Saltbush 1st Rehearsal. - MISCHA BAKA

Thursday, May 17, 2018

Saltbush 1st Rehearsal.


Today we brought together all the actors who successfully auditioned for the part of ‘ teenage girl.’ Nine actors ranging from 15 to 17.

Today we established familiarity and how we will be communicating and working during the making of the film.

I began the workshop with a relaxation on the floor that rises up into a dance. I asked the group to move thorough the doorways that arise between each person. I asked the group to listen to their hearts and bodies and to not think too much, or be critical.   

Siobhan and myself each danced with the teenagers.

We played a game of ‘musical sleeping bags’ keeping true to the trekking story of our film.





The girls tumbled, pushed, pulled and wrestled their way into sleeping bags, the physical abandon promoted the performative quallities we are looking for.

An improvised scene had all the girls sleeping in their bags. One student was selected to go without. Her objective was to convince another to give up their bag for her. This worked well. Moment: Convincing a friend to go out into the dark to help pee in the bush, then returning to steal her bag.

Chatting over snacks was important for the group to know and feel comfortable with each other.

Finally, we had pairs of two perform for the group. The instruction was to dance Separate and find a sense of coming together within the dance.

The group could see how coming together was achieved through body language, eye contact and positioning.

Siobhan and me described how charting coming together, moving apart and back together again can provide structure for a scene, and how we will use this concept and language to direct a scenes shape.  

I always feel a bit nervous getting to know people, but I feel this workshop did well to find a sense of ease with the group and establish the tone of how we will be working.

I will take some of the ideas form this workshop and place them into a final draft document to start developing the story.

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