Conflict

Reflection on Conflict Unit

1) Why is conflict an important part of a drama presentation?

Conflict is an important part of a drama presentation as without an actual issue or problem in the story, there's no actual plot and is quite boring. Conflict is what drives a scene. When there is a problem that causes a story not to reach a resolution is what makes a story interesting. When there is a problem, it causes the audience to become more invested in the drama presentation as they become interested in how the conflict will be solved. There are also times when it's physical conflict which includes fighting and a lot of people find that entertaining to watch since they find watching people fight interesting. 

2) Give an example of one lesson when you created conflict in your drama scene and say how you did it. (Pauses, gestures, action, dialogue, etc.)

One lesson where I created conflict in drama was when after we read a poem, we had to select key words from it to create freeze frames. There were words like crying, tremble, nightmare, etc. We then had to create a performance based on the words. I decided to make my conflict about a plane crash and how there was only one survivor (the pilot), who trembles and faces nightmares about all the people that were killed on the plane. In order to create conflict, action was very important as it had to show the sadness and grief the pilot was facing and dialogue was important as all of the people dead had to act as ghosts and shout angry things at the pilot, blaming him for their deaths. 

3) How did you demonstrate creativity in your final video task? Give examples of how you tried new things or were thinking outside the box.

I demonstrated creativity in my final video task as although it was inspired by an advertisement played at the super bowl, where the abused woman was pretending to order pizza and the man on the phone understood immediately and called the authorities, we made ours have a different outcome. Instead, the abused woman call the hotline but spoke to a man who was very unhelpful and failed to save the woman, who ended up being shot by her husband. In order to play the abused wife, I had to try something I had never really had an opportunity to do in drama which was cry on command, this was quite difficult to do but I managed to do it for the video. I also tried to put myself in the shoes of an abused wife and tried to portray my nervousness and fear throughout the video, especially when on call with the hotline as I was constantly trembling and struggled to speak as I was so overwhelmed with fear. I tried new things in my video as we managed to show how important is to listen and help those without a voice.

4) Do you think your message was clearly communicated in your video or could you have improved it? If so, how?

Yes, I think my message was clearly communicated in my video. The message was that we must always listen and try to help those who reach out to us for help. As in the video, the abused wife calls up the hotline meant to help those who face domestic abuse but instead she is met by someone who constantly tells her to speak louder and doesn't help her fast enough which leads to her death as he failed to get her help in time. However, we could have put a message at the end to listen closely or something along those lines. 

5) Think back to your performances at the beginning of term two, and now your current performances, do you think you have improved or developed any drama skills?

Yes, I definitely think I have developed my drama skills. At the beginning of the term, I found it quite difficult to act out such a depressing unit. Conflict was quite sad and there was nothing comedic about it and at times, I couldn't really keep a sad facial expression and didn't really put myself in the shoes of the character I was playing. Very often, I'd start laughing or smiling which caused me to go out of character. Therefore, I think I have improved in my facial expression. When I was interacting with other performers, I'd often go out of character but I definitely improved that and began to take the character I was playing more seriously. I also developed my pitch and emotional range as in order to do such a sad unit, you had to be able to show sadness and anger which I couldn't really do at the beginning of the term as I wasn't taking it very seriously but in the final video, I really put myself in the shoes of a woman who suffers from domestic abuse and pretended to be in her place which made me feel her sadness and pain. I also improved in my body language as in the video, I demonstrate good body language as I show my fear by the way I was constantly trembling and shaking.