Performance Analysis

On Friday the 17th of May at 7.30pm STAMP Theatre performed their production of ‘The Trial’ on the LPAC stage.

The day of the Performance we arrived at the theatre for 10.00 am to prepare for our cue to cue which began at 2.00pm. During this it was a great way to physically and vocally warm up and get into costume whilst preparing for the events ahead. A cue to cue was both helpful for the lighting tech team but also very significant for the actors as it was essential we were all in the exact positions for the spotlights and frames.

As much practice with the Frames as possible was also essential once they had been attached to the bungee cord, as we needed to feel as comfortable and controlled with them as possible. This was one thing I felt slightly nervous towards as in rehearsals we had been restricted with working with the frames because of how they had to be attached by a bungee cord. For the ‘Telephone Scene’ in particular it was difficult as we had to stretch the frames to the front of the stage whilst also being careful in the way we were holding them, as to not to snap the rope.

Once this had all been finalized we had a successful dress rehearsal then prepared for the upcoming show.

On reflection of the performance, I personally felt as though for me, the show was a great success and we all gave it our all and came in to characters to our full potential. We dealt with slight mishaps such as a frame snapping both professionally and artistically, and this did not take our focus away from the performance.

I felt as a chorus we worked well together, and the months of dedication and practice finally came together and showed within the performance. Reflecting back on my character of Leni also, i feel as though i was happy with the performance i gave and confident i gave off the messages and persona i intended. The reaction from Joeseph K also assisted me to do this as the relationship between us was one of the vital sub plots behind my character.

To conclude i have thoroughly enjoyed the past 4 months working with STAMP theatre both working on the marketing/advertising as well as being in the show and has been a privilege to work along such a dedicated and talented team.

Thanks for reading

Becca xx

A reflection on the theatre company process

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Looking back at the process it is possible to see where the company has diverted away from their initial ideologies. STAMP’s aim in the beginning was to create a performance that did not rely on aesthetics but on the performer and their relationship with the audience. Reflecting on the final performance of The Trial I feel that we potentially had a striking aesthetic due to the simplicity and intelligence of the set and as such contradicted our initial aims in the manifesto. As is stated, ‘we will play with our source, we will have fun with what we can do with it’ (Watson 2013, online), though the playing and creativity of the set unintentionally broke away from the manifesto’s aims, we as an ensemble were able to explore and play as Brook would have intended. I feel this still made for entertaining theatre.

Post-show comments from audience members suggested that the performances were excellent and the aesthetic of the piece was correct, though it could be argued that with The Trial there is almost a moment of sudden bathos that occurs in the second act with the story of Block, we tried to achieve this change in mood but still maintain the playfulness that occurred in the first half of the play. It was only when K was alone with the audience that we really wanted the mood to be turned on its head- possibly this was too late for the audience to make that distinction. The play itself was enjoyable to perform in and our end product was something to be admired and appreciated as good theatre, even if it had strayed from our initial aims.

Our aim was to create a pure theatre; perhaps we still achieved this but not in the way we envisaged. The entire process has been an eye opening experience into the industry and how it functions. Hopefully STAMP Theatre will revise the ideologies of the manifesto and continue to make interesting and diverse theatre.

Work cited

Watson, A. (2013) STAMP Theatre’s Manifesto, Online: (Accessed 22/05/2013).

Brook, P. (1968) The Empty Space, London: Penguin.

Post-Show Review

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The final performance of The Trial went extremely well! Firstly our marketing was a success, having sold nearly 190 tickets we reached and even went over our objective of 150. Having only performed using the real frames the night before during a tech rehearsal I myself was nervous about what could go wrong but after two runs of the play using them, we were all comfortable with them.

For some scenes I struggled using the frames as there was a lot of tension in the bungee rope however, Lucy stated that I didn’t need to use it for them which was far easier and made me more relaxed. One thing that I particularly enjoyed was hearing the audience’s reactions, particularly in parts where we had repeated the scene so many times that it lost its comedic value for us. When playing the bailiff, I received a positive reaction from the audience even before I had said any lines, people were laughing at the character, which spurred me on.

I did however nearly forget one line of Huld’s however; I used the pipe I had to cover it up until I remembered it, even receiving a laugh after delivering the line after. I felt that my concentration in Huld, The Bailiff and the chorus was at the best it’s ever been when the audience was there. The play also received very good feedback from the audience who commended the set, lighting, direction and performance.

I felt that because Alex Watson was in the tech box that it was far more comforting for me as a performer as I knew that if there was a technical error, then he would’ve known the play well enough to step in. I felt that the other members of the cast were also the best I have ever seen them perform, however grotesque peoples characters were in rehearsals were magnified by the presence of an audience. I found this myself, that I actually performed better with having an audience this was possibly because the more reactions you got from the audience, the more grotesque you needed to become to get a further response.

Communicating our lighting needs

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In our manifesto we state that as a collective, STAMP Theatre aim to focus solely on performance rather than the visual aesthetics such as lighting design. Therefore when it came to lighting design the artistic director and I liaised often about keeping the differing lighting states simple.

In our production we had 8 lighting states in total and when creating a lighting plot Alex Harvey Sporle (ASM) and I tried to make this as easy as possible for our venues to comprehend. In total we had 18 spotlights (2 on each of the 8 hanging picture frames, one on the door frame at the back and one DSC), a general white wash, a general blue wash, a split downstage wash (separating stage left from stage right), a state where both downstage areas were lit at the same time, and back lights (to create shadows).

In order for the LPAC technical team to understand exactly what we wanted I had to make additional documentation to transfer our ideas over. This documentation enabled them to get a general idea of what we required when it came to rigging on the day. This also meant we didn’t spend too long discussing what we required on the day of rigging. This documentation included a focus chart – detailing exactly what each light needed to do, and a magic sheet – which works hand in hand with the LX plot and focus chart to reiterate the function and positioning of each light.

Here are the completed magic sheet and focus chart, Alex Harvey Sporle will post the finished LX plot.

The Trial – Focus sheet

Magic sheet – stamp

I made these documents in a generic format that is clear and understandable for technicians across different venues.

The focus chart is a simple way of communicating what each light on the LX plot is needed for. This gives the venue an idea of any lights they may need to use as substitutes to create different states if they do not have the specific ones stated on our LX plot. A good example of this from our LX plot we requested moving wash lights, but the LPAC were unable to provide these so, knowing what we wanted to create the technical team were able to ensure substitute lights were available (we used shutters instead).

‘[T]he magic sheet sorts the dimmers or channels into graphic focus locations’ (Shelley,2009, p.264). As you can see by the magic sheet I put together, I have used arrows to show what direction the light is coming from and the channel number within the arrow to point out what light it is. The magic sheet goes hand in hand with the LX plot and the focus chart, each showing the channel numbers.

Works Cited

Shelley, S.L. (2009). A Practical Guide to Stage Lighting. Oxford: Elsevier Inc.

Thank you for reading,

Emma Huggins

Grotesque Theatre

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When trying to define the use of Grotesque and Abusurd theatre in the works of Berkoff, it is first essential to understand the meaning of what Abusurd theatre is. Esslin states that ;

“Aburd is that which is devoid of purpose.. Cut off from his religious, metaphysical, and transcendental roots, man is lost ; all his actions become senseless, abusurd, useless!”. ( Esslin 1983, p23).

Within The Trial one of the most important things we needed to portray was how different the rest of the characters were to Joeseph K, and one of the most creative ways to intepret this was through facial expreissions and movement. The movement around the frames was a very intresting and grotresque concept that we each had to make our own. For example:

Within the scene where the city comes to life, we all had to portray a movement and sound that created a bustling city waking up. I chose the conseience deicison to brush my hair whilst singing in differnt tones ‘Brush brush brush’. Throughout the rehearsals the soundscapes became more and more exaggerated and physicalised , which we had to maintain throughout the rest of the production.

As an actress performing as a part of the chorus, it was first difficult for me to remain in this characterisation throughout the whole of the production, as when others were in the spot light, we assumed we were not longer able to be seen. On the day of the perfomance it was clear from the blackouts placed on us that we were still in a slight amount of light, so remaing a neutral facial expression towards the audience is something we all decieded to agree on.

Through several excerisises within rehearsals we worked on extending facial expression in the eyes and mouths, to which begin with a found a challenge. Once we got use to being confortable with doing these expressions in front of one another, this was then taken to another level with the physicallity in each of our movements. As the character of Leni, my facial expressions throughout the scene were to be very wide eyed and childlike. One of the most difficult challenges for me was to keep this facial expression throughout the scene even if i was not speaking for a long perioid of time , as it was still vital for me to stay in character.

A decision was made for our hair and makeup to all be very similar, with girls having tights buns on their heads and boys scraping theirs back with gel. This gave a sense of union, and repeating the image of how we are stripped back to core acting and simplistic use of costume and hair.

Our makeup however reiterates that of stereotypical groteque theatre in some aspects, with the justification that we wanted a theatre of 400 seats to all clearly see our expressions throughout. We foucsed on developing the eyes and lips, with thick eyebrows and bright red lipstick for the girls, which also subconciousley made me feel as though i was wearing a mask, and this assisted in me exaggerating even further my facial expressions for the audience to see.

‘The Chorus’ with our exaggerated faces ready to perform

Works Cited

Esslin M- (1983) The Theatre of the Absurd (Third Edition)- Pelican Books, Doubleday and Company, Inc