Scene 6 - Bedlam
We start off scene 6 in Bedlam, at night time, all of us slumped over - lunatics didn't have the luxury of beds, we sleep where we sit. It was fun doing this scene, moaning and wailing through nightmares, I gave my character a sort of straight jacket and wrapped my arms around my waist. The scene has a fantastic look about it, all of the lunatics wailing and moaning with Renfield at the very centre. When Renfield starts to sing "Who at Cock Robin, my head it throbbin', the sound of sweet sobbin', sobbin', sobbin'..." we all join in, screeching and cackling madly. By the final "Sobbin'", the noise has grown to a crescendo so that Nisbett has to shout to be heard. When Renfield smashes the plate of food out of her hands, we all react, waking up and laughing, then as Renfield spots the scuttling spider on the floor of the cell, we - the lunatics - mutate into the spiders ourselves. When Sophie says "...it's not nice, eating dead things", we lift up our hands and inspect them. The idea is that it's like we've got a trail of blood trickling down our wrist, we are fascinated by it and even slightly turned on by it. When She says the word "Necrophiliac", we slowly lick the 'blood' off our wrists. It's perverted and weird but it really shows off the perveted insanity of the play, the lunatics are completely given in to Dracula and all he represents. They aren't holding back on or suppressing any of their desires, this also ties in directly to Antonin Artaud's ideas which is why the lunatics and chorus work is so vital in the play. We could have decided to simply go off stage when we aren't actually performing, however the decision to incorporate the entire cast in every second of the play and use all of these ideas that I've been putting down is directly related to Artaud's ideas about ritual, releasing the double and being cruel to the Audience and the Actor.
The scene ends with us all, as a chorus, repeating Renfield's lines "Come into my parlor, sad the spider to the fly". It's sickening and scary, but for the girls Andy also wanted it to be sexual and perverse. Then, from spider positions, we slowly start moving our shoulders into the bat movements we went through with Siou in Movement. We slowly lift up, starting the movement from our spine and shoulders, rolling into our arms and rising as bats. We based our movement as a group on something similar to birds flying together, or a shoal of fish. Lots of individual journeys moving as one entity. We flow about the stage, from one side to another before surging up to the back of the stage and into our positions to begin the next scene.
Scene 7 - Dracula's castle
We start scene seven in the format shown above, myself in the position of the front left gargoyle, however our bodies start draped over the back steps. As the "doors" swing open, there is a beat before the two hounds rush forward at Jonathan, who lets out a yell, then sit in guard dog position. The doors and the draped bodies, in complicity, drop to their knees in a sort of bow (doors) and turn up and out (bodies) and the bodies transform into gargoyles. The gargoyles are sort of like the lunatics but frozen in terrified, pained expressions. Then Dracula is shown for the first time, stood at the top of the steps. It's a magnificent image, and the slow decent down the stairs is such a key, poignant part of the play.
As Jonathan lingers before the threshold of the castle we all lean forward; it's Dracula's desire, he's compelling and willing Jonathan to enter and when Jonathan steps into the castle we all let out a sigh of satisfaction and return to our position.
After Dracula has welcomed Jonathan, he claps his hands and summons supper. At this point the chorus scatters out into a semi circle, sitting in front of the audience facing in to the stage in a watchful pose, almost like animals waiting. There is very little action from us, with the attention in on the scene. This scene is very naturalistic, despite the completely unnatural drama at this point in the play.
When Dracula mentions the "throng of your London crowds", we all get up and walk about the bottom of the stage, visualizing the Victorian city. This shows how Dracula has immersed himself in the English world without leaving his castle. It symbolizes both his supernatural ability to leave his physical world and join the rest of the world, a very scary ability, but also his presence in everyone. Everyone has parts of all that Dracula represents and embodies - temptation, evil, tabooed desires - and therefor is susceptible to him. We then go back to our horseshoe position.
Again, we get up and become werewolves when Dracula and Jonathan discuss them, circling Jonathan and growling. As Jonathan utters the words and Dracula translates them, we repeat: "ordog, pokol, stregioca, vrolok, vlkoslak". As we are about to pounce, Dracula ushers us away and we slink back to our place in the horseshoe around them.
The scene ends with Jonathan hypnotized by Dracula and when Dracula exits one wave of the watchful creatures runs up the stage and grabs Jonathan, pinning him down on to the steps. Then another wave of the creatures rushes to the stage and sits, watching the audience and the front of the stage, and that it how the next scene begins.
This is a very long scene, however due to the naturalistic nature of it there is not a huge amount of chorus work to set.
We start scene seven in the format shown above, myself in the position of the front left gargoyle, however our bodies start draped over the back steps. As the "doors" swing open, there is a beat before the two hounds rush forward at Jonathan, who lets out a yell, then sit in guard dog position. The doors and the draped bodies, in complicity, drop to their knees in a sort of bow (doors) and turn up and out (bodies) and the bodies transform into gargoyles. The gargoyles are sort of like the lunatics but frozen in terrified, pained expressions. Then Dracula is shown for the first time, stood at the top of the steps. It's a magnificent image, and the slow decent down the stairs is such a key, poignant part of the play.
As Jonathan lingers before the threshold of the castle we all lean forward; it's Dracula's desire, he's compelling and willing Jonathan to enter and when Jonathan steps into the castle we all let out a sigh of satisfaction and return to our position.
After Dracula has welcomed Jonathan, he claps his hands and summons supper. At this point the chorus scatters out into a semi circle, sitting in front of the audience facing in to the stage in a watchful pose, almost like animals waiting. There is very little action from us, with the attention in on the scene. This scene is very naturalistic, despite the completely unnatural drama at this point in the play.
When Dracula mentions the "throng of your London crowds", we all get up and walk about the bottom of the stage, visualizing the Victorian city. This shows how Dracula has immersed himself in the English world without leaving his castle. It symbolizes both his supernatural ability to leave his physical world and join the rest of the world, a very scary ability, but also his presence in everyone. Everyone has parts of all that Dracula represents and embodies - temptation, evil, tabooed desires - and therefor is susceptible to him. We then go back to our horseshoe position.
Again, we get up and become werewolves when Dracula and Jonathan discuss them, circling Jonathan and growling. As Jonathan utters the words and Dracula translates them, we repeat: "ordog, pokol, stregioca, vrolok, vlkoslak". As we are about to pounce, Dracula ushers us away and we slink back to our place in the horseshoe around them.
The scene ends with Jonathan hypnotized by Dracula and when Dracula exits one wave of the watchful creatures runs up the stage and grabs Jonathan, pinning him down on to the steps. Then another wave of the creatures rushes to the stage and sits, watching the audience and the front of the stage, and that it how the next scene begins.
This is a very long scene, however due to the naturalistic nature of it there is not a huge amount of chorus work to set.
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