Guest Artist:

Michele Sereda 

Actor/Director/Writer

 

Michele Sereda is the artistic director and co-founder of Curtain Razors. Ms. Sereda graduated from the University of Regina Theatre Department with a degree in Performance. Her theatre experience includes performance at all Saskatchewan's mainstage arenas: Globe Theatre, 25th Street Theatre, Persephone, Saskatchewan Playwrights Festival, and venues in western Canada and most recently at The Theatre Centre in Toronto. She has numerous film, television, and radio credits, and has participated in interdisciplinary work and/or study with New Dance Horizons, One Yellow Rabbit, MacKenzie Art Gallery, Neutral Ground, the Dunlop Art Gallery, the Western Front Society and Experimental Dance and Music in Vancouver. She regularyly conducts theatrical workshops for schools, organizations, and universities.

 

 

 

Check out these websites about Michele:

 

Artsmarts Project with students

 

Knowwhere Productions

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Lawrence School

Teacher: Charlene Parkinson

Grade 8

 

Workshop Ideas:  Good morning, I just thought I would take a moment to connect with the project as I have just finished a run of a solo work in progress called Navigating that looks at romantic notions of identity, deep ancestry, and memory.  So Charlene and et al, in the next couple of weeks I will be thinking about the spirit of story and see what we can do. But I have a couple of questions - how many students are in your class?  Have they created their own work before?  And if so, how?  And Charlene what would you like to learn about?  hope you are keeping well, and I am so glad to be part of this project,   Michele

 

 

Hi! I am very excited to have you working with these students!  They are a very creative bunch and many of them have a passion for drama.  There are 20 students in Grade 8.  Most of them have been a part of the "Drama Club" for the last 4 years as well as I have them for one 45 minute drama class a week.  They have had some experience creating short skits, doing improv work, miming, creating characters, as well as performing in various plays.  I am interested in learning more about having the students create their own plays as well as helping the students to improve their acting skills so that they are very believeable characters.

 

 

I am looking forward to having you here!

Charlene

 

Charlene, hi a couple of days ago I sent some proposed ideas as to what we could do, but I didn't post them on this sight, I just replied directly to your email.  When you have a moment let me know if you received it and then I can start working on the prep for it.  Hope you are having a great day, Michele.

 

Oct 11

Hi Michele and Charlene:

I see by your above post that the outline is still in email form.

I'm looking forward to reading about your plans when you get a chance to copy them over Charlene.

In the mean time I have a suggestion - how about posting a picture of your class for Michele and what if Michele uploaded a photo of herself or a production still for the students to see? Might be a nice way to get introduced before the day.

Can't wait to read more,

Sherron

 

Oct 15 - Sherron is starting a schedule - please change/revise as you wish

Schedule

 

• 9:45am - 10:00am Teachers arrive, meet the artist and one another, introduce the day, expectations

 

• 10:00am - noon (when does the bell go Charlene? And what about recess - can they just be given a break when Michele is ready?)

 

• lunch - plan to bring a bag lunch so we can talk about the workshop, share resources, other ideas

 

• 1:00pm - 2:30pm workshop continues

 

• 2:30pm - 3:00pm - Teacher time to debrief with Michele, reflect, discuss what to "show & share" for the next day

 

 Hi Charlene and Sherron,

 

I've looked at the proposed schedule and that looks fine that we would work for two hours in the morning and then one and a half hours in the afternoon.  If the students are interested in who I am and what I have done Sask Learning Created a website on me - it was doneby Joyce Sotski - four artists from the province were included one from dance (Robin Poitras), one from music (Dave Lawlor), one from visual art - (Neil Mcleod), and me for theatre.  Google my name with Saskatchewan Education and this site will come up and it has various projects that I have done professionally, also projects with youth (the Broadview Truth or Dare project is in there)  It's written in a conversational style, and it has images of my work.  This would be a good introduction to the class and for you Charlene, to know who I am. 

 

When I get back to Regina on Friday (am in Calgary right now) I will be able to give you a specific website address.

 

Charlene, the more I look at your description of your class, the more I think the character exercise of making a character from a photo, or sourcing a photo to make character is something they would really enjoy.  We could easily do that in two hours and have them make their own monologue. 

 

Then in the afternoon what we could do is start having the two characters come together and having them interplay or intercut their monologues together to make a scene.  That would give them a good insight into making their own work that comes from them and defines who they are.  Much of my work is about saying and speaking truthfully as to who you are and what you have to say which in turn defines your style and signature.

 

Also what usually happens with this exercise is once we starting putting the characters together to start making a scene a natural story starts to evolve, and through this the individual starts to make connections and the group as to how to piece it together, and then they start to take ownership of the process and the creation.  I have found that individuals who may be a little leary at first, when they start to see the connections become excited by the work. 

 

So what I could do from this end is find the series of photos to work from, bring the journals that the photo's would be pasted in to develop the character monologues.  The information I will be asking them to first write and create from to make character while looking at the photo would be (all in 20 words or less):  The person in the photo - what is their education, what kind of family to do they come from, what kind of relationships do they have, what is their main desire, what is their belief (not religious but main belief), what era do they live in, what is their occupation, and the last thing they do is name their character.  From that information I ask them to then select education, relationship, belief, and desire, and in first person write a short 70 word dialogue telling us who they are.  Then after that I ask them to then write a monolgue that tells a story about that person that would include some of this information.  It may shift, it may stay, I leave that freedom for them.  That would probably take about 1.5 hours.  The last half hour could be used for discussion and closing the session with a listening and reacting exercise. 

 

The afternoon would entail finding the character's center - where are they centered in the body, what makes them move the way they move, and also finding out psychologically where they are centered basically how does the character make decisions - through reason, through emotion, through drive.  Once we have figured that out we will move to gait - and seeing what kind of walk (gait) does the character have, what is the character's rhythm, quality of walk hard, soft, even, smooth, etc, and then find a sculptural pose for the character.  From this point I will then pair them up with each character sharing their story with each other, and then figuring out how they can intercut their stories to become a conversation.  That will be a full day, and will hit lots of points for you to work with later, I hope!

 

How does that sound Charlene?  I would love to hear your thoughts.

 

much warmth,  Michele  - ps will try to call you on Friday to discuss this plan.  What time would be good to call?

 

 

Hi Charlene, its me again, had a moment to find the site for SaskLearning - so you are looking for Saskatchewan Artists Ignite.

 

Michele

 

Hi Michele!

Thank you for your phone call this morning.  I apologize for not responding to you sooner.  Education week was very busy!  Just a note that our lunch is from 11:45 - 12:45 but it is not a problem to have lunch from 12:00 - 1:00 if that works better for you!  Is there anything that you would like me to do with the students prior to the workshop to have them better prepared?  Are there any other things that you will need access to? (Computer, Projector...etc.?

Thanks for everything!

Charlene

 

Hi Charlene, your welcome, and its nice to hear a voice!  A couple of thoughts - we can go from 11:45 - 12:45 that's no problem.  Just remind me when I get there, and also see how your students feel about going an extra 15 minutes and breaking from 12:00 - 1:00, either way works for me.

 

I've sent the link Sask. Artists Ignite - as a way to prepare them.  Go to this site, click on my link and that shows the kind of work that I do.  If you wanted to look at other theatre artists who work in this way (who are my sources of inspiration and by no means would I say that I am doing what they are doing but it gives you another insight as to how I am and how I work).   I would suggest that you and class do some visual research on Robert LePage, Ronnie Burkett, and then start looking at the dance work of Margie Gillis, visual art work from the Dada period, and Futurism.  These are heady, but what this will do is start to propel them into a world of non-traditonal art/theatre making.

 

We will need access to a computer, pens or pencils, a projector - not that I can see, a large empty space so we can move, a CD player, and chairs for everyone.  Do you also have some balls that are about 8 inches in diameter, and some blindfolds?  (The blindfolds we may not get to, but it's just a backup.)  Also a flip chart with  markers, for the mapping of the story.  

 

Will you be capturing some of this on camera so we can show and tell to the group?

 

see you soon, Michele 

 

Oct 24: Hi Michele & Charlene,

Carol Weibe (one of our Teacher Leaders) will be attending as well and will be taking photos to help document the day. You can also let her know if there are specific shots to help describe the activities. Carol will upload the photos to the wiki that day too, so they can be shared the next day. Carol however cannot attend on the 31st, but she'll be sure to get the photos on for you.

Charlene - do you need help gathering anything? Let me know if I can help.

Sherron

 

Oct.26:  Hi Michele & Charlene,

    My name is Carol Wiebe.  I'm one of the teacher leaders and I'm looking forward to Tuesday.   I will be taking a few photos to enter onto the wiki site.  I'll be there by 9:30.  See you then.

Carol

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