Final Task Reflection

The strengths of our performance were that we were able to show the audience what we intended otherwise our character movement/Gesture, personality and interactions were clear. The audience understood our characters. Our mimed interactions and audience interactions were somewhat good alongside the length of our performance, it was barely at 2:30 seconds, therefore we needed to improve that. Our language and sound effects were not that good, clearly we did not focus on that part of the scenes and should have done that.

If I were to score my performance I wold rate our own performance 22-25 out of 35, since we got some of the clear sections done, but the details within the performance were untouched, we need to focus on that for the next unit.

Overall I think that the absolute BEST part about our performance was the relationship between the characters, that was clearly shown and interpreted throughout the performance, how Harlequino always ruined Pantalone's plans, and the various different pranks Harlequino performs, it was actually a pretty fun task to act out.

If I were to improve it, I would certainly look to the areas that we did not meet first, which are: Language, Gramelot, Audience interaction and the total duration of the performance, after touching upon those matters and especially fixing the gramelot issues I will move on to the areas that were met but no so greatly, such as interactions, clear structure of the scene and mimed interactions, they were met according to the rubric but need serious improvement! therefore after touching up on all factors that I think should be fixed, I believe our performance should go up to the 28-30 score bands, or a 7-8 out of ten (maximum).

Other groups...

First Group (Who did as well as us): Taseen and Arshad (Maybe they were better)

Strengths: They had good interactions, we understood who the characters were (Arshad, yours was a bit confusing), but afterwards we got to understand the scene, you had a few audience interactions and actually a fair use of gramelot... Nice job!

Score: I would score their performance maybe a 26 (minimum) and 28 (maximum) or a possible 7-8 out of 10

Best part: The best part was when Taseen was explaining this part to Arshad and he did not seem to understand, though later on he did.

Improvements: More Gramelot (Just like us)

More sensible audience interactions 

And show a clear structure of the scene, so that we (audience) can understand.

Second Group: Shopnil and Jawwad 

Strengths: Their group was somewhat better than ours in terms of entertainment, I liked theirs aswell especially during the points when Shopnil was trying to explain something, Jawwad (Pantalone) ruined it, and teased him. Perfect relationship, nice job guys!

Scores: I would rate their performance a 30-32 out nof 35 or a possible 8-9 out of 10, since they did meet most of the requirements (INCLUDING GRAMELOT, Congratulations for that!)

Best part: Again the explanation scene and the great use of audience interactions was nicely done

Improvements: To get the maximum grade, you would need to have a longer scene

Maybe more interactions, since we did find it a bit continuous, other than that, the performance was AWESOME!

Both groups including our one did pretty good from my perspective, we enjoyed the task and probably hope to do something like this in the near future!

-What did you do well? 

I think that we had an understandable plot structure, which explored into both character's views and opinions throughout the act, therefore we had a pretty good understanding on who we were, and what we were supposed to do, the audience understood what we had to do and our intentions throughout the act.

-What did feedback did you receive? What do you need to improve? 

The direct feedback we got from ms. Kimi, was that there was no gamelot or jibberish, therefore we have to add language in order to dive into the separate characteristics and expressions of the character, hence we need more language and the performance was around 1.3 minutes, we need to add extra content in order to add to the scenes furthermore lengthening the performance. 

-What specific things will you do to improve before performance?

I will try to add more content, and climax to the story, and basically lengthen the performance, I would like to use language and sounds to characterize the different characters, and I would also like to make the performance a bit more 'vibrant' otherwise not repetitive but newer ideas every scene.

Peer Evaluation:

I will be assessing Arshad and Taseen's group...

-What did they do well? 

They had a variety of things going and we could understand who was which character.

-What feedback would you give them? 

Arshad's actions were a bit confusing since he was performing in an awkward manner which did not add to the character.

-What specific things could they do to improve before performance?

Use a bit more gramelot and maybe make your intentions and interactions a bit more clear?

The audience calling part was a nice addition though I did not understand what I had to do when I was up on stage with them.

Peer Evaluation

I will be assessing Ryan and Azman

-What did they do well? 

They had a variety of different interactions and the characters were understandable-What feedback would you give them? 

Call up some audience members and include them into the climax

Use gramelot

-What specific things could they do to improve before performance?

Gramelot

Audience interactions

Final Performance Process Update- Unit 2

Starting off the class last week, we started to plan and brainstorm out three scenes that could possibly best describe pantalone (Anira) and Harlequino's (Saadman/me) relationship, the ideas that we devised for our final Comedia dell' Arte final performance task were the following:

• Pantalone tries to greedily steal a few vegetables from a stall, while the merchant is facing away, harlequino makes a large gramelot noise and notifies the merchant, in result pantalone is in trouble... Later on pantalone finds out who did this, and finds that harlequino is hiding behind a tree, as pantalone rushes with his ushered back, harlequino continues to jump around and notify everybody, later on pantalone punches harlequino and he falls to the ground fainted... Pantalone once again locks his room and goes in to trade with a successful merchant, Harlequino picks the lock and successfully ruins the trade, takes the chair away from pantalone, and in result he will fall.

We tried to focus on one big idea throughout the class, so we picked the idea focused on above, We chose this because it had more climax, there was drama, entertainment and most important of all it will show the two characters relationships in the world of comedia, Our story will have some audience interactions, such as when harlequino is picking the lock he will ask the audience members fir help on pranks or tricks to play on pantalone, it will be above 2 minutes maximum 3. And there will me a use of constant gramelot throughout, otherwise it will contain exaggerated expressions and meet the requirements on the rubric.

• It contains most of the requirements from the rubric (strength)
• It is a bit continuous and repetitive (weakness)

Part 1: Performance Task 1 Self-Assessment 
What choices did you make for your rough draft performance?

For my first rough performance, I made the following choices to enhance and add to my performance:

·         Add in more body gestures,

·         Interact with the environment or the audience around you

·         Communicate well with the audience in terms of what you are meet doing

·         Facial Expressions

I tried to include as many of the features listed above, to enhance my performance and overall communication, I wanted to add to the process which I utilize  to convey a message, or a specific environment to the audience, to not only add to mine but the audience’s experience along the performance aswell, I received kind yet constructive criticism about my act last class, and I hope that the new performance is/will be better than before, or at least meet the requirements, or the inquiries of the audience.

How much time did you spend practicing for your performance? 

To sum up the period of time I had spent on working on thinking, and composing this act would be very less compared to other tasks in drama class, Since the act was short it was easy to image the act, and the overall goal and requirement of the performance, but the more difficult part was keeping it concise, fitting the whole message, or environmental data to the audience, to show them what is around me, and what I am doing. In order to convey this message I indeed had to practice for around thirty to forty minutes but around 1 half hour thinking about the concise part, composing and organizing the series of movements, expressions and gestures… To perfectly fit the character I had picked and meet the audience’s and my personal requirements.

What specific feedback did you get from your Rough Draft performance? 

From my rough performance, the audience respected my performance, and alongside they also provided constructive criticism, or in this case feedback. The feedback the audience provided for me, were:

·         To contain more facial expressions

·         Higher interaction with environment

·         Communicate with audience

·         Overall Body Gestures.

What did you choose to change for your Final Performance? 

For my final performance I chose to change the focuses below:

To contain more facial expressions

·         Higher interaction with environment

·         Communicate with audience

·         Overall Body Gestures.

I consistently tried to include these 3-4, requirements into my performance/s. As observable from the repition along this blog… But I try to add these factors into most of my performances, only because they are areas of focus for me personally, and they are things I need to improve in order to enjoy not only myself but the audience aswell.

How did you feel your Final performance went? 

My performance was overall quite good, it met the requirements, and achieved my personal goals, I felt it was successful from my point of view, but can be improved.

What specific feedback did you get? 

The feedback which I received from Ms. Kimi, go as it follows:

“The Unlucky One”—victim of perpetual bad luck

-extra points for the fall (nice commitment)—looked real!

-nice physicality with legs & arms

-facial expressions good

-little longer, explanation with more things

-take out to audience

-reaction to test

Phone breaking, good…

Really unlucky—foot smacks floor

Good interactions

No taking out to audience

The feedback I received was good, and constructive, I appreciate the effort the audience put into analyzing my performance, and I really appreciate the basic attention the audience provides for me.

What score would you give your performance out of 10 using Criteria B descriptors? Explain why.

I would rate my performance a 7 out of 10. The 7 is a high number, and I think it is the maximum, or a more generous grading for my performance. My performance was quite good (not being arrogant). It was overall successful and there are some essential improvements to be made, it deserves a 7 at most because I showed an average understanding and had a good sense of idea and ability therefore I deserve this number out of 10, according to the criterion.

Part 2:

Pick someone who's character is completely opposite than the one you chose. 
Evaluate their character based on what you know about the character. 
How close did they come? What did you like about their performance? 
What do you think they could have improved from their performance? 
What score out of 10 would you give them using the Criteria B descriptors? Explain why.

 For this part I am picking Arshad, otherwise the chatterbox. The performance was one of the best, and his specialty was his use of levels and extreme facial expressions.  His character based on both real life and media related experiences, I can state that it was extremely realistic, I use the work extreme because of his essential use of facial expressions, he seemed like an ignorant person only talking about himself and other people, not listening to incoming conversations, he seemed that he was doing so. He actually came very close, but maybe he should have added a bit more interaction maybe more environment, by probably giving people the ‘hand’ and performing other talkative gestures. I loved his use of levels along the performance, especially during him lying down on the floor. I liked his performance a lot, and I would grade it 8/10, I would give it that because he had exceptional skill and ability and knew what to do to imitate or act out this character. He met my requirements of facial expressions and levels, therefore it was AWESOME! GOOD JOB! 

-lazzi (what were your favorites within this piece? why?) 

My favorite part of today's class was viewing the different professional performances played and how we performed a bit today, our next class we re gonna get together in our groups and create another piece or scene tomorrow. ABOUT THE VIDEO, MY FAVORITE part was when they were in the car, the car had the best environmental sounds and furthermore a greater environment, it felt more alive and also because of the interaction with the audience. The other favorite part of the performance was when the girl corresponded to the actor, it seemed like the girl was paying attention and furthermore interacted with the actor fully, it showed that they were both fit for the scene and that the girl knew she was going to be the one to be on stage, i would like to question if the scene was planned or if it was improvised. Overall I found this very entertaining, and intuitive, it seemed very innovative to me especially because I never experienced anything like this before.

-using varied interactions (environment, props, characters, etc.) 

the environment was created through varied sounds and two chairs it was unique how they did the whole act with such a small use of physical props, they mainly used sounds which was their main interaction. The environment was fully generated through random sounds and probably a series of lights, the lights helped create a simple mood, but it also enhanced the actor's mood and overall facial expression. The variety interactions helped create mood and environment, the main props were two chairs, otherwise the rest were created through imagination. 
-taking out to audience 
He called up a girl from the audience for his act. THe girl acted appropriately and went with the whole act,  he took out the audience by bringing out his inner character, honestly i think that the essential way to take out, is to act like your in the character's shoes, therefore you need to be the character in order to act it.
-exaggerated emotion (1 to 10) 
his exaggerated emotion was about 7 out of 10, this was when he was in the car, there was a lot of exaggerated expressions and emotions since he had a member of the audience, he had to clearly show the audience member what he was trying to communicate, therefore he had to be exaggerated.
-exaggerated physicality (use of space) 
He changed his use of space during different scenes so that was the only part where it occurred. The stage had different parts, such as the car, a park sort of place and some other environments, therefore it was divided so that the character could move around and create separate environments around the area.
-exaggerated facial expression 
During the car scene, when he got angry, happy and somewhat sedudctive. Again like before he used it to take out to the audience therefore it was required for the whole performance.
-stock characters of Commedia: He looked a bit like harlequin and pant alone changing at times. He had to do so in order to communicate with the audience around him.
-performance elements (sound, lights, staging) 
The main performance elements were sounds and lights, both used to create simple moods or serious emotions, both were created from lights and sounds, utilizing the senses of the human in order to show the audience what the actor means.
-working with audience member (how did he make it clear to her what she should do? how did he support and lead her through the scene?)
He used sounds and other senses to enhance it. he also used lights and other stage inventions to communicate to the audience what and how he meant what he stated.