Floor plan and other location pictures Fort Amhurst devising

Above is the scenes in order from start to finish. The final plan that we formulated. 

Changes to Carl's Movement piece

After completing Carl's movement piece. We decided to perform it to the rest of the class who weren't actually involved in the scene yet due to not being present. After watching our idea they were really interested and pleased with the way the movement correlated with the music. They did propose quite a few ideas to adapt the piece in some ways. For example around the middle of the scene we all put our hands up as if to trap Carl. To show the audience that Carl is trapped in his own head. It was a cool concept but we ended up taking it further. By reaching in and holding down a part of Carl's body. We felt this would make the scene more intense. And more physical.  We also added quite a few scenes including a synchronised dance/movement scene. And a puppeteer scene. 

I was very fond of the puppeteer scene. Because it's showing Carl's schizophrenic character being influenced by all the different personalities inside the institution. 

Risk Assessment Fort Amhurst Devised

Risk Assessment- Fort Amhurst

Production: 13

Date: 29/06/2016

Company: Revolution Arts-The Howard School.

Completed by: Dan Smith ( Student at the Howard school sixth form) 

Hazard:Trips and falling over in the space of the tunnel areas.

Involvement: 15 cast and Crew for each performance along with 15-20 audience members within the two performances.

Likeliness: Highly unlikely due to the walk through the tunnels being slow safe and controlled.

Severity: mild/medium. If a fall was to occurr it's quite a dangerous place to fall. As the floor terrain is very uneven and cave like. The walls are also very sharp and bits of chalk stick out here and there. Also to call the emergency services in the unlikely case of a severe accident from falling. We would have to navigate out of the tunnels to contact emergency services.

Causes of action to avoid incident: Crew members kept hold of walkie talkies throughout which also radioed through to the owner of the location fort amhurst who knows all the emergency exits. 

Cast were well rehearsed and understood the spacing well

Pathways lighted in the correct manner to help guide the audience safely. 

Any hazard were either warned at the start. Or clearly displayed.

Hazard: structural failiure

Involvement: 15 cast and crew. 15-20 audience members. 

Likeliness: quite unlikely however the tunnels are old so may be a slight chanc 

Severity: severe if a hazard was to develop 

Actions taken to prevent: Cast did not utilise the walls or ceiling for safety reasons. 

Hazard: Fire

Involved: 15 cast and crew. And 15-20 audience members. 

Likeliness: Highly Unlikely

Severity: medium

Actions to prevent events: Fire extinguishers around areas. Emergency areas well lit

Hazard: Lighting and epilepsy

Likeliness: Unlikely

Severity: Medium

Actions to prevent events: At the start of the tour lighting and strobe lighting was initially warned and audience members were asked if anybody suffered from epilepsy before entering the tunnels to watch the performance.  

Micheal and Charles scene Devised

In my scene with Dom. We ended up putting a little twist on it. While the audience is thinking all along that I am a psychotic killer. They soon learn that I am just a normal man who has lied to get out of going to jail. But since being in the mental institute being ploughed with medication he starts to  Believe he is insane. So during the scene when Dom is actually revealing that my character is not insane, and only feels it because of the medication, My character starts to freak out of fear that he will be transferred to a prison. 

During the scene my character is very non communicative. Until Dom starts reading facts about my characters murder and family history. At this point my character comes to terms with the fact he is being discovered and his lies are coming out. 

So at the end of the scene when Dom has worked Michael up into an angry stupor. Michael goes to attack Dom with the pen Dom is actually using to write notes with. I feel this would make the audience feel uneasy that I'm not actually crazy. I'm just a killer who has been let to roam a mental institute and they are all stuck in with me. 

Fortunately for the audience I am dragged away at the end by the doctors away from Dom. Whilst I shout threats at him about killing him and his family. I feel my scene would have had a creepy effect on the audience. Having them realise that half the people in the institute aren't actually crazy. Just natural born killers. 

7 Devils. Devised piece

The 7 Devils piece was the final piece i was in. In the final performance. I feel it was the most powerful movement piece we actually performed. We were all scattered around the room in chairs. There were 7 of us in total (7 patients). The room had a balcony like hole in the wall which we shined a light on. This is where Dan Mckay and Freya stood ( The Doctors ). This gave an eerie effect. Also due to the fact the audience scattered themselves around the room. Some even between patients. 

The music we used for the piece was ( 7 Devils- by Florence and the machine. The music was very powerful and eerie sounding which helped deliver what the physical movement was showing. It was showing all of us going through a relaxation movement. But showed all our inner demons coming out. We were trying to show that we were trapped and locked inside our twisted minds. I feel that the music seriously helped get across the audience what was being shown. 

At the start of the movement piece. Before any movement. There was a small clip being played at the front that we were all staring at. A relaxation clip showing a doctor talking about relaxing advice. At the end of the clip we began doing slight rapid movements for example grabbing our faces or reaching out forward. We were all doing this in sync. Then we slowly moved around to different chairs around the audience. We done this to make things extra creepy. At first the doctors said the patients wouldn't move. Which probably made the audience feel relieved and inclined to stand anywhere. This delivered effect when we all started getting up and moving. Around the audience. 

By the end of the movement piece we are all in different chairs to our original ones. The reason this was my favourite piece. Was because of the 1: location- I felt that doing it in this large creepy room which was on a different floor to the other rooms really gave massive effect: I also felt extremely in character and really put myself in the position of the character I was playing. Portraying exactly how I would be feeling or behaving if I was really there. 

I was told by audience members after that this was their favourite scene. Due to the unexpected outcome of the movement. Also I was told that obviously the venue itself is quite haunted and paranormal. The music and scenario of what we were actually doing did put some people on the edge. Feeling a bu strange. We wanted this exact reaction from this piece and we got it. 

Transitions 39 steps

Transitions throughout the performance are quick. And kept to a minimum. We only really every brought on one different object to display a different scene or location. For example when Hanny and Pamela are coming up to do the Fence scene. Tom was late to the stage with the fence. This wasn't supposed to happen. And when he eventually ran out with the fence. He tripped over and kicked one of the legs off. Which managed to get an earthquake of laughter from the audience. We all found this absolutely hilarious because Tom ended up having to stand onstage holding the fence. The performance was so funny we ended up making a transition a comedy sketch in itself.

Another thing we did was use the same object for different scenes. We just quickly moved it around. The table at the start of the performance was a Sherrifs desk. Placed in the middle of the stage. It was then later moved over to the other side of the stage during a quick scene change to be the table in the hotel reception. Soon after this scene it was again pushed up stage right. To become a bed. 

I can't really remember any other transitions in our act that we performed. Although we managed to make a car out of four chairs which was very amusing. We stylised very well because when the car was turned on. We all started bouncing around as if we were in an old car. Winding up and down the windows making squeaking noises. This was a good transition. It was mad funny in the end of the scene when Toby and Tom end d up just stacking the chairs up on top of each other and walking off. 

The simplicity of our transitions had an increasingly good impact on the play itself. There was always something to watch and find amusing. Even through transitions 

Pace and Energy

For 39 steps due to it being in the style of vaudeville. It had to be very fast paced to deliver the comedic value of the performance. Not to mention there were only 4 of us acting and there was about 8 different parts. So some of the characters had to multi role, which again was true to the style. We made the performance very quick paced because it doesn't give the audience a chance to get bored. There was always something going on. Someone doing movement or talking. This meant that we could not slow down. Because it would completely go against the style of the performance. 

Saying this however during the comedic parts of the performance. Slow movement was used. For example. During Toby and Toms scene when they are playing the elderly characters. They slowly stumble on stage pulling funny facial expressions. This had a better effect on the audienc because it was really slow. Also during Toby's speech when he was talkin quite slowly and stumbling over his lines. The audience cracked a lot of laughs. 

This is how we knew we had delivered the play well. We got a great reception from the audience. Even I had trouble holding back my laughter at some points because it was just overwhelmingly funny. Also the pace between scenes were short and snappy. There want really any scenery or back drops. Only occasionally a different chair or a fence was brought out to symbolise a different scenery. Costume changes were snappy and fast. We couldn't at all drop the energy. We ended up delivering an incredibly funny piece. And if lines were forgotten or somethin went wrong onstage (which happened) we quickly improvised with even more comedy. The audience didn't even know any mistakes were made.