Choose a primary character? Type the name of the character and the play that they are in.
Girlfriend in the play Really
What are five relevant Given Circumstances to that character? Use a sentence to explain each one so you have five sentences total.
Girlfriend is an artist so she was drawn to Calvin. She got into photography so that’s why she’s taking pictures the whole play. Calvin was her partner so that’s why his mother is in the apartment with her.She admired Calvin’s work as an artist and was even a bit jealous of it. Girlfriend is also upset and broken with Calvin’s death and that’s why she doesn’t speak much and gets upset with herself at the end.
What do they want and Why do they want this? Use three sentences to answer this.
Girlfriend wants two things, she wants Calvin back so that she can continue to work with him, love him, and support him, and she also wants her own art to flourish and be something worth remembering. She misses Calvin and admiring his work whilst he loved her and told her she was beautiful all the time. She also wants her own art to be seen as something better because she feels upset that she’ll never be as good as Calvin was.
What are five examples of tactics/verbs that they use throughout the play? Five Verbs
Question
Guilt
Attack
Assist
Comfort
Cite an example/moment in the play where they use that tactic/verb? One sentence
Verb - Attack ( Pg. 63 Mother.)
Girlfriend: “He’s not the kind of person that would-”
Mother: (A cold stab) “You have no idea what kind of person Calvin is.”
Girlfriend: “I don’t--I’m sorry?”
Mother: “He’s my son, I don't think you have the right to put these ideas into the world, when he has no recourse available to defend himself.”
Monologue
What page number is the monologue you are looking at from? Single word
Page 68
Who are they speaking to and what is their relationship to that person/people? Single sentence.
Girlfriend is answering Mother’s question of “are you all right?”
What do they want from the person/people they are talking to? Single sentence
She wants to let out her negative feelings about her work and her life since Calvin is gone, she just wants to be listened to and comforted with her concerns.
Why do they speak uninterrupted? Think about this a little. Normally, we don’t get to just talk a long time without another person answering us. Political Speeches are an example where the speaker is uninterrupted. A Thank You speech after getting a reward. Why does this character get to speak uninterrupted? What is your opinion? Five Sentences
I think Girlfriend speaks interrupted here for a number of different reasons. One being that the type of conversation her and Mother are having contains a lot of rambling about how they feel, being they don’t have a lot to speak about. Another reason is that she’s very emotional, both characters are, so if they’re talking about something serious like Calvin, they listen to each other. Girlfriend is also praising Calvin in the monologue, which is stuff that Mother would like to hear so she lets her speak. Lastly it’s just them two in the room, so besides for a few times, both characters don;’t really interrupt each other when speaking.
Themes
What would you identify as the theme of the play? What is the play About? Five Sentences
I think the Theme of the play was about self-image when you get deep into the roots. This play was about two women both together sharing the grief from the same loss. However, Girlfriend doesn’t speak much in the entire play, unless she’s talking about Calvin. Mother just rambles on and on until she gets Girlfriend to reply to certain things, mostly about Calvin. The whole play, both these characters are kind of self-destructing into themselves, Mother with her pills, and Girlfriend with her art. Both characters seem lost without Calvin even though he didn’t seem like he helped them all that much, And both character’s lives seem to go downhill and live in self-loathe after Calvin is gone. So I think the theme is a commentary about how these characters live and deal with themselves after a change like that.
What in the play resonated with you right now? What felt relevant to you? What did you identify with? Five sentences.
I think a couple of things in the play resonated with me. For one, at the end when Girlfriend is worried about her life and saying she’ll never be as good as Calvin, that’s a fear we all have when we lose someone great, and I think we want to make dead people [proud to honor them in a way. This is relevant to me because I have a few people in my life that I try to do good by even though they’re not around anymore. Also I think it’s very relatable how they’re just taking pictures of each other the whole time while having this very real conversation, something that we do in life to try and ease the pressure of hard situations. I also feel bad for Mother, because the character reminds me of a person I know who suffered a great loss in high school, and she just wanted to talk about anything but what had happened, so she would ramble on about anything just like Mother did in this play, to try and lighten the pain a little bit and that mannerism definitely resonated with me.
This is great Remey. You engaged with the play's core ideas and found ways that they resonated with you. Well done.