Precious handbook by SALMA ADIEM

SALMAFLIX

KINGSTON UNIVERSITY 2023

S T A R T

PRECIOUS

DIRECTING PROJECT BY SALMA ADIEM

For every Precious out there, YOU ARE NOT ALONE

How and why I chose this play

Summary

Aims

My adaptation

My script version

Beyond the text

Things that didn't work

Characters

Lights and setting

Rehearsal images

Rehearsal log

Conclusion

Thank you!

Bibliography

How and why did I chose this play

At the beginning of the course, we had a small activity where we had to direct our classmates to see how it feels to be the director. I wanted to do something dramatic in which both characters raise their voices and use their bodies to express different emotions. While my activity failed, I learned two things: Drama and Comedy are separated by a fine line, and sometimes even the saddest situation can become a satire and be funny, which is what happened to me in that activity. And if I wanted to avoid laughs, I should focus on making it less “Telenovela” and using serious topics. At the same time in my “Play Today” lessons we were being taught about the theatre in yer face and using “Blasted” by Sarah Kane as an example of the theatrical movement. At first, I thought that’s what I wanted to do, her play had everything I wanted to represent and do as a director and because of the topics the play covers, it would be difficult to cross the line with comedy and I would only need two or three actors. hold stunning creativity, experiences and stories.

This paragraph is ready to hold stunning creativity, experiences and stories.

I ended up not continuing with Blasted as it was too powerful to represent and it would be harder to summarise everything in a 10-minute play as the story itself develops through time, even if somehow I gave context to each action, it would lose its meaning and power, ending up with a very abstract play about people eating a baby at the end of the play. But I was sure I wanted to keep doing something similar to “In yer face”.That’s when I found “Who is gonna love me?” on YouTube, a short scene from the movie “Precious” in 2009.

Summary 1/3

The scene begins with Mary arriving at the social worker's office. Precious is already there and has spoken with her previously about everything that happened to her, they called Mary to come over to clarify everything that happened to Precious so she can have full custody of her children and continue with her studies and her own life by herself.The scene continues with Ms. Weiss asking specific questions about how the abuse happened, and when and where was Mary. Mary avoids answering by talking about the good times she had with Precious and Carl, Precious’ father and abuser when they were younger, she explains how well she treated Precious as a kid and the happy plans she had with Carl. Ms. Weiss tired of her avoiding the questions, asks her directly how everything happened.

Summary 2/3

She waits a few seconds and decides to talk about her version of the events. She narrates the day when Carl first abused Precious when she was a baby sleeping next to her while she was still in bed watching everything happening. She defends herself by asking what was she meant to do if Precious didn’t complain, scream or say anything about it. She continues crying and asking Ms. Weiss what was she supposed to do when the man she loved was having sexual relations with her daughter and she never said anything as if Precious “stole her man”. The climax begins when she asks “Then, who is gonna love me?” because that one sentence reflects that the problem Precious has goes beyond her father abusing her, her mother was jealous of her because his husband “preferred” her daughter over her.

Summary 3/3

Precious can’t handle it anymore and she stands up for herself, she explains to Ms Weiss that she’s been studying and receiving good grades, and she is planning on going to high school and college. She looks at her mother for the last time and forgives her for the abuse she made her go through and lets her know she won’t see her again, even if she dies. She leaves the room. The scene and movie end with Precious walking on the streets with her two kids.

THEMES

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The original film mentions and goes through experiences with abuse, poverty, illiteracy, young pregnancy and the challenges that Precious faces as a young woman.

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In my directing piece, due to the lack of time, I decided to focus the entire play on the mother-daughter relationship and the sexual abuse Precious suffered. I focused more on the victim's point of view and how she overcomes the situation by putting herself first

AIMS

My aim as a director of a play like Precious was to somehow represent and imitate Sara Kane’s style but without being too extreme. One of my goals was to make a play in which the audience would stay quiet because of the surprise/ reaction of what is going on scene. With Precious’ story, there were many parts to choose from and made an amazing directing piece, the main reason why I chose that particular scene is because of the mother’s reaction to the situation. She only cared about her, “Who was going to love me then” line is what called my attention the most. I was very specific with my aims on this project and I am happy to say that I achieved most of what I expected to happen.

My adaptation

Now that I summarized what happens in the scene I chose, I will begin to explain the changes and adaptations I made to explain my own narrative.

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• To begin with, I adapted the original cinematic script to a theatrical one with neutral English. I erased the use of the N-word, and substitute the repetition of the word “rape” for “abuse”.
• I opened the opportunity to have an open cast, the only thing I left fixed was the gender of Mary and Precious.
• I was open to the idea of having a Mr Weiss if needed. Since I erased words that have any reference to a race or a skin colour, race wasn’t important either even if the actors were mother and daughter.
• To summarise the scene I wanted to do (Originally 10 min) and add some context I cut many monologue parts and focused on that particular scene, I deleted any mention of actions that happens in the movie but are irrelevant to the scene.

• To contextualize and create some sort of connection with Precious to the audience I used a different scene from the middle of the movie in which Mary is physically attacking Precious after giving birth to her second child with Carl. I used the scene as a flashback just right after Mary says “Me and Carl loved Precious” for two reasons, to “Stop the boring part” of the interview and to contrast and show the audience what type of person Mary is since they have only seen her enter to the room and victimize herself. This way I thought of achieving continuity in the play and a proper introduction of both characters. The play goes back to where it was left and now the same room and the same characters, but it feels different now that we know the reality behind why everyone is in that room.
• The rest continues as in the original movie but towards the end when Precious decides to finally speak against her mother I cut some interactions in between to transform it into a monologue, I added the lines “You are my mother and you are supposed to teach me what’s right and wrong…” to dramatize more Precious’ interaction since she barely speaks during the interview, creating an accumulation of anger from Precious waiting to explode and say everything she always wanted to all in one
• The ending part, I erased the part where Precious walks away with her kids for a short scene of her having a mental breakdown destroying the set symbolizing her freedom.

• Bulleted list
• Bulleted list

Sit amet

MY VERSION OF THE SCRIPT

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My version didn't change too much from the original script, all I did is cut mentions from the movie that arent relevant to the scene and modify Mary's way to speak to a neutral english.During Precious moment, there were some interruptions and I also eliminated them so it could be a full monologue. I introduced part of another scene in the middle as a flashback to help to contextualize the story.

Beyond the text

Some things that aren’t written in the script but also meant a lot during the performance.

• Precious never looked at Mary until the end when she stands up. In the house scene, Carl “was there” but because I focused on Mary’s jealousy and anger against Precious, I “represented” his presence with “his pants” on the floor also representing that she was recently sexually abused by him.
• Simultaneously, on the sofa where Precious was crying, there was a stuffed bunny wearing her t-shirt, but her skirt was off. I wanted to represent and remind “Broken Childhood” since Precious is meant to be 15/16 years old but neither in the movie nor in my performance the age is mentioned enough.
• Mary’s confidence deteriorates little by little, when she first enters the scene, she walked securely, but as the play continues her confidence decreases and begins to shutter words and not be able to reply to Precious.
• Ms Weiss was “forcing” herself to keep on character, in the film she keeps professional, but in my adaptation, I wanted her to be able to break that “professionalism” and have more realistic expressions.

Things that didn't work

• One of the ideas I had for the lightning and sound was to add office sounds before Mary enters the scene. Every time Mary and Ms Weiss replied to each other, they would hit the table or stand up to exaggerate the conversation.
• I was going to use the entire scenario as an office, with a nice setting and make it look more like an office, it didn't work because the transition to the house would take a few seconds longer and make it awkward/ break the tension.
• The end scene, since day one I wanted Precious to have a happy ending, years later.
• Through rehearsals, I realised that it ruined the tension and the style of the play since it was very realistic. Precious having a panic attack made more sense to me and it was perfect to continue after the climax.
• For lighting I had a more complicated idea, there was going to be many unnecessary black out for transitions. The use of the script every rehearsal, I should have made an activity to rehearse without them.

CHARACTERS

+ I N F O

CAITLIN FAROO

SHAUNA FOSTER

SAVARNA CHARLES COUBRY

As Ms. Weiss

As Mary

As Precious

TIP: Click on the images to jump to their pages

Mary

She is Precious mother, she is been abusing her own daughter because of jealousy after her husband abuses physically and sexually of her. She feels no remorse for what she did, in fact she believes that she is the victim.

Since she is the total opposite of Precious, she wore a dress and a blazer on top. I wanted her to wear better clothes than Precious since this character loves to pretend that everything was alright. A clear representation of her personality.

"And who was gonna love me then?"

Ms Weiss

She is wearing a formal outfit and constantly writing down what Mary says she did to Precious.

She is the social worker that is helping Precious to have full custody of her children. She feels empathy for Precious and would do anything to help her.

"You shut up and let him rape your daughter?"

Precious

To reflect the difference between her and Mary I choose an opposite style for Precious: Jeans and a jumper, it gives an idea of her personality and by watching the difference of styles between mother and daughter it can also tell the audience how different they are.

Precious is a 15-year-old girl that has suffered different types of abuse throughout her life since she was a baby, the person she was meant to trust the most, made her life miserable. Even after all these bad things that happened to her, she continued with her goals and did the best for herself, in this case, continuing with her studies.

"That's enough mamma!

lights and Setting

Part 4

Part 2

Part 1

Part 3

The ofice.Back to Part one.

Mary and Precious home.Warm lights, with orages tone only focusing the right side of the scenario. A sofa, stuffed toy, Pants and a belt on the floor

The office.Cold lights only focusing the left side of the scenario. One table three chairs and a door facing the audience.

Part 4

From minute 8 to the end

Both sides of the scenario unites in one big piece.Lights begin to blink when Precious crosses the door. Gilded Lily by Cults plays in the background.

REHEARSAL IMAGES

Rehearsal log

1- 8th March. First rehearsal I reunited all the actresses to introduce ourselves and talk about the project and my ideas and warn them about the content. I had an inconvenience with one of the actresses and I decided to substitute her. 2-21st March. Without one of the cast members we had a first rehearsal focused on Mary and Precious going through the script and I was taking notes for some changes. 3- 6th April. With a complete cast and an adapted script, we had a rehearsal using only the office as a set. 4 14th April. Another rehearsal but I experimented with making the actors move around. I had the idea of having a flashback in a different room/ set. Modified the script. 5- 25th April. The script was closed, and we experimented with the play having two settings. Everything went right. Peter recommended I should put the door facing the audience. 6- 3rd May. We had our tech rehearsal. Another fast rehearsal afterwards and at 4 pm the actual presentation.

Overall it has been an amazing experience to be able to experiment with how it feels to be in the management of your own project. I remember that at the beginning of the course, the idea of doing an entire production as a director terrified me and luckily, I can say I was wrong. Both the lessons and the project itself have been fantastic. About my directing piece, there might be things I could have improved or perfected, but I am proud of the work I have done with the actresses, and I was very surprised with my colleague's reaction to it as I never thought I could cause any reaction to the audience.

Salma A

Bibliography

• Script Slug. (2019). Precious (2009) - Script Slug. [online] Available at: https://www.scriptslug.com/script/precious-2009 [Accessed 6 Mar 2023].
• ‌Precious. (2009). Directed by Lee Daniels. Smokewood Entertainment Group. Distributed by Lionsgate Films.
• The Director's Craft SUBTITLE A Handbook for the Theatre EDITION 1 AUTHOR Katie Mitchell "preparing for rehearsals" 9-31

• • Kane, Sarah. Blasted. London: Methuen Drama, 2001. Print. [Accessed 28th March]
• • Nevitt, Lucy. Theatre and Violence, Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 2013. ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/kingston/detail.action?docID=4763858. Page 31-35 [Accessed 4th April]

*The last two were used for another module but I also used them to understand violence in theatre as my play is very violent.

Images bibliography

• Howls of a Life, Buried Deep Within (Published 2009). (2023). The New York Times. [online] Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/06/movies/06precious.html [Accessed 6 Mar 2023].

• Nolfi, J. (2021). Lee Daniels fired ‘disrespectful’ Precious crew after white DP couldn’t light Black skin. [online] EW.com. Available at: https://ew.com/movies/lee-daniels-fired-precious-crew/ [Accessed 12 May 2023].

• Shoji, K. (2010). ‘Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire’. [online] The Japan Times. Available at: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/culture/2010/04/30/films/film-reviews/precious-based-on-the-novel-push-by-sapphire/ [Accessed 12 May 2023].

• Precious (15). (2010). The Independent. [online] 29 Jan. Available at: https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/reviews/precious-15-1882240.html [Accessed 12 May 2023].

• TUCKETT, G. (2010). Film review: Precious. [online] Stuff. Available at: https://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/culture/film-reviews/3299541/Film-review-Precious [Accessed 12 May 2023].

• ‌Box Kingston University By Peter Case