The Drama GCSE Course Essay Example for Free

The Drama GCSE Course Essay During the summer term of 2003 I have been working on an improvised piece of drama for option 3 of the drama GCSE course. The theme of our piece is fame. Our improvisation is about a young man called Jack who has the misfortune to become famous at first this is his dream come true but as the story unfolds he becomes more miserable and becomes addicted to drugs. The opening scene is where everyone who has had something to do with his death is gathered around him in his coffin at his funeral. Caudilia Smith throughout the funeral stays totally emotionless and does not shed a tear for her dead husband. Then it switches to Jack in bed being woken by his drug dealer, she barges in and starts to threaten Jack and he tells her he can get the money tomorrow and she agrees and tells him he will be dead if he doesnt. then we move further back and go to the high street where he first becomes famous. A news reporter comes to the agent who is sat at one of the cafes on the road where she is accosted by a journalist and is asked to comment on her upcoming blockbuster this is the scene where we find out that the agent is looking for a real life hero. Then Bernard moves past the journalist who has to move to block the agents way whilst Jack and Bernard are talking which is significant because Bernard starts to walk across the road but a car is coming and he does not see this because he is fixated on Jack but luckily a passer-by comes to the rescue and saves him but everyone thinks it was Jack who has saved him and because of this Jack becomes skyrocketed into fame which gets him a wife and helps feed his habit. But as he goes on his head gets bigger so he cant see the cracks that are forming below him. Caudilia finds out about his habit from a phone call that she listened in and she informs the papers and then because his agent finds out about this he gets sacked and then his wife leaves him and he has no-one left and then he kills himself. And then we all put him in his coffin, which is significant because it was our fault that he died so we are putting him in his coffin. When Maria Marten was set it was normal to see Gypsies and for the social classes to affect relationships then. And also the difference in currency then because it is not Guineas any more. The language is much different compared to the improvisation that we are doing now because we use much shorter sentences and frequent swearing but at the time of the script it would be considered very rude to swear but now its seems like a second language (not to me of course) to us. Also even the William confessed his love for Maria he hid it from the public and when he was caught with Dora and she asked who she was William just fobbed Dora off and said that she was just a peasant and he probably would not be caught dead with a girl like Maria. At the time of Maria Marten people believed Gypsies and took head of what they said but whereas now no one believed them, also people wouldnt be allowed to speak to other people in a higher social class than themselves. People behaved a lot different in the Victorian times because they had to be seen as properly behaved they couldnt be seen with people that were in a lower class than they were and this is where snobbery comes into it. And in the Victorian times people lived dull lives and didnt have much to do so going out to see a melodrama was like going to an Eminem concert for use it was that exciting! A melodrama in the Victorian days is the equivalent of going to the cinema and watching a movie. In our piece there are different types of cherecters in there there is Caudillia she is the gold digging bitchy type and then there is Bernard who is a nice person and is always good natured until he finds out jack has not been entirely honest with him. Then ther is the scheming journalist and then there is the larger than life I dont have any time for you agent. We chose this type of style of drama because it suted what we wanted serious yet funny and I feel this suted what we wanted exactly because with the amount of people there is there is enough room for both types of acting. We have learnt of the changes in the time affect the type of thinks that are funny now becayse they would not be funny then they probably would be improper. The fact that the script ended in tragedy gave us an incentive to head in the direction of tragedy.