Drama Skills: Package Holiday

S3 Written Ass essment of Learning

Knowledge:-

Areas of the stage

Voice terms:

Accent Way of speaking according to county or region (Cockney, American)

Pace Speed of speech (fast, even, slow)

Register Way of speaking according to who you are speaking to (formal or informal)

Pause A break in speech

Clarity Clearness of the voice

Tone Emotion e.g. happy, excited Intonation Variation in pitch – the rise and fall of the voice e.g. varied, limited

Pitch How high or low the voice is

Volume How loud or quiet the voice is, shouting, whispering

Emphasis Stressing a specific word or phrase

Movement Terms:

Facial expression Look on the face which shows emotion

Gesture Movement of the hands and arms that have meaning

Posture How the body is held

Pace Pace of movement

Eye contact Use of eye contact with other characters – held or not

Body language Messages given by the position or movement of the body

Characterisation Techniques:

Character cards Written summary of character appearance, details and background Improvisation Drama created without using a script

Role-play Language based exploration of exploring attitudes and beliefs

Hot seating Answering questions in role

Voices in the Head Recall of words said by others about a character or situation

Writing in role Written diary, letter or similar written from a characters point of view

Thought tracking An aid to characterisation, when a character speaks their thoughts aloud

Thought tunnel Character walks past others who comment on their situation

Describing relationships between characters:

When talking about relationships, there is a very simple formula to be used.

 How do A & B know each other?

 How does A feel about B?

 How does B feel about A.?

 What is the quality of their relationship?

My character Lucy Jones is friends with Susan Johnson. Lucy thinks Susan is

her best friend and respects her very much. Susan doesn’t actually like Lucy and uses her to get what she wants. The relationship is very one sided because

of this.

Consider how you used voice, movement and characterisation skills to show the relationship. In a full length play it is likely that the relationship will change over the course of the play.

Example: Anne and Mrs Frank

Actual relationship:- teenage daughter and mother.

What the relationship is like:- mostly Anne is respectful towards her mother, however they often argue, mostly because Anne thinks her mother favours her older sister.

I showed that I was annoyed with Mrs Frank by using loud volume and shouting “No!” at her. I emphasised the words “it’s always Margot this and Margot that” to help communicate how annoyed I was that I thought the mother favoured the sister. I used positioning by moving to DSR away from the mother CS to show I was hurt. I used body language by turning my back on her to show I was rejecting her. I cross my arms and tucked my chin into my chest to show that I was in a bad mood.

What makes a character “interesting or challenging to play?”

This is a personal response. An interesting or challenging character could be a character that you think is very different from you in terms of age, personality, social class, status. It could be that this character has interesting relationships with other characters in the play.

It could be that the character provides you with a voice, movement or characterisation challenge.

Examples could be that you have to learn an accent; that you have to make the character comic; that you want to use movement skills to convince the audience you are 63 years of age. As always you should use drama terminology to explain your answer.

I was pleased to be cast as Mr Sherman as the role was challenging. Mr Sherman is a 60 year old Jewish immigrant living in America. He is a tailor. I was interested in the character because he always wanted more time to make his own designs but spent most of his time mending things for others. The role was challenging because I wanted to develop a specific and convincing accent. I wanted to use an impatient annoyed tone and speak at a fast pace to his customers to show that he is always a bit annoyed with them. The movement was challenging because I am 14 and I wanted to show that I was 60. I changed my posture to be more stooped and walked at a slower pace, leading from the knees. I often used a frowning facial expression to show that he was often a bit unhappy. He I exaggerated his finger movements and had them curved a lot as he spent a lot of time using them sewing. I also gave him a small pair of old fashioned glasses which he wore when at the sewing machine to show that his eye sight was failing. He used a smiling facial expression and softly whistled when working on his own drawing to show that he was happier when doing these.