Lydia

Discuss the use of lighting and sound in “teechers”. How did it add to the plays intentions?

Lighting and sound played a big role in the production “teechers”. The song by Pink Floyd, we don’t need no education, was played at the beginning of the production. This was to show what type of school Whitehall is. The audience gets an understanding that the school may not be posh, the children don’t care about education and the teachers are struggling. When there was a school disco the children pretended to be teachers by using dance movements from the 80’s. This was to show the audience that pupils do not dance like teachers. The song hit me baby one more time, by Britney spears, was used as this song is from the 90’s. Also later on in the next scene Mr Nixon, the new drama teacher, hits Oggy Moxon (the hard nut at Whitehall). The song hit me baby one more time is used again. This is supposed to be comical as Nixon is hitting a pupil just as the song says “hit me”. At the dance Gail, a student who fancies Mr Nixon, goes up to Nixon at the dance and throws herself in his arms. The song lady in red is played whilst the pair is dancing and the tempo is changed half way during the song to show the audience that Gail wants more to happen. In the scenes where there is only one person on the stage, the spotlight is always on them, this draws the audience’s attention to that one person.

sophie walkers crisps

Drama ‘teechers’J by Sophie Walker

What scene was I most impressed with?

The scene that I thought that had the most feeling and the most thought and effort gone in to it, was brad and Callum’s scene.  It impressed me a lot as both their facial expressions and body language had shown true meanings to the audience.  The way they used the space and walked around and didn’t corpse and made the audience feel involved was fantastic. They used their words very strongly and in a powerful way. They had performed this so well because they had practiced hard and felt strongly for this particular scene.  They also made it really believable and as their tone and pitch of their voices changed  they really made it feel like a power ful scene.  They had changed the tone and pitch of both their voices  to make it seem like they are generally being serious  and they ment what they were saying.

 

 

What was  my thoughts on the sound and lighting of the play teechers?

 

My thoughts of the lighting, I think it went well because when we needed a spot light it came on at the right time and went well with the scene of whatever one it was . In the disco scene there was a disco ball and it filled the whole room with a rotating light of glimmer and shine, which made it seem like a actual disco.  Made it seem like real life and got everyone involved.  We put a disco and there was lighting up anyway so all we had to do is turn them on and switch them off at different times. The sound matched our school enviriment  because it was a ruff school and it was lould and came on at the right times and it all went brilliant.

unfinished

The character I played was called Gail Saunders. She has a crush on the new drama teacher. She was a flirtatious, spoilt, promiscuous teenage girl, with a high sense in fashion. My intentions were to show this as my character to the audience. What I did to portray this was

Lisbeth

Alice footBall

Redirecting a Scene and Thoughts on the Performace

 

One of the only scenes in our drama performance that I think could have been directed better is the intense scene between Mr Nixon (the school’s drama teacher) and Oggy Moxon (the school bully and hardnut). This is because the argument is supposed to go on between the two of them whilst a massive crowd gathers to cheer them on. However, in the scene that we performed, there wasn’t a massive crowd. Instead, there was just an argument between Oggy and Nixon whilst Dennis (Oggy’s weedy friend) took on the role of the cheering crowd. When we actually performed the play to the audience, the person who played Dennis forgot to mention that “a massive crowd had gathered”.  I think that it would have been better if a crowd had gathered or the actors offstage had shouted remarks at the characters to show that the students at the school liked to watch a fight which suggests that they are from quite a rough, violent area. This also would have made it clearer to the audience. I would also redirect the scene so that the gap between where Nixon and Oggy stood clearly got smaller as they got closer to each other and the fight became more intense because I feel that this was unclear in the performance and would have been quite effective had it been carried out properly. 

Overall, I think that our class performance went very well as everybody remembered their lines and queues which meant that it ran smoothly and the audience did not feel awkward. As the show went on, the actors began to feel more confident which showed in their performances as their characters became more exaggerated and confident.

t-rex

Green =what

Red=why

Blue=how

discuss a scene that needs improving

I think that the scene with Mr. Nixon, oggy and Dennis needed to be improved because all but Dennis didn't show engagement in this scene. This scene is when scruffy Dennis is given a porn magazine by Oggy moxon, Mr. Nixon argues with oggy and almost gets himself hurt, it was Mr. Nixon’s first encounter with a school bully. He doesn’t go about it as well as he could have done. Personally I think that Charlie toomer played Oggy too quietly when oggy is meant to be vicious and full on, Charlie needed to make his voice louder and stand with a better posture. This would show that oggy thinks he owns the school and is very powerful, it also shows that he thinks he’s bigger than the other kids and stands above everybody else. Ryan Dennis was playing Mr. Nixon, I wasn’t happy with the way he played it because he was too subtle when confronting oggy moxon, he should have been acting as if he were in charge, after all Mr. Nixon is a teacher. He also should have been louder because no matter who a teacher is talking to the teacher will always be loud and make himself look like the bigger person and make himself look in charge. I was happy with the way mason acted as if he was Dennis; he portrayed himself as if he were a young lad looking at his first porn magazine. he got really exited and was shaking as if he'd discoverd a new species

 

talk about my performance, what was good and what was bad

I think that I performed well in the scene where my character Mr. Nixon had a run in with Mr. Basford who was played by Callum, they had a disagreement and we had to act out an argument. We both rose our voice as the scene heated up and we both used body language to show we had strong opinions, for example for a few of my sentences I would poke him in the chest to show I disagreed and what I thought had to be heard. I wasn’t happy with the scene I played as Mr. Nixon when I tried to control the class and they were just ignoring me, I should have been a lot more aggressive and I should have shouted to show I was angry and wanted their attention.

 

I was very pleased with how the whole play went, we had great feedback and I think it went very successfully. My mum said the whole cast performed well and showed they also really wanted to get involved. The way our class performed got the audience very involved I also think the lighting helped with this because it feels like we are not in a drama room but in the school that the actors were pretending to be. We made the audience feel like this by picking some of the audience up and getting them involved.

wibbons

Discuss the intentions of your character. How were they shown?

                For the opening of our performance of teachers I was playing the role of Salty. Salty is a student at the secondary school and is the character that is performing the drama play within our play. He is a loud and energetic character that comes on to the stage with lots of energy and confidence. When Salty is first introduced into the play the audience knows straight away that he is a child that is restless and hyperactive. To display this to the audience I spoke loudly and never stopped moving. I sway my arms around and walked about when the other characters on stage with me were talking. I shouted my first line and strongly emphasized my other lines. My intentions of playing the role of this character this way were too show the audience that Salty is a mischievous character that is all ways causing trouble and annoying the people he is with. By shouting and talking to the audience and not leaving them alone showed that I was not going to be quiet and that I loved to bother everyone.  Also in the production I played the role of Nixon, a drama teacher at the school, he is an easy going teacher that has quite a laid back teaching style. I played Nixon as quite a relaxed character but in one of the scenes was depressed and angry. In the scene when Nixon was depressed I put my hands on my head and sat down facing the floor, I talked slowly and sighed multiple times. I kept shouting at the people in my class and ignoring what they were saying, then at the end of the scene I jumped to my feet and shouted and gestured to with my hands. The intention of having my hands on my head was to show the audience I was depressed and didn’t want to look/face anybody. Looking at the floor shows I was feeling down and didn’t want to be teaching in the lesson. The fact I was ignoring what the people where saying was to show that I was not focused and I was distracted by my depression. The constant shouting of the two girls in his lesson were building up to the final point of when Nixon jumps to his feet and the anger over takes his depression as I shouted at the top of my voice to tell them to put there hands on their heads and their fingers on their lips. Using hand gestures in the seen just emphasizes my anger.

Katie Miller

Intentions Of My Character

In teechers I played the role of Hobby, a under confident shy chav, who goes to whitewall school. The first impressions I got from reading Hobby’s lines is that she is bored most of the time and doesn’t want to be in whatever situation she is in. For example in the scene I was in, The scene where Gail, flirty character, and Hobby are telling their Drama teacher,Mr Nixon, about the plays they have done before in drama, Hobby seems disinterested . She says the line ‘We done it’ A few times, this shows she is bored and doesn’t care what is going on around her or what Mr. Nixon has to say. I also think she has a manly aggressive nature about her. When I played hobby I made my actions slower and acted lazier. I also ate a mars bar in between lines to show she is always eating. I played the character of Hobby like this because of the stage directions and the manner of in which she speaks. I also created a picture of Hobby in my head and tried to make it come across in the way I played her. As We didn’t have set costumes for each character, we just wore uniform, If we did have costumes I think Hobby would of worn a hoddie as it shows she doesn’t really care. A few other people played the character of Hobby as well as me. Alice and Sophie played hobby as an Aggressive manly character. They Changed their accent, the changed their accent to a low, deep tone. This showed she was quite intimidating and manly. This adds to the fact she may be shy and under confident as she doesn’t like her voice or personality.

Lighting and Sound

In teechers we used sound and lighting throughout the show to create tension, build up scenes, to make people stand out and to set the scene. We also used sound and lighting in the show to improve our performance. Lighting was used for every scene in the show. For example in the scene where Gail, a flirty character, and Hobby, a shy character, are telling their Drama teacher,Mr Nixon, about the plays they have done before in drama, when another student,Peter Saxon , approaches Mr. Nixon and starts a speech about drama;A spotlight was used to single him out and to make everyone focus on him, everyone also cleared the stage so that he could be alone while he carried out his speech. This was done to create tension and to make people feel intimidated by his height, as he is a tall character. It was also done to show the types of students that go to whitewall. There was also a big use of sound within Teechers. Sound was used to set the scene; it was used as a transition from scene to scene and was used to relate to the scene, so the type of music would relate to what was happening in the scene. For Example, in the Disco scene where Gail and Hobby are at the disco waiting for Mr. Nixon, the music is disco style and upbeat. As soon as Mr. Nixon arrived a slow song came on, creating the perfect moment for Gail to appear in Mr. Nixon’s Arms, ready to receive the kiss she had been waiting all night for. ‘Hit me baby one more time’ By Britney Spears was used at the start of the scene to show the upbeat side of the disco but as soon as Mr. Nixon arrived the music changed to ‘Lady In Red’ a perfect song for Gail and Mr. Nixon to dance to. The song ‘Hit me baby one more time’ Was used to show upbeatness, fun and chaos with in the disco, whereas ‘Lady In red’ was used to show a serious romantic side to the disco and scene.