Course Reflection

    * 1. Gain Shakespeare Literacy

      Demonstrate mastery over fundamental information about Shakespeare’s works, life, and legacy

I feel like my grasp over the Shakespearean realm as both increase in breadth through my studies of the comedies that we studied this semester, and also a greater understanding of where William got his material before. I had no idea before that he was the Walt Disney of his time taking popular tales and then fleshing them out until it becomes something of it's own. It made me more inquisitive of the the histories that he wrote. I learned that, at the direction of Queen Elizabeth, Shakespeare would villainize the members of the opposing family, like Richard III. I Feel like the things I already knew were also accentuated in this class, keeping my previous studies on Shakespeare keen and sharp.

   * 2. Analyze Shakespeare Critically

      Interpret Shakespeare’s works critically in their written form, in performance (stage or screen) and in digitally mediated transformations. 

 

In my analysis of any of Shakespeare's work I feel like I have been able to dig into the text in a way that made me question the culture of the time. It also led to a greater understanding of the male psyche. It was great to do the First Folio work on my own even though  I wasn't able to share much of it with my class mates. I will admit I watched more Shakespearean performances in this one semester than I have in a while, whether that be film or play. It was great to understand how the acting plays along with the script. I also love how some directors make the plays their own just through their theme, like WWII in Love's Labours Lost. Forcing myself to blog about the different plays made me actually vocalize and pause to think about social, historical, and mental issues. It was a great way to prove myself socially.

      

  

  * 3. Engage Shakespeare Creatively

    

In my creative work I did many in class presentations of readings and also memorized and dramatized monologues. It was great to see how the plays I was rereading mostly could be interpreted differently than I had when I had done them in my acting career. I especially enjoyed working on Meleager with Rebecca and Cameron. I loved the fact that we got the chance to be like Shakespeare making something out of seemingly nothing. There were many other projects I had always wanted to do for this class that I never was able to get around to strictly because of time constraints, but I'm glad I was able to teach fight choreography theory and Shakespearean acting theory to my fellow class mates for the projects I was able to do.

      

    * 4. Share Shakespeare Meaningfully

    

I loved bringing my friends to the performances at BYU. We were able to have many good discussions based of Love's Labours Lost. It actually led to a deeper analysis of both of our lives and how we were approaching the thing that we must do rather than the things that we want to do. I was meticulous about writing on my blog when we were reading plays or when we were preparing Meleager for construction, but my sharing didn't stop there. I frequently would post on Facebook about the tantalizing experiences that we were having in class. It was cool to get responses from others about how they thought Shakespeare should be interpreted. It was also a great opportunity for me to share my love of shakespeare with many of those around me who don't think Shakespeare is cool. Obviously those people haven't read Julius Caesar or Henry IV parts 1, &2, and then Henry V.

   * 5. Gain Digital Literacy

      Students use their study of Shakespeare as a way of understanding and developing fluency in 21st century learning skills and computer-mediated modes of communication. Those skills are grouped under the following categories.

      

 

I had never before thought of reading a play while listening to it. Then again I haven't really studied a play if i wasn't preparing to perform it. I learned about valuable resources for both good audio plays and absolutely terrible ones. I give props to the people that made the freeware versions available. 

 

I had never before written a blog. I'm not usually online except for when I'm doing research for my fight choreography needs. It was cool for me to be a part of what seemed to be a living organism that I could contribute to. The feeling was even better when the whole class started working on the wiki together. It took me till nearly the end of the semester, but I feel like I am capable of being able to start a blog for my fight choreography company. It's always been something I had considered doing.

 

I liked the ability for anyone I wanted to just go read my blog. I feel like I could share this blog with any of my acting friends and they would wonder in amazement. I can't wait to see what just the other class thinks!

i response to that last one....

So I realized that a reflective blog post is different than what I just did. unfortunately I'll have to look at that tomorrow before coming to class. I'll be sure to be more in depth and give details. In essence, I'll be reflective.

Learning Outcomes Analysis point by point

    * 1. Gain Shakespeare Literacy

      Demonstrate mastery over fundamental information about Shakespeare’s works, life, and legacy

      a. Breadth (knowledge of a range of Shakespeare’s works) I gained a great breadth when I read the comedies in our selection. I hadn't read Love's Labours Lost or Much Ado About Nothing before. I had already read all the other plays that we read in class.

      b. Depth (more thorough knowledge of a single work) I loved learning about King Lear more intensively. I had performed scenes from and dances about this play before, but I loved watching the degeneration of sociality in this play.

      c. Performance (stage and screen) I enjoyed watching Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead in movie format as well as Merchant of Venice and Love's Labours Lost on stage

      d. Legacy (history, scholarship, popular culture) We discussed a lot about this in class. I hope I brought a few nuggets of knowledge concerning the First Folio that everyone could appreciate.

   * 2. Analyze Shakespeare Critically

      Interpret Shakespeare’s works critically in their written form, in performance (stage or screen) and in digitally mediated transformations. This includes

      a. Textual analysis (theme, language, formal devices) I did this mostly in the analyzing of the texts as we read them, as can be seen in my blog posts.

      b. Contextual analysis (historical, contemporary, cultural) See blog posts concerning Man's attitude and many, many others

      c. Application of literary theories when we wrote our final project on Meleager, I was meticulous about adding iambic pentameter, punctuation and style. Unfortunately for time we had to edit out our best examples for the final project.

      d. Analysis of digital mediations we did many in class viewings of different Shakespearean video performances including some of my own off of facebook.

  

  * 3. Engage Shakespeare Creatively

      a. Performance (memorization, recitation, scene on stage or video) I did several readings in class, as well as monologue performances and also our final project was full of Shakespearean goodness.

      b. Individual creative work (literary imitation, art, music) check out my youtube channel. also I showed videos of dances and performances that I've done in the past for competitions.

      c. Collaborative creative project please see OUR PROJECT on the wiki

      

    * 4. Share Shakespeare Meaningfully

      This includes engaging in the following:

      a. Formal Writing. Develop and communicate your ideas about Shakespeare clearly in formal and researched writing and through a format and medium that puts your ideas into public circulation. All on the blog, plus some work I did on facebook that I didn't link to my blog

      b. Informal Writing. This mainly means through regular online writing Blog

      c. Connecting. Share one’s learning and creative work with others both in and outside of class. When I cast Meleager, there were only two of the 7 of us from class that were actually in the video. I shared with them what we had been doing and also the chance to be in the video. I'm glad that they joined too.

      I also loved to tell people about my Shakespeare class. It was one of the most exciting classes I've ever had in college. My parents always heard a fair deal about it, as did my coworkers. I would also post statuses on Facebook concerning my thoughts on projects and certain characters in plays.

   * 5. Gain Digital Literacy

      Students use their study of Shakespeare as a way of understanding and developing fluency in 21st century learning skills and computer-mediated modes of communication. Those skills are grouped under the following categories.

      a. Consume - Effective and independent selecting, searching, researching, I always would listen to the plays as I read them. It made it more enjoyable for me because I wasn't the one imagining voices in my head for the different characters. I also enjoyed when I switched from the LibriVox recordings to the BYU Audio Plays. They are much better in quality and also have characters played by the right genders. (LibriVox FAIL!!!) There was also a lot of research that went into each of my posts. I would look up what I could online to make my posts meaningful and not just blurbs from my head.

      b. Create - Producing content that demonstrates learning and which can be shared for others to profit from. All on the blog or wiki

      c. Connect - Engage with other learners within and outside of the class to develop thinking and share more formal work. My group up in Salt Lake would frequently meet together on Monday afternoons to make sure that we were all on the same page and also that everyone was making progress with their portions of the group projects. We also would comment on each others' blogs to help one another get better quality out of their original ideas. I also helped out connect other actors from BYU Provo to the other groups so that they had professionals to help them with their performance requirements.

      I'm not sure if professor Burton would like us to provide specific examples of stuff that happened in class, cause if so, there's a lot that I did in class that I haven't mentioned here. I like to be involved. Personally, I think that's the one downside to having someone from the other class grade us, because there's no way to tell how involved they were with the whole process.

      Also just because there wasn't a whole lot of commenting doesn't mean that people didn't read your blog as I found out. It's the same thing with Facebook. people read, but they don't have anything to say.

FIGHT VIDEO!!!!!!!!!!!!

So it is finished! I hope you all enjoy it. It took many hours of editing and several different editions, but IT'S DONE!!!!!

I hope you enjoy it!

the Shoot

We started the day out pretty intensely.

I got a new actress to play Atalanta at 9:30 PM on Friday night.

I was awakened at 6 AM Saturday morning by a text from said girl saying that she was throwing up blood.

At 6:05 I called my little cousin who agreed to the part and to be at my house in under an hour.

At 6:20 I was asleep again, only to awakened back up at 6:35 by a text from Nic Betker, the man who plays Meleager and was in Forever Strong saying that he was at my house.

Between then and 8:10 everyone else shows up and we start cutting everyone's BYU INAPPROPRIATE  costumes. There was much cleavage on the men's part, and there was not one sleeve to be found.

We arrived on location at 8:30 and started to put freezing cold creek mud all over our bodies, screaming profanities as a college class went by teaching about all the different uses of the park. We became a new lesson for that class. ha ha

At one point one of my actors (a marine) broke my spear and did not tell me. He asked if he could run off and get something from his car. It took him over an hour to get back to location, wherein he went to the local Smith's and back with Cameron and Nic. He attempted to fix my $80 spear with a cutting board and black duct tape. It actually worked quite well.

We dressed up the spear in spare cloth from everyone's deceased shirt sleeves and it actually looks quite well :)

We started the actual filming around 9:30 and between then and 5:30 the following events happened.

Dogs did not stop coming into our filming location. It was ridiculous. I had to put Rebecca on Dog Guard Duty. In her doing so  we were able to maintain the integrity of many a shot

Blood was everywhere, but not as much as I would have liked. Although Nic and I were asked later on if we were okay by a couple of stoners.

Everyone had food and water. No one passed out from the heat or dehydration. Nobody went into shock after the shoot like I did after the first alley shoot I did that I showed you guys, although I guarantee that there  was much slumber! everyone was exhausted by the end of the day.

Injuries were taken including slivers, bruises, cuts, stabs, and sunburns. The best of all of them was when the marine tried to dodge Meleager's punch. Well.... he dodged his eye straight into his fist. The Marine went straight down to the ground. I'm going to put that into a blooper reel.

He was a good sport though. He did three takes after that and then we sent him home. I ended up playing his acting double later on, but you'll never know it :) heh heh heh the wonders of movie editing and angles!

Cameron unleashed his inner actor and ferocious beast. He really surprised me with how well he did. All the coaching and especially his practice paid off.

We had a great shoot and everyone was fairly well behaved. It was loads of fun for sure and I can't wait to show you guys the final product, but that probably won't happen until Saturday I'm guessing. I did learn a few things this time through though.

I need to be more attentive to camera angles according to the action. I can't assume that the camera man knows the best angles. I need to vocalize my vision to him better.

Along with that I need to ALWAYS tell the actors to adjust their action. Because I didn't I lost about half of our footage.

With film, there is almost always a way to edit around the rough edges, you just have to know what you're doing :)

With all that said I love you guys, especially the Meleager team for going along with such a crazy idea of a fight shoot in the mountains without shoes for most of the time. I had a lot of fun and the video is turning out really well so far!

Getting prepped for the fight shoot

Alright, so we've got the script thanks to Rebecca. She and I edited it yesterday, and it's good. But not quite as good as the video production is going to be! It's gonna be sweet.

as this is a blog I would like to vent some anxiety. In the last few days I found out that some of  the costumes and weapons I was going to be borrowing from my old high school are now unavailable to me because the school is shut down for spring break.

Costumes, not a problem. Walmart to the rescue right.

The weapons? oh dear, now that's another story. Where the heck do you find Spears and swords a few days before a film shoot?


The South Towne Mall, that's where.

Guys I just bought an $80 replica, battle ready spear from the movie "300".

yeah... I just bought that spear for our fight video, along with another cool knife.

I always use top notch things for my fight videos and I consider my weapons an investment in future choreography gigs so no worries if you didn't just spend $120 on your project for this class.

My only anxiety now is that the spear is still heavy and super sharp and it can do some damage to the body if used improperly. But don't worry, I know exactly what I'm doing! I'm taking a grinder to take off the sharp point so that if it does hit some one it's not going to puncture the skin :) I've done this a million times with other knives that I use in my shows. I just need to get out my jitters about the fact that I actually bought a spear.

Who does that?

Anyway, so all of the people in the movie are going to be meeting at my house on Thursday night from 5-8 PM so I can teach them their lines and their choreography. It's going to be sick!

Meleager story line justification/analysis

So Cameron and Rebecca showed me the error in my blogging ways.  My blogger was about 2 years old. I now can put videos directly into my blog, like what I've wanted to do this entire time.... sad that it's at the end of the semester. Forgive me if there are still some technical errors I'm still getting used to it all.

So Rebecca and I sat down on Monday and analyzed two Shakespearean assassinations that would lend to our story. We analyzed Julius Caesar's death and also the death of Hector in Troilus and Cressida. These are the notes on structure/ and or human behavior with murder that we saw in these scenes

Julius Caesar

1) Uncertainty/ fear of being found out by murderers
2) suspiciously high praise to the man they are going to kill
3) Sealing the deal (aka the "stabbity death") [ha ha name that reference]
4) Instant pronouncement of the deceased's death to the public
5) Reaffirming one another and a strong command to stand together

Hector
A) Hector is without armor
B) Achilles strikes Hector down mercilessly
C) Achilles swears vengeance on Troy

So while thinking about our story we decided to take these elements and combine both of them into our story of a scene in act 4 of Meleager, but with one key difference. We wanted to play the dipole with a few of the attributes of these scenes to make it more authentic, cause Shakespeare would never write the same fight scene twice!



So here's our story so far. Rebecca is writing out specific dialogue to match the story line. every time you see a letter or number in parentheses, look to the notes on the other two plays to see how they coincide :)

ACT 4
Meleager gives the Calydonian Boar skin to Atalanta as a prize for striking the beast first.

In the passing of the skin, her disguise is revealed.

(1) Plexippus and Toxues (Meleager's brother and uncle) fear being sentenced to death for not telling the officials of the hunt about Atalanta being a girl. Punishment for both would be being thrown off a cliff. So they plan to kill her for the council to get out of being punished.

Meleager stands up to them because of his adulterous love for Atalanta

(2) Iphicles and Eurypylus start praising Meleager for being such a noble man while inching over towards Atalanta, whom they take hostage.

Atalanta drives an arrow shaft into the leg of Eurypylus and pushes away Iphicles. Iphicles starts running as soon as Euriponditis pursues him. Exeunt both men.

Plexippus and Toxeus go after Atalanta again and they knock her out to prevent her from causing more damage. (A) Meleager is trying to stop them the entire time while completely unarmed. (B)After trying to talk them out of murdering her while she's unconscious  he Kills both Plex and Tox. (reverse B, 3, &4) Meleager gives mercy to Eurypylus and lets him go after swearing him to a pact never to reveal the identity of Atalanta as the stranger who entered the competition.

Meleager then follows after Euriponditis

____________________________________________

Next scene

Iphicles enters and hides from Euriponditis who enters very quickly after.

Iphicles swears that he won't tell a soul about Atalanta, but Euri doesn't believe him.

Battle ensues

(3) Iphicles falls

enter Meleager

Euri worries about the word getting out that he killed Iphicles since a lot of people suspect that Euri is in love with Iphicles's wife, Chloe.

(5) Meleager tells Euriponditis to man up and stand tall because Meleager will just blame the whole thing on Iphicles trying to steal the boar hide, and that Meleager killed him for stealing such a prized possession.






Yup, that's what we've got so far! It makes me wonder if we should have based it after all the confusion in Hamlet, or Macbeth though. I really like what we came up with though. It makes for some cool plot progression!