REHEARSALS (WEEK TEN)

1) Blog
This week we were able to have a rehearsal as a whole class and focus on blending our two performances together. At the start of the rehearsal we altered some of our stage positioning and will now have a designated props table on one side of the stage. My group then also decided that if we can we will tell completely new stories, to avoid making our improvisations look too contrived. This alteration improved our performances greatly and the mistakes that came from not knowing added comedy to the performance. As a class we have also decided that our costume will be one piece of red clothing, mixed with either jeans or the colour black.

Posted by Emma Bilton


2) Improbable Week 10
I thought our rehearsal and run through this week went really well! I'm feeling optimistic about our final performance, obviously some small things need work, but our basic structure is quite pleasing I think; I look forward to our rehearsal tomorrow where we can sort out some of our technical problems, and also a few of the other small issues with the piece.

Posted by Ella Rhodes


3) Blog
Monday's seminar/rehearsal was just amazing!! Everything seemed to fit. At last. Although there are still various things we have to think about, like how we want to incorporate music or lighting one can clearly see where it'll be going now.
And, once again, we experienced the magic about improvasition. I had so much pleasure in watching (from the back) Faith improvising on a completely new narrative of Chloe. It had humour, wit and excitement in it. I really do hope that we will be able to achieve something similar next Monday. Because after all, you cannot plan things like that. We also tried to repeat some scenes that had worked beforehand in a similar way. These attempts turned out to be rather unsuccessful and quite dissapointing at some points. People were trying to stick to a pattern which once worked and you could sense that the freshness was missing and they were waiting for 'something' to come up while acting which just didn't seem to happen.
However, we will be focusing on some basic things that still need to be worked on during this week and try not to overthink the actual improvisation narratives. I hope this will help us creating an enjoyable 20 minute show for the audience on Monday, December 10th.

Posted by Mirjam Frank


4) Blog week 10
I was really intrigued by this week's rehearsal as a whole class. Although it was difficult to keep concentration as a group at times, I felt that it actually went rather well. As I had missed the previous rehearsal, I was really interested to see how the pieces had been merged - as it turned out although they had been merged it became an apparently different piece with the whole group there and an interesting diversion for the other half of the group. Although I had not seen many of the other groups individual stories to start with, it was clear that they were becoming stale to the actors, if not to the audience. They were unhappy with this though, and it became so much more alive when Chloe came up with a completely surprising new story. It was incredibly cheerful thing to watch - a group becoming so much more involved and happy with a piece simply because of a small change. I am really looking forward to tomorrow and mroe surprises!

Posted by Emma Fielding


5) Blog
i really feel we made a lot of progress on monday, and there is a genuine sense of cohesion and ensemble within the group now, which i think is so helpful to the improvisation we do. putting in a surprise story, not only produced a wonderful scene but proved that we can make a good scene out of true improv, even though at times we are scared 2 go into performing something unknown.

Posted by Chloe Gosling


6) Blog
I really understand what Improbable mean when they say they are never fully prepared for a piece before they perform it. If it was i think it would take away from the excitement of it, some of the life and energy of the performance as a whole. We are prepared and our rehearsal time has been well spent, especially in the last two weeks, but the only elements we are not prepared on our basically our improvisations (which is a good thing funnily enough). And that is the only thing that scares me, how our performance could go spectacularly or it could just be ok. i don't believe anything bad will happen but i want the whole thing to go as best as it possibly can. We'll see i guess!

Posted by George Calderwood


7) Week 10 Blog
I feel that as a whole group we have definitely improved our piece over the last week. The extra rehearsals we have had have helped us to understand the exact blocking of our piece as well as focusing on certain scenes and extracts that needed work. Although, as a group we feel we have produced a good piece of work, we do not want to rehearse it too much as it would take away the creativeness and spontaneity of the piece. I am looking forward to performing it and feel that itshould go very well.

Posted by Charlotte Harvey

Comment: Having a performance with spontaneous elements doesn't mean that you shouldn't rehearse too much. Rehearsals are also intended to help you feel more comfortable and confident about your skills and tools, and to help you develop your connection between yourselves and between you and the work. Nesreen


8) Keeping it Improvised
I have really enjoyed our rehearsals this week and am looking forward to our performance on Monday. On Monday's lesson it was great to see the spontaneous ideals of Improbable being used in our piece, particularly through Chloe's idea to change her story at the last minute. I found the use of a new story refreshing and it allowed the others t improvise in a much cleared and easier way as they were not blocked by previous ideas. On Wednesday's rehearsal, George's idea to play some improv games to further boost the energy and spontaneity of the group was really effective and I think we all benefited from it. I guess it just goes to prove that the best ideas can come from play!

Posted by Fran Smith


9)
I think that the rehearsals on Saturday were very interesting. Although the first run through was quite unenthusiastic it shows that when working in different spaces you can get quite intimidated. I do think that the idea of making the space ourselves was a good idea as it allowed us to take control of the situation. Overall I think the piece will go very well.

Posted by Louisa Hagan


10) Blog
I'm feeling quite optimistic about tomorrow. Of course with impro there's always a chance it'll fall flat on its face, but I think if we perform with as much energy as we did yesterday we'll be fine. I'm much happier now that we have our "entrance" to get us going.

Posted by Emma Berge