With the actors and the audience interacting and sharing the same space, it can get confusing - how can you tell who's in the play and who's in the
... [Show More] audience?
The actors are all wearing masks
The audience are all wearing masks
The actors all have British accents
The audience all wear red carnations - correct answer The audience are all wearing masks
As the audience has complete freedom to go wherever they want in the building, there are potential problems. Which is NOT a problem discussed in the video:
An audience member might choose to be in a space where nothing is happening - they might leave, and five minutes later something interesting happens there.
If an actor has to go to the bathroom, an audience member might follow him (most actors, we are told, choose to hold it).
If there's a fire, this would be a catastrophe. - correct answer If there's a fire, this would be a catastrophe.
As the play they are staging is Goethe's Faust, the story of a man who sells his soul to the devil, they needed to make one major change to the warehouse when they were preparing it for performance. What did they do?
They painted all the walls red.
They painted all the walls black.
They added a number of fire pits so that the play would be lit by open flames.
They built a number of trap doors so that Mephistopheles and his devils could pop up, unexpected, from the basement. - correct answer They painted all the walls black.
In the discussion of the play, the director talks about how film and TV is a visual medium, and the theatre is all about language and dialogue. The playwright talks about how she writes dialogue for twenty-somethings on stage, and says that:
That her characters never say "um..." in conversation. She wants her language to be precise and poetic, "like Shakespeare."
That when her characters say "um..." in conversation, this shows that they are "dim-witted."
That when her characters say "um..." in conversation, this shows that they are "reaching for something."
That when her characters say "um..." in conversation, it is used as filler so that they can perform "stage business." - correct answer That when her characters say "um..." in conversation, this shows that they are "reaching for something."
The interviewer talks about how young women want to "own their voice" without excuses, but still sometimes speak with an upward inflection that suggests youth and uncertainty. In the play, we see this when:
Jennifer asks them if they want to take home any leftovers.
Alison talks on the phone to her father.
Halle talks on the phone to her husband.
Both women speak to the male cab driver. - correct answer Both women speak to the male cab driver.
The director says that even in the last few years, since the play was first staged, the conversation about women's voices has changed, and as a director she "feels less of a need to assert an authoritarian, traditionally masculine presence" as a director.
True
False - correct answer True
There were major differences between the original production of Hair and the 2009 revival - for one, the original performance had moments of anger, with the song "Let the Sun Shine" performed straight-faced and very seriously, and in the revival, that same number was performed with smiling actors throwing flowers to the audience. [Show Less]