Defiance/Denial
Many plays throughout history have brushed upon the idea of defiance or denial. One can see countless examples of characters that take matters into their own hands instead of accepting what is told/given to them. One could argue that in Prometheus Bound, Prometheus’ fate resulted from his denial or defiance of Zeus’ proclamation of killing all humans. He refused to accept the fact that the human race would be destroyed and decided to give humans fire. His actions angered Zeus and Prometheus was thus punished by being chained to a cliff. This same concept of refutation of fact is prevalent in both The Bacchae and Oedipus Rex.
In Oedipus Rex, Oedipus refuses to accept his heinous fate. He tries to directly go against what was prophesized about his life by running away. This essentially leads to his exile. One wonders if this destiny could have been avoided by accepting what was told to him. Perhaps he would have stayed at his “home” and never encountered his true parents. This parallels with Pentheus in The Bacchae. In the beginning, Tiresia tells Pentheus of Dionysus’ strength and Pentheus responds by threatening the foreteller. This hostile resistance to fact resembles Oedipus. He also refuses to accept the fact that the stranger is Dionysus and that the women are being liberated by him. Then he defies everyone’s advice and continues pursuing his curiosity about the baccic rites. This is another example of how a character’s incapacity to accept what they are told results in their death or demise.
Therefore Prometheus Bound, Oedipus Rex, and The Bacchae all contain examples of characters that deny or defy prophecies. These characters end up suffering because of their resistance to the truth. Perhaps one is to conclude from these tales that sometimes it is better to face reality than to potentially suffer trying; and although these stories are indeed myths, one can draw the conclusion that a little bit of patience, acceptance, and understanding can prevent disastrous ends.
blog julia chicago
I really enjoyed “Chicago” I had never seen it before but I really like the music and had heard it in the green room of my theatre before. It was not as disturbing “Cabaret” but like Cabaret the gruesome nature was part of what made it appealing it also had a similar dance style. It was not as entertaining to me however because well it had the car wreck nature it stayed moderately on the face of things rather then dealing with the truly disturbing nature. Yes it showed the capacity to kill lie lust and greed for but no where on the level of Cabaret. Whereas Cabaret was very scary because you were aware that the Nazi’s were rising It was also more sexually gruesome. Therefore I saw it as a tamer more sugar coated version I found both plays difficult to imagine on stage but particularly Chicago. I couldn’t visualize the jail scenes switch the variety acts. My inability to imagine made the film that much more interesting and made me want to see the show that much more because of the adaptations.
One acts JULIA
I thought you gave a lot of good examples of the “V effect” the breaking of fourth wall put things out of order and you are right on your observation this confusion has a purpose. However I don’t know if it is meant to provide an emotional roller coaster. How would you support this. I think the effect changes your emotions some times but more importantly it makes you think so I would argue your comment “if it were altered in a way where everything is straight forward and the audience doesn’t have to think about anything it wouldn’t have the same effect was closer to the point. How does the V effect change emotions by making people sympathize with those they might otherwise condemn and never sympathize with out of shock and fear like Uncle peck or an A.I.D.S victim or by making us laugh where we’d normally cry? Elaborate.
julia D BLOG
How I Learned to Drive changed dramatically for me between the page and stage. Seeing a play staged always changes it but in many ways what changed my perspective on the show was not the choices by the director but my circumstances at the time. I first read the play when trying to choose the college I would attend.I wanted to see if it had parts I liked and I viewed in the context of what types of shows would A.C. put on.I enjoyed the humor of the show and how it tackled diffclult issues.But this was also shortly after going to a confrence on child explotation their were various speakers and sessions but many of those I attened focused on prostitution as well as indivdual sexual preadators.I met people who had been victims of abuse saw pictures of youg girls beat up an F.B.I. agent talked about the tactics used by My Space predators.All of this made it hard for me to see any real love for Lil Bit from Peck I saw it as lies and tactics and whenever I thought the playwright was implying otherwise it angeed me.Also because I was trying to ask myself if I could play any of those roles it was that much more disturbing.
The second time I came across the play was at call backs this was even more disturbing because well I did not get called up to read little bit I was scared to death I would but I was also blown away by the acting I saw particularly Micheal who was utterly creepy but also fragile.
Then I read the show for props which meant a lot more visualizing then previously because before I had been thinking more about the characters.
Then I read the show for this class were I was looking at the choices in terms Of Brecht.
The last time when I actually saw the show I was thinking about all these things but I also was deeply impacted by the fact that I now knew Jacquie from CI and I Also knew Micheal from his directing the scene I was in.Because I knew Micheal Peck became much more sympathizable because even before I sympathized with Peck I understood how hard it can be to play a charcter of that nature.The live performance also made the stage directions which are always hard for me to visualize clearer so that I saw the wedding and the look on Pecks face and I got beyond the surface.Seeing Jacquie in the role was also super disturbing particulary because the pictures made it impossible to fully separate her from the role .Especially heartwrenching was the one of her covered in Christmas bows the idea she was trying to give herself as a gift to peck to get him to stop drinking it added so much to the text. The glamour shot and the jon bena picture were also disturbuing.
For me the play was as much a journey as for Lil Bit however luckily I was able to learn without the type of cost she had to pay.
How I Learned to Drive changed dramatically for me between the page and stage. Seeing a play staged always changes it but in many ways what changed my perspective on the show was not the choices by the director but my circumstances at the time. I first read the play when trying to choose the college I would attend.I wanted to see if it had parts I liked and I viewed in the context of what types of shows would A.C. put on.I enjoyed the humor of the show and how it tackled diffclult issues.But this was also shortly after going to a confrence on child explotation their were various speakers and sessions but many of those I attened focused on prostitution as well as indivdual sexual preadators.I met people who had been victims of abuse saw pictures of youg girls beat up an F.B.I. agent talked about the tactics used by My Space predators.All of this made it hard for me to see any real love for Lil Bit from Peck I saw it as lies and tactics and whenever I thought the playwright was implying otherwise it angeed me.Also because I was trying to ask myself if I could play any of those roles it was that much more disturbing.
The second time I came across the play was at call backs this was even more disturbing because well I did not get called up to read little bit I was scared to death I would but I was also blown away by the acting I saw particularly Micheal who was utterly creepy but also fragile.
Then I read the show for props which meant a lot more visualizing then previously because before I had been thinking more about the characters.
Then I read the show for this class were I was looking at the choices in terms Of Brecht.
The last time when I actually saw the show I was thinking about all these things but I also was deeply impacted by the fact that I now knew Jacquie from CI and I Also knew Micheal from his directing the scene I was in.Because I knew Micheal Peck became much more sympathizable because even before I sympathized with Peck I understood how hard it can be to play a charcter of that nature.The live performance also made the stage directions which are always hard for me to visualize clearer so that I saw the wedding and the look on Pecks face and I got beyond the surface.Seeing Jacquie in the role was also super disturbing particulary because the pictures made it impossible to fully separate her from the role .Especially heartwrenching was the one of her covered in Christmas bows the idea she was trying to give herself as a gift to peck to get him to stop drinking it added so much to the text. The glamour shot and the jon bena picture were also disturbuing.
For me the play was as much a journey as for Lil Bit however luckily I was able to learn without the type of cost she had to pay.
Order of Presentations - Final Session
Here is the order in which students will present their work during our final session tomorrow, starting at 12:00 noon.
Presentations:
1. Emily Bull
2. Sarah Johnston
3. Jacques Kriel
Presentation/Performance:
4. Julia D'Ambrosi
Performances:
5. Amanda Mims (solo piece)
6. Katie Marchant & Taylor Woods (scene)
7. Ashley Ray, Liz Webb, Alex Byrne, Ann Nelson, Sam Theis, Ian Downing-Beaver, and Layne Rylander (staged reading)
Because of the limited time available, it is necessary to restrict presentations and performances to 15 minutes or less. In order to guarantee that everyone's work can be seen during our two hour exam period, I will ask a presentation that exceeds 15 minutes to stop. If time allows, we can return to review that presentation after everyone's had an opportunity to present.
The following students will be providing abstracts of their research for the class:
Michelle Okafor
Lauren Chiodo
I look forward to seeing your work!
Lauren's final project progress
I believe that I am making a lot of progress on my project. I had actually already read and seen A Walk To Remember before, but I reread it for this project. I noted scenes that I would like to adapt – they were important to the plot, etc.
I went to the author’s site and got information on him, his life, and A Walk To Remember. I then found reviews of the book and movie, both good and bad. I have finished reading and going through the research I’ve complied. I will be re-watching the movie and writing the essay/adaptations the rest of this week.
Meditation 13
For my final project, I collaborated with Katie to research Neil Simon and a few selected works of his. One of which, "Barefoot in the Park," I will be focusing on especially. This week I am looking at a few different monologues for my performance selection, I have narrowed it down to a few from "Barefoot in the Park," but I am still not certain yet. My main focus is finishing my research on "Barefoot in the Park," I am almost finished though. We have been writing a paper with both of our research combined to contribute to biographical information on Neil Simon and his selected works. With "Barefoot in the Park" I am especially focusing on the adaptations which originated from this play.
Project Update -- Katie Marchant
Taylor and I are jointly writing a research paper on Neil Simon and two of his most well known works,
Barefoot In The Park and
The Odd Couple. For my section I have written a biography of Neil Simon and am starting to write a history of the adaptations of
The Odd Couple. Taylor will post about her section of the paper. My section is coming along well and I feel very confident in where I am progress wise. I have found some very good information online and at the library. I hope to finish the first draft of my section by Thursday so I can revise and edit on Friday. Over the weekend Taylor and I will combine our sections and rehearse the monologue that Taylor will perform during the final on Wednesday.
Progress report.
I believe our group has made excellent progress with our semester project. All we need is to finish the script, and once that is done, it will be smooth sailing after that. All that is left is the actors will need to memorize their lines, we will need costumes and props and everything else needed to put on a show, and we all have to write our papers. Once the script is written we will all meet together to discuss it and talk about our papers, and then we will meet a few days after that to finish our project. My group is doing great!
clarification
As a follow up on what I just posted, I would like to clarify that I was unable to attend a meeting because of one act rehearsals. I also would like to say that I think once we smoothe out the bumps in the script I think it will be somewhat quicker and easier. But we ARE doing good work, and I enjoy the group! :)
Semester Projects # 13
Our group is making slow but steady progress. Unfortunately I was unable to be at the last meeting where we assigned scenes to be written. I initially planned on being partnered with Sam to help him write his scene. Then I had another idea. What if one person did not participate in the writing process? This one person could then read the scenes written by the group members and make sure the play develops and progresses logically. I thought I could be this person. I told my idea to a few members of the group, and they approved that we could use an unbiased third party to edit and correct any inconsistencies in the plot. This would be easy for me because I had not begun to write the script.
Now I am just waiting for the scripts of all the scenes. I have received a few, but I really do not want to begin to work on them until I read the entire play front to back. I figure the best way to do this is to read everything in context. After I read the play I will make suggestions and discuss them with the group. That way we can collectively decide to make any changes that we all see fit.
Then I think we can start to address details of the play including staging and costumes. We might even discuss physical characteristics we would look for while casting each of the characters. We could also talk about the changes we made in the fairy tales and why we felt these were appropriate for our adaptation/ collaboration. Then we can start to plan the presentation and possible visual aids that we might use. All in all, I think we are making good progress and heading in the right direction.
project progress JD'
I have written 3 scenes and an introduction for my adaptation of Measure for Measure named You’re All Equally Wrong- Measure for Measure Converted to Currency. I have also written an introduction for explaining my project. I am worried because I fell behind on blogs but my project is going well. I feel like it is both further along and more behind then I expected.
My intro really explains how I feel about the play and provides a focus. I had been unable to connect my adaptation with my problems with some of the critical interpretations I had read. But I feel I finally successfully did this. I still need to justify my individual choices. I already have this in my head but I just need to write it down .I have been taking note of changes this whole time however so this should be easy.
My largest concerns are punctuation and grammar and the part about previous adaptations. I am also worried about citations. I have read at least 20 works about the play but I have not yet written about previous staging and interpretations. This should be the most difficult writing I have left .
Lauren's 12 Meditation
Last week’s blog was about some of my feelings regarding Shakespeare and adaptations of his work, so now I’d like to talk about the One Acts. Of course I’d like to tell everyone that was involved that they did an amazing job, but I also realized a few things while watching my friends and classmates prepare for the One Acts.
Many people think that the hardest part of being in a show is being on stage – at least, I know many people who are not involved in theater think that. I did, before I became involved in theater. They have to memories lines and blocking, give each performance their best effort – it’s trying and exhausting. But I think that many people often overlook the part of the director – cutting plays, blocking plays, staging plays – even simply castings plays can be difficult.
I’ve adapted a full-length play into a One Act once before, my freshman year. It was quite possibly one of the toughest things to put together so that it makes sense and flows together. I’ve also had directors in the past who were not good at this at all, therefore the show wasn’t half as good as it could be.
I think that all the directors did a very good job with their One Acts. I felt like all the shows made a lot of sense and I was drawn in by each of them individually. Each director took their text and adapted it to the actors they cast, the requirements for their class assignment, and other restrictions like the stage, etc.
I, for one, am very impressed with everyone that was involved. Again, good job, you guys!
11-22-06 #12
Contemporary Shakespeare is an integral part of the progression of Shakespeare. After the discussion in class on Monday about the production of Shakespeare, I learned that when it was originally performed, it was done in contemporary dress; to reflect that day and age with their story. I think that performing Shakespeare in today’s society should be done in a more contemporary setting to hold steady with past production history. I also think that it was originally done to relate to the audience and to tell a story that they can understand. Often times today audiences who see a performance of Shakespeare that is done as a historical production lose sight of the meaning behind it. With the language and the dress and the location, people can easily get confused about what is being said and what is actually going on if it is not performed well. So I think that it is important to present Shakespeare to a society in a current adaptation more often than in a historical format. When watching contemporary movies with the original Shakespearean text, I often don’t even notice that it is not a familiar speak because I can relate to the actions and the way it is being said. I think more people in society will be able to respect Shakespeare’s stories and understand what he is trying to say if it is presented in a way more graspable to people today.
Meditation 12
During class we were discussing the various adaptations that have come from Shakespearean shows. A few mentioned were movies like “She’s The Man”, “10 Things I Hate About You”, and other productions which basically follow Shakespeare’s plotline but place the character in modern settings. But there are other films like Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet, or Richard III which take Shakespeare’s lines, almost exactly, and incorporate them into a new time period and I thought that was an interesting take on Shakespearean adaptations.
When people in the class were talking about the different types of Shakespearean shows they had seen and performed I thought of a production that my school did for One Act Play two years ago. It was called “Shogun MacBeth” and it was a kabuki stylized show complete with elaborate Japanese costumes and white make-up with very defined, dark facial expressions. It was such a stylized form of performing that it made me think of Shakespeare in a whole new light. The two dimensionalness of the characters only added new perspectives to the complexities of Shakespeare’s original characters. Like I said in my last meditation, the amount of creativity that people can incorporate into adaptations is infinite. The possibilities are endless.
The Benefits of Modern Shakespeare #12
Shakespeare is one of the most well-known playwrights of all time. People of all ages and even various ethnicities and races are familiar with his work. A large portion of this is due to the fact that his stories and plays are still being performed today. Some of these performances are attempts to recreate Shakespearian theatre exactly as an audience would have seen it during the sixteenth century. However, modernized adaptations are also extremely popular on stage as well as on screen. I think that these modern versions of Shakespeare’s work help keep his brilliant scripts and stories alive. Not that I think Shakespeare will ever cease to be performed; but I do believe that by adapting his work, audiences are allowed to reconnect to his plays.
Many people believe that adaptations stray away from original Shakespearian theatre. I used to be such a person. I thought that by presenting a play written by Shakespeare it would be appropriate to recreate the experience from start to finish, with Elizabethan attire and English accents. However, I now see that modern adaptations allow modern audiences to relate to the stories of Shakespeare’s plays. An example of this can be seen when analyzing the film Ten Things I Hate about You with Julia Styles and Heath Ledger. This movie is basically the exact plot from William Shakespeare’s Taming of the Shrew only set in a modern day high school. Because of this change of setting and circumstance, I was able to actually relate to the characters Kat and Bianca much more than I would have been able to had the movie been set in the Elizabethan period.
Ten Things I Hate about You is one of the many examples of Shakespeare’s work set in modern times. I think that it illustrates how modernizing his plays can sometimes help preserve them. That’s why I believe that performing one of Shakespeare’s plays in its original form may be interesting from a historical perspective. But it is through the production of modernizations that we are able to recreate the same emotional responses and experiences for the audience.
missed one acts
I was busy helping my friend rebuild his fence after a storm, sorry I couldn't come to one acts I'm sure they were excellent. So lin this blog I will be talking about what i plan to do in regards to a final project.I plan to write an adaptation of mine own, I'm thinking of doing an adaptation of either one of shakespeares plays, or adaptation one of my favorite books into a play. I think either one would be enjoyable, and challenging. Shakespeares a little over done however, so it will be my fallback if my favorite story cant be adapted.
Its a story by harlan ellison, and I hope I can pull it off. I dont have the writing chops ellison does, but no one on earth really does. So hell why not give it a shot? I don't like depending on other people this way, it will be all my fault if I fail.
So onward with the project!!
Violence
Shakespeare has a lot of violence in all of his plays. All of them. Including Richard III. Well, what would you expect from a play about a guy trying to get the throne from his family? That he’s just going to ask them? No. He’s going to fight for it, even if it means killing both his brothers, his nephews, his wife, and his friends. So it comes to no surprise that this man was the most hated person.
But when you think about it, how sensitive are we to this type of violence? I know back in the “olden days” they loved violence, especially live executions. Has it changed now? Not exactly. I mean, sure we don’t have live executions anymore, but we still have movies and video games in which there is a lot of death, blood, gore, and whatever other term would be appropriate for this situation. But we don’t think to ourselves “this isn’t real” like we would when seeing Richard III. We don’t stop and say “oh, that’s not what is really happening. He’s not really bleeding.” No we don’t, but I believe that is because we are so into the show, into the game, into the movie, that the thought of it being fake never crosses our minds. We are too busy trying to understand what is going on to worry about whether or not it’s real. A show like Richard III is not going to change our views on violence. Even after seeing multiple versions of the show, I still have the same perspective on violence in movies—as long as the good guy wins, or there is a good story line, then I am hooked. When there is violence in a movie, I don’t think about the realism. I’m too busy thinking “Oh, the good guy has to win! He has to beat the bad guy and be the hero of the movie! SHOOT HIM!”
I know that with video games, the person playing knows that the game is fake, and going to a movie I know the movie is fake, too, but at the same time, the first thought in my mind when seeing a Shakespeare show is “what the crap is going on?” not whether or not it’s real.
11-17-06 #11
I think that Looking for Richard, was very helpful in explaining what all went on in Richard III. I think that Al Pacino used the research and studies he did for the film well to help explain what is behind Richard III and to help convey just what it is about. The intertwining of the research and rehearsal and character analysis with the production helps to convey the story Shakespeare was telling. I really liked the way that Pacino went to London and did research on Richard and how the development of the character went into this film. He would discuss every act and what is going on and then go into what the characters are feeling and what they desire and want from each act; then in faded into the important parts of the play. I particularly enjoyed the cast read throughs in which they translated their lines into contemporary language to express what the character was feeling. I think that it is important to show things like this as to help comprehend what Shakespeare really means. I find it difficult to just pick up and read Shakespeare without perusing every line to find what it means. So seeing in preformed, rehearsed and researched really helps to decipher the meaning behind the words, to find out the intentions of the character by seeing it preformed live help me to understand what is going on. I think Looking for Richard is a very useful tool in helping to teach Shakespeare and helping people to respect and understand the beauty in his writing and to learn from it- and even to be able to apply to their lives. I think Pacino showed a new side of Shakespeare and why it is important to study and learn from; he conveyed the idea that life isn’t just about what we understand and know, but about delving deeper into what we don’t understand to grasp new concepts and better ourselves. His desire to understand Richard III shows us that we should yearn to understand and surround ourselves with new knowledge and a desire to discover new things about life and not just settle for what we already know.
I was so very confused by all the different characters and how they were related to each other in Richard III. So here is my understanding of all of the characters, how they relate to each other, and my opinions of the main characters. I am going to begin by listing the characters by how they are related to each other then I will go back and explain some of my opinions on the main characters.
According to
http://nfs.sparknotes.com/richardiii/characters.epl the characters are related as follows: King Edward IV, Richard and Clarence are brothers. Their mother is the Duchess of York. Queen Elizabeth is King Edward’s wife and she has four sons; Gray and Dorset from a previous marriage and the young princes (Edward and the Duke of York). Rivers if Queen Elizabeth’s brother. Queen Margaret is the late King Henry VI’s wife. Lady Anne is the wife of the late Prince Edward (the son of King Henry and Queen Margaret) who was killed before the play begins. Buckingham is Richard’s right-hand man in all of his schemes. Richmond is part of the Lancaster family who was dethroned by the Yorks. Richmond gathers an army and defeats Richard in the end. There are other lesser characters that I will not go on to describe. Wow… I am still confused even though I didn’t include the other characters that pop up occasionally!
Here are my thoughts on Richard, Lady Anne and Buckingham. I believe that Richard was a very lonesome and misunderstood man. He feels that he must prove himself worthy in the eyes of others because of his physical disabilities and his way of making himself worthy is to work his way to the top by killing anyone in his path. I feel that he does this because it is the only way he thinks that he can gain worthiness but in reality he is making himself more and more unlikable. I don’t really understand why Lady Anne agreed to marry Richard when she knew that he was partially if not solely responsible for the death of her husband and father-in-law. Was it simply because she felt that she needed protection and she believed that Richard could offer her that? I suppose that times were very different then and a woman really did need a man to survive in the world but I think that she probably could have found someone else who wouldn’t wind up killing her in the end. Buckingham is a very interesting character. Is he helping Richard simply because he wants to get ahead or because he truly believes that Richard has the right to the throne? I don’t believe that he is truly as cold-hearted as Richard. I think that he was simply taking advantage of a way to get ahead and didn’t realize how far Richard would take things.
Meditation #11
As I was reading “Richard III”, I got a clear picture in my head of what the film would be like. It would be a serious production with melodramatic actors, almost no comedy, it isn’t meant to be a humorous show, but during class today, when we watched the clip of “Richard III,” it seemed to be mocking the seriousness of a Shakespearean play. The way Richard was dancing up the stairs and singing to himself after he wins over the woman he loves, by professing his love for her over the body of her dead husband, in a morgue. That scene in itself is darkly humorous, but compiled with the direct speeches into the cameras and the dancing; it provided audiences with a new perspective of Shakespeare.
While I was watching Looking For Richard tonight, it occurred to me how many different varieties of adaptation are available for one play. Al Pacino created a great documentary about Richard III, actually meant to be an educational film, it told the story with interjections from the cast and crew. Also, filled with commentary by literary analysts and random surveyed citizens, they gave their own thoughts on the play. “Looking For Richard” really showed the different approaches that could be taken with such a stylized show. It reminded me of Baz Luhrmann’s take on “Romeo and Juliet”. He used the dialogue and just set it in modern times, a stylized show taken to a new time period, just like Richard III was taken to the time period of World War II to aid the plotline.
Julia D blog
In “Looking for Richard” there is a lot of talk about sharing a love of Shakespeare with the masses. Before I go any further I should say I am not sure of my opinion but for now I’ll argue against the idea of sharing the passion. I am not a football fan my father has tried his best to instill this passion in me but I find myself seesawing between being bored and overwhelmed. There are brief moments when I understand and actually enjoy the game but on the whole it doesn’t seem worth it. I am not saying my father should stop watching football or that he’s dumb for enjoying it. I just have other interests furthermore if someone tried to simplify the game so I could understand it the game would be loosing some of its complexity and beauty. On the other hand continually pausing a game on the television to explain every action instant replays and challenges kill the suspense and spirit of the game.
Looking for Richard tries to share a passion, to do so its edits, it narrates it even changes a line,( G to C) and switched settings. Yet Compared to other versions of Shakespeare “Looking for Richard is very conservative. “Ten Things I Hate About You” changes language setting and plot details of “The Taming of the Shrew. “No Fear Shakespeare” a written adaptation goes so far as to modernize the language and cliff notes if it can be called an adaptation summarizes the plot with bare bones descriptions. If we take out what makes Shakespeare odd and challenging and transform it to familiar then what makes Shakespeare distinct what is really of value. Shakespheare often took his plots from other stories. So if the plot is all that stays perhaps he deserves no credit at all .Furthermore reading cliff notes is a lot like seeing the answers at the back of a math book as opposed to every step of the work done to get that answer. On the face value just seeing the answer seems easier. But to really understand the answer you have to no the process and understanding the math is a lot easier with the work in front of you than with just the answer. In movies it’s considered acceptable to show a person get on a bike at there house then one second later show them put their bike on a rack by the grocery store. This is a simpler version of this event then showing the person ride past numerous houses, nearly hit a cat and pedal for 20 minutes but the edited version presumes more knowledge then the unedited. By this logic I think the easiest way although time consuming to understand Shakespeare is to see it in it’s most complete form possible on stage every scene acted in Elizabethan language.
But then I see it from the other side. My first experience with Shakespeare was a Wishbone version of the Tempest. It definitely edited it certainly took artistic license in casting a dog as Ariel and the show cut in and out from the play and the adventures of a boy in the 90’s with his dog. But because of that version when I went to see the Tempest in 4th grade (still cut some for time) I understood the play. I didn’t get every line but I understood more than I would of and really enjoyed the show.
I give credit to the Wishbone version for providing me a basic understanding of the plot of “The Tempest” and thus an entrance into the world of Shakespheare. Understanding the plot wasn’t what made me love the show but it let me put my focus elsewhere into appreciating the characters and the puns.
On a separate point in response to one British man in the movie saying that the British understood Shakespheare more because they had a greater culture knowledge and experience in the arts. I don’t think I enjoyed the “Tempest” because of what I knew of Shakespeare and art but because of what I didn’t know. I was to ignorant to have Bard-phobia. I was young enough that not getting every word of a conversation (which I agree with Al Pacino is an obsession which bogs many people down) seemed normal. I really liked “Looking for Richard” because in the end it seemed to come to the conclusion that Shakespeare is never straight forward. Even professional actors and scholars don’t know things, debate things, and get confused. I think Al Pacino’s line “everyone gets and opinion” and the scholars admittance of “I don’t know” were great examples of that. Shakespheare is about exploration scientists love precision artists possibility.
Thus it’s good to get a basic understanding of the plot, it’s good to do research as long but you can’t stop there. That’s not a play It’s a lot like football there’s a certain amount of players set innings(or acts) given roles but the structures not the game it’s people maneuvering within that structure that’s the beauty of football, the chaos between the lines.
Romeo and Juliet Were Too Young To Fall In Love, Anyway! - Lauren's 11 Meditation
Lauren Chiodo – meditation 11
I dislike Shakespeare. This is not a secret. I know that it is practically taboo for someone who has any interest in the theater to dislike Shakespeare, but I do. I hate acting out his work, reading his work, and trying to understand his work. I even dislike watching his work being performed.
I always laugh when Romeo and Juliet die. I found
Richard the Third to be funny as well, not an unnecessary bloodbath. Even Shakespeare’s most dire dramas are lost on me. I’m not sure what this says about me as a writer and actress, but it’s true.
Some people like to see adaptations of Shakespeare. I am not opposed to them, of course, but my favorite Shakespearian adaptations are the updated kind. I’m not talking about taking Shakespeare’s words and injecting them into a modern time, place, and with modern people. I’m talking about taking one of Shakespeare’s works and changing it to fit the time.
Some such adaptations that come to mind are
Ten Things I Hate About You, a movie from 1999 that stars Julia Stiles and Heath Ledger; or
She’s The Man, a more recent movie starring Amanda Bynes and Channing Tatum.
TTIHAY is a loose adaptation of
The Taming of the Shrew and
She’s The Man is another loose adaptation of
Twelfth Night. I enjoy these adaptations because they make Shakespeare’s work relatable. Watching
Romeo and Juliet makes me glad that I was never as dumb as those kids. I know that most of Shakespeare’s works are meant to be dramatic, but I find them ridiculous. The way the people act and interact in his works is so completely different from how society works today. It’s almost unfathomable.
Richard 3
Who gave Al pacino the chance to make a Richard 3 movie!!!!! And also why did he cast wynona ryder, her accent was horrendous as was her acting, it made me depressed to see that this movie was actually made. Al pacino played a decent richard 3 and I guess the documentary was interesting in parts, like seeing british people spout out bullshit about acting. Did they just talk to hear themselves, did they like their voices that much? It was depressing to see these supposed experts in their crafts just..just waste breath.
Anyway I didn't really come to understand the play any more because of this documentary, I felt that a lot of it was self serving and slightly retarded. but thats just me.
Censored
One of the main themes of the FTP was that it was “uncensored”. This theme was also brought into the movie, but as a whole theme for each situation in the movie. The painting, the shows, even the work programs had the theme of being “uncensored”. This, however, was not carried through, for anything.
The painting that Diego Rivera did in Rockefeller center was a censored project. When Rockefeller went to Diego with his project, he told him to paint anything, as long as he saw the sketches first. After he saw the sketches, Rockefeller told him to start painting. But after Diego was through, Rockefeller noticed that what was painted was not what Diego had originally given him. Rockefeller ordered him to repaint it, but Diego refused. In this sense, the painting was censored because Diego was not allowed to draw whatever he wanted, and when he did, Rockefeller got very upset and told him to take it down. I don’t think it is fair to censor something like that, because it is the painter’s vision, not Rockefeller’s, and the way he expressed himself may not have been the way Rockefeller wanted him to, but what he painted was what he wanted to express. I think the only reason why Rockefeller was upset about the painting was only because of the communist-like portraits in a non-communist country.
The shows that were being performed at this time were also censored. The Beaver musical, the one that was made for children, was thought to be a communist show and was pulled after it had just gotten started. The Cradle Will Rock was also pulled when they closed down the theatres and if anyone performed the show, they would be out of a job with the government. By closing down all the theatres, however, many people were out of jobs. The FTP was the only reason why many people had jobs in the first place. Olive never would have had a job if she never went to talk to the FTP. Programs as such were a great source for jobs, but they were also censored. They could only take a number of people, and they had to have all the requirements in order to get a job. The programs were censored also because they were looking out for communists amongst the group, and if they had even the slightest hint that someone was, they would either close the program completely, or make cuts in the number of people allowed to work.
Diego Rivera's Mural # 11
In the movie “Cradle Will Rock,” Rockefeller hires Diego Rivera to paint a mural on the wall of his building. However, after Rockefeller and Rivera had finalized the terms of the agreement, Rivera changed his original sketches and painted controversial issues and communism. Rockefeller, therefore, refuses to accept his work and has the painting destroyed. Some people think that he had no right to destroy art. When this was discussed in class many people thought art is a public property and belongs to everyone. However, I think that in the case of Rockefeller and Rivera, this was not the case. I feel that Rockefeller had every right to declare the work unsatisfactory and have it destroyed.
When making a business transaction, all parties involved must come to some sort of agreement. There is a stage in the process that involves defining the terms upon which the agreement or trade is made. In Rockefeller’s case it was a painting in exchange for a large sum of money. Rockefeller agreed to pay a certain sum in exchange for a certain kind of painting. As is the case in any bargain, both sides of the exchange are obligated to fulfill the requirements. If one person changes the deal or fails to meet the conditions then the contract is void. This is exactly what happened. Rockefeller saw that Rivera was not painting according to the agreed-upon sketches. Therefore, he refused to pay Rivera for the mural.
Another reason why I think Rockefeller had a right to destroy the work is because the wall upon which the mural was painted still belonged to Rockefeller. He can do anything with his wall or his property that he wishes. Just because Rivera painted on it does not mean it belonged to him. If an artist paints on the side of a building at his own free will, it does not mean the building belongs to that person. The fact that Rockefeller destroyed the mural was probably fairer to Rivera than if he had kept it. If Rockefeller left the painting there without paying Rivera he would essentially be benefiting from Rivera’s service without fulfilling his part of the bargain. Therefore, I think that Rockefeller was not wrong for smashing the mural because Rivera did not meet the requirements of the deal and because the wall still belonged to Rockefeller.
11-10-06 #10
So I think that Diego Rivera should have followed what he said he was going to do. And that Rockefeller was not wrong in destroying the work of art. The piece was supposed to be American encouraging work of art and Rivera’s showed much support to his communist roots. It was not an appropriate thing for him to paint in such a building at such a time where people feared communism. He should have stayed true to what he told Rockefeller he was going to do. And again, I think Rockefeller had all right to remove the painting, he owned the wall it was on, and he decided it was what was best for the people. He didn’t need people getting upset with him for having a painting of such controversy in his building. The same goes for all art of the time, it was an important project to support the arts, but at the same time the artist should respect who is paying them to do what they want for a piece and to support their country. Art for art sake is a good thing, but when it addresses such issues as communism during red scare times, I do not believe it is appropriate. Art should have been done in a positive fashion and not to frighten citizens. Art for art sake is a very integral part of the art because it creates movements and new types of art and expresses ideals. But there is a place and a time for every work, and some are just not appropriate during times, for instance terrorist supported paintings would not be appropriate well anytime, but especially around 9/11. Art needs to be done to be appreciated, and therefore an artist needs to know their limits when painting for someone else.
Meditation 10
During Monday’s class discussion, the possible villain of “Cradle Will Rock” came up. Hazel Huffman, portrayed by Joan Cusack, was suggested as a possible antagonist to the story. Yet, throughout the entirety of the film, the American government appeared to be the cause of the problems experienced by the Federal Theatre Project. Characters like Hazel Huffman may have contributed to the government’s goal of terminating the Federal Theatre Project; but she did not single-handedly mastermind the takedown.
Also, I found it increasingly difficult to feel sympathy toward any character who was so determined to unravel the threads of the organization who supported her financially and turn her back on her co-workers based on unfounded suspicions. I felt this way especially during the scene where she returned to work and her co-worker told her about the budget cut due to her testimony. Even though she didn’t originally intend for this to occur, she told the government that there were “communists in the system” so therefore they would obviously try to weed them out. She seemed so shocked when they all shunned her publicly at work but she did the same thing to them when she made her testimony, which was broadcasted on the radio. I just did not feel her character was worthy of sympathy since her situation was entirely self-inflicted.
The character of Hazel Huffman did seem to embody many of the feelings experienced by Americans at that time. They had to decide whether they wanted to risk being accused of being a “communist” or just jump the gun and be the accuser of someone else. Katie made the comparison between the Red Scare and the current situation of Americans being unpatriotic or “un-American” if they do not say the pledge of allegiance. This movie also reminded me, as I stated in class, of the Salem Witch Trials. People who potentially did nothing wrong were being hung based on false accusations, just as the people of America were being black-balled during the Red Scare; which provided the motivation for Arthur Miller to write “The Crucible”.
Meditation #10 -- Katie Marchant
I feel that the political unrest in Cradle Will Rock can directly correlate to the political unrest in today’s society. In the 1930s through the 1950s the majority of the country was obsessed with the fact that in US could possibly be taken over and turned into a communist nation. The government was actively searching for what they considered “traitors”, people how had political views that were not the “norm”. Today our government is also searching for “traitors” in almost the same way. After 9/11 there was a huge patriotism push and anyone who opposed this push was considered to be a traitor and an enemy of the American democracy. In a way the government in the time of the Communist scare was saying that people who supported communism were not being patriotic but as Cradle Will Rock showed us the government was probably chasing the wrong people. The people they should have been concerned about were probably the rich and those in high society because they had more than Communistic ideals, they had the money to support the Fascist dictators of other countries. We can still see this political unrest today in that if the government feels that someone is a traitor or an enemy of the US they can have their phones tapped or be imprisoned. The government should probably be more concerned about the choices they are making with finances and security than if some group of protesting college kids in Austin are having un-American ideas.
Sit down! You're rocking the cradle! - Lauren's tenth meditation
Out of all the films we’ve watched this semester, I think that I have enjoyed
Cradle Will Rock the most. As I said in last week’s meditation, I have always been fascinated with the time period the movie was set in, the Great Depression. I’ve found some facts online about the movie that I think are interesting.
I had never heard of
Cradle Will Rock before this class, but it received many nominations and awards when it came out in 1999. It was nominated for a Golden Palm at the Cannes Film Festival. Emily Watson was nominated for the British Supporting Actress of the Year award at the London Critics Circle Film Awards in 2001. It was also nominated in 2000 for the Best Ensemble Cast Performance at the Online Film Critics Society Awards. Bill Murray was nominated for the Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role, Comedy or Musical, in 2000 at the Satellite Awards.
At the Istanbul International Film Festival in 2000,
Cradle Will Rock won the People’s Choice Award in the International Competition. In 1999, director Tim Robbins won a Special Achievement in Filmmaking award from the National Board of Review, USA. The movie also won two awards at Sitges – Cataloniain International Film Festival in 2000 for Best Film and Best Director.
In the first scene we see where Olive is sleeping in the theater, we see that it is supposed to be Fall 1936, but the movie in the background says that Italy is about to invade Ethiopia. Not only did this invasion place in October 1935, Ethiopia was still known as Abyssinia at this time. The three other most noticeable places where the historical timeline has been changed for dramatic purposes is the fact that the Rockefeller mural was destroyed in February 1934; the first performance of
The Cradle Will Rock took place in June of 1937; and Hallie Flanagan testified in front of Congress in December of 1938.
The final piece of information that I found interesting was the business aspect of
Cradle Will Rock. The estimated budget for the movie was $32,000,000. The opening weekend of the movie in the US in December of 1999 yielded $93,988.
Not only is
Cradle Will Rock a good movie, it is also an interesting movie in what it deals with and all the details behind it. Wikipedia.com said, “While the original production of
The Cradle Will Rock was stated to be ‘The most exciting evening of theater this New York generation has seen’ (MacLeish, Cole 2000), many critics did not feel the same about Robbins’ reproduction of the event for film.”
I, for one, did enjoy the movie very much. Was it as earth shattering and ground breaking as the original play? No, but it was still well done.
Citations
“Internet Movie Database”. 7 Nov 2006.
“Wikipedia”. 7 Nov 2006.
Joan Cusak - "Bad-guy" or misunderstood?
In my last meditation I discussed how movies often distort history or events to tell a story. It is not always bad, but just one of the side effects of writing a script for a movie or play based on historical truth. One such change in history is the biased representation of an antagonist. In almost every movie, historical or not, there seems to be a clear cut bad-guy and a good-guy. The good-guys are always moral and innocent to some degree. The bad-guys usually are evil or deceiving in some way. However, in the movie Cradle Will Rock, I noticed that the person who could be considered an antagonist, Joan Cusak’s character, Hazel, didn’t seem to fill the roll as a bad-guy.
I really made this distinction towards the end of the movie. As the plot of the story began to fall into place and the relationships between all the characters came together, I realized that Hazel was one of the main people that was causing problems for the Federal Theatre group. But although I saw her as a troublemaker, I didn’t get the feeling she was an immoral, stereotypical bad-guy. Towards the end of the movie in the scene where the announcement is made that the project had been shut down, I almost got a feeling of sympathy for her – a feeling that is usually never associated with bad-guys. I am not saying that I condone her actions or think that she was right for going to the government reporting communist behavior within the program. However, I think that in the movie Cradle Will Rock, Hazel’s character was portrayed with complexity such that the audience could see that her intentions were not purely evil. Her character is developed slowly and with care so that the audience can see that she is human. She has doubts and even experiences loneliness and fear. I found it unique to see the antagonist of the film be depicted as a human with emotions, and not just a “bad-guy.”
Factual events in entertainment
The movie “Cradle Will Rock” is a true story. The events that happen are true, the dates of the events are true, even what was said during the court with Hallie Flanagan and the House Committee on Un-American Activities are directly taken from the stenographers notes during the actual trial. The scene at the end when the actors performed the show in front of the stage at the theatre was a true event.
The performers were forbidden to perform at the venue they had originally scheduled to perform at. They decided to change theaters, and instead of performing the entire show on the stage and losing their jobs, they chose the writer, Marc Blitzstein, to perform the show. He was to perform the show entirely by himself, reading all parts, explaining the stage directions, and singing all the songs. After the first line of the first song, however, Olive Stanton rose from her seat and slowly started singing the song. Quietly at first, and then eventually going full voice. As the show progressed, each of the actors stood and did their parts, improving the moves in front of the stage and using the aisles.
Another part that was true was the “death” of the Federal Theatre Project. In the movie we see the two students carrying the ventriloquist dummy down the street in a coffin with a sign behind it saying how long it had “lived” for. In this sense, they are carrying the memories of the FTP to it’s grave, and all the baggage that came with it. Once they turn the corner, they leave the past setting, and enter into the modern day Times Square.
From this I got that they were showing that no matter what they’ve had to go through to get there, theatre is still alive, and will forever be alive because of the people who will risk everything to perform. I also got from this ending that theatre may not have been the biggest thing during the setting of the movie, but now, on Broadway, theatre is booming. Everyone knows about theatre, about Broadway, and about the famous actors and actresses that have performed in various shows. Because of the FTP, I believe theatre is going stronger than it ever could.
11-3-06 #9
Cradle Will Rock brings up more than just the telling of a historically story. Not every historical film is entirely accurate; in fact, most are modified to fit the story rather than the truth of what happened. I think that is perfectly okay. It is not a requirement that a film about the Great Depression be entirely accurate unless it is to be used for educational purposes. A story about history is generally using the story of what happened to convey a point or a message in a way that people can relate to. Cradle Will Rock tells the story of people who are looking for work and all come together on the project The Cradle Will Rock. The characters must decide to do what they believe is right when the union tells them they cannot perform after funding for the FTP was revoked. The characters show that you should promote what you believe is right, like performing a play with a message that they support, even if it means losing your job. I believe this movie was not made to tell the story of the production of the play, but to convey a point and support the point that you should stand up for what you believe in no matter the cost. A historical movie is not about telling the story about what happened, and that is why in many cases it is the recount of one person that no one has ever heard of and their story, with a message. People can relate to things that have happened in the past, they know about them and they may have been involved or know people who were, the history just gives people something to relate to in the story. I think that the use of history to convey a point is a good idea and that it is perfectly okay to revise true history to fit the story.
Changing History for Cinematic Purposes #8
In class on Monday, Kirk asked the class how we thought movies dealt with history and historical events. This brought up an interesting point that I had never really considered. To what extent do films accurately portray facts in history? How far from the truth will movies stray to appeal to the audience? Where can we draw the line in terms of an exciting movie that is historically false versus a boring movie that is truthful? And more importantly, do filmmakers have a right to change the truth in order to tell a good story?
When Kirk first asked this question, I was rather upset to think that movies dealing with history would blatantly disregard fact to make a movie. I have always found movies to play a very influential role in shaping public opinion. Therefore, I have always thought that movies should live up to this role and portray fact as accurately as possible. Then, as the class discussion progressed, movies like Titanic and Pearl Harbor came to mind. I started to wonder, how responsible for public opinion can we really hold movies. In Pearl Harbor, for example, the focus of the story is on the love triangle between three fictional characters: Rafe McCawley, Danny Walker, and Evelyn Johnson. I know that when I went to see this movie, I didn’t really expect to learn about the ins and outs of the December 7th attack on Hawaii. I went to see whether Josh Hartnett or Ben Affleck would get the girl. However, in seeing such a movie I came out with a better understanding for people’s lives at the time. I came to the realization during this discussion that movies are not meant to inform the public as much as to entertain them. That is why documentaries attract a completely different crowd than chick flick’s do.
I guess this discussion brought it to my attention that movies aren’t necessarily made to teach. And if this is true, then why can’t filmmakers use certain events from history to tell an intriguing story? The public’s knowledge or lack thereof should not stop Hollywood from producing entertaining movies. After all, there’s a reason movies don’t claim to be “based entirely on a true story.”
Meditation #9 -- Katie Marchant
One thing that really interested me about Cradle Will Rock is how there are multiple stories that are intertwined to where we can possibly see characters from one of the other story lines in the current scene. The major story lines are: Olive Stanton, whom we meet in the very beginning of the film; Hazel Huffman and Tommy Crickshaw; Rockefeller and Diego Rivera; Welles and Houseman, their actors and patron; then there is the story line that crosses almost all of the others, the Margherita Sarfatti story. This film crosses all the barriers of social class and economic background at a breakneck speed that shows how the people of the time were feeling because of the politic situations.
It is kind of confusing to me to try to recreate the story in my mind. I know what happens in the end but it is the order of events that mess me up. This story is a very powerful one and having all of these different stories shows the audience how many people were affected but the Federal Theatre Project and by the Red Scare. Something that really affected me was how Joan Cusack’s character, Hazel Huffman, was so scared by the fact that there were communists within the FTP that she testified against them but she continued to work at the Federal Aid office because she was more scared of not having a job and becoming one of the people on the other side of the desk.
I am not by any means a history buff but from what I know and have read about this period of time, Cradle Will Rock does an excellent job of portraying the chasm between the economic classes and the general feeling of the time. Even if all the events are not exactly factual this film gives its audience something to think about and makes them want to learn more.
Historically Speaking
One of the main reasons why people go to the movies is for entertainment. We all go to see how many cars Jean Claude can blow up in a span of two hours, or how long it takes for the guy to realize that he really is in love with the girl and he has to go save her. Typical story lines. No one figures, however, that they are going to the movies to see a historically correct film.
Not many films today are even historically correct. Titanic, not true; Pocahontas, not true either. But who is to say that these films cannot be shown because they are not entirely true? No one can. The audience is the reason the shows make all their money, so their strategy is to get as many people to go see the show as humanly possible. But how will they do that, one might ask. Well, just look at the Titanic. Look who is in the movie.
Leonardo Dicaprio. They’ve pulled in all the teenage girls who are “ga-ga” over him. And Kate Winslet? Here come the boys! Again, the entertainment factor has taken control due to the actors that have been cast in the movie. Not to mention the fact that there is a very steamy love connection that happens during the movie!
Yes, all the drooling teenagers have arrived to see the movie. But why this movie? Why make a movie about something that killed so many people? Entertainment and the chance to make people aware of the past. I know I wasn’t aware that a gigantic boat sank in the middle of the ocean forever and a year ago. It had never been brought to my attention until the movie came out. The story isn’t entirely true with the fact that there wasn’t a young woman named Rose, or a young man named Jack. In fact, I have heard that Rose was really a very young girl. But what do I know? I wasn’t there. Well, technically I wasn’t there. I was at the movie version, not the historical wreck itself.
In the end, the movie producers and directors, and even the studios themselves, have the right idea about movies from the past. “Based on a true Story.” That is shown at the beginning of every “true” story. But the word ‘based,’ what does that mean? A name, a town, a dog, a cat, anything that could draw it to the historical event. But no one really cares, as long as there are attractive stars on the screen becoming that character and just entertaining us!
I Hope This History Never Repeats Itself - Lauren's 9th Meditation
I’ve always been morbidly fascinated with the Great Depression. I’ve never been able to understand it, but I’ve always been interested in it. Maybe because I feel like it’s something that I know I will probably never witness – this really is something I’ll only learn about in history books.
I was very impressed with Cradle Will Rock. Like we were talking about in class, many historically based movies downplay the actual history they’re telling. I did not find that true with Cradle Will Rock. Especially after reading the book experts we got from Kirk, it seems like Robbins and company went to extra lengths to make the movie, but make it pretty accurate as well.
I realize this is a true story, but many times true stories can become completely different stories when the go form history to the screen. I think that the resources Robbins and company had played a huge part in helping make this movie as exact and realistic as possible. The autobiographies and biographies gave them something concrete to work with, and perspectives of the same situation seen from different eyes. They also had a few people who could still recollect what had happened during this huge point in American history. All of these mostly first hand accounts were talked about in the book, so I assume they were used in the construction of the movie as well.
I thoroughly enjoyed Cradle Will Rock and the stories behind it. I wish more historically based movies took this much care with the real story that they’re
10-27-06 #8
Paula Vogel’s writing style is very unique and thought provoking. I really enjoy the way she writes because she entices you with her strange and matchless stories about very touchy issues. She discusses things that many people are afraid to talk about at the time; in How I Learned to Drive she discusses incest and child molestation, and in The Baltimore Waltz, she discusses AIDS, which at the time was a very touchy subject. Both stories make the audience reading the story very uncomfortable, and in the case of How I Learned to Drive, even more uncomfortable while watching it. The ability she has to make her work uncomfortable, but still entertaining and humorous and bearable to watch is outstanding. I never imagined being able to laugh at the humor in incest or AIDS before. She has a wonderful way with stories that she can make even the touchiest subjects entertaining to watch.
Both plays have achieved addressing very touchy subjects in a way that no one typically thinks of them. In How I Learned to Drive, many people do not think of a child molester as a kind, loving person who actually cares about the child. In The Baltimore Waltz the subject of AIDS is addressed, in the 80’s it was not a subject someone talks about it, but she addresses in it a way that makes people more comfortable with it by making it humorous. She does a very good job of discussing these topics in a way that people do not usually think of them, but still gets her point across. Vogel really makes you think and look at these prevalent issues from a way you never imagined before. Vogel does a very good job with her writing to address different subjects in a way that makes people understand from a different view, while still making the show entertaining. I really enjoy her writing style and would like to look more into her work.
Meditation #8
During our class discussion on Monday, we talked about our sympathetic feelings toward Peck, a character in "How I Learned To Drive," and how they changed from just reading the script and seeing it performed. Also, how the audience’s perception of Uncle Peck changes throughout the course of the play. While reading the script, I didn’t feel any sympathy for Peck at all; he seemed like a creepy, disturbed middle-aged man with serious mental issues. But when I saw the actor’s portrayal of Peck in the show, as a tentative man who did not seem to understand how twisted his perception of expressing love was, my feelings toward him changed dramatically. For example, in the hotel scene, I could actually see his whole fantasy world crumbling down around him because of Lil Bit’s rejection of his love. This event consequently caused his real world to crumble as well, causing his death. I felt really sad for him, not that she should have accepted his offer but just that he had founded so much on this hope and it couldn’t ever happen.
Peck had serious psychological problems for believing that this particular expression of love was normal in today’s society. Although, I am not entirely sure that he so much believed it to be accepted as hoped because he lied about seeing Lil Bit alone sometimes. But then again they told the family about the photo shoot, not the specifics but still, then there was the extended car drive, both of which were viewed as normal activities between an uncle and a niece.
My feelings changed drastically during the scene with the teenage greek chorus playing the role of Lil Bit’s voice in the car. I am not sure if it was the grotesqueness of actually seeing Peck touch her, and knowing that she was so young, but I was angry at myself for feeling sorry for him in the previous scene. I could not believe that I had felt anything but disgust for this molester.
The quote by Paula Vogel, “It takes a village to molest a child” really hit home during this show, especially in the scenes with the interaction with the rest of the family members. Like Lil Bit’s mom telling her that if anything happened it would be her responsibility, she knew how he looked at Lil Bit and she allowed her to go with him anyway. I felt like I was a part of that village she was talking about because I was witnessing it and not able to do anything to help her. Maybe the family was ignorant to the specifics of the relationship between Peck and Lil Bit, but even Aunt Mary told us that she would be glad when Lil Bit went to college so that she could have her husband back. She knew, just like the mother, and did nothing about it, nothing to help her; this is why that quote hits home so well throughout the course of "How I Learned To Drive".
Meditation #8 -- Katie Marchant
After reading two of Paula Vogel’s works I have come to realize that she has a very defined writing style that I feel that I could recognize very easily. Her works are written in a very particular combination of dialogue and characters speaking directly to the audience. Another way a reader can recognize a Paula Vogel work is by the introductory scene titles she implements. By using these different stylistic methods she creates a work that is very interesting to read and almost hard to comprehend. But when you see the play performed on stage these stylistic elements make the show much more interesting.
Vogel’s subject matter in both of the works we read is very dark yet at the same time the plays had some very comical moments. It seems weird to say that a work like
How I Learned To Drive, whose subject matter includes incest and molestation, is comical but it is. Just reading the play I was very disturbed and did not find it funny at all but when I saw it produced it was much easier to pick up on the subtle humor.
The Baltimore Waltz seems to be more directly funny and although the subject matter is dark (not quite as dark as
How I Learned To Drive) the humor is easier to pick up while reading. It would be very interesting to see a production of this show to see if I pick up on other things like I did in
How I Learned To Drive.
Liz in How I Learned to Drive
The most disconcerting moment for me of the whole play was after the hotel scene, where it show the first time little bit got molested. The technical aspects of this scene sre perfect, I felt uncomfortable as all hell. I felt like that voice would be in my head forever, when the light shined and lil bit was getting felt up, liz as part of the greek chorus became her voice, in this instance became innocence as it was about to be lost. It hit home. No matter what sympathy you may have for uncle peck, no matter how much you think lil bit was asking for it and not enforcing her decision for "the line", it hit home. This man is a monster for what he did, this is not to say he is completely to blame for his actions, however he is still a monster.
The scene with her voice on lil bit scared the crap out of me. As liz pantomined all the actions that lil bit did, I could feel that everything that was happening physically to lil bit, was happening to her very soul. And Liz was that soul, I admire liz for being able to pull it off so well, her very mannerisms begat the innocence and shock that is going through lil bits mind. We see liz in that role only once, her other roles are great,no question, but we never see liz as the innocence of lil bit after that or during the play because, somewhat like a mix of memento and quentin tarantino we see glimpses of the past, and we connect the dots to find that her innocence is gone, forever lost, taken away by the sympathetic monster.
I cant come up with an original title. So, blog #8
The show How I learned to Drive by Paula Vogel is a very twisted play in which a girl is sexually molested by her uncle for 7 years. Working with this show was a very new experience for me because I have never had to give the subject of incest a deep thought like I had to for the show.
Incest and child abuse are major problems we have in society, but because of the media, no one ever thinks twice about both sides of the story. The news makes the stories so black and white that the citizens of the affected area just believe what they hear: that the predator is either a strange man who only goes after young children, or that the predator is the “nicest person.” But no one can really believe these stories. As written in the show, the so called “predator” is a man who everyone trusts, a man who is very respected by all, a man who helps anywhere possible. Uncle Peck is a trustworthy man; the last person expected to do such an act. The part that people look past, however, is the fact that Peck also has his emotional problems. Peck is shown as a human in this play, not as a sexual predator. It is shown that he is a person who has needs, and wants, and troubles, just like everyone else. He just has a strange way of relieving his stresses. It is given as a clue in the end of the show that perhaps someone had done to him what he had done to Lil’ Bit. When she says: “Who did it to you, Uncle Peck? How old were you? Were you 11?” it gives the audience the idea that perhaps this whole incidence is just a part of a huge cycle that has been going on for years. It is also a clue within the family that sex is just a huge part of their lives with Grandma getting married at 14, and Lucy getting pregnant at a young age.
On the other hand, it is not fair to state that Lil’ Bit is the sole victim in this situation. She is also, in a sense, a predator towards Uncle Peck. She has control through many of the scenes as she states that she is “drawing the line” and that he is “not to cross it” after she has drawn the final line. And she plays with his mind. Saying that she wants him to teach her to drive, and she wants to do the photo shoot, and she never actually stops anything that he is doing by telling anyone what is going on. She also continues the cycle of child abuse when in the scene on the bus with the young man, she describes the “second act” of their meeting, implying what happened after they get off the bus. In this scene, she finally sees that she is doing what was done to her. The cycle again continues.
Uncle Peck - More than just a Criminal
Many offenders are known to have committed such crimes while still leading a normal life with a family and spouse. The BTK murderer, Dennis Rader, is one example of this. He had a wife, children, a house, a job, and even volunteered at the family’s church. No one knew he was the brutal murderer of Wichita, Kansas. I have always thought that this was interesting. How is it possible that such inhumane people are able to lead double lives; teaching Sunday school by day and committing heinous crimes by night? I always assumed these criminals were too sick or demented to participate in normal aspects of society, and I never thought I could feel sorry for such a person. However, I experienced this exact thing in the play How I Learned to Drive, with respect to the character Uncle Peck. I think one thing that makes this play so unique is its ability to let the audience see the human side of his character.
In the play, Lil Bit struggles with the effects of being molested as a child by her uncle. The audience is made aware of this from the beginning of the play through various monologues. I immediately assumed that the uncle’s character would be displayed as a creepy, distorted human with essentially evil tendencies and obsessions. However, this was not the case. I did not condone Uncle Peck’s actions in any way, yet at the same time I felt sorry for the ongoing cycle he seemed to be trapped in. Lil Bit makes a comment towards the end of the play asking herself who sexually abused her uncle as a child. In this remark, Lil Bit herself expresses a feeling of compassion for his situation. I also sympathized for his character in the hotel scene, when he proposed to his niece or when he comforted her when she was upset by the rest of her family. He seemed to really love and care for Lil Bit as his obsession proved to be beyond the physical level. This does not justify what he did to Lil Bit as a child, but instead it depicts his ability to love. This made me I wonder if Uncle Peck was aware of the emotional damage he was causing his niece, because if he truly loved her, he would not want to hurt her. After all, he did express to Lil Bit multiple times that anything that happened between them would be consensual.
These examples are two of the many instances in the play that made me see another side to Uncle Peck – a side with more depth and natural characteristics than the personality of a stereotypical criminal. I do not think that Uncle Peck was justified in any way with what he did. I think there were many things he could have done to stop the molestation cycle. However, I think the play How I Learned to Drive was successful at accurately depicting how criminals are still human.
#7 10-20-06
“How I Learned to Drive” is a play based entirely on an adaptation of a pedophile from a view that no one ever thinks about. When most people think of pedophiles, they think of sick, disgusting men who sit and wait for their prey to arrive so that they can do all things unimaginable to get what they need. Creepers, I’ll say. But the play addresses a pedophile from a different perspective, one that makes you want to run up and hug him and sympathize with him. Uncle Peck is really a kind, helpful, loving man who wants to do all he can to help his family; he loves Lil’ Bit, yes a little more than normal, but he never does a thing to intentionally hurt her. Now, don’t get me wrong, what he does is sick, it’s just that he lets her draw the line and doesn’t do anything she doesn’t want him to do. Although he has skewed her idea of what is appropriate for him to do, she still knows she can draw the line, but she still goes on with it and even initiates some of it too. It is still sickening to watch an old man molest a small child and that, from whatever way you look at it is still wrong, but you still gotta love Uncle Peck. He is truly a good man and a genuinely sweet one at that, which is what the play is trying to show us. Look at this good man, who due to something in his past has gone sour in some areas. You feel sorry for such a good man to be trapped in his mind where he thinks pedophilia is okay, you want to comfort him and let him know everything will be okay, you want to help him.
This play shows us the same story we have heard for years and years, that pedophilia is wrong, but it shows us from someone else’s view. A story is adapted to be told how someone else views the situation. It brings out a new opinion and side of the story; this one tells about something most people have never thought about. Honestly, until seeing this play, I have never sympathized with a pedophile, but now I have, even if it’s just a fictional one. The story brings about new ideas, while still maintaining the same morals—yes pedophilia is wrong, but have you ever looked at it from inside the pedophile’s head, do you know what they have gone though to be here and what they are truly like as a person? I really enjoyed the play because it brings out a different aspect of the story that isn’t usually perceived.
Fact or Fiction - Lauren's Seventh Blog
In the recent blogs, people have discussed what they think about many stories having more than one version. Some people think it’s perfectly normal, others think that may discredit stories altogether.
I believe that stories are meant to have more than one version. Think way back in the day before there was pens and paper and internet. How did people communicate? Through stories. Maybe not stories with words, but through stories. So if caveman A was talking to caveman B about a hunting trip, that’s one version of the story. But then caveman B goes to caveman C and tells him the same story but adds his own details. What he caught, what he saw, what he heard. Just a few details can change a story a lot.
Even now, when you tell stories, don’t you get the urge to change the facts, even just a little? Maybe you want to make it a little more dramatic or make yourself look better?
It’s only natural that stories from centuries or decades ago would get a little changed over time. I think it makes them interesting, not invalid.
Meditation # 7 -- Katie Marchant
There are so many creation myths. Basically every country and culture has a creation myth that they claim as their own. But many of these myths have some of the same basic elements; a deity of some sort, a man and a woman and animals. The three versions I want to briefly explore are some variations of the Christian/Jewish Creation Myth (The Book of Genesis), The Navajo Creation Story, and The Chinese Creation and Flood Myth. I am not sure why I choose these three in particular; I think that it is because I just liked them. Each of these myths have the three basic elements that I mentioned earlier.
Starting with the Christian/Jewish myth, only because it is the most widely known and the easiest to explain. It begins with God creating everything in a certain order. 1- heaven and earth 2- light and dark 3- separation of sky and earth 4- sea and land 5- plants 6- sun and moon and stars 7- birds and amphibious animals 8- animals 9- man 10-woman. God did all this in six days and rested on the seventh.
The next myth is one version of the Navajo myth. The Navajo myth differs in that the people came from 3 underworlds into this world. After they arrived in this world, the “Glittering World” they decided where to put the mountains then the Gods made the sun and moon and sky and all the other necessities of life. It goes on to tell about monsters and the twins that saved the new Earth People.
Next is a version of the Chinese myth. It is a creation/flood story that was originally in a poem form that was sung. In the beginning there is a deity that creates the three basics but there was a huge flood that wiped out all of mankind except for one man and his sister who survived by using a huge gourd as a boat. The man wants his sister to be his wife. In the end they have a child together who turns out deformed with no arms or legs so the man chops it up and throws the pieces around the hills but when he wakes up the next morning all the pieces became men and women, the new mankind.
I really like how vastly different these myths are even though they are telling basically the same story, how humans came to be on this earth. I like that in each of the stories there is a deity that creates the world but then that deity leaves it up to the people it creates to populate and take care of the what it gave them.
This is where I found the myths that I used:
http://www.magictails.com/creationlinks.html
One interesting aspect of theatrical adaptation is how many different stories can evolve from one main idea. The first thought that came to my mind when we began discussing this as a class was superheroes. Superman especially, since 1940, there has been at least 30 different adaptations released in the form of film. (http://searcha.movies.go.com/?q=Superman) This number does not include the television series “Smallville”, “Lois and Clark” or the new movie based on the original Superman’s life, entitled “Hollywoodland”. All of the preceding based from one original work, a comic book. It is interesting to me to see so many varieties of adaptations evolving from a comic book. Television series, novels, fantasy movies and dramatic movies are just a few of the factors that contributed to Superman’s fame and made him an international icon. I don’t believe that all adaptations have had as much influence as the Superman cartoons did. But really, think of Spiderman or Batman, they have theme parks and action figures and Saturday morning cartoons created because of them. I believe that these are myths, in a sense that they have magical powers, and more likely than not they could not really occur. However, to the children of our generation, they are heroes, in the same sense as the Greeks believed their gods were heroes. As I think about all of the stories I was told as a child, I realize how much they came to be a part of my identity. Take Santa Claus, a legend, a myth- one which has sparked countless stories, movies, and become an iconic part of Christmas.
It fascinates me to think about how important one character can become to so many people’s lives. In a way, we are just like the Greeks, knowing that there is no way that our heroes could really accomplish the feats they claim but still accepting them. Like Santa Claus, leaving presents under every child’s pillow in one night, no person could possibly accomplish this, and yet we still accept it; not as truth, but as a story which dances in our dreams.
The Multiple Versions of the Return of Orestes
How is it possible that there can be multiple versions of the same story? Wouldn’t the differences between the plots discredit the story as a whole? This is the case with the varying accounts of the return of Orestes by Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. Each of the three has written different interpretations of the story of a brother and sister’s attempt to avenge their father’s death. One would assume that the mere presence of three varying versions of the event would discredit the validity of the story. After all, true historical facts would not be so controversial. However, I believe that one must accept the consistencies between the stories as trivial effects of the varying interpretations.
One can see how the accounts differ when examining how Electra comes to believe that Orestes has returned. In The Libation Bearers by Aeschylus, Electra is suspicious that her brother is in town because she sees a lock of his hair and his footprints near her father’s tomb. Her suspicion is confirmed when Orestes shows her an article of clothing he was given as a child. This is different from Sophocles’s account in Electra. In his version, Electra doubts that Orestes is who he says he is until she sees her father’s ring on his hand. This ring convinces her of Orestes identity. However, Euripides writes in his story of Electra that she sees a lock of Orestes’s hair, his footprints, and an article of his childhood clothing and still doubts his return. She only believes that the man is her brother when she sees a scar on his forehead from when he was a child. These differences suggest that none of the three stories is to be trusted because the accounts are too inconsistent with one another.
However, I think that these discrepancies are somewhat irrelevant. I think that there will by differences between the versions of all stories that are passed on throughout time. The more important thing is the fact that each of the three stories describes two siblings that yearn to avenge their father’s death. Each story depicts Electra’s initial disbelief of Orestes’s return. For a story that has been known to hundreds of generations, I think the idea that this story is still alive is impressive. The details of the story can vary, but the overall plot is the same; therefore proving the story more valuable for its mere existence and survival throughout time.
Differences
How can three stories that revolve around the same story, and have the same type of characters, portray a situation differently? Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides did in their interpretations of the return or Orestes. All three stories tell of the same brother and sister who are trying to avenge their father’s murder, but they each have their own spin on how Electra comes to find out about her brother’s return.
In Libation Bearers by Aeschylus, Electra, with help from the chorus, visits Orestes’ grave, and once there spots a lock of hair on the grave. She believes that this hair is much like her own, giving her reason to believe that her brother might have come back in secret to avenge the murder of his father. A few moments later, Electra notices some footprints that she states are: “Marks upon the ground/ Like those my feet have made, the very same…” (Lines 216-217). She claims that the footprints are the same size as hers, and look just like per own footprints, but she notices that there’s two sets of footprints, one for her brother and one for the person with him. But when her brother appears, she doesn’t believe it is him when he tells her who he is. He finally convinces her when he pulls out the piece of clothing that she made for him before he was sent away. This is an interesting way of proving that she thinks it’s her brother, because it would be hard for someone to know anything about a person from hair, and footprints.
On the other hand, in Sophocles’ Electra, Electra is holding the ashes of who she believes is her brother, when Orestes’ comes to her and talks to her about her misfortunes, and about her sorrows. He tells her that she shouldn’t have any sorrow because there’s no need to mourn the living. It isn’t until she sees the ring of their father on his hand that she believes it is really Orestes and he is really alive. This version, I thought, was more entertaining because of the confrontation between Orestes and Electra in which she believes he is mocking her for grieving her brother’s death until she realizes that he really isn’t dead, and he is standing directly in front of her.
In the last rendition we read, Electra written by Euripides, the realization that it is truly Electra’s brother who is talking to her is brought out in a more humorous way. First, Electra is married to an old man, and Orestes and his friend are guests in her house, though she doesn’t know the whole time they had been there. When she is shown the piece of hair, she shoots it down because she knows not all siblings have the same hair. When she is shown the footprints, she again shoots it down because it is a rocky ground and there is no way footprints would show up on rocky ground. The proof she needed was a tiny scar he has on his brow from falling when they were children. This small piece of proof was what changed her mind; a tiny scar made her realize that the man who was a guest in her house was really her brother for whom she has believed was dead for all those years.
Though all the stories are different adaptations of the same story, they all have the same ending, with her seeing that her brother is really alive, and he has been for all these years. And they all have the same moral: Don’t trust what you see; instead, go deeper to see all the clues needed to know the true version of what you’re looking at.
Myth
Myth is defined as "a traditional, typically ancient story dealing with supernatural beings, ancestors, or heroes that serves as a fundamental type in the worldview of a people, as by explaining aspects of the natural world or delineating the psychology, customs, or ideals of society" by the American Heritage Dictionary. In the discussion conducted in class we can see where that would apply, Greek myths or mythology are moral lesson using ancient heroes as subjects. In Greece they were widely held as truths.
Some people in discussion brought up the fact that tales could often be brutal or seem evil, and so could not be moral tales. However, that merely supports the fact that these are moral tales. By showing the evil the writers and tellers of greek myth are showing you what not to do. Do not kill your father and sleep with your mother or bad shit will happen, Oedipus has shown us this quite effectively. He had severe punishments for his actions, because he did wrong and the gods delivered justice. Now the Gods have different moral standards than humans, but thats allowed because they are immortal. The myths are a way of showing what not to do as a human, because no one reading the myths are gods.
There are many different definitions for the word myth. One of the most prominent is that a myth is something that is false; something that is not true, but we all believe it because it’s what we have been told, most of the time, someone tells us to scare us.
The most memorable myth I have been told is not to swallow my gum. I was told many myths about this, actually. One said that it would stay in my stomach for 12 years. Another said that it would stay in my stomach and grow bigger and bigger for 7 years. And the most frightening one-it would clog my throat, and I was going to choke and die. Another myth I have been told is not to swallow watermelon seeds. Why? Because it will sprout and I will have watermelons growing in my stomach until they get so big that I have to have them surgically removed. I believed this for a good 5 or 6 years until I accidentally swallowed a seed, and I got so upset I sat up all night crying, and my sister had to explain that it wasn’t true. But because my mom had told me these stories, I believed them.
The same could be said about “urban legends” and fairy tales. Because we have been told these stories for such a long time, we believe them. An urban legend that I once saw solved on the show “Myth busters” was the myth about if you mix pop rocks and coca cola, then you will die. They say something about the carbonation mixed with the sugars and ingredients that make pop rocks pop causes your body to basically implode. But this was proven false. Because no one was willing to volunteer their lives, for all they knew, this became a myth. And everyone believed it because for so many years people were told this story, and over the years the story became more severe, and perhaps grotesque, causing people to fear even thinking about it. Fairy tales, on the other hand, have changed over the years, too. If you take the Disney movies, that are told to be fairy tales, they are changed to gain an audience from children. The fairy tale of The Little Mermaid and even Pocahontas are changed to draw in a bigger crowd with their happy endings; the typical fairy tale ending of “and then they lived happily ever after.” But in real life, that never happened. Or in the original stories. But let’s face it, no one would want to go see the true story of Pocahontas, in which her real name was not Pocahontas, but Matoaka, and she was captured and taken to England, and that is where she met John Smith. But she didn’t fall in love with him right away. She very much disliked him at first (
The Pocahontas Myth).
I would have to say that my definition of a myth is not that it is a story that is false. I believe now that a myth is simply a story that is passed from generation to generation, that has yet to be proven false.
Myth Busters! - Lauren's Sixth Meditation
In class on Wednesday we began talking about myths. I still believe that many myths are meant to teach people things – specifically children. We talked about Greek myths, urban legends, and ‘prescriptive’ myths. It got me thinking about all the myths I heard when I was a kid. I decided to look up a few and finally put my questions to rest.
I always heard that if you mixed Pop Rocks with Coke, your stomach would explode due to too much carbon dioxide. This has since then been proved untrue, and the Pop Rocks company ended up having to do serious damage control when this myth came out only four years after the company got up and running. Pop Rocks were no longer sold after about 1983, which many thought proved that they were dangerous. The truth is that Kraft bought the rights to the candy and marketing them under a different name.
I remember when the movie Dead Man on Campus came out. The movie is about a guy who hears the myth that if your roommate commits suicide, you automatically get a 4.0 for the semester. He then spends the rest of the movie trying to find a roommate who is fragile enough to kill himself, thus giving the surviving roommate a 4.0. While most colleges will take deaths or other accidents into consideration under these circumstances, there isn’t a college in the US that has the 4.0 guideline. This myth is supposedly fairly recent, is seems to have started in the mid-1970s.
I’ve also heard tons of myths about how Disney incorporates sexual messages into their films. A lot of these, when you stop and take stills of the films, are completely untrue. Some are still pretty sketchy, and others were obviously done by accident.
I think myths are a funny thing. All these things above seem so silly now that I’ve looked at the evidence, but I’ve believe much stupider things before. What about myths makes them so damn believable? I’m not sure – does anyone else have an idea?
Citation
Snopes.com. 13 October 2006. < http://www.snopes.com/>.
