Helen's performance

5. Select a passage from a novel you have chosen to study which provides an effective introduction of an important character or characters. How would you use staging, design and acting to ensure that this introduction would have dramatic importance for the audience? To show a strong beginning of the story, I will choose to have Désirée starting from her early age when her real mother abandons her under the mango tree since the flashback in the middle is confusing for the audience to understand what is really going on. As a result, I will have her flashback about the drought and about not having water, then her mother tries to throw her away, in which it explains clearly why she is related to the gods. And also, it gives specific and reasonable details about how and who is Tonton Julian and Mama Euralie. To stage this, I will give a brief introduction, someone over talk to the audiences about the severe weather and severe situation. Maybe, the gods will stand on the side, watching at ...

3.     Select a passage from a novel you have chosen to study which deals with despair and euphoria. How might staging, design and acting combine to register  one  of these experiences for an audience? From my love, my love, I feel strongly and emotionally about her euphoria moment because it makes me feel the happiness in her life. Even though she meets many troubles at the end, she still recalls the memory of before; and I still want to highlight her happy moments. As a result, I chose the point when she goes to hotel, and sees Daniel is there. And started to take care of Daniel from her heart and her soul. She spends her days and nights taking care of his body, messaging, putting energy for him, but as she gets weaker, he also takes care of her, and that's the point when they bond together the strongest. The scene that I want to display is when they find each other and know they cannot live without one another; Desiree lives in affection from Daniel; D...

Chapter 15: Désirée stays in the small room for a long time and she doesn't want to eat because she is not seeing Daniel; the servant said he went away. Then, Mathilde is here, trying to persuade her to go away. However, Désirée keeps saying she is belonged to Daniel; And Mathilde tells her that Daniel is getting married with Andrea. Désirée doesn't want to believe in this, so when Daniel is back, she is waiting and asking him if they are going to be married. Daniel says he is going to be married with Andrea, but he doesn't want Désirée to leave because they both love each other. In addition, when Désirée is staying in the room, Papa Gé shows up in the dream, but other gods are speaking through him. Erzulie questions Désirée why she threw the red comb away; Agwe gives her knife to kill Daniel because he betrayed Désirée and the gods. Then, Désirée wakes up, but she doesn't want to believe that the Gods came to her dream, and at the same time, she finds the knife, so sh...

Chapter 12: Désirée is woke by Daniel's godmother Madame Mathilde; the godmother wants Désirée to leave the castle. However, Désirée explains that she cannot leave now because she is here for Daniel Beauxhomme. She knows that he is not getting well, so she can help him by having her soul and her love. Then, Daniel comes in and says to Mathilde that he cannot leave her as well because he becomes better after she looks after him. And he will explain this to his father. When his father arrives, he is surprised that Désirée is here. And Daniel tells his father that he becomes better and feels refreshed when Désirée is here. Moreover, Mathilde begs to Gabriel that Daniel looks better in his eyes. Désirée looks in Daniel's eyes, thinking that's the reason why she stays with him, and she doesn't care about his father. Désirée and Mathilde work together to help Daniel's sickness. And Désirée takes care of him when he feels sick every day. This is when Daniel feels stronger...

The peasants also worship the gods, hoping and believing gods is the only way that can guide them through disasters and mishaps in their lives. The book had totally 4 gods: Agwe, god of water, Asaka, god of earth, Erzulie, god of love, and Papa Gé, god of death. Each god have different power and control different thing in the book. For example, Agwe is a cruel, and aggressive god. In Chapter 1 page 16, " Agwe sometimes unleashed to devastate fields, flood roads, and sweep everything out to sea." From this sentence, we can acknowledge how aggressive he is; he will leave nothing for the peasants when he is agitated. However, Agwe is also very unpredictable and gentle to the children; when Désirée's mother abandons her because there is no much for them to eat, to survive, her mother leaves her under the mango tree. As a result, Agwe is mad and floods the everything; this caused a lot of people died, and yet Désirée survive from it. From my perspective, it might be a boy who ...

Chapter 11: Désirée stays in the moonlit sea, bathing herself, combing her hair. As the morning comes, she dresses up and goes right up to the Black Mountain to see Daniel. The shoes she has couldn’t fit her feet because she had never have this kind of confinement before; but, for Daniel, she has to wear it.  At the top of the mountain, the gatekeeper lets her get through. At the same time, she sees Daniel and his father driving by. Then, Daniel asks Désirée who is she, and why she is so familiar to him. Désirée answers that she comes to see him from far away. And so Daniel disappears. Then, she sees the beautiful lands that Daniel has: fruit orchards, waterfall, pheasants, peacocks around the garden. Désirée wants to make the garden as her home here. In the garden, she can do whatever she wants: gathering foods, bathing in the swimming pool, snuggling besides the trees. She sure wants to see Daniel, but she knows if she does, people will throw her out from the hotel forever, so s...

The most impressive part of that performance is the lighting and stage technology. Before the show, Ms.Guarino told us about this show is about Afrofuturism, which is a combination of African cultures with the technology. As we see the play, this was all played by black, brown people. All different personality, identity in blacks give us the acceptance and sympathy of black and brown people in the world. When the director told us to switch off the phone, the performances began to impress us immediately. It first started with a man in VR experience. This experience took us into an imaginative memory on the screen. The first word that I said is Oh my god. I have never thought about theatre can be actually like this. With all the photos on the screen, the popping music switched on as well. Then, many dancers come up to the stage, with the rhyming music and videos. It combined perfectly to the theme of futurism. On the other hand, the music itself is more on the African style: the drums, t...

Chapter 6: As all the thing gets back to normal: plants start to grow, peasants start to work, Désirée has other thinking about her boy, Daniel; she constantly is dreaming about him. Then, Désirée wants to leave the family to find the boy. But first, she goes to Monsieur Bienconnu’s house, listening to the story of Daniel and his father. She then knows how and why they are so rich in the society. Désirée comes back from Monsieur’s house, seeing and telling her dad about her plan of going to find the boy. She thinks that the boy needs her. However, as Mama Euralie sees her, she forbids her to leave the house, and grabs her to the gods. Chapter 7: As Mama Euralie grabs her daughter to make a plea about whether Désirée should leave or stay, Désirée is frightening, and scared about all the actions. She doesn’t think that the gods will agree with her opinions. They then walk into a drumbeats, in which the gods are in there? From there, she sees her mother, saying lies about leaving her ...

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1MUDN2YUNP1erRUauwEh8qSgTmrDwR2OYH56xCivFQjU

Stage this as a play, custome Désirée peasant girl and outside dreamer. In this play, all the peasants are wearing colorful traditional clothes to represent the culture of this island. Also, they can wear ripped or dirts cloth to represent they are working on the farms. However, Désirée might wear something else like a blue and red color of dress. This dress is what I am hoping her to wear because one the red represents the passion of going out, passion of experiencing different situation. And to point out more of the dreamer’s point, there is butterfly on this dress. This expresses largely about the dream of hers, wishing to have a car and have a man picking her up. The blue strip, the blue color, represent the related relationship between Désirée and the Agwe, god of water. Maybe on her head, she will have a butterfly rubber band to further point out her goal. I think Agwe can have all blue costume to highlight the role of water god. (All blue with paints on his body) The god of...