Session One

Week Two - Tuesday 6th September

Warm up – Archetypes

What is an Archetype?

Archetypes: Hero, Damsel in Distress, Villain, Henchman (sidekick), Prince (not necessarily same as a hero).

Melodrama

What is melodrama? Create a criteria for melodrama

•                Loud voice

•                Exaggerated movement/gestures

•                Emotions are demonstrated physically

•                Facing the audience

•                Heightened emotional subject matter

In small groups create a short scene of melodrama, which incorporates features of the above.

Share and discuss some of these scenes.

Why might melodrama be unsatisfying to an audience?

What would be the opposite of melodrama as a style, what features would this have?

Melodrama often featured a ‘star’ actor who played the best part and who would receive a round of applause when stepping on stage.

Stanislavski found this style of performance unsatisfying and the nature of the ‘star-system’ and so his ideas (and those who shared these views) started to emerge.

Naturalism VS Realism

What might the term naturalism mean? What does it mean?

Create a ‘naturalistic’ scene – containing as much 'naturalistic' detail as possible.

Re stage the same scene as a piece of ‘realism’ – i.e. it shows what needs to be shown.

This was a movement in theatre and literature – Emile Zola’s Therese Raquin

5 minute version of the Cherry Orchard

What were the key events that different groups picked out?