Study Guide. Go, Dog. Go! Friday, February 9, 2018 at 10:30am

Transcription

1 Study Guide Go, Dog. Go! Friday, February 9, 2018 at 10:30am

2 Contents ATTENDING A PERFORMANCE AT TILLES CENTER YOUR ROLE AS AN AUDIENCE MEMBER... 5 BEFORE YOU SEE THE SHOW AFTER YOU SEE THE SHOW REVIEW WORKSHEET ABOUT TILLES CENTER

3 ATTENDING A PERFORMANCE The Concert Hall at Tilles Center seats 2,242 people. Hillwood Recital Hall seats 490 people. When you attend a performance at Tilles Center, there are a few things you should remember: ARRIVAL Plan to arrive approximately 30 minutes prior to the show. Performances cannot be held for late buses. LIU Post Public Safety will direct buses to parking areas. Remain seated on the bus until instructed to unload. Please stagger chaperones throughout the group to help keep students in line and moving quickly to the seating area. Groups are directed into the theater in the order that they arrive. BEING SEATED (IMPORTANT!) Upon entering the theater, ushers will direct students and teachers to sit row by row. Students will be seated in the order which they enter the building. Groups from your school may be seated separately from one another throughout the theater. We ask that at least one chaperone is assigned to every 15 students for grades Pre-K-5, and one chaperone to every 30 students for grades We recommend that a teacher or chaperone sit at the end of each row of students in the theatre. With adequate adult supervision, students that may be seated in different sections of the theatre will have enough chaperones to ensure safety. We ask for your full cooperation with this procedure in order to start the show on time! Please allow ushers to seat your group in its entirety before making adjustments within the row. This allows us to continue seating groups that arrive after you. Once the entire group is seated you may rearrange students in new seats and use the restrooms. Schools are not allowed to change their seats location. All students must be supervised by a teacher at all times including when going to the restroom - high school students are no exception. 3

4 DURING THE SHOW There is no food or drink permitted in the theater or lobby areas. Photography and audio/video recording are not permitted during the performance. Please turn off (or leave behind) all electronic devices, including cell phones, portable games, cameras, and recording equipment. Keep them off for the entire performance. The devices may interfere with the theater s sound system, as well as, disrupt both the audience and the actors. And please no texting or checking messages during the show! Please do not disturb the performers and other members of the audience by talking. If something in the show is meant to be funny, laughter is encouraged! Please do not leave and re-enter the theater during the performance. There is no intermission; visit the restroom prior to the start of the show. Performances generally run minutes. EMERGENCY CANCELLATIONS If schools throughout the area are closed due to inclement weather, Tilles Center performances will be canceled. If, on the day prior to a performance, it appears that inclement weather may cause a performance to be canceled, all schools will be called by our staff to alert them to this possibility. School representatives should periodically check the Tilles Center website (tillescenter.org) when winter weather advisories and warnings are in effect. Updates will be posted regularly on the home page. On the morning of the performance a message will be posted on the website no later than 6:30 AM indicating if the performance has been canceled. If a performance is canceled, Tilles Center will attempt to reschedule the performance on a date mutually agreeable to the artists and the majority of ticket buyers. 4

5 YOUR ROLE AS AN AUDIENCE MEMBER TO THE TEACHER: An essential component needed to create a live performance is the audience. Please talk with your students about what it means to be an audience member and how a live performance is different from TV and movies. Please share the following information with your students prior to your visit to Tilles Center. Some performances may involve audience participation so students should behave appropriately, given the nature of the performance and the requests of the artists on the stage. By discussing appropriate audience behavior as a class ahead of time, the students will be better prepared to express their enthusiasm in acceptable ways during the performance. BEING AN AUDIENCE MEMBER: Audience members play an important role until an audience shows up, the performers are only rehearsing! When there is a great house (an outstanding audience) it makes the show even better, because the artists feel a live connection with everyone who is watching them. When the house lights (the lights in the part of the theater where the audience is sitting) go down, everyone feels a thrill of anticipation. Focus all your attention on the stage and watch and listen carefully to the performance. The most important quality of a good audience member is the ability to respond appropriately to what s happening on stage sometimes it s important to be quiet, but other times, it s acceptable to laugh, clap, or make noise! If the audience watches in a concentrated, quiet way, this supports the performers and they can do their best work. They can feel that you are with them! The theater is a live space. This means that sound carries very well, usually all over the auditorium. Theaters are designed in this way so that the voices of singers and actors can be heard. It also means that any sounds in the audience - whispering, rustling papers, or speaking - can be heard by other audience members and by the performers. This can destroy everyone s concentration and spoil a performance. Do not make any unnecessary noise that would distract the people sitting around you. Be respectful! Applause is the best way for an audience in a theater to share its enthusiasm and to appreciate the performers, so feel free to applaud at the end of the performance. At the end of the performance, it is customary to continue clapping until the curtain drops or the lights on stage go dark. During the curtain call, the performers bow to show their appreciation to the audience. If you really enjoyed the performance, you might even thank the artists with a standing ovation! 5

6 Go, Dog. Go! By Allison Gregory and Steven Dietz Adapted from the book by P.D. Eastman P.D. Eastman s classic children s book comes to life on stage in an exploration of movement, color and space. The dogs delve into life with gusto, creating a visual spectacle for the audience to feast upon. They snorkel. They howl at the moon. They sing and dance and climb trees. There s cars, hats, audience participation, even a wild game of ball as this laugha-minute visual spectacle manages to sneak in some important lessons about life. Go, Dog. Go! is a musical romp full of surprises, clowning, vaudeville, singing, barking, and of course, six lovable dogs! A Note from the Playwrights: P.D. Eastman s timeless work honors the joyous simplicity of the world around us. Therefore in crafting a stage version of Go, Dog. Go!, it is not our intention to fill out or open up the story in the style of many traditional adaptations. We have, in fact, added virtually no words of our own. Expanding the book in this way would, we believe, rob it of its essential wondrous and loopy anarchy. Instead, we hope to celebrate and explore the existing words and pictures. LITERACY Reading: Literature (CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.K-2.7): Describe the relationship between illustrations and the story in which they appear. 21st- CENTURY LEARNING Social and Cross-Cultural Skills (K-12): Interact Effectively with Others - know when it is appropriate to listen and when to speak. IMAGINATION S.T.E.A.M. Mathematical Practice: Counting & Cardinality (CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.K.CC.B.5): Count to answer "how many?" questions about as many as 20 things arranged in a line, a rectangular array, or a circle, or as many as 10 things in a scattered configuration; given a number from 1-20, count out that many objects. 6 Childsplay

7 What is a touring show? Childsplay creates a play with professional actors, a full set, costumes, props, and sound, then packs everything in a van and brings the show to venues across the nation. We perform in theatres, gyms, cafeterias, and multi-purpose rooms. How does it all come together? The design team and production staff have many challenges when creating a tour. They have to consider how many months the production will be on the road, how to fit all the elements (including the actors) into a van, and how to make the load-in, assembly of the set, pre-set of props and costumes, sound check and load-out as easy for the actors as possible. This is accomplished by countless meetings and planning sessions that occur as much as a year before the first performance. Where do we go and how do we get there? We travel all across the nation in a large van. In a week s time, a touring company may perform up to 14 shows in as many as 8 different locations. Tours can be on the road anywhere from 6 to 12 months, sometimes even longer. By the end of the tour, the actors may have performed as many as 200 performances. How do you put everything in just one van? All of the scenery, props, and costumes that you see in a Childsplay tour must fit into a van. The scenery usually comes apart into several pieces and then stacks, folds or nests together in the van. There is also room in the van for the sound system, toolbox and the cast which could be as many as 5 actors. If the cast is lucky there is usually room to squeeze in a few suitcases when they go out of town! What happens when you arrive at a theatre? Once the cast arrives at their destination, they have to set everything up in less than one hour, and depending on the size of the cast, with as few as 3 people. The Childsplay scene shop uses what they like to call tool-less technology to create tour shows. This means tour sets get assembled with as few tools as possible, sometimes none! Pieces are held in place by screwing in knobs; pieces interlock or rest on posts and sometimes fabric appliqués are Velcroed on to hard scenery frames. Tours also have a portable sound system with sound effects pre-programed on a computer. Once the sound system is set up all the actors have to do is hit one button on the computer to run sometimes very complicated sound sequences. Use the restroom before seeing the show as we do not have intermission during our school performances. Stay seated during the performance. Be respectful to the performers and other people in the audience by not talking during the performance. Appropriate responses such as applause or laughter are always welcome. Food, candy, gum and beverages will not be allowed in the theater/during the performance. Use of cell phones (including text messaging),cameras or any other recording devices are not allowed during the performance at any time. 7 Childsplay

8 What is the difference between seeing a play and seeing a movie? If you could be any kind of dog, what kind of dog would you be? What would your name be? How are dogs similar to humans? How are they different? How can you make a play out of a book with very few words? What do you think the play will be like? What do you think the songs will be about? What do you think the dogs in the play will look like? How do you think they will move and sound? Costume designers are asked to create the look of each character. They start off by reading the script and then have design meetings with the director and the other designers to exchange ideas. The designers pull information about the play from the text to inspire their designs. After several revisions, they create a final rendering (drawing)that is used to aid in the construction of the costume. For Go, Dog. Go!, there aren t many words, so the designer has to pay close attention to the illustrations in the book for inspiration. Activity: What can you learn from a picture? Look at illustrations in the book Go, Dog. Go! Describe what you see. Who are the characters? What are the characters doing? Can you tell how the characters feel? How do you think the costume designer will make the human actors look like dogs? Identify (by circling or pointing) three things you think a costume designer would have to include in her costume design to make the audience understand the actors were playing dog characters. Extension: Imagine that you were chosen to be the costume designer for Go, Dog. Go! Create a costume rendering (drawing)for the director and other designers. Be sure to include the three things you identified to help the audience understand the actors are playing dog characters. Mouse Paint by Ellen Stoll Walsh I Went Walking by Sue Williams Elephants Aloft by Kathi Appelt Many Lucious Lollypops by Ruth Heller BROUGHT TO YOU BY WHERE EDUCATION AND IMAGINATION TAKE FLIGHT 8 In addition to Go, Dog. Go!, read these other books by P. D. Eastman: Are You My Mother? The Best Nest Flap Your Wings Sam and the Firefly Snow by Roy McKie and P. D. Eastman Childsplay

9 Go, Dog. Go! By Allison Gregory and Steven Dietz Adapted from the book by P.D. Eastman IMAGINATION Who were the characters in the story? What were the problems in the story? Where did the story take place? How was the play like the book? How was it different from the book? What part of the play did you like the best? Which character was your favorite and why? Share a moment from the play that made you laugh. What other funny bits do you remember? At the end of the performance, the actors took some questions from the audience. What other questions did you want to ask? 9 Childsplay

10 Associate Production Manager What does an Associate Production Manager do? We asked Rachel Solis, Associate Production Manager at Childsplay to tell us about this theatre job: Art Dog by Thacher Hurd Mo the Dog in Tropical Paradise by Diane Stanley Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Bill Martin Jr. My Many Colored Days by Dr. Seuss Mouse Paint by Ellen Stoll Walsh I Went Walking by Sue Williams How Loud is a Lion by Clare Beaton Many Lucious Lollypops by Ruth Heller Super, Super, Superwords by Bruce McMillan Kites Sail High: A Book About Verbs by Ruth Heller Bears on Wheels by Stan and Jan Berenstain Freight Train by Donald Crews Lunch by Denise Fleming Color Zoo, Color Farm and Planting a Rainbow by Lois Ehlert As the Associate Production Manager I work mostly with our local and national tours. My favorite part about being the Associate Production Manager is how many different things I get to do on any given day. My days never look the same which is why I feel like my job is so much fun! Every season several of Childsplay s shows will tour around the entire state of Arizona, and one will tour across the United States. This year our national tour will also tour in Canada! When we tour a show, our professional actors pack everything we need set, costumes, props, sound equipment into our tour vans, travel to our performance location, unload and set everything up, perform, and then pack it all back up again. While we re in rehearsal for a touring show, I am in charge of making sure the actors and our stage manager are trained and ready to go out on the road. During the rehearsal process not only do the actors and stage manager have to learn the movement, music, and lines, they also have to learn how to put up the set, run everything for the computer and speakers so we have sound, drive the vans, maintain their costumes, work with our education department to come up with the Q&A portion of the show, and many other things. Together we have to figure out how to fit our set, costumes and sound equipment into one van! We always have to think on our toes because anything can happen out on the road, and you have to be able to adapt to all kinds of situations. Touring shows are really fun because every day is different. On any given day we can perform between 1 to 3 shows at 2 different locations. One of my most important jobs is to create and maintain our touring schedule. Once the shows are ready and out on the road my job is to be there for them if they need anything while they re out. Sometimes a prop will get broken or a costume piece will get ripped and I will communicate with our Prop Master, Jim Luther, or the Costuming and Wardrobe Supervisor, Daniel Hollingshead, to coordinate repair of the item before the tour hits the road the next morning. One of the best parts about the local tours is that we re so close to the audience that you can see their reactions to everything. 10 Childsplay

11 LITERACY Reading: Literature (CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.K-2.7): Describe the relationship between illustrations and the story in which they appear. Tableaus As a class, examine a favorite illustration from the book Go, Dog. Go! Students create frozen pictures, or tableaus, of their favorite characters from the pictures using only their bodies. Taking turns, students share a phrase or emotion that they imagine the character may be feeling in that frozen moment. The activity can be repeated focusing on the action verbs of the illustrations. 21st- CENTURY LEARNING Social and Cross-Cultural Skills (K-12): Interact Effectively with Others - know when it is appropriate to listen and when to speak. Learning tool: Cause and Effect Worksheet Conductor 1. Divide students into two or more groups. Have all groups sit next to each other facing the conductor. 2. Each group is given a specific animal noise. (Example group A: a dog growling, group B: a dog barking, group C: a cat meowing) 3. Conductor gives specific hand signals to each group to signal differences in volume, speed and rests. (Example: hand above head: louder barking, hand below waist: quieter barking, Twirling hand: faster barking, Palm out: stop) 4. Groups begin making animal sounds while the conductor silently instructs them to change volume, speed and to start and stop using hand signals. Conductor can experiment with asking the group to do different speeds or volumes simultaneously. 5. Students may take turns being the conductor. S.T.E.A.M. Mathematical Practice: Counting & Cardinality (CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.K.CC.B.5): Count to answer "how many?" questions about as many as 20 things arranged in a line, a rectangular array, or a circle, or as many as 10 things in a scattered configuration; given a number from 1-20, count out that many objects. Find All Our Furry Friends! Using Go, Dog. Go! as a resource, count the dog pictures. Find totals for: the entire book, each page, pages 6-7, page 58, or whichever pages you choose. BROUGHT TO YOU BY WHERE EDUCATION AND IMAGINATION TAKE FLIGHT 11 Childsplay

12 Name: Review Worksheet Write and illustrate a review article to inform others about the performance you saw. Title your article, illustrate a moment, and write about the performance! Include what you saw and heard, how the performance made you feel, and your favorite part. Title: 12

13 Tilles Center for the Performing Arts, at LIU Post in Brookville, is Long Island s premier concert hall. A constituent of LIU, Tilles Center hosts more than 70 performances by world-renowned artists in music, theater and dance each season. Among the artists and ensembles that have been presented by the Center are the Boston Symphony Orchestra conducted by Seiji Ozawa, cellist Yo-Yo Ma, the Big Apple Circus, Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, James Taylor, the Paper Bag Players, and Wynton Marsalis. In addition, Tilles Center is home to important regional arts organizations such as Eglevsky Ballet. Tilles Center s Concert Hall seats 2,242 and features orchestral performances, fully-staged operas, ballets and modern dance, along with Broadway shows, and all forms of music, dance and theater from around the world. Chamber music, cabaret, solo recitals, and theater productions for children and adults are presented in the more intimate 490-seat Hillwood Recital Hall. Tilles Center s Education Programs are made possible, in part, with funds from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo and the New York State Legislature. Arts Education programs are made possible, in part, by the Gilbert and Rose Tilles Endowment for Arts Education. School Partnership Program An intensive part of Tilles Center s Arts Education program is the School Partnership program, modeled on the highly acclaimed aesthetic education program that has evolved over a 35-year period at Lincoln Center. The Partnership is a comprehensive approach to teaching and learning about the arts, applicable to all grade levels and academic disciplines. The Partnership inspires students and teachers to approach the arts with an open mind and to gain insights into the creative process. Attendance at professional performances at Tilles Center is combined with experiential in-school workshops. Led by teaching artists and teachers, students explore their own artistic capabilities while strengthening essential skills abstract thinking, teamwork, critical judgment, and problem solving. Guided to a deeper level of understanding, students learn what to look for, and listen to, in a performance or work of art. The School Partnership works with students in Pre-K through high school and provides professional development for teachers. For information about the School Partnership Program and other performances, visit tillescenter.org or call (516) School Partners Carle Place East Meadow Freeport Great Neck East Williston Glen Cove Roosevelt Syosset The Portledge School 13