16. Learning by Making and Doing: Group Project - Part 3

After the prologue section with the drawing-video introducing the basics of Hamlet and the related questions, a priest-like character broke in, with costume and makeup highlighting an ambiguity of gender and a contradiction of seriousness and playfulness (and craziness, or strangeness). This “priest” made a speech to enhance the framing of the spect-actors, and then led them to go through the underworld, by making use of the baseman of the venue, and also a ritual for a transformation via re-incarnation of the lost souls from Hamlet on the stage of the venue, putting them into different characters from Hamlet as different groups (each character represented by 3 people).

They were told to fight for the privilege of retelling their version of the story of Hamlet to the world by proposing criteria of selection that applied to all characters, including themselves. Each round, after collecting all criteria from different characters, the priest as the host, with the servant as the assistant, would distribute “shits” to those who failed to meet the criteria. After two rounds, the host hinted that they could think about the criteria not just as beneficial to themselves but also, strategically, how to make alliance with other characters because the aim was to select two of them and exclude the others. They were encouraged to have a few minutes to make some diplomatic meetings with other characters to decide whether and how to “corporate” against others.

After a few rounds, the two characters (groups) with the least shits won the right to move to the final selection, which was a trial in front of juries, played by all other participants who failed to get into the final selection. The “losers” in the last part dialectically turned into the powerful ones who had the power to ask questions and vote, while the “winners” became the ones who were forced to answer, defend themselves, promote themselves or please the juries/voters. The two candidates were represented by two human-size puppets hanging from the ceiling, manipulated by two participants from that character group for its movement, and one for its voice. The final winner would be the one who won the privilege of telling the story to the public while the other one fell into the infernal fire.

(Setting up and testing the string-puppet system for the "Final Trial" section)

These later parts were the design to model the mechanism of social selection, social distribution and democratic procedure that involves also strategic alliance and all kinds of tricks. Through setting criteria and promoting themselves, the players were also expected to think about the character they represented from more unconventional but possible angles.

Besides many details regarding operation, one main reflection for this project, dramaturgically speaking, is the ending. After the trial, if time allows, can or should it be one more part to facilitate discussions among participants with all characters dropped, providing a space and time for the experiences to be reflectively processed and integrated? Other crucial questions could include: Was the guiding to help the participants entering their character as a perspective sufficient? Was the flow of the whole process dialectical enough? Were the sociological/socio-political themes explicit enough and not too directive?