Blood Brothers Essay

It feels like he is this omnipotent being and he is deciding the fate of all the children. It’s almost as if he is the emotion that everyone wants to avoid but no one is doing anything about it, Mrs Johnstone carries on in her life pretending that she isn’t superstitious and although there is this undying voice inside her saying that she is and one day Mickey and Edward are going to die. This voice is what the Narrator is, he is fate and Mrs Johnstone chooses to ignore it but she knows you can’t change fate. On the stage he is always there, he is omnipresent, this constant being there shows that the thoughts of Mrs Johnstone are still there and that nothing you do will undo the past. Mrs Johnstone has to live with the decision of what she has done but she chooses to ignore it. The Narrator can be viewed upon as the referee of life (or as you might ‘God’), you know the rules and now you have to follow the rules (the superstition) but Mrs Johnstone turns a blind eye, forgets about it and pretends that it will never happen, but she must follow the rules. Prejudice Prejudice is a fixed opinion, which is not based on a fair examination of the facts. The picture with the black and white boy and the so-called ‘magical stick’ (simply because we don’t know what it is) is a base of which many different scenes can be produced and discussions can take place. The children come across as innocent, possibly that they have no reason to be prejudice against each other but through past happenings (lynching in America and the KKK) their parents want them to be prejudice to supposable keep them from harm. It shows that possibly prejudice to this degree is only set in motion if something terrible happens by a specific ‘type’ of people (the KKK killing black people) and that when it comes down to it the people themselves are not the same as the people who have done this feat. Suppose that everyone in the world was white and everyone was the same religion, height, age etc. but despite this the KKK would exist and the lynching would still go on; people would find another way to view differences, where you live or even your surname. My point is that I think its human nature to take a dislike against different people, if you look back hundreds of years and people lived in remote places (tribes for example) and a tribe moved to join another tribe, because the new tribe is different it presents its self with a new variable, that it could jeopardise the well-being of the original tribe. So this original tribe will try and eliminate this variable (driving them away or even killing them) to stop it from harming their own tribe. You can translate this to the black people moving into America and the white people living there trying to protect them by getting rid of any new possible threat. Mickey and Edwards first meeting and an evaluation of two groups Francis (me), Jamie and Barry   There was a nice mime of the gun from me as I sat on the apron of the stage. It was good because the gun I made in my hands by pointing one of my fingers out and it looked as though it was a gun because it took the form of a gun well. We did some good work even though we had only one lesson to get it done in. It was good work because we learnt most of our words and got the blocking sorted. The giggling after the ‘F word’ was good because it was very childish because I and Jamie looked as if we were embarrassed.   My body language was good, my arms movements were exaggerated and typical of a seven year old because that is how the act with their arms.   Even though Jamie lost his place in the play, he didn’t come out of character and got back on tracks very quickly. Very good facial and body language from all of use and especially me, me and Jamie’s facial expressions matched seven year olds expressions and Barry’s face showed that he was ‘pissed off’ and he acted as though he was the boss by talking louder and demanding respect.We could of have improved by thoroughly learning the script and concentrating more on our actions. James and Richard   Both of them learnt the script and did not lose their place or forget their words. They didn’t fully use their hand movement so they couldn’t act exactly as a seven year old would because people at that age use their hands.   When they said the ‘F word’ they looked as though they were very excited and embarrassed. They looked like this because they acted as young people would when they heard a naughty word; they did this by having wide eyes and giggling immensely.   When James’ said ‘pissed off’ it was well done because it sounded as though he really was pissed off. Only on one incident did James forget his words, but nether the less he still kept in character and sorted it out by referring to the script. What I have learnt about the class differences between the twins I have learnt that Edward’s class is most probably upper class; either this or they are very rich middle class people. I have learnt that Mrs and Mr Lyons have a highly etiquette way of living, for example they do not allow swearing of any form whereas with Mrs Johnstone’s way of living swearing occurs frequently. Mickey’s class is probably lower class, which is they do not have a large amount of money or income. She has many children and works very hard for Mrs Lyons but still does not get a large income. I have learnt that it’s most likely that Mrs Johnstone’s family expresses their emotions more often than Mrs Lyon’s family; this could be because Mrs Johnstone does not have as much material possessions compared with Mrs Lyons so she spends more time in her free time with her kids. On the contrast Mrs Lyons has many material possessions so she doesn’t spend that much time with Edward because he’s playing with his toys (for example). The changing attitudes between Mickey and Edward Through the play the twin’s attitude changes in aspects of their lives, for example them being blood brothers forever and the relationship between each other. When they were both seven years old they took delight in knowing that they were born on the same day, furthermore they made each other their blood brother. They were both immensely thrilled by this new bond they made and longed to be like each other. However when they grew older their views on being a blood brother changed, especially for Mickey who grows up and realises that he previous action of becoming a blood brother is child’s play. He says that ‘while no one was looking I grew up’, and I think that because of his harsh life with not much money he stops believing in the childish act and starts realizing that he has to open his eyes and stop playing games. However with Edward he hasn’t got a single worry in his life because he has lots of money a good social life and really not many initial problems at all; so because of this he still believes in this ‘blood brother’ stuff because he hasn’t grown up and found out what the world was really like. He still lives in a pampered world where anything he wants (and because he is an only child he is spoilt) he gets, he can afford to play games and Mickey can’t. Edward doesn’t realize no important a job is, ‘why†¦ why is a job so important’ because he can live off his parent income if he wants to, but Mickey knows that without a job he’ll have no money and because he mum cant afford extra school he cant get the grades to get a good job. Mickey’s attitude towards life changes the most, when he was seven he saw everything as a game and didn’t have any real problem to worry about. Although as he grows up he realises that he needs money and a steady income and him being a blood brother with Edward is just a children’s game. On the other hand Edward has gone to university, he can use his parent’s money to give him anything he wants and he hasn’t yet realised what life is really like when your throw in the deep end without any support, so because of this his attitude of being a blood brother hasn’t changed dramatically. How we acted these changes out We acted out the first time Mickey and Edward’s first meeting, this showed that they are immensely fascinated with each other and wanted to be just like each other, furthermore on top of this they are born on the same day and become blood brothers. To show further how this friendship was good I wrote a monologue showing how Edward was dumfounded with Mickey’s knowledge and who he is and that he wants to play and be friends and blood brothers forever. Later on in the play where the most time and the most dramatic difference was noticeable where they had spent the most time away form each other was when Edward got back to Mickey from university. We acted this out in a workshop and showed that Mickey was extremely livid by his job and Edward’s fortune. Edward had friends he had money and he had just come back from university and he had a great time, whereas Mickey was just working for minimal pay ‘putting together cardboard boxes’. When we see Edward and Mickey meet for the first time Mickey expresses that he hasn’t grown up and he makes him ‘sick’. Mickey has put up with so much when Edward was at university and his nerves were stretched to breaking point and as soon as the person who is most like him in the world comes home and sees that he is doing very well, he snaps mentally. I think that this is why he is forced into taking drugs. We acted this difference out by showing that Mickey was very angry and livid by the thought of Edward and that he saw him self as a failure, no job and even when he had one it was a very poor job, and Edward doing extremely well makes him feel even worse. The workshop During the workshop I learnt that gesture and hand movements are very important to express emotions and that it isn’t all through the voice. I learnt that you can use swear words, gesture and actions which provoke something in the audience but only once or twice because after a couple of times it doesn’t have the same effect that it has the first time. I learnt to know that when your on the stage it’s your stage no one else’s so you do not have to rush what you are saying because you are the one on stage and nobody is their to take it away; space between what you are saying. Also that when Mickey is angry and listing all the things that he is angry about I know that it is a good idea to rise in anger as you progress, because Mickey thinks of one thing which makes him angry then he says another and he knows that there are many things that he is angry about; so it topples on top of all the things he is angry or upset about in one frame of mind. In the workshop I learnt that you must always try your best if you want to become an actor (or any other profession) and that if you have an ambition, you should pursue it fully. The best performance When the people in our group performed I thought that Ned performed well; although there is only one criticism I can offer. His charisma on the stage is very good; he projects his voice and shows very well what the character is feeling. When he was playing Mickey and expressing how Mickey felt about his life he did it in such a way that you felt very sympathetic towards him; me must have emphasised a lot to understand what he feeling. The only criticism I can make is that when he acts as though he is upset or angry he tends to do it all the same. His acting at expressing those emotions are very good but he tends to do the same acting for different characters. I just feel that not everybody is angry or upset in the same way, there are many different ways of being angry so I think he should a larger variety of different ways of expressing different emotions.