Bob Fosse

Bob Fosse is an American dancer, musical theatre choreographer, director, screenwriter, film director, and actor, born on June 23, 1927 - September 23, 1987. He is the son of a Norwegian father and Cyril K. Fosse and Irish-born mother Sara Alice Fosse. He teamed up with Charles Grass, another young dancer, and began a collaboration under the name The Riff Brothers. They toured theatres throughout the Chicago area. After being recruited, Fosse was placed in the variety show Tough Situation, which toured military and naval bases in the Pacific. Fosse moved to New York with the ambition of being the new Fred Astaire. Although Fosse's acting career in film was cut short by typecasting, he was reluctant to move from Hollywood to theatre. Nevertheless, he made the move, and in 1954, he choreographed his first musical, The Pajama Game, followed by George Abbott's Damn Yankees in 1955.  In 1957 Fosse choreographed New Girl in Town, also directed by Abbott, and Verdon won her second Leading Actress Tony. That year he also choreographed the film version of "Pajama Game" starring Doris Day. In 1960, Fosse was, for the first time, both director and choreographer of a musical called simply Redhead.
Fosse earned many awards, including the Tony Award for Pippin and Sweet Charity, the Academy Award for Cabaret and the Emmy Award for Liza with a "Z". He was the first person to win all three awards in the same year (1973). He is also the only person to have won all three awards in the category of "Best Director", along  being a member of the American Theatre Hall of Fame.

Fosse was first married from 1949 to 1951 to dance partner Mary Ann Niles (1923–1987). After his first divorce, he remarried in 1952 to dancer Joan McCracken; this marriage lasted until 1959, when it, too, ended in divorce. His third wife was dancer/actress Gwen Verdon. In 1960, they had a daughter, Nicole Providence Fosse, who later also became a dancer/actress. He separated from Verdon in the 1970s, but they remained legally married until his death in 1987. On September 23, 1987, Fosse died from a heart attack at George Washington University Hospital, while the revival of Sweet Charity was opening at the nearby National Theatre.

Women's right campaign

The lesson with Dominique was to understand the texts of what was going on back in the early 1920's. As a class we have decided to do a research on the Suffragettes' an all female group with aggressive tactics that have unsuccessful effects on the government and the people whether to pass on the votes to the women. This is the posted work on my research of the Suffragettes', containing information on when the all-female militant campaign had formed and their tactics as a group.

The Sun has got his hat on

For this part of the Musical Theatre course we are doing a showcase which we are performing a dance for song "The Sun has got his hat on". This dance is fairly straight up, and the song is easy to sing and memorize. The chorus is sung by all of the classroom, and parts of the song Asher Bennett sings independently. The dance style is old-class fashioned, so for the song, we would have to wear black trousers, white shirts and old school hats, to make the dance seem realistic. 

Shakespeare Monolouge

	Original Text
		Modern Text
	SEBASTIAN This is the air, that is the glorious sun. This pearl she gave me, I do feel ’t and see ’t, And though ’tis wonder that enwraps me thus, Yet ’tis not madness. Where’s Antonio, then? I could not find him at the Elephant. Yet there he was, and there I found this credit, That he did range the town to seek me out. His counsel now might do me golden service. For though my soul disputes well with my sense That this may be some error, but no madness, Yet doth this accident and flood of fortune So far exceed all instance, all discourse, That I am ready to distrust mine eyes And wrangle with my reason that persuades me To any other trust but that I am mad— Or else the lady’s mad. Yet if ’twere so, She could not sway her house, command her followers, Take and give back affairs and their dispatch With such a smooth, discreet, and stable bearing As I perceive she does. There’s something in ’t That is deceivable. But here the lady comes.	SEBASTIAN This is the air, that’s the glorious sun. I can feel and see this pearl she gave me. I may be dazed and confused, but I’m not insane. Where’s Antonio, then? I didn’t find him at the Elephant. But he’d been there before me, and they told me he’d gone out looking for me. I could really use his advice right now. I feel sure this situation is due to some mistake, and I don’t think I’m crazy. But this sudden flood of good luck is so unbelievable that I’m ready to distrust my own eyes and my own rational mind when they tell me I’m not insane—maybe the lady’s insane. But if that were the case, she wouldn’t be able to run her house, command her servants, listen to reports, make decisions, and take care of business as smoothly as she does. There’s something going on that’s not what it seems. But here she comes.

Fitness

Assignment : Physical Theatre and Barbican Performance

Assignment : Physical Theatre and Barbican Performance

Warm up : During the lesson with Dominique, we have recently been playing a game in the grid to increase our focus. One game we have been playing is a game where we have to bounce the ball once onto somebody's square; if the ball is bounced twice or it goes out of somebody's square they are out of the game, until they have to wait for some people to be out to come back in the game. Another activity we have done is unpredictable; this was to make sure we know when we move to the space. The only thing about it is when we don't know who is going to move. We had also played a warm-up game where we had thrown a briefcase, a ball, and a umbrella to the person in the middle. The person can say for the person "Go", so they will move and the person who says "Go" will move to the middle. This gets the class physically active as the process of the warm up gets us focused. 

During the lesson, we have been looking at some old photos around the 19th century where we have been looking at the time where women had to fight for their rights so we have created a still image, where myself, Cagla, and Deneile had to force feed Cagla in a aggressive manner; during those times women were forced feed inside prison. This was called "The Cat and Mouse Act" which several women would be sentenced to prison and be forced feed by the prisoners, only to release them to starve and bring them back to the cells. We had also learnt how women had to struggle for their rights as there was two women rights campaign: the Suffragists, a peaceful group and the Suffragettes, a all-women aggressive group. The Suffragist tactics were to give the message around the world peacefully, via having men join the group, giving out speeches to express their rights while the Suffragettes committed violent activities; planting a bomb on David Lloyd George's house, despite the fact that was supporting the women's movement, chaining themselves to railings, and being sentenced to jail.

Furthermore, we had also learnt of a women named Rosa Parks. Her history reveals her to be a brave women; on a Thursday evening Rosa Parks makes her journey home via bus. Tired, Parks walks to the seats marked for white people, which at the time was against the law for an African-American to sit in the area of a white person. She finally settles a spot in the middle of the bus. The driver began to notice the whites section being taken, and more white people are boarding the bus. The driver then demands for the blacks to move up the bus, until when a all African-Americans decide to comply to the drivers command, this is the first time Parks had broken the rules of the segregated laws, which she always disliked seeing as she is the only black women to not co-operate. As a black lady, she had refused to give up her seat for the benefit of a white person, and was arrested although in the process, she had gained recognition and she had ultimately standing by her race and is proud who she is. It further shows that Rosa Parks was not hesitant to give up and she knew she would go to prison if she did not comply, but she wanted to give a message to all black people in the world.

UNIT 50: Movement in Performance - Self Assesment

1 - Excellent    2 - Very Good    3 - Good    4 - Satisfactory    5 - Needs Improvement

Unit Content - 

Application; attendance; punctuality; appropriate presentation; taking part in warm-ups; focus and concentration; commitment; effort; energy.

(3) The presentation was the only thing that have developed my character. The warm-up participation had gave us the effort to develop our voices. The focus and concentration was good enough to perform well during the rehearsals, and the energy was high enough to play my character properly.

Process: response to stimulus; contribution of ideas; experimentation; improvisation; working co-operatively with others; identifying what you need to improve; making improvements.

(2) The contribution to the ideas was a important. This was because the purpose of this was to ensure that everybody would develop the characters we are playing. For instance, one of my peers has gave me an idea that my characters voice in the beginning should start to develop as the song continues. This had prompted me to experiment my character, such as who is my character, what is his features, appearance wise and how he uses his facial expressions. Things like this would help me develop my character. Also, working co-operatively with others will help them gain confidence as well as yourself. The one thing I need to improve on is to make sure I don't make a mistake, and take responsibility in my role because some people were repeatedly calling me out on my mistakes. I will make sure this never happens. 

Physical skills: posture; alignment; co-ordination; balance; participation of whole body; strength; extension; elevation; flexibility; Stylistic qualities; focus; dynamics; expression.

(3) My physical skills were focusing and balancing. During the dances of the songs I would extend my arms and legs that would increase; for example during the song "Globalsoft", my arms have extended due to the warm-ups we did; furthermore our dance teacher have gave us advice that if we extend our arms we would make the song work. Posture and balance was also an important thing in the showcase; this is because in some songs this would require us to keep our postures straight, and the balance will help us to not make any mistakes or have an accident. I have used the types of expressions that have suited the song because expressions is a another important thing in the showcase, so we know what to do as a performer.

Interpretative skills: focus; projection; energy; emphasis; dynamics; facial and bodily expression; projecting and communicating ideas.

(2) During the warm ups and the rehearsal process, I eventually began to develop my voice for singing my song "Revolting Children" for Matilda. This is because of the fact that in the beginning of the song "Revolting Children", I was trying to get used to singing the song, and in fact I was quite nervous of singing. However, the process of this had gave me more confidence to sing, and adapt to my character's personality. Also, some people in the class had gave me some ideas on how I could develop my character; they gave me advice that I could stare at Miss Trunchbull after she shouts right at my ear, and to keep breathing to develop the intense hatred inside my character and keep staring at her. The energy in my song was at 100% as the song is purposely meant to express how wild we are as children.