STEPHANIE MANN
Start From The Beginning Portfolio
About Me
My name is Stephanie Mann, and I am one of the four founders of Hargraves St. Productions.
I have been devising and performing in the theatrical field since 2013 in both ensemble and solo shows.
I began free-lance scriptwriting in 2017 and have held supporting roles in productions such as 'It’s My Party and I’ll Die If I Want To' and 'Freakshow'.
With the desire to expand on my acting abilities, I began to delve into screen acting. This is an avenue that I want to continue exploring in the future, however, theatre still holds a special place in my heart.
Within the production 'Start From The Beginning', I assumed the roles of director, performer and web designer, as well as working collaboratively on devising and scriptwriting.
START FROM THE BEGINNING
Start from the Beginning was a 24-minute online Zoom performance with a combination of pre-recorded and live elements.
Inspired by the true stories of the women around us, the show invited the audience to witness the ongoing impacts and trauma of abuse. The production aimed to highlight the prevalent issue of domestic abuse towards women in Australia, which had been further exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic.
The show draws from a multitude of source materials and dramaturgies; most notably Theatre of the Absurd, Epic Theatre and Feminist Theatre with moments of realism.
‘During the course of a performance, when does an audience become a community?’
~ Anne Bogart
‘What’s the Question’ (2013)
During the Covid-19 pandemic, this question posed by Anne Bogart became even more pertinent as theatre made its transformation into an online medium.
Luckily, community isn’t based on physically being together (although it helps immensely). To me, an audience becomes a community through the shared experience. When a performance creates a common ethos, which cannot be denied even with the viewers being in separate locations.
Being physically in a theatre allows for that wonderful moment when a viewer looks around at the people surrounding them and realize that they are all, at least in that one moment, feeling the same. With the performers using direct address within the live elements of ‘Start From The Beginning’, audience members could still receive this confirmation from the actors themselves.
The themes present in the performance already brings forth a pre-established community around domestic violence against women however, it also allows for those who are not to experience that ethos and to hopefully join said community.