Pouring of the Sun & All That Fall
There are numerous techniques that can be used in a performance to help create the world of a story for the audience. Props, backdrops, and costume are just three of many tools that effectively aid actors in creating this world. All That Fall by Samuel Beckett and Jay O'Callahan's Pouring of the Sun are both unique productions that create the world of a story with practically nothing other than the actors' voices and actions. All That Fall was originally written and performed as a radio play, which explains why the world of this story is almost entirely created with sound. Through the words, actions and facial expressions of the play's nine actors, the story of Maddy Rooney's journey to surprise her husband at the Boghill railroad station for his birthday and her many encounters along the way is told.
When an actor performs a play with minimal means besides their own voice and body, the imaginary world of the story becomes much more of a challenge to create. When Maddy and Dan fall down a staircase on their way back home, two actors stomp up and down a miniature staircase to create the sound of the fall. The performers also rely heavily upon sound effects to enhance the clarity of this imaginary world. Through their changes in tone, grunts, moans, laughing spells, giggles, screams and cries of pain, joy and sorrow, the audience is painted a vivid picture of this world. O'Callahan, unlike the performers in All That Fall, does not use costumes or props (aside from a chair) to create the world of Ludvika Waldony. Pouring of the Sun and All That Fall both display the ability of an actor to effectively create the world of a story without using most of the traditional tools other than their voice, expressions and imagination. fective tool the actor's use in this performance to create Maddy Rooney's world are their voices. The consistency of these sounds help keep the audience captured deep within this imaginary world. As Maddy is dragging herself to the station, the sound of her lackadaisical stroll is created by one of the actor's sliding cups through a box of sand. In Jay O'Callahan's performance of Pouring of the Sun, he too paints a vivid picture of an imaginary world without using anything besides his voice, words, expressions and minimal actions. Each character that he becomes is accompanied by a drastic change in his voice, tone, stance and facial expressions. O'Callahan effectively speaks as the character Ludvika Waldony, a Polish immigrant who raises her family in Bethlehem, and then immediately becomes a drastically different characters such as her son John, all without using any tools besides his voice, expressions and stance. O'Callahan tells a story of a family of immigrants who live in Bethlehem and work in the steel mills from the 1920's to the 1950's. The actors use their voices to imitate sounds of the wind blowing, cows mooing, birds singing, horses naying along with a slew of other noises heard throughout Maddy's journey. Although creating the world of a play is difficult during any production, there are many tools that are often used that contribute to the ease of this task.
Common topics in this essay:
Pouring Sun,
Maddy Rooney's,
Waldony Polish,
Maddy Dan,
Sun Fall,
Waldony O'Callahan's,
world story,
create world,
imaginary world,
pouring sun,
Jay O'Callahan's,
create world story,
jay o'callahan's,
creating world,
facial expressions,
vivid picture,
maddy rooney's,
besides voice,
pouring sun fall,
Ludvika Waldony,
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Acceptance Essays
