When looking at the physical approaches to characterisation ,in terms of drama and acting, 'The 7 States of Tension' and 'The Laban System of Efforts' are two very commonly used techniques, well know, techniques.
Firstly looking at 'The States of Tension', this physical approach helps actors to relate to their characters as well as making them more lifelike, and therefore easier to relate to for the audience.
In practice, the first thing we did with these acting states was play a game of 'zip zap boing' using these states of tension. We were told to use different energy levels and different amounts of tension at different times. We, as a group, quickly realized not only how different these level controllers made our performances, but also how difficult they were to maintain. The amount of effort we had to put in to get the balances right for each 'state' was difficult, but did become easier as we went up and down the scale.
The next thing we did was take on the role of different 'characters', the stereotypes of different groups of people, later relating them to the 7 states of tension. These are the characters we were given, and the general persona that came with each:
1. Dead: hardly enough energy to hold yourself upright.
2. Californian: laid-back, relaxed, easy, on the back foot, chest leads before head. Cool. Swagger.
3. Stage manager. Neutral, no attitude to anything emotional sponge. Moving by changing direction using the whole body to turn.
4. Director. As above but with an attitude. Interested, engaged, questing, searching. Front-foot, head lead. An idea has just occurred.
5. Suspension: Optimist, Looking for a bomb. Faster than ‘alert’ as if searching for something. On the front-foot, head lead, excited, eager.
6. Passion: Pessimist, Lots of tension can be heavy or light. Much more tension, fear, passion, desperation. There is a bomb!
7. High-catatonic: Rigor mortis! The bomb has exploded. You pay out so much, you can’t move! Total shock of tension through the body – you are immobilised.
During this activity, we were told to walk around the room, starting at 'a 3', neutral, and then changing into the different characters, the different states of tension, when they were called out. This helped us to really think about the characteristics each state of tension involved, therefore giving us a ground for placing all characters (including those in Gotcha) to a state of tension within the list of 7.
After carrying out this exercise, based on 'The 7 States of Tension' in general, and learning/ understanding a bit more about them, we moved onto relating this information to the characters in Barrie Keeffee's play 'Gotcha.'
Here we worked in groups, on a specific scene in 'Gotcha', and assigned ourselves character within it. I chose to take on the role of Lynne. We then discussed and decided (within our small groups) the state of tension each of our characters would have at different points of the given scene.
Thinking back to what we'd learnt about the states of tension, I decided that my character, Lynne's would remain at a state of tension level 2, The Californian, for the duration of the scene as she wasn't involved in the events too much at this point and also wanted to persuade the kid that everything was alright. At the very end of the scene, when someone's life was at risk, I decided Lynne's state of tension would shoot right up to a 5/6. I felt that this was a good way to both put across Lynne's caring nature as well as helping to show that these people are human, and having her react in this way reassures the audience of the realistic qualities of the play.
In order to achieve this I had to quickly go from being laid- back and relaxed to eager and tense very quickly. I had to change my body language, from slouching to up-straight (alert) and my facial expression, from dozy to shocked and afraid. I also had to change my voice, I had to change my tonne (from understanding to accusing), my pace (from fairly slow to very fast) and my range (from level to high pitched.) This was all in order to achieve, what I felt were, the correct states of tension for my character (Lynne) and the scene (the Head threatening scene) in the play ('Gotcha'.)
Moving on, the second physical approach to characterisation we looked at was The Laban System of Efforts.' These are used within acting to achieve the following:
- Used in vocal work to connect voice and body
- ™ Finding pitch and range
- ™ Getting grounded and rooted in voice
- ™ Character gestures and physicalities
In practice, we started off by doing a warm-up exercise involving a range of different movements to a 'dance song.' We were told to do things like press, punch, dab, flick, slash, wring, float and glide, doing different actions to go with them. This warm up was used to get us use to the idea of different movements having different qualities, sort of like different 'rules' when being performed. We did this exercise for a while and then moved on to a group task, where we split in half into two groups.
In the group task, we were given different 'people to be like', usually these 'types of people' juxtaposed each other a lot , e.g. business men and stoned hippies, ballet dancers and heavy weight champions. Here, without realizing it yet, we were looking at how the way different people move can be so different to others. We later looked back and remember how the ballet dancers would use more of a flick of a movement (these being quick, light, indirect and free movements where as the heavy weight champions would use more of a press in terms of the way they moved (these being sustained, heavy, direct and bound movements.)
When looking more into the technical side of these techniques, we found out that....
Each category (in terms of movement) had two possible options:
Time: Quick/Sustained
Weight: Heavy/Light
Space: Direct/Indirect
Flow: Bound/Free
Then, putting this all together, we found out that the movements each had their own effort qualities, making them what they are:
Press: Sustained Heavy Direct Bound
Punch: Quick Heavy Direct Bound
Dab: Quick Light Direct Free
Flick: Quick Light Indirect Free
Slash: Quick Heavy Indirect Free
Wring: Sustained Heavy Indirect Bound
Float: Sustained Light Indirect Free
Glide: Sustained Light Direct Free
With all this information fresh in our minds, we were set the task of (in small groups) to create a scene, from the play 'Gotcha' that happened before the play is set. Within this we incorporated both 'The 7 States of Tension' and 'The Laban System of Efforts' in order to create the best piece possible.
In my group, we decided to create a scene with Ton's and his children a week or so before the play takes place. We decided to show that he was the same at home, as at 'school' (angry, jumpy and bordering on psychotic at times.) In order to do this we had the head being at a State of Tension level 2 when talking to his younger daughter, his 'little angel' as we had him call her, but be on a level 6 when yelling at his older daughter. As well as using dab- like movements when talking to his youngest but punch- like movements when yelling at his oldest.
Within this scene, I played the youngest child and so was at a level 2, state of tension, for the entire scene as I was aiming to achieve the idea of immaturity and naivety that a young child would have. I also, referring to the childish characterisitics my character had, used 'float-like' and 'glide-like' movements, again thinking about the idea of the character being care- free and oblivious to what's going on (relating directly to 'the affair' between Ton and Lynne is 'Gotcha.)
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