Evaluation of East End Tales

East End Tales is a play written by Fin Kennedy. It is a series of nine stories inspired by photos and news articles from local papers in east London. The story ideas were developed by a group of Year 10 Bengali girls, and as they worked with the play developing it, it was then written in a lyrical style. We performed the play as a physical theatre piece, using our bodies to show feelings instead of using our voices. It was performed on the 12th February 2015, at my school (The Brit School of Performing Arts).

I developed ideas for the performance by watching videos on youtube of physical theatre, and I also went to see a play performed at my school which was physical theatre. I learnt a lot of things in class as well, when we did activities and excercises for example when we had to use our bodies to create sounds which sounded like the weather. 

The play script helped me develop ideas, when I read it I read between the lines I dug deeper into the characters, so each one I played, even the tiny parts, so in my head I had a whole background story for them, and this helped me play the characters better. I also used the playscript to help me with the soundscapes, I would read through knowing where the tale was set and what kind of weather it was, so I could make the sounds of it in the background. 

At first I think everyone was kinda stuck in the aspect of developing the pieces and making them physical theatre. I think a lot of people found it hard to get comfortable with moving our bodies in different ways and being quite uncomfortable. When we started doing excercises in class and becoming more and more understanding and comfortable with physical theatre the tales started to get better and develop. When we all would work in big groups and focus on something I think the work produced was really good, when everyone concentrated and tried hard the overall product was really good. I liked when we did the monologues, I think it helped everyone to understand the play more on a personal level, as we wrote them ourselves we could really go deeper into our chosen characters emotions. 

The moments that worked the best for me were the group tales, Tale 1 with all the girls and Tale 2 with all the boys worked very well. I think this because it was effective how the boys were acting out being a girl and the girls were acting out being boys. And because we directed them it was interesting to see what the boys think of girls and how they interpret them and how girls do the same for the guys.

My favorite moment was probably when the domestic abuse tale came on, I think it was good because its a subject that isn't talked about much and is a touchy subject and for 14-15 year olds to be interpreting their opinions of it is a very big thing. I think the audience was shocked as it is a big topic, and I wanted them to be because it would've drawn them in and made them think and feel something towards the subject. The play has a lot of different stories all which can happen in real life and domestic abuse is something that happens everyday to many people, and I believe its something that people find uncomfortable because its a very serious subject, and by us yr 10s performing about, I think this would've made a big impact on the audience.

I liked the tale about the lioness called Michele whose drugs get take from her. I think Michele played the character well, when the drugs get taken away from her she played the character so well, you could tell just from her eyes how badly she needed those drugs and how precious they were to her. She created a very tense atmosphere which drew all the audience in, the way she spoke and the way her body language was made everyone feel on the edge and she really did an amazing job. 

The weaknesses were working as an ensemble. Trying to get everyone listening
and concentrated was hard especially when doing the soundscapes. And in my group trying to get everyone involved and engaged was very hard. We over came it by basically realising that we hadn't much time left and when we all realised that everyone worked really hard and pulled through because theatre is important to all of us.

I have developed my physical theatre skills and my accents. I am now more comfortable with physical theatre and have a better understanding of it. I also have developed my accent skills as I now can do an East End accent. This term I have learnt that when it comes to acting you just have to let yourself completely go no matter how stupid you feel doing it because what your producing will probably look really great. I also learnt that even if you don't get along or like the people your working with you have to find a way to compromise and get on with the work because in life there is always going to be people you don't work well with but you have to put up with it anyway.

I have become better at learning lines and being able to lean them quickly. I have practiced by focusing in the class more and concentrating on the work only. And finally I have learnt how to rehearse efficiently.

Overall I think the performance went really well. Everyone pulled together to create a really good piece of work. I believe I have developed my team skills and my physical theatre skills. I will always use everything I have learnt in this project in the future. I really enjoyed physical theatre and hope to do more of it. 

HMW or lesson on 5th Feb

In todays lesson we mainly ran through our tale, but because there was many people missing it was hard to run through ours. What I did was talk to my group about how if we became a particular character at the beginning, so it would make the audience immediately know that the tale is set in a shop. I think just adding small details was a good idea because if we made big changes it would've been hard to rehearse it with everyone by the next week also it would of been messy because it was very new. Also using small little details makes the piece look more realistic and draws the audience in.

We used soundscapes in some of the tales. This adds a bigger and better affect to the tale, we mainly used them in the tale which use terms to do with the weather. It sounds so good when we all use different sounds to create a storm or hail. We used soundscapes as well in the domestic abuse scene when the plates were smashed, the only problem with this one was because the sound would be one big bang if someone was late or early or if someone didn't do it, the whole effect is ruined.

Because our tale was quite short we actually finished early so we didn't have to have extra rehearse time.

HMW for lesson on 22nd Jan

In today's lesson we mainly went through everything perfecting it all. We started with the taxi bit. I like how we all have different actions in each of our parts. Its really good when we all join in on the "knowwarramean" parts, it sounds really effective and sounds like the East End. To improve we need to get into the East End character more, using an accent and acting like a cab driver. To do this we need to physicalise a cab driver by using actions to show were driving a taxi, also slouching over and looking like were not the best mannered but not rude. When I imagine a East End cab driver I think of a man who is not exactly the brightest but is really nice and friendly.

We then worked on the Tales 1 and 2. Im in tale 1 which has all the girls, at first we kind of struggled getting on and doing stuff because we had plenty of ideas, which meant we would talk about what we were going to do instead of trying ideas out and putting them into our work. But when we did finally start doing work it was really good and we all work well together. In the lesson we changed some of the ending to make it look better and cleaner. To improve I think we just need run it through loads so we know exactly where we need to be without looking at the others.

We finally worked on our individual tales. With my group we put everything together and just kept running through. The hardest thing about my group has been trying to get everyone involved instead of not caring, I've just been putting on a positive attitude because I really want to do well and do the best that I can. To improve I think we need to all be on time with every "kerrching" and group action or sound. We can achieve this by running it through loads and really getting to know the piece inside and out.

EET Homework for lesson on Thurs 15th Jan

 3 ideas you might use to develop the last chunk of your tale:

1. Use physical theatre by interpreting the characters in the tale, show their emotions and appearances.

2. When talking use an East End accent.

3. Try to use the whole stage when performing and think about spacing so it looks good and is helpful for the audience watching so they can see everything.

We started the lesson doing the Taxi prologue which didnt go to well. I think everyone needed to practise more and we need to learn our lines. I think it will look really good when we add actions and if everyone does East End accents it will be amazing. I know that in the East End their really loud especially at markets so if we give that vibe i think it will be really good.

Our group tale is going okay, Ive been kind of leading the tale, but still be getting ideas of others. The problem with my group is that some members are being really uninterested and not doing it or just not puting full effort into it. Also my whole group are not putting on East End accents and Im the only one so its really unbalanced as a piece. I just hope they learn their lines and come into their characters on the day of the show.

Thurs 18th November EET class

In our lesson today we were split into two groups, boys and girls. We decided to make the boys do tale 2 and the girls do tale 1. We decided this because we thought it would be more interesting if the boys portrayed a women and the girls portrayed a man. This would also help with our acting skills as now we have to interpret the opposite sex to which we are, and we have never done this before so its another learning curve. I actually really liked doing tale 1, I thought the character we had to portray was really interesting and I thought that it was good also because we were able to do a lot with the tale using lots of physical theatre. 

what decisions did you make when staging Tale 1? We decided to make the main staging a diamond shape, we chose to do this because it looked really effective when we did some of the movements. It also gave us more oppitunites to use physical theatre effectively, for instance at the beggining Gloria says "he be a boy" and then everyoneone goes down one by one in their lines saying "he be a boy" and looks really cool. Its also good because who ever is talking goes to the front of the diamond, so its a good way to show to the audience clearly who is talking and so they can see and hear them, and its also good so whoever is talking can have their moment in the spotlight. 

what is working well?  Needs Improving? What is working well is that we have used physical theatre in an interesting way. For example when Nancy says "spiky hair" we all surround her at different levels pretending to be the hair and when she runs her hand through her hair we all move back like the hair on her head would. What needs improving is how we approach the work, because everyone has good ideas but choose to share them all at the same time. So what happens is that we do more talking then acting and trying the ideas out. So to improve we need to do less talking and more doing.


When working on your group tale - what section did you focus on next? We focused on the "kerrching" paragraphs. Because there is a lot of the Kerrching" sections that we should do the same actions each time. So I decided that we physicalise the cash machine, so because I each time say the lines I stand in the middle, and everyone else surrounds me being different parts of the cash machine.   

How are you communicating it in Physical Theatre style? Well we use our bodies to represent different parts of the cash till. For instance Daniel is the food scanning part, so he pretends to move the food and scan it, he also makes the sound of the food being scanned. 

How are you delivering the lines? I deliver my lines doing an East End accent, I also slouch over and look really board because my character is a moody teen who really coudnt care less about this job and just wants to leave.

What ideas do you have for staging the rest of your tale? I think we should use physical theatre when we are describing the characters. In the tale there are parts when the characters are described on their personality and appearance so maybe we could use our bodies to show that.