Evaluation

The importance of this piece didn’t quite hit me until I watched the women waltzing. The loss represented by the army jackets and the delicate music capturing the delicateness of the heart. It was truly beautiful. It made me see how brutal the events of world war one were, the blood bath that it really was. That was the intention of the piece in my opinion, to educate people and show how truly horrific it was and remember the bravery and suffering of everyone effected. This was achieved in a number of ways. The breakdown of sections united at the end captured the separate worlds that interlinked through trenches across europe. The reaction we had from the audience wasn’t expected. We made people think. 

I feel like telling this story from the perspective of young people in the 21st century was part of it being so effective. The moment Tuwaine stepped forward and spoke the words ‘When I think of world war one..’ immediately connected everyone in the room to how we remember it. This mixed in with the recordings of veterans left everyone listening very carefully and there was a peaceful atmosphere. It set a rhythm to the piece which I found was really important. Furthermore this ran through the whole piece the use of sound added so much, especially in Cameron and Jordans duet. The sound of the marching and panting was raw and the changing in rhythm of the marching espcially as it speeded up created tension. There movement was so powerful. The way they only five words ‘I don’t like war anymore.‘ were repeated and bounced between one another as they used each others bodies to move almost like they were in trenches, it was honest but simple, thats what made it so successful. 

In terms of my own performance I feel like I was focused the whole way through, its easy to become caught up in someone else’s work when your onstage and watching. It was tricky times to remember you onstage however I don’t feel like this effected my performance too much. Me and Jack played with the dynamics of our duet in each performance and tried to tell a story because we both felt this was really important. One section I loved watching each time was the Letter reading. I feel like this is where the message of the piece hit the audience and performers the most, the women's voices carried pain and angst, with real peoples words. However the role of women in the whole piece was something that I was disappointed with. In my opinion women were depicted as victims, left hopeless without men. I feel like the work section wasn't representative of the amazing work women did in the war. This is something that could have been improved through using stimulus from female nurses that worked on the front line and in arms factories. really brave women. However  this would be my only criticism of the piece. 

Moving on the set was in my opinion more than suitable. The hanging pictures were slightly sinister but looked so interesting, the lighting was cold and impersonal, furthermore the use of lighting as the soldiers dropped was harsh yet perfect. I feel like the combination of movement, poetry, real stories and visual effects created an honest piece of theatre that communicated the lack of knowledge in our society  of such a prominent part of our history. In the words of Phoebe Wagner  ‘We will never forget, But why on earth should we remember?’