For our FMP, we are doing a musical piece based around the Grimm brother’s fairy tales. The plot of this musical is how children’s imaginations are not the same as how they used to be, instead of being creative, they are corrupt by the internet and social media in todays society. The only way to save this generation is to help them remember all the old fairy tales and have them be in touch with their creative sides.
My character Is Faye Leveau is a villain in the story, she is known for being one of Lord Bosemanns really dramatic followers She is Will and Carly’s fake step mum throughout the whole Performance. She is known for being their snarky rude stereotypical step mum. Faye is also the teacher in their history class who has to gaslight the students into thinking reading stories are bad and that fairytales.
Fairytales are passed down in European cultures for children, They first came around the Renaissance period when writes such as Giovanni Francesco Straparola and Giambattista Basile were famous. The fairytale culture never stopped at writers such as the Brothers Grimm and Charles Perrault!
Some of the other characters within the performance are all based off actual fairytale characters. They have some of the classics like Cinderella, they keep her backstory the same as what it always is in the fairytales, however this isn’t a normal type of ‘fairytale’ which means her present self is completely different to her known ‘rags to riches’ story. This is evident as she becomes a chat show host where she has special guests that are also made up characters as she mentions Jack and Jill from the nursery rhymes. Cinderella isn’t the only one whos present story is different to the books, For example Little red riding hood, she’s known as the young girl who goes to visit her grandma but ends up encountering the big bad wolf! That is still her backstory just like the original fairytale however its different to her current personality. Unlike Cinderella, Riding hood has more of a gruesome present story. She is no longer known as Red riding hood the young and sweet girl, She’s now known as Red riding hood the Vicious blood thirsty wolf hunter.
Most children own an electronic device at a very young age, So from this very young age we become addicted to being on our phones or I pads/tablets because we have grown up on them. It has become an integral part of our society and as there may be many benefits it has to offer, it also has negative effects on our society, too much of anything is bad for you! It can be really unhealthy for you and it can effect your perspective, not just on others but also on your self which can cause many problems such as anxiety depression and self deprecation. Over relying on things such as social media and technology can cause many problems throughout life. It might help you with certain aspects of learning and knowledge growth but it can also damage your brain and put things in your head that are not true at all. We must be aware on social media at all times as there are many risks and dangers of it. We need to make sure to prioritize other activities and relationships in our lives.
Who are the Grimm Brothers?
The Grimm brothers, Jacob Ludwig Karl Grimm and Wilhelm Carl Grimm were German academics, philologists . cultural researchers and authors. They collected and published folklore together! They collected stories people used to love! They wrote down over 200 of these stories in a famous book called the ‘The Grimm fairytales’! People only started paying more attention to the Grimm brothers after they created a big book to help other countries figure out the German language
Grimm brothers- Early life!
The Grimm brothers were born in Hanau, Germany. They were the oldest surviving siblings in a family of 9 children! At a young age, their father died leaving their mother to raise and look after them. Both brothers were interested in language and literature from early ages. They studied together at ‘The university of Marburg’. Jacob studied law, Whereas Wilhelm studied Literature and Philology. Their work was inspired at an early age by the study of language and folklore. This is what lead to them publishing the fairytales. As young men they were both very intrigued by the romantic movement, which emphasized emotion, individualism, and the beauty of nature.
Social media statistics!
- As of January 2021, there were 4.2 billion active social media users worldwide!
- The average person spends around 2 hours and 30 minutes on social media every day!
- The most famous popular social media platform with adults is face book, with over a billion monthly active users!
- The most popular social media platform within the youth is Instagram with more than 500 million users active evryday!
- Tiktok has rose to fame over the past 7 years and now has over 1 billion active users a month and more than 2 billion downloads world wide! It was also known as Music.ly from 2014 to 2017 before merging with tiktok!
- Twitter gets more than 500 million tweets per day from 330 monthly active users!
- 22% of society used social media in 2013, it is now 2023 and over half the population is using social media everyday!
Theatre Production (the process start to finish)
First is planning, the production team have to get the basics such as what to perform and hold auditions for the actors.
The actors need to have practiced their material thoroughly and make sure they are ready to perform in time and carefully choose an area that showcases their talent and abilities!
Be confident when you walk in, if you don’t have faith in yourself, the casting team most definitely wont.
Being on time to the audition is a big part, show you are reliable and are willing to play the role. Do research on the character and show your interested.
The most important, stay positive even if you don’t get the roll! Think of this as a way to build on your skills and get better. It isn’t the end. There is always bigger and better chances out there!
Rehearsals, The actors need to make sure they show up to auditions to practice their lines and movement
Again, Make sure your punctual to your rehearsals, this shows willingness and respect to the director, fellow actors and other crew members.
Make sure you arrive at the rehearsals with lines memorized. This saves everyone’s time and gives actors time to work on their performance rather than remembering their lines.
Being prepared is a very big deal, actors should be ready to go as soon as they get to their auditions. This could mean bringing set, props or costume into their rehearsals.
Last but not least, Stay focused and listen to any feedback the director gives you. Rehearsals may be long and tiring, but it’s worth it in the end. Any feedback the Director gives you may be hurtful but they only tell you to help improve YOUR skills and to make YOU a better actor.
Next up is the technical elements on the performance, This is a really important factor of the performance as anything could go wrong and mess up the entire performance. It’s always good to have multiple people learn the technical elements incase something happens or someone is absent. They need to learn about things like Lighting, Sound , set and stage directions.
Before starting the work on the technical elements, Make sure your ready and schedule it before as it could take longer then normal rehearsals and you may have to go over it multiple times as it is very complicated to learn.
Communication is key during technical run throughs as you need to make sure you’re all on the same page and you all know what you’re doing! This helps things run smoothly. This will not work if there’s a miscommunication between the director, stage manager and actors.
Make sure to test everything multiple times to make sure everything is right! If something goes wrong, you need to make sure you have a backup plan!!
Make sure you conduct a dress rehearsal! This help to make sure everyone has the costumes needed and it helps for timing as you need to know how long you have in between scene changes to get changed if needed!
DO NOT PANIC IF THINGS GO WRONG DURING THE REHEARSALS! It’s completely normal to get things wrong during the run throughs. This is the time to work on things and correct them. There’s a 99% chance things will go wrong the first time and that is totally fine. Its your first time of course it’s not gonna be perfect!
Make sure you put your safety first! Make sure everything is in the right place and secured there. Make sure the crew members and the actors are aware of any hazards around the set to keep themselves safe.
Make sure your being flexible and open minded. Technical rehearsals can be random and unpredictable and could need you to be quick thinkers and good at problem solving. You won’t agree with everything everyone says, and that’s okay! It’s completely normal to have your own opinions, However it is not okay to hate on other peoples input just because you don’t believe its right! Everyone has a right to give their own opinions!
Next up is preview shows, these are always a good idea to see if a smaller audience will like it first. This can help a lot of things like confidence for one, this is improved because your having the chance to perform in an audience where you can mess it up and you can get feedback from the audiences point of view first instead of being put straight onto the big stage in front of thousands.