7 Stages Of Grieving Play Analysis

The Seven Stages of Grieving co-written by Wesley Enoch and Deborah Mailman is an emotionally powerful play about the grief of Indigenous people and the hope of reconciliation. It is presented a series of theatrical episodes that follow the journey of an Aboriginal woman. The contemporary play shares true and personal stories and focuses on the issues that separate and unite Indigenous and non-Indigenous people. This play uses many techniques and conventions to convey the problems raised, and I believe every group performance used these techniques to their advantage to create an inspiring and reflective piece.

The first group, We’re not fighting, we’re grieving (WNFWG) used many elements of drama to enhance their performance. Their first piece, Photography Stories was based around family connection and how life is so easily forgotten when the photos that once hang proudly on the wall get put away to make space for others. How memories get lost once a person is decease. I felt that the group did an amazing job at conveying the emotions throughout this piece. The photographs became a symbol of loss and death. Every time one was put in the suitcases, the audience watched a connection with family being broken because we had just watched the their characters story. While observing the characters life; being born and growing up the audience form a connection because their can relate. The group
incorporated these story lines to draw the audience in and through there use of mood and atmosphere make the onlookers reflect on the piece, silently asking if they forget push away their memories in the same way. The piece also contained great use of proxemics and space when is the different family photos. The audience was able to understand the relationships between each character by how close or far away each individual was from one. For example when Charlotte (Stella) meets her grandchild for the first time the family gather round suggesting a close and tight family. The body language also conveyed how happy the family were because of the new born.

In the groups third piece consisted of a very dark tone and atmosphere. The piece Mugshot, was based around police brutality towards Aboriginal people. The scene started in court with Stella explaining as a Jury, what felony had taken place. The way Stella spoke created en immense amount of tension because of how serious her tone was. It mad the audience aware of how grave issue raised was. Throughout the whole piece, movement was used to great lengths to express different characters or changes in moods. For example Ella H and Ella S were often running into scenes suggesting they were teenagers or young adults with lots of energy. When the scenes slowed down or when slow motion was used is created tension and suspense because the audience understood something major was about to happen. The group also incorporated sounds cleverly into their piece. When the teenagers were mucking about and joking around there was lots of laughing and loud talking or singing and then when something serious happen everyone was quite so the audience would just focus on the major issue at hand. This was exceedingly effect in the way it created a change in the mood of the piece.

The group that performed last with Caitlin, Csilla, Erin and Lou did an amazing performance on loss of culture. It really stood out because of the emotions and facial expressions each character had at the confusion of the situation. The piece was about the how Indigenous people struggle to get back their culture after being ‘branded’ with white culture. The initial movements and expressions of the characters lead the audience to believe the girls sitting and playing were just children suggesting innocence and this is reenforced when there was confusion on their faces due to the alphabet appearing on their clothes. The emotion in this piece was demonstrated very powerfully as the realisation go their lost of culture hits them and the characters become frantic to take of the letters only to find a Z branded on their chest. Through most of this play there was little or no talking. This silence created very good imagery and this was extremely effective as all you could hear was desperation everyones breath as they tried to erase the white culture from them. There wasn't a lot a movement in the piece but the body language presented made up for it. The entire cast had straight backs and a confident stance while they where chatting to each other but as soon as the letters appeared they began to slouch more and look around the room more conveying to the audience they were suddenly scared of what was happening.

The Seven Stages of Grieving is quite a hard play to perform in a group as it was made for one person but I think each group did an excellent job of adjusting the pieces accordingly to suit the conditions.
I believe each group managed to send a clear message to the audience about loss and grieving but still keeping our own characteristics and personality into the play to make it our own. Every group used a wide range of techniques and conventions to help inform the audience of the themes and issues focused on in the play and created powerful adaptions of already told
stories.