Production Task #2: MAKE-UP....get ready for me!

Description

The last week before holidays started we started to actually rehearse for the OAP. Also, we managed to decided the technical aspects of the play such as make-up and costumes. As my task is Make-up, I need to have a clear vision of what I want to achieve. The main thing is that it contains elements that help to exaggerate the visual way the play looks as melodrama is basically about exaggerating plots and characters and appeal to an emotional response.

Analysis

We decided on the following makeup for each character:

Spencer Alexis III: 

Some visual reference of wounds +glasses

• WIG
• HIPSTER GLASSES (White)
• WOUNDS (forehead, neck, ear and cheek)
• HIGHLIGHTED LIPS
• NAIL POLISH 
• FRECKELS 

wounds

HAIRSTYLE

hipster glasses

Grandpa Alphie:

• PARTIALLY BOLD
• WHITE HAIR AND BEARD
• THIK WHITE EYEBROWS
• EXPRESION LINES
• EARS (from school play)

Hairstyle and beard

Expression lines, hairstyle

Harriet Jessica Lauren:

Curlers 

• CURLERS
• FACIAL HAIR (lips)
• PINK NAILS
• HIGLIGHTED EYEBROWS 

Lips and highlighted eyebrows

Visual reference on how the glasses fit to a person

Spencer Alexis II:

• SPORT GLASSES (like swimming ones)
• MORE EYEBROWS (conceal) 
• LITLE MUSTACHE 

Sport glasses

Caroline Elizabeth Shaniqua:

HAIRSTYLE

• LONG EYELASHES
• HICKIE
• LIGHT BLUE NAILS
• SPOT
• PIERCING ON THE NOSE
• BANGS

Piercing on the nose + bangs

hickies

Hair color 

Berlinda Jones:

• ROUNDED NOSE (from school play)
• RED HAIR WIG
• SILVER TEETH
• PINK NAILS
• LILAC LIPSTICK
• LONG EARINGS

silver teeth

contexture wanted + possible hairstyle

lilac lipstick

In each different case, the make-up will provide a type of help to the characters and to the actors, not only by emphasising and exaggerating them, but by giving them the tools for their character essence. The make-up in the OAP basically will show a story behind it. For example, with Spencer Alexis III, when the audience sees him, they will already know he had an accident or someone punch him, we already know he is injured so obviously this will create a subconscious thought behind every watcher and each of them will start thinking on different possibilities with the story. This will be very interesting as we are letting the audience use their imagination since the play starts and by just providing a visual image. This makes me think, until what point an image can speak for itself? or it is that it stops showing something when you deduct what is in it or behind it?

Also, we can see that by working with a gama of pastel colors, we are giving a certain order to the play to have boundaries and explore within a design concept. I think that the fact that make up will be exaggerated will also help the actor himself as when you look like a character it is easier to become the character. 

So, basically, what I want to achieve with this make-up is that every single one the characters can give a certain story from just a single look. I want the make-up to be a indirect reflection of each characters personality and story due to the plot line, so I will have to connect the make-up to each characters intentions and roles in the play. 

Connections

IMAGINATION IN THE AUDIENCE: I can connect my point of view of every make-up having a story (by the audience imagination) with the fact that we decided of having scenes that are not seen by the audience but are imagined by them when they hear about them in the seen scenes. It will be very interesting to see how each person imagines these scenes as each one will have different views and images, the same way it will be very interesting to see what people imagine behind the visual image of a character

ROMPER LA PIEL: I can connect this to the school play as we also had the process of choosing make-up for each character. The similar thing between melodrama and german expressionism is that both are trying to exaggerate the characters in a physical way. Also, the actual process of selection is very similar as in both cases the make-up brings and effect on the audience that makes them wonder why are the things are portrayed the way they are. 

PAUCARTAMBO: In Virgen del Carmen celebration, I learned a lot about masks, and I associate them directly with make-up as both are masks you put to yourself to represent someone else. In the celebration, we could see that every mask represent a kind of stereotype or character for a story (of paucartambo), but, each of the masks from each of the comparsas have their own story behind the mask. That is the effect I want to create in the OAP as it opens you to a different way of seeing a play, so different emotions and responses will appear from the audience.

LAST YEARS OAP: This is a contrast rather than a connection. Last year in AMOD make-up was really light, they used some, but they didn´t have any effect on the audience. This makes me think on how the rhythm of the play will vary from last years OAP´s as we will try something different. It also makes me reflect on how people will   react to this new vibes we want to create.

Reflections

"Teenagers all think their life is a movie. If you break up with someone or you have a fight, you walk around with movie scores playing in your head. You sort of see yourself suffering as you're suffering. There's a lot of melodrama attached to the real events of your life"

This quote makes me think on how every part of life is seen as a form of theatre (like we heard in a conference some months ago). This led me to see that one of the reasons of people liking acting either in theatre or movies is the representation of situations that happen to you, so you feel identification or empathy for a certain character. Also, it makes me think on the reasons we have to do a melodrama, as maybe by exaggerating real situations you manage to "low the seriousness" of the events and actually make fun of things that actually make you sad and painful. I think that this quote´s reference to the fact that sometimes you see yourself doing something reminds me of watching theatre because of the fact that you see people in situations you can be in. And, for me at least, its actually true. I can manage to see myself in the scene i´m living from an outer point of view, and I know that you can do it too my dear reader ;) 

I want to explore how an image tells something visually and in what point it stops being an image and starts being an idea from your imagination of subsconcience.

This idea makes me think on how everything is a sign, and how perception can change its meaning. Two people can look at the exact same thing but see thing totally different, which reminds me that your whole essence as a person and the whole "idea" of YOU is built up by experiences and outer influences that get into you. I had always have this idea that you basically are what you absorb from society , and that nobody is themselves but have little parts of everyone. 

now I'm thinking....

How do we know who we really are? why is my idea of me different to everyones idea of me? do imagination always need to be unreal? why can an image speak more that words? how about theatre with no words? does it works equally effective? can make-up change the whole rhythm composition of a whole play? will it have a positive effect on the audience in the OAP? How do I know I am having an interesting idea? will I really know it before having a reaction of the audience? Or success is based on society reactions upon it?