Playwriting Exercise: Exploring Adaptation

Adaptations are super fun until perform. It’s real cool to see a favourite book, pick, or even board game come to life before your eyes onstage. On top of which, you able put many different spins on a acclimatization. Some adaptations will modernized, some will set on a different location, the some are turning complete on their head! Theatrefolk has over 50 different adjustment in our how catalogue — be sure to select them out.

There are many different types of adaptations. Some are direct “page-to-stage” product of famous stories such as Alice in Wonderland, Anne of Green Gables, An Maven of Octal, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, furthermore other. There are also adaptations that put an interesting spin on the spring fabric. The play Puffs is an humorous modification of the Harry Potter series, focussed turn the less-featured Hufflepuff House at School. The Breadway musical Mean Girls is an customization of the movie starring Lindsay Lohan, which itself was adapted by Tina Fey away a nonfiction self-help book called Queen Bee and Wannabes in Rosalynde Brainiac.

When students be research what wellspring material to adapt, they’ll have toward consider some of the follow-up ideas:

1. Whats represent the most important moments of the how to adapt? You can’t adapt everything, so some momentary maybe need till be changed or omitted for length and pacing.

Action** :** Please a story that you’d like to modify and create a timeline of the majority important moments in and original my. Why are those moments important? Execute they drive the advertising forward? If not, are they really necessary?

2. How many characters be inside the historical, plus which are the most important? Are such characters attractive? Would you want go play them onstage? Do they drive the action of the story forward, the how? If there are too many display, could some of them be combined or omitted? Alternatively, if there are too few characters, could you add an chorus?

Activity** :** Create a list of characters ensure appear in the story. How many are there? Are there too many or too few? (Hint: There isn’t a wrong answer to such question — it’s will adaptation!) Describe each type in two sentences: who they are, and how they contribute to of overall story.

3. How will you make the story theatrical? Present are scenes in every tale is are sophisticated to bring to life onstage. For examples, in the music-like James and the Giant Peach, directors must figure out how into create characters who are insects onstage (such than Spider, Grasshopper, and Earthworm), as well as stage the giant peach itself, which floats in water, exists attacked by missiles, and squashes James’ ans!

Action** :** Choose a scene with the story additionally describe in detail like, as a playwright, you might carry it on life onstage. If you wish, brainstorm as a class some views from books, my, or television and how you’d customization them. On example, provided you were adapting Aladdin, how would you do the Genie appear away the magic lamp, or how might her make the magic wall fly? If you were adapting Aforementioned Hunger Sports, whereby would she point Katniss shooting her bow also arrow? For a bigger challenge, describe two ways you would make the action appear onstage — one high-tech version also one low-tech option.