POST NUMBER ONE

Activity #2 Musical Time

Hello fellow big a-fish-ionados (ya I know that's really bad :p), it seems quite quiet still even though we are only 14 days away from the due date of this project. I guess I will start off the posts then! 

I recently watched the full length high school production of the Big Fish musical on youtube; (as it says to do in the handout), and thought overall it was quite good. In some parts though I thought it lacked a little, but nobody's perfect.  

I did learn a great deal about this musical while watching the youtube version, mostly about the progression from the present world and the past/story world and in which order the scenes come and go. For example the western scene where Edward falls asleep to an old western movie and then incorporates the setting into his dream, a smooth progression from reality to bigger than life story. One other example of this is when Josephine asks Will how his parents met and he (begrudgingly) tells her the story of the Calloway Circus after saying that there were 20 different versions of the story and the set changes to the circus.
 At first when we were doing the read through, it was very hard to keep track of what was really going on, and I think I'm not alone in saying I missed a lot just by reading the script. I missed practically the whole red, white and true scene; I was confused when the stories were being told because of the flipping between the two time lines. The transition has to be very distinct if you want people to understand the story overall, and we couldn't visually show that at a read through. 

In this musical there are aproxomativly one billon scenes, so you have to make each different and clear. Personally, from the youtube version of the musical I felt that the flood ("start over"), circus ("time stops"), Sandra's "I don't need a roof" and the "what's next" scenes/songs  stood out the most to me.

The flood stood out because of the picket signs, the anger of the citizens and mostly the moment where Don Price realizes that nobody really knows that they're protesting (a major flaw in their plan). That moment of comedy just makes it pop slightly more than the other scenes.

What's next is possibly the climax of the play where Will finally accepts the magic of the stories and has to tell his father how he dies. It's very quick and frantic yet touching at the same time. At the end they arrive at the river where Edward sees all the people he ever knew there, almost like his life is flashing before his eyes. The reason this stood out to me is because the story this time is told by Will who has to help his father through death by using imagination and fantasy, and realizes that you need stories to soften the hardships in life and have fun.

The circus is a scene that stands out because of: the unique environment, Mr.Calloway (the werewolf), costumes, but mostly the interruption of the alabama lambs' song into a really cool slow motion "time stops" where Edward shows the moment where he fell in love with Sandra (at first sight, no less). The song itself is pretty and really crescendos near the end which is why it has such a lasting impression on the audience.

Sandra's "I don't need a roof" stands out because of the emotion put into that song. It's quite beautiful in it's message that she loves Edward so much that even if the house falls down she will still be happy as long as she has him. She brings the message that to love and be loved is happiness, you don't need much else, and a roof is an afterthought. Mind you, the singer has to feel the song for it to be powerful. It shows the raw emotions of sadness and love and that makes you remember it well.

THE MORAL OF BIG FISH
At first I was confused about the moral of the story because there was so much going on all the time, but as I was able to think it through more and more, I realized a moral, or what I perceive as the moral of Big Fish. I believe that Edward uses stories to breathe life into the mundane world of facts, science and boredom. Where cold knowledge is anticlimactic and sometimes hurtful, he teaches Will and the audience that imagination is important for people to live happily, to hope, to dream bigger, to love bigger and to light the darkness that is reality.

BIG FISH METAPHOR
The big fish story is one that is used as a sort of expression that originated from fishing where the fishermen would describe the size of their fish using their hands and show that their fish was one of giant size when it was actually smaller. It is now an expression for when people exaggerate their stories much like Edward Bloom's highly imaginative storytelling that is obviously not all completely real. It is a metaphor for living larger than life, (In relation to the musical) simple as that.

So now that I know all that, I can tell you how all that information will help me get into character. For one, all characters have to have a certain whimsy, because they are part fantasy even if they hold truth to them. Every person in the cast has to be completely devoted to their characters because when you use exaggeration, nothing gets left behind. There is no hesitation and all actions have to be big and fully in character (and no I'm not referring specifically to the choreography).

I will mostly be in the past story scenes so I need to exaggerate my character (without being too silly), that includes faces, the way I dance the choreography and my body language on stage. I need to devote myself to the storytelling while I am on stage.

That concludes the first part of my assignment and I hope some of you other students will post something, too, so I can finish the third part.