Fairytales Unscripted: A Narrative Report

768 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Essays on fairytales

MainStreet is currently preparing for our production of FairyTales Unscripted, but with this show we are facing the challenge of preparing for a show that is, well, unscripted. The show is an entirely improvised full length play. The creative team has to design for a show where anything could happen. I asked the directors of FairyTales, Dan O’Connor and Jo McGinley about how they are preparing for this show. How is Fairytales at MainStreet different from your other productions? Jo: Murry and MainStreet are amazing and so detailed. This is a really professional team and it feels great to be a part of the season. We are getting everything done in advance and there is a high level of professionalism. Now we can really focus on immersing our cast in the style of the show and we can prepare better for opening on our part. This is going to be our longest run of FairyTales yet. It will be an interesting journey as our actors immerse themselves in the style for a while. We have to be able to create a brand new fairytale that is familiar and recognizable and every day when the actors leave, they will be leaving with brand new, original fairy tales and then turn around and do it again tomorrow. We just saw Elephant and Piggie and we were …show more content…

We will give the team a reading list, assign research topics and things like that. The directors also design improv exercised to help the actors begin improvising in the style. For our Jane Austen Unscripted, one of our exercises had the actors bonding over shared values and being excited about a shared perspective of society. We also played the music of the style and taught them a dance, so they knew how to be proper and speak and move during that time period. The goal is to give them so many tools and skills so when they are on stage they can relax and flow moment to moment. They already did their homework so they don’t have to think about it, it comes natural to them

Show More
Related

  • Rationale for Retelling Macbeth in Shrek Style

    779 Words  | 2 Pages

    ...e cheated a script from all Shrek, Macbeth and improvisation (brain storming.) We then ran through the performance seeing if there were any glitches, mistakes or things that just don't make sense, timed the performance. We then decided that we should have music from the original film Shrek and put that into our play to add tension, (in a way.) We also figured out what costumes we were going to wear, since most of as were playing more then one character we needed easy costume changes, simple but effective!

    Read More

  • Classic Fairy Tales: Annotated Bibliography

    1399 Words  | 3 Pages

    In his evaluation of Little Red Riding Hood, Bill Delaney states, “In analyzing a story . . . it is often the most incongruous element that can be the most revealing.” To Delaney, the most revealing element in Little Red Riding Hood is the protagonist’s scarlet cloak. Delaney wonders how a peasant girl could own such a luxurious item. First, he speculates that a “Lady Bountiful” gave her the cloak, which had belonged to her daughter. Later, however, Delaney suggests that the cloak is merely symbolic, perhaps representing a fantasy world in which she lives.

    Read More

  • Devised Theatre or Collaborative Creation

    965 Words  | 2 Pages

    “Devised theatre can start from anything. It is determined and defined by a group of people who set up an initial framework or structure to explore and experiment with ideas, images, concepts, themes, or specific stimuli that might include music, text, objects, paintings, or movement.” (Alison Oddey 1). Devised theatre, also called collaborative creation, is a form of theatre in which the script is created through a collaborative process with the actors and the playwright, rather than the traditional method of theatre with a premade script. Devised theatre is created through the process, collaboration, and multi-vision of the group. Similar to improvisational theatre, a devised theatre play is created in the rehearsal process from the performers interacting with each other. By the time the devised play is performed the work is a cohesive piece that is, for the most part, set in stone. This form of theatre is a modern form of theatre, that came about from the collaboration of many different type of artists, because of the need of the performers to have some input into what they are performing. The devised theatre form is most utilized in the USA, Great Britain, and Australia, but especially in our country. Devised theatre utilizes physical movements, rather than focusing on only the language.

    Read More

  • Rewriting and Transforming a Fairytale

    1239 Words  | 3 Pages

    Fairy tales are considered as stories for children, to amuse them or some bed stories before they sleep. Sandman is one of those stories created by Scandinavian narratives and written by Christian Andersen, famous children’s literature writer. In the tale, Sandman comes at midnight and puts his sands into the eyes of the children and makes them sleep. While they sleep, with his umbrella he shows them either good or bad dreams. E.T.A Hoffman uses the elements of the fairy tale and rewrites it as a gothic-horror story. Hoffman’s Sandman is also comes at midnight and puts sand to the eyes of people, but not for the dreams but to take their eyes and feed them to his children. Nail Gaiman’s version has gothic elements but also it still carries the soul of the fairy tale version. He uses the Sandman as a protagonist in his story but the events occurs in dark and morbid places.

    Read More

  • Annotated Bibliography: Fairy Tales

    336 Words  | 1 Pages

    My history knowledge and curiosity of history are both lacking. I have read Scott Harshbarger’s "Hansel and Gretel" and Fairy-Tale Nationalism. His analogy of Hansel and Gretel to some of the events surrounding World War II took a great deal of research and study. The metaphor surely is plausible and seems to whisper a truth. Each character and their role are added a visual connection which fastened the metaphorical nd analogy. He went into detail with terms such as "narrative transport," a term coined by Richard Gerrig to describe what happens in the mind when we are swept away by a story. Adding a touch of German History the reader can most definitely see there is a connection. If you take the time

    Read More

  • Margaret Atwood The Penelopiad

    1027 Words  | 3 Pages

    In every piece of theatre, it is vital that there is a great deal of forethought and communication in the minds of the production team members. Countless hours are spent in production meetings, determining the look, staging, feel, and details of a show. Bowling Green State University’s production of The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood effectively uses planning in areas such as costuming, directorial choices, and music and dance to make the play as entertaining and informative to audiences as possible.

    Read More

  • Wicked: Broadway Musical

    1363 Words  | 3 Pages

    When I was first watching it, I didn’t particularly love it because I was comparing it to the last performance that I had seen. The actors were different, the songs were being sung differently, and frankly I was just not enjoying it. But as the musical went on, my perspective changed and I quickly realized that while everything was different, everything was so right. I began to enjoy and appreciate the new actors take on their characters. I once again came away thinking this was my favorite musical ever. I’m very happy that I was provided the chance to yet again to see my favorite

    Read More

  • Character Analysis: A Career As A Tech Playwright

    882 Words  | 2 Pages

    This particular theatre company stood out to us, due to the process in which they devise a script for their productions. The company employs what they refer to as “Dreamer Realistic Critic”. In this process, they initially start with a bold and imaginative idea. This idea is very complex and creative, yet pushes the limits of the realistic world. The next step in the process is to consider how they can make unrealistic dreams a reality on the stage.

    Read More

  • Zipes's View on Fairytales

    1969 Words  | 4 Pages

    In this essay, I examine what Zipes means by institutionalised, define what makes a fairy tale and evaluate how different versions of Little Red Riding Hood reflect the social ideology of the period.

    Read More

  • High School Theater Observation Report

    436 Words  | 1 Pages

    Students learned in-depth skills for both on and off the stage. Students presented a student run showcase at the end of the two weeks, preforming prepared monologues, scenes and skits. • Town of New Hartford Sumer Theater Program: 2013-2015 • Assistant directed for two years, helped teach the students a variety of improv and acting games. As well as putting on a full-length play for kids ranging from 8-14. •

    Read More

  • Arthur Miller's Death of Saleman

    3354 Words  | 7 Pages

    When you read this play, take special care to remember the difference between the work of a playwright and that of a novelist. Novelists may imagine their audience as an individual with book in band, but a playwright writes with a theater full of people in mind. Playwrights know that the script is just the blueprint from which actors, producers, stagehands, musicians, scenic designers, make-up artists, and costumers begin. You will need to use an extra measure of imagination to evaluate this play before you see the Goodman production.

    Read More

  • An Unconventional Fairy Tale

    907 Words  | 2 Pages

    The film entitled “Shrek” is unlike traditional fairy tales and is a complete reversal of traditional writing methods. Unlike traditional fairy tales such as “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs”, where the handsome prince rescues the princess and they both live “happily ever after”, the creators of Shrek have used an Ogre (usually known as vicious man eating monsters) to be the hero. This has been used to help create comedy and an interesting, if unconventional, story line. Along with a series of characters who appear to be playing each others roles and magical creatures behaving strangely, the film is like a fairy tale which is completely opposite of what is first expected.

    Read More

  • Power The Tempest

    1418 Words  | 3 Pages

    Often, when writing a stage production, a stage director needs to fully place himself in the position of their audience; though the director is often the creator of the production they are directing, the audience normally determines whether the production is an overall success or failure or whether certain parts of the production are working in the overall composition. When crafting a stage production, a director tends to take one aspect of the audience into deep consideration: the audience’s reactions to certain scenes or events. It is a common goal for stage directors or creators of all types to try get the audience to feel a certain way about a certain scene, characters, or settings; this is done through mainly the power and strength of a stage performance and can leave the audience feeling a variety of emotions. Overall, in this manner, the stage director is attempting to somewhat manipulate the emotions and overall feelings of the audience or, in other words, bring the audience under his

    Read More

  • The Importance of Fairytales

    1612 Words  | 4 Pages

    I chose to research the genre of fairytales because the genre retold by Grimm’s caught my attention. Fairytales in modern day usually have a happy ending after the good versus evil concept. Rapunzel specifically, isn’t told in its original form.Theres much more darkness and even though happily ever after is in play, not all fairytales end that way. Fairytales have much more depth than people realize in modern day. It portrays the real struggles we face growing up. In Rapunzel, her mother gave her away and she was raised by an enchantress who locked her away. This very much explains child abandonment or a child that has been given up for adoption and the things they face growing up.Theres a connection between these fairytales and real life situations .Fairytales have a way of expressing real life situations in a way that uses a few elements that help tell the story in a way children can understand. Some of the elements include: magic, morals, royalty and love.

    Read More

  • Childhood Stories: Versions of Fairy Tales

    1351 Words  | 3 Pages

    Childhood was a very interesting time of life for me. Through everything that I had gone through growing up, still I always remembered the story tales that had been read to me over the years. Although The Three Little Bears and The Three Little Pigs were different stories, they both contained few similarities as well as many differences. The similarities in these two stories would be the significance of the number three and two characters invading the privacy and territories of unexpected families. Throughout both stories, everything that was happening involved the number three from the number of pigs, to the number of everything in the Bear’s home. The Three Little Pigs had a purpose to leave their mothers home to find their fortunes and to learn to become independent because the mother was no longer able to tend to the pigs any more than she had. The Three Bears already had purposed that they wanted to go pick some berries to make a pie (in some versions) so they stepped out the house to do so. In other versions, the bears left the home to let their fresh bowls of hot porridge cool down. Goldilocks was just wondering through the forest picking wild flowers when she came upon the Bear’s cottage. She didn’t have a purpose for other than what seemed to be invading and taking what didn’t belong to her and being a curious young girl. The wolf had a purpose to have the three pigs for dinner, literally. The Three Little Pigs had purposes to find jobs and to make something of themselves as grown-ups.

    Read More

More about Fairytales Unscripted: A Narrative Report

Open Document