Chris and Chong's discussion

cfro

October 10, 2008, 12:49 AM posted in General Discussion

Hey! I've been looking at the first four dialogues.

In The Other Woman Zhang Liang and Lili's relationship, which i remember beginning to get rocky last semester, really begins to go downhill. Lili calls Zhang Liang and, on getting a woman becomes jealous - a little too fast, perhaps becausse Z.L hadn't been spending enough time with her! Z.L and Lili argue, and Lili hangs up on him!

Next Lili talks to her friend Chen Jing, who we remember was interested in Z.L! So when CHen hears of their troubles, she subtly begins to persuade Lili to leave him. The last line leaves herself an opening - she says that ZL is zhende bucuo (really not bad), and implies that someone else - her! - might be more suited.

On to the inevitable break-up. It is implied by zhongyu jie dianhua le that ZL has been frantically calling and Lili has been ignoring him. They argue about the call to work, and sort of mutually, angrily break up. This dialogue seems pretty universal to me - i guess couples everywhere are the same! When we present it we should definately ham it up a bit, get some of the emotion going... it won't be that easy to stage, though, because its just a phone conversation - Z.L and Lili don't actually see each other. We should think of actions we can do seperately to make it more interesting. And one of us is gonna have to dress up as Lili! Z.L. is definately pretty hurt here - he is the contrite one, until they start arguing.

Which leads to the fourth dialogue. Z.L's dad tries to console him by telling Z.L about his own experiences, and how important it is to move on. This seems pretty culturally universal too! Z.L., predictably, doesn't take it well.

ckim2427

October 10, 2008, 01:29 AM

Hi Chris!

I'm glad that we can work as a group.

I've looked at the later 4 dialogues and caught the main summery.

In 'Seeking Comfort', Lilli is heart-broken from her breakup with Zhang Liang. Lilli is chating with Liu Xiang who once had realationship with her. Liu Xiang tries to comfort her and Lilli starts to feel comfortable with Liu Xiang.

In 'Uncomfortable Encounter in a Bar', Lilli and Liu Xiang is drinking in a bar. Zhenhua and Zhang Liang coincidently go to the same bar to drink. They encounter each other and have conversation but Zhenhua gets too emotional and have a quarrel with Liu Xiang, because Zhenhua thinks Liu Xiang stole Lilli from Zhang Liang. Eventually, they got out of the bar.

In, 'It's over', Zhang Liang and Lilli is sitting in a bar and having a conversation. Zhang Liang apologises Lilli about the behaviour in the bar the other day. Lilli also apologises him. Lilli tells Zhang Liang that she engaged with Liu Xiang and going to Australia. Zhang Liang and Lilli both agree that they are going to be just friends.

Finally, in 'It's over (again)', Zhang Liang tries to make up with Lilli but she doesn't want to. Zhang Liang and Lilli fight seriously. I guess now they are over forever.

I think this is pretty much it.

ckim2427

October 22, 2008, 01:42 AM

Hey Chris~ how are you doing?

I guess we should prepare some costumes for our presentation. Since we are switching the roles at each time, we need a scarf and a jacket to represent Lili and Zhang Liang. We can switch the costumes when we change the roles.

I've thought about the way we going to present and I think we need a table and two chairs. In the "Break up" you can sit on a chiar and we talk over the phone. I can stand and move around while we make a phone call. So we just need our mobile phones. But when we present "It's over", we can sit on around the table and pretend to drink coffee or something as if we are in a bar.

If you have any good ideas please tell me.

Other wise I'll see you tomorrow.

cfro

October 23, 2008, 12:36 AM

Hey Chong - like we discussed, i think that sounds good.

I think we need to focus more on how we present in terms of acting, how we represent the characters, what they are feeling etc - so i thought i'd look a bit more closely at the two specific dialogs we're presenting.

The whole play is a huge soap, so i don't think we need to worry about overacting! 'The Break-Up' especially is kind of the climax of the play and i think we need to really work on hamming it up a bit. It gets more and more melodramatic as it goes on - from Zhang Liang's kind of plaintive "ni zenme hai zai wuhui wo ne?" it builds up to Lili calling Zhang Liang a two-timer ('liang tiao chuan') - and 'ni wuchi!'. So I think in performing it we should build up the energy and the drama as we go to follow the shape of the narrative.

'Its Over' will be a bit more difficult because it is more understated – talk moves to abstracts, like the almost Chinese-proverb sounding 'Rensheng zhenshi you yisi'. I think the important thing in performing this is to emphasize the subtle difference between the two former lovers' attitudes; Z.L seems to be more nostalgic about their time together, and maybe even to be considering trying to get back with Lili – and it is only in this dialogue that he truly realizes that this is impossible, with his final admission that he and Lili were 'youyuanwufen'.So to present this we'll need to be more understated and careful; we should make it a little awkward (because it is), and sad, especially for Zhang Liang.

And we need to focus on really learning the lines!

Anyway, tell m what you think

Chris.