Day 3: Notes

Day Three : Notes
August 15th, 2007
Linda Putnam

OVERVIEW

MORNING
30 minutes Led Plastiques (Some corporal) River by Linda
15 Minutes Lollow the Leader River by either Hillary, Paul or Tanya
15 Minutes Open Floor
- either follow your leader, and if you are complled to follow another image do so
- slip the screen
- no touching - touch is forbidden in your basics - if there is adknowledge the person

ex. Tanya touches Linda in a river

Both stop
Tanya refers to herself saying "Tanya" and then Linda "Linda"
Linda refers to herself "Linda" and then to Tanya "Tanya"
Then shake hands and continue

LUNCH

AFTERNOON OVERVIEW
Actors Notebook
Tom High Tom Low poems
Reduce to Source exercise
7 Character stages
Corpse with 7 Character stages
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AFTERNOON

Q: When you perform can you move from TH / TL or do you use it in particles? How do you work it?

- can build the character by memorizing the stops and then run them through your script

The actors notebook

Three columns

COLUMN 1 COLUMN 2 COLUMN 3
Everything someone says Everything the character Everything I want
about your character says about themself the character to be


Column 3 will lead you to the next character you want to play
- you have to justify everything the audience hears about the character - you have to justify whats in the text - Thats Column 1 & 2
- Column 3 you can slip in if its justified in the text

- Once you have this column read it like a novel
- Then Inhale the Q: Who is this person?
- Exhale an get a spectre / an expression and write that down
- Inhale I feel ____.
- Find two centres
- put these in your body - 1 is a primary source - a source tht has weight - the 2nd source is weak or a fragile body part - get the two body parts going simultaneously - the engine the drive is the primary source - we'll throwing our weight around in the priimary source like the corporals - if you land you have to know how to fall

- I want____ and I need ___> can also be answered - or can fool around with it in the room
- images - there are universal images - with an ensemble you cn make a list of all the repeated images
- if you like having your craft be a craft, form can work for you - if you are a natural there is more risk of falling on the ice
- enjoy the precision especially if you're on the edge

- TH / TL is a precise form
- covers all the physical body including extremitites

Q: Is the primary source a place of indication?
- its the place where you actually build the character from
- the weight bearing source is usually in your torso - the Pelvic Floor is part of the Vunerable triangle

- thighs are a fertile source
- women are the outside thigh
men are the inside of the thigh

- Shoulderblades can be weight barring (shoulderstnads)
5 mysteries (cat) - this is where you get your flips or your backbends
-tripod handstand / push throughs in The Cat - you can find your five mysteries here- if you get backaches in this work it may come from carrying the 5 mysteries too high in the spine

- A primary source can be carried by: The Shoulderblades, The Pectorals, The ribcage, and the pelvic saddle
- can carry a primary source through left/ right Dissociation

PRINCIPLE: Left / Right Dissociation

- neck isn't a great primary source - you need to save it for voice and focus - could be secondary

- sound / breath endurance is a more complicated struggle as you age

- 2nd source is a body part, but could also be a value

In performance one gives themselves three valuses:

1 has to be related to character or choreography
1 has to be related to the performer / actor
1 has to be related to that night / that particular perfomance

After the show, Hunker and see how you did with these values

- values could be ensemble, have known everything you did (lines, choreography etc)
- its a form of self-reference - a way to ask yourself questions before someone else does

Q; Did you jelly your image?

- im Improv and theatre we say YES before NO - you carry others and not yourself to you can grasp reality whenever you need to

SHOWED TH/ TL Poems

Excersise with Poems
do the same excersie as yesterday with your I feel word except run the TH / TL from High to Low to High instead

Excersise

1. take 10 minutes to reduce your poem to a single source
2. perform your poem for yourself
3. inhale
4. exhale I feel ____.
5. Find a word or an image that resonates for you.

*** never get so far away from your basics that you lose your basics


Source Work
7 Character Stages

The 7 Character Stages Are:
1. Energy
2. Presence / Absence of Light
3. Creature
4. Masque / mask
5. Personae
6. Characiture (spelling?)
7. Character


Presnece / Absence of light

- night / day
- its what exists in the presence of light and what does not exist in the presence of light and vice versa

Creature
- an animal

Mask
- a recongnizable human with no reference in time
- passion - they are passion - creations
- help organize a character through an inner rythum - they are presentational

Personae
- upright human being who knows a bit about time - time is close to them

Characiture

- this stage has unfourtanetly been denegrated @ fake - is a wonderful artform
- characiture is a upright human character lacking moral fiber ex. Chaplin, Marx Bros.
- a pure re-action
- a full character but something is missing or askew

Character
- a human being with moral fiber

Q: How do 7 characters relate to time?

- in physical performance Time is facinating
- In ENERGY - time is meaningless
- clown shows can be made out of time
- PRESENCE / ABSENCE of LIGHT - has time becuase in herant within the term is the passage of time (we pass into and out of light and dark)
-CREATURE has time (Im hungry, I need to mate, I have to attack)

Book to Read: Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers
- CREATURE is on 24 hour time
- MASK - time is vast
- mask knows about the passage of time as a concept of living or dying but there is nothing as a reference
-total innocent


- run these 7 through the Corpse

THE CORPSE

- the corpse never fails to produce material if you can endure it

Stand in the Perfect T
In the Perfect T:

1. The outside of the feet line up with the armpit
2 knees are over the bigtoes
3 ribcage is over the pelvis
4 butt loose
5 pelvic floor falss
6 put a two finger space in the armpits and let the arm fall
7 palms rest facing out
8 eyeballs @ face height - facing forward

Now Duplicate this lying down
to get to lying pose:

1 hands move inward
2 head rolls down
3 chin rolls down
4 roll down / tower in reverse
5 take top and under of kneww - lift and drop it to lying down
do this for both knees
6 roll down to floor from ribcage
7 drop the chin and drop the hands
8 roll down to the floor

- nose is in line with the public bone
-hold the feeling of the floor with your feet
-hold the feeling of the air with your hands
-eyes are on the horizon
-inhale source
- exhale and go through 7 stages of chracter

PLAY THE RETURN
When your impulse is gone, your lost, you have an out - return to the corpse
breathe / drop the source into the diaphram
and go


HUNKER

- position is very uncomfortable or impossible to hold
- get into hunker position - see your work

- Q yourself on an inhale: What is the nature of my experience?
- exhale 3 simple answers
- Q; Take one of the three answers inhale and Q yourself: What is the nature of ________?
- exhale 3 answers
- take a look at your work
- say thank you to your maker
- look up / see the room / see your street clothes

- when you work in the presence/absence of light you get the eye

PRINCIPLE: Only go as far as you know how to get back
- if your lost look for the breath of the source round - you may be censoring by fudging the RETURN if you have a judgement - you may miss a level of the 7 character stages
-put the source into the breath and the Corpse competley before you go back in - get the breath and then drop in the source

Q; If you lose the source: Where are you dropping the content and replacing it with imagination?