1st Stumble Through

The Wednesday rehearsal, Abby suggested we do a stumble through of all the scenes we have devised already, giving us a chance to highlight the gaps that need filling and to give us a first look into how the piece is shaping. It was really handy as some of us had never seen parts of it before, and it was great to see it starting to come together.
Evaluation:
Dances have their basic structure in shape, but now need to be finished and started to polish, this is relatively easy to do which can be done early. They convey the right moods we were aiming for, and whole company dances really lift and heighten the mood!
Opening flows and fits together well, the entrance and first viewings of the younger couple needed to be interlinked and the transitions a lot smoother, yet the introduction to the old couple is concise, laying an understanding of her mental state is there, but when we go into her first memory needs to be a bit clearer.
There are many gaps we need to fill, from the dance to drafting to war no.1, the war to the hospital scene, the prisoner of war ending to no memory, no memory needs to start being devised around and how it links to the ending.

In the later rehearsal, Nick and I chose to devise a movement sequence for when Alfie gets drafted to war for the first time. Yes the young couple have already had a dance sequence together, yet this was a lot less physical and a lot more emotive, but the movement allowed us to convey this sense of sadness and deep frustration that words either couldn't do or wouldn't do as well.
Nick had the thought of 'Lovesong' by Adele, its fairly slow, and how the music swelled and got more emotive fitted the sequence, giving the sequence and the couple a journey through both movement and music.
We chose to have the letter as a main focus. We started devising by finding ways the letter could be passed under, over and around each other, never letting the letter drop and always as a point of contact. Then we travelled it and added levels and moments of stillness where the couple couldn't look at it and just held or embraced each other, the letter in between their hands.
As the sequence developed, we found that there was a point where frustration turned to anger for the young Evie. That the letter became to much, so she scrunched it up and threw it away, turning to Alfie and starting to push him away, yet wanting to hold him but knowing that letter has gotten in their way. The more upset she got, the more desperate Alfie gets to just hold her, and finally wraps his arms around her, and they stay like that till the music fades out.
We got some of the others to watch it, and the feedback was great, that it was nice to see a journey for the couple where it isn't all 'perfect', and having Evie break instead of Alfie they agreed was an effective twist almost. It allowed the couple to really gain sympathy from the audience.
It then became apparent that we needed a scene before this that linked the end of the dance to the letter. A scene where the audience learn that they have been together and their relationship has developed, to gain that audience's respect and feelings, so that when the bad news comes, the audience aren't been demonstrated to that they should feel sad, but they really feel it from how the play has developed.