Grotowski and Pygmalion.

Throughout this lesson, we took the opening scene of the play- "Pygmalion", which involves a punning girl (Eliza), who gets her flowers knocked over by an onlooker. The pair then begin to argue. 

To connect this scene with Poor theatre, we decided that we would take the scene into an unusual space, that didn't nee any 'set-up'. To do this, we decided that we would take the scene outside onto the busy playground. This gave us an easy area to perform in, and it also gave us a large audience immediately. Moreover, it was an almost perfect site, as it was similar to the one in the play. 

We decided that we would portray the argument between the characters loosely. To do this, we had James (who represented Freddy knocking over Eliza's flowers), who slammed into the year sevens and threw their crisps around. Then Sophie (who represented Higgins), began shouting at the kids and threw the remains of the crisps in their faces. She got progressively angry and began screaming at the year sevens. The rest of our class either tried to calm her down, or stayed back (we represented the onlookers). Finally, when the teachers were alerted, we stopped and told the audience that we were just performing a piece. 

Overall, this was very successful as the onlookers soon became enthralled in the action and many people even ran to get a teacher. It was effective as it showed us how fluid and unique any piece of poor theatre can be. Just because there is no complex set or stage, doesn't mean that the performance is any less interesting and complex. Moreover, it shows us how we can use the themes of the play we choose to create an interesting piece.