We also devised "Boggis's Chicken House" scene. To begin this scene Charlie, James and I dig our route to underneath the Chicken House. To show us "digging our route", we move our hands in circular motions at all times unitl we "arrive". We "travel" with Charlie at the front of the line, then me and then James. All movements are done in cannon, so when we turn round a corner Charlie would go first whilst I carry on, and then I'd turn when I got to the exact place he turned, and then the same with James. To make our "journey" look more interesting rather than just having narration saying "the foxes arrived", we made a movement sequence:
- travel from SL to C digging forwards
- travel sideways from C to SR (each actor turning sideways in cannon)
- travel forwards around a corner from facing SR to facing SL
- travel from SR to C ducking in cannon
- travel from C facing SL to C facing F (travelling slightly forward still ducking)
- * dialouge between the fox characters *
- Charlie jumps to stand up straight where he is
- I jump to stand up straight to the left of Charlie
- James jumps to stand up straight to the right of Charlie
Throughout this movement section, Oliver narrates to ensure the young audience understand what is happening. Once we arrive there is more dialouge between us three fox characters. We found out that Lewis can do a really impressive chicken noise impression, so he shall make various chicken noises when we jump up and stand in the Chicken House. We decided that when we "take the chickens home" we shall carry placards of pictures of chickens.
As my broken toe was extremely painful this lesson and it wasn't
essential for me to be up and moving in the next scene we devised, I
decided that I would begin to work on the placards. So this scene didn't upset the children, we decided to have pictures of what they would recognise as "food chicken" as opposed to "animal chickens". I began making these placards by getting some cardboard and drawing a pencil outline of chicken legs and roast chickens. I wanted two placards to be just chicken legs and small roast chickens (for James and I), but I wanted one placard (Charlie's placard) to be of one large roast chicken, as so Mr Fox looks a lot stronger than the fox cubs. The hardest part to making these placards was mixing the correct colours. So far I have done two of the placards, so by next lesson I will have done my third and final chicken placard.Whilst I was painting the set, the rest of the group began work on "Bean's Secret Cider Cellar" scene. As my character of the fox cub goes home to Mrs Fox, only Mr Fox and the other fox cub go on this journey. On the journey they meet Badger, Mole (Robert) and Rabbit (Lewis). They have worked out another movement section to "arrive" at the cellar. This whole journey is narrated by Oliver again, but also has a creepy piano underscore. This creates tension suitable for our young audience. We didn't have time to go any further with this scene, but Oliver is scripting this scene ready for next lesson. He has told me that at the end of this scene my character of the Rat will end on stage shouting after the other characters in rage. As to make my insults appropriate and suitable for the young audience, I have taken my insults from the new "Insult Generator" on Matilda the Musical's website (http://uk.matildathemusical.com/insult-generator/#main-body).
The insults I found which I like are as follows:
- "You malicious evil termite!"
- "You foul little worm!"
- "You nasty-faced thick-headed stink bomb!"
- "You jumped-up nasty-faced newt!"
- "You horrible nasty-faced animal!"
- "You filthy malicious crook!"
- "You lousy vile cockroach!"
- "You slimy yucky filthbog!"
Obviously, I won't be using all of them as there won't be time, but I have given myself options, and the rest of the group can say which ones they like the best.
