Saturday 29 April 2017

Alice in Wonderland- Week 1


We're back! This morning we launched an exciting new term for the Chameleon Group! It seems like forever ago since 'The Princess and the Goblins' was performed and we were eager to get the ball rolling on a brand new adventure; namely Alice's adventure through the rabbit hole to the crazy realm of Wonderland!


It was fantastic to see so many new and returning faces amidst the group! Plus it was nostalgic to be back at Roborough Studios, where our first youth groups originally began a year and a half ago (though it feels like an eternity). Our new chameleons quickly made themselves comfortable and it was brilliant watching everyone take part in the warm up games! Adding to the nostalgia, several warm up games returned from our previous projects for another round. Captain's coming was particularly fun, as we added brand new rules to it as we went. Everyone had a chance to contribute.


We then launched into Ben's favourite game; create a shape, where the group had to work together to create various shapes such as circles, triangles and even a star. Our good friend Augusto Boal and his opposites warm up (one of our longtime favourites) also made a comeback. The group first had to walk, stop, jump and clap and then do so again with the instructions reversed and rearranged.



 We then got onto some light-hearted acting work. The group played 'what are you doing?' which was a nice way to ease into performing for some of our newer members. The game appeared on many weeks in our last project and involves performing an action and telling the person who comes on next what action they must perform. The one after them must then come on and copy, after which they will receive an action to follow too. We had some fun suggestions today; such as being chased by bees, leading a jewel heist, feeding a cat and figuring out an arm-movement based language for talking to dragons.


Next the teams split off into two groups. At their request it was boys and girls. In their teams they had to create a scene that went with the title 'A Knight on a Quest.' Some fantastic ideas were put forward and we ended up with two brilliant short pieces of work. The boys chose to tell us a tale about a knight who is sent by the King to defeat an evil goblin and claim his one million gold prize. The girls told a tale of two knights who were always too busy fighting over who would save the damsel in distress to actually save her. The poor maiden ended up falling from a tree and getting lost in a rose bush by the time they were done bickering.


Finally the group came together to talk about the main theme of the term. We wrote down what everyone knew about Alice in Wonderland and then talked about some of the things we will be doing over the course of the next eight weeks. Once we had finished our chat the group got to their feet and performed a 'speed run' of Alice's story. It was manic but hilarious, and five minutes later they had completed a very brief version of Alice in Wonderland!


All in all it was a brilliant first rehearsal! We're excited to continue next week when we will look more at what our version of Alice in Wonderland will be like. More fun an games ahead, but for now it's great to be back!











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