Year 8: Commedia Dell’Arte

Learning objectives:
Throughout this scheme of work students will:
 Learn about the history of Commedia Dell’arte
 Develop their physical theatre skills, focusing on mime and slapstick comedy
 Understand the conventions of the stock characters within Commedia Dell’Arte.
 Create lazzi

Week Activities
1 Objectives Today you will learn the LESSON TITLE: Getting Physical
following:
• What slapstick Bell Work (3 mins):
comedy is and the As pupils enter the room get them to organise themselves into register order in total
conventions of this silence and then sit in a semi-circle facing the teacher.
style.
Keywords Slapstick Comedy TAKE THE REGISTER
Mime
Resources  PowerPoint – ‘1. Share learning objectives
Lesson 1’
Drama Rules (6 mins):
Go through the drama rules as set out on the PowerPoint. Ensure that you point out
that the beginning letters spell the word Drama. As you go through each, share your
own interpretation of the rules of your drama classroom and your expectations.

Starter: Stop. Go. Clap. Jump. (7 mins):

This is a game of concentration and focus. Ask pupils to walk around the room. As
they do you give them instructions which may be stop, go, clap or jump. As you say
these, they should complete the action. Once you have established these actions,
swap the action with the word so that stop means go, go means stop, clap means
jump, and jump means clap.

Development: Slapstick Comedy – Make ‘Em Laugh (8 minutes)

Show the video on the slide: a clip from Singing in the Rain of a song – Make ‘Em
Laugh. It is an example of slapstick comedy. As they watch, use whiteboards for
pupils to make notes about the questions on the slide:
 This is an example of slapstick comedy, but how does the actor use physical
skills to try to create comedy?
 Can you pick out particular moments or actions that are funny?
 If you had to define slapstick comedy based on this performance, what
would your definition be?

Take feedback after the video ends.

Key Vocabulary (4 minutes):

Share the key vocabulary with pupils. Get them to recite the definitions all together
as a group.

Go through the slide talking through the ingredients of slapstick comedy.

Mime – What am I doing? (5 minutes):

Get pupils into pairs where they take turns to mime everyday activities, which could
be things like getting up out of bed, getting dressed, brushing teeth, eating breakfast,
going to school.

Pupils should make the mime as clear as possible for their partner to guess.

Main Task: Storytelling Mime (15 minutes):

Task One (5 minutes):
 this is an individual task. Pupil should decide on a title or theme for a mine eg
walking the dog or the mistake and writes their story out. Try to create the mine
based on an everyday or regular activity that they do. This will help them to think
through the detail an make the mind clear. Explain that's just as any story you should
have a beginning, middle and end but also something that happens to change the
course of events. This could be funny and remind the people's that it is all imagined
so it can be as fantastical as they like.

Task Two (10 minutes):

Once pupils are happy with the story outline, they should start developing the mine.
If they start with the beginning of the mind first and add the physical gestures and
actions, then they can add emotions. For example, where is the dog lead kept? Do
you put your shoes and coat on first? What time of year is it? Is the dog very excited
when going for a walk. Encouraged the pupils to build the mind slowly but initially
keep within a time limit of one minute per section when they have created the mind
they should think about pace as they might need to slow some of the action down or
make it quicker.
Remind people's that they don't have words to help them to tell the story so they
must use facial expression movement and gesture to help make a clear mind. They
should exaggerate everything. They should use things like pratfalls and mild comic
violence to find comedy within their mind. This is that there my name is comedic
and funny.

Plenary: Spotlight
Peoples should pair up with another to watch their mime. as they do they should
consider the following questions:
 What did the performer do to make their mime clear?
 Describe a funny moment within the mime.
 What could they have done to improve the accuracy of the mime or the
comedy within the mime?
2 Objectives Today you will learn the LESSON TITLE: Finding your Voice
 following:
• What Gromalot is and Bell Work: Just a Minute (1 minute plus 2 for feedback):
how to use it within Sitting in their semi-circle, pair pupils with the person next to them. Between the
performance. pair, they will speak for one minute in total: just 30 seconds each.
• How vocal skills can
be used to The person on the right will speak first and then they will swap.
communicate to the
audience without the Today’s topic: What is slapstick comedy? What is mime? Which skills are
use of language. important to make these successful?
Keywords Gromalot
Tone TAKE THE REGISTER
Inflection
Intonation Share learning objectives
Resources  PowerPoint – ‘2. Starter: Pass the Chewing Gum (6 minutes)
Lesson 2’ Students stand in a circle and the teacher takes an imaginary piece of chewing gum
from behind their own ear. The teacher explains that this is a magic piece of gum as
it is constantly changing flavour and that in order to really get the most out of this
chewing gum, the student has to chew hard.

The teacher then pops the gum into their mouth and chews, making ‘mmmmm’
noises and perhaps even communicating the flavour between chews, ‘mmmm red
velvet cake flavour!’

Then after a melodramatic chewing session, the teacher passes it on to the next
student who will take the imaginary gum and chew it. The gum gets passed around
until everyone gets a chew.

Development: Gromalot (3 minutes):

Watch the video on the slide which explains Gromalot. Allow pupils to ask
questions if they have any.
 Key Vocabulary (8 minutes):
Share the key vocabulary with pupils. Get them to recite the definitions all together
as a group.

Development: Using Gromalot (4 minutes):

Teacher is to demonstrate the use of Gromalot. They should take on an obvious role,
for example and air hostess, or teacher, or police officer, or member of the royal
family, and so on, and try to communicate this character without using English
language but by changing their voice and using some mime. Pupils to use
whiteboards to write down their guesses for the character or situation being
demonstrated by the teacher.

Main Task – Making a Scene (20 minutes):

In groups of no more than four, pupils need to create a short comedic scene They
should make use of mime, slapstick comedy and Gromalot. Their scene should be
titled either The Gathering, Mission Impossible or An Awful Journey. Remind them
to exaggerate everything by physically and vocally as well as to tell a story within
their piece.

Spotlight (10 minutes): Watch back two or three performances, giving positive
feedback for each about how well they have achieved the task using key vocabulary
where possible. As we watch these scenes back, ask pupils to consider the
following:
 What did the performer do to make their voice clear?
 Describe a funny moment within the performance.
 What could they have done to improve the accuracy of the vocals or the
comedy within the mime?

Plenary: Name that Keyword (6 minutes):

Pupils are given definitions for keywords and must write wha the keyword is.
3 Objectives Today you will learn: LESSON TITLE: Hierarchy and Status
 • The drama
techniques: still image TAKE THE REGISTER
and thought-tracking.
• The physical skill: Share learning objectives
proximity.
• How these techniques Starter: Animal Walks (7 mins):
can be used to Many actors use animals to inspire themselves in their work in character building
communicate ideas to and movement. One classic direction in an audition is “Do your monologue again
the audience. but this time with the movement of a lion.” (Or any other animal the audition panel
Keywords Stock Character feels is suited to the character.)
Status
Resources  PowerPoint – ‘3. Ask the students to walk around the room and tell them that when you call out an
Lesson 3’ animal, they need to respond by physically embodying that animal. They should go
for it completely, becoming animal like and unafraid of what others might think.
There is no need to add any vocalisation to the animal. The teacher can call out any
animal: lion, puppy, fox, swan, mouse, gorilla, elephant, etc.

If the teacher starts with the lion, ask the students to really think about how that
particular animal moves. Is the animal slow or fast? Predatory or submissive? How
do they move their spines? Their heads? Where does their centre of energy come
from? Teenagers might need a bit more encouraging and energy thrown at them by
the teacher to participate fully.
Once the class has done this for about 5 minutes, explain that you would like them
to walk around the room as humans but still displaying the traits of the animal called
out. If, for example, the teacher calls out lion, the students will walk around on two
legs, but they will adapt their movement to be more lion like - perhaps slowing
down, or becoming slightly aggressive, or flicking their hair every so often.

Key Vocabulary 1 (4 mins):

Share the key vocabulary with pupils. Get them to recite the definition all together
as a group.

Commedia Dell’Arte (10 minutes):

Show pupils the information video.

Development: Status (6 minutes):

Pupils to number themselves 1-12 based upon their birth month (Jan = 1, Feb = 2,
etc.) 1 is the lowest of the low, with absolutely no status, with 12 being royalty.
Pupils must move around the space, first walking like someone of the relative status,
and then they can talk with one another, greeting each other. As they do this, they
should try to work out who is higher status and who is lower status than them. They
should share their ideas about who they believe was higher or lower, but more
importantly, what made them think that.

Centres of Leading (5 minutes):

Each of the Commedia stock characters walks lead with a different body part. In
order to work on this idea, ask pupils to walk around the room, and request body
parts for them to lead with, You will likely need to demonstrate how this looks.
Suggest they lead with their head, chest, nose, knee, feet, etc. Ask them to try to turn
this walk into a character.

Becoming Commedia Characters (15 minutes):

Read through the information slide talking through the four stock characters we will
focus on: Magnifico, Pantalone, Il Dottore and Zanni.

Next, watch the video. It works as a guide to get everyone walking like the
characters, Work through this with pupils. You will need to demonstrate this at the
same time.

Plenary: Knowledge Check (5 minutes):

Pupils to answer these five questions:
 1. In which country did Commedia Dell’Arte originate?
2. What is a stock character?
3. Which character is at the top f the hierarchy?
4. Which character is at the bottom of the hierarchy?
5. Describe the personalities of Il Dottore and Pantalone.

4 Objectives Today you will learn the LESSON TITLE: Lazzi

following:
• What a lazzi is. Bell Work – Who’s Who? (5 minutes):
• How to create a lazzi Pupils to look at the images of the stock characters and match them to the correct
using the skills we name.
have developed so far
this term. TAKE THE REGISTER
Keywords Stock Character
Status Share learning objectives
Lazzi
Resources  PowerPoint – ‘4. Starter: Status (6 minutes):
Lesson 4’ In pairs, get pupils to label themselves A and B.
• A will begin.
• A is a master, B is a servant.
• A will give B a job to do. B will complete that job and then say to A, “What
shall I do now?”
• B should repeat this until they are given a new job.
• A has to keep coming up with jobs.
• If A hesitates or can’t come up with anything, B becomes the master, and A
the servant.

Key Vocabulary (2 minutes):

Share the key vocabulary with pupils. Get them to recite the definitions all together
as a group.
Development – Lazzi (10 minutes)
Pupils to create a lazzi, but not yet using the Commedia stock characters. In groups
of three, they should create one of these short scenes:
• A butler saying ‘Walk this way’ and the guests walk exactly the same way
the butler walks - mimicking his walk.
• A phone or the doorbell rings, a character finds out it’s his/her mother, and
frantically hides.
• Someone tries to hide by pretending to be a statue or putting a lampshade on
their head.
• Twins switching places to try to get out of a problem and then end up getting
into worse trouble than before.
•
Watch them back, giving feedback.
Main Task: Creating a Lazzi (5-minute set-up, 20 minute rehearsal):
In groups of four, pupils are going to create a lazzi involving Magnifico, Il Dotorre,
Pantalone and Zanni.

Spotlight/ Plenary (15 mins):

Watch back all of the performances. As the audience watch, get them to write ideas
to the following questions on whiteboards for each group:
• Why were the still images that were used successful?
• Give an example of a useful thought-track?
• Describe how someone used particularly effective vocal expressions to
communicate with the audience?