/be/have, that being human does not?

Anonymity

Silence / using gestures to communicate

Using humour to pull the rug out from under the audience

Clown can only exist when they’re being watched

Mcdonalds uses the image of the clown to make you believe that it brings you joy (even though it isn't good for you). Practicing clown awakens you to your own true joys

One intention and one emotion at a time: pure, authentic, transparent . 

Tasks: one thing at a time

Playing a clown is playing a version of you. Then you set your clown to play a character. You cannot put on a clown, because they’re authentic/truly coming from a place inside ourselves 

Impulsive, responsive

Unpredictable, volatile, because they can change their minds on a whim and don't seem to care (this links it to our current political climate: take Trump for example. Talk about unpredictability...)

They don’t have shame. Shame is the most radicalizing emotion that can get humans to do certain things, but clowns do not experience this.

They don’t have fear 

Thoughts derived from this:

There are several modes of performing within our piece. In the beginning, we are in mode two: clown mode. There are no inhibitions to our lives, so we can clown freely, enjoying our lives whilst acting on impulse.

Then, rules on carrots get imposed on us. These impact our freedom as clowns. The pressure this causes, gets us to either be pushed into layer one (naturalistic, we must think before we act) or it pushes us into layer three (unhinged enhanced clown layer: guerilla).

The elements of shame and fear are very interesting within this context. Humans can get scared into certain behaviour, but clowns tend to not respond to threats in this way (think about the fool in medieval courts: their job is to dance in a pool of danger). What role do shame and fear play in our clown world?

[rebeccadirects]

First day of table work. These are the moments when I'm REALLY glad I own a massive backpack

[thirdrailmentees]

We had our first rehearsal on Monday! We're currently in the throws of "table work" - an intensive thematic and dramatic investigation of the play. We're tackling big ideas, and bigger choices, and everyone is getting really excited. Here's a sneak peek at our process.

[hernanpaganini]

Sostendré la vela erguida aún cuando no sobre nada.

Table Work. March 11. Working on some new acrylic paintings. / Trabajando en unas nuevas pinturas. Acrílico sobre papel.