Story Development, relationships between elements, skill building in a material as well as intellectual sense
Thurs November 9 - What we did
Talked about Main Characters. Some important questions: Does the main character need to be relatable? What is the goal of the Main Character? Debate over familiar characters - whether they are main characters or villains, like Elsa from Frozen, and Wednesday Addams from Addams Family. I specifically chose characters that have classical Villain qualities while still being the Hero/Main Character, so we could peel apart intention and POV as a driving force in the relationships within a story.
Using those Main Characters, we talked about who their specific Villains were, and how they fit together in a Yin/Yang way, are developed from the same basic needs and circumstances. Questions we talked about: What kinds of beef might a Villain have with a Main Character? What is a Villain's goal? Is it similar or related to the Main Character's goal?
Continuing with our 2 pop culture Main Characters, we talked about what their style/design communicated to us about their personalities and how those same qualities are reflected in the home/safe spaces they live in or create for themselves - Elsa is a cool blond, (while her sister has warm red hair) she creates an icy blue dress and a spiky ice castle to protect herself, feel comfortable, more like herself. Wednesday's home is as dark and unsettling as she is, matching each other in a deep way - it feels comfortable to us BECAUSE they match. Their personal environments give us a ton of clues about who they are, even if we don't know the characters yet.
Task for the day:
Come up with a Main Character (Students chose a Teacher - I suspect its related to their previous play Matilda, where the focus of the story was Ms Honey) and what kind of Villain feels like would arise from our sense of that Main Character (Students chose a Student as the Villain, they were torn between the kid coming from a wealthy environment/living in a castle or a kid coming from a broken home). Once we had a starting point we split into 2 teams to begin fleshing out the ideas of who these characters are and why they are this way. Glue and paper/fabric scraps etc are the main tools for visioning - responding to unusual shapes and textures will rapidly develop character potential beyond the safe spaces young people get stuck in, and working on the 2 characters separately gives us space to as a group bring them back into the same world together - deepens the narrative while asking the young people to thread storylines and details together - important practice for when we move into design for West Side Story in January.
Will start next session with mini crit, letting the teams share where they got to and recieve feedback. After that, continue to flesh out characters, to be essentially finished (depends on the energy of the group, may need another session) - Same teams will design the setting for each of their characters next - will involve a group brainstorming session first, to make sure our narrative is clear.
The goal: To present the story with their designs (super rough and messy, its just the beginning) to the acting group, for feedback and to let the acting group figure out how they might want to embody this story - collab with Omar (other DreamYard ta) for this component. Do they create scenes? Do they pair off to plan? This would happen after thanksgiving/1st week of December - maybe a week or so later.
Final week before Xmas break - practicing building miniature sets with graham crackers, icing, candy materials. Using low risk, messy materials is important practice here, as this is a rambunctious and easily distracted group of middle schoolers, and the actual set building will require some really conscious, thoughtful self organizing. Unclear yet if we will be using boxcutters and exacto blades as well as other tools during the final build process. I will modify whatever the outcome looks like to match where this group is at - there is still some time to figure out what is possible.
Story thoughts:
Warm ups or potential projects -
If you could make a space, a house or room etc that reflects who you are - what would it look like and what would it have in it?
Imagine a character that you know and love, in a different kind of environment then they might normally be found - how might this different environment change what they value, what kinds of goals they might have and the opposition they face?
Thoughts on Hostile vs Friendly Environments
Clues you are in a hostile place:
+ extremes - cold/very hot, very high up/very low drop, loud/silent
+ sharp edges, painful objects
+ darkness, shadows
+ unpredictable elements
+ inability to leave, being stuck, trapped, lost
Clues you are in a friendly place:
+ colorful
+ balanced - not too warm/too cold, too tall/too short
+ bright, light filled
+ gentle noise, rounded shapes
+ predictable, comforting elements
+ ease of movement, helpful guidance, sense of freedom
In a bright world - shadows are clues, give a sense of uneasiness - foreshadowing. In a melodic soundtrack - a discordant note signals to our sensory awareness that something is not right. From milk turning sour in the Barbie movie, to beautiful food beginning to rot in Renaissance paintings and poetry - trouble in paradise is signaled by a change, something different/unfamiliar entering into an environment - the normal world becomes unpredictable, less known. Neglected spaces, passage of time being made obvious, a sense of mortality via literal decay are common cues in storytelling because of their universality of effect on us.
What happens when an environment with friendly markers turns out to be dangerous? The natural response is to not trust it any more, and sometimes not even yourself and your ability to see what's real - because the rules of the world are broken. My current working thesis is that 'Good' and 'Bad' are reflections of each other, like a warped mirror.
Its gonna be so fun to explore with these students via the scenic elements of West Side Story how the cityscape and lighting can embody the narrative the characters are expressing.
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