Florida Trip

Over Thanksgiving break (November 16-24) I went to Florida for vacation, where I noticed some relations to theatre. On Saturday November 17, I went to a football game at University of Florida. My dad and I were able to get seats in a box with his college friend, Mike Rywant. I took a million pictures while we were there, and I noticed that the view from the box showed the stadium looking similar to an ampitheatre. I was reminded of the time we went to our football stadium during class one time to simulate an ampitheatre. Here is a picture of my view:

Then, on Sunday November 18, I walked around campus with my dad. I am looking at possibly attending University of Florida for college, so it was an awesome experience! And of course, I had to take a picture when I saw the theatre building. If I went to school there, maybe I would take some classess in the theatre building:

Also, at the end of our tour, I was stopped in my tracks when I saw an ampitheatre!!! I told my dad we just had to stop and take a picture for my theatre class because it looked like an ampitheatre, and he told me it was. This would be a great place for an impromptu play, and I bet the theatre students use it often. It was really pretty, and I would love coming to this spot if I go to school here!

PPP Reflection

We also compiled a Practical Performance Proposal (PPP), which is a 250 word pitch about what you would do with a stiumli. Then, you write a 1000-1500 word explanation explaining your choices using research. My stimuli was the Hagia Sophia, and I wrote about performing a play in the dome of the building. We all shared our ideas with the class, and I completed this reflection about the experience of writing/learning about other people's PPPs.

I thought hearing about everyone's PPP's was fascinating! The PPP was really fun to write because it displayed my creativity. I could write about anything I wanted, so that made me more interested and enthusiastic about the paper. I thought I had a pretty creative idea for my PPP, and then when I heard everyone else talk about theirs I got even more inspiration. The most interesting lesson about hearing everyone else's ideas was the difference between them all, yet the similarities as well. That just goes to show we can all use our PPP's to demonstrate our unique creativity. The only other person's PPP who I found about in detail was Frida's, and I thought her idea was brilliant. She planned to perform "Jesus Christ Superstar" in the Hagia Sophia. I thought this was interesting because we both chose the same stimuli but had totally different ideas as to what to do with it. However, our ideas were similar in that we both incorporated the research about the cultural elements of the Hagia Sophia. Frida discussed the fact that she would be performing a Christian play in a Muslim place of worship, using a homosexual actor. I found her tying together of all of these different cultures very interesting and creative. In mine I also incorporated the history of the Hagia Sophia in being transformed from an Eastern Orthodox Church into a Muslim mosque. I briefly learned about everyone else's PPP's and I thought it was cool that a couple people would perform already written plays, while other people would perform plays that they had actually come up with by themselves. I like the idea of writing your own play better, but I think both are creative and effective. I look forward to writing more PPP's in the future, and changing my perspective each time!

RI reflection

So for Theatre HL, we have to write a 2000-2500 word research paper about a theatre practice and how it pertains to an aspect of a play. I wrote about how actors protraying Mother Courage and Swiss Cheese would convey Brecht's idea that theatre should appeal to reason, not feelings. I have written my rough draft so far, and since it was our first RI, Mrs. Burke had us reflect:

The first RI was certainly a learning experience. I'm not accustomed to research of this magnitude, or even writing regular essays of this length, so it was definitely a struggle. Although, in the scope of IB, having to write a 2000 word research paper will certainly prove a helpful practice for our extended essay. However, it was not just the superficial word count that proved difficult. Finding good research was a certainly a challenge, making it even harder to create a thesis because I wasn't sure if my ideas would have enough research to back them up. Organization of my essay also proved to be another challenge. I wasn't sure how to space out my summary of the play, and then it felt awkward not to start talking about what I would actually do with the play until a couple pages into my paper. Although these challenges were sometimes incredibly frustrating, I know they helped me to learn something totally new in writing this research paper. Another rewarding challenge was the actual topic of my RI. I chose to research Brecht's Epic Theatre, which I discovered I didn't really like. It made me uncomfortable to envision that type of theatre. However, it was good because I know I need to expand my horizons to learn about new theatre practices. In that aspect, Epic Theatre was a good topic to choose if only to challenge myself. Yet, in the future I will probably try to pick a different topic that I can find more information about and that I will be more interested in. Despite its challenges, I'd say this first RI was a success in that it taught me a lot. What's life without some learning experiences? ;)

Reflection

As this is the end of my first marking period in IB Theatre HL I, I thought it would be appropriate for a reflection on what I've learned/ experienced so far. WOW! What a fantastic learning experience taking this class has proved to be! I've already learned so much about theatre practices I didn't even know existsed! Theatre of cruelty and epic theatre have taken me to all new realms of possibility, but they have also taught me that appreciating theatre does not mean that you have to like anything. I am certainly not a fan of either epic theatre or theatre of cruelyt because I don't like how they pick at the sub-conscious. However, just because I don't like them doesn't mean I shouldn't learn about them, hence my RI on epic theatre. I have also been incredibly forutnate this marking period to experience theatre performances!! We had a fabulous trip into the theatre world at Penn State, showing me how versatile theatre studies can prove to be. I look forward to learning even more theatre practices, as well as trying to go experienc etheatre around me even more. I know this will be integral to my evolving studies throughout this course. I <3 THEATRE! :)