"Who Was An Actor? ...Who Had His Scene?"

We showed the scenes we've been working on in Auto-Course throughout the week. Rocio and I got together 2 hours before class and rehearsed what we had written - as well as simplifying it - trying to do less with talk and more with action. It was really good working with Rocio. She's a beautiful actress, and we have good complicité together. We accept each other's offers and things feel easy between us.

When Rocio and I showed our scene, Philippe let us go right to the end. We got the click-warning (people click their tongues when Philippe raises his drum stick threatening a kill) for just a few seconds but the scene changed naturally and we survived!

"You have to move...If the People of Paris sleep a bit, you need action...Move!"

Philippe said what we showed was okay. "Not McDonalds. Better than the Chinese restaurant in Sceaux. But not top top."

He said the moment when the Bailiff decides the poor woman is fuckable wasn't clear. What the audience saw was the idea of it, as opposed to to really seeing it. I don't entirely understand what that means, but I think it's the difference between seeing what the writer was trying to achieve as opposed to it just happening in front of the audience's eyes - unaware of the mechanics. To make this clearer, I needed to phone the message in a bit - look at her, at paradise, at her, at paradise, at her, then make a grunty sexual noise, smile, and then move towards her.

Philippe said I wasn't getting paradise to boo at me enough. I played a bit, and then found that holding an upward inflection at the end of a sentence, and giving it space afterwards, helps!

Finally Philippe said that space is really important between actors. He got us to replay the moment when I entered. But this time instead of Rocio standing still at the door as I pass her, he got her to step backwards as I came in, so that there is aways a large space between us. Then he got us to play the scene - I have my turn (in my space, not entering hers) and then she has hers. We were a bit fast (snatching our scene) when we initially showed, and this time Philippe helped us to feel how much slower and lighter it can be.

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"It's a scene. A Mélodramatic scene."

Philippe encouraged us to 'have a scene' for even the simplest things. e.g. In Sara and Rodrigo's scene, Rodrigo drops all of Sara's money on the floor. In the first playing of it, Sara picked up the coins quickly whilst Rodrigo kept talking. When Philippe helped, he got Rodrigo to pause and look away, as Sara very slowly and gently picks up the coins. He was guiding her to make a scene out of picking up the coins. She could take 10 minutes doing it and it could be beautiful.

This is the same for the moment where the Bailiff decides the poor woman is fuckable. "It could be a long scene." Great for the spectator. Fun for the actor.

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"Who was an actor? ...Who had his scene?"

Philippe talked about having your scene that would be written about in the newspaper.  e.g. People come to the show to see the fantastic scene in which the Bailiff decides the woman is fuckable.

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"In Mélodrama you have just one problem... Two is too much for the People of Paris."

Franck's groups' scene had two problems. 

1: The Bailiff is coming. 

2: There is an alcoholic father in a poor family.

We need just one problem.

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"Who feels sorry for her? ...or you don't give a tiny shit?"

It's important that we feel pity for the poor (good) characters. Otherwise we don't mind the nasty characters being nasty!

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There was a fantastic showing with 7 actors in it. Anna, Sophia, Mike, Charles, Brette, Nonika, & David. "Well done. Everyone has a scene. We love everyone. That's very rare." It was great to experience a well rehearsed, well written, well performed mini-play.

Philippe said whilst it was well done, it was normal - not Mélo - you'd see it in Sydney. And encouraged us all to push a bit to see where we could go with the form.

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"Every good story is Mélo. If it's not Mélo it's boring."