Objective: Students will demonstrate their understanding of character work through Viewpoints by creating and performing a character time-line.
Materials:
Handouts of Page 129 in the ViewpointsBook
Hook: Have each person take out their scenes/monologues from a play that they are very familiar with (homework). Have them share with a friend what they chose and who their character is. If there are students that did not choose a scene or monologue have them go into the theatre office and pick out a play that they know inside and out.
Write on the board using many colors of dry erase markers the characters that you will be discovering and creating character development for. Instruct them to explore and not to narrow their character into a box.
Instruction: Hand out the character development handout to each student. Instruct them to keep this paper near them as we Viewpoint and write down discoveries and nuances that they come up with as we go. They need to answer each question but can write discoveries of their own below or on the back. They will turn in these Character Discovery Papers at the end of class.
Take the class on the stage and have them prepare themselves by getting barefoot and getting the wiggles out. Follow the activities on Gesture (expressive and behavioral) found on page 49 in The Viewpoints Book.
Help each student put emotion behind each of their actions and express the emotion through their body—allowing their face to be neutral.
Once this skill is mastered have them explore the gestures of their characters. Have them do the opposite of what their character would do and then have them do a mixture of what their character would do and what they wouldn’t.
Lead a brief discussion on how the above activities went.
Group Practice: Have each person go across the floor and pretend that there is red paint on the souls of their feet. Have them do the following:
Create an abstract painting of themselves
Create a time line of their life
Create an abstract painting of their character
Create a time line of their chracter’s life
Individual Practice: Lead them through the Scene work exercises found on pages 131-132. Have them use the scenes and monologues they found as the spring board to these activities.
Assessment: Have a couple students perform one of the three Viewpoint activities (abstract painting, time line, and scene/monologue using Viewpoints for staging and connection).
