Journal Monday October 31- Pantalone

Today in class we had to experiment with Pantalone. In Comedia dell' Arte, Pantalone is an old man that is or the father of the lover that doesn't want her daughter to get married, or an old man that wants to get married with the lover. He is a very selfish man and is always bend back and touching his pouch of money. He walks making every step count by putting the leg very up and slowly pressing it down. His feet are looking outwards and he speaks slowly, emphasizing every word that he says.
I don't know why when I think of Pantalone, I imagine him with a british accent, maybe because the british accent sounds very sophisticated and aristocrat and Pantalone is a man that thinks big about himself; he believes he's the master of everyone.
I am really not having a great time in class this past week because I don't really like this topic. I really don't connect with any of the characters of Comedia and I think everything is too cliché and exaggerated and I don't like that part of theatre. I prefer the realistic kind were we are not over the top but simple and believable. And I am not a funny person. I am much better at dramatic plays, I am not good at or enjoy acting in funny plays because it simply doesn't go with who I am; that's why I am having trouble in this topic.
In class I am going to do the best I can to try to portray all of this characters, but it has been very difficult for me.

Comedia Dell'Arte Pamphlet

Reading the pamphlet I have realized what comedia dell' arte really is and all the aspects that go inside of it. I found it very intriguing that they have to actually improvise the whole play. I personally, have a problem doing this. I prefer having a script and developing my character with time. However, comedia dell' arte is exactly the opposite; you start knowing exactly how your character is, but you improvise all the actions that happen. Maybe my choice has to do with the fact that I am scared of messing up. Improvisation can be very dangerous because it can go so bad, or it can go so well, so I am scared of the scene just not working out and not being funny. So now that I know more about this topic, I am actually looking forward to learning about this because it would be a risk for me to take and learn how to do comedia dell' arte successfully.
Moreover, I think that it is amazing how we keep using the same stereotypes of characters now a days and we took it from comedia dell'arte. Now, every time I watch my series or movies, I will have that in mind all the time and see how different actors develop this characters differently and how they react to different situations, and what is the aspect that makes everything FUNNY.

Comedia Dell' Arte:

GIN Presentation Journal

I think the presentation went very well! We had created something last class where we started with a tableau, then Alex and Pinto would say a quote from a famous person. After this we would spread out and different people will go in the middle and say their monologues or just two or three lines from their monologues and then go. We would end in the tableau again and Alex and Pinto would repeat their quotes and we would end. Personally, I didn't like the idea; I didn't thought it was original or impacting and I think that with the theme being human rights, we could really do a presentation where we really shocked the people and left them thinking about our presentation. 

So we came to school on Friday at 2pm and the teacher basically told us that we had to practice or invent something new in the next 30 minutes because we where going to present at 2:30, so of course I panicked. It a very important presentation if you think about it, its 400 students from different countries looking at you and I really wanted people to see how amazing our  theatre program is. 

So when we got to center stage  we decided to take control of the situation and just invent something else that was much more efficient and well-made than what we had done last class. To be completely honest, I liked the challenge the teacher gave us because it was going to help us in our creative skills and not only that but to work quickly and efficiently together. 

So our idea was to basically come out from different parts of the audience (as if we were part of the public) and place ourselves throughout the stage. Alex would start with his J.F Kennedy quote and then each person would say one impactful line from their monologues. So for example, Alessa said: He was pushing and pushing and pushing! Then I would say I just want my son back! and on and on and on. This part of the presentation was going to end when I said my line, we would count to three and we would break to the sides. Then Alessa would start with her entire monologue; after her went Daniela and Nikolas that had integrated their monologue together, after them went Javier who also said his entire monologue, and after Javier I went and I just said the first 3 lines from my monologue because I thought it was going to be more efficient and it highlighted the basic theme of my monologue. So what I said was this:

"My name is Christine Collins. On March 10th 1928, my son, Walter Collins, disappeared. A 5-month investigation lead to a boy being found in Dekalb Illinois. They told me and all of you that this boy was my son. He is not my son. Please, I beg you, I just want my son back".

It told her story and the end was shocking and sad, which helped me portray my emotions and the teacher also liked it and thought it was good because I just said what was important. After me would go Mary with a quote from an important person and then she would look at us and we would start saying our lines from the beginning while we came close to the edge of the stage and we would keep saying our lines until we were all in the line at the edge of the stage. Then, Daniela would scream and we would put our head down and the light would be turned off and we would be over. 

We practiced it two times and we didn't come up with any problems so we were kind of confident about the technical aspect, however we all were kind of scared and afraid that we would mess up our lines, well at least I was, even though I didn't say my entire monologue. However it all turned well and people really seemed to enjoy it, at least that's what my friends told me. In my opinion, I think it went very well because no one forgot their lines, everybody was in character, and we all were trying our best. 

So I was very proud with our final product and how the presentation turned out, however, I do think that with a little more time, we would have done an amazing presentation which could have been more effective, maybe we could enter with candles or we could have costumes on which would have helped to transport the audience into a different time and moment. Still, it went well.

At the end the teacher told us that after this, we could choose if we wanted to present our monologues on Monday or not because she had already seen a lot of them in the GIN presentation and last class when we presented, so I really didn't see the reason on why presenting again because I really did the best I could in the GIN presentation and I wanted to it to stay that way.

Journal Monologue Presentation

So I didn't know my monologue by memory, but the teacher told us that that wouldn't be a problem and that we could present it with our paper, however, we had to make sure that we were OUR characters and we were showing the emotions that we wanted to show. So I went first because I really wanted to get it over with. I think I did quite well, because I took in consideration all the aspects that I had to think about. I did my voice much higher because that is how I saw my character and it turned out well because it supported the fact that this women was suppressed and frightened of what the police could do to her, but the love for her son was much bigger than how afraid she was. My presentation in overall I think was good because I did transmit the emotions I wanted to transmit and I think that I portrayed Christine Collins as I wanted to portray her, however I do think I lacked one of the personality traits I had given her which was courageous. I think I could have showed better how courageous she was. What I did highlight was how suppressed she was and how timid and silent she always was. At the end, the feedback the teacher gave me was that I had to make sure I portrayed her the way I wanted to portray her, so really focus on BEING my character and show her personality not mine. I think that having the paper to read does take away some credibility of your act and takes away some of the theatrical aspects of your presentation, but I think that on Friday in the GIN presentation I am going to be able to redeem myself and really portray Christine Collins like I want to portray her.

Monologue-October 16

So at the end, I edited my monologue. This was because of two reasons. First, there where parts where I became very repetitive and it wasn't really efficient, it just sounded as if I didn't have anything else more to say so I was just saying the things again. Second, because I thought it went better with the character if the monologue was concise and straight to the point because Christine Collins didn't really like creating problems and fights and she wasn't really fond of talking about this in public to the press, so basically it helps me show how she doesn't really want to be there, but she is doing it basically for her son. I also have to show this through my gestures and emotions. I really hope that the other students can help me make my monologue even better and also help me create the personality of my character because I know how she is like I understand it, I just have to work on portraying it.


This is the new monologue:

My name is Christine Collins. On March 10^th 1928, my son, Walter Collins disappeared. A 5-month investigation led to a boy being found in DeKalb Illinois. They told me and all of you that this boy is my son; he is not my son. When I first saw this boy I knew, but the agent insisted that I was in shock and that Walter had changed in the past 5 months because of the trauma. So I convinced myself that that boy was my son at first, but deep inside I knew that was not my Walter. I don’t understand why they weren’t listening to me; that boy was not my son. I have given the L.A P.D every opportunity to admit their mistake and renew the search for my son; since they refuse to do so it forced me to bring my case public. The department has made a terrible mistake and they have to please help me find my son before its too late. They are wasting time when they could be looking for Walter. I beg them to please renew my case and start looking for my son. Please, I beg you, I can still feel him, please, I just want my son back.

Final Monologue- Thursday October 13

I finished my monologue today. It wasn't hard at all because I already had the idea written down and the rough draft done, so the only thing I needed to do is find out in what I wanted to focus and erase everything else that wasn't relevant. Also, I realized while I read the monologue that there were parts that sounded so good and so deep and then suddenly there was a sentence that just cut down that feeling and the deepness so what I did was eliminate those sentences or try saying it different. For example, the part where Christine Collins explains how he measured him and the kid was much shorter than her son, it really didn't sound good the way I said it before so I decided to concise the story by not telling the part where I measured him against the wall of anything, but just say that he was shorter than Walter. I did found that by repeating "I want my son back" it really creates a mood and helps the viewer be able to feel the pain this mother is feeling and the desperation she is feeling as well to get her son back. my job this weekend is to memorize it. This is my monologue:  

My name is Christine Collins. On March 10^th 1928, my son, Walter Collins disappeared. A 5-month investigation led to a boy being found in DeKalb Illinois. They told me and all of you that this boy was my son; he is not my son. When I first saw this boy I knew, but the agent insisted that I was in shock and that my boy had changed in the past 5 months because of the trauma. So I convinced myself that I was in shock. However I then realized he was inches shorter than my son Walter that I measured every month. I went directly to the police, but they weren’t listening to me. They told me that trauma could affect the growth of children and his spine could have shrunk. I didn’t understand why they were lying to me; that boy is not my son. I have given the L.A pd every opportunity to admit their mistake and renew the search for my son; since they refuse to do so it forced me to bring my case public and I hope this will make them open their eyes and bring my son home to me. The department has made a terrible mistake and they have to please help me find my son before its too late. They are wasting time when they could be looking for him. I am here because I want the truth to be known and what this police department has done to me and to my son. But the only thing I care about now is finding him; I beg them to please renew my case and start looking for my son. I can still feel him, please, I beg you, I just want my son back.

I found something in the movie that I thought I HAD to add in my monologue that is when they already won the case against the police department and she already knows about the psychopath that had kidnapped her son which practically meant that Walter was dead. But still, there is a part where the pastor which became a great friend of Christine that helped her a lot to get justice, tells her that she has to let go and she responds by saying: "Not yet; I can still feel him". She could still feel her son, as a mother she felt her son was still alive and she could be right or wrong nobody knows; what we do know is that mothers have a special bond with their kids; they can feel when something is wrong; so I wouldn't be surprised if Walter was still alive. So I decided to end that way: " I can still feel him, please, I beg you, I just want my son back". I felt it was a very deep way to end and the repetition of the sentence: "I just want my son back" through the whole monologue is as well very efficient because it creates an impact to the audience. It helps the audience understand the situation at a greater scale and really feel the sadness this mother was feeling when the police denied to keep looking for her son. Who knows, if they hadn't made a mess and given her another kid and instead had listened to her, maybe Walter could have been saved.

Finally, I decided to eliminate the part where she tells about how she was sent to a psychopathic ward with no evidence because it didn't follow the chronologic order. In the movie, she talks to the press and that is what triggers the police to capture her and get rid of her my taking her to a mental hospital so it didn't make sense and I had to center on one specific idea because having a lot of things made my monologue so disorganized and not impacting at all. So I  decided to make my main idea how the police gave her another kid on purpose and decided to treat her badly and ignore her when she said that kid was not her son.

Something that is going to be very important is how I will perform it which I have already explained in depth in another post. I will have to practice a lot and really understand the character and be able to analyze it in depth to be able to portray her as the weak but strong women Christine Collins really was.

Monologue- Aspects to take in Consideration

This week our task if to work on our monologues. I am not going to be able to work this week in my monologue because I am going on a trip, however I think before going away, I should have a basic idea of all the aspects I have to take in consideration for my performance. I already have a rough draft of my monologue, however I do have to figure out what to do about the sounds, lightning, tableau, status, movement, voice, and physicality. I do have some ideas for this.

To begin with, I have this image of the scene I want to portray that depends basically on the lights. I want the scene to be very gloomy, depressing, and weak; because that's how Christine Collins feels at that moment. I want the scene to have very little light. The small light there is, I want it to be a very dim yellow light that comes kind of from the top and shoots at the back part of myself, so that my head if illuminated and the borders of my body is illuminated. This will also give a little bit of light to my face so that you are able to see my face, however it would be very dark. This very sad and gloomy environment will not only help me to get the audience in the mood, but it will help me portray metaphorically the emotions that are going through Christine Collins at that moment. On top of this, it will help me get inside my character because it will indirectly help me to evoke those feelings in the words. 

In addition, the lights will help me depict the status of Christine Collins, which is also correlated with the main issue I am talking about. The dimmed and weak lights will also help me to portray how people (men) saw women at that time; weak. In the 1920's women where still being oppressed by men. If they got raped, well she was looking for it for dressing that way. They where still being treated as a minority and their opinions didn't really count. Even though the global issue of my monologue is the lack of justice and lack equality by the police at that time, which is still seen now a days; you can see this issue also in the oppression of women because they too where taken away their right of being listened and of being equal citizens. So the status of women (Christine Collins), which is weak basically, can be also seen in the lights. Moreover, I think the status is very significant for my monologue, because Christine Collins is not only representing the oppressed women of that time, but her feeble personality was very shocking for me when I saw the movie. Angelina Jolie portrays her as a very timid, weak, oppressed, and kind of coward human being. However, she wasn't, but at the same time she was; that's what I like about this characters, because some of her personality traits contradict each other. She was a very coward person and you are able to see this when she doesn't stand up or shouts back when the police man is insulting her and saying that she is a liar and that she is avoiding her responsibilities as a mother. But at the same time, she does stand up in some way to the rules of society of that time by fighting for he rights and going out to the public so that the police re opens her case and starts looking for her son again. She doesn't quit and she keeps trying to be listened by doing whatever she can to make the police to listen. So she is a very round realistic but yet not easy to decipher character, and that's what I like about her, and that is what pulls me to act her our, it is quite of a challenge. Her outer personality portrays her as a coward person, however deep inside she keeps fighting for her son. Additionally, it is very important for me to portray her low status for me, so I want to show her as a very timid oppressed  and hurt person that looks easy to manipulate. However, through her words and repetitive statement of  "he is not my son", I want to show her inner strength and her persuasion to find her son which will also show the love she felt for him. 

Moreover, I think the movement is connected with the status. Because I want to show a very low and shy status, I want to use as little movement as possible. I will be standing in one place the whole time, so it is not distracting and I think it will help me to make the scene much more intense in general. I want to show how retrieved Christine Collins was so kind of hunched down with the head looking quite down; as if she was afraid to look the people in the eyes. I am not sure if I want to be holding an umbrella, because having one does help with the idea of hunched down as if you where to exaggerate it completely she will turn out in a fetal position. I don't want her to look like an old lady; but kind of hunched down to show her shyness and how scared she is. The umbrella really helps with this illusion and it also helps with her timidness. The other idea if to just have my hands together in front of my body; however doing some nervous twitching with my hands, which I have practiced before and it also portrays a shy almost traumatic personality which could also work. 

I don't know about the sounds yet. I don't think I am going to use any sound at all because I want all the attention to be on Christine Collins and on her story that she will be telling. However, when it comes to her voice, I want to show her timidness and oppression through her kind of high pitched voice; however a very slow, delicate and low voice. By her voice being low and delicate, it will show how she is actually afraid of speaking her mind because it wasn't something that women did at that time, and after all the things that the police has done to her, it makes sense that she is afraid of what they will do to her.

In this specific monologue, the use of pauses is extremely important. The story in general is extremely shocking and intense, and if you use paused in the right moments, it can help you to make the performance in general much better and much stronger. Not only will the pauses help to make the scene much more intense, but it will build up in the idea that Christine Collins is very shy and is extremely afraid of telling the world what has been happening. One very important pause in the monologue that I remember is the part where Christine says: "They told me and all of you that this boy was my son. He is not my son." The period makes the sentence much more intense and shocking than if I had said: "The boy that they brought is not my son". Not only is it much more strong but it is much more direct and impacting.

Finally, I already have all this aspects organized and in consideration. I still have the ask the teacher about tableau because I don't really understand what it is and how I can use it in my monologue. I do have to work on editing my monologue and on centering it on a main idea because it is too disorganized now and there are too many ideas mixed together, so I have to work on it.

In this picture of Christine Collins you are able to see her very weak and oppressed personality. You are also able to see her sadness. This is what I want to show:

Monday October 3- Improvisation

So I wasn't in class the last week because I was sick, so today was the first time I was doing the Improv Games. Nicholas, Pedro, and Sebastian where in my group and I think we did very well together. We started with the "Freezing" game and I think at in overall we where good. We didn't have trouble changing the situations, however I did have trouble moving forward with a situation and doing new things. So for example, I freeze the scene and I started with another idea, but then I didn't know how to go on or make the scene more interesting or fun. So I do have to work on my improvisational skills of proposing new actions or ideas when I already have a scene and an environment.
Moreover, I did think that we did very well in the questions part. At first, I didn't really get it, but then the teacher explained to us that we had to move the actions forward with the questions which makes everything so much difficult because basically a questions is suppose to paralyze an action so it was challenging but after some trails I go the handle of it, however it is difficult to ask another question when the question they asked you is a good one or one that moves forward so it is a vicious circle and you have to be very quick with your mind and be creative enough to know how do you ask a question on top of a question.
Moreover, at the end of the class, they showed us a video of a TV show that I had seen before that is called: Who's line is it anyway. And the program started in the UK, but they did an English version and to be honest, the english version is much better; probably because when they did the english version, they had already understood more about the rules of improvisation and how it can be funny, while in the UK version, they still didn't get very much what improvisation was about.
I did think it was quite interesting what the teacher said about how being a great actor doesn't necessary mean you are good in improvisation and it is absolutely true. There are a lot of good actors you simply don't see them doing improvisation, or they just don't have the talent of inventing a scene on the spot. For example, I really don't see Angelina Jolie being good at improvisation. She seems of a much serious person than that. However, I do see for example, Charlie Sheen being good at improvising.
On top of this, I do believe that improvisation is connected with comedy. It seems as if the good improvisations made by actors or people in the drama class are all funny. And this fact may affect the person able to do this as well. I don't really see Angelina Jolie in a comedy; she is more of a dramatic actress and I think this has to do with the fact that she may not be good at improvisation.
Finally, I think that there are a lot of aspected of improvisation that we haven't grasp upon yet. There are a lot of clues and rules that can help you be better at improvising and before trying it, you HAVE to know this rules; this way you will be successful. The only ones I know if propose and accept, but there are many more I don't know yet.