TEAM in She Kills Monsters

 Tension, Emotion, Atmosphere, and Meaning in

our CA Production of She Kills Monsters

TENSION

  • Scene 7: The audience had knowledge of connections that the characters didn’t know, and though Chuck is being honest he says everything in an oblivious way that irritates the miscommunication and anger/disbelief from Miles. Silences combined with the scene’s dramatic irony created a large buildup of tension that was then lessened and released by the humor of the fighting, both in the moment’s movements and dialogue.
    • As an actor there was an extra layer of stress added when Jackson accidentally broke my mask on Saturday night. I was confused and annoyed with myself, especially because I had to very quickly rush backstage to get a new mask during the scene change.
  • Scene 9: Agnes practically interrogates Lily in this scene, and Vera is barely able to break down the tension when she enters. The awareness of the setting as a public space, contrasting the identities of Lily and Lilith raises many questions as to how much she was involved in before the play’s events.
  • Scene 14: The mystery of “could Lilith be revived?” and then learning that the story was already written this way gave the audience much more room for interpretation. Agnes’ book slam, especially because of the sudden noise, is a startling second that draws attention in a way similar to the physical sound design used mostly for New Landia.
  • Chuck’s fight announcements bring in energy as well as a sense of uncertainty, since all of them eventually play out differently. The tone of Farrah’s fight is very different from that of Miles’, and those from the Beholder and Tiamat.
  • In the last moments of the show, the sister hug is a huge release of raw and intense closure; it was necessary to what the characters and their actors wanted to express.


EMOTION

  • Scene 11: This is one of the most serious scenes, and the actors involved very much resonated with the emotion behind it. They even added in permanent adlibs for swearing not originally in the text.
  • Scene 16: Contains some of the most intimate moments as it’s near the end of Agnes and others’ grieving process and breaks into the relief that everyone is needing. 
  • Q: Which characters experience more growth?
    • Answer/Example: Kaliope the elf literally doesn’t have emotions and acts as a know it all, but Kelly IRL is open and very expressive, comforts agnes saying how much they loved Tilly
  • Overall, New Landia is a more comedic world, especially with when dealing with topics like Tilly’s death and how Agnes was distant from her in life. It can be difficult for the characters to give their true feelings when playing the characters that they see as being very separate from real life.
    • Example: After Lilith dies, the characters’ humor is dims and can barely spill out from the split of IRL and Fantasy lighting. Agnes finds herself stuck in the real world and her anger from this pauses the whole scene for both sides.


ATMOSPHERE

  • Scene 1: The interactions of Chuck and Agnes take on an interesting dynamic since he’s younger than her but also very animated for being in the real world, which admittedly is a contrast that is more apparent in hindsight.
  • Scene 3: Starting with the red lighting placed on Chuck and his platform, the atmosphere gives off a huge aura of adventure, also felt because of the unique green and blue blend on the main stage. There is also dialogue spoken with grandiose tone and new fantasy sounds of Tilly’s chains jingling and weapon swooshes.
  • The switching from IRL and Fantasy are very separate and dynamic identities that made the audience more aware of the setting at any given moment.
    • NEW LANDIA: fun, embodies wish fullfment and freedom; it’s all about immersion and imagination, priming the audience as if it’s a gateway or portal. The set design also builds a connection for Agnes and the audience as they go on a journey of literal and metaphorical discovery.
    • IRL: the atmosphere has much more rough edges, and the lighting utilized was only the base yellow spotlight(s).
  • Costuming also helped actors live into and embody their characters even more than they had before.
    • Example: Different levels of Chuck’s self-confidence can be seen whether he’s wearing his cloak or not. In his cloak, as DM Biggs, he’s focused and feels in control over the events he describes. When IRL, he exhibits much more uncertainty and sees himself as unloved and weak.
    • Example 2: There’s a large contrast of Lilith being a powerful and flourishing character, sharp loud tone always confident and raunchy and abrasive at times. Lily IRL softer and more muted version of herself.
  • The music in the fights was always energetic, though some with audible lyrics felt more positive than those with screamo effects like the Tiamat battle.
    • Overall, New Landia had more sound effects - Steve’s trumpets and the Succubus explosions as two examples - and they had a more cue-like quality in the moments, reflecting how it would actually feel and play out in a DND game.


MEANING

  • Critical Question - What is real? Are assumptions or the characters people play their true selves?
    • New Landia is a much more contained space; things that are fantasy typically stay contained in the Fantasy and can’t affect the IRL without intention.
    • IRL has major ripples both in its own space and the connections in the fantasy world, with influence that makes its messages much harder to work though.
    • By the end, the characters learn to see and accept themselves in the fantasy world as a dreamself experience. 
  • Agnes travels through many stages of grief, but in the finale has reach an acceptance that Tilly is gone, and Agnes can’t know who her sister now that she never knew; but, she can learn to both love and accept Tilly from her stories and own memories. Agnes learns what her journey was meant to do. Tilly can’t come back, but there is both a completed catharsis as well as some minor suspended catharsis, since the evil cheerleaders and tilly’s storylines are not tied/compromised in the main story.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Theatre Workshop Journal - Day 1 [4/12/22]

  INSPIRATION - root word is inspire; opposite is expire - encouraging, provoking thought and influencing positively  - respiration = breathing, can control an active brain - inspire definition is to breathe in IMAGINATION - root word is imagine —> root word is image; a picture or visual of something  - taking an image from your brain and making it into something physical  - comes from the same place as memory in the brain      - easier to re-imagine memories, experiences you already have      - dreams where your brain takes random bits of information and puts them in new images - what is reality? confusion built from missing details - memory and imagination are the materials used to make unique theatre! 2 Truths, 1 Lie:  I remember the morning my Dad left for Florida, I took Taekwondo classes and was close to being a black belt, I got lost for an afternoon with my cousins at a camping ground QUOTE - “Generalization is the death ...
Read more

Mobile - The Making and the Intentions

Mobile achieves the goals of The Paper Bird’s theatre making in many ways. For one, the audience is on the stage for the whole performance since the show is set inside a mobile home. There are also numerous examples of verbatim: tv interviews, personal interviews broadcasted through household items, an astronomy book, and others. Each of the personal interviews also connects to one of the show’s clearest uses of symbolism where people assign themselves as household objects. It allows each person to develop as a unique character with functions such as microwave beeping to censor swears, the choice of words to appear on the alarm clock and more. All of these items, though, eventually become “novelties” to people from the outside, members of the audience included. Catherine as well is drawn to these items and has her own moments where the vehicle’s projector helps display her scattered thoughts with a series of quickly flashing images. Even the song she chooses to play, Hotel California, ...
Read more

Grotowski and Peter Brook’s Acting Methods

The Theatrical Styles of Grotowski and Peter Brook Grotowski Theatre: Communicating through focused sounds and movements  because Grotowski actors believe that acting is a search for self knowledge and awareness, their style has taught them to break free of limitations and utilize their full potential  Improving concentration by working in silence as a creative passage  Developed highly specific physical and vocal training  Grotowski wanted his actors to have direct control over even their most minute movements; clarity is key Actors need to see how they impact others when they look and listen to them “Poor Theatre” forced actors to use all their skills to transform simplistic spaces and objects into a whole range of imaginative worlds, with heavy symbolism and direct audience interaction  Like in Brecht’s method, Grotowski emphasised the use of emotional memories to recall and recreate actors’ experiences with total honesty and total commitment, no matter how p...
Read more