More on development of ideas.

So, having decided that I'm going to transform into a puppy, I analysed my dog when he is hyper. Murphy is a Labrador puppy, therefore when hyper he tends to:
- Bark excessively
- Go to me or my parents and go onto our laps and put his paws out
- Jump up on people (this would be a little bit more difficult as we have decided to have the audience sitting on chairs) however, going onto their knees would be an idea.
- The paws then tend to scratch us repeatedly to show the need of wanting something.

By copying these things, it will enable my character to almost become a dog. Murphy only tends to do this when he wants something which as we are trying to show the need of wanting drugs this would come across..

Artaud

Background
Artaud is similar to Butoh in that the moves you make are very unrealistic. However, it is different because you can use reality and storylines to create an Artaud piece. Antonin Artaud was born in Marseille, September 4 1896. in regards to physical theatre, he was a Frenchplaywright, theatre director and actor, but he was also a poet. He's best known for his theories, which created a lot of controversy at the time.

However, Artuad is more about what the audience feels, how the audience is supposed to feel during the performance, and therefore gain a sense of Catharsis. A way of doing this was for actors to become animals. This then helped the audience understand the supernatural element and therefore feel the emotions more powerfully. We could use this into our performance by becoming animals and in doing helping the audience feel the need for the drugs that the characters are doing so.

What did we do during the Artaud lessons?
Well, I wasn't here for a few of the lessons. But one of the lessons we understood how to incorporate the audience into feelings the emotions we were trying to get across. The emotion our group used was 'Happy' and we were using breathing techniques as we were not allowed to speak by sighing a lot in happiness and using facial expressions. By using facial expressions we are able to get the audience to feel a lot more what the actors are feeling. We decided to act within the audience, and sit next to some of the audience and get some of the selective ones to stand up and join in almost. However, most of the audience felt freaked out rather than happy by the performance which has helped us understand that negative emotions come across better during performances in Artaud.

Also, we had a lesson where we were in groups and we had to portray a fairytale scene and use Artaud's techniques. We decided to go for the Lion King where Scar kills Mufasa. We then had a person play 'the tree' which was also dying like Mufasa was killed slowly. This incorporated some of Butoh's ideas of nature being played by actors. We also had Simba coming from the audience when he finds out that Mufasa is killed.

What is Artaud like?
- Jacque Le Coq - As we are going into the subconscious mind, however, a lot of what you do is improvised in movements. However, you don't need to use masks to go into the subconscious as you do it yourself.
- Butoh - as said previously, however, you don't use breathing techniques in Butoh but you do in Artaud to explain theories.
- Mime, in that you are improvising a lot in performances.

+ here we have.. more research!

Someone asked on Wiki what the subplot of the play metamophisis is, and someone provided these answers

1) Gregor's isolation from his family [talk about how his relations are severed. use all examples of him and his dad, then him and his mum, then him n greta.]

2) family values [their basic moral values towards their own flesh and blood not to mention the sole provider for their 'luxe' life]

3) priorities [how money and luxuries are imp. for mr.samsa then how basic necessities are imp. to the mother and then how gregor is imp. for greta]

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_the_subplot_of_the_play_metamorphosis

In the sense of number one, we have developed a new idea to go along with, whilst incorporating the idea of the beetle. This idea is having characters that are in the desperation for drugs, and being able to do anything for them. When one is high, one thinks that he/she is able to do anything, as portrayed in recent adverts by the NHS. We could then use Artaud's ideas by then becoming an animal who the character is high thinks he/she is, therefore showing the vulnerability of the character. We learn an animal characteristic, but as everyone reacts differently when being high, different people can become different characters, whilst showing the desperation to the audience.

Their isolation could happen through their suffering for how much they need the drugs. We could show this to the audience by actually asking them whether they had anything on them to give to us, how much we are alone, and therefore not working in unison with the other people acting, but working on our own to the audience, almost like selling something.

research on our ideas

We decided that we wanted to go into the Beetle idea, given to us by the stimuli of Metamorphisis.. A play in which the main character 'Gregor' becomes a beetle.
We want to create the beetle crawl and make the audience feel it, perhaps getting the idea of a beetle crawling up the audiences legs or hands or palms.. such as this photo. Hopefully we will be able to achieve this by making the audience feel it, by closing their eyes (losing one of the 5 senses, making the others stronger which is what Artaud liked using. Artaud liked using the five senses, and also getting the audience involved in the performance, therefore the fourth wall is removed). By doing this, we hope to get across to the audience that is it creepy, beetles are creepy.