Medea - The Tuesday Meeting
Initial Ideas
– Using a painting of a mother and child as a backdrop to the action. Have the painting on a large canvas hanging from the catwalk on the back wall. As the performance progresses someone slowly paints out the child with white paint, removing them from the action. Rachel painting and in charge of organising fellow painters.
– Child sound effects at the beginning, we need a tape of children playing and laughing and then have this descend into them screaming, as they realise that their mother is going to kill them. This soundtrack accompanies….
– Two people running on the catwalk at the start. It has to be clear that at first they are running as though they are playing and then start running from their mother, Kali and Frankie doing this.
– Pictures that symbolise oppression, revenge and helplessness. These are three of the key words we thought summed up Medea from our pre-practical meeting on Thursday. These pictures or newspaper cuttings etc. would appear on the canvas as scenes are performed in relation to the words. So small images appearing on the canvas as the child is painted out?
– The death of the children is shown at the beginning and end of the play, in the hope that the audience have changed their minds about the neccessity of it between the first showing and the last.
– Singing and chanting to create soundscape and to communicate the lines of the chorus, as in the production of Hecuba that was shown in the Arts Centre.
– Jack's Dada poem should be included, possibly set to music or read on the microphone (eg. like we did with Yarker).
– Interviewing people "on the street", telling them about the play and getting their opinions on Medea. Then using what they say in the performance.
– From the exercise we did with Annisa use the ritualistic ideas surrounding murder and burial to symbolise the death of the children.
– Key words to do with Medea: HELPLESS, WRONGED, OPPRESSED, AVENGED, HONOUR, DESERTION. Use these words as a basis for scenes in the middle of the performance to show why she was justified in the killing of her children.
– Use recent media cases of child killings, photos, newspaper cuttings and headlines. Contemporary cases with similar issues.
– Having cloth walls to divide the space and create a square auditorium.