UNIT 27: Developed and Applied Musical Theatre Techniques

Unit 27: Learning Aim A - Essay

Unit 27: Learning Aim A from Erin Mason

UNIT 27: FINAL EVALUATION

On the 15th of February 2018, the BTEC Performing Arts students performed in a showcase in front of a live audience in which we performed our exam pieces. The performance included our Year 13 group performance of Grease, along with several other numbers, such as Year 12's rendition of 'Bring It On', their solo exam pieces and other numbers that we performed for our own enjoyment and in order to entertain our audience. The night was a huge success! We managed to fill our theatre with hardly any spare seats. The audience were great - lively and very responsive, which really helped our energy within the performances!

First scene - two separate cliques.

The Process of Learning and Improving 'Grease'

As a company, we decided that the musical we would chose to explore for our Unit 27 performance is 'Grease'. We chose Grease because the musical has a small cast, which was helpful as we only have a small company, plus 3 other drama students whom were willing to join us!

Danny and Sandy meet.

Our narrative for our performance was focused on the love story between Danny and Sandy. Our first scene was set at Rydell, with the two cliques, the 'T-Birds' and the 'Pink Ladies' sat apart discussing Sandy and Danny's love interests over the summer, ending with the song, Summer Nights.

The scene then moves to the two groups meeting and Danny acting uninterested in Sandy. Sandy then becomes upset, singing Hopelessly Devoted before running offstage.

Sleepover scene

The Pink Ladies are then shown at a sleepover, discussing Marty's love interests and pen pal, Freddy, whom she then sings about during her solo, Freddy My Love.

The dance scene.

The scene then moves to a discussing with the T Birds and the partnering up of couples, ready the for dance. The next scene takes place at the high school dance and features dances to popular 1950's songs and the Hand Jive.

You're The One That I Want

This scene ends with Danny leaving Sandy and dancing with Rizzo. This hurts Sandy. Frenchy then sings the reprise of Look At Me, and comforts Sandy. Sandy then gets the idea for a makeover. Everyone exits.

The 'gang' then all appear on stage, Sandy complete with her new makeover, and Danny becomes interested in her once again, ending both the scene and performance with You're The One That I Want.

This photo shows Abi Sweeney teaching us the basic jive step.

During the rehearsal process, we rehearsed with Abi Sweeney, an ex-MADD student, and qualified IDTA teacher. Abi, as a dance specialist, taught us the basic steps of the popular 1950's dance style, 'The Jive', which we later developed and incorporated into the dance section of Grease. Later on in the process, she attended a dance rehearsal and helped us to clean our jive routine. She corrected the hand and head gestures to ensure that on the flicks, our heads were facing our feet and focused in the right places on the chasses and ball-changes. Abi also helped to choreograph the partner sections and lifts during the dance competition in 'Born to Hand Jive', based on choreography from the film adaptation of 'Grease'. Abi was extremely helpful during the rehearsal process and used her skills and experience within the musical theatre industry in order to really help us to clean choreography and help us prepare for the final performance.

Ramy during his session with Mrs Turner.

Mrs Turner, the dance specialist, also helped our during the rehearsal process with regards to the dance element of our performance. She helped more on a one-to-one basic with sections of choreography that we struggled on. One person she helped in particular was Ramy. As not a previously trained dancer, Ramy found it hard to retain and execute choreography during the Hand Jive as it is incredibly fast and has lots of intricate hand and foot movements. Mrs Turner helped Ramy during a one-to-one and he practiced what she had taught so that by the next rehearsal he was able to execute thew hand jive choreography correctly. This helped us as an ensemble as we were all in time and helped us achieve the jive in unison and achieve the correct formations. This also helped rehearsals to run smoothly as we could just rehearse and clean the jive numbers.

Another person who's help was greatly appreciated during the rehearsal process was Mrs Guy. Mrs Guy is our vocal coach whom we rehearsed once a week as a company and then once per week as a soloist in order to aid our vocals for the showcase. Personally, having a one-to-one session with our vocal coach helped both my singing and confidence a great deal. Mrs Guy helped me a lot with my solo, Freddy My Love, as I was struggling to reach the high notes at the end of the bridge, however, by helping me support my notes from my core and by pulling up through the core, I eventually was able to reach these notes and support them. Not only did she help me during this number, but also the other members of the company involved in this particular song as it contains a three-part harmony. I stayed on the melody, with Ellie and Rebecca on the higher harmony and Betsy taking the top part.

This photo shows us doing the projection task.

Our rehearsals with Mr Sluman, our drama tutor were extremely productive. He helped us to block the scenes and helped us to work on characterisation. One thing that we weren't particularly strong at was the projection and accents in the theatre. Mr Sluman would sit at the back of the theatre whilst we rehearsed and recorded us so that we could watch back and notice ourselves where projection and accents weren't correct. So that we learnt to project appropriately, he asked us to stand far back on the stage and he stood at the top of the audience and we had to say a line and see if he could hear us. The link to a video of this exercise is: Projection Exercise.

As a company, we filmed many of our rehearsals and watched them back immediately in order to self assess our performance in that particular rehearsal so that we were able to set targets for upcoming rehearsals. This helped improve our performance as a company and was also useful in order to give peer feedback. The ability to record and re-watch rehearsals is incredibly beneficial to us as performers as only then can you watch ourselves from an audiences perspective in order to make the necessary changes to the performance.

As part of the rehearsal process, there were several changes that had to be made. One of the most major being the changing of the roles. At the beginning of rehearsals, I was cast as Rizzo, however, due to the amount of costume changes and because it was the only way that each of the girls had a solo section of a song, I was re-cast as Marty. I therefore had to learn the whole script as a different character. I think this actually helped as I had a real understanding of the plot by exploring it from the perspective of two different characters.

Another thing we had to change was the partnering during You're The One That I Want. This was due to the partnering being different during that dance scene. Otherwise, with our initial choreography and partners, that characters didn't fit the narrative.

The set was constructed ready for the dress rehearsal. The set consisted of a big platform upstage with a set of steps at each side. Initially, we wanted the platform centre stage, however, we realised that we had to accommodate for the live band. Therefore we had to push the set towards stage left. This meant that several of our formations and some of the blocking within the piece were incorrect and needed to be edited. We had to learn to adapt to the new space as we now had less floor space as our whole performance had to be shifted stage left, along with the physical set. Most of these changes were during the dance scene. During the hand jive and our rock and roll choreography, we had to change our formation to staggered lines so that we could fill the space appropriately and still have the space to perform to our best ability.

Me singing 'Freddy My Love' as Marty.

After the role change, I was cast as Marty. I believe that my portrayal of Marty achieved the correct characterisation. Marty is a teenage girl who's life revolves around impressing the opposite sex. She tries to come across as a mature character, however is quite immature. She is obsessed with her appearance and is thought of as 'the pretty one' of the group. I embodied these characteristics by having a specific motif or movement to represent them, which I then repeated throughout the piece. I showed Marty's vanity and obsession with her appearance by touching my hair, either playing with it or puffing it up - essentially making sure I always look good. Also, whenever Frenchy or Sandy say something 'immature' I would sneer and look down my nose at them. This showed my character trying to come across in a mature manner. I also performed my lines and lyrics in an American accent, in order to correctly portray the 1950's teenage, larger-than-life themes.

Strengths and Weaknesses

During this course, I believe I have developed many skills that I did not previously possess. One of the skills that I am most proud of is the improvement in my vocal abilities. Before taking this subject, I had no previous tutoring or experience in singing or vocal technique. So before this year, I had no vocal training. At the beginning of the year, no confidence in singing and found it hard to sing in front of my peers. However, within a few lessons with the class, I felt comfortable and therefore confident enough to sing in front of my classmates. Over time my confidence has grown even more and so I was able to not only sing as an ensemble, but even a solo, in our Unit 27 performance. Many people commented and said how proud they were that my confidence had grown in my vocal ability, which felt really good and promising to hear. I learnt how to harmonise with other singers, which is a difficult skills, so for that, I am particularly proud of myself.

Another strength of mine is dance. Therefore, I found the choreography easy to pick up and maintain. I was also able to help other members of the company with issues such as formations and timing, using my skills to not only benefit myself, but other members and help the ensemble.

Personally, I would say my weaknesses based on Unit 27 is breathing during singing and projection when singing and acting. I will improve my breathing by performing breathing exercises to strengthen my core and help me to not need to take a breath as often. I will work on my projection by recording myself from far away and listening back to work on it.

One problem I encountered during this process was whilst learning the Jive choreography. The way we were supposed to perform the double chasse and ball change was simpler than I was used to. In my professional training and during competitions, as a dancer, we are taught to perform the ball change as a step-ball-change, as to fit the counts of the music better. I found it really hard to get out of the habit of my previous training of adding the 'step' before the ball change. I had to watch myself on recordings in order to realise I looked different to the other girls, and so had to try really hard to change it. Eventually, I broke the habit and I then fit in and looked identical to the other members of the company.

Conclusion

In conclusion, I have thoroughly enjoyed this course and believe that this, alongside extra tutoring has helped my majorly in preparing for auditions and life in the industry. I have learnt that performing takes a huge amount of hard work, patience and dedication. I know that if I chose to take this pathway in life, that it has to be 'all or nothing'. I have to give my training my all and put in every bit of effort I can in order to be the best and so that I can eventually call myself a triple threat - as this is what I aspire to be! Also, I have learnt how to work well within an ensemble and how to help other people, I think these skills are extremely important, as to be successful within the musical theatre industry, you must be able to work well with other people and take on board advice and notes in order to help yourself and others to improve.

My next steps are to continue to train both in and out of school in order to achieve my best abilities in all three art forms. I shall be applying to colleges soon and preparing for auditions using the skills that I have learnt within the workshops and performances within this course.

I have enjoyed every aspect of this course! It has been an unforgettable experience with the best company and I hope that we all remain in touch and can support each other and work together in the future!

The BTEC Company 2018

UNIT 27: Personal Management Grid

Unit 27: Showcase Videos

Below are the links to our musical theatre showcase. Our Unit 27 performance of Grease is in 'Showcase Part 1' and begins at 2.27 minutes.

Showcase Part 1
Showcase Part 2
Showcase Part 3
Showcase Part 4

Unit 27: Showcase Dress Rehearsal

On 12th February 2018, we performed a dress rehearsal of our entire showcase. This meant running the show from start to finish, with full energy, tech and costumes. Also, this was our first run through with the band.

Below is the video containing our Unit 27 dress rehearsal of Grease, it begins at 6.25 minutes:

After performing in the dress rehearsal, it was apparent that several changes needed to be made. This being to blocking, formations, choreography and also technical issues such as lighting and sound.

Listed below are some of the changes we had to make, all photos included in this write up are from the dress rehearsal:

• Opening - We decided that, in order to increase the smoothness of the show overall, it would

  

  Wall exposed backstage.

  work better and look more professional if we kept the curtains open after the band had played 'Phantom of the Opera' and just began the Unit 27 performance by the song, 'Grease is The Word' fading in and the lights coming up gradually. We chose this song because it is well known and makes it blatantly obvious that the next act will be 'Grease', so that the audience know what to expect and can get in the right mood and frame of mind for what they are about to see.
• Curtains - Another thing, that after watching the rehearsal back, we decided to change, was the black curtains at the back of the stage. They were open for the majority of the performance, exposing the wall behind. This made the staging look unprofessional and unappealing. We asked our technical manager, Mr Douglas, to stick these curtains together for the actual showcase to ensure the stage looks tidy and professional

  

  Table being used as bed.

  throughout.
• Table - We decided after this rehearsal that the girls' clique, would not sit around a table, but just the dining chairs instead. This is because it was difficult to remove the table in between scenes and after trying it without the table, the choreography looked better on the chairs, rather than the table.
• Bed - In the sleepover scene, we wanted a bed, however, after this rehearsal we decided to not use the table and sheet but to carry on using the chairs from the first scene at school but to cover the chairs in blankets and pillows to disguise them as a sofa, as this would be easier and quicker during the scene change.

  

  Lighting problems during sleepover.

• Lighting - Another issue we encountered was lighting. During the sleepover scene as I walked over to the chair to get my kimono, I was not lit. We had to rectify this for the final performance.
• Dance formations - Due to the new positioning of the platform, it was realised that we needed a new formation as for the dance scene, our choreography no longer fit the space. This meant that 2 entire dance numbers needed a lot

  

  Dance in wrong spacing.

  of work and changes.
• Costume - Due to her fast costume changes, Betsy was unable to get dressed in time for her scenes. This meant a change to her costumes to ensure she could get them on and off fast enough.
  

The dress rehearsal proved to be a success. We managed to get through the whole show without  any major problems. There were obviously many minor adjustments to make before we performed the final performance and we have just 3 days to rectify these issues. We shall continue to rehearse as much as we can every day before the performance in order to be at our best for the performance in 3 days. We needed to have a lot more energy, as towards the end of the second half, we were very tired after a full day rehearsing and then the dress run, we all needed to make sure we were well-rested for the actual performance.

Unit 27: Peer Evaluation - Grease Songs