Brainstorming ideas

Group Member:

l   Yimeng (Nancy) Lu

l   Yuexuan (Chantelle) Gao

l   Junliang (Johnny) Liu

Characters:

l   Jonny-the boy in Children of the Sea (18years old)

l   Nancy- Caroline (25 years old)

l   Chantelle- Caroline’s mom (50 years old)+ the girl in Children of the Sea (17years old)

Setting:

Reality: New York City,1992 (the day before Caroline’s wedding)

Dream: Haiti, 1959 (the day when the boy leave Haiti)

Three scenes:

l   Scene one: Caroline is packing her stuff to prepare for the wedding. Due to the coming wedding, she is kind of nervous. However, the mother is always saying something about the wedding that she is not satisfied with and what her expectation is for the wedding. This angers Caroline, and she argues with her mom for the first time. The mother and the daughter have an intense conflict, arguing about their cultural differences and their perspectives. Caroline is checking if there is anything that has not been packed, so she goes to her mom room since there are some of her stuffs. She opens her mom’s wardrobe and find out a stack of letters that her mom wrote to her first lover in Haiti.

l   Scene two: She opens the letters and starts to read. In Caroline’s mom dream, she recalled the days back to her seventeen year-old age. It was the day when the boy is leaving Haiti by boat.

l   Scene three: The next morning, Caroline and the mother understand each other.

Staging:

Props:

l   Scene One: takes place in living room--- sofa, wardrobe, a coffee table, and a table lamp.

l   Scene Two: takes place in bedroom--- a bed, wardrobe, a coffee table, and a table lamp.

l   Scene Three: takes place in Living room--- sofa, wardrobe, a small mirror, a coffee table, and a table lamp.

Dress:

l   Scene One: Caroline wears a long sleeve shirt and a sweat pants. Caroline’s mom wears a nightgown. 

l   Scene Two: The girl (Caroline’s mom) wears a ripped jeans and a long sleeve shirt. The boy wears jeans, and a hoody. 

l  Scene Three: Caroline wears a long white dress (wedding dress). Caroline’s mom wears a women’s formal wear.

The theme of this play is to show conflict between parents and children. Especially in the book Caroline and her mom grow up in different culture and got different level of education which makes their gap and conflict fiercer.

My vision is through Nancy, Johnny, and my acting to show that every individual’s fate is similar. Currently many parents always rest their own dream upon their children and hope their children obey all rules they set. But some time they forget that everyone is an individual person. The pressure they give to their kids may be given to their grandchildren one day. To end this vicious cycle, one of the parent or the children has to compromise. In my play, Caroline’s mom recalls her old days when her father separated her and her lover, then force her to merry another man. She realize she is now being the same kind of person as her father used to be. So Caroline’s mom who sacrifice and gives her daughter freedom. I expect this play can not only show conflict between immigrant parent and child, but also the cycle of fate. 

top 5 choice plus brief reasoning

Top 5 choice plus brief reasoning

1.      Mine: Because I think mine is interesting and creative. It contains appropriate number of characters and the problem of one character doesn’t have much lines won’t happens. Since I made this play, I can manage and understand it better.

2.      Jonny: Interesting topic. Immigrant topic is popular. This play is thoughtful whether the boy from Children of the Sea will choose love or reputation. (Just like love or bread)

3.      Betty: Really creative topic. Each character shares equal amount of lines. I like topics about parents’ love.

4.      Kathleen: The time slice is interesting. It leaves audiences questions whether Guy jumps out of balloon or not. This play leaves actors enough space to act Guy and his family’s inner activities.

5.      Abby: A really special view of point. No one would ever consider such a small character like neighbor, but Abby does.

Review of Endgame

Review of Endgame

Endgame is play that both mysterious and worth pondering. There are several meanings for Endgame. In English, it has the meaning of the end, the last game or the game that can’t be solve in chess. In French, it means the end of life. All of these meanings give me an ominous feeling.

The literal meaning of the title gives me a feeling of the destination of lives, or the final-straw. This is also what I imagined when Ms. Guarino first explains the meaning of this title. Compare with the last play we watched, which is Warriors Don’t Cry, this play is more amorphous: Its setting is not based on real story, and the message it gives us is not clear. Also, the four characters and the dependent relationship between Hamm and Clov, which they rely on each other but they also torture each other, are all not really possible to be in real life. After I finish watching this play, there are many questions that I can’t understand. If I need to use one word to describe this play, then it is mysterious.

As the title shows us, this kind of life will never end. Everyday of people who live in this house are the same. Their day starts by Clov opening the curtains, waking the whole family up, and saying: “I will leave you!” to Hamm again and again, but he never really did it. An interesting point in this play is that each character has their own endgame. For Hamm’s parents, Negg and Nell, everything happens on yesterday. The endgame for them means a cycle that has no start and no ending. They were trapped in trash bin; they can’t see the light; they also can’t kiss each other. Their body was separated, just like the endgame for chess, there is nothing else they can do. Negg and Nell’s love are also like endgame, which it seems their love ends when Nell died, but it actually continues in their heart. “Kiss me.” “We can’t” “Try!” For Nell and Negg, there will never be an ending for their simple but pure love. For Hamm and Clov, their relationship is much more complicated. Although Hamm is not Clov’s real father, he still gives him a place to live. For their dependent relationship, the endgame means it can’t be solved. But for Hamm after Clov left him, the endgame means the end of life. Clov said many times that he will leave Hamm who tortures and orders him, but he never really takes that step. Every time he hears Hamm blows the whistle, he could have pretend he didn’t hear it, but he still walks to Hamm with his painful leg. When Hamm gets angry throwing things away, Clov manage for hi. When Hamm wants to touch his dog, Clov puts the toy on his side. This kind of relationship reminds me of what children do when their parents call them. Even though the kids don’t want to listen to their parent, they still listen after all. If there is really a boy outside, then maybe the relationship between Hamm and Clov will be recur on that little boy. Just like what Hamm said: “One day, you will be me.”

Proposal for Transformation Scenes

Proposal for Transformation Scenes

After reading the book Krik? Krak!, I find there are many relationship between each story. After acting the character of rebellious Caroline, I find out

Similarities between the girl in Children of the Sea and the mom in Caroline’s Wedding.

l   Story: Caroline’s Wedding+ Children of the Sea (+A wall of Fire Rising)

l   The day starts when Caroline announces she agrees with Eric’s propose to Grace and their Mom. Caroline’s mom strictly disagree with Caroline marries with another country’s man. Especially this man is not as well educated as Caroline and probably earns a lower salary. Caroline’s attitude is extremely tough. Her mom wants Caroline to be happy but she also doesn’t want Caroline forget that’s he is a Hatian. In her mom’s dream, she starts to remember her ex-lover, the guy who she used to fall in love with. He was also a rebellious kid just like Caroline when she meets him. She couldn’t extricate her self from loving him. Although he passed the university exam, he is poor and works in an antigovernment radio station, so her father separated them and took the whole family escape to Vale Rose. After all, they still need to face reality. He left her and went on a boat to Miami. After Caroline’s mom wakes up from her dream, she realize how precious love bravely is. She doesn’t want be as cruel as her father who tears her heart. At the end, she agrees with her daughters wedding and shed happy tears during Caroline’s wedding.

l   Setting:

l   Reality : 1992. Takes places in New York City. Caroline is 25 Years old, her mom is 50 years old.

l   Dream: 1959(the year when Tonton Macoutes was created.) Happened in Haiti. Caroline was 17 years old. The boy was 18 years old.

l   Character:

l   Caroline:25 years old. Born in America, grow up in American culture. She meats her husband in Jackie Robinson Intermediate School where she teaches Haitian kids speak English. Her husband is a janitor.

l   Caroline’s mom (young+ old): gave birth to Caroline when she was 25. She had two relationships with men in her life. One is with her ex-lover, the boy who went to Miami, the other is with her passed husband. She meets the boy when she was 17. Then her whole family went to Vale Rose to take refuge. At there, her father marries her with a man who has a little money.

l   The boy in Children of the sea: died at the age of 18 on a boat smuggle to Miami. He is a really rebellious young man, but he has desire to be a better person who can give the girl he love a better future. (This boy is little guy. His mom is Lili who is a prostitute. His father jumped out of hot balloon when he was young. ) In order to take refuge, he went on a boat to Miami.

l   Reason why I make this: Haiti’s culture is really deep in every Haitian’s heart. Caroline’s mom, as a really Haitian women，naturally thin that women are inferior to man. However, we all have experienced relationship and know the feeling of breaking up with the person who you really love. Just like the girl in Children of the Sea who writes her love in letters. In order to have a turning point for Caroline’s mom to comprehend her daughter’s desire of love, I add her relationship with the boy as her secret that she never told anyone. In this way, the play can be more touching and reasonable.