Workshop (1) - First Thoughts of the Mock

Today we began our workshop unit. However, as we are all new to workshopping, we shall do a three week mock unit of "Songs for a New World" before starting our actual unit of "Sweeney Todd"! We were given the lyrics to the following seven songs from "Songs for a New World":

• "Opening Sequence"
• "The River Won't Flow"
• "The Stars and Moon"
• "She Cries"
• "The World was Dancing"
• "King of the World"
• "Hear my Song"

We shall be turning these songs into whatever we want - i.e. musical theatre numbers, physical theatre pieces or sections of drama, for example. We then listened to these seven songs and wrote down our first thoughts on the lyrics sheets for each number and then discussed what we felt:

• "Opening Sequence":  ((See picture))
• "The River Won't Flow":   Definitely a character number // walk through still images // Lewis said it could be quite Brecht
• "The Stars and the Moon":   Another character number // could make it comical or cheesy in places - "no traits of any value but his smile" man comes in front and does a massive cheesy grin and pose and freezes // perhaps use cardboard cut outs (e.g. star for "movie stars", money bag for "fortune in the back" etc.) // use of different men to show next man - each man could sing the chorus of what "he said"
• "She Cries":   Character song // comedy dance & drama piece // Very over-the-top // One guy singing, another guy dressed the same but is acting in mime or dancing a duet with a girl // moments of dance but mainly acting in mime // obsessed clingy girl he can't resist
• "The World was Dancing":   James suggested using a split screen for this number or perhaps he is writing in a diary // character number
• "King of the World":   physical theatre could work really well for this number // James said that it could be quite sinister and perhaps a dig at the government.
• "Hear my Song":   Everyone coming together // Support // Forms a cyclical structure as the last line is from the first song