Rebecca Sowter – No Added Sugar

The end or the beginning?

Rebecca Sowter / May 28, 2014June 1, 2014 / performance

We have now performed Three Words which has been such an amazing experience for all nine of us and I’m sure that some of the other company members will go on to reflect back on the performance on this blog. However, this does not have to be the end of No Added Sugar. More than once it has been suggested that we continue as a company and now that it is all over (and the post show blues have started to kick in), I have started to think more about this possibility.

We know that it is unlikely that we would be able to continue with such a large company and as the term is over, some of us will go our separate ways regardless. We need to discuss our future plans as a group to identify those who would like to continue and develop the company as we could develop this project further with perhaps six of us. I think a good starting point for us is to look at festivals that we could participate in in the next year. The Edinburgh Festival is one of the obvious options to look into first, as well as other large events like the Brighton Fringe and also local festivals such as Lincoln’s Newvolutions and the Derby Feste. We have a good support network within the University of Lincoln that can give us advice about starting up the company which will be very valuable to us if we do follow through with this plan.

It will not be easy and is only a newly formed idea at the moment. We have a very long road ahead of us but no matter what happens, the whole theatre company experience has been an absolute pleasure and will never be forgotten. To sum it all up in three words, I have only this to say:

Goodbye For Now.

Chair Duets

Rebecca Sowter / May 11, 2014June 2, 2014 / Development, Deveopment, performance

Our performance is now just over two weeks away and so we have been blocking the last few smaller scenes this week and we pretty much have a full show (woohoo!). One of the last scenes we have put together has been inspired by Frantic Assembly’s Chair Duets and adds a new element to our already very eclectic performance style.

The scene we have made combines three recordings of verbatim with three separate movement sequences. We took the essence of Frantic Assembly’s Chair Duets: the nature of the action/reaction and the “firm and deliberate” (Graham and Hoggett, 2009, 141) movement are the main two similarities between our work and theirs. However, once we had got to grips with the rules of the chair duets we decided to break quite a lot of them to adapt the style to our own performance. Firstly, one of the sequences does not use chairs at all and another only uses one. Although this breaks the fundamental rule of chair duets (which are supposed to be performed with two chairs facing outwards), we found that we could perform a wider variety of moves. Secondly, we are using the duets to tell the stories being recalled in the verbatim whereas traditional chair duets should not have a story behind them. We have also slowed our movements down in places which contrasts with Frantic Assembly’s routines that are “played at quite a mesmerising speed” (Graham and Hoggett, 2009, 141).

14305389504_42d8aa4c06_h — Our chair duet

Despite these differences, the influence of the chair duet is pretty clear in all three sequences and has been a helpful springboard in developing our ideas. Our duets communicate the same messages of “touches, embraces, flirtations, rejections” (Graham and Hoggett, 2009, 141) as original duets do and all of these actions and emotions play an important part in the three verbatim stories that we have collected. The chair duet has become for us a way to capture the ups and downs of first dates and relationships in a very simple but physical and visually interesting way.

Works cited:

Frantic Assembly (2009) Frantic Assembly Book of Devising Theatre – Chair Duets. [online] Available from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LC-dkYZOUVo [Accessed 11 May 2014].

Graham, S. and Hoggett, S. (2009) The Frantic Assembly Book of Devising Theatre. London: Taylor & Francis Ltd.

The role of the producer

Rebecca Sowter / April 19, 2014June 2, 2014 / Development

My role:

I have really enjoyed fulfilling the role of the producer for No Added Sugar, especially during the last few weeks where our show has started to come together properly. Although I have taken on many jobs as producer (including budgeting, scheduling and setting deadlines), it has recently occurred to me that I don’t really know what the ‘official’ definition of a producer is…

My naivety about my actual job role seems ridiculous, however it seems I am not alone in my confusion about what a theatre producer actually does. It has been described as “one of the most mysterious jobs in the theatre”(Baggaley, 2008)- it is a role that is not firmly assigned definite tasks. Even James Seabright, a successful producer, writes in his book that “the producer’s role can appear confusing and indefinable” (Seabright, 2010, 5). Using his book, I have been piecing together all of the main components of the job and have checked my own progress against it. I feel reassured as it seems that I have indeed been doing the job properly- below is a list of the tasks I have been doing as producer and why they are essential for the smooth running of our theatre company.

The budget:

Seabright writes that a producer “makes sure a show is delivered on time and in budget” (Seabright, 2010, 5) and I have been responsible for No Added Sugar’s finance from the start of the project. My previous post goes into more detail about this aspect of my job role and it is something that I have enjoyed being in charge of. However, more recently I have felt the negative repercussions that come with being in control of the purse strings. As we spend more money and the budget becomes tighter, it has become vital for me to say no to certain costs. One example of this came out of today’s rehearsal as I had to decline the request to use a Polaroid camera on stage as the cost of the film was more than we expected and was not justifiable. Seabright also goes on to say that the producer “typically defines what is ‘on time’ and ‘in budget’” (Seabright, 2010, 5)- although we phycially had the money to spend on the film it would have been irresponsible to use it when we are still unaware about the full cost of our printing materials.

The rehearsal schedule:

I have been in charge of devising a schedule that firstly, suits everyone’s availability and secondly, provides the company with enough time to rehearse. The administrative side of the company is something that Seabright assigns to the producer which he describes as “oiling the wheels of a production for smooth running” (Seabright, 2010, 8).Myself and our wonderful stage manager Shellie have made this task as painless as possible through our system that involves me creating the actual schedule and then Shellie booking the rehearsal space. We list any known absences on the schedule and created them at least a month in advance to ensure that the majority of the company can be present.

The follow up:

Every week or so I post in our company’s Facebook group with a list of the tasks that need doing for the following week. As we are devising which can be a slow process, it is important that we set goals and deadlines that keep us on track. Here is an example of these kind of reminders presented to you in post-it form, just because I can!

Going forward:

I am now a lot more comfortable with my role knowing that every producer is different, and am confident in what I am doing. We are now just over a month away from the performance which means I must ensure that our deadlines are stuck to in order to have a completed and polished show by the 27^th May. It is in these final weeks where my job becomes more important as we still have a lot of work to do. Despite all of this however, I am very excited and positive about our performance and am pleased with the progress we have made, especially that made in the last week.

Works cited

Baggaley, L. (2008) What’s the producer’s role? [online] London: the Guardian. Available from: http://www.theguardian.com/stage/theatreblog/2008/apr/04/whatstheproducersrole [Accessed 19 April 2014].

Seabright, J. (2010) So you want to be a theatre producer? London: Nich Hern Books.

Spendisms! No Added Sugar’s budget sheet

Rebecca Sowter / March 25, 2014June 1, 2014 / Budget

As producer I have the responsibility of dealing with the company’s finances which is going rather smoothly so far. We have been successful in making the modest sum of £166.66 stretch as far as possible. This money was provided from the module budget and can be used for anything the company needs- some other companies on our course have invested the majority of their funds into play rights which has led them to organise fund raising events to get cash for other necessities such as props and costumes. As we at No Added Sugar have opted to devise our performance we have so far avoided any large costs, making it unnecessary to find other sources of income. We have also very fortunate to have access to a free graphic designer and printing press which has saved us a substantial amount of money.

Below you can access both the actual and the projected budget for our show Three Words. Having the two documents provides a good comparison between our initial predictions and the actual amount that we spent. As you can see on the documents, we spent less on marketing than first anticipated due to the free programmes that were kindly printed for us by Wiz Graphics. More money has gone towards props than originally intended which is partly due to the fact that we saved money elsewhere, allowing us to add more finishing touches to the show’s aesthetic:

No added Sugar actual budget

No Added Sugar projected budget

The theatre company module has provided an experience of creating a new company that is as close to doing the thing for real as it could be, however the security blanket of the Lpac and the support of our lecturers has meant that our show has been substantially cheaper to create than it would have been if we had set out alone. We would have to consider the financial implications of buying the things that Lpac has provided, such as technical equipment, if we decided to continue as a company after university and went on to tour. If it was the case that we decided to continue as a group and wanted to tour this very tech-heavy show, we would have to consider other methods of funding which would include raising our own money for when we first start up and then seeking help from government backed bodies like Arts Council UK or our own local council.

Hope Cove and the big “I do!”

Rebecca Sowter / March 8, 2014June 2, 2014 / Development, Initial Ideas, Love

As part of our devising process, each member of the company is researching into different milestones in a relationship which may be used in the performance. For the structure of the piece, we have discussed using a timeline of some sort that plots the generic events that occur in an average relationship (first kisses, meeting parents etc). These events will then be explored individually through a mixture of real accounts from the public, our own experiences and the heightened portrayals that popular films/songs/TV use. I am delving into the muddy waters of marriage; a foreign territory for me which means relying on my own experience is not an option.

In films and TV, marriage and weddings are often overly romanticised or unrealistically dramatic. What springs to mind instantly is the classic soap opera nearly-wedding where just before the couple say ‘I do’, something terrible happens that disrupts the ceremony. This more unrealistic view of engagement could be something we explore, however I have already started talking to real couples who will be getting married later this year. Their responses give an honest but heart-warming account of what this life event is like. From the interviews, I have picked out a few points of interest that could be used in the performance. The proposal is something that I think we can definitely play with and using details of real proposals we could create a very uplifting (but genuine and not sugar coated!) scene. Below is a picture of the location of one proposal that was revealed in an interview which we may explore in rehearsals:

the location of one interviewees proposal

First dance songs could be a useful and interesting way to connect our use of live music to this section. That would also create a potential opportunity to have a more physical scene, as currently we have a lot of static, text based moments. It would also be interesting to link some of the stories that we find together. Here is a short list of possible songs that we could use for this section:

‘Don’t Marry Her’- Deep South
‘Love and Marriage’- Frank Sinatra
‘Marry You’- Bruno Mars
‘Going to the chapel of love’- Dixie Cups
‘Paradise By The Dashboard Light’- Meatloaf