To help with devising around the idea of the tube, I've asked some friends to give me an account of their busiest tube experiences.
Dani Gillespie
"it was one Friday night i think and my brother and i just got out from seeing The Book of Mormon in London and we had to get a tube back to Victoria. So we went to Lester square tube station and it was soo busy. We had to queue to get into the station which was bad enough, then the escalators werent working so we had to walk to down the stair, which as soo long and everyone was pushing because it was late and everyone wanted to get home. I have panic attack quite easily so i did, had one in the middle of the tube station because of how many people and pushing and everything, erghh! okay so then we got onto the platform and the tube thing said it would be 2 minutes but no, it was 10. Had to wait 10 minutes on a heaving platofom having a panic attack, wooo. so we finally got onto the tube and and because it wa late everyone pack onto this one train, so we did. i was squished onto the train side and everyone was still getting on. then we got to our stop 4 stops down i think and everyone got off to, so the train was empty."
To inspire our devised piece we have been given a piece of Music: Hometown Glory by Adele. The Lyrics reminded me of a completely different song, Homecoming by Kayne West, which is about a man who falls in love, follows his dream but when he trys to come back to his partner and his Family, his partner turns him away and he "Can't go back home". It also inspired ideas of Amnesia and one similar to The lonely bones book. The lyrics, "the people I've met", inspired me to think of a story were all the characters were all linked by an event or a crime, which was quickly developed as a group. The Idea is an '7/11' event where by a terrorist/suicide bomber walks into London underground, but bag is switched and so he's now out of control of what's happening; I assume his motive would be to become a 'Marta'. The rest of the characters all have their motives for being on the tube and so I hope these reasons followed by the characters deaths will make this piece a powerful performance. Furthermore some characters will live, one gentleman lets another person on the busy train (who is therefore effectively sending them to their deaths) and another who is pushed out the train by a mate as a joke (so his live was saved by his friend who is going to die), and so their aftermath could help support make the performance powerful. We also hope to use music throughout the performance, as the main focus and underscore, to define atmospheres and characters emotions. I think all emotional songs should be played as cover versions to make our piece more unique, I also find that cover songs are alot more about the singers vocals and so show more emotion than popular artist tracks. For Friday's lesson we started developing an opening to the song Animals by Martin Garrix to try and create a busy atmosphere however we didn't really get very far as we didn't have a great amount of time or space but the idea was there and that's what really mattered.
Character work
My Character is the person who picks up the wrong bag and so ends up with the terrorist's bag and a bomb; I'm thinking a really chilled back, casual 18-21 year old who's just come into some big money or been given a great job at a prestigious company. He always has over ear headphones on and so isn't too focused when picking up his bag. As all of our characters should have songs to match I was thinking Lowrider by War:
Allmusic Review "the lyric takes the cool image of the lowrider — the Chicano culture practice of hydraulically hot-rodding classic cars — and using innuendo, extends the image to a lifestyle"
Lowrider is a chilled out, fun song and I hope if we use it to introduce my character, I could also take "the cool image of the lowrider".
My Character's motive for being on the tube is to go to his new, awesome job, or possibly he's heading home from a concert, or somewhere (depending on when the time of the event is), and buys, or finds in his pocket, and wins the jackpot and so excited to cash it in, or this motive could even be that he's going to propose and his going to one of London's parks to meet his girlfriend. The song I thought would be most appropriate to represent these motives, more so the first two, was When I was Youngster by Rizzle Kicks:
This song shows that their biggest dreams as kids have come true and, to an extent, that's how I think my character would be feeling. It is also fast and upbeat creating a happy atmosphere.
Finally I thought of a scene when the train's music and the terrorist, who's been looking for my character, chases my character but can't get through the crowd and so dials the number to activate the bomb. For this scene I was thinking drum and bass to show panic.
General Notes
I think the piece should be split up, going back to the start of the day, to show everyone's individual story's effectively and explore their emotions through the songs
I think there should be a projection throughout counting down to the explosion, possibly a bomb timer instead of the bomb being dialled, and this could be used to show more clearly when we've moved back to the start of the day
There should be a final scene set a year after the event at a '7/11' memorial, for the characters who survive, they could possibly each thought track or have monologues
I thought Amanda could use a Dear Darlin' cover to show her character's motive, she is going home to see her loved ones as she has months to live and is suffering from a terminal illness, at the start of the song she could be reading a letter from a loved one:
For the new topic, Devising, I have been put into a group with Jake Kavanagh, Liam McMorrow, Amanda Lacey, Ali Heathfield and Connor Clark. For preparation for the lesson, we were all meant to bring in some music that inspires us or could inspire a piece; I thought about IFHY by Tyler the Creator or Good Morning by Kayne West. IFHY
I thought this song would inspire a story line; I thought about a woman who's cheated on her boyfriend and so he gets angry and hits her, but he still loves her and completely regrets it, he wants the best for her but every time he goes to let her leave he gets angry and close to violence but remembers hitting her. The stress could make him take up smoking and possibly lead to not paying the bills leading to a complete downfall in his life and create sympathy from the audience leading to a powerful performance. The end of the music video also leads into the song Answer which also inspires me and made me think about a story line where: a child is adopted and finally finds out on his 18th birthday, he searches for his biological parents and when he finds them, he's angry at them for giving him up, but is glad for the life he's lived and has a good job. The adoption parents feel betrayed when their child goes to look for their biological parents but in the end the child chooses them and that is what I would have hoped to make that piece a powerful piece. Good Morning
This song just generally inspires me, it talks about life through education and from a young age and inspires me because on my GSCE results day, the song made me cry because I felt all my hard work was to be put down to a single moment on that morning. I thought explaining this to the group might help to develop some ideas. Today we built a piece around the song Young by the Foxes about a dancer with high hopes and ambitions but can never find the right partner by when she does, she becomes too old to be a dancer or possibly suffers from a disease and so her career collapses which would make the piece a powerful performance.
