Glassdark Drama Project

Work through these activities. You can do this in your books, but might want to do it electronically instead, which is fine. You could create a portfolio if you wanted. For this project, we are imagining that there is a theatre company called Glassdark, working on making a piece of performance that they are going to tour around. We’re going to look at different things that might be done during the creating, rehearsing and staging of this. We recommend that you definitely do the first unit; after that, you can pick units that appeal to you in any order. Do make sure that you complete all the tasks in your chosen unit, and try to do it in as much detail as you can. Try to do as many units as you can too. Hopefully you’ll find it enjoyable and motivating.

Glassdark Theatre Company are well known for their dark and mysterious theatre productions. They are about to create a new piece of work. They’ve been inspired by the mystery of the disappearance of the lighthouse keepers on a remote Scottish island, called Flannan Isle.

UNIT 1 – COMPULSORY UNIT They’ve comissioned (hired) a Scriptwriter – YOU – and have asked for a story outline. The play will explore what might have happened – so you will need to create a believable explanation. Glassdark quite happiy change the genders of the characters from a story, so you can do this in your piece too. They also sometimes take out characters, or add new ones Your first task, as scriptwriter is to research as much information as possible about the story and history of the Flannan Isle mystery. Here’s some key information about it:

On the 26th December 1900, a small ship was making its way to the Flannan Islands in the remote Outer Hebrides. Its destination was the lighthouse at Eilean Mor, a remote island which (apart from its lighthouse keepers) was completely uninhabited.

Although uninhabited, the island has always sparked people’s interest. It is named after St. Flannen, a 6th century Irish Bishop who later became a saint. He built a chapel on the island and for centuries shepherds used to bring over sheep to the island to graze but would never stay the night, fearful of the spirits believed to haunt that remote spot.

As the ship reached the landing platform, Captain Harvey was surprised not to see anyone waiting for their arrival. He blew his horn and sent up a warning flare to attract attention.

There was no response.

Joseph Moore then rowed ashore and ascended up the steep set of stairs that led up to the lighthouse. According to reports from Moore himself, the replacement lighthouse keeper suffered an overwhelming sense of foreboding on his long walk up to the top of the cliff.

Once at the lighthouse, Moore noticed something was immediately wrong; the door to the lighthouse was unlocked and in the entrance hall two of the three oil skinned coats were missing. Moore continued onto the kitchen area where he found half eaten food and an overturned chair, almost as if someone had jumped from their seat in a hurry. To add to this peculiar scene, the kitchen clock had also stopped.

Moore continued to search the rest of the lighthouse but found no sign of the lighthouse keepers. He ran back to the ship to inform Captain Harvey, who subsequently ordered a search of the islands for the missing men. No-one was found.

Harvey quickly sent back a telegram to the mainland, which in turn was forwarded to the Northern Lighthouse Board Headquarters in Edinburgh. The telegraph read:

A dreadful accident has happened at Flannans. The three Keepers, Ducat, Marshall and the occasional have disappeared from the island. On our arrival there this afternoon no sign of life was to be seen on the Island.

Fired a rocket but, as no response was made, managed to land Moore, who went up to the Station but found no Keepers there. The clocks were stopped and other signs indicated that the accident must have

happened about a week ago. Poor fellows they must been blown over the cliffs or drowned trying to secure a crane or something like that.

Night coming on, we could not wait to make something as to their fate. I have left Moore, MacDonald, Buoymaster and two Seamen on the island to keep the light burning until you make other arrangements. Will not return to Oban until I hear from you. I have repeated this wire to Muirhead in case you are not at home. I will remain at the telegraph office tonight until it closes, if you wish to wire me.

A few days later, Robert Muirhead, the board’s supernatant who both recruited and knew all three men personally, departed for the island to investigate the disappearances.

His investigation of the lighthouse found nothing over and above what Moore had already reported. That is, except for the lighthouse’s log…

Muirhead immediately noticed that the last few days of entries were unusual. On the 12th December, Thomas Marshall, the second assistant, wrote of ‘severe winds the likes of which I have never seen before in twenty years’. He also noticed that James Ducat, the Principal Keeper, had been ‘very quiet’ and that the third assistant, William McArthur, had been crying.

What is strange about the final remark was that William McArthur was a seasoned mariner, and was known on the Scottish mainland as a tough brawler. Why would he be crying about a storm?

Log entries on the 13th December stated that the storm was still raging, and that all three men had been praying. But why would three experienced lighthouse keepers, safely situated on a brand new lighthouse that was 150 feet above sea level, be praying for a storm to stop? They should have been perfectly safe.

Even more peculiar is that there were no reported storms in the area on the 12th, 13th and 14th of December. In fact, the weather was calm, and the storms that were to batter the island didn’t hit until December 17th.

The final log entry was made on the 15th December. It simply read ‘Storm ended, sea calm. God is over all’. What was meant by ‘God is over all’?

After reading the logs, Muirhead’s attention turned to the remaining oil skinned coat that had been left in the entrance hall. Why, in the bitter cold winter, had one of the lighthouse keepers ventured out without his coat? Furthermore, why had all three

lighthouse staff left their posts at the same time, when rules and regulations strictly prohibited it?

Further clues were found down by the landing platform. Here Muirhead noticed ropes strewn all over the rocks, ropes which were usually held in a brown crate 70 feet above the platform on a supply crane. Perhaps the crate had been dislodged and knocked down, and the lighthouse keepers were attempting to retrieve them when an unexpected wave came and washed them out to sea? This was the first and most likely theory, and as such Muirhead included it in his official report to the Northern Lighthouse Board.

But this explanation left some people in the Northern Lighthouse Board unconvinced. For one, why had none of the bodies been washed ashore? Why had one of the men left the lighthouse without taking his coat, especially since this was December in the Outer Hebridies? Why had three experienced lighthouse keepers been taken unaware by a wave?

Although these were all good questions, the most pertinent and persistent question was around the weather conditions at the time; the seas should have been calm! They were sure of this as the lighthouse could be seen from the nearby Isle of Lewis, and any bad weather would have obscured it from view.

Over the following decades, subsequent lighthouse keepers at Eilean Mor have reported strange voices in the wind, calling out the names of the three dead men. Theories about their disappearance have ranged from foreign invaders capturing the men, all the way through to alien abductions! Whatever the reason for their disappearance, something (or someone) snatched those three men from the rock of Eilean Mor on that winter’s day over 100 years ago.

Make notes or a moodboard with all your research on it. Try to build as much information as you can about:

• What happened? • When did it happen? • Who was involved? • What were they like? • What’s the history of the lighthouse? • What theories are there? • Are there any poems, books, films about it?

Your second task: When you’ve got this, try to come up with some possible solutions to the mystery and changes to the facts that would make a gripping story for an audience. You have a meeting with the director, and need to present your findings – Your third task: Create a mindmap or chart or presentation that will help you to clarify your ideas and story outline to the director. This will need to show your ideas and changes.

UNIT 2 – COSTUME DESIGN do this next, or find another that appeals to you. You are a costume designer, working with Glassdark. You must come up with some costume designs for the characters. Task 1 Research – first, you’ll need to find images of the kind of people that your characters are, and also need to be aware of the TIME PERIOD of the story.

So, you’re probably going to be looking for fishermen, lighthouse keepers etc from the correct time period, but if you’re adding new characters you’ll need to check them out too.

You should find a number of these images, and cut out or draw them into an ideas board. Think about accessories (binoculars, for example), footwear and headwear. Task 2 Once you have a nice ideas board, you can create a design for one or two characters. You should draw this as well as you can on a decent size piece of paper, and use colour. You need to label each item of the costume, and also provice a reason why you made that choice You need to think about the colours of the clothes, the sort of style and material, the condition, the time period and accessories. All these need to be appropriate for the character. Here’s a nice example without reasons. Don’t worry about your artistic ability.

Unit 3 – SET DESIGN do this next, or find another that appeals to you.

The action of the play will take place inside the lighthouse, and also outside. You are working as a set designer, and are to come up with a design for either of these locations (or both, if you’re feeling really motivated) Once again this will require you to think about what the inside of lighthouses is like but before you do that, you need to decide what type of staging you are working with. This is all about where the audience are positioned. You can choose one from : Thrust stage In the round End on Different types of staging affect what is on the set. For example, if you’re using in the round, a massive wardrobe in the middle would make it implossible for a lot of the audience to see what’s going on, because their sightlines would be interrupted. A set design doesn’t have to try to recreate real life – you don’t actually need a lighthouse. Think about using levels and different heights; think about using projection; think about hanging things from above – window frames to suggest walls, doorframes to suggest doors

etc. Think about the stage surface – what will it look like? Think about furniture and where it will be. Task 1 Ideas. Your aim is to create sketches and ideas on a mood board. Think about the shape of the rooms, spiral staircases, lots of glass to represent the light at the top, old furniture, using different heights and levels to suggest the a part of the island or levels in the lighthouse. Task 2 Create a few sketches (plan view (this means, looking down), audience view) Task 3 Create a detailed plan view with a key (number the things on the set, and then create a list that explains what each number is) If your are feeling really keen, you could try this to scale. Use graph paper, or make a grid. You could use a scale of 1:50 (1 cm on your plan is 50 cm in real life) or 1:100. This can get a bit mind boggling, because you’ll need to work out how big people are in your scale, and how big furniture and rooms are. Task 4 (optional) Make a model box of your set design and photograph it A model box is simply a detailed model of the set, made to scale. If you are going to do one, decide on your scale and cut out a person at the right height for your scale. This will help you get a sense of the size of things. Use cereal boxes and other bits and pieces to make your modelbox, or even use lego. Designers make these to allow other people to really see the set, and you can also play round the model box with a torch, to experiment with lighting angles and colours and see where all the shadows fall. Here are two examples, a professional one and another, still effective one.

Some interesting set design ideas, not of lighthouses, but all of the sets might work well on a Flannan Isle story. Notice how they are not all realistic.:

Unit 4

SCRIPTWRITING - do this next, or find another that appeals to you.

As the scriptwriter, you are working on a key moment from your story. Write a script for a section of your storyline. You can just drop in to any point in your story. Make sure that you write a quick introduction that sets up the scene. Then write your section of script. Set it out like the example below. Aim for somewhere between 2 and 4 sides. You can do more if you find yourself getting into it. Use stage directions to control voice, movement and emotion. Put them in brackets if you are hand writing, or in brackets AND italics if you are typing. Here’s an example Notice how the stage directions clearly inform the performers about voice, movement and emotion: Davey and Rebecca, his sister are in the lamp room at the top of the lighthouse. She can’t return to the mainland due to the rough seas. Davey, the old lighthouse keeper has been acting oddly, and is staring out to sea, as if he is waiting for something. Scene 13

Inside the lamp room in the lighthouse. DAVEY: Storm’s coming. REBECCA: It’s so windy. (Nervously) Are you sure we’re safe

up here? PETERSON: This has been here since 1834 when the… REBECCA: (Abruptl)y Yes, thank you Peterson. (She moves

closer to DAVEY) PETERSON: (Quietly, but angrily) Noone listens to me… DAVEY: Oh, stop it. (He is getting agitated) Just stop it! PETERSON: (Quietly to himself, without looking up) Shame you

don’t know what’s going to be here soon.

UNIT 5 SOUND DESIGN do this next, or find another that appeals to you.

You are a sound designer for Glassdark. Task 1 You need to decide on 3 recorded sound effects that you think you might use in the production, and also two pieces of music that will be used to create atmosphere. Decide on which moments of your story you might be creating sound for and make a list of the 3 recorded sound effects you’d ideally like to use. Make sure you explain your choices – why are those sounds suitable for the play – what is it about them that is effective or important? Then, try to come up with two music tracks that you think fit the mood and atmosphere really well. Listen to them and try to imagine your story to them. Make a note of your track choices and explain your reasons. Task 2 Look at the short piece of script in UNIT 4. You need to put in one recorded sound effect and one piece of music. Make notes on the following:

• Decide what you will be using. • Decide where the sound/music will come in (this is called a CUE) • Decide how loud. Does the volume change? • Does it fade in? fast or slowly? • What is the exit cue in the script • How does the sound stop – sudden or fade.

Explain your choices

UNIT 6 LIGHTING DESIGN do this next, or find another that appeals to you.

You are a lighting designer, for Glassdark. You are planning some lighting for a scene in the play. In the scene, a character is alone in the cellar of the lighthouse. There’s an open door that they’ve come through, and a tiny window near the ceiling. You need to come up with some ideas that help:

• communicate the atmosphere • allow the audience to see the scene clearly • create a feeling of the location • make the character appear a bit sinister or evil.

Task 1 EXPERIMENT! To get started, you’ll need a torch (or the torch on your phone) , a mirror and a dark room. This experiment will allow you to get some ideas for lighting your actor and making them look sinister.

1. Stand in front of the mirror with your torch on and the lights off.

2. Hold the torch at arm’s length, with the beam pointing towards you. On a phone, make sure it’s not on maximum, and DON’T STARE INTO THE BEAM for phone or torch.

3. Experiment moving the torch around your head and face – above, left, right, below etc , and see where the shadows fall, and how the creepiness of your face changes. You can also try with the light behind your head

Make some notes or if you can, photograph the different effects you’re getting, and keep them. TASK 2 When we plan lighting we need to think about a number of things:

• Colour • Intensity (how bright) • Angle (where the light shines from – think back to your shadow experiment) •

And lighting can:

• communicate the atmosphere • allow the audience to see the scene clearly • create a feeling of the location • highlight an object or character

Have a look at these images, and decide which of those 4 things the lighting is doing well

Task 3 Create your scene idea (You are planning some lighting for a scene in the play. In the scene, a character is alone in the cellar of the lighthouse. There’s an open door that they’ve come through, and a tiny window near the ceiling) Either explain in writing, or Draw a picture of your scene using colour and labels to try to clearly show what’s going on with your lighting idea. Tip For example if you were writing about the last picture above, you might say: “The scene is lit brightly using whites and greens. The green wash on the ceiling and back wall make it look like it’s outdoors with trees. The brightness of the white wash on the children and the floor makes it feel like it’s outside. The children on the swings have lights shining on them from above. These are bright, white, and make the children stand out clearly to the audience. There is also a blotchy pattern on the floor that looks like sunlight shining through leaves.” (A wash of light is when the whole stage or a large area is covered with light)