Blog 15 : Our performance

I think our group is making a creative interpretation. Well, not only me think in this kind of way, every one who have watched the play is having the same idea as me. Maybe it is not the best one, but it is really creative, and it is fresh for audiences to taste such a kind of performance. We choose our play from a non popular part from the book, which not every one can guess what our characters are. We are the butterflies, who watch for Desiree's life, from the beginning to the end when she died, and brought all of her desire. Our lines are all around desiree's stories. So we decided to separate the play into two different staging. We originally planned that we design the plot as butterflies, talking about the story of Ti Moune through the whole play. We have the  first one is about staging about narration. Then when we have to exactly show the story, we will act it out.

The style of the play is mostly funny , from the beginning part to the middle part, but the funny atmosphere ended in the middle of the play. When Desiree met Daniel, she fell in love deeply, so we had a dancing scene which show how romantic it is. Then the last scene about how and why Desiree got threw out of Daniel's house. This is the sad part, which is the also the end of the story. They can feel, and take their steps on Desiree's journey, and understand her life. Different people have different perspectives, so they may have different ways to understand Desiree. Some of them think Desiree is the representative for desire brings people down into darkness, and her name is just a sign. Some people think she is just a pure girl, went a road that does not belong to herself. Just like in the book, "The fish trying to swim on the land". This is kind of the way that we want to show others. Desiree is just a pure girl, but with a strong heart to chase her dreams, and a tragic life for her. 

For the performance part, which I think is the most difficult part in the class and also the project. I did not have any experiences for staging before, so I do not know which kind of way is natural (!) emotion, body language, action and movement etc. I truly have a time in this. So from the rehearsals, when I stood on the stage, not being nervous but I feel like I do not feel comfortable to be natural as myself. But this one can be fixed by gaining more and more experiences. I think the good part that I have achieved which is the expression of emotions. I feel like just right after I understand the story line and the meaning of the script, then I can express it out, with voice and body languages, this is also what my teacher found out when she wrote comment for our rehearsal.  

Blog 14: our hard time

This is my second group work about theatre performance, and also the first one with requirement of recording our drama. For everyone who needed to perform for ,on average, 5 minutes, I do have a group with only two people, that is, me and sofia. So as we are doing a ten minutes play, it is so much easier than other groups  since that I've known the plot in my class, for example the 20 minutes short movie group. Just like my last IB exam work, I am lucky enough to have so many good ideas that leads to a lot of funny effects. This time, fortunately, my partner is also very talented. She has so many good ideas that come out with in the script, and the experiences with staging. Me, as a beginner, I must admit that I am taking the advantage. 

Our play is a little bit complicated. Due to the situation that with only two people in the play, we have to think about a starting with a different topic, or a form of script in order to make the play itself more interesting. So we decided to separate the play into two different staging. We originally planned that we design the plot as butterflies, talking about the story of Ti Moune though the whole play. So we have first staging about narration. Then when we have to exactly show the story, we will act it out. For example the dancing scene about Daniel and Desiree is for both of us. Then the whole scene is divided into three parts, which are the changes through Desiree's life. When she was pure, when she had more eager and then fell into darkness in the end. So the custom of our actors are different. She acts for the different changes for Desiree with different colors of dresses, but I don't change the color because I represent the pureness of her. 

I would like to talk about the feeling when we tried our rehearsal as first time. Before that , I thought our script and staging are perfect to act, but when we actually mesmerize the lines and we go in to the black box and try out, I realized some problems that exist in our performance. For example, because we have lot of scenes changing in ten minutes. So our scripts seem like have a hard time on changing. It is too sudden to show the transformation of staging. This is one of the most serious problems that we have right now. So it is pretty urgent to face this problem. 

Another one is about the facial expression ( the vocab in theatre theology), the expression of emotion. In total, we have four characters. And they are all different from each others on characteristics. For example, there are different emotions for Desiree each scene. They are pure and boring, fall in love with her whole heart, then the last one is when she depressed and desperate about her relationship with Daniel crashed.  

Blog 13: Questions the hard

The novel My love my love of the peasant girl is similar, or have some kinds of connection with the fairy tale little mermaids. In the end of the little mermaids, the witch who traded the little mermaid with beautiful voice to human legs, told her that if she uses a knife to kill the prince, and let the blood flow, then she can go back to her palace deep in the ocean, and forget about everything that hurt herself.  She didn't. She loves the prince, and she doesn't even dare to think to hurt him. So does the same in this novel. The gods, play the similar role as the witch does. They are all magical and powerful. After Ti moune found out that Daniel "betrayed" her and he falls in love with another girl, her heart was broken. Then the gods, specifically Agwe and Papage gave her a shinning blade, and told her to kill Daniel. "Here, take this knife. Strike hard, strike deep. Let his blood flow heavy. Let it run down the sides of mountains. Let it spread over the land. He has betrayed you -- betrayed us all. Only then will the gods be assuaged." (Page 115, Chapter 15)She couldn't make that decision, but that was a trick made by Papage. and Lucifus, who was the god Papage throw her out. After she went outside, she still did not want to leave. She still wanted to have some chances to come back. But when Daniel came through, he did not recognize her, as usual. It's just like he never put Ti moune in his heart, but just a funny little girl, a friend or even a pet. Then she went in the city, soulless. The ending for her is coming closely too. She died, in the crowd of people. Then, something pure and beautiful comes out. "Suddenly,  swarms of papillons appeared on the hill. They winged over the crowd-- big, beautiful butterflies hit against the heads, the mouths, the eyes of peasants, policemen and guests." (Page 167, Chapter 16) Just like the bubbles when the little mermaid dies and changes into. Again, her ending of her beautiful life is just like the falling leaves. They are red, shinny red, falling down from the sky, and that red burn people eyes by its pureness and faith. 

I think this novel tries to tell us that in some way, everything we do and when we make decisions, we are trading and exchanging. Especially when it comes to the topic of extreme love, just like the last reading we did, Romeo and Juliet. They make their decisions to fall in love, and try their best even go through death as the only ending. So does the same with Desiree. She used to be a simple, pure peasant girl from a small village in an island. But when she met Daniel when he was in the car accident, her desire comes out. Her desire to have different life, to be rich, to be married with that stranger Daniel, the white horse prince of her. But one's desire is just like the Pandora's box. Once it opens, it never ends, unless the payment with death. So it's Ti moune's decision. She chooses to take advantage to the outside world, which just like the lyrics from the musical, "A fish swim in the land". 

4 Provoking questions

1. What difficulties are Ti Moune and Daniel facing in their relationship?

2. Do you think the gods in this novel really exist? Why?

3. What are the inside desires of Ti moune?

4. Why Ti moune fall in love with the stranger so fast? Why? 

My love my love is...

My love my love is a kind of realistically romantic book. It is related, or linked with the little mermaid, with the similar idea the plot from the novel. It is always sighing the depress of funny destiny, poor young cinderella falls in love with a handsome prince with white horse. But the difference is, the prince does not seem like that he falls in love with the girl in a same way. This book let walk through the inner world of a poor peasant girl, taste every shake from her heart. 

If you let me to mention and introduce my favorite chapter,  it must be the Forth chapter. Although I have only read not much from the book, I still like the early chapters from the book, especially the parts when the story has just started. For example, I like the balcony scene from the play Romeo and Juliet because it is the start point of the love between Romeo and Juliet, and their first announcement of their relationship and feelings to each other. I would like to call it "the golden point".

The story of this book goes smoothly, so does the same of the feelings of the beautiful peasant girl to the handsome, rich stranger Daniel. Ti moune was taking care of the young stranger. It was from her first sight of him when he was in the car accident in front of the village. Although other peasants don't care about the stranger from the "outside" world, she still tries her best to take care of him. She told her aunt and uncle that she will not let this young man die, and she won't let the god of death Papage takes him away from her. "Mon Dieu! the healer said when she saw the leg, "What to do now? Even in big hospitals where they say miracles are worked man die of such wounds." "He must not die?" Desiree cried. (Page 39, Chapter 4) The uncle and aunt realized that the young man is unusual, to the peasant girl. 

For several days of taking care, Ti moune cares more and more of the stranger. He even smiles to her when he was awake from the unconscious! Now this man is like a treasure to her. But also a door to the outside world which she always wants to experience and have a look. When she saw the car and touched it, she feels unreal: The "modernized" machine that she has never touched! Everything special to her from the young man tells Ti moune: this stranger means the chance of her special new life. Just looked at his face, Ti moune likes him more and more. Until a day, she prays to the gods. "Agwe, you who are responsible for my life. Erzulie, mother of love. Have mercy. Drive this demon of death from my sight. I swear I shall give my soul for the life and happiness of my love -- my love!" (Page 47, Chapter 4) When I read through this, I was totally shocked. I didn't know that her love was so true, real and hard! Love comes too fast, just like the tornado. The tornado is blowing in her heart, just like the fire on grassland -- never ends. 

The performance of gods

The story of the book my love my love seems so completed even though most of the settings are all made up. Even  the gods of the peasants believe in their small village. There are four gods in total, and two of them are goddess. They are Asaka, the goddess of Earth, plants and Erzulie, the goddess of love. And the two gods who are male. Agwe, the god of ocean and Papage, the god of death. The male and the female god are opposite to each other, for example the goddess of Earth towards to the god of sea; the goddess of love towards to the god of death. 

For me if I will stage them into a play, I think I will make them look significantly. The goddess of earth Asaka should wear a long dress with green color on it. It represents earth, plants and lives and also the color of hope. The god of sea Agwe should wear a kind of ancient clothes with water blue color. It represents the deepness of the sea. It is also in every fairy tales. This "pair" of the two gods are the true and real origin of life and our plant. Every places can't leave without them. So they should always stand together, and have a kind of connection. Because there won't be land for human beings to live without water, and in another way there can't be sea without land or even islands for human beings to live with. When it relates to the story of the novel my love my love, although the island is in the sea, but it's still dry out of raining and water. So if both of the two gods and goddess don't have close relationship, people can't live well. So this is also another reason why the native people set them into different gender. 

The goddess of love Erzulie can wear the dress with either red or pink color. She should make up or dress either with live happiness or romantic and mature. She should be bright warm, kind, and hopeful. Then her "partner", Papage the god of death should be silent, cold, strict and hopeless. Just like the opposite of the goddess of love. Because love and death are always opposite in our society right? He should wear a full white robe, and bring a sickle with him. His face should be strict, no emotion on it. A scared, strange mask would make this better. He is doing his job every second, and judge human beings sins. The face of the god of death would be remembered in everyone's heart, deep inside, with the name of fear. Both of the god or goddess of love and death are the symbols of two ending point of our lives. One part is the reason why we have chance to come to this world: love. The birth of human being's life is the collection of love. But then it also brings us death, as the same time we have our life. 

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