The Best of Josh Comune

  In Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet, the first we hear of Romeo's character is from Benvolio talking to Lord and Lady Montague. This comes after the fight, and when the Prince of Verona addresses the Capulet and Montague servants. The Prince threatens to kill the servants if he catches the two fighting again. Lord and Lady Montague have not seen there son all day, and ask Benvolio if he has seen Romeo. Benvolio says he has, and that Romeo has been walking before the sun was up. He also stated that Romeo seemed troubled. This worries Lord and Lady Montgasue, and his parents ask Benvolio to get to Romeo to see whats bugging him. Romeo comes moping over to Benvolio after his parents go away so the two can talk. Romeo says how he is love sickened from a girl who doesn't love him back. This girl is Rosaline who ironically is Juliet's cousin. I didn't like Romeo's character at first.  The introduction of Romeo shows his immatureness. He seems very upset to tha...

My group had to perform Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet IN 1 MINUTE! It was very challenging but proved to be a lot of fun. I think we went to crazy with trying to jam in as many scenes as we could in the short amount of time and did go over 1 minute. But when the other groups went I definitely learned some things about Romeo and Juliet. In all the plays we saw reoccurring themes. Love, Death/Tragedy, and Conflict were present in every version. This is important because this is the foundation of the play. We know this because the group that needed to perform the play in 30 seconds left out all other kind of themes that were in longer version but these 3 themes were in all of the productions. The only two characters that were in all productions of the plays were Romeo and Juliet. These two characters portray all the important plot points. It was interesting that the shortest time group decided to go without a narrator as well. I thought they would've just highlight the play b...

Common Themes in all productions Love Death/Tradegy Conflict Romeo & Juliet 2 Minute: Characters: Romeo & Juliet Friar Lawerence Church guy that marry the two Tybalt Benvolio *Music Apothecary Scene: Party scene- they dance and music- (love) Friar marries them Fight scene where Tybalt and Benvolio die Friar gives Juliet potion leading from fake death scene Romeo death scene Juliet death scene Theme Love at first sight Comedic- unrealistic?? All die 30 seconds Characters: Romeo Juliet Paris Themes: Repeated actions rytheme No body learns lesson Everything gets worse Tradegy scene: Opens with Juliet fake death scene Romeo death scene Juliet death scene 1 Minute: Characters: Narrator Servants fight Prince Benvolio Romeo Juliet Tybalt Friar Lawrence Apothecary Lord Capulet Lord Montague Plot: Fight prolongue- act 1 Prince tries to break them up They go to party- Benvolio shows Juliet to Romeo- married Tybalt finds ...

Shakespeare------> Renaissance-----> Elizabethan England------> Poetic verse Shakespeare- writes in a poetic way for the queen and other royalty The play would be spoon fed to the uneducated audience so they to could understand the play Iambic Pentameter: 5 betas per line, 10 syllables per line Syllable- the different sounds and parts of a word                 -A{ca}de{my} Character charts: Sampson-Capulet's servant Gregory-Capulet's servant Prince- Prince of Verona Romeo- Son of Montague and Lady Montague, falls in love with Juliet who is apart of the family rivals Capulets Juliet: daughter of Lady Capulet, and Lord Capulet, falls in love with Romeo Benvolio- Romeo's cousin Mercutio-  is a close friend to Romeo and a blood relative to Prince Escalus and Count Paris. Rosaline- Romeo's first love who didn't love him back Tybalt- Juliets cousin  Paris- Juliet's to be husband hand picked by her father Act 1 ...

   Devised Theater is can be tricky to define. It is between improv, and having a story outline. You can have a script in Devised Theater, but it is not limited to one director. It is often a group effort when making the script. This became apparent to me early from watching the other groups perform before us. It is a collaborative collection of everyone's idea on how they think the script should be. It's cool how flexible the script is. Devised Theater is awesome because the actors can all have input, and feel as if they have contributed equally. Many other groups seemed as if they didn't even have a script. Their project's seemed to be comprised with lots of improvisation, and rambling with their lines.  I really liked this, because it seemed natural. I also found it really interesting to see everyone's interpretation of devised theater.    Our experience as a group with Devised Theater has been both exciting and challenging. Both Ivan and Jasmine seemed u...

Devised Theater is a tricky term to define. It has many interpretations. I ended up finding out that it means along the lines of collaborative creation. This means that scripts aren't coming from one source, but from many people in a group. I remember watching  "Sent from my iPhone" the Cheshire Academy production, and the spontaneous nature of the play. Devised Theater can be on the lines of improv, or it can have set lines for dialogue. It is really flexible in what you want it to become. Often times Devised Theater starts out by playing a game on stage, and the production can have audience interaction. Some people who have performed Devised Theater are Jersey Grotowski, and Peter Brook. One of the first devised performances ever was "Oh What a Lovely War!"

https://youtu.be/IjdjqWLuLFk     During this week in IB Lit Peformance, I was asked to perform a monologue from the play "Fences." Everyone from the class was told to pick a monologue they liked.  Being the always energetic, lively person I am, I decided to twist things up a bit. I decided to choose the monologue where Troy faces Mr. Death. This monologue Troy had in the play stood out at me because its as if he accepted death to come swoop him anytime it wanted.  Troy would be okay with it as long as his fence was complete. Troy finishing the fence would symbolize his life cycle ending.  This was interesting to me because I felt that I'm that moment Troy lost the will to live. I knew it was going to be hard to portray that kind of  emotion, but I felt as if I took this challenge head on.   The first thing I thought about with this monologue was how to capture that raw emotion of hopelessness, and presenting that in a strong willed way. Troy never...

Alright..... Mr. death. I'm gonna tell you what ima do. Ima build me a fence around this yard here. You see? Im gonna build me a fence around what belongs to me. And I want you to stay on the other side. You stay over there until you're ready for me. Then come out, and bring everything you got. You not gonna sneak up on me anymore. When the top of your list say Troy Maxon that's when you come around here. Ain't nobody else got nothing to do with this. This is between you and me. Man to man. You stay on that other side of that fence until your ready for me. Then you come and knock on that front door. Anytime you want. I'll be ready for you. I will be Troy in this monologue. This monologue takes place after Troy has found out that Alberta has died and his daughter has been born. The emotions that go into this scene is a mixture of anger,  acceptance of death, and depression but not in a way that effects his tone of voice. The voice needs to be strong and during ...

In this monologue, I will be playing a metaphorically newly born, and confident man who looks back at his previous introverted lifestyle. He looks back at his life and starts out the scene laughing at himself. Then it takes a serious turn when he starts talking about the girl he never asked out. I will be acting as a confident, strong actor who shows power in the way the lines are delivered. At the end the mood lightens and my character will show this through vocal simulation.  I am not sure on what my movements will be just yet, but will work on that in class. Monologue: I used to be an introvert, shy and silent. My inner thoughts nestled under a soft spoken voice. I remember missing out on many opportunities as a child. I remember wishing I had the courage to ask that girl out who I had a crush on for 5 years. But I never did. Rejection was my greatest fear growing up, and not meeting up to the requirements for people to find me appealing. I cared too much on what everyone e...

   On September 1st after fall fling at Cheshire Academy, my IB Lit and Peformance class went to see Shakespeare in the park. It took lace at Edgerton Park in New Haven Connecticut. The play that was performed was "The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet" this version of the play was far different from any  I had ever seen, and incorporated an unseen forth modern twist. The director of the play was Raphael Massie. Mr. Massie works in the department of threaten arts at UNH and is well known in theater industry, espically in the state of Connecticut. The themes of the play are love, and tragedy. The plot of the story takes places between two star crossed lovers from Verona, and their path to being together.  Lady Capulet who is Juliet's mother tries to arrange the possibility for her daughter to marry the wealthy Paris, however this is far from what happens. At a party where Juliet and Paris are supposed to be arranged to marry, Romeo, who sneaks into the party, and who comes ...