A special edition of FLAL newsletter for the Annual Play

How King LearLed a BetrayedWife GoneAstray“Acting always fascinates me,” said SelenaWu, who plays Tracy Wendice, the leadactress for Dial M for Murder. “Because thereis a strong connection between reality andacting.”

The reason Selena chose to play Tracy cantrace back to an acting experience at Highschool, when she participated inShakespeare’s play King Lear, acting theking’s elder daughter, Goneril.

Selena Wu pointed out that this charactershared similarities with Tracy. “They are bothpious,” said Selena. “For personal intentions,they pretend to be kind, nice, and faithful.

However, Selena believes that Tracy is evenmore difficult to interpret, because, comparedto Goneril, Tracy is more sophisticated andshrewder. “Tracy hides her hatred, anger andpains so that she can manipulate her plans,”said Selena. “Unlike Goneril, who exposes herevilness immediately after she gets what shewants, Tracy hides her secret through thewhole play.”

By Michelle Kuo

Selena indicated that the long period oflying makes the character hard to playsince she has to show audience bothinner and outer part of the role.Otherwise, it is possible that audiencewould mistake Tracy’s real motives.Nevertheless, the difficulty doesn’t turnher away. “The demanding requirementintrigues me since I can connect thischaracter with the past character Iplayed before. It is really amazing,” shesaid.

Vivian Chen, the assistant director, sawthe difficulties Selena faced with."Tracy has a more complex personalitythan some other characters and is moredifficult to portray, especially forSelena," she said. "Selena is a veryfriendly and kind-hearted person whonever thinks of hurting anybody’sfeelings."

“Selena is not like Tracy at all,” saidKineta Lai, the event generalcoordinator. “She is a kind and naïvegirl who is always willing to helpclassmates.” Kineta emphasizes thatSelena’s personalities are far fromTracy’s. “Unlike Tracy, who is mucholder and more scheming. Selena issimple. The difference may make itdifficult for her to play out Tracy.”

“Selena found out the connectionbetween her own personalities andthe character’s,” said Nita Huang, thegroup leader of script team, who isone of the members realizing theimages of the character the mostsince she is in charge of adapting thewhole script. Nita said that actuallySelena’s performance is beyond herexpectation.

Selena knows that her personality isfar from that of Tracy. Fortunately,she has another experience thatmakes interpreting her role easier—her recent personal life is similar toTracy’s in the play coincidentally.

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Although it is a little sad, Selenaindicated that through theexperience, she can put herself inTracy’s shoes. Her story happened atthe end of last semester, when shehad chemistry with a person who sheis willing to develop romanticrelationship with.

They share their feelings, emotions, and lifetogether. When Selena considered to haveanother step further, the boy fell in love withanother girl without any warning. “I have noright to interfere with his decision since we arenot in the relationship officially,” said Selena.“However, I felt that I was betrayed.”

Selena said she could hardly be angry atMarven and Alice in the beginning, since theyare kind people and also partners for this play.“But after the incident, I started to transfer theexperience to the character Tracy, who has adisloyal husband,” she said.

“It is interesting that I started to view Marvenas the guy in real life,” said Selena. “Looking atMarven, I can feel that there is a burst of angerin my heart. My eyes will be sharp andferocious. Furthermore, the experience makesme understand Tracy’s hardship, including thesorrow and struggle which turned a traditionallygood wife to a cruel murderer.”

Selena has four rehearsals, for two to four hourseach. “I spend about 12 hours for the rehearsalevery week,” said Selena. “And the hours willbe increased, which is kind of tiresome,especially during the mid-term week.”

Although Selena considered the rehearsals to beoverloading, Kineta said Selena was diligentand never lax. “Selena is a self-disciplinedperson,” said Kineta. “Her character has morelines than others, so she often read her scripts.”Kineta added, “Despite the difficulties, Selenanever complains.”

Aileen Okeke, an actress who playsSwann, also attached the diligencelabel on Selena. “Selena is diligent,using a systematic note-taking toorganize the skills,” said Aileen. “Shewrites down lots of details, includinggestures, emotions, or poses,especially on the long dialogues,together with the director’srequirements, other actress or actor’sadvice and her own reflections.”

In addition to reciting the scripts,Kineta also mentioned that Selenapays attentions to the lecture andtrainings from the acting coach.

“The instructor told her that charactersshould be alive. Actress has to bringherself into the character,” said Kineta.“She always keeps the advice at herheart. But I hope Selena can be lessharsh to herself, because she often toldme that she fears that she is lagging behind.”

Selena also shared a short story. Atthe beginning, her gestures andposes are tedious and awkward whenshe has the long dialogues withSwann. Therefore, acting instructorasked her and Swann to sit on thechairs separately so they can onlyperform by their limbs and heads.

“The stillness of our body forces meto focus on my expression and subtlegestures,” said Selena. “It is quiteuseful.” Afterward, Selena foundthat she has grasped some skillsabout performing. “After I got thetips, I noticed that everyone wouldraise their head in the dialogue part.”Selena said excitedly, “It wasunforgettable that everyone focusedon us. It just like, you know, myperformance was recognized by theaudience.”

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On stage, the charming gentleman on thefence over two lovely women, wouldmomentarily find himself paying the pricefor the extramarital affairs, which led tounexpected consequences for hisirresoluteness. With at least 30 years’ agegap, it is not easy to act like a man who ismiddle-aged, so playing such a role needsboth preparation and courage. GeraldChang is the one who rises to thechallenge.

“I didn’t even attend the audition,” saidGerald. Last October, when the directorsstarted enlisting the crew, students appliedfor the audition, but not Gerald. He hadnever considered becoming one of theactors. “I was worried that I’m not goodenough and cannot perform well,” saidGerald. “I could become the liability forothers.”

For Gerald, anxiety over falling short of aperfect performance is the first hurdleGerald should conquer.

“I didn’t have any experience performingon stage,” explained Gerald. “Even thoughI know there are acting classes for us, I stilldidn’t think I could do as well as others insuch a short time.”

In any case, he didn't feel like he is thebest person to play Marven, the leadingrole. “Those were just for fun. I’d neverparticipated in a play which has a deadlineand would be watched so seriously,”Gerald noted. For him, the annual play is atotally different game, because it will bestaged in a big hall while every nuancewill be watched carefully. So, instead offun, this is pressure.

While the lack of confidence on the part ofGerald became a hindrance to stepforward, directors and other actors spentthree weeks calling him, convincing him totake part in the play. Finally, althoughworries remained in his heart, Geraldnodded, not wanting to disappoint thedirectors and other actors. He decided notto be on the sideline, formally becomingMarven.

Even though it took time, Sara Hsu, one ofthe three directors, had never worried. “Ialways believed that he would join useventually,” said Sara. “Gerald is not anaggressive person, this is exactly why he isthe perfect candidate for Marven, acharacter who is irresolute.” .

A LittleBooze Makesa PerfectMan inAction By Sharon Wen

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As for the character, Marven is a little bitgreedy and an irresolute person in therelationship. He found himself tornbetween Alice and Tracy. The age gap, theexperience an adult male should have, andthe different characteristics andbackground were the difficulties thatGerald was facing

Gerald, in fact, did some minor rolesbefore: one for the role play during thefreshman year, and the other was for acomedy in the summer camp. In bothcases though, his roles were no more thanjust passersby.

“During the first rehearsal, even theaudience and professors told me that Ilooked nervous,” said Gerald. “But mynerves did not come from acting infront of people. It was from the worriesof not doing well.”

“I think that he is that kind of personwho is highly self-demanding,” saidSelena Wu, who played Tracy. “Hewanted to put in all efforts to do everypart well.”

Gerald recognizes the weakness ofhimself, and he knows how to deal withit. “The only way to fix this problem isto be one hundred percent well-prepared, like practicing beforepresentation at school.”

Along the way, Gerald kept finding hisown way to achieve a betterperformance. One is the fighting scene,one of the climaxes of the play and hisfavorite part. It only lasts for about oneminute, but for the sake of completingthe whole series of action, it isimportant to have great camaraderiebetween two protagonists. Every moveand all actions had been adjusted manytimes.

“This part had been revised so manytimes, but the point is that every timewe got totally different results from theprevious one,” said Gerald.

“We couldn’t figure out how to act pantingwith the fight,” Sara shared. They trieddifferent ways like climbing on stairs andrunning, but still couldn’t find a solution.“One day we called him to come to practiceafter he drank some alcohol, we surprisinglyfound that he could perfectly act out beingshort of breath, presenting the fighting scenebetter.”

“I don't know whether others notice it, buthe is a good observer of acting,” said AileenOkeke, who plays Swann. Behind hisnervousness and self-doubt, Aileen still seeshis advantages.

“I found that it was not hard for us tocooperate with each other,” said Aileen. “Ithink it is because he is good at observing,and he can give the right reaction back to us.Besides, even when he had no line, he stillgave a good reaction and listened carefullyto others, rather than standing there anddoing nothing.”

To improve his acting skills, Gerald said healways needed to watch videos of rehearsalafter getting home. “It is hard for an actor toimagine how audiences feel under thestage,” he added. At home, he would readthe script again and again to mark thedifferences and to develop into his acting.

“Though the annual play took me a lot oftime and there are rooms for improving,”Gerald said. “This is a special experience forme, and I did learn many things from it.”

“It’s hard for me to express theemotions,” Gerald said. “I cannotexpress my feelings and act out what Iwas imagining.” In the acting class, anactivity called wandering is one of theimpressive activities for him. “Theteacher gave us an adjective asinstruction and asked us to imaginewhat we would do or how we wouldreact,” recalled Gerald. “I think this isthe hard part for me, because I cannotjust depend on my imagination withoutclear instruction.”

“I think writing acting diary is a goodway of helping me to assert myself intothe character,” Gerald shared how heprepared for the character. In the actingdiary, actor penned the life and whatthe character would think. Through theacting diary, Gerald can get over hisweakness and understand thebackground of the character better.

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The story of Hua Mulan, a woman whodisguised herself into a man for joiningthe army in replace of her father, hasbeen a household anecdote for mostpeople. In “Dial M for Murder,” anactress is going to present a malecharacter with no disguise. She is readyto convince the audience that she is aman with her superb acting.

Charlie Alexander C.A. Swann, adissolute man, is a supporting characterin the play. All his sets seem normal, butwhat makes him out of the ordinary isthat—he is going to be interpreted by anactress, Aileen Okeke.

“As an actress, how I present a malecharacter will provide the audienceanother perspective to see this role,” said Aileen. “I could describe Swannwith three key words: opportunistic,shady, and driven.” Aileen explained,“Before we start acting, we should getfamiliar with our characters. My methodis to assume his life in college.”

“Swann was born with a silver spoon in hismouth,” said Aileen. We can imagine thathe grew up under pressure. It is because ofhis background that he was forced to dowicked deeds. “To some degree, Swanndeserves sympathy,” Aileen noted.

When it comes to the difficultiesinterpreting the role, as a woman cross-dressed as a man, Aileen has many to share.

“I spend time on my movements,” she said.The position she stands, the pace she takes,to the posture she sits, all the motions aremeticulously designed. During this process,Aileen also finds some differences betweenfemales and males. “For example, men tendto have a larger range of motion. It is theway to how they show they are masculine,”said Aileen.

Besides movements, clothes and makeupare also keys to a successful woman cross-dressed as a man. A good look will alsohelp Aileen act as a man from the interiorto the exterior. An impressing image-building gives credit to our make-up andcostume team.

“We put a great emphasis on contouringwhen putting up makeup,” said Grace Lu,in charge of Swann’s makeup. “We wantSwann to have an angular face. Anotherobvious feature is his eyebrow.”

Women tend to have a pair of eyebrowsin the shape of arch. To decrease thefeminine look of Aileen, Grace makesher eyebrows with a sharper angle.

“We also tried putting on false eyelashesto make her eye look bigger,” saidGrace, giving a wry smile. “But the falseeyelashes only make her look morewomanish, which end up being abackfire.”

This embarrassing situation didn’thappen to Marven, a male characterplayed by a male actor. As a result,Swann is the only character being on thestage without false eyelashes.

A VersatileActress insidea DissoluteCharacterBy Selina Chang

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Swann’s shoes are in a bigger size,compared to the size which fits him. Suitwith thick shoulder pads is alsoindispensable. While most actors wearwatches as accessories, Swann has awatch with a bigger dial. From head totoe, all his components aim to give him arugged look.

“For example, we all agree that dissoluteis a feature of Swann, but it’s notbecause he is a man that he is dissolute,”Ken explained. “A characteristic of aperson usually has a direct link to theperson himself or herself. That is, weshould step backward, take a look at thestory behind the character, and figure outwhat makes the character this way.”

As for how to analyze the character,Aileen finds her own way. Being fond ofwatching movies, she is good atevaluating characters with differentbackgrounds. Moreover, findingsimilarities between different charactersis also helpful for her to interpret thecharacter better: she has her original ideatoward roles in the play.

“Take Hazel for example,” said Aileen,“she is quite similar to Jordan Belfort,the main character from the movie TheWolf of Wall Street—both of them areapparently oppressive while calculatingin their minds.”

Acting involves a great versatility indifferent aspects. For instance, bodyexpression, plot presentation, and roleinterpretation. It is even harder when theactor or actress has to overcome theobstacles of gender differences.However, Aileen shows us her abilitythrough her assiduous efforts, becauseshe knows her way around acting.

Another challenge is voice. Obviously, womentalk in a higher pitch. At first, Aileen tried tolower her voice, making her voice soundshusky, which in turn affected her performance.“When Aileen lowered her voice, we can senseher feeling awkward,” said Ivy. “It makes herfeel less self-conscious about her performing,which is the last thing we want to see.”

This predicament is also challenging for Tracy,the character who puts on a rival show withSwann. Selena Wu, the actress as Tracy, said,“We had a hard time deciding whether Aileenshould lower her voice or not. For me, it is hardto imagine it is a man talking to me, withAileen’s original voice. On the other hand, it isnot easy for Aileen to act in an uncomfortablecondition.”

Selena also mentioned that it was hard for herwhen she needs to imagine Aileen to be a man.“There is a scene where Tracy has to seduceSwann,” said Selena. “It is quite challenging forme at the beginning. Since I have known her fora long time, I can’t help but viewing Aileen asherself. But when we all get into characters, thisproblem was gradually solved.”

When it comes to the performance,Ivy Sun, the director, has a specialtip—She holds a meeting withactors and actresses. They discussthe characters toward themotivation behind his or heractions. She further helps theactors and actresses to get athorough understanding of theircharacters.

It may seem that the process ofrehearsal goes smoothly, but thereare still difficulties theyencountered. “Compared to theactions, the thinking modes of menare harder to emulate,” said Ivy.“For instance, it’s easy for Aileento imitate a man’s action, but shehas no idea when she should applyit to her performance.”

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However, the acting instructor provides Aileenwith a different idea. “Instead of focusing onhow to act like a man,” said Ken Chung. “Weshould focus more on how to present thecharacters, which has nothing to do with whatgender the character is.

This time, Annie decided to play the roleof a supporting actress. In contrast to theleading actress, Alice is more active andemotional. Before knowing whetherMarven is innocent, Alice tries to saveher lover with whatever means they maybe. “Alice is a special character in theplay,” said the head of stage props.Besides her American identity, Alicealways wears bright-colored clothes,rather than dark costumes that otherprotagonists wear.

“I think my personal traits are like Alice,and I am very imaginative,” said Annie,noting her way to play the role. First, sheread the script carefully over and over,and then she started to imagine the tone,the movement, and the gesture of eachscene. The passion and experience inacting made all the difference.

“From the beginning of our rehearsal,we barely needed to tell her what todo because she seemed to have theideas already in her mind,” said SaraHsu, an assistant director. In a scene,Marven and the leading actress Tracytalk in the front, and Alice andSophie, a police officer, stand behind.The director did not tell Annie to doanything, while she went to Sophieand started to talk to her, lettingSophie write and draw somethingdown like they were discussing thecase, increasing the richness of thescene.

However, Annie has some difficultieswhen it comes to show the audienceher relationship with Marven. “It’spretty hard for us to perform like acouple at first,” said Gerald Chang,who plays Marven. At the beginning,Gerald and Annie cannot get in thecharacter, and Gerald even wanted tolaugh whenever he looked at Annie,feeling awkward and embarrassed.

“We’ve tried many gestures andpositions to be more like a couple,but they all look weird and funnywithout emotions in us,” said Tsai.

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A SupportingActress Playinga Leading RoleOff StageAnnie Tsai, who takes the role of AliceHalliday, must be one of the mostanticipating actresses for “Dial M forMurder” for two reasons. One is that she isnot only enthusiastic about but alsooutstanding in acting, and another is herpersonal traits.

Annie has always been interested in acting.Her experience in acting can be traced backto the time when she was in senior highschool, when she played two small roles inthe English drama contests. In addition toacting on stage, she was one of stagehandsin costume design. What’s more, she wasthe director of the role play at FLAL.Therefore, it is easier for her to understandhow to perform and what the expectations ofthe audience are.

By Annie Chen

In a scene, Marven sits on a sofa, and Aliceneed to take away a mug from his hand. Atfirst, Annie just walked towards Gerald andtook it away. However, the director thoughtit would be boring and suggested Annie tostand behind the sofa and reach out toGerald’s hand. In this way, the picture mightlook like they are having a back hug. Annietried it, but this gesture only made her looklike a gibbon, rather than a womanpassionately in love.

Fortunately, Annie is open-minded and notcoy. When the director gives hersuggestions, she is always willing to try.“Compared to Gerald, Annie is more active—like Alice in the play—when it comes toacting like a couple,” said Ivy Sun, thedirector.

Annie said the expressions of her characterthrough her eyes is difficult. In scene one,when Marven and Tracy talk, Alice isenvious but cannot tell through the dialogue.What she can do is to stare at them withenvy to let the audience know, but at thesame time, she needs to avoid gettingTracy’s attention.

In the middle part of the script, Aliceneeds to persuade Tracy into savingMarven. Again, the dialogue is simple,so the two actresses must show theirtension and confrontation through eyecontacts and their tone. For this, Anniespent a lot of time practicing.

As for the character in the team, Saraand Gerald both agree that Annie is funto be around. “Though she is busy, shegives me the feeling that she is alwaysvigorous,” said Gerald.

In addition to the annual play, Anniealso joins the volleyball team and needsto assistant the school swimming team.Actors and actresses practice onMonday, Tuesday, Wednesday,Thursday, and Sunday. Every Mondayand Thursday, Annie would be late forpractice since she needs to go to theswimming team for three hours first. Asfor Friday, she plays volleyball.

Nonetheless, when everyone looks tiredand low-spirited, Annie would be thesource of energies. “She does not needto act like a clown or do somethingintentionally to make us happy. Hertemperament is naturally contagious,”said Sara.

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Annie often sits on the floor orsofa reading her script, and thenshe just laughs out loud suddenlyand cannot stop. Or, sometimes,she sits in the corner and starts toplay air guitar, lift her legs, andscrunched her face. These actionsmake others feel baffled and odd atfirst but then amused, starting tolaugh, pulling themselves together.After all, Annie is a positive,active, and eye-catching character,on or off the play.

Hazel and Sophie are indispensablecharacters in “Dial M for Murder”. Theyare like Holmes and Watson who do theirbest to find out who is the murderer;however, during the practicing time, theyhave been forced to overcome variousdifficulties, such as whether they shouldspeak in British accent, even though theygot used to speaking the American accent.

Irene Wang, who plays the role of Sophie,is hilarious in her real life, so sometimesshe could not help laughing at some funnystuff even though she is acting. They seemeffortless on the stage, but they facedifferent and new arduous tasks behind thestage every day.

When it comes to acting skills, one of themost important factors is to act like theroles they play. Sometimes they cannotpick up a role they like, but they need to dotheir best to play the role.

This is really a challenge to maximize theiracting skill. “Hazel is the character whoshould have seemed immensely powerful tocontrol the situation as soon as she entersthe scene,” said Eden Wang, who playsHazel. “In the beginning, I thought I am notthe right person who has enough confidence.Because I did not think my personal traitsmatch the role.”

Sophie is a new character, not in the originalscript. She is also a detective, helping Hazelto solve the case. Irene thought she desiresmore lines to act out the role. “Although Igot just a few lines, I got to stay on the stageas long as possible like Hazel,” said Irene.

“I am struggling with how to play thecharacter of Sophie with just a few lines,because I should not look awkward on thestage when I have nothing to do,” Irene said.

One of the main script writers is NitaHuang, who is in charge of the scriptsection. She changed the gender of Hazeland Sophie, hoping to project an effect thatcan explore the female difficulties in thatage of the society. Therefore, she decided toset up Hazel as female and added a newcharacter into the revised script.

“In the beginning, I thought Eden wouldhave played the role of Hazel as a bossy andcontrolling police officer,” Nita said.“Apparently, Hazel is not the character likethat.”

Female Holmesand WatsonAdd Spice to anAbortedMurder By Sunny Chang

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“This is a huge challenge for me to playHazel, because I am not the person whocan control the stage setting like Hazel inthe script,” Eden said. After a fewmonths though, Nita and Ivy thoughtEden could play Hazel perfectly.

Taiwanese learn to speak in Americanaccent in English class since they werekids. Therefore, transferring to Britishaccent is no doubt a challenge for actorsand actresses. “I do not remember howmany times I was told to do my best tochange the accent problem,” Eden said.“I think more than twenty times.”

An actor is different between in the realworld and in the play. Irene thoughtGerald Chang, who plays Marven, themain character, is a shy person in the realworld. His face turns red easily when heis in the real world.

“In rehearsals with Marven, I could nothelp laughing at him,” Irene said. “Healways seems awkward, but in the formalrehearsals, he becomes a serious and isgood at acting.”

Psychological dimension in eachcharacter is one of the difficult parts ofthis play because the imaginations in thecharacter’s mind is supposed to be shownin their faces. “I have been trying veryhard for so long now,” Irene said. “It isextremely difficult to act out that byimagination.”

“Sophie has just a few lines, but theshow time for her is as much as Hazel,”Ivy said. “It is a tough task for Irene toplay well on the stage with just a fewlines.”

Promoting Hazel and Sophie is the keyto attract the audience. “The mostdifficult part is how to highlight theircharacteristics by using a few words insome apps like Instagram,” said AndyLiao, who is one of the script promoterson the internet. “Therefore, I have toread over the script about the twocharacters in the adapted story.”

One who plays the “bad guy” can be aclimax of the play. Selena Wu, whoplays Tracy, thought that the mostdifficult part is that she needs toconsider how to pretend to supportMarven and pretend to be innocent inthe play.

“Hazel and Sophie are exasperatingwith their suspicious expression andmovement,” Selena said. “I amsupposed to be a professional hypocrite,but it is extremely difficult for me tointerpret the role.”

“But Eden tried her best to adjust heraccent, tone and emotions so that I likeher show more and more,” said Nita.

The director is like an engine, making surethings are working. Not only the actingparts that the director needs to control, butalso things like lighting, costume andmusic.

Ivy Sun, the director, believes that EdenWang is a person who is good at keepingthings organized, while she is also good atobserving. Ivy said that Eden is suitablefor playing the role of a keen detective.On the other hand, Irene is a person whois warm and adorable. Ivy said that Irene’spersonal trait fits Sophie, as she expected.

“Hazel is set up like Holmes in thebeginning,” Ivy said. “Eden thought she isnot in any way like an outstandingdetective like Holmes, so she had toovercome some obstacles.” 10

In the beginning, Hazel was not thecharacter that Eden wanted to play. Shethought she does not match the personaltrait. Ivy did not think so. In the end, shedecided to invite Eden to play Hazel.

As Selena puts it, although thischallenging task is crazy at first, and itis really hard to get the accent inplace, after following the advice fromDavid Wang, assistant professor atFLAL, to listen to BBC News andrecord her voice afterwards, shegradually grabs the know-how ofBritish accent, especially theintonation that puzzles Selena themost, and can apply it in a way ofemphasizing the key points. “

And one important part is that becauseall actors should influence each otheron the stage,” said Selena. “We musthelp each other by concentrating onones’ own language interpretation tobetter the performance.”

Gerald Chang, playing the MarvenWendice, to this point, mentioned thathe has been learning British accentsince six years ago, because he thinksof this accent as elegant and high-class. As stereotype as it may sound, itis shared by one of the two assistantdirector, Vivian Chen.

Vivian also believes that Britishaccent sounds more well-educated.“But I think the pitch of differenttypes of voice decides whether aperson sounds good when he or shespeaks in American or British accent,”said Vivian.

Be well seated, close your eyes, switchto a channel randomly, then feel thevoice, breath, and pause of the speakeron the Gogglebox, can you recognize ifit is “Friends,” “Sherlock,” or “Lupin”that you are watching?

In all audiovisual works, the actors’accent is the first thing that catches theaudiences’ eye, or, you can say, ears,dragging their mind into the fascinationof the plot.

For a play like “Dial M for Murder”written by Frederick Knott, there is nodoubt that the use of British accentplays an important role, grabbingpeople’s eyes as well as embellishingthe plot with the power of its attractiveaccent.

“Different from American accent thatsparks for its connected speech,” saidEden Wang, who plays the role as Hazelthe inspector. “British accent is clear,sonorous, and firm, with the specialflow and patterns that stand out.”

In fact, all of the ten actors hold Americanaccents, turning out that most of them mustacquire British accent to interpret the rolesauthentically. In the process of learning,some really encountered difficulties, for theactors have been speaking English inAmerican accent for years.

“Not a chance,” said Selena Wu, who playsas the main character Tracy Wendice, whenshe first heard that she has to interpret herrole in British accent. “By no stretch of theimagination can I understand and speak outthe words in British accent in such a shorttime.” Unlike Eden, who in her life has beeninto a lot of British drama on her owninterest, Selena seldom get in touch with thesources that contains British English.

In this case, it is no strange thing that Selenadoubted if she could change her accentovernight, not to mention the change ofaccent was decided in the middle of theprocess of rehearsals.

Learning toQuack Like aDuck in BritishAccent By Annie Tsai

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Gerald remembers one interesting storyconcerned with British accent. That is whenProfessor Wang told him at the firstacceptance check of the play that his accent isnot British at all, but sounds more Texan.

“I was shocked,” said Gerald. “Sure enough, Ilearned that there must be someone elselistening and checking if you speak in the rightway, if perfect accent is what you pursue.”

British accent is certainly a far cry fromAmerican accent. The oral resonance position,intonation, and tone are the most obviousaspects. Therefore, great efforts for the actorsare needed to change accents alternatively.

As a matter of fact, each of the actors has theirown ways of practicing British accent. “Ispeak to myself in the shower,” said Gerald. “Iimagine how the accent works and say somesentences as well as the lines out loud, so thatI can assimilate this accent into my life to benatural enough to speak out.”

It is riveting to see all the actors keeppracticing, fix their tone, and speak like aBritish. No man is perfect, but as theycontinue to fail and fix, they are on the road,nearing to what they wish to be.

Still: It’s British accent.

A good shape of voice helps theaudience learn the background of thesetting, and grasp the audience intothe storyline. As biologicalanthropologist Helen Fisher writes inher book “Anatomy of Love: ANatural history of Mating, Marriage,and Why We Stray”: The humanvoice is like a second signature thatreveals not only your intentions butalso your background, education,and intangible idiosyncrasies ofcharacter that can attract or repel apotential mate in moments.

From Prof. Wang’s perspective,imbued by a friend who studied theaccents in Ireland, he learned thedifferences of British accents.

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“Accents from different areas in theUK present various social status ofpeople,” said Prof. Wang. “Therefore,if you can speak British English well,once you speak, your audience knowseverything of your background,which makes it much easierimmersing into the play.”

Of course to achieve this, highintensive rehearsals are absolutelyessential. The director team arrangedthe practice of each cutting at leastfour times a week, hoping the actorscan reach better familiarity andprofessionalism to the scripts andactions. “To peruse, understand, andknow each of the body functioning,”said Ken Chung, who coachesperforming skills. “It is alsoimportant for the pursuing of a goodvoice.”

“You hear the first line of the actors,” saidVivian. “And you know we are in London, or inEngland, if not too specific.”

Recycled StuffRefitted in theMagical Handsof PropsAs the lights go off, a group of peoplewearing in black rush out from the backstage, running hither and thither throughthe stage silently. Scene after scene, youcan hardly notice them while you have afancy watching the play. Who are thoseunnoticeable characters? They aremembers of the props team—themeritorious statesman behind thespotlight.

The play “Dial M for Murder” is basedon the background of the 1970s society.There are three scene settings: Tracy’shome, restaurant and the court. The playuses large amount of props to change thescene with little modification and it alsosimplifies the process of changing scenes.

The story is about a murder case and theaffair between an American writer Aliceand the master of the house Marven.Tracy, the betrayed wife, is plotting howto murder her husband in revenge on hishusband’s cheating. A secret murdertakes shapes step by step.

By Nora Chen

The play is set in England, so finding propsthat meet the need is more difficult.“Because of the setting of the background,some little things like rotary phone, somephotos had to spend time to find,” saidVivian Lin, director of the props section.“Otherwise, most students don’t have thosethings so they refit the props or just buy anew one. Anyway, in the process of findingsuitable props, they always have to makesure the materials would be like in 1970s.”

After World War II, 1970s’ England is thesynonym of economic distress, inflation andstrike. However, a historian MinicSaundraburin thought the most families’ lifequality is better than anytime. In his opinion,people pay attention to fashion, the culture isdynamic and diversification at that time.

And the depression didn’t seem to havereduced people’s love for decorating theirhouse. In this era, glass, aluminum andglasses—these kinds of new materialsbecame popular. Most important of all,blotch printing became everywhere. As wecan see in the play, for example, the sofa inthe play is the blotch printing style.

“The process of spraying is reallysmelly, and because sprayed partcould not touch the under paper, sowe have to spray in two phases.This is my first-time doingspraying, so I think the finalproduct is not as expected,” Viviansaid.

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The process of finding the props may not besmooth, so refitting becomes important. “Iknew that there are some props been refitted,and one of them is the phone desk I providedwhich was white in the beginning, thensprayed into grown,” said Alice Hsiao, amember of props group.

“What impressed me the most is the diningchair. At first, we found so hard but we justcouldn’t find it. However, one day whenwe finished our lunch and were on our waybacking to school, we found that there wasa chair to be recycled but still integrated,so we decided to move it back to school,”said Vivian.

“We even left a note just in case the chairis not really abandoned and belongs tosomeone,” Vivian continued. “Luckily,we don’t receive any phone calls.Anyway, I feel magical in the process offinding our dining chair, I would neverhave thought of finding our props likethat.”

Besides the process of finding thosematerials reminiscent of the 1970s, propssection has another significant mission:moving props up and down the stage.This is not an easy job because they haveto put those props to the right place in theinterval between two scenes without anylight. That really test their eyesight andtheir agility. “I think the procedure of putting propson and off the stage is a little bitcomplicated at first. However, afterremembering all the moves, it becomemuch easier,” said Emily Chen, anothermember of the group.

As for the audience who watch the play,the props crew may not be the most eye-catching ones and their existence are alsohard to be noticed. However, they are themost indispensable small screws of theannual play. Why are these people stillwilling to devote themselves to thesupporting roles in the play? There aredifferent reasons for the group of eight.

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“When I was putting my groupwillingness survey, I put propssection in front of others because Ithink the stuff will be relatively less.Moreover, I know props section willrehearse with the actors and actress, Ithought it would be funny,” saidJason Chiang. “I don’t want to be an actress and Iwould love to join the process ofrehearsals, so that is why I choose tojoin props section,” Emily Chen said.

“Because I thought I am not good atart designing and they told me thatprops section does not need the abilityfor designing, so I put props sectionon my list. However, I still did somerefitted of the props, so I am kind ofentering in props sectionaccidentally,” said Vivian.

There are so many details in propssection, that call for consideration andagility. With the rehearsal day afterday, they become more familiar withthe running position than the firsttime. The process become smoother,and they also learn the lesson of theimportance of cooperation along theway.

The work in props section is not always sodownbeat. There are some props that makeeveryone impressive and the process offinding them is funny. There is one scenein a restaurant, which is the twist before theclimax of the play. The setting of therestaurant has a certain degree of difficultybecause the scene has to be set up in theinterval of screen change in just over 30seconds. Therefore, to find some light andsuitable props to fit in the play is really ahard nut to crack.

Not a few people have trouble pickingclothes for daily wear. Just imagine howhard it would be when selectingcostumes for a drama with backdrop setin 1970’s of Britain.

Trying from Chanel, Audrey Hepburn,Margaret Thatcher’s dressing style, thecostume team racked their brains topresent an authentic 1970’s British stylefor the performance. They came torealize one thing: picking the costumewas not as easy as playing house. Theunpredictable challenge, was on its way.

Selecting costumes which are in linewith the story background is notdifficult. In effect, accessibility is thepoint. In many cases, team membercould not borrow the apparels similar towhat they expected. Buying a newclothes is the last resort since it wouldbe economically inefficient for usingjust for once.

Clothes Makethe Man,CostumesMake the Play

By Niki Zhuang

“Many details need to be considered,”said Kineta Lai, who serves as eventgeneral coordinator. The specificsinclude stage setting, season, prices,historical background, and sources ofcostume—all need to be aware of. Theinspirations are hidden, probably holdingeveryone under the stage in awe.

Initially, the team decided to adopt aCoco Chanel’s dressing style on femalecharacters. The fashion combinedvintage, elegance and nobility in itsiconic tweed and suit jacket, which hasbeen a hit in fashion industry.

However, the style was originated in1990, a 20-year gap with the time in thedrama. Lacking coherency with fashiontrends, the incompatible Chanel’s stylewas eventually taken out of the table. Subsequently, they turned to thealternative: Hepburn’s style, reputed as1970’s women fashion icon, that seemsnever going off the trend.

Avoiding clichés is the principle thatfollowed; people can wear in simpleelement but still look vogue and one ofthe kind. Black dress, gingham trouser,headscarf, hairband and ballet flats arethe typical components.

Even though the style is graceful enoughto exhibit in the annual play, things didnot go well as expected.

“Female’s costumes were the trickiest one.We tend to find clothes in Hepburn's style,but it turned out that the style was notprudent enough to align with character’spersonality,” said Amanda Chen, in chargeof arranging outfits for Tracy, a 40-year-oldBritish woman in the drama.

Finding Tracy’s garb was said to be thetoughest task among all the characters. Afterreconsideration, the costume team resortedto another plan: Margaret Thatcher's style.Costume radiating sense of majesty andgrandeur could be quite a match with Tracy.

The Thatcher’s clean cut dressing hadearned a lot of attention especially when sheheld Prime Minister Office from 1979 to1990. Tailored skirt suits with shoulderpads, pearls earing and leather bags usuallyappeared in her wardrobe.

Sometimes the ideal is light, but whatpeople see is night. Considering Thatcher'sstyle as the last silver lining to find Tracy’scostume, Amanda still could not borrow anyfrom our department. After all, this kind ofstyle is seldom seen in Taiwan. Even if itcould be found, it is not easy to find the suitperfectly fits Tracy’s figure.

Selena Wu, who plays the role of Tracy, wasnot surprised that the process wasprolonged. “Each member has opiniontowards the costumes, and probably theyhave inconsistent recognition of backgroundknowledge,” said Selena. 15

“The Hepburn's style is great, but Tracy isnot supposed to dress provocatively,” saidSelena. Tracy is reserved and her world ishard to break in. As her husband has anaffair with another woman, she schemed amurder to take revenge for those ruined herlife.

“Part of costume should be in red andblack, which respectively represent outrageand sophistication,” said Selina. Andwhether Tracy successfully commit themurder would be the climax of the annualplay.

Contrary to Tracy’s apparel, accessingAlice’s costume was a breeze. Alice, anAmerican sweet girl, was given a bright andlively dress in the drama. The style is moreclose to modern people’s wearing, givingchance for team to borrow in a short time.

The problem of finding costume for Tracyhaunted the team. “It was a great challengeto find the costume with strong period feeland simplicity,” Said Selina Chang, theleader of costume team.

Although an obvious barrier existed, theoverall results are statistically better thanprevious years. Bertha Wu, one of staff from General Affairs Department, providedwith revenue and expenditure table. Thereport indicated that the whole expenses oncostume and cosmetics was aboutNT$8,000, which was NT$3,000 lower than the average in years.

Another delightful news for the teamis that, public relation team raised alot of funds from sponsors, givingeach group a bigger budget.“Therefore, we decided to allocate anadditional NT$5,000 to the costumeteam,” said Bertha.

As the budget increased, purchasing anew costume becomes acceptable. Intheir final decision, they determined tobuy a wine-red lace dress on theonline shop. Crystal hairpin, which isperfectly compatible with the dress,goes well with Tracy.

In the whole drama, Tracy alwayswears in red, though she would changethe dress after first half of play. Shewears the other wine red dressborrowed from a professor. “Dressingin red all the time actually is the hintof murderer,” said Selena. Probablysome of well-spotted audience wouldnotice.

Finally, they made it. They completed ahuge task, and successfully collected thecostumes for all characters.

The team just accomplished half of theirwork though. The other half will be onthe day of annual play. At that day, theywould have a race against time

Aside from selecting suitable apparelsand accessories before the play, they arealso in charge of putting makeup foractors and actresses within limitedtimeframe on the day of annual play.“Resistance to great pressure is definitelyrequired if joining us,” Amanda forced asmile.

Selina said, “The moment when actorswere put on costumes and makeup, I felteverything I did was worthy.” After thesecond acceptance of annual play, Selinawas finally relieved— it was such aweight off her mind.

“Anyone participating in annual play isindispensable,” said Kineta. Even thoughpreparation required lots of efforts to putin, Kineta indicated that she barely heardof complaints. Solidarity takes essentialrole in this activity, steering the team tohigher efficiency and better performance. The odyssey of preparing annual play wasbounded to be rough and winding, but itis a testimony whether the team memberscould overcome together with unity.

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Selina also mentioned, “I think theeyebrows are very important, since girls’eyebrows have different styles. Forexample, thin and arch, thick and straight,thin and sharp, etc. while men’s eyebrowsare simpler, which is thick and with sharparch. In order to make our actress look like aman, we emphasized the eyebrow.”

For more objective point of view, reachingto a cosplayer can be helpful. She is Wen, a19-year-old Taiwanese student. Her hobbyis doing cosplay, often acting as a malecharacter. As an experienced malecosplayer, she said, “What needs to behighlighted the most is the makeup andexpression of our eyebrows and eyes. Men’sfacial features are quite different from thoseof women, so we have to pay specialattentions to them.”

Speaking of the difficulties, Wen stressedthe height. “Height often is unable toreproduce the role, but this is not a bigproblem. There are many height-increasingpads and shoes, but I still hope that I canhave broader shoulders and guards when Iplay a male role. Long legs can really add alot of points to the role.”

The largest difference between the makeupfor men and women is that the brow ridge ofmen’ s shifts backer than women. Moreover,the part of their eyebrow tail goes a little bitup to their temple or goes straight forward.

Doing regular stage makeup for theannual play is not too difficult forthe makeup team. However,turning a college girl into a middle-aged man by makeup is a differentstory.

During the past 18 years, from2003 to 2020, there were examplesof using makeup to turn a femaleactress into a male character. The2019 annual play And Then ThereWere None is a good example.

One of the makeup team memberof the annual play that year, AliceFeng, said she forgot most of themakeup parts since it had been twoyears. However, she rememberedclearly about the details of turningCrystal Chiang, the actress whoplayed a male character that year,into a handsome dandy role.

Doing Cross-genderMakeup theCosplay Way

By Jaime Wang

“The contour is the most importantthing. Crystal’s chin is a little chubby,so in order to make her look more likea playboy, we indeed put efforts onsharping her face line,” Alice said.

“Our teammates are all girls. Some ofthem might have experience of helpingothers on makeup,” said Selina Chang,who leads the makeup team for Dial Mfor Murder. “But turning a 20-year-oldgirl into a middle-aged man is a rarechance for them.”

“We tried different ways to buildher face outline sharper. Ourteammates indeed put many effortsin this challenge,” said Selina. Thestructure and contour of face havesignificant difference between menand women. Therefore, details needto be noticed to make sure that theactress will not expose.

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In contrast, women’s eyebrow tails willgo down whether the arch is obvious.“We worked really hard on Aileen’seyebrows and contour since these arethe parts that needs to reinforce most,”said Grace Lu, who together withYvonne Lian are in charge of Aileen’smakeup. “Especially, men’s foreheadsare more obvious than those of women.”

Aileen Okeke plays the role of Swann,one of the male characters in Dial M forMurder. “I think the most difficult partto fix is my skin. It is a bit too dark fornormal foundations,” she said. “If thefoundation color is too white, my skinwill not turn white but grey, which willlook dirty, like some mud on my skin.”

Grace also said, “Aileen’s skin color isdarker than others as well, so no regularfoundation fits. So we have to mix byourselves to make it closer to heroriginal skin color which will not makeit look weird.”

“The foundation color we mix isdifferent every time. After hundreds oftimes trying, we determined that theproportion of the foundation is set to be70% of color 40, which is the darkest,20% of color 20, medium white, and10% of color 10, which is the lightest.This tone is the most suitable forAileen’s skin,” said Grace, whileworking with Yvonne.

To understand more about man’smakeup, Selina said they did a lot ofresearch, “We referred to The Queen’sGambit since the background of this TVseries is also 1970’s and the story tookplace in UK. The retro style really fitsour style and tone for this annual play,”said Selina.

The character Benny Watts is a goodreference for the makeup team becausethe makeup team also struggled whilemaking up for Thomas Brodie-Sangsterbecause Thomas looks way too youngfor Benny Watts. They added goatee tohis face to make him more mature.

Grace and Yvonne said they did think ofadding some wigs or mustache, sinceAileen’s hair is very curly. “We didthink of that before. For example, herhair quality, length, or the utensils weused. At last, we did not use wigbecause our director think it is too fakeand funny.”

In the original script of Dial M forMurder, Swann was a female character.However, not long before the audition, itwas decided that Swann would bechanged into a male character.

“When I was told by the director that Igot the character Swann, I took it,” saidAileen. “Because the director said it wasthe right choice at that moment.”

Aileen has never played a male character,nor has she the habit of putting onmakeup, so this is a cool experience. “Forme to try out different things is cool.Also, I think I am more like a neutrallooking girl, so I would like to see what Iwill look like as a man,” said Aileen.

“During rehearsals, I am afraid myactions will blur my makeup so I slowdown my moves and act gently, avoidtouching my face,” said Aileen. “I think Ihave to get used to it soon cause puttingon makeup really helps me get into thecharacter.”

“Our makeup team has meticulous careand superb skills, so no matter when theyput on makeup or test foundation, I feelso comfortable without any foreign bodysensation. I can see a brand-new methrough the mirror and am amazed by it. Iwant to convert the hard work of ourmakeup team into the motivation ofacting,” Aileen noted.

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Rehearsing five times a week, the director andtwo assistant directors have built a solid bondand can complement among other.

Scattered with a mass of notes, the printed-outscreenplay on Ivy’s hands were full of marksand instructions for each lines. Holding thescripts, Ivy stood up and walked to the sofa,one of the props in the room, telling MarvenWendice, the leading actor, and Tracy Wendice,the leading actress, to be firmer and moreconfident.

Ivy always knows how the whole picture andthe atmosphere of a scene should be like.

“The hardest part of being a director is to havegood communication skills,” said Ivy. She gaveactors many chances to express a scene eventhough they sometimes could not meet thestandard in her mind. Instead of forcing withdemands, Ivy helped them with patience. Onceholding a banana doll from claw machine, Ivypretended it as Marven and herself as Tracy todemonstrate how a plot should play out.

“Vivian has a built-in music library in herbrain,” said Ella Hsieh, from the sound effectgroup. Accumulating various genres of music inher brain, Vivian opens her music appcontaining over 300 songs to show the teamwhat type of music the director wants. Withmusic sensitivity, Vivian offers various types ofmusic like classical music for reference whenIvy wants a scene to have specific backgroundmusic.

“Finding out details is one of a keyelement to be an assistantdirector,” Vivian said. Vivian isgood at observing details. Thehand gesture to hold a wine glass,the subtle change of facialexpression, and the timing ofsound effects—nothing can escapefrom her eyes.

Vivian’s sensibility can also befound in everyday lives. OnceVivian had dinner with Ivy andSelina Wu, who takes the role ofTracy Wendice, Vivian was thefirst person finding the order andthe amount of the bill were wrong.

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A Trio ofDirectorsJazzes Up aVintage PlayLighted up, placed with props and setwith a large sheet of mirror, a rehearsalroom on the sixth floor of College ofHumanities building has been wherestudents practiced for the annual plays.This year, when actors and stagehandswork there, the biggest difference is atthe front, where two seats are substitutedby three—for one director and twoassistant directors.

Known for their telepathic teamwork,Ivy Sun, the director of “Dial M forMurder,” Vivian Chen, and Sara Hsu,the assistant directors of the play givetheir advice from different angles toactors and actresses.

“They usually focus on different aspectsduring rehearsals,” said Annie Tsai, whotakes the role of Alice Halliday. “Ivyusually tells us whether the whole part issmooth or not. Sara and Vivian usuallyfind out our improper habitualmovements, unsuitable intonation andother details.”

By Hannah Jhan

Three heads are better than one. Insteadof two brains as normal, three brainsmake things with more possibilities.Discussing where Tracy should stand in ascene to make the whole picture lookmore balanced can storm the brains.

“I think she should stand behind thesofa,” said Ivy. “Nah, standing beside thetable is better,” Sara responded. “Well, Isuppose she should stand far fromMarven and other people since it is toocrowded there near the sofa,” saidVivian. With three opinions, threemethods are allowed to try and the bestone can be picked.

One of the biggest advantages of the trioof directors is that everything comes witha solution when they meet problems.Take choosing costumes for TracyWendice, director team spent timediscussing which color was suitable. Inthe event of tie, one comes down tocasting vote. Red dress won by a score oftwo to one.

The deep bond among them not onlyshows during rehearsals. Ivy and Viviantake the same physical education class tolearn Tai Chi together. Ivy and Saraparticipated in the FLAL Sports Day tohave volleyball game. Their relationshipis built not just from the rehearsal roombut from their daily lives. The more timethey spent staying together, the deepertheir affections became. 20

Knowing the script well, Sara canalmost memorize all the lines of theplay. This is how she pays attention todetails. Tripping over their tongues hasbeen a common phenomenon for actors.Sara becomes a physical teleprompterwhenever actors forget their lines.Some specific words or numbers in thescripts are adjusted by translation orscript team to fit the background of theplay. Sara can find out errors whenactors forget to change the originallines.

A deathly silence occupied therehearsal room. Nobody thought of away to let the very first scene of theplay to look not that awkward as thecurtain rises. Sara is like a bulb lightingup the room when everybody thinks ofno way to solve a problem. What Aliceshould do and where she should staybecame a problem for the people in theroom. After a few moments ofaffliction, Sara figured out a solution,which was to let Tracy go behind thesofa first and get a book to read.

“They have helped me a lot,” Ivy said.With two assistants, Ivy can let actorsbuild up her imagination more easily. In“Dial M for Murder,” there is a scenewhere Tracy threatened Swann. WhenAileen Okeke, who takes the role ofCharlie Alexander C. A. Swann, did nothave enough nervous emotion, Vivianand Sara started to help Aileen toimagine Swann’s emotion.

“For me, there is only a reason urging aperson to do a thing,” Aileen said.However, behind Swann’s nervousness,three reasons, which were money, loveand his creditor, forced him to beuneasy. “Why do you go to college?”“There must be more than one reason,”Vivian asked. “To study,” said Aileen,“that’s all.”

“How about learning Japanese?” Aileenwas reminded. “Alright yes,” Aileenresponded, “Learning Japanese then Ican exchange to Japan and communicatewith Japanese.” Gradually understandingdirectors’ views, Aileen began to knowmore about the reasons that Swann’snervousness was complicated and deep.

A group of students from FLAL started theirmission. Walking into a restaurant not for ameal, Selina Chang, one of the publicrelations team members for “Dial M forMurder”, started her eloquent promotion onthe annual play in order to raise funds. Asthe students waited for an answer, therestaurant said, “Yes,” agreeing to sponsorthis event.

Strange as it may seem, but asking shops forsponsorships is a common resolution tounderfunded activities like this. In additionto plucking up enough courage to ask forfunds, there are more challenges for rookiecollege students fundraisers to overcome.

Gaining a sponsorship is a lengthy process,filled with uncertainties. Therefore,members need to do research before hittingthe road. “Before embarking on seekingsponsorships, I tended to look informationup about the shops that used to sponsorrelated events like our annual play,” saidNora Chen, another public relations teammember.

Fan PageBecomes a NewEngine forRaising FundsBy Andy Liao

Eloquence and courage are the keys whenasking sponsorships. In order to makefundraising not as bumpy, members extend theannual play’s proposal to the target shops. “It isimportant to emphasize that our event is non-profit with the goal of making contributions toour community,” said Nora. “We emphasizethe idea of mutual cooperation.”

“Getting a successful sponsorship is likelooking for a needle in a haystack,” said GraceLu, director of the public relations team.“Sometimes we do a lot of work in vain, withstores turning down our request.” Waiting for afirm’s reply also takes a long time—for as longas two months. The team, in pendulum, mayend up giving up, as it is a very difficult task.

“Time is also a main point,” said Selina. “Inorder to get patronages, we choose groupaction as a strategy to make our plea moreconvincing; however, we have difficultycoordinating our members’ time because somemembers have to fulfill the duties of otherteams.” Selina noted that they also needed toavoid rush hours of restaurants, furtherdiminishing available time for members to seekpotential sponsorships.

Raising money is not enough forcompleting the mission, PR teamwould cooperate with the fanpage team, maximizing theinfluence of sponsorships.

Using a sponsorship copywritingon the fan page has been aregular tactic, as the owner ofthe fan page can distributeinformation associated withpatronage enterprise, gaining themutually beneficial relationship.For college students, especiallyfor those who lack sufficientfunds, it could not be better tohave sponsorship copywriting onthe fan page.

Running Facebook to promote thepopularity of the event has beenused by FLAL annual play to reachthe target audiences. With thepreference of social media amongcollege students, who tend to useInstagram nowadays, in February2021, the fan page group set up“Dial M for Murder” Instagramaccount for the first time. 21

“Now our members have to curate twosocial media,” said Kelly Yang, who isa member of the fan page group.

Making a good sponsorshipcopywriting is a skill that has to beacquired. “Not only should one raisethe popularity of the enterprise, but wealso need to mention the positive sidethat makes an association with thetarget group—students,” said KimberlyHsu, who is responsible for supervisingthe final version of copywriting.

As a copywriting creator, Kellythought that creators had to narrow thegap with the target audiences. Makingcopywriting more appealing, shespiced up the content with emojis.“Rigid typing style is not an option forcrafting an advertisement, because youneed to make it conversational andvisually attractive.” She browsed themany fan pages to have a grip of itbefore making her first copywritingdebut.

Sometimes, hard work does not payoff. The publicity effect would not bepositive if the promotion activities donot grab the students’ attention. InMarch, “Dial M for Murder” fan pagecooperates with UKEAS, a Britisheducation agency, wanting to hold alecture at NTPU. The result is not verypositive, because only few peoplesigned up to attend this lecture.

“I had to force all my members to attendthe lecture as if they were interested instudying abroad,” Grace recalled. “Sincethe time for promoting this lecture wasshort, and the lecture was not closelyrelated to majority of our students.”

But this time, the promotion article makes astark difference. A pie piqued the students'interest.

It is by no means easy to resist the lure ofdessert especially when it comes to havinga lucky draw. In the first roundsponsorships article, Facebook fan page“Dial M for Murder” cooperates with apastry shop “Lazy Patisserie” for thepurpose of boosting the popularity of thefan page and increasing the sales of dessert.

“It is the biggest success so far. Posting twoadvertising articles on the fan page before,I found that the feedback is underrated. Iwas overwhelmed by a sense ofembarrassment when I saw no one leavingcomment below to take part in the luckydraw, especially when you already rackedyour brain for giving a good copywriting,”Kelly recalled.

“Originally this pastry shop gave uscoupons only. Thanks to one of mymembers, she made further contact withLazy Patisserie. The shop asked whetherwe had interest in selling pies. Thisprecipitated the success of mutualcooperation,” Grace said.

The article has been accumulating over200 comments from NTPU students,reaching over 15,000 views, attractingmore than 150 people to “like” this fanpage. “It can be said that the dessertsponsorship is fruitful, breaking manyrecords. And I think this is the trueessence of making sponsorships,” Kellysaid.

Requesting funds from shops, teammembers met a special challenge in returnfor money. City Burger, a breakfast shopnear NTPU, assigned team members amission before giving sponsorships funds:giving PR team NT$2,000 if they cancollect receipts accumulating toNT$14,000 from NTPU’s students.

NTPU Freshman, a Facebook group, is anavenue where one can post dininginformation around Sanxia district. Teammembers took advantage of this topromote City Burger. “Most students wantto explore good dining places near thecampus, and NTPU Freshman has over1,5000 members, so it is a good place toreceive huge amount of feedbacks amongstudents,” Kimberly said.

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It is not enough to ask sponsorships byvisiting the shops in person. With theburgeoning development of social medialike Facebook and Instagram, heraldingthe new sponsorships method for studentsproves promising. The cooperationbetween the public relations group and thefan page group exemplifies this trend.

None of the six people on the camera crewhad any practical experience in shootingvideos. How difficult, then, would it be whenthey had to shoot a trailer?

The head of camera crew, Robert Lin said,“The trailer should have a sequence and aclear understanding of where the strengths ofthe production are or where the key momentsare so that we can know where to put thehighlights and which scenes are suitable forthe scenario.”

He also mentioned, “It is also necessary tothink about what kind of message the trailerintends to reveal to the audience, so it isessential to understand who the audiences areand what kind of images they expect.”

Ivy Sun, director of the play, responded, "Itis also important to leave the audience withsome images of the plot. But you have topoint out some but not too much, nor can youjust pass by without telling anything.”

After the director and script teamprovided some suggestions and gavean overall direction to the cameracrew, they watched the video providedby GQ on how to make a good trailerbefore they designed the shot. Then,they felt that they agreed with what itwas said, so they moved forward toshoot our trailer in this direction.

“We also watched many movie trailersfor references and observed how thosewere shot, including the technique ofshooting and the length control onshooting,” said Robert.

Then the camera crew becameconcerned on whether there will be toomany key elements revealed to theaudience. After discussions amongthemselves, they decided to reveal partof the main plot, allowing the audienceto understand the general outline.However, they tried not to reveal toomany spoilers with the chronologicalorder and sound effects.

“We have taken the previous trailer ofthe film as the guide and added someelements and scenes related to thestage play,” said Oscar Yu, a memberof the camera crew. “We grouped thehighlights together and set each shot toa very tight length in order to increasethe tension and excitement duringwatching, allowing the audience tostay focused and interested.”

Oscar also said, “By combining theexcitement and tension in two and ahalf minutes, I believe our trailer willcertainly do its great job of capturing alarge audience.”

After the direction of the trailer isdetermined, the crew met anotherdifficulty in choosing the filminglocation. The crew originally plannedto rent a studio to shoot the trailer thatcan demonstrate the feel of the play,but it was difficult to seek a venue thatmet the requirements of the British erain the 1970s with insufficient funds.

“As it was very expensive to set upoutside, we ended up choosing tofinish the trailer at minimal cost andbuild the scene in the publicperformance room with existing propsfor shooting,” said Ivy.

Trailer for aThriller Is Meantto IntrigueCuriosity By Charlotte Ho

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The crew decided to use the filters andsound tracks to fix the problem, and theresult turned out to be great. “We put thescene of Tracy on her way home to the frontbefore Marven was strangled by Swan. Itmakes the audience feel that Tracy isworried about Marven’s safety, so sherushed home. However, in fact, Swan wassent by Tracy to kill Marven,” said one ofthe crew members.

They also deliberately made the shot lessvisible and made it impossible to see thevictim’s face, giving the audience enoughcuriosity and imagination as to who was onthe ground.

It gives out the main lines of scenes but leadthe audience to imagine the opposite side ofthe story so as to give the audienceconfusion in the scene and wondering whothe real killer is.

The six in the camera crew did an incrediblejob with a minimal cost of only two bottlesof black tea to finish the trailer and solve allthe challenges in the process.

Due to financial constraints, they madethe decision to shoot on campus, but ittook them a long time to adjust theangles to keep the audience fromnoticing it was shot at school. “Wechose to rely on angles and the post-production to adjust the shot,” saidTeresa Lin, a member of the cameracrew.

For the props, it was extremelychallenging in a tight budget to build aphone booth that matched the one in theoriginal film version. So, it took quite alot of time to borrow the desk lamp andsofa. Those and other problems, such asthe studio or lighting devices, weresolved by the director of thephotography club, whom they know,and the props relied on friends andrelatives nearby to search for suitableones.

“The difficulties in renting props andfilming equipment had made me feelthat connections are really important,because they can effectively solve manyproblems,” said Robert.

And the time for shooting the trailerwas squeezed into two days, causingthe shooting progress to be rushed in atight schedule. Also, some extra shotsthat are not in the script were addedduring the shooting, causing a littleconfusion when setting up the scenesand props.

Compared to the problemsencountered, editing is the biggestchallenge they met. The camera crewfound that when they combined all thepreviously conceived and filmedscenes, they were incoherent andtedious, resulting in a situation that theeditor needed to figure out how to dealwith the inconsistent lighting and theincoherence of the film.

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In addition, tight schedules and unexpectedsituations also affected them whileworking on the production. As the six inthe crew did not have any previousshooting experience, the lighting processwas a bit challenging, causing the shootingday to take some time in figuring out thebest lighting angle.