Irma Vep; Theatrical Conventions; The Play That Goes Wrong; The Baltimore Waltz

Please take the first 10 minutes of class to read the handout. Key ideas:

• Give characters irreconcilable needs. Place obstacles. Fight to the finish.
• Use the "locked cage"
• Use the ticking clock (time lock)
• Use the vise
• Use personal traits, qualities, state or conditions as reasons for confrontation.
• or allow characters to break societal, religious, or moral laws

Ask: 

• How does the character feel now?
• Why does the character feel this way?
• What will the character do as a result of this feeling? (we'll create emotional storyboards next class)

Period 1: Conclude The Mystery of Irma Vep.

• Kansas City Repertory Theater
• The Art of the Quick-Change (Buffalo Theater)
• Creede Repertory Theater
• Arizona Theater Company
• Irma Vep Teaser/Trailer
• Film History: Les Vampires (Feuillade, 1915), with villain Irma Vep (played by Musidora)

Theatrical Conventions:

• Masks
• Cross-gender (costume/casting)
• Asides
• Soliloquy
• Stillness/silence/pauses
• Use of a narrator (seen in "memory plays" like The Glass Menagerie or Brighton Beach Memoirs
• Synecdoche (part represents the whole)
• Suggested scenery (consider the set in Driving Miss Daisy, for example)
• Costumes & props
• Multiple casting (one actor plays several roles)
• Lights or lighting changes
• Soundscapes/sound effects
• The fourth wall; Breaking the fourth wall (addressing the audience)
• Flash forward, flashback, slow motion, freeze
• Tableau
• Montage
• On-stage deaths; stage fights
• Physical theater; mime
• Unities of time, place, or action
• Transformation of time, character, place, or through props
• Songs
• Choruses
• Heightened language; unrealistic speaking patterns
• Placards, signs, and multimedia

Look for some of these conventions in the following short play: The Play That Goes Wrong.

Time remaining:

Let's begin reading Paula Vogel's The Baltimore Waltz. 

HOMEWORK: None. Extra credit: watch Peter Pan Goes Wrong & identify different theatrical conventions used in the play. Write up your analysis and turn in as extra credit for this marking period.

Prepare for the coffeehouse Thursday, 7:00; Ensemble Theater.