"The Audience Likes To Dream Around One Thing And Not Have It Pulled Out From Underneath Them."

Steph offered the opening scene from her version of Sophia's story to be improvised. However the scene was about a character other than the main character. It was misleading. As an audience we think the show is going to be about character A, when actually it's not, it's about character X. What she proposed was an anecdote - a side note - not the main story. So Philippe said no to this opening. "Don't confuse the audience."

Philippe reiterated what he was talking about yesterday about sticking to one story. "Be careful...two stories in your writing...Money back! Money back! Money back!"

"You can't change. If you change you are going to receive 'Money back! Money back! Money back!'...Spectators will be furious."

"The audience likes to dream around one thing and not have it pulled out from underneath them."

"The writer has a fun to develop the imagination of the spectators around this story."

~

Frank offered some scenes from Steph's story to improvise - mostly for the mother and daughter. At one point I asked whether it's possible for men to play female roles, and Philippe said for this story he doesn't mind if we do transvestite acting as long as it's not a parody. So Thomas and I went and dressed as Steph and her mother. And the afternoon turned into something quite unexpected! Eventually Philippe worked with Thomas on bringing his 'Steph' to life - getting him to play a gay actor who is playing the character of Steph - always with a smile on his face. He also got him to do fascist growling sounds, and speaking as if his lips were an arsehole. This was a focus on Thomas as an actor, as Philippe said he could be good as Bouffon like this. But it was also an example of how you could do a grotesque stylised version of Steph's story. And because us dressed as women were actually more exciting than real women playing the scenes today, he said why not?

~

I've noticed that I feel a lot freer as an actor improvising in this workshop. I think it's due to a few factors: 1) My confidence and comfort as an actor improvising on stage has grown 2) The extra information (who I am, what I want, what happens in the scene) helps a lot & 3) The stakes are quite a lot lower in this course (Philippe isn't nearly as hard on us as he usually is. Regardless, it feels good to be playing more freely. I'm particularly enjoying trying to help the writer by playing rhythms I think will help with the story telling. It helps me learn about the mechanics of each scene too.

~

Here's a cool picture taken by Ric a few weeks ago. Summer days in Paris playing Ultimate Frisbee at the park. "The Venga Bus is Coming..."