Today's lesson

In Thursday's and Friday's lessons we worked out the timeline for our performance. We also stuck some of our posters on the walls and sorted out exactly what props and set we need for our room. We also managed to go over a few of our scripts and sort out some moments with people who are not in our rooms.

We now need to stick more posters up and get food for our room, we also need to make sure the voice over is done and the video for the projector which will be playing as our scene goes on.

My Personal Timeline

This is my timeline for the performance:

6:45 - Heating up soup, cutting bread - preparing canteen
7:00 - Meal time, serving food
7:10 - Lauren Conversation about party
7:20 - Stealing food, getting food from the cupboard, collecting bowls, walking round the canteen, adjusting posters, refilling soup, stock list.
7:25 - Speech from hallway people
7:30 Leaflets (O'Brien speech on screen)
7:35 - Eleanor to room 101
7:40 - Sam asking for Eleanor
7:45 - Soup spilling
7:50 - O'Brien speech
8:00 - Revolution

- When I have spare time I will be checking stock, cleaning and cooking.

My Character

I have decided to call my character Margaret Jones. She is a party supporter and works in the food hall where she is the head of the kitchen. Margaret lives with her husband and two children who want to become thought police. Margaret really respects Big Brother and hates traitors because she has been brought up to believe everything that the party and big brother says. She does not like trouble and is very strict with her employees.

Lesson I Missed

Due to being in France I missed the lesson where they planned what was going to happen in a timeline, however my group have told me what I need to do. Currently we are getting our costumes together and props as well as learning our lines from the scripts we wrote.

Soup script

Waitresses are moving around robotically without any friendly interaction with audience members. The atmosphere is cold and bitter and the workers are doing everything correctly accept from one who seems to be quite distressed in her gestures and hectic movements.

Waitress 1: (repeating to herself flustered, whilst looking at the cameras and posters on the walls) war is peace, freedom is slavery, and ignorance is strength.

(She walks in a hurry to serve the soup carrying cutlery, a bowl of soup a plate of bread and a glass on a tray. She bumps into the lead waitress dropping everything she’s holding making a loud noise )

Lead waitress: (shouting angrily) you clumsy fool!

Waitress: (fragmented and scared) I’m sorry, I don’t know what’s wrong with me today I-

Lead waitress: You stop right there! I’ll tell you what’s wrong that thought criminal has got to you haven’t she! Everyone this woman is a t –

Waitress 1: (cutting in) NO! I’m not, and I would never betray the party.

Lead Waitress: Don’t let those criminals get into your mind alright?

(weeps)

Waitress 1: I just don’t want them to hurt her

Lead waitress: Hurt her? What are you talking about, you must be sick. They will teach her the right way to be, she’s clearly a lost soul that needs bringing back, so she can be normal

Waitress 1: What’s normal?

(Continues to weep)

Lead waitress; (sternly) stop crying your embarrassing yourself, people are watching. It’s clear you’re effected now if I was you I would shut up whilst your ahead. I’ll be rid of you in a second, you’re not a star waitress and I will not have another one of my workers disgrace this kitchen.

Waitress 1: That’s enough now, I am not a criminal! And I’m a good waitress stop it!

Lead Waitress: (starting to get angry) Don’t you dare tell me when to stop now clean up this mess now!

Waitress 1: (stares at the cameras and whispers)Why do they have to watch us all the time?

Lead waitress? : (shocked) what did you just say?

Waitress 1: I-

Waitress 2: (covers Waitress 1’s mouth) Just ignore her she in an awfully weird mood

Pause (lead waitress stares at them both suspiciously)

Waitress 1: I’m truly sorry it won’t happen again, I won’t be so clumsy (quickly starts clearing)

Lead waitress: (sighs) Just get back to work, this is way too much chaos for one day in a lunch hall, and your talk is beginning to frighten me.



(Through the speaker you can hear) ‘War is peace, freedom is slavery and ignorance is strength) and Waitress 1 continues to weep silently to herself whilst they all repeat this.

Timeline

6:45- heating soup and cutting bread. Making sure the live feed is set and properly
7:00- cutting bread, sweeping floor, serving soup
7:10- meal time ( an alarm rings, everyone rushes into the food hall to get a meal. Two people follow in after the rush, whispering and acting suspicious)
7:20/25- stealing food
7:35- cleaners and cooks talking to audience
7:45- rebellion leaflet
7:50- soup spills 

This is our timeline for our performance just in our room - I have highlighted the parts I am involved in.

Multimedia Performance

In our performance we will be using multimedia. Multimedia refers to the use of the processes, techniques and product of media such as film and radio in the creation and performance of a piece of live theatre.

(http://www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/backstage/multimedia)

In our performance we will be using audio, images, videos, projection, live feed and a few other types of multimedia. Projection can be used in theatre to create an illusion, set a location or tell a story.

In the Wizard of Oz projection is used to created the twister and also t make the wizards head. Here projection is useful because it creates a more realistic scene and it is more imaginative.

Projection is also used in A Curious incident of the dog in the night-time to show the boys thoughts. Using projection the audience are able to see the thoughts that are trapped in his head and it make s the performance more interesting and exciting.

Immersive Theatre

Immersive theatre is when a piece of drama involves the audience within the performance. It is when the audience no longer watch the show, they become part of it and have to create the performance with the actors. Our 1984 piece will involve immersive theatre so I have researched three companies that use immersive theatre in their performances.

Punchdrunk


Punchdrunk works with producing and commissioning partners to create the unforgettable theatrical experiences of the future. Since 2000 Punchdrunk created by Felix Barrett have been creating performances that focus on the audience as much as the focus on the performers. They have performed many different shows and are now currently performing: The drowned man: A Hollywood fable. Punchdrunk is funded by Arts Council England and Esmee Fairbain Foundation.

http://punchdrunk.com/
(source 5)

Secret Cinema

Secret cinema is an organisation that was formed in December 2007. Secret cinema use music, sound , film and theatre in their performances which they perform in abandoned places. Secret cinema is there so that audiences can lose themselves in imagination and fiction that challenge social and cultural interaction.

http://www.secretcinema.org/
(Source 6)

Dream Think Speak

This company was founded in 1999 by Tristan Sharps and it creates and produces his works. The performance uses film and installations alongside live performance so that they can take their audiences on a journey. They have performed in many different spaces even though it is a Brighton based group.

www.dreamthinkspeak.com

(Source 7)

Ministry Food Hall

Ideas and notes

Characters = Cleaner (rebel), lead cook and second cook (party supporters, Third cook (scared doesn't know what side to be on), guard.

Needs to have a strong smell of food - Soup, water, bread - electric hot plate.

Posters - Missing people on walls - recruitment and big brother.

Windows clear so can look down onto training.

TV Screen = for all to see (live confessions, show there success, hangings, traitors)

Speakers - Slogans being repeated.

Notes from Film = live confessions, telescreen showing how successful they are, tin can bowls, dirty, posters, grey, victory gin, language from the mouth not the mind, double plus good, hangings, busy and crowded.

Guard - watching with gun.

Camera filming canteen, live feed into )O'Brien's office.

Costume - white apron, hairnet, grey skirt, grey shirt, black shoes, tights and surgical gloves.

Find dramatic moments to happen over your 1-hour period.

• Spilling soup
• Stealing food
• Cleaner encouraging rebellion
• Catching leaflets
• TV announcements
• Watching O'Brien's monologue

Props List.

Tables, Chairs, Soup pt, Ladle, Electric hot plate. bowls, cutlery, cups, metal Jug, Posters, Tv Screen or Projector, Speaker, Camera (live feed), leaflets, serving table, costumes, stickers, broom, cloth, gun, food, ingredients, water.

Scripts.

Rebellion Leaflet script

(The cleaner is sitting discussing to audience members and handing out leaflets, cook one (leader) sees paper with a sign on and walks over)

Cook one: What are these you are hiding?

Cleaner: (tries to hide the leaflet) Nothing, just some leaflets about the newspeak dictionary.

(Cook one takes a leaflet from a member of the audience, which shows a rebel organisation)

Cook one: What do you think you are doing? Give me all of these right now (Shouting) (to cleaner) you here now, stand there. (To the audience) Whatever these leaflets are telling you they are wrong, they are lies. The party is double plus good and should have your full support. The party give us our homes and our jobs, they protect us from war and we cannot live without them. Big brother is our leader and we should all love him, he is our protector and anyone who disagrees is WRONG!

Cleaner: Don’t listen to her /him, don’t let her contr…

Cook one: ENOUGH! You two (choses to audience members) in the corner now. (To cleaner) Who made you hand out these leaflets, tell me now!

Cleaner: NEVER (shouts)

Cook one: (to audience) how are you involved in this?

IMPROVISATION with two audience members and cleaner

Cook One: right, because you’re not telling me the truth or who has put you up to this, I’m going to have to take you to O’Brien and he will decide your fate from there.

Cleaner: NO PLEASE HE WILL SEND ME TO ROOM 101 PLEASE IM SORRY PLEASE.

Cook One: This is my duty and I must see it through.

(Take to O’Brien’s office more IMPROVISATION)


Stealing of food

Cook 2 stops working and goes other to the kitchen area, thinking no one is looking, she grabs some bread and hide’s it in her pocket. Cook 1 catches her and walks over to where cook 1 has continued to work pretending she didn’t steal a thing.

Cook 1: What do you think you’re doing? Put it back now!

Cook 2: (Nervously) I…I have no idea what you’re talking about

Cook 1: The Bread! Put it back now!

Cook 2: I...I don’t have any (nervously fiddles with the pocket the bread is in)

Cook 1: (Looks down at her pocket of where cook 1 is fiddling, and pulls the bread out) what is this? BREAD! That’s what!

(she grabs hold of cook 2 and drags her towards the back of the food hall, cook 2 starts screaming, she gets thrown out the door.)

Cook 2: (she screams through the door) NO! PLEASE!!! I DIDN’T MEAN TO!

(Cook 1 walks through the door and slams it shut behind her, cook 2 is still screaming, a slam comes from behind the door. The screaming suddenly stops; cook 1 returns and carries on working as if nothing happened)

Multimedia Plans.

Lighting - Dark, dim lighting - Flickering lights.

Live feed - filming audience in canteen.
Equipment: 

Camera in our room in a position where it can see everyone, and a screen that is connected to it in O'Brien's office.
Idea:

So that the audience can see they are being watched when they go look in O'Brien's office they will realise they were being watched in the canteen without knowing.

Screen - to show notices and slogans

For this we will need a TV or Computer screen and have an ongoing video always playing. The screen will have to be quite big so that everyone can see it, therefore we might have to use a projector.

Second Prezi

This prezi could be used to introduce the audience to the rebellion. 

My prezi: http://prezi.com/s0t_qi9_wzwm/its-a-beautiful-thing-the-destruction-of-worlds/

My prezi talks about all the negatives in the party so this could be used on all the TV screens around are rooms. At the end of the performance we play to have a rebellion starting so this could be shown on all the screens so that the rebellion can get their message across. However to make this fit for the scene I would probably have to make it more specific and take things out.

Evaluating Tips

http://multibrit.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/how-do-i-critically-evaluate-something.html


(Source One)

1984 Response and Film

I think this performance is going to be really good because by using multimedia it will bring our performance to life and will show that we are in the year 2050. I think that the book 1984 have given us lots of ideas for our performance and even though we are not acting out scenes from the book we are using the locations to set up our performance and we are also using the themes and political issues in our performance.

Today we watched the film in class and I made lots of notes which are going to be useful for both Mr Rennisons and Ms Lees lesson, because they inspired ideas for certain rooms in our performance and I was able to pick out the key moments of the film which will be useful in my presentation. Having watched the film I can now see how they were brainwashed and how the party kept control which means that I now have a better understanding of how people are trapped in a life they don't want and this will help me in my performance because I can feel empathy for the characters.

Here are my notes:


Themes
Hope
Fear
Violence
Oppression
Control
Betrayal

'Language from the mouth not the mind'
'Oranges and Lemons...' - song from the past.
'Double Plus Good'
'It's a beautiful thing, the destruction of worlds'
Future = 'A boot stamping on a human face forever'
'Past is erased, a lie becomes truth, then becomes a lie again'

Key Moments

• 'I Love You' note
• Sex in the woods
• Notebook
• 2+2=4 in diary
• Buying the antique shop room
• Childhood keeps coming back, stealing chocolate, when return mother and sister gone all that is there are rats
• Reading the Book
• Woman singing
• Hidden telescreen and arrest
• O'Brien questioning and torturing Winston (2+2=5)(tooth pulled out)
• Still has feelings for Julia
• Room 101 (rats)
• Betrays Julia
• Winston and Julia meet - they are brainwashed and broken (betrayed each other)
• Winston confession - didn't commit all crimes, wants to be shot with clean mind
• He loves big brother

Other

• Constant War
• Always watched
• Chants with salute (x arms crossed)
• Hate Goldstein
• grey, dirty area
• Called brother
• Mrs Parsons - children accuse people of being thought criminals - uniform
• Street parade warm criminals and enemy shot and hanged
• Everyone suspicious of each other
• Children march, sing, like army
• INGSOC posters everywhere
• Paper weight/snow globe - message from 100 years ago
• Luxuries - Winston and Julia
• Bombs in background
• War with Eurasia and Eastasia - keeps changing
• Helicopter surveillance
• Electric torture
• 2+2=5
• Brainwash
• Make people disappear
• Room 101 - Worst Fear
• Winston believes himself to be mentally deranged

Characters

Winston

Julia

O'Brien

Mrs Parsons

Mr Parsons

Big Brother

Children

Torture assistant

New speak worker

Bad - Room 101, arrest of Julia and Winston, Hate, Brain wash, torture

Good - Hope, love note, Winston and Julia together, diary.

Using this information I can use the themes to come up with a new style of this play for my presentation.

Research

I thought I would do some research about George Orwell and what was going on in the world in 1948.

George Orwell

Orwell was a British journalist and author, who wrote two of the most famous novels of the 20th century 'Animal Farm' and 'Nineteen Eighty-Four'.


Orwell was born Eric Arthur Blair on 25 June 1903 in eastern India, the son of a British colonial civil servant. He was educated in England and, after he left Eton, joined the Indian Imperial Police in Burma, then a British colony. He resigned in 1927 and decided to become a writer. In 1928, he moved to Paris where lack of success as a writer forced him into a series of menial jobs. He described his experiences in his first book, 'Down and Out in Paris and London', published in 1933. He took the name George Orwell, shortly before its publication. This was followed by his first novel, 'Burmese Days', in 1934.


An anarchist in the late 1920s, by the 1930s he had begun to consider himself a socialist. In 1936, he was commissioned to write an account of poverty among unemployed miners in northern England, which resulted in 'The Road to Wigan Pier' (1937). Late in 1936, Orwell travelled to Spain to fight for the Republicans against Franco's Nationalists. He was forced to flee in fear of his life from Soviet-backed communists who were suppressing revolutionary socialist dissenters. The experience turned him into a lifelong anti-Stalinist.


Between 1941 and 1943, Orwell worked on propaganda for the BBC. In 1943, he became literary editor of the Tribune, a weekly left-wing magazine. By now he was a prolific journalist, writing articles, reviews and books.


In 1945, Orwell's 'Animal Farm' was published. A political fable set in a farmyard but based on Stalin's betrayal of the Russian Revolution, it made Orwell's name and ensured he was financially comfortable for the first time in his life. 'Nineteen Eighty-Four' was published four years later. Set in an imaginary totalitarian future, the book made a deep impression, with its title and many phrases - such as 'Big Brother is watching you', 'newspeak' and 'doublethink' - entering popular use. By now Orwell's health was deteriorating and he died of tuberculosis on 21 January 1950


(Source Two)


The story


Winston Smith is a member of the Outer Party. He works in the Records Department in the Ministry of Truth, rewriting and distorting history. To escape Big Brother's tyranny, at least inside his own mind, Winston begins a diary — an act punishable by death. Winston is determined to remain human under inhuman circumstances. Yet telescreens are placed everywhere — in his home, in his cubicle at work, in the cafeteria where he eats, even in the bathroom stalls. His every move is watched. No place is safe.


One day, while at the mandatory Two Minutes Hate, Winston catches the eye of an Inner Party Member, O'Brien, whom he believes to be an ally. He also catches the eye of a dark-haired girl from the Fiction Department, whom he believes is his enemy and wants him destroyed. A few days later, Julia, the dark-haired girl whom Winston believes to be against him, secretly hands him a note that reads, "I love you." Winston takes pains to meet her, and when they finally do, Julia draws up a complicated plan whereby they can be alone.


Alone in the countryside, Winston and Julia make love and begin their allegiance against the Party and Big Brother. Winston is able to secure a room above a shop where he and Julia can go for their romantic trysts. Winston and Julia fall in love, and, while they know that they will someday be caught, they believe that the love and loyalty they feel for each other can never be taken from them, even under the worst circumstances.


Eventually, Winston and Julia confess to O'Brien, whom they believe to be a member of the Brotherhood (an underground organization aimed at bringing down the Party), their hatred of the Party. O'Brien welcomes them into the Brotherhood with an array of questions and arranges for Winston to be given a copy of "the book," the underground's treasonous volume written by their leader, Emmanuel Goldstein, former ally of Big Brother turned enemy.

Winston gets the book at a war rally and takes it to the secure room where he reads it with Julia napping by his side. The two are disturbed by a noise behind a painting in the room and discover a telescreen. They are dragged away and separated. Winston finds himself deep inside the Ministry of Love, a kind of prison with no windows, where he sits for days alone. Finally, O'Brien comes. Initially Winston believes that O'Brien has also been caught, but he soon realizes that O'Brien is there to torture him and break his spirit. The Party had been aware of Winston's "crimes" all along; in fact, O'Brien has been watching Winston for the past seven years.


O'Brien spends the next few months torturing Winston in order to change his way of thinking — to employ the concept of doublethink, or the ability to simultaneously hold two opposing ideas in one's mind and believe in them both. Winston believes that the human mind must be free, and to remain free, one must be allowed to believe in an objective truth, such as 2 + 2 = 4. O'Brien wants Winston to believe that 2 + 2 = 5, but Winston is resistant.


Finally, O'Brien takes Winston to Room 101, the most dreaded room of all in the Ministry of Love, the place where prisoners meet their greatest fear. Winston's greatest fear is rats. O'Brien places over Winston's head a mask made of wire mesh and threatens to open the door to release rats on Winston's face. When Winston screams, "Do it to Julia!" he relinquishes his last vestige of humanity.


Winston is a changed man. He sits in the Chestnut Tree Café, watching the telescreens and agonizing over the results of daily battles on the front lines. He has seen Julia again. She, too, is changed, seeming older and less attractive. She admits that she also betrayed him. In the end, there is no doubt, Winston loves Big Brother.

(Source Three)

Useful book review:

nicolebasaraba.com/book-review-1984-by-george-orwell/


The Year 1948



1948 Events & Facts

MAJOR EVENTS:

• Mahatma Gandhi assassinated in India
• House Un-American Activities Committee accuses Alger Hiss of spying for the Soviet Union
• Communists seize power in Czechoslovakia
• U.S. Congress ratifies Marshall Plan, approving $17 billion in European aid
• State of Israel created; admits over 200,000 European war refugees
• Soviet Union seals off land routes to Berlin; West responds with massive airlift of provisions
• President Harry S Truman re-elected in upset over Thomas E. Dewey 
• President Truman integrates the U.S. Armed Forces

BUSINESS & ECONOMY:

• U.S. continues to cope with severe postwar inflation while rocked by labor unrest
• United Auto Workers succeed in linking wage increases to cost-of-living index in contract with General Motors
• Congress enacts federal rent controls

SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY:

• Alfred Kinsey’s Sexual Behavior in the Human Male is the first large-scale study of individuals’ sexual habits, with stunning revelations about infidelity, homosexuality and other issues
• U.S. government conducts extensive missile tests in New Mexico desert
• 200-inch telescope at Mount Palomar begins operation
• Cortisone introduced as an arthritis treatment
• "Big bang" theory of the universe’s origin postulated
• Orville Wright dies

SPORTS:

• World Series: Cleveland over Boston, 4-2
• Olympics held in London
• "Citation" wins Preakness, Belmont and Kentucky Derby
• Boxer Joe Louis retires
• Babe Ruth dies

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT:

• Movies: Hamlet, Macbeth (Orson Welles), The Naked City, Oliver Twist, The Fallen Idol
• Songs: Nature Boy, Buttons and Bows, All I Want for Christmas is my Two Front Teeth
• TV Shows: Howdy Doody, Philco TV Playhouse, Toast of the Town, Kraft Television Theatre, Meet the Press
• Books: The Big Fisherman, Lloyd C. Douglas; Crusade in Europe, Dwight D. Eisenhower; Cry, the Beloved Country, Alan Paton; The Ides of March, Thorton Wilder;Tales of the South Pacific, James Michener; The Naked and the Dead, Norman Mailer
• Long-playing (33-1/3 RPM) record invented
• Boxing and wrestling are TV’s prime attractions

EVERYDAY LIFE:

• Selective Service inaugurated, providing a continuous peacetime military draft until repealed in 1973
• New York’s Idlewild Airport opens (renamed JFK Airport in 1963)
• Swiss outdoorsman George de Mestral invents Velcro
• Noted food critic Duncan Hines founds a company to make prepackaged cake mixes

FUN FACTS:

• Popcorn sold on a mass scale for the first time
• "Scrabble" introduced

(Source Four)

Lesson Three

In today's lesson we talked about what we were going to do for our performance. We discussed the space we had and what we were going to do with it, then we split into groups and were given an area to develop a piece.

We will be creating an Immersive theatre experience which is audience led so they can go wherever they want. The audience will be allowed to explore the different rooms and will be able to join in with the performance. The audience will be the story teller and every audience member will see a different story/performance because we will have prepared 3 or 4 hours worth of performance material but we will only be performing 1 hour worth of that material. Our play is going to be set in 2050 and will end by a revolution taking place and O'Brien will die .

The set will be very detailed and have senses so that the audience can tough object, smell things, touch, taste and be able to interact with the set without the actors being there. We will also use some of the spaces to incorporate multimedia for example: Audio, images, video, live feed, projection, lighting, smoke and set.

1984 Rules of engagement (Source One)

• The audience must be dressed in boiler suits (something cheaper, sash, masks?)
• The audience is given free reign to explore a massive set.
• The set engages multiple senses - sight, sound, touch - and is incredibly detailed design.
• The set must be large enough to get lost in or feel totally alone at moments.
• The set lighting is typically quite dark with deliberate, staged pockets of light.

For each room we use we need to know the assets of the room, what the multimedia opportunities are, the function of the performance and the set and props we need for each room.

411 = Room 101

This is going to be the torture room where peoples worst fears are and is where we could have torture tool, sounds of screaming and a torture handbook. We could also find out what the audiences fear are in a questionnaire or by asking them but so they don't know why so that the fears are specific and will affect the audience.

Lecture Theatre = Reception Area

This is where the audience will be briefed to the performance, it will have a cold atmosphere and there will be a projection of big brother on the wall.

418 = Winston's/Hero Home

In here we will have his diary, a telescreen and home props.

413 = Ministry food hall

This will be the 'ministry of truth' canteen where we will be cooking real food and which I will explain in more detail in a later post because this is my groups room.

415 = O'Brien's Office

This will also include the monitoring station so there will be lots of files, video evidence of thought criminals and live feed of the audience in the other rooms.

Space = Group Hate Room

This will be where people shout and footage which will be of the enemy and footage showing rebels attacking. We will also have thought police watching for people who are not supporting big brother.

Hallways = Propaganda

In the hallways there will be lots of computer screens showing notices and speakers saying slogans and things about education etc. 

Court Yard = Exercise area

This can be used to show the Joy Camps (Labour camps) and what goes on there or it can be used in chase scenes when the thought police are chasing someone.

Grass and Trees = Woods or Rebels

In this area we might have the rebels asking the audience to join the revolution so they can take part in the rebellion or we will have hidden cameras in the trees so even though they think they are safe they are still being watched.

In this performance there will be a strong sense of security with people guarding rooms with weapons and ear pieces looking out for thought criminals.

It is essential that the audience take part. They will be respected visitors to air strip one for the day. They will be briefed before they enter our world and it can be a large audience(100?)We will be able to involve the audience and ask them to do things and certain audience



members may be taken away and be part of a scene so that everyone has a different experience. The use of multimedia will add to our performance and make it more realistic.

Sources

Source 1
Title - Multimedia Performance at BRIT
Author - Mr Rennison
Web address - multibrit.blogspot.co.uk
Date found - 3-4-14

Source 2
Title - George Orwell
Web address - http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/orwell_george.shtml
Date found - 3-4-14

Source 3
Title - Plot Overview
Author - Spark notes
Web address - https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/1984/summary.html
Date found - 3-4-14

Source 4
Title - 1948 Events and Facts
Author - Baby Boomers
Web address - http://www.babyboomers.com/1948/
Date found - 3-4-14

Source 5
Title - Punchdrunk
Author - 
Web address - http://punchdrunk.com/
Date found - 13-4-14

Source 6
Title - Secret Cinema
Author -
Web address - http://www.secretcinema.org/
Date found - 13-4-14

Source 7
Title - DreamThinkSpeak
Author -
Web address - http://www.dreamthinkspeak.com/
Date found - 13-4-14

Source 8
Title -
Author -
Web address -
Date found -

Source 9
Title -
Author -
Web address -
Date found -

1984 - The Book

In the holidays I decided to read the book so I could get a better understanding of what the story was about so that I could understand what the political views and atmosphere was like at the time. The books themes are love, control, power and opinions.

I really enjoyed reading this book because it meant that I could understand Winston's thoughts and the situation he was in. From the book I can understand that he is living in a world controlled by 'Big Brother' and they people can not have opinions or there own thoughts.

By reading the book I was able to come up with locations for our play and also I already knew about the 'telescreeen' (how they are always being watched) and 'Room 101' (the place that no one wants to go to.)

I think reading the book will really help me in this project but I would also like to see the film, here is the trailer:

Ideas for the play and Group Research

In our research lesson we had to post lots of information on one blog which is this link:

http://multimedia1984.blogspot.co.uk/

I also thought I would explain some of the ideas for the play that the group I was in came up with. We were annotating the text but also coming up with locations and ideas for scenes.

We thought that we could use the dance changing room as a holding cell. Some adults would be chosen as thought criminals and put into the cell. We would have a scene just for these adults because some prisoners (us) will already be in the cell. In the cell we can cause a panic, or tell them about our punishments and why we are in here.

We also thought we could have one room which is completely peaceful and full of trees projected onto the walls. We would have a picnic in the room and it would be the place where Winston and Julia met. The parents would think it was a place no cameras were but we could have some hidden which have a live feed in another room.

(Kitty's idea)When the parents enter our performance they could be scanned and put into two groups, only a few would be in one group and they would be seen as thought criminals. we would then separate them from the other parents so that they could be interrogated.

We could have speakers which say the three statements and also the song 'oranges and lemons...' so that the parents are constantly reminded of the party's belief and the song that Winston is trying to remember.

Experiments

Today's lesson was split in half. For the first half we used technology and came up with experiments we could use in the performance, In the second half of the lesson we did research about the play and came up with lots of ideas for our performance.

3 Experiments

Our first experiment was focusing on the way that words were simply removed from the dictionary so that people could no longer express themselves. We decided to use an old projector and write words on it with a whiteboard pen, then we projected the words onto the blind. The actors would then try to say sentences but sometimes they would not be able to say the word because it no longer existed. We tried to ways to make the word disappear, either crossing it our or moving the blind so you could no longer see it. Both ways worked and I thought it was very effective so it could be used in our performance.

When we had completed this experiment we didn't have time to do any others however we did come up with some ideas.

Idea One

We thought that we could use sound using the speaker and have a voice over repeating the quotes 'Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength, War is Peace.' We would have a line of people standing with random words projected on to their body but as they start to here the statements all their thoughts are abandoned and only the three statements are left on them. For this we will probably need a laptop with word, a speaker and a projector.


Idea Two

Finally I though because we are having lots of different areas we could have a live feed in one room which is being filmed in another. For example we could see someone going about there daily routine in front of a telescreen and then in the other room you could see people trying to work out whether or not they are a thought criminal.


Today's lesson was really fun because it meant we could be insightful and play around with the equipment we had to come up with a good idea. Also working as a group meant that we had loads of ideas and realised that it was not that hard if we planned our shots and had good timing. Doing this made me think of so many different ideas of how we could use modern technology to make our performance come to life and it is a great experience being able to act, produce and direct all at the same time.