Antigone Mask Workshop, Text Work, Round By Through & Shoal Of Fish

This lesson consisted of a Greek mask workshop, looking at some choral parts of the script and trying out some choreographic devises for these sections. This was really useful for me as I know we will have to devise these physical parts ourselves, so we used this lesson to grasp a better idea of our intentions as a chorus. For example-

• To assist in explaining the narrative to the audience
• To symbolise the community in the world of the play, in this case; Thebes
• To give the heavy parts of the play lighter intervals to create a sense of balance throughout the piece
• To add movement and energy

During the mask workshop we learned bout the meaning and purpose of masks in the original performance context of Antigone. They were used to show the exaggerated facial expressions illustrated on them to the further away audiences, which enhances their melodramatic physicality. They were also used for actors playing antagonist characters, or characters that had controversial views or lines to say, this way the actors having the play these roles would be able to hide their identity and not be personally attacked for it. 

The workshop involved picking a mask that had the emotion that caught our attention the most, then using our bodies to portray this. I found it easy to create exaggerated movements as I could not use my vocals, which made mime a lot easier. The relevance of this to our piece is that although our concept is contemporary, we want to keep some traditional aspects. I feel it is really important for us to use these, I suggested we use the masks in new ways, sourcing inspiration from traditional, Chinese and modern mask works-

I would use the triple faced masks to create a creepy disturbing atmosphere in the piece, such as Antigone's reflection scenes and during the period where Creon is turning mad over power, showing the different views in the city and how the community is or will judge him, also suggesting that he is just seeing or thinking things that aren't real. The idea of the backward masks would work really well with some physical theatre pieces for the chorus, using our bodies to create strange shapes do a fast rhythm would have add energy and create a really effective visual, whilst making the audience think we are looking directly at them.

Following the mask work, we were put into pairs to look at the first chorus. Jess and I chose the lines

 "Swooping

Soaring

Diving

Plunging

Mouth open wide

Blood spears for teeth

Circling

The seven gates of Thebes."

Because we had to memorize this quickly and speak it as we performed it, we made the movements simple. Using mostly our arms and facial expressions to portray each word/line differently. We delivered some lines alone and some in unison, this was tricky but effective, showing the different voices of the chorus but showing we as a unit have the same intentions and role. 

We then had to do the same but with our masks from before on, we realised that it was very difficult to deliver lines with them on, as we couldn't move our faces much and they physically blocked sound. We tackled this by using our diction to speak as clearly as possible and projecting physically and vocally to ensure we were heard. This made me think that for the performance, we shouldn't try to speak with masks on, because we will have to really try to project because of the outside conditions, the masks will make this even more difficult. Wearing them differently could work though. 

Finally, we had to keep the movement we had devised, but not speak the dialogue. Just using our bodies to portray the narrative was really tricky, however making our movements really big helped this.

Following this we looked at Round By Through, a technique involving bodily manipulation to portray feelings of one person or how others are making the feel, it also demonstrates narrative and creates a fast or slow paced piece of movement. We looked at, in groups of 3's, different movements we could do, working in a sequence to each take a turn to be manipulated. After a while it felt natural to create a routine. When manipulating others I aimed to create contrasting movements, creating harsh angles and proud postures, and then collapsing them to the floor to make a lower status character.

We were then put with another group of three to create a 6, and looked at Shoal of Fish. Moving around in a tight formation was initially difficult, as we all didn't know which directions we were going in, however I suggested that we stay in a small cluster, and whoever is at the front of that formation, depending on the direction we are in, decides the flow of the group. When we turned, that role changes. This created a smooth flow in our movement. Developing this, we added gestures, such as head turns, arm movements and jumping. This gave me the idea of how a chorus could use this, I would use this in some of the chorus' in which the city's people are interacting with the royal family (episode 3, episode 4, episode 5, etc).

We then worked on putting these two together, Shoal of Fish and Round by Through. I suggested we Alternate between the two, we came up with this order-

1. Abi's trio Shoal of Fish with Emily's Round by Through
2. Swap this
3. Ensemble Shoal of Fish, exiting and entering the room
4. Ensemble Shoal of Fish with cannon

When performing this to music I found it a lot easier to stay in time with the beat, and my group and a chorus. Our piece was very effective because we had high energy and the group movements and transitions between parts were smooth and flowed well. 

To finish the lesson we looked at some of the script, the Wonder is Man chorus. This part is about the cities people rejoicing about how the land they live on is fulfilling them with what they need and how the animals survive there. We looked at how we can create a rhythm for this, because this part of the script was interpreted as verse. These poetic sections are common and add energy, whilst giving the narrative more relaxed intervals during the harsher, deeper scenes.