Composing Richard Pankhurst's monologue - Suffragettes

In terms of how to present our suffragette section, i had the idea of doing it from the point of view of Emmeline Pankhurst's loyal husband, Richard Pankhurst, so the audience get a real insight into what the time was like from someone who went through it all - also to keep the theme of women's rights, having a male tell this piece. I put myself in charge of creating Richard's monologue, while the others worked out what would go with it. I composed the monologue to have quite a conversational feel that would tell a story, engaging the audience, but have some life and no bore to it. I found this a very difficult task as it was hard to compose a speech that was factual and informed the audience of detail but for it to be spoken conversational and engaging - rather than just reciting a fact file. To overcome this, there are sections where the character directly addresses the audience to keep them drawn in. Throughout the monologue, I have created spaces where we would add short mini scenes further going into the details, giving the audience a real visual of what occurred.

character profile and writing in role - Micheal Fallon

Michael Fallon

Place of Birth: England

Male: Gender

Nationality: English

Age: 35

Occupation: UK defense secretary

Family: Father walked out on the family when Michael was very young; raised by his mother. Younger sister, Wife and 2 daughters.

Religion: Christianity

Hobbies: Taking his daughters skiing, going to church, going bowling with friends, cooking, plays guitar, going to the pub for a drink once in a while.

Writing in role

What a bloody waste of my time! She's crazy! The woman is crazy! Calls herself a fucking Sergeant Major! I'm giving her a chance. A real change, and she can't be bothered to listen to a word I'm saying. I'm actually trying to do something in favour of her, but yet she thinks I'm somewhat insulting her! Well maybe she's right then - maybe women aren't strong enough .... Because I see no power or leadership in any inch of that woman! I'm giving her the honour and recommendation to be out there on the frontline fighting for this country and she don't want no part of it! Shame on you woman!! I tell you, my two little daughters are stronger women than she'll ever be!

Creating physical theatre and movement - Human Trafficking

Having so far had quite a naturalistic straight drama piece that has relied heavily on dialogue quality and straight acting, we though that piece of stylised movement to music was needed to give strong dynamics to the overall piece. A decision was made that presenting the section of human trafficking through a physical theatre piece would be the best choice as the telling of a story would be delivered in a very unique and stylised way, certain actions, motifs and movements being able to effectively show the vulnerability and powerlessness of women who were forced and trapped into slavery and trafficked across boarders. A member of my group really liked the song 'Radioactive' by Imagine Dragons and instantly, we all agreed. The song portrays a certain aggression and hostility that is in fact overpowering, strongly representing the entrapment and victimisation of these women.
The piece includes lifts (and drops), violence, and sexual references and motifs all shown through stylised movements and actions that contribute, alongside the rhythm and antics of the song, in conveying this control and manipulation that men had over women in this particular crisis.

The actions like the lift and drop are purely to show the control and power that the men have over these women in the way we work as a unit to empower her. The motif used at the end of the video where it looks we are stringing her up like a puppet is to represent how the men would mould their girls into being these 'slaves' to be trafficked. The other female character in the piece is to symbolise a sense of experience in this field and the brainwash effect it has - using a slave to catch a slave.

Women's rights - Suffragette research

In the nineteenth century women had no place in national politics. They couldn't stand as candidates for Parliament and were not even allowed to vote. It was assumed that women did not need the vote because their husbands would take responsibility in political matters. A woman's role was seen to be child-rearing and taking care of the home.
As a result of the industrial revolution many women were in full-time employment, which meant they had opportunities to meet in large organised groups to discuss political and social issues.
Organised campaigns for women's suffrage began to appear in 1866, and from 1888 women could vote in many local council elections. When parliamentary reform was being debated in 1867, John Stuart Mill proposed a change that would enable women to vote on the same terms as men but it was rejected by 194 votes to 73, and after this, the campaign gained momentum.
Nineteenth century feminists talked about "The Cause", which described a movement for women's rights on a general basis therefore it had no particular political focus. But by the close of the century the issue of the vote became the focus of women's struggle for equality.
The movement to gain votes for women had two wings, the suffragists and the suffragettes.
The suffragists had their origins in the mid nineteenth century, while the suffragettes came into play in 1903.
The suffragettes, a name given to them by newspaper The Daily Mail, were born out of the suffragist movement. Emmeline Pankhurst, who had been a member of the Manchester suffragist group, had grown impatient with the middle class, respectable and gradualist tactics of the NUWSS (National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies). In 1903 she decided to break with the NUWSS and set up a separate society, becoming known as the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU).

Mrs. Pankhurst believed it would take an active organisation, with young working class women, to draw attention to the cause - creating the motto of the suffragettes; deeds not words. From 1912 onwards they became more militant and violent in their methods of campaign, and law-breaking, violence and hunger strikes all became part of this society's campaign tactics.
In 1907 the WSPU split itself into two groups after Emmeline Pankhurst and her daughter Christabel came into conflict with other members of the union's executive body. Those who left formed the Women's Freedom League, while the Pankhursts and their supporters established an even tighter grip on the workings of the WSPU. By 1909, the WSPU had branches all over the country and published a newspaper called Votes for Women which sold 20,000 copies each week. The NUWSS was also flourishing, with a rising membership and an efficient nation-wide organisation.

The theme of women rights - idea

In today's lesson, after a totally different idea about a piece about refugees had been pitched the lesson before, we decided that we didn't want to just forget about everything we've created on the women's rights idea, so we decided to look at women's rights as more of a theme that would spark a wide range of aspects and stories. We found with a particular refugee story we researched that it could tie in very well with women's rights, along with our original idea of a woman wanting to fight on the front line in the army and their being a whole debate of equality. We also found that we could really touch on the subject of suffragettes and the right for women being able to vote, the whole agenda of arranged marriages, along with the horrifying action of human trafficking. The overall piece would use the technique of cross-cutting to present all these different aspects under the theme category of women's rights to an audience where this common theme is the focus. We started to really research into these different acts under the theme of women's rights because although the whole idea is very much favoured throughout the whole group, we want to make sure that it is done right; using the right techniques to effectively deliver these stories of this very important issue that has risen a fair share of historical events and acts in the past.

Creating new scenes - focusing on a different element

In today's lesson we wanted to steer away from creating our opening scene and try out something different - like another section that could potentially be used in our piece, experimenting on a new element. I really liked the idea of really trying explore and express this difference between the profile of Woman and the profile of Wife, and my group and I decided for it to be done in a way thats clever and stylistic. We still wanted to include naturalistic dialogue and that element of straight drama, but really go stylistic in how we do it - using the element of cross-cutting.
The piece consisted of showing the different lifestyles of these to opposing characters, exaggerating completely different worlds so that there is an emphasised collision if they were to ever meet, using every day activities like getting dressed and ready in the morning etc. The difference is shown through the way the wife's priority is to make sure the husband's clothes and that he is able to get ready, whereas the woman's priority is herself - making sure her own jacket is on.

Trying out ideas and staging

In today's lesson we focused on how wanted to stage our piece, whatever the final idea be. We tried and workshopped two different types of staging, traverse and in-the-round, using the piece we had previously created in our last lesson. We were trying out a movement piece that goes on during a monologue that follows after the scene with Michael and Judith within different types of staging. We first tried the round staging and in some cases, it worked well, but a lot of the times it created limits to the piece in which we tried to adapt to the staging, but still did not work. I feel that the round staging should be used for more close and intimate pieces with a smaller cast on stage at the particular time as it is a very effective away in drawing the audience into the performance - allowing them to become emotionally attached.
We then tried the section out in traverse and we instantly found a lot more comfortable in this type of staging. It allows the ability for big, spontaneous pieces to take place with bigger casts and lots of action going on, but similar to in-the-round, allows the staging of small-scale, more intimate pieces. Personally, it straight away allowed me to become more natural with my character as an actor; in the sense that I was able to be freer. I was not worrying about focusing all my performance and delivery in favour of one place, and at the same time was not worried about it being too much for the audience to focus on - which would instantly distance them from the performance and therefore the aim and message. Instead I felt comfortable with my delivery, knowing the opposite angles I was being watched from. Doing it traverse also would allow an audience to the witness the action stage from contrasting spectrums, providing a handful of dissimilar views and opinions.