Hard to Swallow Drama Exam Evaluation

Our play uses variety of styles, mainly Brecht’s epic theatre as our play depicts political message. Our play is structured as montage as it shows different stages of George’s life in a non-chronological order, we effectively did this

In both live and filmed performances, the performances will often differ in small ways from the plays. Whether this is due to the actors, the set, or to a change in the story itself, these often small differences can have great impacts on the finished product. In Thornton Wilder’s “Our Town” play and “Our Town” performance there are various differences and similarities between the two. These come out in how well the performance follows the play, in the actors interpretations of their parts, in the scripts, props, and in the setting. The “Our Town” performance viewed in class was one of the more faithful of performances in regards to following the play.

While viewing, I pictured them eating eggs, sausage, and toast for breakfast. The use of pantomizing allows the audience create their own visions and put themselves into the play.

Brecht’s political theatre stems from his political views towards communism and the upper class society. Theatre that comments on political issues within society. Brecht began to have a dislike for the capitalist society he was brought up in and wanted more of an equal approach to the world and the people around him. With epic theatre, Brecht wanted it to be both didactic (able to teach others) and dialectic (able to create discussions and ideas). The audience at no time during an epic play can be seen to be in a trance or take what they see on stage for granted. Our performance is reflective of Brecht and his Epic and Political theatre as we address many political topics such as Marxism and the divides between classes and the corruption of the government. We have props such as protest signs and banners to communicate Brecht’s political theatre to the audience. In the first episode, Brown’s Boys, there is a scene where MPs choke and die after ignoring the recession and protesters emerge into the audience chanting that ‘politics is dead’ and ‘they don’t really care about us’ while holding banners saying, ‘politics is dead’ and ‘Gordon Clown’. This was done as it represented politics and the fact the seriousness of the situation was ignored; showing how quickly the issues with the recession spiralled out of control and became something that even the higher up in society were unable

The film “Dying to be Thin” followed the cases of several individuals who have struggled with an eating disorder at some point in their lives, showing the different factors that play a role in eating disorder onset. Different individuals in the film have different reasons for developing an eating disorder but there are some over-arching themes such as the media’s influence, career-related pressures, and certain personality types.

“Hunger” is an article published in 1989 by social justice activist Maggie Helwig. In this article Helwig discusses the stereotypes behind eating disorders, and gives real life examples of the impacts an eating disorder can have on someone. She is able to incorporate many ideas that smoothly flow together to capture the audience’s attention, while also making the audience consider their thoughts and views on eating disorders. She ends the article by giving insightful information as to what it was like for her to suffer from an eating disorder, and why she chose to starve herself for eight years. Helwig uniquely incorporates logos, pathos, and ethos in her writing to completely gain the audience’s attention and influence their opinions on eating disorders.

“Dying to be Thin,” produced by PBS, is a documentary that examines the troubles that persons who are affected by eating disorders go through and the constant, daily struggles they face with health and body image. The film tells the story of a number of young women who battled mainly anorexia and bulimia and mixes a variety of ages to give a “during” and an “after” perspective. Many of the women in the video were ballet or some similar type of dancer. Dancers, by their own account, are encouraged to be thin. The issue really came to the forefront after a young ballet dancer from Boston died of heart failure at the young age of 22, with an eating disorder deemed to be the cause. The narrator goes on to introduce more young women and detail the potential illnesses that their eating disorders can cause. Chronic low blood pressure, kidney and liver damage, severe early osteoporosis, and heart failure are all common things seem in patients who suffer from eating disorders. Most patients have dangerously low body weights, body fat percentages, and, often, young women will experience amenorrhea, which is the loss of menstruation. All of the people in the video wanted to be better and were seeking a road to recovery. The video showed though, how difficult that can be since the eating disorders can be so wide ranging and have a number of different root causes. Often patients develop eating disorders as something that they have control over, in a world that they feel is out of their

To begin with, the production of this play was done very well in order to appeal to the audience’s emotions. While reading this play, or any play for that matter it is not always easy to pick up on what the characters are actually feeling. Once those

As illustrated in this novel, eating disorders are about a lot more than just food. The novel

In the writing “The Globalization of Eating Disorders” the author, Susan Bordo strongly uses the pathos appeal to influence the emotions of her audience. This writing speaks in detail about the growing issue of eating disorders, that is not only becoming an international issue; but as well I an issue that now affects young men and women alike. The way that this author uses this specific appeal is in a large part with very personal and relatable dialogue, about the sufferings of young adults that are affected by these issues. The author goes as far as to begin the writing, telling the story of a young girl “never fat to begin with, she’s been on a diet for a couple of weeks and has finally reached her goal weight of 115 at 5 to 4 inches… but in her eyes she still looks dumpy” (639). The author goes on to make a point to this narrative, but just the thought of this girl’s unhappy nature with herself, is enough to captivate the audiences’ emotions. The author uses this type of the pathos appeal throughout the rest of the writing to continue influencing the emotions of her audience, as to make her argument stronger.

“The mindset that a person can never be "too rich or too thin" is all too prevalent in society, and it makes it difficult for females to achieve any level of contentment with their physical appearance”(Serdar, "Female Body Image and the Mass Media: Perspectives on How Women Internalize the Ideal Beauty Standard").‘‘The Fat Girl’’ was published in 1977 as part of Dubus’s short story collection Adultery, and Other Choices. It has now become one of his best-known works. Throughout Dubus’s career, many has praised his writing for their eloquent treatment of sensitive topics such as eating disorders. Whether it is known or not, eating disorders are very prevalent in our society. In fact, eating disorders are the most common psychological disorder in our society to date. But why such prevalence now? Well, we can find the answer all around us, in fact, we are being bombarded by imagery every day the effects several eating disorders. Family, friends and society all affect eating disorders prevalence in today’s society. As the reader delves into the short story “The Fat Girl” they can see how Dubus addresses the delicate topic of eating disorders and their contributing factors.

Anorexic danger close to dying after weight fell to 35kg, recounts the story of a 20-year-old girl, Korey Baruta and her battle with an eating disorder, anorexia. Korey is a dancer, and constantly receives criticism on her size 10 appearance. The disorder first develops at the age of 15 and lasts for four years, until she is forced to seek help at an eating disorder clinic. Once arriving at the clinic, she is required to immediately transfer to an emergency ward, here she is given a warning on her life. Baruta has lost a large percentage of her body mass, has been diagnosed with “kidney failure, liver problems, and a heart murmur”, due to this loss in weight.

Employing her essay with key terms like body image, anorexia, and bulimia among other disorders, the essayist has written her piece rife with appeals to pathos to define them; the essay’s introduction carries her readers into a girl’s mind who struggles with her appearance

Children who had to nurture themselves from a young age don’t trust adults because they weren’t shown affection, which causes the child to have no healthy dependence on their parents, which then causes them to rely on the media to get a sense of self-worth. This self-worth is found in their physical appearance and it causes them to feel the need to starve themselves so they can “measure up to society’s standards.” This example is one of the hundreds of ways that a dysfunctional family can cause a girl to become anorexic. Another possible cause of anorexia is a lack of a sense of femininity. Women seem to find their sense of femininity from men. We look to men to tell us if we are beautiful, ugly, fat, skinny, etc. We tend to base our sense of femininity on our physical appearance which causes us to diet, wear “fashionable clothing,” and it can even cause us to starve ourselves. Fathers play a huge role in their daughters sense of femininity. Our fathers tell us we are valued as women, we are beautiful, and we are cherished. If you grow up with a deceased, absent, or disengaged father, you grow up with a huge hole in your femininity, which causes low self-esteem. The other main focus of Anatomy of Anorexia

Another moment I thought was particularly effective was the use of muffins to provide comedic relief and hold the audience’s attention. This was done by constantly changing the levels in the scene, with characters sitting down, standing up, and following the plate of muffins. Due to both characters having opposing