Minutes for Female Driven Thriller - 10/30 meeting
written by Kirsten Mitchell, actor (and producer at Praxis)

Today, Journey, the world moves or a person moves.
Are Heists thrillers? Some of the group said yes, some no.
Can thrillers be comedic? ex. Scream, Conspiracy Theory (references to Catcher in the Rye clue us into the type of conspiracy).

What if someone is a freako? What if the leader of a government is crazy or something isn't what it seems, the world is innocent untill... Discovery is made.

Movie 2001, computer Hal isn't what he seems, becomes a thriller half way through.
Movie The Exorcist, little girl is innocent, possessed by devil.

What should Female Driven Thriller be?
Role reversal, women in power over men. The idea of Nuturing in a sinister way. Movie Alien, woman is thrust into the main role without pointing to the fact that she is a woman, at first you thnik its going to be Tom Skerrit, it becomes a female driven thriller because of circumstance, alien kills Tom first.
Character Driven: relationships are more important; woman to woman relationship. Wacky idea: she is hunting down some sort of conspiracy, everyone she goes to is a part of it, she ends up being central to the conpiracy's inception. The characters are part of a call girl ring. Because call girls are outsiders, skilled in manipulation.

Outside group of women in society: Nannies; they could manipulate through nuturing. Perhaps the nannies are raising children to be brainwashed into doing something for them someday. Maybe they are baby switching. Nannies form secret ring in order to manipulate the wealthy.

Nannies example of subculture, denegrated, an underclass that is both inside and outside, as outsiders they are given alot of trust.

A perfect society, innocent. What if its not a black and white story but gray everyone is culpable.

Being put into the outside w/out trying, shunned, but then shunning doesn't work.

For next time, look over all the homework handouts, what people submitted. Group decided they were ready to go from the page to the stage, so to speak. Read and reflect on what you liked that people brought to the homeworks. Come to the next meeting prepared to discuss what you think is good that we have come up with so far, opptional bring in an article that you feel expresses what we've been talking about.

Minutes for Female Driven Thriller - 10/23 meeting
written by Kirsten Mitchell, actor (and producer at Praxis)

Hey all,

Here are the meeting notes from last week:

Characters homework was a way for Bob to learn more about us and for us to stay connected to the project outside of meetings.

Today: Start imposing challenges; questions still unanswered: What is the world of the play? What is the crime?

Types of thrillers: Personal crime(classic), and Political crime(social/topical)
Example of a personal crime thriller, DOA, characters have base motives, the victim solves his own murder and finds out the reason for his death is trivial. Example of a political thriller: The Manchurian Candidate.

Bob's aims: Selfish, to bring the group to the play. Selfless, find out what's going on in people's minds today.

Focus on the future, predict from a pattern. What will life be like 40 years from now? What about the difficulty of being identified, what tactics will be used to be recognized?

Perhaps there will be some sort of international id. Karin brought up her difficulty to open a bank account as a foreigner. Today's ids are becoming inadequate. People are becoming the victims of fraud. What about drug testing and credit checks, results could be manipulated. We're being watched, analyzed and filed. What if a homeless person is actually the victim of descending status brought about by someone else.

What if the solving of the mystery had a time limit like 90min.

World cards:
1) Recreational drugs of the future shut off some of your senses
2) Reflection: a brain mapping lie detector
3) Wrapping: gives you skills instantaneously, mental plastic surgery
4) Closing your halo, hiding your thoughts
5) Halo: software containing everyone's personal info data
6) Bitmass: radio frequency transmitters, sensors
7) The leith pill: used to forget bad memories
8) Virus inhibits one's ability to use systems
9) Information replaces currency
10) Everything must be bought
11) Dating: quick background sessions

Homework: In roughly 200 hundred words construct a world in the future, make it multidimensional, 3-4 dimensions or aspects.

Minutes for Female Driven Thriller 10/16 meeting
written by Chris LoDuca, actor (writer as well)

OK, here are the minutes to last weeks meeting, Thursday, October 16,
2003


THRILLER: Threat to losing something of value.
-Mystery
-Ticking clock threat
-Stakes

BOB's THOUGHT:
In life we participate in a various number of games.
Theatre is one of those games. Could we use games for development?
Card games could inspire a moment when we find ourselves stuck.

Example of a card game:
Find a place where a the presence of a video camera could present a
problem.
-We decided that a bathroom would be a place and we played out a
little improv to prove that point.

SURVEILLANCE VIDEOS:
-Don't tell the whole story
-Editing can Juxtapose a reality
-Truth and Lies are blurred
-Everything seems to be covered by Video
-Skews memory of events

STALKERS:
-Would be interesting if there were a stalking character that always
appeared on someone's surveillance tapes or pictures.
Who would be the villain? It could be the person owning the camera
equipment.

SOCIAL RULES:
Makes us feel uncomfortable if we don't participate
-ie: Standing for the National Anthem – it makes a person feel
uncomfortable if they don't do it. The collective conscience expects
you to stand.

Someone mentioned the movie 'Wave' made during Hitler's reign. I think
it was Bob.

EDWARD R MURROW:
-Used video to undo a person (Senator Joe McCarthy) by allowing his
true self to emerge on camera. (I kept calling him Eugene McCarthy,
but I meant Joe McCarthy - sorry).

We all agree that Negating in an improve is BAD.

STAKES:
Bob: Researches and uses random facts to write a play. Thus the
homework.
He feels that doing homework makes the process seem like "ours"

HOMEWORK:
Craft more than 1 character (2 minimum)
Show 4 facts about that person
Show pivotal moment in time that formed that Characters beliefs,
personality tics, etc.

Choose from the following:
Hero
Villain
Victim
Suspect

Give Bob feedback about how you think the meetings are going.

October 16 2003: Pictures don’t lie

Session notes - Female Driven Thriller - Thursday, Oct 16 2003
Kirsten and Larry joined Joe, Karin, Gary, Colleen, Kimberly, Chris, Gabriella & Bob. Now the entire group is together. We redid intros to greet the new people; this took up some time from the session, but was needed to get the new people and the group from last time on the same footing.

Bob summarized the introductory meeting. Besides getting to know each other, the group had defined what a thriller is for their purposes: A mystery where someone or something utterly dear to the crime-solving hero is put under direct threat; to solving the and the hero must solve the crime to save that thing they hold most precious or lose it forever. Thrillers nearly always have deadlines (ticking clocks) at their heart. A mystery is a story where one or more false stories cover a true story, which must be discovered as part of the narrative.
He also explained that he thought we could use games to develop the show, but not to get too disturbed about the word “games;” games are the basis of all human existence, games are based on our ability to represent one thing by another and to create . He then introduced Card Game as first game we have available to us;

We did first Card Game and Larry drew card #10, video cameras watching us. Larry also read the card to the group.

Video cameras watch you shop, drive, enter or leave an office building, train or bus station, or airport. Describe one location where a camera can be present, then enact a problem caused by it.

Following game rules as stated on the card, we suggested possible situations; came up with cameras in corporate offices and then more specifically in toilets in corporate offices.
Bob suggested an improv on the bathroom idea. Gary volunteered, began the improv, pretended that his chair was a ‘toilet’ and, parked there, read a magazine. Gabriella joined the improv and became a voice on a speaker in the bathroom, telling Gary it was forbidden to read a magazine on company time. Gary then started playing with his game watch; Gabriella told Gary that, too was illegal. Gary then covered his face. Gabriella stated that, too, was verboten; and that the company had now detected he was angry and required counseling. Chris joined and became a security guard who banged on the bathroom door, barged in, and told Gary he to clean out his desk, he was fired.

We launched into a lengthy conversation about the improv. Bob mentioned that the cameras were not only being used by corporations; for example, a traffic program on cable TV typically showed video from a menu of literally a hundred traffic sites around New York City; these cameras were on 24/7.

Chris told a true story of a drug dealer who approached him in Kinko’s; he was offered marijuana, asked to see it, smelled it, it was oregano, told the dealer, dealer denied, then admitted, Chris commented that if a corporate camera a Kinko’s had seen him, that a video of him smelling the contents of the bag of suspected contraband shown in a court of law would have had him convicted and imprisoned for buying drugs with no basis in truth.

A lively conversation ensued, where we concluded:

• People implicitly trust pictures (seeing is believing) and routinely use them as proof of something.


• Kirsten described a recent fight she’s seen at the playoffs on TV, and how the motions of one player during the fight were actually to pacify an angry player, but which taken out of context (the player apparently pushed the other player’s head toward the ground) appear to be cruel and violent. Colleen dissented; she was at the game and in person it really did look as if it was in fact a violent act.


• It was commented that a picture shows only part of what is true and often shows something with no context.


• The news and entertainment have merged. Bob suggested that Hearst had started that process; but it was pointed out that it’s dated back to at least the 19th Century; papers in the 1860s sensationalized news. Chris suggested that Edward R. Murrow and other Great Generation reporters had reformed the news beginning in the 40’s, but that it was starting to revert back to its big bad days.


• Karin mentioned photos of her that people had seen and mistakenly turned into racy little stories; taken out of context some of the pictures appeared to be sexually suggestive or violent but those interpretations were always the result of misinterpretation (because Karin was there and knew the context was different than the more dramatic one people assumed).


• Cameras really are everywhere. Bob said the cameras are cheap and are made in such quantity and it is human nature to use them once they are available, they are too useful not to be. As a result, the world is now one step closer to Orwell’s vision in 1984.
  Joe left; Gary moved into Joe’s seat, someone commented that Gary could finally get off the ‘toilet.’


Chris mentioned he sings; We should use all the talents of each cast member, and design the characters to use these specifically.