Declan Donnellan

Donnellan is a theatre practitioner who developed on from Stanislavsky's ideas of 'objectives' and actions in theatre. Alongside Nick Ormerod, he formed a company called Cheek by Jowl in 1981. A lot of their work is performed at the Barbican Theatre. In 1989 he worked as the associate director for the royal national theatre. There he was involved in productions of Sweeney Todd and Angels in America. He also worked with the English national opera, the royal Shakespeare company and the Bolshoi ballet. He is able to work in both the Russian and English language. He wrote the book 'the actor and the target' which explores his theories and practices for acting.

He identified that there are internal blocks which can stop the actor from being able to progress in rehearsals. Some of these blocks are:

• I don't know what I'm saying
• I don't know what I want
• I don't know who I am
• I don't know where I am
• I don't know how I should move
• I don't know how I should feel
• I don't know what I'm playing 

These blocks are internal. Donnellan believed they should then create 'targets' which identify an external objective, because you also identify who or what you are doing your objective to. I thought about how I could apply external targets to my lines in 13, here are some examples:

'Ruby, you should be careful' -  I warn Ruby
'What are you' - I question Ruby
'Do you want one of these' - I offer John
'It's your bedtime' - I instruct Ruby

The idea of using targets as opposed to objectives is that it externalizes your objective. Whatever you do or saying you are doing to someone or something else. In order for this to work you must be able to visualize it. Donnellan developed the idea of seeing what you say.  This is because it is what we as humans naturally do. If you start telling someone a story about your day you are likely to visualize it. This is because we emotionally connect with it and that is also how we remember it. By creating a target it helps you to visualize everything you are doing or saying onstage.
 

Laban Efforts

Today we started off by standing in an imaginary glass box. We were told to mark out the size and shape of this glass box. This was to start us off learning about the Laban efforts. This is the exploration of different ways of moving and speaking. All the ways combined make up all the different ways in which we as humans may function.

The ways of functioning are based on different weights, spaces and times. Within the glass box we were told to move with various different weights, spaces and times:

 Weight
 This refers to the intensity of movement. How much effort it appears to be needing to move. For example: strong movement would require more effort and the movement would appear heavier and more weighted. Light would appear easier and would move through the space smoothly and relaxed.

Space
This means how much or little focus and precision the movement has. If it needs to get to a certain point and neatly, it would be a direct movement. Or the movement could be flexible which means the movement has less purpose to it. It may not have an exact destination it just flows through the space.

Time 
This refers to to the consistency of the movement. A sustained movement would be very smooth, and would glide through the space, flowing from one movement to the next. A broken movement would be very disjointed. It would change direction sharply in the space. 

When you combine the different versions of these you have the laban efforts. These are meant to be able to cover all ways in which humans may move. 

Light+Flexible+Sustained= FLOATING

Light+Flexible+Broken= FLICKING

Light+Direct+Sustained=GLIDING

Light+Direct+Broken= DABBING

Strong+Flexbile+Sustained=WRINGING

Strong+Flexible+Broken= SLASHING

Strong+Direct+Sustained=PRESSING

Strong+Direct+Broken= THRUSTING/PUNCH

We worked through these combinations in our 'glass boxes'. This exercise worked really well as a warm up but also as a way of opening up the possibilities of movement. It was tiring but it helped me to start thinking about how I could apply some of those combinations to my character in 13 and any other character I may play in the future.

We then applied this to our 13 text. We got into scene partners. I worked with the actor playing my daughter. It was interesting to see what happened to our scene when we had dabbing qualities to it or gliding. Our characters conflict a lot onstage so it was good to bring out that conflict by trying it with a pressing and slashing quality. We showed our scene and listened to others. We had to identify what effort people were applying to their lines. I think this is an interesting way of approaching a speech. However, I think it needs to be combined with objectives and other techniques so you aren't just playing an emotional state onstage.