Evaluation

This picture shows how realistic we tried to make our performance such as having the audience on a list and ticking them off as they entered 'The Nerve Meter' we made the club feel exclusive as people where only allowed in one by one and was placed in certain seats. I feel it made the audience wonder whats going on a physically involve them in our piece.


 I loved the idea of having the name of each play or for the audience each groups fear in a balloon as it gave this type of atmosphere in the room as none of the actors or audience knew who was performing next therefore the reactions to when the balloon was being pop was more honest. I also liked the fact we had an audience member pop the balloon as it had them physically involving themselves in our piece making them feel like they had a sense of control in what is happening inside the club.

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With the music playing and everyone getting into their position on the block I felt drew the audience in as it had some type of story through still images there was not a part of the block that you would not be able to get some type of story out of it. The different levels used and facial expression really linked well to the type of clubbing atmosphere we wanted to create for the audience.


Giving the audience shots of lemon juice links well with the theory Artaud has that everyone has a deep darker desire meaning there is more to what meets the eye.



The different types of reactions to the characters reaction to finally facing their fears some people screamed while others laughed this all gave a vocal insight to the type of people they are this was very interesting to watch.

 I have loved experimental term so much I find it very sad that it has to come to and end I feel this term has really pushed me as an actor as well as a person since I have had to remove myself from comfortable situations and live in the moment.

Antonin Artaud

Antonin Artaud(1896–1948)

Was a french playwright poet actor and theatre director he was born in Marseille France to Euphraise Nalpas and Antoine Roi Artaud both his parents were natives of Smyrna which was a native Greek city he was also greatly affected by his Greek ancestors. When he was 4 years old he suffered from severe case of meningitis which gave Artaud a nervous, irritable temperament throughout his teen years. He also suffered from neuralgia(a pain in ones nerves), stammering and severe moments of clinical depression which was treated with opium which lead to a lifelong addiction. 

He is commonly known for his book ' Theatre of cruelty' in which he stated that by cruelty he meant not extreme sadism or causing pain but just as often a violent physical determination to break the false reality he believed that text has too much value for what it is worth and that theatre should be made up of a unique language a halfway mark between thought and gesture. Artaud described it as spiritual in physical terms and believed that all theatre is physical expression in space.

The Theatre of Cruelty has been created in order to restore to the theatre a passionate and convulsive conception of life, and it is in this sense of violent rigour and extreme condensation of scenic elements that the cruelty on which it is based must be understood. This cruelty, which will be bloody when necessary but not systematically so, can thus be identified with a kind of severe moral purity which is not afraid to pay life the price it must be paid.

Masks

A group picture of my workshop group playing around with mask

This is such a fun exercise you really get to leave your comfort zone and do crazy things which really links well with the whole idea behind experimental where you experience new and strange things.

 

Hanging torches

 

Torches should be used in our play as the actors will be controlling the lighting of our piece we will be able to spotlight certain moments and since it is going to be darker it will give off the club like affect.

Questions?

Everyone connected like puppets

An idea was to have everyone connected like puppets on a string to the nerve meter or make the nerve meter a person who has loads of strings coming out of them. It will look very abstract but also eye pleasing for an audience member to have a person standing in the middle of the room with loads of strings coming out of them and connecting all around the room will make it look like teh audience is in a spiders web and the nerve meter is the spider.

The idea for our piece

Workshop - 8th January 2013

Clubbing music

while everyone is coming into the club this type of music will be playing it will make the piece feel more rel for the audience as well as the actors.

White noise

This plays while we take the shot its a metallic grinding very uncomfortable to listen to while we physically show the drink going into our system.

Opening track

This plays when the whole group gets onto the blocks and into a dramatic pose such as dancing, laughing I think this is a effective way to start it because it will paint a clear picture of the type of characters that are coming into The Nerve Meter. This music has a hypnotic way about which then makes me feel relaxed like its guiding me into another room which can link to taking the audience into this clubbing atmosphere.

A lesson on Antonin Artaud

 

The Spurt of Blood TRANSLATED BY RUBY COHN

CHARACTERS
A YOUNG MAN
A WET-NURSE
A YOUNG GIRL
A PRIEST
A KNIGHT
A COBBLER
A BEADLE
A PEDDLER
A BAWD
A HUGE VOICE
A JUDGE


YOUNG MAN: I love you and everything is beautiful.
YOUNG GIRL: [With quavering voice] You love me and everything is beautiful.
YOUNG MAN: [In a lower tone] I love you and everything is beautiful.
YOUNG GIRL: [In an even lower tone] You love me and everything is beautiful.
YOUNG MAN: [Leaving her abruptly] I love you. [Silence] Face me.
YOUNG GIRL: [As before standing opposite him] There.
YOUNG MAN: [In an exalted high-pitched voicej I love you. I am great, I am lucid, I am full, I am dense.
YOUNG GIRL: [In the same high-pitched voice] We love each other.
YOUNG MAN: We are intense. Ah, how beautifully the world is built.
[Silence. There is a noise as if an immense wheel were turning and moving the air. A hurricane separates them. At the same time, two Stars are seen colliding and from them fall a series of legs of living flesh with feet, hands, scalps, masks, colonnades, porticos, temples, alembics, falling more and more slowly, as if falling in a vacuum: then three scorpions one after another and finally a frog and a beetle which come to rest with desperate slowness, nauseating slowness]
YOUNG MAN: [Crying with all his strength] The sky has gone mad.
[He looks at the sky] Let's hurry away from here. 
[He pushes the Young Girl before him]

[Enter a medieval Knight in gigantic armor, followed by a Wet-Nurse holding her breasts in her hands and puffing because her breasts are swollen]
KNIGHT: Let go of your tits. Give me my papers.
WET-NURSE: [Screaming in high-pitch] Ah! Ah! Ah!
KNIGHT: Damn, what's the matter with you?
WET-NURSE: Our daughter, there, with him.
KNIGHT: Quiet, there's no girl there.
WET-NURSE: I'm telling you that they're screwing.
KNIGHT: What the Hell do I care if they're screwing?
WET-NURSE: Incest.
KNIGHT: Midwife.
WET-NURSE: [Plunging her hands deep into her pockers which are as big as her breasts] Pimp. 
[She throws his papers at him]
KNIGHT: Let me eat.

[The Wet-Nurse rushes out] [He gets up and from each paper he takes a huge hunk of Swiss cheese. Suddenly he coughs and chokes]
KNIGHT: [With full mouth] Ehp. Ehp. Show me your breasts. Show me your breasts. Where did she go?
[He runs out] [The Young Man comes back]
YOUNG MAN: I saw, I knew, I understood. Here on a public street, the priest, the cobbler, the peddler the entrance to the church, the red light of the brothel, the scales of justice. I can't stand it any longer!

[Like shadows, a Priest, a Cobbler, a Beadle, a Bawd, a Judge, a Peddler, arrive on stage]
YOUNG MAN: I've lost her: give her back to me.
ALL: [In different tones] Who, who, who, who.
YOUNG MAN: My wife.
BEADLE: [Very fat] Your wife, you're kidding!
YOUNG MAN: Kidding! Maybe she's yours! 
BEADLE: [Tapping his forehead] Maybe she is.

[He runs out] [The Priest Ieaves the group and puts his arm around the neck of the Young Man]
PRIEST: [As if confessing someone.] To what part of your body do you refer most often?
YOUNG MAN: To God. 
[Confused by the reply the Priest immediately shifts to a Swiss accent]
PRIEST: [In Swiss accent] But that isn't done any more. We no longer hear through that ear. You have to ask that of volcanoes and earthquakes. We wallow in the little obscenities of man in the confession-box. That's life.
YOUNG MAN: [Much impressed] Ah that's life! Then everything is shot to hell.
PRIEST: [Still with Swiss accent] Of course.

[At this moment night suddenly falls on stage. The earth quakes. There is furious thunder and zig-zags of lightning in every direction through the zig-zags all the characters can be seen running around bumping into each other and falling then getting up and running about like crazy. Then an enormous hand seizes the Bawd by her hair, which bursts into flame and grows huge before our eyes]
HUGE VOICE: Bitch, look at your body!

[The Bawd's body is seen to be absolutely naked and hideous beneath her blouse and skirt, which become transparent as glass]
BAWD: Leave me alone, God.

[She bites God in the wrist. An immense spurt of blood lacerates the Stage, and through the biggest fiash of lightning the Priest can be seen making the sign of the cross. When the lights go on again all the characters are dead, and their corpses lie all over the ground. Only the Young Man and the Bawd remain devouring each other with their eyes. The Bawd falls into the Young Man's arms]
BAWD: [With the sigh of one having an orgasm] Tell me how it happened to you.

[The Young Man hides his head in his hands. The Wet-nurse comes back carrying the Young Girl under her arm like a bundle. The young Girl is dead. The Bawd drops her on the ground where she collapses and becomes flat as a pancake. The Wet-Nurse no longer has her breasts. Her chest is completely flat]
KNIGHT: [In a terrible voice] Where did you put them? Give me my Swiss cheese.
WET-NURSE: [Boldly and gaily] Here you are.

[She lifts up her dress. The Young Man wants to run away but he is frozen like a petrified puppet]
YOUNG MAN: [As if suspended in the air and with the voice of a ventriloquist] Don't hurt Mommy!
KNIGHT: She-devil!

[He hides his face in horror. A multitude of scorpions crawl out from beneath the Wet-Nurse's dress and swarm between her legs. Her vagina swells up splits and becomes transparent and glistening like a sun. The Young Man and Bawd run off as though lobotomized]
YOUNG GIRL: [Getting up dazed] The virgin! Ah that's what he was looking for.

Nerves

 

Nerves connect to everything in the body during the piece pink wool will be used to represent the nerve endings. As the club is called The Nerve Meter we wanted to have everyone connected like the nerves

The type of lounge we are going for

 

We want to give off a type of 'vibe' when it comes to the type of lounge we plan to set out piece in. We want it to be elegant and look classy with small tables a cute looking chairs so that when the audience sit down they will feel like they are in a expensive places.

 

Body over mind dance

On the 15th of January my group and I took part in a exercise called  'Mind of body' We had to spread yourself across the room close are eyes and just listen to the music. During the mind over body exercise I felt like I was in another world where my mind had no control over my body It felt very surreal as if i was in a dream like situation. When you become one with the music my arms and legs began to feel heavy which led to me tumbling all over the place. My body movements reminds me of being extremely drunk and nothing feels real. I found it quite interesting that by closing your eyes and listening to music it can transport you to another world.

Some people responded differently meaning that they let lose and let the music take them over or some people found it annoying at ended up on the floor covering their ears as if they are in pain. Also some people began to worry if everyone was watching them so they wasn't able to fully let go of the mind and do what the body wants to do meaning they was not able to fully experience the 'Mind over body' exercise which is a shame as in my eyes I enjoyed that exercise a lot.

When the music stopped we was asked how long do you think we had been moving for some people said 8mins others said half an hour personally I felt that we had been dancing for maybe 15mins either way long or short I really enjoyed the exercise.

This exercise links to Artaud because he believed that theatre should affect the audience as much as possible where he would use a mixture of strange sounds lighting and other performance skills therefore if an audience saw this exercise they would feel very strange and maybe even become entranced by the music and there subconsciousness will make them join in with our movements.

I think that this movement section should be put into our final piece because it would be interesting to see the audiences response to it maybe transport them to another world or place as during this exercise time is forgotten about.

Response to The Nerve Meter

When I first read the The Nerve Meter I did not understand what the poem was about I felt very confused bout and had to read it many times till I finally understood that it is about an actor expressing there opinion and feelings on how the world is seen through there eyes. As everyone has their own prospective on how they see the world and the events that happen in it this poem is very emotional as the actor expresses his/her feelings in a monotone structure. Also that in society you can loose yourself as a person which in a way can turn you crazy 'intelligence is only a vast contingency, and that one can lose it' as you slowly become a completely different person to the person you originally was alienating yourself from yourself. That when you begin to the process of finding yourself you end up alienating yourself from reality creating your own bubble until your whole again. This poem also touches upon that in the moment of finding yourself you gain the knowledge of no one will full understand you except yourself  'I am the witness, I am the only witness of myself...I am the only person who can measure its extent'

The Nerve Meter by Antonin Artaud

 An actor is seen as if through crystals. 
      Inspiration in stages. 
      One musn’t let in too much literature. 


   I have aspired no further than the clockwork of the soul, I have transcribed only the pain of an abortive adjustment. 
      I am a total abyss. Those who believed me capable of a whole pain, a beautiful pain, a dense and fleshy anguish, an anguish which is a mixture of objects, an effervescent grinding of forces rather than a suspended point 
      —and yet with restless, uprooting impulses which come from the confrontation of my forces with these abysses of offered finality 
      (from the confrontation of forces of powerful size), 
      and there is nothing left but the voluminous abysses, the immobility, the cold— 
      in short, those who attributed to me more life, who thought me at an earlier stage in the fall of the self, who believed me immersed in a tormented noise, in a violent darkness with which I struggled 
      —are lost in the shadows of man. 


   In sleep, nerves tensed the whole length of my legs. 
      Sleep came from a shifting of belief, the pressure eased, absurdity stepped on my toes. 


   It must be understood that all of intelligence is only a vast contingency, and that one can lose it, not like a lunatic who is dead, but like a living person who is in life and who feels working on himself its attraction and its inspiration (of intelligence, not of life). 
      The titillations of intelligence and this sudden reversal of contending parties. 
      Words halfway to intelligence. 
      This possibility of thinking in reverse and of suddenly reviling one’s thought. 
      This dialogue in thought. 
      The ingestion, the breaking off of everything. 
      And all at once this trickle of water on a volcano, the thin, slow falling of the mind. 


   To find oneself again in a state of extreme shock, clarified by unreality, with, in a corner of oneself, some fragments of the real world. 


   To think without the slightest breaking off, without pitfalls in my thought, without one of those sudden disappearances to which my marrow is accustomed as a transmitter of currents. 
      My marrow is sometimes amused by these games, sometimes takes pleasure in these games, takes pleasure in these furtive abductions over which the sense of my thought presides. 
      At times all I would need is a single word, a simple little word of no importance, to be great, to speak in the voice of the prophets: a word of witness, a precise word, a subtle word, a word well steeped in my marrow, gone out of me, which would stand at the outer limit of my being, 
      and which, for everyone else, would be nothing. 
      I am the witness, I am the only witness of myself. This crust of words, these imperceptible whispered transformations of my thought, of that small part of my thought which I claim has already been formulated, and which miscarries, 
      I am the only person who can measure its extent.