On April the 19th I attended a performance called Chitty Chitty Bang Bang at the Cliffs Pavilion in Southend-on-Sea. Art forms that were involved included set design, singing, costume design, dancing and lighting. The main thing involved was acting, just like any other performance. I have been to performances in the past but I think this was the best because there was always something interesting going on and I was never bored! Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is a story about a man called Potts, a crazy inventor who makes a car that can fly and float. His two children love this magical car. They meet a lady called Truly Scrumptious, who tries to help Potts with his inventions. An evil Baron Bombarst wants the magical car. Instead of taking the car, he takes Potts' Grandad. On the way to rescue Grandad, who has been taken to a land where children are banished, Potts' children are stolen. I loved the storyline of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang because I like fictional things. I think that it was good that there was a range of different kinds of people acting e.g. children, adults and older people and it was good that there were different kinds of characters e.g. villains, Baron Bombast and heroes, Truly Scrumptious.
One aspect I really enjoyed about the performance as a whole was the fact that there were many different types of art forms involved in the play, as well as the obvious element of acting, such as singing and dancing. Throughout, there were scenes with solo singing but also scenes were everyone was singing. These different approaches changed the mood of the play because if someone was signing alone you could really focus on one thing whereas when everyone was singing together you felt the same big impact but it was more uplifting and there was more to look at. Even though they compare, everyone sang very well, in a typical theatrical way. Another thing that affected the mood was the lighting. For example, a red setting gave off the sense of danger when the children were about to be captured. There was also pink for the scene where they visited the sweet factory which portrayed happiness or love. Blue represented sadness. This just showed to me how important lighting is in the theatre because everyone is open to their own interpretation. Another point about the lighting used was the fact that the spotlights were sometimes used to bring our full attention to the actor/actress. I found that the spotlights were most commonly used when someone was saying something by themselves or maybe they were singing.
Another aspect of the play that I really liked was the special effects they used. For example, at some points, steam rose from the ground to resemble fog, and they even could achieve the effect of lightning by making all the white lights flash at one time. This is why I think that, overall, the play was really well done because a lot of people would have put in lot of effort to make everything come together, even the tiny details made a difference. All of the costumes were well suited to the characters and were well co-ordinated. For example, there was a a group of girls dancing and they all had the same dress on.
The only thing I would say as an improvement would be to have more comedy in it because a lot of it was quite plain and I think I would have enjoyed it more if I found it funnier. Also, a lot of young children watched this play and they always like to have fun and laugh. But I think the acting was very good and sometimes the actors had to use different accents and I think they pulled them off really well! They projected their voices so even though I was sitting quite far back in the theatre I could still hear them.
I would definitely recommend this to people of all ages because, for children, it's not a hard story to follow and for adults, it isn't too childish at all and there is a really great atmosphere in the theatre. I experienced first-hand, the effects of set design, costume design, lighting, acting, singing and dancing so I really learnt how they can be used in the theatre to change the mood, engage people or make the play more realistic.
0 Comments