Puckett,+Jett



Jett W. Puckett

 Dr. F. Richmond

 THEA 2100H

 02 April __2012__

Performance Critique of //Dark Ride//

When I sat down in the Cellar Theatre to watch //Dark Ride// I was very intrigued to see the show because I had heard it was going to be completely different than anything I had ever seen. That turned out to be true, but the trouble is am still unsure of what to make of it. I had never seen a play of the Theatre of the Absurd genre before, and honestly I have no desire to do so again. Although I did find the play entertaining and funny at times, overall I found it to be impossible to follow, and I am still searching for any meaning. The play opened with a young woman desperately trying to decipher an incomprehensible book with no apparent significance, and ironically that is exactly how I (and I am sure most of the audience) felt throughout the performance. I will say that was an appropriate and very clever way for the playwright to set the stage for the rest of “the ride.”

 The first thing I noticed when watching //Dark Ride// was the unusual set. There was very little furniture or props and the focal point of the set was the array of televisions in the center of the stage. Throughout the play what appeared on the screens constantly changed, for example, a café, a desert, fish in an aquarium, and even close __ups__ of some of the characters in the play. I would guess the screens were probably used in an effort to lower set __construction costs__, gain versatility, gain visual stimulation, and also because the play seemed to try to focus on technology. Technology (or communication) is actually my only guess for a theme of the play.

 The actors would also sometimes directly interact with the screens such as when, after fighting with and knocking the jeweler unconscious, the runaway boyfriend swipes the jeweler’s scepter across the screens and it created something like a firework show. I do not know what that was supposed to mean or depict, but it was visually interesting and pretty impressively coordinated between the actor and the technical crew. Overall, I found the set to be pretty boring however. The props were pretty minimal and uninteresting, and I thought they were too darkly colored. The Cellar Theatre is all black and very dark, and the darkly colored props did not __offer__ the eye enough visual contrast from the background; it was even hard to tell distances and depth on the stage. Also, with the exception of what was being shown on the televisions screens, the set never changed throughout the play. I found this to be problematic because the play jumped around in time and in place constantly, and it was often impossible to tell where the actors were supposed to be. A less static set would have greatly helped this problem, but I understand that there were probably harsh budget constraints that limited the set.

 Like the other two plays I have seen this semester, I was again impressed with the overall quality of the acting. Before taking this class I had never seen a play performed primarily by __college student__ actors, and I have really been blown away by the ability and skill of the actors for their young ages in all three performances. Frankly, I feel that the low quality of each of the plays chosen by the department to be performed has held back the actors, which is why I am really looking forward to seeing the famous play //Chicago// at the end of the semester. However, I have still enjoyed these first three plays because it has really been a broadening experience to see such unusual performances.

 In //Dark Ride// I thought the __best__ actor, or at least the most enjoyable, was the General. His character was quite hilarious; he reminded me of a character you would see in an //Austin Powers// movie. I definitely think he was very well casted for the role, partly because his character was so silly and he is kind of a silly looking guy. The actor’s short and fat stature also seemed to really fit his character. I am not exactly sure why and this is probably a gross generalization, but short, fat actors such as John Candy and Chris Farley always seem to be easier to laugh at, perhaps it is because it is so hard to take them seriously when you look at them. Whatever the reason, I definitely find the funny fat guy stereotype to be real, and it definitely applied to the actor playing the General, Damian Dominguez, in this play. If I was to pick one actor today that Mr. Dominguez really reminded me of it would be Jonah Hill from //Super Bad// and //Get Him to the Greek//, and I mean that as a pretty strong compliment. I find Jonah Hill hilarious, and he seems to be one of the most popular new comedic actors in Hollywood right now. I find the similarity and resemblance between the two to actually be quite striking.

 What really made the General so funny was the fact that the combination of his character looking, moving, dressing, and especially speaking so seriously and with so much arrogance and such a matter-of-fact tone when he was really just an incompetent idiot. I found the irony there to be actually hysterical, and I definitely think he delivered the two funniest lines in the play. In both cases the key was his spot on matter-of-fact delivery with absolutely no emotion; without that the lines would not have been funny at all but with it they actually still have me laughing when I think about the play. Unfortunately I do not remember the exact words first of the two lines I am referencing, but it came after he had received a new “report” from the battle field and it was something along the lines of “[m]y entire regiment has been destroyed in my absence and I have been reassigned to the barracks in Antarctica.” The second line I am referencing I remember more exactly and I would say it was definitely the funniest moment of the play: “[j]ust as Mussolini told his friend when their limousine ran over a small child, never look back.” Again, the key was his emotionless matter-of-fact delivery.

 I would say the next two most memorable actors in the show were the Jeweler played by Nathan Cowling, and Zendavesta played by Will Murdock. Both of their character’s accents were very exaggerated and really stood out (I am pretty confidently assuming neither of them naturally talk the way they did in the play, but I did occur to me that at least one of them might talk similarly in real life). Again their overly serious and arrogant nature in combination with the fact that they were both actually idiots made them pretty funny, especially when you add in the fact that they were both ridiculously dressed. It was also pretty funny to watch them try and seduce some of the female actors in the show, because they were so forward and blunt and also so terrible and awkward with women. Another one of the really funny lines in the play came when the Jeweler asked one of the female characters if she loved him and she said “No,” and his mater-of-fact response without skipping a beat was something along the lines of “I think you will find love is less of a feeling than it is a…situation.” I also found it somewhat impressive that the General, the Jeweler, and Zendavesta were able to stay in character so well despite how exaggerated, ridiculous, funny, and “absurd” their characters were. I imagine during the early stages of the rehearsal process this was actually quite hard to do.

 Although I do think the overall quality of the acting was strong once again, especially in reference to the three actors discussed above, I must say that most of the other characters in the play were pretty forgettable. I do not think this was the fault of the actors however, I think it was more due to the weakness of the play in general. Most of the other characters just seemed to have very little depth and development and also lacked moments in the script that really stood out; this is not entirely true of the cook and the run-away-boyfriend who each had a few good moments, but I think it was especially true of all the female characters in the play. Even with the play’s program as a reference, I cannot match the names of the characters listed in the cast section with the female faces I remember from the play. I actually remember thinking during the play that this would be a problem when I sat down to write my paper; I do not think there was a single point in the play where I actually absorbed the name of any of the female characters. They really were just that forgettable and boring. It also did not help how little they used most of the characters’ names in the play and how the play jumped around so much. The play jumped from one scene to a different seemingly completely unrelated scene so abruptly and so constantly that it was impossible to process what you had just watched. I will say that it was impressive how fast all the characters, especially the General and some of the female characters, spoke throughout the entire play. I have never been to a live play where the characters spoke so fast before, and it was especially impressive that I was still able to understand most of what they said. The actors must have studied and practiced delivering their lines to the point of exhaustion. However, I was not able to catch everything and this was often confusing and frustrating as I was trying to make sense of what was going in the play and sitting in the audience worried about the fact they I was going to have to write a paper about it. I understand the speed of the dialogue fit with the “absurdity” of the play, but it would have been much less frustrating if some of the lines had been delivered more slowly.

 Overall, I thought the play left a lot to be desired. I enjoy being able to draw out the deep hidden meaning of plays and literature, and I did not think there was really any depth to this play at all. And if there was, it was impossible to find it. Although I did think the play was quite funny and actually even hysterical at times, frankly, I thought the play was overall an incomprehensible mess. I felt a little sorry for the actors at times because I thought many of them were quite talented and had obviously prepared very hard for the performance but were held back by general ineptitude of the play; this especially applies to the less developed characters. But perhaps doing such an unusual play was a good and versifying experience for the young student actors, just as seeing the play was for me. Also, I will say that the play was enjoyable in moments and that those moments probably would have been more numerous for me had I not been frustrated by trying to make sense of such a difficult play in preparation for writing a paper about it.


 * Word Count: 1928 **


 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">There are important differences between __And the Soul Shall Dance__ and the video illustrations linked to the schedule page demonstrating "realism" in the European, English and American theatre. Briefly discuss a few of them that you consider the most important. **

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Although both __And the Soul Shall Dance__ and the various __video illustrations__ on the schedule page demonstrate forms of realism, I would say that Yamauchi’s work is more of an example of poetic realism where as the video illustrations are examples of more true realism.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">The most obvious difference is that Yamauchi’s work contains theatrical song and dance, where as the works shown in the video illustrations contain only realistic everyday conversation such as in __Fences__. Also, __And the Soul Shall Dance__ (as it was performed y East West Players) contains a very theatrical beginning which portrays “that it is the wind that is blowing the small dwelling and it’s simple furnishings onto the stage” to the sound of wind and a flute (1). The opening scene also includes a “kuroko,” a hooded actor dressed completely in black, depicting the wind blowing a tumbleweed (1). Such theatrical elements are not __present__ in the video illustrations; they show only depictions of events you would plausibly see in real life.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Another key difference is the set of __And the Soul Shall Dance__ as done by East West Players, the set used “two rolling and unfolding house units” (2) as opposed to the more realistic sets of the video illustrations such as in __True West__, where the audience watches the production as if they were a fly on the wall of real house.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Finally, in Yamauchi’s work the audiences watches the scenes from the perspective of Masako’s memories, often watching along with Masako watching on stage as well. This again is less typical of true realism than the “fly on the wall” perspective of say __True West.__

Word Count: 274

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">1. Arnold. //Creative Spirit//, p. 251

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">2. Arnold. //Creative Spirit//, p. 259

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">*Dr. Richmond, I hope you don't feel that I went to far in my criticism of the play towards the end of this __paper__; I was just trying to give my truly honest __opinion__ of what my experience watching the play was like.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Jett W. Puckett

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Dr. F. Richmond

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">THEA 2100H

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">05 March __2012__

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; text-align: center;">Performance Critique of //Hidden Man// <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Before going to see //Hidden Man// I had heard the play was very controversial, and so I was very interested to see what all the fuss was about and made sure to sit in the very center of the front row of the audience. I wanted to be right on top of whatever was going to happen. Although the //Hidden Man// was certainly shocking and lived up to its controversial reputation, I must say I did not like the play. I found certain aspects such as the set, the acting, and the costumes to be well done, but overall, I thought the play was hard to follow, surprisingly boring, and unnecessarily offensive and even disturbing.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> When I sat down in my seat waiting for the play to __start__ the first thing I thought was that the set of the play was very well constructed and seemed real. The scenic designer, __Austin__ Butler, and the crew did an especially good __job__ of building Reverend Finster’s porch; it was constructed out of real wood, and had a real wooden, swinging screen door. It was also lined with dozens of real old bicycle’s, which reminded me of __driving__ through the country and seeing old junk __automobiles__ littered in many of the yards. The structure really seemed like a small house or shack you would see in the woods or in a poor rural area. It was also elevated from the rest of the stage, which I thought interestingly made it seem more like the Reverend was preaching too Robert and Charlie when he was on the porch and they were in the yard.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> The stage’s backdrop of burlap and what appeared to be representations of vines also immediately caught my attention. The backdrop did a good __job__ of hiding the back stage area and more importantly helped the audience to really feel more as if they were in the wilderness. The tangled vines also made the Reverend’s “Paradise Garden” feel to me like a very isolated and secluded place, almost hidden from the rest of the world, this gave an eerie and creepy sense to the stage. The backdrop also made it convenient for the director to hide and also reveal other parts of the set such as the bed and bathtub, each of which served as the main acting area for two of the most intense scenes of the play: the hanging scene and the shower scene, which will be discussed later on. The realistic, seemingly isolated, and eerie stage made for an appropriate setting for the actor’s to portray the play’s controversial themes of homosexuality, drug use, death, suicide, and what I took as anti-religion.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> Additionally, it is worth noting that the Cellar Theatre was a very appropriate __venue__ for this play. A dark, black walled, basement fit very well with the secluded and eerie feeling of the set described above. I also really enjoyed being right on top of the actors, it was a very intimate way to watch a play. Because of the small size of the theatre, the actors did not have to loudly project their voices and it made their dialogue seem more natural. All of the speech was very clear and easy to understand, which is a testament to the actors as well as to the __venue__.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> I also found the acting in the play to be quite strong, overall. The actors who stood out most on the stage were George Contini (Reverend Howard Finster) and Malcolm Campbell-Taylor (Robert Sherer). It certainly didn’t surprise me when I read the __program__ and found out that Mr. Contini was a Theatre professor. It was obvious that he had a great __deal__ of acting experience and expertise. He did a particularly great job of using a natural sounding, deep southern drawl in his speech. As someone who has lived in northwest Georgia my whole life, it certainly sounded like the accent of someone from a rural area in the northwest part of the state. The Reverend’s wife (or the woman character) also did a good job of using an appropriate accent.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> Although, the director, Del Hamilton, could have chosen to go with a student for the Reverend character I thought he was wise to cast an older, middle-aged man for the role. I do not know what Reverend Finster was like in real life, but Mr. Contini effectively portrayed his character as a half-crazy, uneducated, sometimes creepy, but very kind and caring devout believer. It was very easy to buy into his character. I also thought his physical build made the role more effective. He was the biggest and tallest actor in the play which helped him assume the role of the authority figure in the play, and he was also slightly overweight which man him seem like a homely middle aged man, and helped to contrast him from the younger, very thin, Robert Sherer and Charlie Jackson characters and their druggy, “alternative”/“emo” lifestyle.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> Mr. Campbell-Taylor also did a very effective job of portraying his character. He came across as very strong willed and troubled young man, struggling to find his place in the world. He was obviously very angry and frustrated, and you could see it from the beginning of the play based on his very aggressive and physical interactions with Charlie. His interactions with Charlie were often dominant and abusive; it seemed he was physically taking out his frustrations on his friend and lover, and I found this particularly effective. He also brought an incredible amount of intensity and drama to the stage through his contorted facial expressions and exaggerated mannerisms, particularly in the jam session scene, the hanging scene, and the gun scene. The tremendous quality of his acting made those later two scenes feel so intense and so real that they were disturbing to watch; it really felt as though you were actually watching someone attempt to commit suicide. He also physically fit his role. He was very thin and pale, as people (based on my own everyday observations) who live the “emo” lifestyle typically are. I would not be surprised if Mr. Campbell-Taylor lost a little weight in preparation for the play so that his build would better fit his character.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> I think Jordan Harris, the student playing Charlie, was probably a very good actor, but his character was not as exciting of a role as Robert. However, he played his role solidly. His character was much more stable and under control than the Robert character and he did not have to be as loud, intense, or violent. He essentially played the role of the more stable friend frustrated with trying to keep the very troubled Robert from self-destruction. Although his role was not as attention grabbing, he skillfully portrayed the maturation process his character went though from a punk-rocker college student to a working adult. He went from the druggy, punk-rock look of skin-tight graphic t-shirts and torn “skinny” jeans to the professional look of slacks, dress shirt, and dress shoes. He also effectively changed his speech over the course of the play, and spoke much less crudely near the end. I found this transformation pretty effective.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> I thought the other two actors performed adequately, but I though their characters left a lot to be desired. The woman character effectively came across as a plain, loyal, and working class wife, but the character was fairly boring and did not develop enough to warrant discussion here. And I am still unsure of what the stranger character was supposed to be. His clown-like costume of face-makeup and bright colored clothes with intricate un-matching patterns, really made him stand out on a stage and made him an interesting character, but throughout the play I was constantly trying to figure out what he was supposed to be. At first I thought he was just a vision in Robert’s mind because only Robert seemed to talk and interact with him early on in the play. At one point, the play seemed to imply that he was the ghost of a boy that Robert had watched commit suicide, but later in the play the other charters began to interact with him (for example hand him food and drinks). So he must not have been only in Robert’s mind. At another point in the play he told Robert that he was an alien from another world, but this was not done in a way that made the audience sure of whether or not to be believe it. I think the director should have done a clearer job of communicating the significance and meaning of the stranger character to the audience.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> Like the set and the acting, I also found the costumes in the play to be pretty effective. The two gay college-students were very convincingly dressed in the punk-rock look of the 1980’s time period the play was set in. At the beginning of the play they were both wearing black boots or black converse shoes, torn “skinny” jeans, and skin tight graphic t-shirts. It certainly looked just like the clothes I see “emo” students wearing around campus every day. Later in the play, after their characters had developed, matured, and come more to peace with themselves they dressed more professionally and adult like; Robert wore more clean cut jeans and a button-down shirt and Charlie (as mentioned above) wore the attire of a professionally photographer with black dress shores, slacks, and a button-down shirt. The Reverend and his wife wore essentially the same costumes throughout. The Reverend and his wife both wore very simple, very plain, kaki colored clothes, which effectively portrayed them as conservative working class people. The reverend’s attire was also covered in paint which effectively suggested he was a handyman. Finally, the stranger’s costume really stood out as mentioned above, but it did not effectively identify what he was supposed to be. Again, the director and the costume designer should have done this more effectively.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> Although I found most of the aspects of the play discussed so far to be effective and fairy well done, I found the story line and themes of the play to be hard to follow and as a result surprisingly boring. The play seemed to be composed of one intense and shocking but seemingly random event after another, and it appeared that the director’s goal was more to shock you than tell you a story. However, if that was indeed the goal than I must say it was successfully accomplished. I would say the five most shocking scenes in the play were the scene where Robert is tied down in the bed at the play’s beginning, the jam session, the hanging, the shower scene, and the gun scene at the end. The actors, especially Robert, brought incredible drama and intensity to each of these scenes, but the play’s themes were unclear and sometimes it was difficult to tell exactly what was happening. For example, in the scene where Robert is tied down to the bed with a stick in his mouth and Howard is yelling bible verses at him, I was very unsure of what was going on and found it somewhat disturbing. Because it was early in the play and I did not have my bearings yet, and I thought Robert had been kid knapped and was being held captive and tortured or sexually abused by some crazy backwoods family similar to the movie //Deliverance//. After watching the rest of the play and reading the program I, of course, now understand that the play was loosely based on the true story of Reverend Howard helping the very troubled Robert come of age, fight off his inner demons, and save him from suicide, however, I still don’t fully understand what was supposed to be going on when Robert was tied down to the bed. I doubt that anything like that actually happened in the real story; my best guess is that the director put that scene in there to shock the audience and to make the Reverend and Christianity look crazy. Perhaps that purpose was accomplished, but I found the scene more disturbing than anything else. This was one example of why it felt like the director went out of his way to make the Reverend look essentially crazy throughout the play (another example would be when the Reverend sliced his hands open), and I get the feeling that he wasn’t actually so crazy in real life and that the director was pushing some kind of anti-religion agenda. I certainly don’t know this for a fact; that is just how I took it while watching the play.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> The hanging scene was even more disturbing, I suppose it was supposed to represent a suicide attempt and show you how depressed Robert really was, but I think it went much too far. Mr. Campbell-Taylor did an incredible job of acting and making it feel real and tremendously intense; it truly looked like he was choking to death. But making it look that realistic seemed unnecessary, and I felt like it was too much for an audience to have to watch. Even more so, the shower scene went too far. I think it would have been more appropriate and more effective to have them make out with their boxers on, or to do so naked behind a screen or sheet, but showing them making out for that long, completely naked, with full frontal nudity, was unnecessary. Honestly, I found watching this scene to be quite disturbing and offensive. Again, I am just guessing but I took it as the director was trying to use the shock factor to normalize homosexual behavior to the audience. If I am correct and the director was choosing to to use his work to do this, he, of course, has every right in America to do so, but I do not think it is right to force an audience to watch a scene that goes that far without more warning. And I think he certainly could have found other ways to accomplish this goal. I was very uncomfortable watching this scene and after speaking with several people from the audience after the play, I know many other audience members were as well; I think this problem could have easily been avoided by toning the scene down some or by better informing potential audience members of what the play contained.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> In conclusion, I found many aspects of the play quite well done, especially the very impressive acting from Mr. Contini and Mr. Campbell-Taylor. But, overall, I did not like the play. I have never watched a play or film that was so controversial and intense and yet somehow boring at the same time, those three words do not logically go together. Logically, a play with so many intense scenes should very easily keep your attention, but because many aspects of the play were unclear, shocking, and/or disturbing coupled with the fact that the play was so long (2:45) I very surprisingly found myself quite bored by the end of the play and struggling to pay attention. In all honesty, if I was to use a description to sum up the play it would be: unnecessary, shocking, disturbing, and unexplainably boring.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">In debate, there is usually a question that is posed for debaters to answer. It is stated in the form of a resolution. So is the following question in which you may take either the affirmative or the negative position."Resolved, directing is a more important art and craft than acting." **

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Although both the actor and director are tremendously important in modern theatre, it is only the actor that is necessary for a performance to happen.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">It is the actor who brings the “characters to life and secures the vital connection to the audience;" (1) all actors need is a space, regardless of how primitive, and they can put on a show (2). Even without a script to follow actors can “ad lib” or “improv” and put on a spontaneous performance on their own. All other aspects of theatre (lighting, sound, costumes, directing, writing, etc.) are supplementary. However, it is worth noting that the playwright, like the actor, “[is] as old as theatre itself” (3).

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Theatre, of course, has a very long history dating all the way back to ancient Greece, but interestingly the director was not a part of theatre for the overwhelming majority of its existence. Directors were not used “[i]n the Greek, medieval, Elizabethan, and Chinese theatres” because “traditions and conventions were firmly established, and therefore questions of stylistic concern were not an issue” (4). Surprisingly, “[t]he position of the director” did not come into existence until “the nineteenth century” as a result of the new realism movement (5).

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">This is not to say that the art of directing is not important in modern theatre however, for it is the skilled art of directing that “unit[es] all the elements of the performance—script, acting, set, costumes, lights, music, and sound,—into a meaningful whole” and “illuminate[s] the play for the audience” (6). Acting is the only essential aspect of theatre, but directing is unquestionably a tremendously meaningful and important craft in contemporary drama.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Word Count: 275


 * 1) <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Arnold. //Creative Spirit//, p. 135
 * 2) <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Richmond Lecture. 1/9/2012
 * 3) <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Arnold. //Creative Spirit//, p. 136
 * 4) <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Arnold. //Creative Spirit//, p. 136
 * 5) <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Arnold. //Creative Spirit//, p. 136
 * 6) <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Arnold. //Creative Spirit//, p. 135


 * Module on Acting**


 * Your text __offers__ suggestion on two basic approaches to acting, ie. the internal and the external. Chose either one and take the scene between Emily and George as your reference point and develop a fragment of "inner monologue" OR tactic concerning interpretation underlying a short section from the scene. I suggest the men choose to deal with George and the women choose to deal with Emily, although if you wish you may choose to develop an "inner monologue" or "external tactic" for either character. You may use up to 500 words for this module, given the complexity of the requirement. Be sure you let me know exactly which section of dialogue you plan to use for developing your answer.**

//I am writing and inner monologue for George using the internal approach. I am following George’s thoughts starting right before his line “Emily why are you mad at me?” and going through Emily saying “…I got to __agree__ with ‘em a little, because it is true.”// //--// Hmm, what is wrong with Emily? Oh no, she must be mad at me for some reason. What could I have done? I have no idea…I think am in love with her and I think she likes me too, I’ve always thought we would end up together…what if she doesn’t like me anymore? I have to fix whatever is wrong. I should have asked her to be my girlfriend a long time ago, I am so stupid for waiting this long. I have to ask her why she is mad at me. I wish my heart would stop pounding. I can’t let her know I am nervous. I have to act calm.

Oh great, she is acting defensive. I can’t make her mad. But I have got to get her to be honest and tell me what’s wrong. It is hard for Emily not to speak her mind, it shouldn’t be too hard to coax this out of her.

Oh she’s about to tell me. My heart is really pounding now, come on, act calm George. Oh damn, right when she is about to tell me Miss Corcoran has to walk bye. I better act normal toward Mrs. Corcoran though. Back to Emily. Here it comes.

Oh my God, she feels like I have totally changed. She must be talking about how I’ve been acting cocky lately. She’s not the first person to __point__ that out to me. My parent’s point it out to me all the time. I should have listened more to them. I knew they were right, they didn’t even have to tell me, I already knew, but I just can’t seem to help it. It has just become natural for me to act like that. But I can’t let Emily know that I know what she is about to say. I have to, at least at first, act like she is wrong and let her speak her mind.

She is about to cry, she is really hurt, that must mean she really likes me a lot and I have really disappointed her. God, I’m an idiot. She said she hasn’t liked me for over a year. I’ve really been acting like this for that long? But at least she used to like me, I knew she did, maybe she still does, she must still have feelings for me or she wouldn’t be telling me all this. I’ve got to try and __save__ this. Wow, she used to watch everything I did? She liked me that much and it was that obvious? Why didn’t I ask her to be my girlfriend. She’s so right, baseball is what changed me. Oh no, she really feels that I don’t treat people well anymore…that I am rude. Even to my parents. I knew it was bad, but I didn’t realize it was quite this bad. My parents, and apparently all the other girls are saying it, and Emily is so smart; so it has to have really been that bad.

Word count: 500

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Jett W. Puckett

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Dr. F. Richmond

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">THEA 2100H

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">13 February 2012

<span style="display: block; font-family: 'times new roman',serif; font-size: 16px; text-align: center;">Performance Critique of //Armitage// (I FOUND YOUR CRITIQUE OF THE PRODUCTION CONVINCING AND GROUNDED IN DETAILS THAT HELPED TO ILLUSTRATE YOUR POINTS. THANKS.)

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">As someone who is fortunate enough to have studied the texts of numerous classical plays in various English classes in high __school and college__, but who has never gotten the opportunity to study the actual performance of a play, I sat down in the audience of //Armitage// very intrigued. I had only been to a few, always traditional, plays in my life and had never even heard of //Armitage//. And so I had absolutely no idea what to expect and was quite struck when a woman came on stage and informed the audience that anyone seen with a camera or __cell phone__ turned on during the performance would be asked to leave because this play contains nudity! From that point on the play definitely had my full attention.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">With no prior knowledge of the play, I was initially trying to figure out what the setting was supposed to be for the opening scene. At the opening of the show the __lighting__ was very faint and most of the characters were dressed in white and barefoot discussing striking events such as murder and adultery from the past; at the very first, I guessed the characters might be ghosts in a giant mausoleum revealing to the audience what tragedies had trapped them on earth as ghosts. But I, of course, later came to realize that the opening scene and most of the play was set in a giant haunted family home and that the play was constantly jumping around in time and portraying to the audience the story of the family over a period from the late 1700’s to the 1860’s. Once I had my bearings I was able to sit back and enjoy the play while examining it at the same time.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">The first thing that struck me about the play was the constant, strong sexual humor in the dialogue; it was quite funny and very different than any other play I had ever seen or read. It certainly did a good job of keeping my attention, and I found myself just waiting for the next hilarious “one-liner” throughout the play. I rarely had to wait long, especially when the Jane Lamb character (played by Marzena Bukowska) was on stage; I particularly found the scene funny were she was giving Zach a hard time by “purposely refusing to remember” the first time she and Zach apparently met at a masquerade party. Mrs. Bukowska was an excellent actress and probably the funniest character in the show. Her sexual humor both in her lines and in her physical flirtations with Zachary Pendragon and the hangman character was very well executed. It was very funny to watch a girl be so quick to tease and insult such a proud man as the Zachary Pendragon character. It was also quite funny to listen to her make excuses for her own lewd behavior as well as excuses for women in general. Her character was basically a hilarious slap in the __face__ to how a “lady” is supposed to behave, and it was very well performed.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">The other actor that really stood out to me in the show was Matthew Bowdren, the man playing Zachary Pendragon. He was probably the most impressive actor on the night, and if anyone rivaled Mrs. Bukowska for funniest performer in the play, it was him. He did a great job of pulling off a character that was arrogant, dark, cynical, very funny, and (as it turned out in the end) actually a good person all at the same time. Mr. Bowdren’s character reminded me a lot of Charlie Sheen’s hilarious character in the TV show //Two and Half Men//. His character’s arrogance made it all the funnier when characters like Jane and the maid purposely refused to show him any respect and constantly teased him. I especially found it funny when he and the maid were arguing about whether or not he was going to let the Fay Morgan character move into the house. After losing the argument due to the maid threatening to make him find “somebody else to sleep with” Zach said something along the lines of ‘you could have at least pretended to ask for my permission, and you better make sure to keep this quit because people hearing of this girl staying here could ruin my reputation as local tyrant.’ What made this so funny to me was the fact that the owner of the house lost an argument to his maid solely because he had let himself make the mistake of sleeping with her and she threatened to cut him off if he didn’t let her have her way. Also, it was impressive to watch Mr. Bowdren play the various versions of his character: the young, middle-aged, old, and ghost Zachary Pendragon. The actor was a young man, but he was still able to pull off playing the hunched-over, shivering old version of his character. He particularly did a good job of making his voice sound old, coughing, and raspy, and it was all pretty convincing. This was an impressively performed contrast to the tall, healthy, young version of himself with the clear, confident, powerful voice of youth.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Despite the play being so funny, it was also very dark. The play’s dark humor was effectively performed and was an enjoyable departure from the slightly more typical combination of humor and silliness such as in the classic comedies //Animal House// and //Plane’s Trains and Automobiles.// In a way, the play was pointing out some of the most unfortunate facts about human nature and behavior, and instead of lamenting them, it was poking fun at them, which is always much more enjoyable. The play portrayed a world where people have no control whatsoever over their sexual desires, constantly cheat on and leave one another, routinely lie, go behind one another’s backs, and are even willing to commit incest and murder to get what they want. And yet the play (especially Mrs. Bowdren and Mr. Bowdren) pulled off being very funny at the same time.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">The fact that the play was constantly jumping around it time did make it a little hard to follow but it also made it more interesting. It was appealing how the play portrayed Zach as such as bad person throughout the performance and then gradually revealed to the audience that he actually hadn’t murdered his step daughters’ parents as he had been accused of, that he had forced the separation of his son and his son’s lover to try and protect his son, and that he was actually a pretty good guy. All of that made for a very captivating twist in the play. In the end, the audience realized that, although he was certainly far from perfect, he was actually just the type of man who for whatever reason wants everyone to think he is a lot worse person than he actually is.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">In addition to the funny dialogue and strong acting, I also found the play’s costumes pretty well executed. They were meant to be traditional to the 1800’s time period the play was set in, and I thought this was achieved pretty effectively. The costumes reminded me somewhat of the costumes from //Gone with the Wind//. I particularly thought the costumes of Zach, Jane’s first husband, and Zach’s son, seemed realistic to what wealthy male elites of that time would have worn. But two things in particular about the costumes in the play really stuck out: almost all of the costumes were white and throughout the entire play every character was barefoot. At the very beginning when I was still trying to figure out what the general premises of the play were, I thought these two oddities might have been to show that all the characters were ghosts. Ghosts are fairly commonly depicted as being white (such as in //Casper)//, but being that the characters weren’t all ghosts, the director must have had other reasons for this costume decision. My next thought was that the color white fairly commonly seems to signifies goodness, innocence, and purity in literature and culture (such as wedding dresses), but that certainly wasn’t the case in this play. There were clearly no metaphorical knights in white shining armor in //Armitage//; most of the characters were obviously far too sexually loose, manipulative, and/or dishonest for that to be the case. I am still very unsure why the director choose to use so many white costumes in the play, but it is my tentative guess that perhaps it was to purposely contrast how you would expect characters dressed in white to behave or to show that people do not actually behave as society wants them too. As to the question of why all the characters had bare feet, I think the most logical answer was to avoid noise. All the characters were dressed in clothes traditional to the period, and if they had been wearing shoes they would have had to wear the bulky, clunky shoes of the period (such as the boots and riding boots all of the men from //Gone// //with the Wind// wore throughout the film) as well. Those type of shoes on what appeared to be a wooden stage logically would have created a lot of distracting noise and made it difficult to hear the actors’ lines. However, bare feet (such as barefoot children), like the color white, also fairly commonly tend to symbolize innocence, so again, it is my tentative guess that perhaps this was another attempt by the director to purposely contrast the characters’ innocent appearances with their often lewd behavior. It would be interesting to ask the director about the real reasoning behind these two costume decisions.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">I also found the director’s portrayal of ghosts pretty effective. When ghosts (or the old version of Zach) were on stage, the lighting would change the mood of the play by suddenly becoming faint. The ghosts of Zach and his father were also hunched over, spoke in very raspy, depressed voice and were also covered in white strands of paper; it reminded me of how I have seen the ghost of Hamlet’s father portrayed in film. The ghost of Zach’s mother was also well executed, especially her voice. I think she was most likely cast for that role specifically because of the eerie, screechy, sharp tone of her voice. She really did come across as the ghost of someone who had murdered her husband during sex.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">I also liked the director’s decisions about where to place the actors in the theatre. I thought it was enjoyable how the actors would often walk down the theater’s aisles right beside the audience, because I had never been so close to actors at a play before. I also like how the director would focus the audience’s attention on certain actors by placing them below and in front of the stage and all the other actors. The play often had many actors on stage, but as an audience member you always knew where to focus your attention.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">In conclusion, I certainly found the play to be very enjoyable and especially very funny. I think the high quality of the acting was what stood out the most, but I also think the costumes, lighting, and directing decisions were all really well executed. It was also very neat to see such a non-traditional play for the first time, particularly when I walked in having no idea what type of play I was about to see.


 * Contrast and compare the role and purpose of secular drama and theatre as an expression of the communities from which it arose and for which it has served with that of religious and ritual drama and theatre.**

(GENERALLY GOOD EXCEPT FOR A FEW SLIGHT PROBLEMS) Although secular drama evolved out of religious drama, there are several key differences between the two in addition to many similarities.

Ancient Greek theatre has its origins in the religious festivals honoring the god Dionysus. Plays were added to the activities of the festivals in the 6th century B.C.E., setting the stage for the emergence of the famous Athenian drama of the great 5th century Greek playwrights Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides (1). Centuries later, pageant wagon mystery cycles were performed throughout medieval Europe; these were very similar to the plays of ancient Greece, which preceded them. (HOW ARE THE "PLAYS" SIMILAR TO THE CYCLES? I THINK YOU MAY MEAN THE CAUSE OF BOTH WAS TO CELEBRATE SOME RELIGIOUS OR RITUAL EVENT. YES?) Both were strongly linked to religious festivals and were celebratory productions performed only seasonally through the collaborative effort of the entire community, overwhelmingly by nonprofessionals (2). The mystery cycles were started (CONDONED?) by the __Catholic Church__ to teach biblical stories to the mostly illiterate population (3). Interestingly, medieval plays reinforced community/religious values and social structures, whereas ancient Greek plays often challenged them (4).(INTERESTING POINT)

Henry VIII’s break with the Catholic Church in 1534 coupled with the __Renaissance__ gave __birth__ to the vastly different, secular drama of his daughter’s reign, Elizabethan Theatre, including the famous works of Shakespeare and Marlowe (5). Elizabeth’s long, stable reign allowed England’s economy to prosper and for the nobility to finically(FINANCIALLY) support theatre. Professional playwrights and actors quickly sprung up and theatre became year-round (PLAYS WERE PERFORMED THROUGH THE YEAR?) (6). Like the Renaissance, these plays focused not on religion but on “the complexity of human motivation” and “human understanding;” “it was the internal struggles of the characters that became the major subject of drama” (7).

Drama has always been meant to __entertain__, but its themes and the nature of its production have evolved over __time__.

Word Count: 271


 * 1) Arnold. //Creative Spirit//, p. 14
 * 2) Arnold. //Creative Spirit//, p. 25
 * 3) Arnold. //Creative Spirit//, p. 19
 * 4) Arnold. //Creative Spirit//, pp. 26; 14
 * 5) Arnold. //Creative Spirit//, pp. 26-27
 * 6) Arnold. //Creative Spirit//, p. 27
 * 7) Arnold. //Creative Spirit//, p. 27