Finalllll the last blog!! Ypaaaaaaaaa

I am really happy that I finished all my final today, and this may be the last work that I have to finish, is to talk about our final again. That is the last work about performance that I have to do for the whole year. It is really fun as a final project compares with the final exams from other classes. The final play that we did about plot is directly from an Indian movie, the story line was complicated for the audiences to understand. The hard part of the script is it is from a movie, from a totally different culture, and especially the size and length of the play is limited, so that we have to cut a lot of stuff which is hard to make the plot reliable and understandable. That makes our work harder. Even we are allowed to use sounds effects, stage lights, --- even crew members to help us make the production better. But still I feel like it is complicated for other audiences to understand. The last time that we have tried was right on the exam period B at Monday, the first day of our nightmare -- final week. I felt like I did it better than the last time we did rehearsal or failed to recored as the final one. I did not forget any parts of my lines, and I finally remembered all the movements that I have to do from the script, basically with my partner Ben who acted as Jamal, my brother in the play. I feel like I am really getting to become an actor, well not a professional, but at least for fun and entertainment. Because to become an actor with performance skills , the most important part is to be confident, in order to deliver my lines clearly, and make those movements natural.  I think I am really getting closer to that situation. Still, I have to be really thankful for the great, rare experience from the work of Spring drama production. That totally changed  myself. So, back to the final project. The last time as the final project, there are still a lot of things that I have to be aware, change, correct, and make it better. For an example, most of the actors who are professional have the ability to improvise and overcome the awkward situations. For example, when ourselves forget our lines, or our partners forget their lines, or we went wrong. How to improvise, change the script, and bring it back to the right route? That is really important and needed. I need that ability the most. Because when the person who delivers their lines right before me who may cut a part of their lines, I will be shocked and frozen, or even did not notice that, still "waiting" for that part of the line come out from his / her mouth. And this eventually make the performance into an awkward situation. We are working in a group, so we have to learn how to make a great group work.   

My last performance !

As we just finished so many times for performance work, and the whole long year, we finally step into the final project, that last performance that I may do as the last one. It is kind of sad, so I decided to try to make the last one better. Yesterday we just did the first draft videoing the scenes that we had. Well, to be honest, the first draft was not quiet good. I forgot one line of my scripts, and my partner Ben did the same thing as me. The things that I did well I guess was just about the performing skills. Because I have been worked on performance work a lot of times, and that helps for my experience. The most important one, and which I am proud of myself about is I have been worked on the drama comedy tonight in front of the audiences from all school even some of them are from the town of Cheshire. That is the biggest part, it is not about psychical skills because I did not play for some important roles, but I gained and learned a lot. At least, I am no longer scared or shy in front of one hundred audiences. The thing that I did not do well on, or the group did not do well on is the script itself. Because our story is directly from an Indian movie, and the story line is too complicated for the audiences to understand, especially the size and length of the play is limited, so that we have to cut a lot of stuff which is hard to make the plot reliable and understandable. Another thing is that we are not "professional", or not even attend average level for writing scripts. We definitely can not compete with the "student production" scripts that we did for the summer season drama. The another part is that we did a lot of flash backs.  Due to students from the same class but different periods, they told me that they had  that kind of problem before - made the play more hard to understand or misleading happening. The scenes changing from current time and flash backs are hard to control and make it understandable. Maybe it is because of the black out and custom changing were not projected during the first draft. But still, that is still the most important problems that we are having right now. For me, personally I think I still have to work on my lines delivering, facial expressions and give more impression to the audiences. For most important part, I have to be connected with the emotion from the scenes of scripts. That is also what my English teacher gave me for notes for.For the other groups, I guess who does not have the same problem that we are having right now are fine. Their script are well produced, and their participation are great. I am interested to see more of those group works, that may help us a lot in order to improve our quality.  

Persia

The first draft of final

http://youtu.be/Oegh5H_Remk

It is my performance!

There are a lot of blogs that I have written from those two years, and yet so many plays I have been watched. But this time is the most important, significant and exciting time to write down this blog. Because I am no longer commenting this play by audience, I am an actor now! We have come far, from the end of March until now, two months. Time flies by, and I have learned a lot --- even having the feeling like I won't be able to learn more than this time ever in the high school life. The experiences of practicing and participating performance totally changed my life. How amazing it is! I was a quiet nervous person, and I stepped into the door of black box and as a cast member in order to change it.  The group working performance is exciting and fun, rehearsal is serious and nervous, but those two performing days are the most nervous time I get ever in my life. When I was acting as Elle's father, I was sitting on the long chair in front of the audiences. Although I am not the important or major characters over all, I still got super nervous. My body was shaking a little bit and I could not stop it. For any reason, that was really the first time I performed on stage in front of about a hundred audiences. My heart was beating so fast! But thanks god, the second scene quiet after it I felt so much more confident and better. Then I continued trying to memorize my lines and get ready for each parts of the scene that I have to act. The scripts are funny, and those students' productions are amazing. Suddenly when I said my lines and audiences were laughing, I calm myself down constantly, then I felt so happy, with full of joy in my heart: It's me, who made audiences laughing! There is nothing more like a glory ever happened in my life. I know I am not that important in the plays, even I do not need to be important, I still can make a change for audiences' feeling. That is my glory!

Who wants to be a millionare

So that was the first week of us doing the final project, and that was kind of hard to go through it, and luckily that we are doing it by a group of three but not alone ( thanks god). The script and idea was quiet tough to write and think of the story line, because it is from an Indian movie, which commonly has messy story lines. And the story is pretty broad too. The whole line is too long for us to put in the limited size for the final project, so the work of cutting line and trying to make the line seem complete is quiet hard, too. The story is about how a "chaiwala" (tea sever) went to a famous tv show "Do you want to be a millionaire" and finally won his million rupees prize. The story is basically about his life with his brother and so many struggles that he went through, which gives him power and experiences to be knowledgable for those tricky questions. The purpose for him to achieve is to find the girl that he loves when they knew each other from young ages. He thought if he won the game in the TV show, the girl would see him and find him. He successfully did, with the sacrifice of his brother. I am the brother in the script, and the story line was shown from they became homeless to how they went through all those struggles of life being starving, badly treated, kidnapped and so on. So although the whole story seems dark, but it is a comic ending. The hard parts of performance is still, the story line is too messy, for only 3 actors. It will be so hard for audiences to understand it, but we are trying, to make it better. I am Joseph, and I prove this message ))  

About the final

We have been going through for a lot of projects and staging performance works this whole year, and we have finally finished the IB exam, which lasts us only one work before the last month of our school year, the final project. So this time our topic is free and open minded, that we can choose whatever we want as scenes and content. Any kinds of books (appropriated) are accepted. So this is a kind of good news, but also a bad news in some way for some certain kinds of people. For example, me. I have limited imagination and I really have a hard time to think about topics and ideas when it is open for us to find. So this is 12 o'clock in the "morning" of Monday, and I just came out of an idea. Although this idea is not quiet solid and completed, but I am still proud to say that it is from my true heart.

So the book that I want to choose is Persepolis. This is the book that we have learned last year, also from Ms. Guarino's class. That is the first book that I really liked and payed a lot of attention on reading it since I started to read English books. So that should be the top choice which gave me a a strong impression. Although I know that mostly the choice for staging should be more comedy like, or at least not a heavy topic in order to let classmates to come and participate. But this is the topic what I love to talk about, the unfortunate mixture of politic, time period, religion, and the chaos of homeland. That topic is heavier than everything that we can think of, but also that is really valuable to make literature product. 

That book brings us back to the chaos of 1979 the Islamic revolution of Iran and how the author's life changed, as a participant, a watcher, and a 9 years old young girl who even did not quiet understand what have changed for her life, and homeland. 1870-1980 is the time period of chaos in worldwide, and people had to fight against the struggles from governments, or even stronger powers. And that is life. The whole book tells the story from when the riot against the Shah, the last dynasty of Iran, and then the Islamic revolution started, when the main character was a 9 years old girl, ends up f or her adventure in Europe which her parents sent her to there, Vienna of Austria. They were worried for her safety. The author is also the narrator, which makes this comic book more like an autobiography. The "camera" is always on the moments of life on Marja, the girl who suffered from life. 

I believe that book is a wealthy choice with so many possibilities to stage for, although I do not have a clear idea for them.

In the end, I want to quote from her comments for the book.

"I know, when I choose to tell this story, I can not go back , forever. My homeland, Persepolis. The Mountain Alberz with shinning snow, and the smell of jasmine from my grandma. 

However, I choose to tell you the story, from Persepolis of the Ancient Persian civilization, to the mysterious scarf of Iran in nowadays. I remember my grandma's words forever, "Do not forget where you are from. "

That is my pure childhood within the revolution, my vagrancy of my love in my youth.

This is my Iran, my homeland.

This is my Persepolis. " 

Exam

Just couple days before, we had our biggest test all over the year,  the final exam of IB. We had two papers, that includes the stuff that we have learned lately from the book The whale rider. The next part is about analysis of two poets and several of their poems that we can choose to mesmerize and analysis from them. For the "bigger" picture, the book of The Whale Rider is more question asked the analysis for staging much more than plot. That was the paper one and also, the second part of the name of our class, performance of "IB English Literature and Performance", which we have worked on a lot from the whole year. We did at the first the adaption of the script for Romeo and Juliet by Shakespeare. Then we did the book of my love my love, which was the performance work for the IB. That was I had most improved for, performance, it also encourages me for doing drama as afternoon activities to gain experience and practice, participate in the world of performance. But writing and analysis are still my hard time of English, basically in any classes. This hurts my grade a lot, in any cases, even towards to my ACT exam. The analysis of poems are really hard to understand and take place for me to write them down, about the thoughts. I guess, the understanding is the biggest challenge for the way of learning English. It took me a lot of time to try to outline them into a specific, solid essay. I had the notes and prepare for the work of the exam, but when I get into the questions, I got really bad on it. I did not know how to clarify my mind. I guess, the best way to figure this out is only by practice, and more practise.  This is the only way to figure out.