fandomhigh | Screen Acting, Thursday Afternoon

Daisy was back up at the front of the classroom, perched in front of the array of film equipment with a glass of water.

"Right, welcome back. I hope none of you had too many problems this weekend, and that you're all very happy to have your voices back. It occurred to me to turn the whole thing into an object lesson on silent film, but, well, that would require way too much work on my part." She stood and stepped forward a few steps. "Today we're going to focus on the acting part of screen acting. We're going to make sure you have a few basic skills that apply to both theater and film. The first thing we'll need to do is warm up our bodies and our voices. I would like each of you to state your name and apply some sort of sound and gesture to it. This can be absolutely anything you want. For example," Daisy set her glass down on the table and straightened her posture. "Daisy," she said, adding a dramatic sigh and a hand pressed to her forehead in a classic ‘vapors' pose. "Daisy Adiar. Go for it."

That accomplished, Daisy stepped up again. "Right. One more thing, and we'll get to the ‘meat' of the class. Let's play a quick improv game, get your brains working as well as your voice and body. This game is called ‘What are you doing?' It's simple. One person gets up, and mimes some activity." Daisy started pretending to read a book. "The next person asks, ‘what are you doing?' and the first person must say something that they are obviously not doing. I might say ‘I'm flying an airplane'. Then the second person must start miming that activity," she started pretending to fly a plane, "and a third person asks, ‘what are you doing?' and so on. The game ends when someone can't think of an activity to do within 5 seconds." Daisy stepped back again to let the students get to work.

When the game ended, she pulled out a stack of paper. "Okay, let's get to it. Last week, you made up your own scenes. We're going to do that again, only with a bit more structure. This is an A/B script. An A/B script is the most basic script you'll probably ever seen. There are two characters, character A and character B. There are lines. There is nothing else, including plot. You get to add the rest. Use only the words on the paper, but use your inflection, or how your voice sounds when you speak, and your body language to convey to all of us what is going on in the scene. Is two friends meeting up in the hallway to gossip about the latest break-up in the social world? Is it an alien abducting a dog? Use your imaginations, if you still have them, and give us something worth watching. I'll film everyone's efforts, and you can critique each other."

[ooc: OCD ~~a comin'!~~ is go!]

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as you do

State your name, do something weird/interesting. Gesture and noise, please.

Mime something, ask the question, mime something else. It's very simple really.

This one time? in college? I had to use this scene and act like I'd had a sex change. This other time? In high school? A friend of mine had to use this scene to act like he'd had a sex change. I spent an hour teaching him to be female.

For all your snark needs

blahblahblahdeathblahblahtaxes.

She won't be pressing you for ways you might die. No, really.

OOC, I am OOMed.

Kawalsky signed in.

Kawalsky cleared his throat. "Name's Kawalsky," he said and held his arms close to his sides, flapping only his arms. He sounded and looked rather like a guy pretending to be a commando penguin named Kawalsky.

Jamie signed in.

"Jamie Madrox," he said also clearing his voice.

Jamie then waddled around the room quacking like a duck.

Jamie goes through the routine of pulling items off a shelf and throwing them in to a grocery cart and pushing it along, occasionally reading a label on a "package".

Jamie doesn't wait for a partner to pick him. He pulls the collar of his overcoat up and begins acting like he's in film noir type of scene.

He mimes opening a door with a fake cigarette hanging out of his lips.

He then pours himself a shot of whiskey and tossing it back.

"Hello," he says in a gruff voice.

Alanna signed in.

Zero signed in.

"I'm Zero," Zero said, bouncing excitedly on the balls of her feet.

She eyed Jamie and Kawalsky and said, "Um. Or do we have to pretend to be water fowl?"

"You can do whatever you like best, Zero."

Tim signed in.

"I'm," tim bent at the knees till he couldn't get any lower without falling over. "Tim." he rose up onto his tip toes.

"What are you doing?"

Kawalsky tripped himself over in front of Jamie. "Hello," he grunted.

Jamie gives Kawalsky a long hard look. "What's going on?"

"Eating Ice Cream."

Kawalsky got up and dusted himself off. "Did you hear about last night?"

Jamie burst into tears and wailed.

"Yeah, I heard."

*sniffles and wibbling*

Kawalsky put a hand on Jamie's shoulder and looked at him hopefully. "So what do you think?"

Jamie pulled his shoulder away from Kawalksy violently and glared at him angrily. "Things sure will be a lot different around here!"

Kawalsky sighed melodramatically. "I guess so." He turned away in soap opera fashion.

Jamie looked suddenly filled with regret and wistfullness. "I should get going."

Kawalsky half-turned. "Okay," he said, eventually nodding. He looked tormented. Or constipated. It was hard to distinguish between the two. He raised a hand to wave. "Goodbye."

Suddenly Jamie is giving Kawalsky a bear hug. He clenches onto him for several uncomfortable moments before releasing him and walking away.

"Goodbye."

Tim began to mime eating ice cream.

Screen Acting, Thursday Afternoon

Sign In

Warm up!

What are you doing?

A/B scenes

Critique others' work

Talk to each other

Talk to Daisy

OOC

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