1. Soap Operas Lesson 2

2. Lesson Objectives By the end of this lesson pupils will have: Learnt about the main difference between acting for the stage and acting for the screen Learnt about naturalistic acting Have learnt the 3 key terms for working in front of a TV camera Created a Soap opera scene using these skills

3. Screen acting Screen acting is very different to acting for the stage When acting for film or TV you need to be as NATURALISTIC as possible NATURALISTIC acting means that you are trying to behave as realistically as possible and portray scenes in great detail There are 6 main differences between screen and theatre acting…

4. 1.Movements and gestures for screen work are much smaller 2.Projection is not as important as microphones pick up what is said 3.You don’t have to be as aware of positioning as separate shots pick up facial expressions and capture every moment 4.You are expected to reproduce the same scene in exactly the same way several times 5.Theatre is in the moment so there is no room for mistakes, whereas screen work is more forgiving and you get a few chances to get it right! 6.There is less rehearsal time for screen work. A professional play will rehearse for 4 weeks before it opens where as there are usually only a couple of rehearsals of a scene before it is filmed

5. Let’s have a go! In pairs you will have 2 minutes to rehearse each of the following scenario focusing on acting as naturalistically as possible 1.Getting dumped 2.Going to pay for something in a shop and realising you have don’t have enough money to pay 3.Opening your exam results in front of a friend and discovering you’ve done really badly 4.Finding out you’ve won the lottery!

6. Key Terms When acting in front of a camera there are a few key terms that are used so that actors know when to start and stop We will be using these terms later in the lesson when we perform our work so pay attention!

7. Rolling /At Speed This means that the camera is recording and the camera person is ready for the scene to begin Action Once the director says action you should wait for 5 seconds before beginning to act. This is essential for when the screen shots come to be edited Cut Directors usually wait 5 seconds at the end of the scene to make sure that there is plenty of scene on which to edit. This means that when you get to the end of a scene you need to hold a freeze frame for 5 seconds

8. Your Task In groups of 4/5 you have 15 minutes to create a short Soap Opera style scene about being in a lesson at school – think Waterloo Road! Remember we are looking for NATURALISTIC acting so you should behave in a way that is believable! Time to perform using our key terms and evaluate…

9. Plenary Can you name the 6 key differences between stage and screen acting? Can you explain the key terms of Rolling/At Speed, Action and Cut? What is NATURALISTIC acting and which group did this most successfully?