EMBRACING THE SPLENDIFEROUS SILLY

Transcription

1 EMBRACING THE SPLENDIFEROUS SILLY WITH SHAKE & STIR THEATRE CO PRESENTED BY JOHNNY BALBUZIENTE (COMPANY TOURING MANAGER) & NAOMI RUSSELL (EDUCATION MANAGER) For more info please

2 WARM UPS LITTLE WHITE PONY Students stand in a circle. Three (or more!) students create another little circle, within the circle. Everyone sings the following verse and claps in rhythm: First Verse: This is my little white pony This is my little white pony This is my little white pony This is how it goes. While singing the verse, the three people in the centre circle move around the circle as though they are on a pony, to the rhythm of the song. At the end of the verse, they then need to choose someone standing in the outer circle and do the next verse and actions with them (essentially a crump off). The person selected in the outer circle, must do actions back with them and then they are in the next group of three to go in the centre circle. Second Verse: Front front front my pony Side side side my pony Back back back my pony This is how it goes. We then repeat the song and actions from the top. To finish off the game, call out Everyone! before beginning the first verse, and have everyone join in, moving around the space on their ponies. IN THE BOX Students stand in a circle. One person starts a clapping rhythm and the chant: In the Box, In the Box, We re gonna put it in the box. Repeat a few times to get the rhythm in their heads. One person then says I m gonna put in the box and then next around the circle must put something in that rhymes with whatever was chosen. This is not an elimation game, so if someone struggles or falters, everyone just repeats In the Box, In the Box, We re gonna put it in in the box before starting a new rhyming word. EG: I m gonna put my fat in the box I m gonna put my cat in the box I m gonna put a rat in the box I m gonna put a mat in the box I m gonna.. umm.. ahhh. In the Box, In the Box, We re gonna put it in the box

3 THE MINISTER S CAT You can enrol students into characters for this game if you want to. Around the circle everyone must describe the Minister s Cat using a word, following the letters of the alphabet. EG: The Minister s Cat was an ANGRY cat The Minister s Cat was a BOISTEROUS cat The Minister s Cat was a CAREFUL cat The Minister s Cat was a DEVIOUS cat The Minister s Cat was an ENERGETIC cat The Minister s Cat was a FIERY cat You can change it up by giving them a character to play such as grandmother, sassy, know-it-all, scientist etc. You can also have variations of the sentence such as The Politician s Dog or The Principal s Mouse ALPHABET Get the students walking around the space in neutral without speaking to anyone else or touching others. You re then going to call out a letter of the alphabet and then give students about 10 seconds to come up with something that begins with that letter. They must create this with their bodies. Count down from 10 to give them time to make the object and call out FREEZE at the end. Comment on exciting shapes or interesting objects they have made. You can make it harder by giving them a location as well EG something found under the sea, in a bedroom, at the shops, in a classroom, inside a castle. Extend their imaginations as much as possible depending on their grade & skill level. LEMON & LION Face warm up! Get students to either stretch their mouths wide like a lion roaring, or squeeze them tight like a lemon.

4 ACTIVITIES PLAYING WITH TEXT In small groups, hand out a piece of text from your chosen play / or as stimulus material. George didn t say a word. He felt quite trembly. He knew something tremendous had taken place that morning. For a few brief moments he had touched with the very tips of his fingers the edge of a magic world. Ask students to select 3 key words that stand out to them, then they must get up in their groups and create 3 freeze frames that show these words (eg trembly, tremendous, magic ). Extend them by asking them to create a transition from one word to the next. Come back and present to the group, commenting on which words they may have chosen and how we knew. THE 3 C S OF CHILDREN S THEATRE CO-OPERATION The ability to tell the story together as a group CHARACTERISATION Snapping between story-teller and character, physical and non physical characteristics CREATIVITY Try and think outside the box when creating consider things like multiple narrators, soundscapes, body percussion, gesture, levels and voice! APPLICATION OF THE 3 C s CO-OPERATION Snapshots Walking around the space in neutral, call out a number and students must form groups of that number, then call out an object they must all create with their bodies. EG In groups of 5! Make me an ice cream sandwich Ensemble Walking walking around the space in neutral, tell students they need to decide as a group when they will stop walking it s all about trusting each other, if you want to stop you trust that the group will stop walking with you. And vice versa, if you start walking again everyone will start with you.

5 2 up 3 down (adding in sound) Have groups of 5 standing in a line. Tell them at any given moment there must be 2 students up, and 3 bobbing down. So if someone who is down wants to come up, someone who is up needs to bob down. You can then layer into this a sound effect for each time they go down, and up. CHARACTERISATION Leading Centres This is all about creating big and bold characters! Start off in neutral, walking around the space. Then begin to explore how a character might develop if you led with a particular body type. Structure this as much as needed for your students. EG younger ones you could start with Let s all lead with our chests. What type of character might lead with their chest? (Hopefully they call out strong characters like superheroes, royalty, powerful people). You can then get them to shake this character off and go back to neutral, before introducing a different body part, such as belly. Have fun exploring really over the top characters with them. Voice work Once they have built a character, hopefully a voice will start to emerge on it s own. How would this character speak? Consider volume, pitch, pace and intonation. Give them CREATIVITY Putting it all into action through script work see scripts at the end of the notes! CONVENTIONS OF CHILDREN S THEATRE Children s theatre is a hybrid genre drawing upon elements of many different genres of theatre including, but not limited to: use of humour audience participation visual appeal non-realistic elements easy to follow narrative structure stock characters moral message or educational worth. EXAMPLES FROM S MARVELLOUS MEDICINE COMEDY Theatre for young people must engage them through humour, even if the tale is dark or unhappy in some way your hook with children is always through laughter. George s Marvellous Medicine is full of various types of comedy including slapstick, black comedy, double entendre, improvisational comedy, puns and through Roald Dahl s fantastic storytelling of course! AUDIENCE INTERACTION We love it when children are interactive in the show it means they re engaged! Unlike adults, kids don t always follow the rules of theatre when it comes to audience etiquette. They see no problem with calling out, laughing, yelling, and asking questions therefore

6 the show must embrace this and run with it. In George s Marvellous Medicine all the characters also play the role of narrator and speak directly to the audience. VISUAL APPEAL If this show wasn t visually appealing, kids wouldn t watch it. Our director, Ross Balbuziente, worked very closely with the lighting designer, Jason Glenwright, and set designer, Josh McIntosh, to make sure this show was as visually appealing as possible. Think about the bold lighting choices, the use of elements such as bubbles, haze, colour changes to transform into different worlds, the use of the moveable set all helping to create a magical world for children in the theatre. NON-REALISTIC ELEMENTS Children s theatre has the ability to transcend genres of theatre, throwing non-realistic elements into the mix. Specific examples from the show include: magical elements, breaking the fourth wall, actors playing multiple roles, actors playing animals (that talk as well!). All these elements help to engage children allowing them to suspend their disbelief and use their imaginations in a really fun way.

7 SCRIPT EXCERPTS Here we go, then! A magic medicine it shall be! So give me a bug and a jumping flea, Give me two snails and lizards three, And a slimy squiggler from the sea, And the poisonous sting of a bumble bee, And the juice from the fruit of the ju-jube tree, And the powdered bone of a wombat s knee, And one hundred other things as well, Each with a rather nasty smell. I ll stir them up, I ll boil them long, A mixture tough, a mixture strong. And then, heigh-ho, and down it goes, A nice big spoonful, hold your nose, Just gulp it down and have no fear. How do you like it, Granny dear? Will she go pop? Will she explode? Will she go flying down the road? Will she go poof in a puff of smoke? Start fizzing like a can of coke? Who knows? Not I? Let s wait and see. I m glad it s neither you nor me. Oh Grandma, if you only knew What I have got in store for you!

8 MEDICINE SPELL Fiery broth and witch s brew Foamy froth and riches blue Fume and spume and spoondrift spray Fizzle swizzle shout hooray Watch it sloshing, swashing, sploshing Hear it hissing, squishing, spissing Grandma better start to pray.

9 AN IDEA! NARRATOR 1 All of a sudden he had a tremendous idea! An urge to do something about her. Something whopping! NARRATOR 2 Something terrific. A real shocker! NARRATOR 3 A sort of explosion maybe? I want to blow away the witchy smell that hangs about her. NARRATOR 2 George may have only been eight years old I m a brave little boy and I m ready to take this old woman on! NARRATOR 1 George wasn t going to be frightened by her! Even though I AM frightened by her. NARRATOR 3 He wanted to explode her all the way into out-a-space! So she would never set foot on earth again. What, no! No I don t. I don t want to hurt her she may be really mean but she is my Grandma after all. I just want to shake her up a bit. ALL NARRATORS So no exploding? No!

10 IS A WITCH? Alright, here s the thing. It s something I have been wondering for a while and I ve thought it often and put it out of my head but now it s back again. I think that Grandma Is a witch! Come closer to me, little boy. I know! It sounds crazy right? I mean, witches are just in fairy tales, Come closer to me and I ll tell you secrets. Well now, I m not so sure! You mustn t be frightened of your old Grandma. When Grandma gets like this, she had an icy thin smile, the kind a snake might make just before it bites you! Some of us have magic powers that can twist the creatures of this earth into wondrous shapes. Some of us, have fire on our tongues and sparks in our bellies and wizardry in the tips of our fingers I wanted to run away but my feet are stuck to the floor! We know secrets about dark places where dark things live and squirm and slither all over each other Grandma, stop being silly. We know how to make your nails drop off and teeth grow out of your fingers instead! Stop it!