'Frantic Assembly's' Othello Theatre Review.

Theatre Review of:

Frantic Assembly's 'Othello' at

The Oxford Playhouse on Thursday 23rd October 2014

In this production, Frantic Assembly took a well known Shakespearean play 'Othello', and brought it to life with a contemporary feel for a new younger audience. Their use of fast pace physical theatre left me on the edge of my seat and gripped to the characters and themes, the running themes of Love, Tragedy and Envy, kept the audience on their toes as characters emotions go from extreme to extreme, as


Set:
Pool table is being revolved around(centre of the set), important things happen there- night of their wedding was spent on it, death scene.
walls used to show his intoxicated state, not usual to see set manipulated by actors.
smashed windows.


Lighting:
Sliver white light to show her purity and self worth
Bland wash over main parts of the play, the lights pick up during physical theatre scenes.


Costume/Props
White tank top, Othello-dominance and  diversity shows him being a leader
Desdemona has on rolled up to show her being different and maybe a leader of the females.
Othello is the only one to have a weapon(Bat), this shows his status with everyone else.


Sound (music)-
pop, disco, techno music playing in the background brought life and linked it back to modernised version.


Acting:
use of gritty London accents contrasts to the text. Relatable to an audience.




Direction:


Perf-Style:


Conclusion:
Pros and Cons of the production,

Beautiful Burnout Exploration notes

Luke Scattergood Beautiful Burnout Exploration notes

Context

We wanted to explore the fact that boxing was often seen as a gentlemen's sport, and despite this Dina was trying to make herself known as an equal . In our scene Bobby gives Dina praise for her boxing, "Thanks Bobby". I slowly nodded my head to her, this showed my characters acceptance, yet still kept the authority, with the rigid movements, the simple movement doesn't show much praise to Dina, as he was to drive her to do better. I didn't want to make It over the top with Bobby's movement, as he wouldn't have shown  a lot of gratitude to all of the other male boxers. Later on in the play, Dina says that she "can see herself home", this showed Dina's independence when it comes to looking after herself. This may be because in her earlier life she was not always treated well, or as an equal status to others, So she wants more attention from the others. Bobby says "to do what she is told", by using a stern voice it shows that as much as Dina wants to be treated equally, it doesn't mean she can do what she wants.  

Language

Although all characters would have a Scottish accent, which is made clear to the audience through idiolect, such as "Gunnae" and "Nay". This use of colloquialisms can be used to expand a character, for Bobby he would put a lot of emphasis on these words, which may come across harsh or bully like. For my character of Bobby I could tell that he would be quite short and aggressive, I did this as Bobby's job would be coming tedious, as he does the same thing throughout the play, as the boxers is not always on their boxing technique as they should "think about boxing, not the humiliation of his opponent" I shortened a lot of my words, when playing Bobby, taking on a lot of the shouting characteristics, using the language to assert my authority from the characters language we could make guesses off where they were from, that they were from a place like Edinburgh rather than a place like Glasgow, where things are usually seen as a bit more high class.

 

Non Verbal Communication

When I first became Bobby in the play, I needed to show my annoyance with Ajay messing around in training and then leaving the club. I crossed my arms and began to walk away, to make it look like my character had given up, I then turned back sharply, that gave off the idea that my character was really annoyed that he wasn't getting the correct respect that he thought he should. To show my characters gradual agitation, I added more and more hand gestures, like a flick of the wrist to a tense throw of the arm, as the scene went on. This added different levels of tension to my character as Ajay said his lines. On the line " likes you tae win like that", I did a sharp point right in Ajays face. I held this position for a moment, this raised the animosity between Bobby and Ajay, as we stared into each other's eyes, we could feel the raise in tension, as the audience fell silent, this was a very good lead up to the next section of the play, where Bobby asks Ajay to leave the gym.

 

Vocal Awareness

For my character of Bobby I feel that when he is in the scene the level of tension is always high, I raised the tension on the line "Get your kit, Get out of my gym". I slowed downed the pace of my words, leaving big pauses between each word, this gave words meaning, to show that my character was being serious at this point. I also put a lot of emphasis on the word "My". This showed that the character of Bobby has control, by stressing the personal pronoun, to say that he owns the gym, so it is his rule you have to go by. My interpretation of the character of Bobby has a very strong Scottish accent this then comes across as an aggressive tone, which is how I read Bobby to be.

 

 

Characterisation

The character of Bobby is the main trainer in the boxing gym and too show that his is the most (important) person in the gym, I used big body language, keeping my head up and looking down on everyone else, at the start of the scene, to show Bobby's dominance I walked around the character of Ajay, this made my character some across as intimidating. We paid a lot of focus on the physicality of  a boxer, how they are light on their feet, I also used a lot of hand gestures, like emphasising words by waving my hands and using them to point to an area, this showed a lot of dominance for my character. The audience could then link this to my character being involved with boxing and being very hands on.

 

 

Response to a practitioner

The practitioner linked to ‘Beautiful Burnout’ is the theatre group Frantic Assembly, before starting on the play we looked into how they take general everyday movements and gestures and make them into a sequence or routine, we came up with 5 movements and put them together, changing the pace, dynamics and focus points. This then became more of a choreographed dance routine than the original movements. Putting this into boxing brought new life to the piece. It sped it up and made sure that there is always something happening. Another of Frantic Assembly's theories is that there should always be some form of movement, we added some chorus movements on certain words within our scene. On words like "Think", all characters tapped their head twice to emphasis the words that Bobby was saying, by all of the other boxers doing the same moves a Bobby, it also highlights the point of Bobby being in control, and makes the other boxers look like kiss ups as the "best boxers in the gym" is not in the good books.

 

Interpretation

In our scene Ajay quotes that "he is the best boxer" and he "has the best moves". We did the whole of this section in slow motion, this showed Ajay pin-pointing every move that he makes, and we had the other boxers mimicking him, and watching him box. This showed the theme of envy and how everyone wants to be like him, yet can’t do it. Within the script we felt that the gender difference between the boxers stood out, we explored this more by having Dina out in front of the scene, prating her boxing with everyone else behind then going up to her to tell her to stop and take her on.

To get into the theme of 'Frantic Assembly' style we focused a lot of our performance, mainly the physical theatre sequences. I used their technique 'Stylised Predestrian Movement', we took the basic boxing movements, like sparring, bouncing on the feet and skipping. We then played around with pace, exstaggeration and repetition. We changed from fast pace to slower added depth to the boxing. On the line " Style of attack", me (Bobby) and Ainsley went into slow motion, and stared out front with a concentrated face, this showed our focus on the sport. As the characters in slow motion, we kept turning around to watch was Ajay was doing as he was the "best boxer", and we wanted our moves to mimic his. We want to make it clear to the audience that the other boxers wanted to be like Ajay we kept copying him, yet at a slower pace to him. This highlighted to the audience the difference in abilitys in the gym.

 

 

Visual Spatial and Aural

Visual: I wanted to show the class of the boxing gym and how run down it was, we did this by having it very dull and dark lighting, using blues to bring a sombre tone to the stage. We kept set to a minimum, using muted monochrome colours in out set and costume design choices, This showed the concentration of the boxers and didn't draw away from the fact that they wanted to achieve their dreams.

    Spatial: We kept everything to the rule of quads, making it symmetrical and the same in every scene, this symbolised the repetition in the boxers lives, how they would always come to the gym to try and better themselves, yet they never seem to get anywhere.

     Aural: An underlining music track was played underneath our scene, it had a strong beat and fast pace, not only did this help keep up our pace and in time in the physical sections. But it symbolised the pressure that the boxers are put under. Like Bobby beating them down behind them.

 

exploration notes BB

Interpretation

For our scene we went into depth of how Dina wants to be on par with the boys, we showed this through a physical theatre sequence, of Dina breaking away from the scene, and standing in front of everyone else, Dina then does a phrase of boxing and the other three characters mimic what she does. This makes it look like she is the best of the game, and all of the men want to do what she does so they can stand out from the ground. We experimented with pace of the boxing, by adding slow motion it means that an audience can see every move that she makes, and that she can perfect her moves in a game.

 

 

Context

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Visual Spatial Aural elements

 

 

 

 

Response to a practitioner

The practitioner that we looked at are Frantic Assembly, to get into their way of working we did some warm ups that were fast pace, energetic and kept you on your toes, this helped us understand the pace of a physical theatre piece. We also spent time doing some Chair Duets, we started off with a theme (I.e. relationships and thoughts of some movement phrases then we played around with pace and fluidity, until they were not so obvious what the movements were and could be repeated without seeing a break in the sequence. For our duet, we looked at an argument between friends, and how things can go too far, until they have had enough and just make up. We showed this by mainly having pushing and pulling actions, and then having the other resolves it by picking the other up or placing a chair back for them.

Beautiful Burnout Contextual Research for Boxing 16/11/2014

Boxing, the combat sport.

Boxing is a full on combat sport, where two people fight to see who has the most strength, speed and stamina.  The aim of the game is to throw punches until the opponent is either down for 3 or more seconds or unconscious, usually from a hit to the head pr exhaustion. Boxers would traditionally have gloves to protect their hand and soften the punches, yet have also been known to just have supporting wraps around hands and forearm.

In one game of boxing it is split up into rounds lasting 1 – 3 minutes, this is decided by the referee who over sees the match and says when a new round should begin and can declare someone a winner or a loser. A boxer can also decide when to stop; this is called throwing in the towel.  This comes from where boxers would physically throw in their towel into the ring, to show defeat or failure.

Boxing as a qualified sport has been around since ancient Greek times, where it was entered into the Olympics in 688 BC. Boxing was a popular spectator sport in ancient Rome, where competitors were known to wrap their bare hands in leather to soften the blow. This then went on to us hard, worn out leather, to make for a harder blow, and act as a weapon.

Image found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boxing#mediaviewer/File:Young_boxers_fresco,_Akrotiri,_Greece.jpg

Boxing then came to England in 1838, where the rules of the game were re-viewed and made it harder to win a game. Fights were held in a ring of 24 feet by 24 feet. Fighters had to be standing again within 30 seconds to be allowed to fight back. And biting, head butting and hitting below the belt were seen as rule breakers.

Image found at:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boxing#mediaviewer/File:Blow2.jpg

The game of boxing in England was known as the gentleman’s sport, and to this day can still be known as this, this relates to the play of ‘Beautiful Burnout’ where the character of Dena doesn't want to fight with the girls any more and feels like she is ready to fight in the same matches as the boys, this is seen as wrong and is not allowed within the rules.

In the nineteenth century boxing is know a more common sport throughout England and some of the United States. And were often held in secret locations and performed as a gambling sport, Now days amateur boxing can be seen at the Olympics and Commonwealth games and other venues sanctioned by amateur boxing associations. And women’s boxing is seen a lot more commonly in these events yet it is still not allowed to have cross over gender fights.

Othello Theatre Review

Frantic Assembly took a classic Shakespearean play and up dated it through the set, costume and technical elements, Designer Laura Hopkins placed the well know play in a run down pub, what a big contrast to the story that the actors portrayed. Love, Tragedy and Envy take over the characters lives as they are easily persuaded to kill and defy. A fantastic adaption taken from the streets of Cyrus and set in a common, contemporary by director Scott Graham. With a pool table being at the centre of the stage, set on tracks, the actors use the set to show characters emotions and change in scene.

With the lighting creating a sombre tone, using washed out, blue and silver gets to show the death of Othello's love Desdemona. The rest of the stage goes silent as Desdemona life is taken. The addition of the blue spot light shows how cold and lifeless she is and sends shivers down audience members spines. However lighting is rather dark and plain to some what represent the dark and dangerous street where murder happens. A spot light is spilt onto the stage from the bathroom where gossip and relationship take place, out of the audiences eye. This shows the brighter side, and where things come clear.

An update in the set and an up date in the costume, bring new life to the show. Characters are dressed in the stereotypical common clothing, such as track suits, trainers and jeans. Mark Ebulue is dress in a sleeveless tank top, some may say to show his muscles, which he uses to show his dominance in the crew, and make him standout from everyone else. Out of the many props used the most significant was the handkerchief, used to represent betrayal , It is a talking point that 'why a creative team would not update this yet everything else on set? I would think that there is nothing that could be used as a replacement.

Parts within the pay may drag and there are parts that may dip form the usual fast pace action, however elements of physical theatre break away from the text to bring back to life, suing loud, bass filled techno music. During these sequence, actors would incorporate lifts and repeated movements. Choreographers Steven Hoggett plays around with the pace of the break outs. The opening sequence contains 10 - 15 minutes of non verbal acting, From this the audience got an understanding of character relationships and the dominant from the weak. Other sequences include Rodrigo (Richard James-Neale) drunken rampage, where the adjustable set is use to show drunken feelings, nothing is plausible. It is not usual protocol to set moving by man, yet Frantic Assembly use this to show the fuzzy feelings that the characters feel. Another sequence is the death scene where Desdemona is lifted onto the pool table (represented the death bed) by Othello, as the roll around, using levels and extension is there limbs to show their relationship connection as he wraps his hand round her neck.

Although mainly set in one area, the audience are teased to small glimpses of different areas, such as the toilets and outside areas. This is due to the moveable set and maybe could be a metaphor for the characters lives revolving around Othello's and their main area. And as the set is moved to create out coves, to allow the characters to eavesdrop on others to get more reasons of defying. This really made the audience understood how much the characters would do to defy one another. With a cast of high standards, it really allows for the story to be told in a exciting and dynamic way. Leading man Mark Ebulue walks into a scene and really shows dominance and control over the other characters. This really helped the audience to understand how other characters would fear him so much.

6.3

 

 

Electra Notes on production features

 

6.2

Directors Vision of how I would direct the play of Gotcha.

 

If I was to direct my own version of the play of Gotcha I think I would really highlight the idea that the character of Kid is very lonely and feels very isolated, and all of the things that he does in the play like, lock them in the storeroom and threaten to kill them and come onto Lynne is a cry for attention and love as he is not getting it at home. I think it is important that the audience understand that this play is not just about a troublesome child doing bad stuff, yet a way of telling the audience that not everyone is just bad that there are reasons too. This can be shown through the time set of the play, made clear by the music playing, and the links in the text to the context of the play like maybe the character of Kid having a possible learning difficulty yet in the 70's he would just be labelled as 'bad'. To get this message across to the audience I would get the character of Kid to add a lot of depth into his lines, by delivering them with a lot of different emotions, by jumping from one to the other. I would also put a single sharply focused spot light on the character of Kid when he is delivering his anecdotes about his life and family, this would make it clear to an audience that the character of Kid is feeling very isolated and doing this for attention.