My rationale - Animal farm

Animal farm by  George Orwell

Created by Shake & Stir theatre co.

Adapted for the stage by Nick Skubij

 

 

The production animal farm is an allegory for the Russian revolution. Each character symbolising something from this event for instance Boxer represents the working class, he lets the higher authority (pigs) make all his decisions, he trusts them but is later betrayed (when he dies his body parts are sold) or for example squealer who represents the Russian Media, he justifies the pigs and spreads false statistics, squealer is used to explore how power can often use language to twist the truth and gain control or for instance my character, Mr Pilkington, the easy going gentleman farmer who represents the capitalist governments of England and the united states with his bitter enemy, Mr Frederick, who is based on Adolf Hitler. 

 

The message we wanted to get across to the audience is that we should always be aware of what s going on in our government as sometimes people can get to greedy and selfish and no longer care for the people of the country. That you should stand up for what you believe in, no matter how hard you must fight to let your opinions and voice be heard.

 

personal aims and goals

During this performance I wanted to gain more confidence in acting and being on the stage, for me to perform to my full potential I have to feel combatable with my environment and the people around me, so during this production I have gained  better friendships and became closer with my peers. I also want to show my teacher and my audience that I can play any role that is thrown at me since the character I am playing in animal farm is completely different to me as a person for instance I am a young female where as Mr Pilkington is a older male!

 

 





Everybodies roles

Animal farm by  George Orwell

Created by Shake & Stir theatre co.

Adapted for the stage by Nick Skubij

 

 

cast

 

Director/old Major/animal - Rachel Blanch

Assistant director/Jones/guard dog - Emily Louise Becroft

napoleon - Cameron May

Snowball- Rani Matthews

Squealer- Isabella Ragonese

Boxer- Tobias Gaitt

Mollie/pig/hen- Jessie Barclay

Clover- Taylor McCool

Benjamin - Jayden Mallin

Mr Pilkington/sheep - Charlotte Daniels (me)

narrator 1 - Kayla Davidson

narrator 2 - Alana Rhodes

narrator 5- Ryan McAuliffe

 

props set design:

Alana Rhodes

Emily Louise Becroft

Rani Matthews

Taylor McCool

Charlotte Daniels (me)

 

Costume:

Rani Matthews

Alana Rhodes

Isabella Ragonese

Charlotte Daniels (me)

 

Makeup:

Taylor McCool

Alana Rhodes

Kayla Davidson

 

Music:

Cameron May

Rachel blanch

Ryan McAuliffe

 

lighting:

Emily Louise Becroft

Jayden Mallin

 

 

 



Mr Pilkington costume and makeup

Since I am playing a male character and I am female I want to make it seem believable so for my makeup I used a light brown eyebrow pencil which matches my hair colour to draw on a beard,  made my side burns and eyebrows thicker and longer, which are all characteristics of men!

 For my outfit, I used my dads jeans to make me look really frumpy and bigger built, I used a lot of layers to symbolise that a farmer is out in the cold working hard and I added a tartan shirt, which is a stereotypical farmer piece of clothing and also to add some colour

Since my hair is long, like a girl I will be using a lot of hairspray and tightly pulling back my hair into a bun, to make more like a man, give me ore of a professional look and to make sure my hair isn't covering my face and therefore preventing the audience from seeing my emotion when I'm on stage

Saturday rehearsal

Today we went through, the entire play without stopping, one whole run through, for the first time. It took us about an hour and a half and we had Daphne in for the day to do a technical run through with the lights!
without stopping it made the play seem a lot more real and therefore made me focus a lot more and get into my character.
we also put all of our scenery, props and set together for the first time, which again made it seem more real and made things a lot more serious.

The slides to the other room were opened up during our run through which gave me an idea on where the audience are going to be situated. Rachel (director) sat at the very back of the room and told me if she could see more or hear me when I was on stage which helped me to realise I needed to speak louder and showed me where I needed to be situated on the stage so that all the audience could see me at all times.

 we also used fishing wire to tie the tree to the light fitting and rani and I laminated the windmill blocks so that when they are pushed and thrown around the stage they don't get destroyed or ripped.

Term 1 Week 9 period 4

Today we went through the slaughter scene this is the scene where an animal kills another animal for the first time in the play which is very important since one of the 10 commandments for animal farm is 'no animal shall kill a fellow animal' in this scene I play a goose who is killed for questioning Napoleon. we wen through this a few times however I feel the scene is a little weak as when we die it doesn't make a very big impact we just fall to the ground however when the music and lighting is added the scene will be more intense.

we also went through the re building of the windmill scene, which is a choreographed piece where the animals (an animal ,boxer, clover and  Benjamin) have synchronised movements as they move the blocks of the windmill across the same this makes the scene really strong, powerful and also adds diversity as lots of the scenes involve a lot of straight talking between characters, where as this interprets the story in a new fresh way to the audience.

Set preperation and decoration day 2!

Today we started by doing rehearsals, we ran from scene 7  till the end it took us nearly 2 hours. Since in-between scene's everyone would stop to discuss what is going on in the scene which shouldn't be happening, at his stage we should just be running through the scenes without stopping because we know it so well. this is something which should have been sorted in the first few weeks of rehearsals! so in the last few lessons we are going to have to really focus and work as hard as we have ever worked, no messing round and make sure all of us no are lines and where we are. luckily for me I have know my lines from the beginning, since I don't have as much lines as others also the times I come on stage is very spaced out so it gives me time to get prepared and to get in to character between scenes.

next Rani and I, spent the rest of the day in the sewing rooms creating the slave outfits for the animal at the start of the play. I used a material called calico. I started off my cutting out two rectangles of fabric of 60cm in width. I pinned the sides and cut out a v shaped whole at the top for the head to fit through, next I sewed up any where that had pins, there was a few malfunctions with the sewing machine at times since I haven't used a sewing machine in about 2 years so it took me a little time to get used to it before I got started. next I turned the garment inside out so no one could see the sewing lines and began to rip, cut and tear the garment to make it look used, worn and old.

Term 1 week 8 period 3

Today we started scene 10, which is the final scene out of the whole production. scene 10 is also where I have my rather large speaking part for Mr Pilkington. we didn't actually get to my part of the scene however whilst others where rehearsing I went over my lines a few times. Also in lesson I created a mind map for my character, Mr Pilkington. I have been quiet un sure on who my character was, what he stood for and most importantly his significance to the story. I also created a back story fir my character to help me further get into role and I also don't have much lines through out the production which makes it difficult to know who my character is so by creating the back story it gave me more to work with. from making this mood board I am now more aware of my who my character is and have a better insight on how I should play him on stage.