“As a director, discuss how you would stage Act 2, Scene 1 from page 25 – Voices: let the bride awaken now. –To- page 27- Leonardo: Don’t worry, in order to bring out your interpretation of it for your audience.”

In my production of Blood Wedding, I am going to set it in 21^st century Spain, making the set more modern and the mannerisms of the younger generation in the play more up to date. I will also represent the present day through the set design and the costume choices. As well as this, I have no intention to change the text, but the way in which the characters are going to speak will represent modern day. For example, the older characters such as the mother and the servant will speak with a faint Spanish accent and the younger generation like the bride, Leonardo and the bride-groom will have more common accents to show the different generations. My staging choice will be a Proscenium Arch, this will allow my audience to have a good view of everything going on, and also I want to have an elaborate set and this staging will allow me to do this. I want clear set changes to represent the different scenes because this will contribute to the modern take on the play.

Throughout this scene I want to represent the intensity of the relationship between Leonardo and the Bride, but also the importance of this scene, because this is an important scene in the play in which the idea of betrayal and passion. The servant in this scene plays a bigger role than meets the eye, during the whole scene she’s stood awkwardly between the bride and Leonardo however she is a representation of the obstacle between the bride and Leonardo’s love and passion for each other. The first line of the extract, “Voices: Let the bride awaken now. On this her wedding day.” I want this to be said from the side of the stage so they aren’t visible to the audience. As the line is spoken, I want the servant to react to the voices by, heading upstage left and implying she is looking out of the window for the arriving guests, leaving Leonardo alone down stage right, sitting on a chair at the dressing table. Whilst the servant remains up stage, he softly and quietly speaks his line “Let the bride awaken now. On this her wedding day”, as he speaks he drops his head in a sad manner to show how he is feeling, he will speak the whole line with emotion putting emphasis on the words ‘wedding day’. While he is saying this line, the lighting will change from natural lighting of the whole stage to just down stage right being lit in a pool of white light to show his isolation on stage. When he has finished speaking and the servant begins to speak again, the lights will come back to up, lighting the whole stage with natural lighting again.

On the line “Did the bridegroom bring the orange blossom so she can wear it on her heart?” I want Leonardo to make his way further down stage left facing away from the servant as he speaks. I want his tone of voice to be very low and for him to sound as if that line was hard for him to say, to create the sense that he wishes it was him who was giving the bride the orange blossom. The reason he will be facing away from the servant so he can hide the emotion on his face and also so he is unable to see the entrance of the Bride from upstage right, as he speaks his line, so she over hears him. As she says “what are you hinting at?” I would like the bride to forcefully push past the servant heading down stage centre towards the Leonardo. Her tone of voice sounding angry towards Leonardo, and as she strides forwards her posture will remain upright and proud, to show her anger and frustration. In contrast to the bride Leonardo’s tone of voice remains soft and calm, as he realises the bride has entered. I want him to turn suddenly when she begins to speak, but not move until he begins to speak.