Recount

We had that many space issues in this session that we missed the first hour and a half at least and I was quite pissed off at the space people for not doing their job.  This reflects some of those rehearsal variables that can altar what was planned and the direction that the rehearsal takes.  Although this meant letting the ensemble go and get lunch where we spoke with another student who put his two bob into the piece and some interesting points were raised.

One thing I did forget to mention in the last post was that we did attempt at the end of the session to formulate a web of of relationships and how the bullying would occur.  Originally my concept for the piece was that there would be a bully, bystander and victim character and basically one major incidence of bullying and several minor.  it was suggested in the first rehearsal by one of the ensemble that we could have several bullying events occur all revolving around the bystander.  The ensemble members had discussed all the incidents occurring not being central to the narrative but I believed they need to be in order to be effective.  This is also sparked conversation about the Australian movie 2:13 about a student who commits suicide.  The story involves five central characters and their lives are all entwined.  We discussed the effectiveness of this form.  This was all laid to rest until the previous rehearsal.

At the end of the rehearsal we developed a web of character relationships that resembled this:

These bully victim relationships were taken from our individual bullies that we created in the second session.  I took this idea and did some reworking over the days until this rehearsal and came in with the following relationship web.  It was still based of the characters were created early on in the process.

I had developed an idea of the bullying sequence of events and I informed the ensemble.  We then spent the rest of the session work shopping the bullying sequence of events.  The following is what we finally established:

1. Young girl bullies pop-girl – texting, facespace
2. Alt guy breaks up with young girl to protect friendship with pop girl after young girl has sent naked pictures of self to alt guy
3. pop girl pissed off at young girl, finds photo’s of nakedness and emails them to all including young girl
4. young girl confrontation with alt guy – he is confused
5. young girl copes by going to dance classes and talking to bystander
6. Alt guy confused turns to pop girl for support – she is guilty
7. pop guy jealous decides to bash alt guy and it is filmed
8. alt guy turns to pop girl for support but she turns back on him feeling trapped he commits suicide

We also established a role for each characters for each ensemble member.

Reflection

This rehearsal had it’s problems but overall it was successful.  I never engaged in a process such as this for the TIS performance.  We never developed a narrative structure.  I think it was essential for this project to develop such a narrative structure.  Prior to begining the process I had my own coneption of what this structure would be.  However once beginning the process and engaging with the ensemble this has to change and adapt as necessary and it has.  This narrative structure has given us a base to work from and develop specific scenes.

It may be complex but this should work towards meeting my primary aim to show cyber bullying as a complex issue with complex consequences.  This will hopefully be achieved through showing the complexity of the many different layers and elvels in the narrative structure.  Second to this it hopefully can show how easily bullying can occur and really asks the question who is to blame? and why?  Hopefully we can steer the answer towards applying a no blame approach for cyber bullying as advocated by Rigby (2007) and is the case and suggested strategy for non cyber bullying currently.

The complexity could work against us in that it may be too complex for the students to follow.  However growing up in a post modern world where we are bombarded with information from multiple sources constantly throughout our lives it seems that the students should not only be able to handle this but should also really be able to engage with the contant and form more easily.  Morrison and Stinson (1995) argue that TiE needs to begin to work with the post modern form because this was what young people deal with on a dialy basis.  So a complex structure such as this working on multiple levels at once should allow us to ask multiple questions of the audience and hopefully allow them to walk away from the piece asking those same questions.

I’m constantly due to my experiences with the TIS piece questioning if we are travelling down the right path to meet my aims and objectives for the piece.  The strategy used by Kaufman (Brown, 2005) definitely needs consideration makign sure that their is a set of guiding principles for a piece that ensure it is on the right track.  I look back at my aims for the piece and I cannot help but think is it developing in the right direction:

Primary aim:

• To develop an awareness of the complex problem of cyber-bullying and its consequences.

Subsidiary aims:

• To explore how the issue of cyber bullying could be dealt with.
• To explore what cyber bullying involves.
• To explore the complexity of the bully, bystander and victim dichotomies.
• To explore how the media is contributing to or helping this issue.

The litrature discussed by many on the subject of TiE and YPT is to at all cost avoid suicide (Cahill, 2006; Cassidy & Watts, 2002; 2000; Mirrione, 1993; Pammenter, 1993; O’Toole, 1975).  We seem to be definitely heading in the direciton of suicide and I’m constantly throwing around in my mind how we can approach this without encouraging the idea that suicide is alright.  It is definitely a consequence and it is proven that cyber-bullying can and has on multiple occasions led to suicide or attempted suicide.  I guess the question that I’m really asking is how do I ensure that our message is in line with our intentions because the wrong message not just in regard to suicide could lead to some places we didn’t intend on going.

The appropriateness of our form and content for our intended audience and their needs has mainly been self regulated by the group. We did not have any articulated standards to begin with besides what was written in the brief. The difficulty is in being able to maintain that outside eye while so close to the project. This is why we have gladly accepted advice and feedback from Deakin staff which includes marketing who were able to act as that outside eye. We had intended on a work-in-progress viewing for a group of similar age high school students but this never occurred.

It became apparent for me three weeks ago after a work-in-progress viewing for my supervisor Jo and marketing the real purpose of this piece was to reinforce the information that will be presented before we perform in an entertaining and humorous manner. It is not just art it has information and a message that must be present. This is difficult because how does one inject this information without making it sound preachy or instructional? It is a difficult question to answer but a necessary one. It has just as many implications for my next project because how do I present a story about cyber-bullying which doesn’t moralise, preach or dictate to its audience and addresses the following questions:

· What bullying is?

· The effects of bullying?

· Societies view of bullying?

· What should be done about it?

Do I take a road similar to Arena theatre and just create stories that are interesting and presented in interesting way avoiding the specific educational aims or objectives? Or do I as an educator have a responsibility to the audience to create something that is interesting, presented in an interesting way, and have an educational aim at the same time?

Working for marketing I have a responsibility to them to create and present something that fits with their ideas. In this same work-in-progress viewing we were told that the performance had an inherent negative meta-message towards tertiary study. This was something that was debated constantly throughout the process. O’Toole (1976) argues that even if theatre is educational it will only be so minimally compared with the many of other developmental factors in a young person’s life, such as friends and family. Even so, just because the effect will be minimal that doesn’t mean that the message should be negative or have a negative slant. O’Toole contends that the most that could be hoped from in theatre ‘is that the balance of outlook might be shifted a fraction (if one is didactically inclined), or at least a microscopic fragment of significant experience might be added to the individual’s power of choice action’ (O’Toole, 1976: 31). For so long I overlooked this. I needed to return to Cahill (2006) and realise that the minimal affect or shift could be the tipping point for someone deciding that tertiary study is too hard and not for them. Tertiary study may not be for them but who am I to disempower them and their choices before they have even had a go? I guess it is even more the case when I’m being paid to present tertiary study in a positive light.

The week before performance week we had one last viewing for marketing. It was here we really got to understand what they meant by inoffensive. Some clarification was needed in regard to form and content but the majority were cuts we needed to make:

• Remove second F from Jaffy and therefore its implication
• Remove pictures of beer due to binge drinking problem
• Try and find another word for crap if possible

We changed the top two but not crap as we really couldn’t see anyone being offended and considering we had already lost two jokes we decided we couldn’t find another word for ‘crap’. Throughout the process we had constant discussions on who would find what offensive and why. Would a telemarketer, waitress or chick-out person find the job section offensive? Marketing raised a question in regard to the spoon feeding section and if students would be offended by it. There was not a performance at Melbourne where this didn’t get a large laugh from the audience. Where do we draw the line and say enough is enough we can’t please everyone someone could be offended or maybe we would just rather live in a 100% PC nanny state.

My pitch that I handed to marketing included a description of what the piece was intended to look like. This was a series of vignettes that would cover the issues that a student might face transitioning from secondary to tertiary education. There would be a central metaphor and hopefully a narrative thread that tied it all together. The metaphor I guess looking back now is probably that life is like a relationship because there are always choices, problems, good times and always plenty more fish in the sea. Reflecting now I wonder what the show could have been like if this was the central metaphor and vision that I had approached the ensemble with? The issues and ideas about further study we wanted to cover developed in the research stage through brainstorming and discussion. These became the basis for our series of vignettes. The first rehearsal I conducted a skills and interest audit and what came across was a mixed bag although generally we all had an interest in non-naturalism in some form. We wanted to create something non-naturalistic at least in part. Initially some scenes were headed in a non-naturalistic direction:

• Horse race
• VTAC monster/beast/animal
• Choices (matrix pills)
• Moment of truth (dropped)
• Ready steady crap
• The lecture
• Student services saved your life (dropped)
• Spoon feeding

These all began with ideas or comments made during brainstorming and discussion sessions. We workshopped people’s ideas:

• What happens?
• How do you see it happening?
• What does this convey?
• Is it clear?
• Is there text or objects we can draw on?
• What does it look like?

These were questions for the ensemble to answer not just the ideas originator. Some developed quickly and easily, some slowly and arduous, some have changed beyond recognition, and others have been dropped. The horse race for example came from an idea which got thrown around about year 12 seeming like a race to the finish with the horses wearing blinkers. When the blinkers are taken off there is a realisation a whole world exists out there. I particularly liked this idea. It has developed slowly week by week and almost dropped a few times but eventually it became something that we decided to use because we did like the point it made. We drew on text of the meblourne-cup-call which was edited and reedited time and time again, tried being the horses, the jockeys, the jockeys riding crates, and a transformation of student to horse. It was really just a process of trial and error mixed in with discussion and reflection. As was the case for all the others listed above, some made it and some didn’t but I believe the performance was stronger for this reason (Dijt, 2006).

A lot of other issues or areas we wanted to cover didn’t stem from a non-naturalistic idea as was the case for those listed above. Running dry improvisations tended only to lead to naturalistic scenes and banter. One of the Deakin staff suggested looking at these scenes non-naturalistically; you could have actually seen the light bulbs turn on. This started a process of thinking about what was the core message we were trying to convey with these scenes and then how could they be portrayed non-naturalistically? A prime example was making friends (which has drastically changed since its inception). Further study can be difficult initially with people experiencing feelings of loneliness and isolation but after some effort everything gets easy. The idea then became to portray through the space a sense of isolation and a cold and lonely environment which gradually eased as the new student found there place approaching different groups. The other ideas that were very naturalistic were worked in this same manner and then everything was workshopped in the manner discussed above.

Morrison and Stinson (1995) argue that young audiences need post modern content as well as a post modern structure. This they argue is due to young audiences growing up in a rapidly changing complex and multi-layered post-modern world. Was the performance inherently post-modern? The project was not approached in a deconstructive sense but it did contain elements associated with post-modern form such as pastiche, collage, non-linear narrative and others. I would not call it an example of post-modernism but it contains the elements which Morrison and Stinson (1995) argue are essential for promoting and developing artistic and aesthetic experiences for young audiences. This they argue is a ‘responsibility as educators for widening their cultural experience’ (Morrison & Stinson, 1995: 40). Considering the brief this was not an intention when beginning this project but it has been on my mind regarding my next project for some time. I wonder why then it developed in this way and the age of the ensemble is the first thing that comes to mind, considering we are all young ad have grown up in this post-modern age as well. Nonetheless it could have been beneficial for the audience in widening their culture experience and I hope it was.

As discussed in the previous post the research phase was an ongoing process more important at the beginning of the overall process gradually becoming less and less but always present. Initially the research involved discussing the brief and what it meant to each of us. We also discussed each of our own transitions from secondary school to tertiary education. What we discovered was that each of our stories was so individually different and a commonality emerged for each of us that there was a lack of emphasis placed on the options aside from university after high school i.e. travel, work, tafe and so on. This became a bit of a cental tenet for the developing piece. Wanting to show that there are options before and during tertiary study and that these options a not binding either. We then undertook a brainstorming session based around questions that I developed in response to my understanding of the essence of the brief. They were (click on the link to view mind map):

• What issues do students face transitioning?
• What are these issues?
• When and why do they stop being issues?
• Is there anything funny about these issues?

Separate to this we each also carried out our own individual research which involved finding a body of literature from the web, journals, news articles and books. Another useful method which presented a lot of data was talking to students who had just started university or were currently in year 12. Both groups had presented information from different angles that were great to take on. The year 12s presented information on where they are now and the worries that have about the process their going through and the unknown on the other side. While the 1^st year tertiary students presented the challenges that they were experiencing currently as they transitioned into tertiary study. The other point which needs consideration is that the entire group has recently (in the last five to three years) gone through this same transition. Another element specific to our own experiences concerns actually working in schools with students who are going through this over the past couple of years and seeing, hearing and experiencing (in a way) what they are going through.

We undertook some image work from stimulus words or phrases using the cop-in-head technique (Boal, 1992). These images didn’t end up being used directly but they did a few times create discussion and action that inspired us to build a scene or develop one further. The image below:

The image was based on the notion of making friends. Using the cop in the head technique these phrases came up from left to right:

1. Bastards
2. You have really nice hands
3. What was your name again – get away from me
4. Sorry what year are you in?

This didn’t correlate directly into a scene but we decided to include a scene on making friends and the idea that it can be difficult (at first) was established alongside not knowing what to say or who to approach and when. The early devising we actually started off using ‘you have really nice hands’, which I’m glad to say has evolved to something more appropriate (not really the word I’m looking for).

What I can say is that everything that was undertaken has had some influence on the outcome of the content and that generally anything focused on the project cannot really be considered a waste of time. Dijk (2006) argues that the more waste products an ensemble creates should result in a higher quality piece. The most influential source and method of research was discussion with people about their experiences. These discussions became the foundation for many of the scenes that are included in the performance. This is because it provided both facts and experiences of the transition period. The other methods influenced or contributed minimally, they were not worthless and I will continue to use them all in future practice.