Oral presentation

 • understanding of the text(s)
 • critical perspectives on the dramatic potential of the text(s)
• insights into the performance process experienced from page to stage
• critical evaluation of their particular role and contribution to this process of transformation or adaptation and realization.


Oral presentation:
In Edwidge Danticat's story Krik Krak, it mainly focus on the harsh life Haitian people experienced during that time period and how did they overcome the difficulties or were beaten by the difficulties. In those many interesting stories, there's one story talked about a daughter in an immigrant family, which she was preparing for her wedding.
This time I performed the show Caroline's Wedding in story Krik Krak. The reason why I chose play this story was that it was interesting and realistic, it talked about the connection between fathers and daughters, and how did the Haitian culture and American culture influenced the mom and two daughters. Which made me become interested in editing it into the performance.
Because I played the role of dad, so there's less direct information that describes dad in the book that can help me to write down dad's characteristic and his relationship with his wife and his daughters, Caroline and Grace. But however, from several places in the conversations between Caroline and Grace, they always missed their dad and always wanted to see dad again. Because of those conversations and some potential description of dad, I would write down lines of dad and also I asked my teammates, Betty and Kat about their understanding of dad from the book, those advices also helped me to build the character of dad. And in my mind, even though dad is a Haitian guy but he loved Grace and Caroline, and because of this love, he understood each choice they did.
Because in Krik Krak, the author always wanted to show that the Haitian people were in struggle, they always fought for life but they never lost their believes. In the previous stories, 1937, even mom was in prison and she knew she did not have much time left, but she still contained confidence toward everything. In the night women, even though the main character was a prostitude, but she did that only for her son. This belief also shows in this story,  Caroline's Wedding, the main characters, Grace and Caroline were both Haitians but they had the green cards of United States, which the green cards were the hope for these two characters, or even the whole Haitians because they were in chaos and America was a good place for them to avoid war, the author used those two main characters as the miniature of the whole Haitians. Then during several times, like Caroline talked with mom, Grace talked with Caroline. They both referred the name of dad, which I could directly know that how important dad is in this family. And for dad, these two girl and his wife are the most important people in his mind.
What was difficulties in adapting the story into the performance is the dreaming part, because dad was unreal and we did not have much information compared with Grace and Caroline, so finding his characteristic and decided the plot involved him really challenged me. But I believe from our performance, audience can clearly found out that dad is an important component in the family, especially for his two daughters.
In order to do this performance perfectly, first thing our group did is to think about the start point and the end point. Because dad was died and he is very important in the family, which we made the start point which dad was dying and then the following development is followed by dad. One interesting thing in our story is that we developed dad's role, which even though he was only a ghost but he still missed his wife and daughters and because of this caring, he contributed a lot in order to protect his family members until the wedding night.
In order to perform dad's role actively, not only I need to analyze his characteristic but also I believe I need to interact with other family members on the stage. Which I put this caring into my lines and my actions. I need to show emotion change in order to let audience knew my personality and persistence. The setting was I as dad died in the hospital and then the place moved to haven to start my afterlife, so in the beginning I lay on the bed serenely. Grace and Caroline were crying beside me in order to show that dad is really important in the family, then the lights shut and I moved to the stage right where is the haven. We divided the stage into three parts, reality, dream, heaven, I always stood in right stage and sometimes went into middle stage as the dream to communicate with Caroline and Grace. In my right stage, in order to show the armosphere of heaven, I decided to not put any color of light to show the loneliness, and in the stage middle because it is the dream world, I used blue and red lights to indicate its variness and creativeness. Then in the beginning of the stage, when I went to the heaven, in order to perform that I am weak at that time when I first come to heaven, I coughed several times and used the crutch to support my body in order to show the weakness. But when I found out that I was alive, firstly I just called the name of my relatives: my wife, my daughters. Which this line I spoke very loudly in order to show my caring. Moreover, because I was a ghost, I can hear others conversation but my relatives can't hear me. Even though under this situation, I stilled asked Caroline that she needed to eat dinner with mom and also blamed myself that why I can not protect my daughters anymore. Then in the wedding night's eve, this day I dressed up and I did not use that crutch, because I knew my daughter will marry with Eric and I was very glad to know this. During this conversation with Caroline, I always smiled and congratulated her. And in the end I even hugged with her, this action I believed totally showed my love and caring toward my relatives. Because god reminded me before that I can touch the person who was familiar with me, or I will disappear immediately. But I still hugged with my daughter because I was really happy for her and also congratulated for myself that I won't be worried about my family anymore because Caroline found her mr.Right, Grace was mature enough and my wife can take care of herself. Then the lights shutted immediately which gave audiences a hind about dad's final destiny.
Because of this performance, I can totally understand the author's attitude toward the Haiti and also performed the role of dad gave me the idea experience of how family is important for every member in the family. Also I believed that from my performance both in lines and interactions, audience can feel the caring of father and how did the children of dad supported himself to continue living in this world.