Goldilocks part 1

Today in lesson we started to work on Goldilocks by using silhouette. We practice first by making the simple images in the story like the beds and the chairs to find simple ways on creating them.

We then started the performance by creating our 3 bears. Me, Tom and Dom created papa bear, we made him by using me as the base of his body and holding my hands above my head to make the ears, Tom was in front of me making the arms of the bear and Dom was behind to make the silhouette of the bear bigger. Toby, Carl and Dan S made mama bear by doing a similar shape to papa bear but closer to the sheet so that the bear appears smaller than papa bear. Meg and Dan M made baby bear by meg sitting crossed legged and holding her hands above her head to make ears and Dan M kneeling behind her to add the arms of baby bear. We then created a forest after the bears, the people who made papa bear made a tree on the right of the silhouette using our bodies as the trunk and hands as the branches but I e of us made a bird using his hands that sat on a branch. Another tree was made on the other side and Meg with Dan M made a silhouette of 2 flowers on the ground as Freya as Goldilocks walks through. We then created the 3 bears chairs, I made mama bears chair by kneeling on 1 knee to make the base and my body for the back of the chair. Meg made baby bears chair the same way but was closer to the sheet so it appears smaller. Papa bears chair is made by Carl and Tom, Carl was the base and Tom was the back. Our next creation was the beds, we made papa bears bed first which was made from Tom, Dom, Meg, Dan M and me, the four of them shaped the bed and I was used as a balance for whoever laid on the bed as I was hidden in the shadow for Freya to put her hand on. Me, Toby and Dan S made mama bears bed which was made with me and Toby as the base and Dan S as the back of the bed. Baby bears bed was made with Meg, Carl, Tom, Dan M and which was done similar to papa bears bed but closer to the sheet so we were smaller. These where the main silhouette for our story of Goldilocks we focused and worked on today in lesson.

 

Todays lesson was a fun lesson and I believe we are starting to show some flair and imagination with our idea of silhouette but we could still be more imaginative with how we create the shadows as well as what we make with the silhouette as we have currently made mostly basic silhouettes for our piece so we all need to go and research ideas to add the flair to our performance. We also need to be practice "Little Red" in our own time so that when we next need to run "Little Red" we can just go for it with loads of energy and not need to spend time re-teaching ourselves the performance.

Little Red part 2

Today in lesson we continued working on Little Red ridding hood and finished staging the story. After Red has become tired of running back and forward across the stage, the wolf goes to grab her. Red then ducks after saying "ow, a daisy" and the wolf misses grabbing her, for a second red stays down as we can see that the wolf is puzzled about how he missed the grab. Red then lifts her arm up knocking the wolf over. Red is now aware of the wolf's presence. Red apologies by saying "sorry kitty" which is another joke towards the wolf. The wolf gets up and says "I'm no kitty, I'm the wolf". The wolf then becomes interested by reds basket of cookies and tries to take them but fails. Reds tells the wolf that the cookies are for he grandmother. The wolf then tricks red and sends her in the opposite direction so he can get there first.

Our next scene in the show is at reds grandmother's house. As we create a bed made of 4 people with Toby as the grandmother sat on the bed. Freya is the door to the house , the wolf rings the door bell and then again and again getting faster until he hits it one last time. Freya is saying "ding dong" each time the bell rings. The grandmother shouts "who is it". The wolf then says "it's red" with a silly voice. The grandmother then opens the door, the wolf hose to attack but the grandmother says "Hello red" because she's a confused old lady. The grandmother invites the old in so the wolf quickly pushes the grandmother under the bed. The scene then changes back to the forest as red skips through as the rest of the cast have formed creepy trees that turn happy as she comes past them. 

We go back into the bed made of the four of us and Freya being the door again as red knocks. The wolf dressed as the grandmother invites her into the house. We took the classic lines of "what big teeth you have" and "all the better to eat  you with", then changed some of it to make it more appealing for children like those lines became "all the better to eat you cookies". After this Red screams in terror as the scene freezes and focus hose to the narrator (Dan M) as he says "boy and girls, red needs our help". He looks around and realize he is the only one that can help so jumps into the story and scares the wolf off. Dan then narrates what happens after that which is how Red and her grandmother lives happily ever after.

 

This was a very good lesson as we have now finished our story of "Little Red" which means we are making good use of our time leading up our performance at a children's school. We are moving on to our second story next lesson which is Goldilocks so we are all trying to come up with creative ways to tell this story that isn't similar to how we're performing "Little Red". we thought of a few ideas like puppets or silhouettes but we will decide what one is better in our next lesson to tell the story of Goldilocks. To improve ourselves more as company I think we all need to do some more research to children's theatre as most of us are struggling to come up with ideas for our story in successful ways for children that isn't repeating what we have done already.