Katie Mitchell Masterclass - Handout On Naturalism and Multi-Media in

Katie’s Career and features of Katie’s work

• Work in three areas: mainstream text-based theatre (combining new plays and classics), live cinema and opera. • Work is defined by psychological detail, a focus on female experience, a naturalistic aesthetic and radical experimentation with the forms of theatre making. • Worked for 31 years and directed over 100 productions, including 5 music theatre pieces, 17 live cinema shows 29 operas and 68 plays.

Katie’s career as a theatre director divides into two phases.

PHASE ONE: Naturalism and Stanislavsky in the UK

• Studied how Theatre Directors are trained in Europe and learnt techniques of Stanislavsky • During first 18 years of Katie’s career, she explored Stanislavsky’s techniques and naturalism in the UK working at all of the main , like Royal Court, NT, Donmar and RSC • Specialised in staging classic plays by like Strindberg, Chekhov and • Worked on new plays by writers like and • Mainly focussing in on the experience of the female characters.

PHASE TWO: Live Cinema and experimental work in mainland Europe

• In 2006 Katie staged ’s novel THE WAVES and created a new form of making theatre which was later called ‘live cinema’. • The novel comprises of 6 monologues and consists entirely of spoken thoughts and little dialogue. The challenge was how to communicate those thoughts and show how the characters were inside their own heads • ‘Live Cinema’ is a technique where there is a large screen above the and the action on stage is filmed and edited live and projected simultaneously on the screen. It is like looking at a film shoot at the same time as watching the finished film in a cinema • Katie tries to shift the emphasis from the interiority of the male characters to that of the female characters as the habit of audience is to look for meaning in the male characters. Live cinema is a technique to help audience focus in on female interiority.

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• In 2008, Katie took this live cinema technique to Germany and then started working regularly in Europe where she developed the live cinema technique • Moved away from working on texts by male writers to texts written by female writers like , Caryl Churchill and . • Directed more Novels, as well as playtexts. Novels were written mainly by women like the German , Elriede Yelinek, the Austrian poet, Frederike Mayrocke, and the American feminist, Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Katie directed more Novels than playtexts in this time as it was harder to find the female stories she wanted to tell in the existing canon of classical plays

PHASE ONE: Naturalism and Stanislavsky in the UK

The main features of PHASE ONE, the Naturalistic work:

• The texts selected focus on female characters and experience and the action of the plays take place in one indoor location (1). • The shows are staged in a proscenium configuration (2) and there is always a black guillotine curtain rising or closing on the action at the beginning and end of the scenes. • The set design (3) is very detailed and life like – often decayed industrial building or 19th Century domestic rooms with large windows and electric ceiling lights • The costumes (4) are very life-like and lived in, giving the impression they are real clothes and not theatrical costumes. Very little make-up is used • The lighting (5) is very naturalistic, representing a balance of natural light via windows or doors plus lighting from practical lights (for example, pendant ceiling lights, standard lamps or desk lights). The lighting designer will hide the use of the overhead theatre lights as much as possible. The light levels are very low and life like and not bright and theatrical. • The sound (6) is used in a naturalistic way to describe location and time (e.g. sound of dog barking). It is also very influenced by film, especially the use of abstract subliminal sound to underscore the scenes. Sometimes there is already an abstract sound effect running as the audience enter the room. This effectively subverts audience emotion when watching the performance. Music is used for scene changes, dance sequences and also works alongside the abstract sound design to underscore the scenes. More recently, will wear radio mics to balance the sound of spoken word and music / underscoring. • The Actors (7) move and talk in a life-like way with no added theatrical gestures. Similarly, they speak in a life-like normal way with minimal vocal projection. • The Movement (8) is very life-like and life-sized and detailed. Sometimes, slo-motion is used to emphasise a specific moment in the action. At other times dance sequences are used, mainly using the sort of ballroom dancing you’d see on STRICTLY.

Looking at Extracts of Productions Let’s take a look at some clips of shows to see what I mean when I talk about the elements of:

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• one indoor location, • proscenium configuration • detailed interiors • naturalistic lighting

The Seagull (day) Notice how the sunlight pours across the stage from stage left to stage right, how the practical electrical lights are suspended in the ceiling and how decayed the walls are.

THE SEAGULL (night) Notice how the practical lights are providing most of the lighting for the scene and how you cannot see any theatrical down lights from the lighting rig above the stage

Let’s turn our attention to sound and music. You will have noticed the use of the record player and dancing to music in THE SEAGULL, but let’s look at a bit of CLEANSED to understand how the idea of using sound design to underscore the scenes works:

CLEANSED Notice how the sound doesn’t fall away as the text begins but continues to underscore the scene. Notice also how all the actors are wearing radio microphones so that we can balance the spoken word volume with the soundscape.

WOMEN OF TROY Here is a clip from WOMEN OF TROY set in an industrial building. Notice how dark it is and how the lighting comes through doors and the glazed second floor, and how detailed the architecture, glazing and doors are. Notice also, the use of sound, dance and fire.

How to achieve this in a school setting Now, we have a clearer picture of main features of a Katie Mitchell production, let’s turn our attention to how to achieve a scene in the same style in a classroom setting.

• Pick a scene from a play that focuses on a female character. The play can be modern or classical. It can be written by a male or female writer. For female writers, have a look at plays by Alice Birch, Caryl Churchill, Lucy Prebble or . Here are some examples of plays containing some excellent short scenes: o Revolt. She Said. Revolt Again by Alice Birch o Love and Information by Caryl Churchill o Kill by Caryl Churchill • Make sure the scene takes place inside a room or building. • Present the scene in an end-on, proscenium arch configuration. The seating should be at one end of the room and the performance space at the other. • Any set design elements should be detailed and life-like. If students decide to paint their set, they should paint in a way that makes the space look lived in with evidence

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of daily wear and tear. If students are only using furniture and props in their scene, encourage them to find real objects that look worn and used. • If using Costume, guide the students to use clothing that looks life-like and lived in and does not look like a theatrical costume. Looking for costumes in a charity shop is an ideal place to start if there is money available. Avoid theatrical make-up like strong eye-liner and heavy foundation. • For Lighting, try and use practical lights such as desk lamps or bedside lights to provide the main lighting source. Challenge students to create a full blackout in the room they are working in, and use the practical lights to create the atmosphere for the scene. • Sound and Music could be generated through a phone and a Bluetooth speaker. Students should try and source naturalistic sounds and abstract sounds and music to underscore the action of the scene. Encourage them to explore sound ideas from films that they enjoy. There should be a clear relationship between the sound/music they are using and the action on stage. • When using Movement, ask students to pick one key moment to use slo-motion to emphasise the action. They could also try and include a moment of couple dancing. • should be naturalistic. They should play their characters as if there is not an audience looking at them. Use the following six-step process to get life-like and life- sized acting.

Lifelike and Life-sized acting The process is based on answering six simple questions. These 6 questions are a distillation of Stanislavsky’s work, honed by Katie Mitchell:

• Who am I? BIOGRAPHY • Where am I? PLACE • What time is it? TIME • What’s just happened? 24 HOURS BEFORE – IMMEDIATE CIRCUMSTANCES • What are the changes in the scene? EVENTS • What am I playing between the changes? INTENTIONS

Suggested Exercises to introduce students to these tools

BIOGRAPHY Why do we build biographies for characters we play? Everyone’s behaviour is shaped by events that have happened in our past. For example, if we have been bullied at an old school we can behave in a cautious way with friendships in a new school. Or, if we have been made to feel we are not good at doing something by a teacher, like we are not good at maths or at drawing, then we can be uncomfortable in a maths or an art class.

1. Open up a discussion Before working on biography take a few minutes to reflect on the way that things in your past effect how you behave at school or outside school. Thinking about the relationship between events that have happened to you in the past – your biography - and how you behave in the

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present moment will help you understand why you need to sort out the past of a character you are playing in a play. 2. Springboard your discussion with this practical exercise Ask your students to imagine they are walking into the school canteen at their first day of a new school. They could physically walk into a space and sit on a chair to help them. Ask them to do this in 3 different ways: o On the first day of a new school when they were bullied at their last school o On the first day of a new school when they were very popular at their last school o On the first day of a new school when they have previously been made to feel embarrassed about the clothes they wear As a group, discuss the difference in how the student walks, sits and looks around them in each scenario. You could ask the students to do this simultaneously as a group so they can also experience the difference in each scenario.

IMMEDIATE CIRCUMSTANCES When playing a character, why do we need to think about the action that has happened 24 hours in advance of the scene? In life, the effect of the past 24 hours is present in how we act in the present, and it’s the same for a character in a play.

Try these exercises with your students to introduce this concept: 1. Open up a discussion Ask your students to think about their past 24 hours. Is anything affecting their behaviour right now? Perhaps one person stayed up very late, and is now very tired and lethargic in class. This will open up a discussion about the relationship between the past 24 and the present. 2. Springboard your discussion with this practical exercise Ask one student to enter the classroom and sit down at a desk 3 times, with different immediate circumstances each time. • On Monday morning after staying up all night on their Xbox • At the beginning of the last lesson on Friday after having a horrid day at school where they got a detention • On Wednesday morning after having split up with a boyfriend/girlfriend the night before As a group, discuss the difference in how the student walks, sits and looks around them in each scenario. You could ask the students to do this simultaneously as a group so they can also experience the difference in each scenario.

PLACE Why do we need to think about Place when we are playing a character in a play? In life, being in a different place makes us act differently, and it’s exactly the same for a character in a play.

Try these exercises with your students to introduce this concept: 1. Open up a discussion

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Think about how you behave if you are in a classroom compared to how you behave in an airport or a shopping centre or on a football pitch. The amount of space you have, the temperature, the smell, the number of people moving around you and so on, all affect how we behave. 2. Springboard your discussion with this practical exercise Ask one student to walk across a room and sit on a chair and imagine you are in the following different place: o A doctor’s surgery o An airport o Your bedroom o A in a shop.

As a group, discuss the difference in how the student walks, sits and looks around them in each scenario. You could ask the students to do this simultaneously as a group so they can also experience the difference in each scenario. 3. Develop this exercise You can repeat the above exercise but ask students to use less everyday places such as: • A submarine • A boat on a rough sea • The moon • Underwater

TIME Why do we need to think about Time when we are playing a character in a play? In life, differences in time affect how we behave and it’s just the same for a character in a play. Time breaks down into 4 categories: • Year • Season • Day of the week • Time of the day You can explore this with your students by doing the following exercises: 1. Open up a discussion Ask your students to talk about how they behave in each of the categories of time. For example, ask them to think about the differences in how they would walk down in street in 1820 to 2020. Then ask them to talk about how they would behave on a lovely spring day, compared to a freezing cold winter day. Ask them to talk about how the behave on different days of the week – is it different on a Monday compared to a Saturday? Then ask them to think about how they would behave at different times of the day – how would they behave at 8am, 6pm and 2am? Guide them to understand how differences in time can change how we move or talk or look around us. Draw the student’s attention to how the 4 layers of time are always working together in life (we are always in a year, season, day of the week and specific time). 2. Springboard your discussion with this practical exercise Ask the student to imagine they are walking a few meters down the road to a bus stop, where they then sit down. Ask the students to do this in three different scenarios • On a Monday at 8am in the middle of winter • On a Friday a 6pm in Summer 1

• On a Sunday at 11am in Autumn As a group, discuss the difference in how the student walks, sits and looks around them in each scenario. You could ask the students to do this simultaneously as a group so they can also experience the difference in each scenario.

Using the Play text

A play text is a very dense weave of lots of different strands of information and on a first read, it may seem a little daunting to try and separate out the many strands. Looking out for the following things will help students break the text down: • BIOGRAPHY • PLACE • TIME • IMMEDIATE CIRCUMSTANCES • EVENTS • INTENTIONS

The students can use the simple technique of ‘Facts & Questions’ to locate the first four layers of information (Biography, Place, Time and Immediate Circumstances). Facts & Questions is a system of analysis where we can look closely at what is materially present in the text. It’s important to be sensitive to unconscious bias when doing this work (where the bias reflects our own lived experience and socialisation) which may mean we make assumptions about the identity of a character or other aspects of the environment or action in the text. Facts refer to any information that is indisputable. For example, if the characters are definitely married or related. Questions are the tools you use to interrogate the text for any information that is disputable. For example, if there is no information about the age of a character or there is no information about how two characters met. You address this information by asking a question about it.

Using this technique to locate information about PLACE in a text

STEP ONE: Ask the students to read the text and list the facts about the places. For example, ‘this takes place in ’. Encourage them to take information verbatim from the text.

STEP TWO: Ask the students to list the questions about the place which are not clear. For example: ‘Where in London is the flat?’. Then students must answer the questions as simply as they can from their first impression of the play, using the text to cross reference where they can.

STEP THREE: Then use the list of facts and answered questions to draw a ground plan of the house where the action takes place (identifying the room/s where the scene occurs), plus anything mentioned in the text about what is immediately outside the house, like drives or gardens or outhouses or boundaries. You can also draw a plan of the first floor if rooms in that floor are referred to in the action of the scene.

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The plans are helpful for acting in a life-like way as it allows the students to have a clear idea as to where they are coming from when they enter a room (where the action of the scene begins) and where they are going to when they leave the room. They will be able to stand in the room and turn 360 degrees and know exactly what is surrounding them (both inside and outside).

Using this technique to locate information about TIME in a text

Use the same technique of facts and questions to work out the season, day of the week and time of the day. Make sure students have a list of facts and a list of questions that they then answer from cross referencing the text. There may be some guess work as many play texts do not give you a clear idea about time.

Using this technique to build a character BIOGRAPHY

Build each character’s biography from the facts about the character that the text gives you and simple answers to any questions you may have about the characters’ past that arise when you read the scene.

STEP ONE: Read the scene and make two lists about the character’s past, one of facts and one of questions. Remember the two lists are only about what has happened in the past before the scene begins; it is not about what happens in the present action of the scene itself.

STEP TWO: Now put all the facts and answered questions in chronological order starting with when the character was born up until 24 hours before the play begins. Don’t worry if you can’t put precise date on every bit of information – just put it in the simplest place possible in the chronological timeline.

Remember the biography is to help the play the scene so keep cross referencing between the biography and the information or impressions the scene gives you. You repeat the same task for each character. Make sure you cross reference between the biographies as you are building them so that any decisions you make about one character’s past fit together logically will the other character or characters in the scene.

Using this technique to work out what happens 24 hours before the play begins (IMMEDIATE CIRCUMSTANCES)

Using the same technique of fact-and-questions, list the facts from the text about what has happened in the twenty-four hours before the scene begins and any questions you have about those twenty-four hours. Then answer all the questions as simply as you can and put the facts and the answered questions into a chronological timeline. If the students are looking at multiple scenes, they can also use this technique to investigate what happens in between scenes.

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Next the students need to work to analyse the present action of the scene, EVENTS and INTENTIONS.

EVENTS What is an event? Plays are mostly about watching characters change. This could be because of something other people do or say to them, an external event (like a war or revolution) or because they simply have a new thought. EVENT is a word that can describe a change in a play. These changes can be a big event like someone dying in a swordfight or small event like someone breaking eye contact and you realise they are lying to you.

Here is how you can help students identify events in the play: 1. Open up a discussion Ask students to think about changes in their own lives such as the moment when someone blows out all the candles at a birthday party or the moment when someone says something really horrible in an argument or the moment when someone tells you they love you. Ask them to think about the way an event can make them change what they then do or say or how they behave. For example, some events can speed up our heart beat or some could slow down our actions. 2. Look for events in the Play text Ask students to read the text slowly and image they are the characters in the situation. Start to notice when things happen that change what a character is saying or feeling or doing. It’s worth noting, most entrances and exits are changes. The change must affect all characters in the scene but it could have a greater effect on some characters than others depending on the situation. They can mark the events in their script by putting a box around them with a pencil. It can also help to number the events chronologically as a way to help them identify a precise moment in the play more quickly.

INTENTIONS What do we mean by Intentions? The word intention describes what one character wants to get from the other characters in the scene. Using this system of Events and Intentions, the characters intentions only change at a event. Intention can also be referred to as subtext, motivation, objective; what these words all really mean is a way of notating what the characters want to get from, or change in, the other characters.

Here is how you can help students explore character intentions in the play: 1. Open up a discussion Ask students to talk about moments in their own lives when they had a clear sense of their own intentions or others intentions towards them. Guide them to reflect on the way that a lot of communication in life is about getting something we want from another person(s). For example, if we were having an argument at home with a parent, the words we speak are often a result of wanting our parents to agree to something or see things from our point of view. Ask the students to reflect on these moments and identify what they wanted from the other person. 2. Look for character intentions in the Play text

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Ask the students to look at what the characters are saying in between the first and second event and try to identify what the character wants the other to do or say. What is the outcome the character wants from doing or saying what they are saying? 3. Notate the intentions Once located you can ask students to notate the intention in this simple way. [Character name]: To get [other character name] to [desired outcome]. For the desired outcome you can use a verb + the outcome. For example: Lady Macbeth: To get Macbeth to kill Duncan : To get Ophelia to leave him alone If the students are working on a monologue, the character can have an intention towards the audience. For example, in Hamlet’s famous ‘To be or not to be’ speech, the intention could be: Hamlet: To make the audience realise he is struggling with suicidal ideation Or this intention could be one the character has for themselves, like when you talk to yourself in your head. For example, another way of looking at Hamlet’s ‘To be or not to be’ speech would be: Hamlet: To help himself to work out whether he wants to kill himself or not

Ask students to notate the character intentions in their script.

PHASE TWO Live Cinema and Experimental Work in mainland Europe

The main features of a live cinema production:

• A blend of theatre making with film making where live cameras filming a scene with actors and simultaneously project it on a screen • The text focuses on the female experience and can be taken from any written material be a play, a novel or a poem. • The action takes place in one or many locations and sometimes in a moving location like a train, aeroplane or car. • The story is carried more by visual elements than textual elements. Most of the text is voice over and not dialogue in order to show what the characters are thinking inside their heads. • The text is written in the form of a film script and not a play script • The audience are seated in an end-on or proscenium configuration. • Video. There are usually between 3 and 5 cameras. The live feed from the cameras goes into a media server which grades the images and then fires the graded images to the projector and then onto the screen. A video designer will programme the video content and also source any pre-recorded stock footage required. A Director of Photography is responsible for working out how the cameras will be used to film the action on stage. • The design comprises a series of small film sets, that can include real train carriages, cars and rooms. The modes of transport will not actually move as the engines have

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been removed but will be filmed in a way to make it appear like they are moving. A large screen is suspended above the stage which the film is projected onto. Any set, furniture or props used are very detailed and lifelike. • As with the naturalistic work, costumes are very lifelike and lived in to give the impression they are real clothes and not theatrical costumes. Very little make up is used. Most of the time, any costume changes happen on stage so that the audience can see them. • Lighting. Very little light is used from the overhead rig. Instead, film lighting techniques are used such as portable lights on stands (Dedolights), Light Bouncers (which are used to throw light onto the actor’s faces) and a Light Boom (a small spotlight mounted on a stick held by a Lighting Technician). Sometime stand mounted lights are used to give the impression of movement in the film, such as when there is a scene on a moving train. The lighting is very Lifelike, using natural light from windows or doors and from practical lights. • Music and sound are deployed in the same way that it is used in films, underscoring every minute of the staged/filmed action. Special speakers are mounted just behind the projector screen to ensure the sound is delivered just as it would be in the cinema. The sound from the action on stage is recorded by discreet microphones hidden in the actors hairline or from microphones hidden in the film sets or from a handheld Boom (a long stick with a microphone on the end, held above the actors by a sound technician or boom ). There is always a sound sealed glass box, where an actor will sit to read the voice overs which are then synced to the images filmed. • The Acting is Film acting, which means it is even more lifelike and detailed than in the naturalistic work. Filming will focus on closeups of tiny movements like the blink of an eye or a thumb rubbing the first finger on a hand. It is therefore important for the actors to repeat all their movement very precisely so that the camera operators can frame the action in a precise way. The same system on six steps from the naturalistic work is used to generate the acting. Finally, actors have to sometimes move from playing a character to operating the cameras for any scenes they are not acting in.

Similarities between Naturalistic and Live Cinema work • Text is about a female experience • Proscenium / end-on configuration • Overall aesthetic of set design, costume, lighting, sound, acting and movement is lifelike and detailed.

Live Cinema Production examples WAVES - 2 cameras and 5 desk lights - All film shots were on the faces of the characters and the background behind was a piece of cardboard with wallpaper on it - One actor would play the face of the character in the close up shot on screen, one actor would hold the cardboard backdrop behind them, the third actor was doing the voiceover of the character, the fourth actor operating the camera and a fifth actor holding the desk light to light the face of the character.

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THE IDIOT - 4 cameras and graded the film in black & white

REQUEST PROGRAMME / WUNSCHKONZERT - Follows a woman in the last 2 hours of her life as she listens to a radio requests programme before committing suicide - Used really big film sets – in this case a whole flat including living room, kitchen bathroom and bedroom - Use of live music. A live string quartet was put in a sound sealed glass box and would play the music that the female character listened to on the radio

AFTER DIDO - Baroque orchestra and six opera singers performed Purcell's live - Simultaneously, 4 contemporary stories were performed in live film sets and projected onto the screen

AL GRAN SOLE CARICO D’AMORE - Opera about the women who fought for socialism that history forgot - Orchestra of 200 players, 5 film sets, 10 singers and a full choir singing live on stage.

MISS JULIE - A story about a love affair between an aristocratic woman and her butler - Live cinema technique create a new, feminist retelling of this misogynistic play as this version was filmed from the perspective of the minor female character, Christine the Cook who is the Butler’s girlfriend. By changing the perspective of the play, 70% of the original script was cut so that the remaining script consisted of moments when Christine was present - Voice overs for Christine were added in using poems by contemporary Scandinavian poet Inger Christensen - Live music also used

REISE DURCH DIE NACHT / JOURNEY THROUGH THE NIGHT - Adapted from the novel by Friederike Mayröcker - About a life-changing a journey a woman makes from Paris to Vienna - This story is set on a moving train so live cinema helped create the effect of a moving train despite it being a stationary film set - 6 cameras. Long film tracks and moving lights were used.

THE YELLOW WALLPAPER - Adaptation of Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s novel about post-natal depression - Live cinema technique helped show the psychosis of post-partum depression, where the central character hallucinates that there is a woman trapped behind the wallpaper of her bedroom

A SORROW BEYOND DREAMS - A sound artist in a glass sound sealed room added sound effects to the film live

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THE FORBIDDEN ZONE - A show made to commemorate the outbreak of the First World War, which focuses on the story of the women in the Harbour family, who made weapons of mass destruction - 4 different narratives in 2 time zones - 5 cameras

TRAVELLING ON ONE LEG - A show about immigration - 6 film sets with 5 live cameras

SHADOW (EURYDICE SPEAKS) - Rewriting of the Orpheus and Eurydice myth, set in a moving car - Written by Alice Birch

MALADIE DE LA MORT - A show about nudity and sex by Alice Birch - Alice Birch’s adaptation shifts the focus from the male point of view to the female point of view - In rehearsals, each shot is worked out in detail and then put together in a ‘threading’ rehearsal

BLUETS - Adapted novel by Maggie Nelson - More low-tech approach. 2 cameras

ORLANDO - Novel by Virginia Woolf, adapted by Alice Birch.

How to achieve this in a school setting

TEAM • Get your team together. You need a director, some actors, two camera operators and an editor (someone who will cut between the two smartphones.)

EQUIPMENT • Now get the filming equipment ready. You will need two smartphones, a laptop and a TV screen or projector screen. You’ll need to plug in the Host Laptop to the TV/projector screen so that the screen can show what you are creating to the audience (through HDMI cable or wireless device such as ChromeCast) You then need to link up your Smartphones to your laptop, where you’ll live edit the footage. You can do this by using Zoom and doing the following: o Create a meeting on Zoom on the Host laptop and share the meeting link with the two smartphones (via email or message)

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o Once all devices are in the meeting, turn off the audio. Click Participants > Mute All to avoid any feedback o Stop video on the host laptop to ensure we just see the footage from the recording devices o Click View (top right-hand corner) and then Full Screen o To switch between cameras, click the Hide Camera button on the recording device. Zoom will automatically pin whichever camera is broadcasting. TEXT

• Choose a scene from a novel or any other text to work on and make sure it is a scene focussing in on a female protagonist. It’s best if you choose a very short scene with a clear and simple situation and change in that situation. • Turn the text into a film script with very little dialogue. • Put voice overs into the text to reveal what the character is thinking

FILM STYLE

• Choose the style of filming. Is it going to be edgy like EUPHORIA or weird like I MAY DESTROY YOU. Are most of the shots close up on faces or wide shots? Are the cameras moving or in fixed positions?

PROCESS

• Set up an acting area with chairs, table, props. • Rehearse the scene with the actors and make some simple decisions about the action, like where they stand and sit or when to pick up any props. For the filming to work well the actors will need to repeat all their actions and moves precisely. • Rehearse how you are going to film the scene. The director then watches the scene with the camera operators and all three work out how the action is going to be filmed by the two Smartphones. Are you going to go in close on the faces or keep the action in wide shots where we see all the body of the actors? Are you going to do strange angles or special effects or just shoot it in a more documentary style? Are the cameras going to follow the characters literally or be static and the character move through the frame? • Then step through the scene and work out which part of the action will be filmed by which operator. Remember to make sure that neither Smartphone operator gets into the other Smartphone operator’s frame. You will use Zoom to enable the laptop to cut between the two Smartphones. • Then work out with actors, camera operators and editor exactly when you want to cut between each filmed action on each Smartphone. Edit points on films often happen when there is some action, like someone getting up or pulling out an object from their pocket etc. The editor should put those edit points into their script.

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Additional Resources

Research Packs

The NT Archive can provide research packs for Cleansed, Women of Troy and The Seagull which contain copies of the programme, press reviews and watermarked production/rehearsal photography.

To request this, please complete the form here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdItCnJ6q3MO9_Q- z1TeirtA4aH64HlKI50jKy9T2JSjTPiig/viewform

Cleansed

Katie Mitchell on Cleansed https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LizhtwXP8A

Sarah Kane: Staging the Unstageable https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O7Z_5JhnkTA

Woman of Troy

Women of Troy Images https://www.theguardian.com/arts/gallery/2007/nov/28/womenoftroy

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