Analysis 

At the start of the process, we began by picking what musical we would like to be in. At the start I decided to be in the musical with the brief of ‘Vampires’. We all decided on our roles, and I decided to be a Dramaturg for the Musical. I have never been a Dramaturg before so at the start of my process I met up with a practicing Dramaturg for what my role is and what I would have to do. I discovered that I would have to create the character profiles and the setting that they live in, and that’s what I exactly went on to do. She also discussed with me how I would have to help in the rehearsal process. She talked about how I help with the developing practical aspect of the show by asking opened questions. So, after this I first started my work while the songs and script were being written. I essentially spoke with the writers and directors about, what ideas they had for the show and what style is the show. They discussed the show ‘In the Shadows’ and keeping the show in this style which is, humorous and ironically funny to watch. So, my first point of call was to watch the full series of ‘In the shadows.’ I took notes on mannerisms of both the humans in the piece and the vampires. I also looked at the relationships in the piece and how these made the piece funny. By this point the script had been written. So, I could start to create this world and its characters. I started my research on vampires and found there were serval different Folktales of vampires throughout the world. Many countries have many different versions of what they believe vampires are and have many different tales surrounding these creatures. After my research later more focused specially on European folklore after researching and decided to base all my vampire charters on a specific folklore that was based off in Europe. For example: 

So, after knowing how many vampires was in the show, I gave every vampire a folklore and rules to follow. An example of this is above. I then went on to create backgrounds for every character and created music playlist for charters and images of how they would look like. Then, I went on to creating the environment of the Musical. My initial idea was creating a little island in the Irish Sea. Following the brief the directors wanted was that they wanted somewhere in Europe with limited technology. So, the first thing I created was the island that was isolated from the rest of the world.  

Once I created this island, I found flaws within it that would not coincide with some character context that I created for the character profiles. One of them being Jane main’s purpose in life was to be a world leading doctor and if she would not be able to achieve this objective if she was so isolated from the rest of the world. So, I went back to the drawing board. I then went onto researching places in England that have Vampiric setting and landed on The Northern Moors. In this environment I was able to place some of the setting that was previously written into very real places in this world. I gave the actors images and links to show them where certain scenes in the musical were set and so they could visualise the environment properly. After all this work then some of the songs had been created. I got a hold of these songs and created some super objectives, objectives, actions and tactics. For every character in the song so they had a very clear intention for not only the scenes but the songs too. After all this analysis work was created, we started the rehearsal process. My role as dramaturg meant that I had to assist the director by asking the openly questions about characters intention within the scene. I also helped actors with questions about the characters and help them explore their characters more by asking them to do it in different ways. I found that through the practical exploration some of my objectives in the scenes and songs had changed due to the actor’s trying scenes and songs in different ways. For example, in the first scene I had imagined the character of the Nurse, objective to be quiet so the rest of the nurses would not hear her breaking the rules. After exploration the objective change to the Nurse allowing herself to embrace Jane’s motive with no regard to what anyone else thinks about it.  

Day one of the researching and developing process we did a script read through. I then gave the actors their character profiles and gave them actors them and told them to go away and to look at their briefs and listen to the Playlist. We then played through the scenes an began to explore scene 1-5. Where we played with intention and physicality of the characters. Day 2 we went through more scenes and allowed the actors to explore their environments. They were also given time in the day where they could ask any questions about the characters and the world. In this day we also learned some choreography, and I instructed the actors to embody their characters mannerisms within the dance routines. This was to keep a body of the characters even in a different style of moment. For day 3 we kept going through scenes and exploring and began to structure the piece. And then, we into looking how songs could be sung by the different characters and how physically portray themselves singing wise. And then, we explored and lightly stage the first number. On day 4 we then set out what we were going to for our sharing. We decided on what we would show by showing songs, scenes and dances that would best show what the narrative and style of the piece is. We then staged these scenes and songs ready for the next day. My job within this was to create my own track. Another, job I did this day was to maintain character integrity.  Overall, the showing went well, and it was nice to hear the audience give a reaction to material. We had laughs for our comedic lines but also, laughs in places which we as team did not know where funny. I noticed this was bits out for if we further develop the musical, because I would like to look at why people found it so funny. As dramaturg it also was lovely to see that embodiment of characters through a practical sense. To see the work that you created being done gave me a lot of satisfaction with my work. But also made me realise that there is so much more I can do and create for these characters. So, if I had more time I would like to explore how unique we can make the vampires. So, they feel even more different dynamic to how the humans behave. I feel this would fun to explore and would heighten not only some the characters but the character relationships and stakes for the narrative. 

Evaluation 

Throughout the rehearsal process I was able to look back at my initial work and reflect on what has been helpful and what I could have done, to prepare us more for the exploring process. I found building character backgrounds helpful for not only me, but the actors involved. This enabled an initial grounding for where the actors could start to build and explore their characters. I received great feedback from both the directors and actors about this work. Something I found through the week was I found recreation, of my initial ideas to be really fun for me and left me with so many more questions about how the characters should be. Another thing I found the R&D was through, the rehearsal process I constantly was asking questions of the actors of “Why?” This was surrounding of why they did feel a certain emotion or why felt the need to move? Throughout the week I felt the need to ask not only this question but several others. I felt this was not only helpful for the actors but for the direction of it too. The director also asked me loads of questions and kept on checking with me if what they were doing, was in the world of the characters. Something I really enjoyed about this week is, that we had three ensemble vampires Which were based off the Slovakian folklore about vampires and I did not give them a clear background because I wanted the three ensemble members to create their own to see what they got from that folklore. To see how they interpreted it. By the end of the week me on and the actors, created names back stories, mannerisms, intentions and lines were added into the script to help the overall narrative move. I discovered the value this week of having an ensemble to reinforce an environment. I will take with me this lesson into future research of musicals. If I were to go back and improve, I think I would start my work after knowing what the message of the show was. Me and the directors we’re constantly asking ourselves why are we putting on the show? And What are audience to take away from the show? We’re still asking ourselves this question now. As much as the show became something quite humorous and fun, I think me and the directors want there to be more of an intention of an audience learning something through humour. Something I have also, reflected on now is that I would like to be a part of the creating the music part of the show. I felt I wasn’t really a part of that and now seeing the projects being created I would like to be a part of the music and make sure, that is in the style of the show and reinforces the Environment we have created in the scenes. Something I would do, in some of the songs surrounding the vampires I would like to add some more European styled music into the show. I feel this is now necessary due to the actors inhibiting European folklore through there acting, so it would make more sense to show this also through their singing and the music style.  

Funding  

At the forefront of every musical theatre project. Funding it is always a concern. For our musical I believe it would be possible to get but there are some challenges. As dramaturg I look a lot into set and setting of the piece. For our show to work we need 4 set changes in the entire show. I imagine it needing to be quite big set changes due to them being contrasting environments. This would cost quite a bit of money due to their needing a lot of pieces of set to make these achievable. However, due to us having a small cast in this show this could be done depending on the budget. Another challenge we would face from technical perspective is that our show is 16+ show, so it margined to a specific audience. The audience who would what this sort of show would also be watching things such as ‘Dracula’ The musical. So, there would be more difficulty in funding due to a musical pre-existing similar concept to ours. But I still do believe there is room on market for our musical because they are lightly similar but completely different narratively wise. 

Conclusion  

 To conclude, I felt this week was a productive week. I felt well prepared due to the work that I put in beforehand. I also felt prepared enough to answer the actor’s questions and help guide them throughout the process. Before starting the process, I had questions, that had been answered through this exploration process. But now after leaving this process I feel I have so many questions that I would one day like to explore about the characters. By no means is this a finished product of our musical but was a great start to it. I especially enjoyed working closely with the actors but the directors too. I felt a real connection to this role and would like to be a dramaturg in my future.  I would one day love to go on and be a dramaturg and this process helped me discover that.