TP5008 - Performer Training: Practitioner Perspectives

Framed by seminar discussions where appropriate, sessions will follow a workshop model with performance exercises and sharing of work in progress as an integral part. Each week you will be offered tuition on specific methods and techniques for developing character, presence and connection onstage with your fellow actors and with the audience. You will engage in show-back sessions where you will give and receive constructive formative feedback in participation with tutors.

As well as specific show back feedback, due to the experiential and discursive nature of the learning in this module there will be lots of opportunity to get tutor feedback on your work and the progress you are making throughout the module.
Information and resources will be available to you on Blackboard and the 'Reading List' contains links to websites and online video material which can help you develop appropriate knowledge and understanding.
Written assessment feedback will be provided within 20 working days of summative assignment submission. Access to library facilities is available 24-7 all year round.

All modules at Northumbria include a range of reading materials that students are expected to engage with. The reading list for this module can be found at: http://readinglists.northumbria.ac.uk
(Reading List service online guide for academic staff this containing contact details for the Reading List team – http://library.northumbria.ac.uk/readinglists)

Knowledge & Understanding:
? Demonstrate a growing knowledge of contemporary acting and performance techniques

Intellectual / Professional skills & abilities:
? Demonstrate a growing ability to analyse your own practice and that of other practitioners

Personal Values Attributes (Global / Cultural awareness, Ethics, Curiosity) (PVA):
? Evidence a heighten inquisitiveness and curiosity towards the range, ethics, and cultural approaches to performer training

Formative
You will share their argument in response to the set provocation as an oral presentation. Staff and peers will offer feedback in class.

Summative
Practice Research project (100%) comprising:
• A demonstration of practice (c. 5 – 10 minutes, as appropriate to form of practice and in discussion with tutor);
• A 1000-words (or equivalent) statement contextualising the practice research demonstration.

In response to a staff provocation or live brief, you will work in small groups to develop, rehearse and realise a practical response (such as performance, workshop, installation or another agreed other format) that investigates the intersection of practice and theory.

The format of the practical demonstration will be agreed in discussion with the module convenor. The 1000 word (or equivalent) research statement will outline the critical and creative references that have informed the project, and how they have done so

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Introducing you to how different practitioners have approached the training of actors and performers, this module will help you develop your practical and critical understanding of how performers prepare for performance. This may involve techniques associated with (for example) Sandford Meisner, Jerzy Grotowski, Yoshi Oida, Freddie Hendricks, and Patsy Rodenburg. These techniques will be studied in workshop sessions and applied to scripted scenes. The module offers the opportunity to expand your performance skillset, while also exploring your personal creative interests and identity. You will learn how to apply these techniques in your own work, making informed choices on the types of material you will perform and which techniques you will use in your creative process. Aside from building your practical skills, you will develop your understanding of training and preparation to recognise these are not ‘neutral’ or ‘universal’ but deeply imbedded in social factors and personal psychology.