Happy accidents (don't you love it when you try something new and it kinda works?): I must say to all my theatre teacher friends that I have found that Batman/Bruce Wayne is a near-perfect illustration of certain acting terms. His objective of the pursuit of justice and cleaning up the streets of Gotham is clearly borne of his given circumstances of his parents having been murdered in a robbery. His obstacle of the strong criminal element is navigated by his tactics of using his immense wealth, his innate detective skills, and his pursuit of physical perfection (and donning a persona that strikes fear in the hearts of ne'er-do-wells) are all adopted at very high stakes, given that he has no actual super-powers.
Today we had a great conversation about how, if little Kal-el had not landed in the heartland and been raised by Ma and Pa Kent, he might not have grown up to the Superman we know (a theory that is well explored in the "Elsewhere" Superman book "Red Son" in which Superman's craft crashes in Soviet Russia instead).
The kids are chomping at the bit to talk about Mr. "With great power comes great responsibility" AKA Spider-man.
I will offer this one caveat. Since these stories have been told and re-told so many times, you should expect some push-back from the geeks (In issue such-and-such it said this....") But I held firm and said "let's acknowledge that there are various versions of these stories, so we will only focus on generalities and what's best known about these characters...." Already on day two, when I was expecting similar push-back from Mr. Comics, he said "No, I get what you're trying to do."
Today, after showing clips from Spider-man:Turn Off the Dark (Yes, I saw it. With students. And I thought it was as dumb as you did.), I brought a really rough-around-the edges, impulsive seventh grader to near tears when he asked "Can we see that next year?" (our school musical theatre program takes a field trip every other year to NYC) and I had to tell him it was closed, which allowed me to have a conversation with the class about the ephemeral nature of theatre.
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Ryan Moore
Ferndale MI
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Original Message:
Sent: 11-13-2014 10:45
From: Kristin Hall
Subject: Superhero-themed lessons
I don't have lesson plans, but I did some work with a middle school group a few years ago in response to this article:
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2010/09/27/kids_dream_up_a_muslim_superhero_in_a_wheelchair/
They came up with under-represented groups/types and created new superheros.
The order of activities was something like:
Think of a group or type of person that is under-represented or unlikely
Create the superhero (endowments) - what powers do they have? What is their mission/goal?
Back story - How did they become a super hero?
Arch-nemesis - Who is it? What is the back story?
They eventually shaped their ideas into a performance piece. As usual with devised work, they created much more material through improvisation than they eventually used.
It was a great devising project ... now that I think about it, it might be time to repeat it!
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Kristin Hall
Drama Director
Lincoln Public Schools
Arlington MA
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Original Message:
Sent: 11-12-2014 07:23
From: Ryan Moore
Subject: Superhero-themed lessons
This year, I have one (small) class of 7th/8th graders who are (mostly) VERY much beginners as actors.
I have noticed that they many of them seem to share a wild passion for superheroes (the boys and the girls both), and I'm looking for some ways to tap into this. I have some thoughts: e.g. each creates an original superhero character, writes a monologue telling us about one of their exploits and we interview them in character. Just wondering if anyone has any lessons or materials that are tried and true that might fit into this endeavor or other superhero themed lessons or dramatic material.
Also, we're heading into the part of the year when we're focusing on play production, so I can also pull directing/design/marketing elements in.
Thanks for your thoughts.
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Ryan Moore
Ferndale MI
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