Acting, shadow theatre and Paucartambo

Description: As the real performance day of the play is coming soon, we’ve been working a lot in our scenes. We kind of finished our shadow scene even though there is a lot to improve as always. I have also been working in scene 10, in which I am Mathilda. We have also introduced our new theatre tradition topic: “Paucartambo”, as we are going there on July. We’ve been looking at the different characters and we’ve been discussing a lot about some of the basic concepts.

Analysis: This week we spent a whole day doing just the shadow scene; we were organizing the entire scene and changing some bits so that it makes sense. I’ve been working more on the shapes that I do with my hands and I’ve try to explore a little bit more to see if it makes the character: Deborah, more interesting. Finishing this scene was very difficult and I highly doubt that it is ready, so we will have to find our own time to make it better, starting of course with me learning my lines, because I just keep forgetting them, and of course I do!, as I was not THAT focus!. I have also been working in my character in scene 10, which is Mathilda. I’ve been told to “enjoy” my character and I’ve been trying different ways of saying my lines. But this character needs more development, and we cannot loose time doing this during rehearsals so I will have to find a way of doing it on my own, and as this is one of my favourite scenes I am sure I will improve.  

Finally this week we’ve been looking at “Paucartambo”, starting of course with some basic concepts: the form, culture, ritual, and author. Starting with the form of theatre we finally come into a conclusion that the form of theatre is: action BUT if we understand ‘action’ in a more broad way.  Culture, has to do with life and it is the connection between people to show who we are and how do we do things, no how we want to do things or how we want people to think but how we actually do it. (this definition I didn’t have it clear up to this lesson). A ritual is just a representation of a myth and has a symbolic meaning. This involves the participation of people and MUST create a change. Finally the author, which is the authority, the one who decides, and the one who knows more, “the owner”.  This has been the definition we came up to this week. Apart from this we’ve been looking at the different characters in Paucartambo which are: “Maqt’a”, “Qhapac Qolla”, Qhapac Ch’uncho” and“Saqra”, and one thing they have in common is that they are really ironic, for example the Maqt’a are the ones who create order but they actually create the disorder. Or the Qhapac Ch’uncho that are from the jungle and people from the jungle tend to be happy but they have very sad masks.

Connections: Regarding shadow theatre  I have been searching more about the Chinese shadow theatre as I really liked this kind of theatre, and apart from the shadows done with the body; they also have their “shadow puppet one” which is as interest as the other one. An example of this is in the video above.  Also as I really need to explore more my character in scene 10: Mathilda, I’ve been thinking in body characterisation which I will probably do during the week. I have also between searching for videos and i found a very connective one with our play that i can maybe use as a guide, which is the previous link (because for some reason i couldnt put the video) . http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lMpigAUQt_4&feature=related. .
Also Paucartambo remind me of Mexican theatre as that is also a traditional theatre which doesn’t have a play, but has a festival, in Mexico: Day of the deaths and in here Paucartambo. I just hope it is not as difficult to research as Mexican tradition.

Reflexion: Regarding Paucartambo, lots of question appeared during the discussion in class. All of them regarding the author, because we do know the author of a play or the author of a book, but who wrote the tradition?, the festival?, who is the owner  of this?. Because this was created by different people so who is the author?, the people that lives there? Maybe Peruvian people?. And anyways, does it have to have a author?, does it have to belong to someone? And if it does have to belong to someone why? Because of credits?