Blog – Page 2 – No Added Sugar

Audience participation: How did it work on the night?

Lauren Elizabeth Walker / June 1, 2014June 2, 2014 / Love, performance, Reflection

(Butler, L. 2014)

So on the 27^th of May, we performed our debut performance at the LPAC! Also, Phoebe and I had the daunting task of picking two audience members to be wed! This for me was the scene I was worried about the most, firstly because I had written it and I was worried that no one would laugh but also because of all the things that could have gone wrong. Audience participation is such a tricky subject as you can rehearse different scenarios but you never know how its actually going to happen on the night, but how do people actually feel about audience participation? And how did it go down on the night?

“How restrictive, inhibiting, and alienating for the spectator the sitting area of the classical amphitheatre is can be seen especially in the case of a contemporary interactive theatre event largely based on the collaboration of the public”(Sakellardou, 2014).

On the night, we couldn’t really have hoped for it to have gone any better. Walking into the audience was very daunting and we had to make sure that we chose the right audience member. We wanted two people who had never previously met before and we tried to stay away from choosing a drama student as we wanted somebody who would feel awkward about being on the stage. On the night I think we ended up with a drama student, but this didn’t matter to much as you could still see that they felt awkward about being up there! Making them read the speech ‘We don’t want this wedding’ at the end of the scene contributed to spontaneity of the scene and putting the live feed on our participant added pressure to them, but I also feel it aided our performance because the audience got a live view of his reaction. Audience participation can be labelled as cheesy and also more fitting to pantomime than serious theatre, but I feel the way we and other contemporary shows (such as filter) utilise it gives it a fresh and new feel. We used audience participation to put our point across to the audience without simply just delivering a scene to them. Like filter, we allowed the audience to feel as they were in the scene, and to share the awkwardness with the participants on stage. I think this scene will help us to keep up the spontaneity in this performance if we were to perform it again. As every time it will be different and will reflect the mood of the audience, sometimes it could go wrong but I think that is the beauty of audience participation. ‘Organised chaos’ was one of the main things we wanted to achieve when we set out of devising this show and feel this scene did and will create this again!

Butler, L. (2014)

Works cited

Butler,L. (2014)

Sakellardou, E. (2014) ‘”Oh My God, Audience Participation!”: Some Twenty-First-Century Reflections’, Comparative Drama, 48, 1/2, pp. 13-38, International Bibliography of Theatre & Dance with Full Text, EBSCOhost, viewed 2 June 2014.

Our Brief Encounter with the LPAC Stage…

Phoebe Wall-Palmer / June 1, 2014June 2, 2014 / performance, Reflection

“If you died, you’d forget me. And I want to be remembered” (Brief Encounter, 1945)

No Added Sugar has had its 60 minutes on stage. Overwhelmed by positive feedback, we have all hit the post-show blues very hard. We immediately knew that this cannot be the end for us, we cannot be forgotten. There is still obvious ways to develop the scenes – we can cut and change certain bits to make a good show something brilliant. Nothing is ever perfect, which only gives us the urge to keep trying to make ‘Three Words’ better and better

There is one particular scene that I want to reflect on. I have mentioned it, rather ambiguously, in a previous post ‘Gestes de la Romance’. The plan entailed a grand romantic gesture for a member of the audience. It began with a simple gift of chocolates and flowers to an audience member, and ended with me singing Aerosmith’s ‘I don’t Want to Miss a Thing’ under a moving spotlight towards him. It seemed to go very well and was gracefully taken by our audience member. Wanting our first performance to go as best as it could, we selected the person that would receive the gesture previous to the show, and made the necessary steps to make it happen. Therefore my biggest intrigue for when we perform ‘Three Words’ again is how this scene would go when a person is randomly selected. In addition, do we need to make the romantic gesture different, bigger and better each time? It is the type of aspect that would be talked about after a performance, and may not be surprising enough for new audiences if we repeat it. The energy received from the audience really depended on the shock and embarrassment factor. This is all food for thought and I look forward to developing this further.

For now, in the words of Michael Pinchbeck, we have “[Ended] the show with a dot dot dot, not a full stop” (2010)

BassClef707 (2007) Brief Encounter (final scene). [online video] Available from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hubyFqSUaGA [Accessed 1 June 2014].

Pinchbeck, M. (2010) What is The End? [online] Nottingham: Making The End. Available from: http://makingtheend.wordpress.com/page/6/ [Accessed 1 June 2014].

Nine Lucky People

Abigail Dawson / June 1, 2014June 2, 2014 / Love, Reflection, Technical

14315762344_ca48138cec_b — (Taken by Linford Butler: 27/45/14)

Taking our caption ‘Two Lucky People’ from one of our scenes, we found that there were not two, but in fact nine lucky people in our company. Every single member, including myself, could not feel any more fortunate to be able to create and perform Three Words. Throughout our devising process we were never alone; we worked closely as a team and collaborated with our ideas. From a Production Manager’s point of view I certainly could not have technically done this show without my Stage Manager (Shellie Barrowcliffe), she was my rock throughout this production. While regularly meeting up for production meetings, together we created the lighting for Three Words and made sure any technical requirements were secured for rehearsals and finally for our show. I trust that together we made a fantastic team and I hope to work closely with her again at some point in our careers.

For our actual performance day, 27^th May 2014, we arranged for the whole cast and crew to enter the Lincoln Performing Arts Centre theatre at 9am. Normally we would not call the cast till around 12pm, but even though our technical rehearsal went smoothly we realised that figuring out sound levels would take longer than we expected. Therefore we had to make sure all the cast were available from the beginning of our Get In so that our LPAC technician Martin could start checking all of the microphone levels for actors and musicians for every scene in show. The entire cast was very patient throughout our Get In, they listened carefully whether it was to speak into a microphone, stand in a certain light, or set up the stage with props. They were all completely focused and did not wander off, consequently it created a calm atmosphere for us all to work in efficiently. Our cue-to-cue was mainly for my SM and any other technicians operating the show to double check the lighting and sound was prepared for each cue in the prompt book. From this, we went onto our dress rehearsal. We made sure every cast member was aware that it must be as high energy as our final performance that evening, and fortunately they were all incredibly professional and we left our dress fun feeling like we had a show ready, professional standard, to show our audience. It left us all pleased and in high spirits for the final performance.

For our Get Out, my fantastic SM had prepared a detailed schedule for each person to follow, in order for us to clear everything away and leave the premises in good time. Again, each cast and crew member were completely focused in the tasks they had been given and followed them carefully. And considering how many cables we had lying around the stage with all the microphones and lights, we were able to tidy everything away and put them back in their original places if they belonged to the LPAC. Below are links to both the Performance day and Get Out schedules that my SM prepared:

Three Words Performance Day Schedule

Three Words Get Out Plan

My final words for this performance are excitement, hope and potential. I believe No Added Sugar, and Three Words itself has a future. The feedback we have received from this production has been incredible and I could not be prouder to call myself a member of this team. I start to feel emotional at looking through any photos from past rehearsals, or even the ones from the actual performance, I have had the time of my life doing Three Words. I seriously hope this production, and company, live on. The future is bright, and we have potentially already been offered an opportunity to perform Three Words once more. Who knows, you may even find us at Edinbrough Fringe Festival next year. Keep your eyes peeled!

Works Cited

Abigail Dawson (2013) Reflection of our Final Degree Performance [Online Video] Available from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mint9L2x7M0 [Accessed 1 June 2014]

The end of an era: Looking back on show night.

Samantha Mckenzie / May 30, 2014June 2, 2014 / Marketing, performance, Reflection

On Tuesday 27th May at 7:30pm we took to the stage to perform our debut show as a theatre company; Three Words. The journey has been a long but exciting one filled with laughter and lessons, the whole process has taught me an awful lot about the hard work and energy needed to succeed as a theatre company.

When show night arrived, we were all prepared and desperate to get on that stage. We were greeted by a high energy audience which was just what we had hoped and in that moment I knew they were going to love what we were about to deliver.

Although I was primarily a performer in the show, as my secondary role within the company is the marketing manager, I reflected on the show and process from a marketing point of view. Everything I had organised and created in terms of promoting the show was leading up to this day and most of all ticket sales and audience feedback.

Due to this, I have collected information of our total ticket sales, audience feedback and our total number of social media followers.

Tickets sold:

163

Audience feedback (taken from twitter):

‘Three Words was a perfect blend of heartache, humour & organised chaos! Really innovative and relatable, congrats to all!’

‘The performance was absolutely brilliant tonight! I cried and I laughed… just… amazing!’

‘Nice one @noaddedsugarTC, I wasn’t sure what to expect but it was hilarious and emotional.’

Social media followers:

Facebook: 269

Twitter: 398

Instagram: 49

I was extremely happy with all of our totals and the feedback we have received. The show was everything we wanted it to be and we hope to continue to succeed with this show and company in the future.

So watch this space!!

Work Cited:

McKenzie, S. (2014)

Time to step it up: A reflection on our marketing strategies.

Samantha Mckenzie / May 28, 2014June 2, 2014 / Development, Marketing

With the show soon approaching, we were always keeping a close eye on ticket sales; our initial aim was to sell 200 tickets and so we were keen to come up with some new, fresh marketing tactics to spread the word of our show. Our social media sites were running successfully and we were up to date on our ideal number of followers and general interest. However, we realised that we needed to find new ways of interesting every kind of audience member we hoped to attend our show, and not just those who are regular users of social media.

Our first step was poster and flyer distribution. Our strong, vibrant image is one which stands out and so we wanted to place it where it would be seen and remembered. We placed our flyers in the university library, Lincoln Performing Arts Centre, local pubs, shops and cafes; all were happy and willing to promote our show by making the flyers available to customers. Our posters were displayed in various areas of the university campus and some local businesses. We received a lot of praise on our colourful, fresh image and we were instantly relieved that we had chosen the particular colour scheme and style as it stood out amongst other bland and dark posters.

Our next step was the competition launch. We wanted people to get excited and involved in our theme and also increase general interest. The competition was online and conducted through Facebook and twitter; the rules were to upload a photo of yourself with the person/object/animal/place you love the most. If using twitter we asked entrants to tweet us the photo and if using Facebook we asked to be tagged in the photo. For both sites the picture must be captioned with three words describing it and the hashtag #threewords; the winner would be the most creative. The prize for the competition was two free tickets to our show which we had received through our own student accounts and therefore had not had to pay for them. We felt that offering free tickets would give the show a more exclusive appearance, as though they were at short supply and hoped that even those who did not enter the competition may go and buy tickets in fear of missing out. The competition was not as successful as we had initially hoped and if we were to do it again then perhaps less complicated rules would be necessary. However we did have a grateful winner who received the two tickets and expressed her enjoyment of the show afterwards.

We were also extremely lucky to have been given the opportunity to promote our show on two local radio stations. Our musical director Gabby was in contact with a presenter at the university radio station Siren FM and therefore was able to organise us a spot to appear on the station. Gabby then went along with our director Tom and my marketing assistant Phoebe and they filled a ten minute slot with discussions of our show and the process so far. A few weeks later we were invited to be interviewed on BBC Radio Lincolnshire which was a fantastic opportunity for us to reach people all over Lincoln, outside of our social circles and possibly those who don’t use social media. One of our writers and performers Lauren visited the station on our behalf and gave a detailed explanation of our rehearsal process from the very beginning, the themes and structure of our show and when the show would take place. We are extremely grateful for the support we were given from our local community and the willing of those who helped to promote our show.

Finally, with only one week until the show, we went out into the city of Lincoln with our ‘board of love’ (a white board and marker pen). We wanted to encourage the public to talk about love and their experiences of it because this is the way in which we collected a lot of our initial writing material. We asked each person we approached to describe love to us in three words and write it on our board. This was in keeping with our show’s title of Three Words and we wanted to know what our title meant to different people. It took us a while to find people willing to stop and speak to us as we did find not everyone was happy to be approached. However we did come across a lot of people who were happy to be involved and were also interested in hearing about the general concept of the piece and what is was for; in these instances we gave out flyers and invited them to come along and see the show. With the permission of those involved, we took a picture of them with the board and their words and posted the pictures on our social media sites. Some of the public accessed our Facebook page and tagged themselves in the photos; perhaps enjoying their moment of fame which was lovely to see! The experience was particularly enjoyable as we compared what different people thought of as love. It was not always a relationship with a lover but a particular place, animal or moment they had experienced; this really tapped into the entire concept of our piece and how everybody has different experiences of love. We also enjoyed seeing the difference between the older and younger generation’s perception of love and relationships; two particular older women discussed how they did not see love as an exciting experience but a routine which was expected of them. From others we received more detailed and intimate feedback and it was wonderful to be a part of Lincoln getting romantic!

Work Cited:

Evans, G. (2014)

McKenzie, S. (2014)

Walker, L. (2014)

Wall, K. (2014)