Research

Target Audience

The target audience demographic for my live play would be working class men and women, aged between 25-50 and over, living in the UK, because the types of subjects portrayed in the play require a mature audience to understand them as they are very adult. I chose to target my play towards the working class group of people in the UK because they may find it easier to relate to the characters who find themselves in similar situations to them.

What is my content?

The content of my project will be a live drama revolving around different plot lines such as alcoholism, infidelity, domestic violence and infertility and how all of these issues can have an adverse effect on a relationship. In order to do all these subjects justice within my play, before I write my script, I could study the effects that all of these issues can have on a person, as well as looking at how other dramas have portrayed these subjects.

Research into the subjects I plan to portray

Alcoholism/How alcohol can negatively affect you
According to drinkaware.co.uk, alcohol relaxes the brain which can make people more relaxed and more confident. However, this relaxed state can make them say and do things they may regret later and create aggressive moods, which makes arguments more likely to happen between people after consumption of alcohol. I will use this research within my play because I plan to show how alcohol can lead to one person becoming abusive towards the other as a result of alcohol consumption.

Domestic Violence within a relationship
According to Women's Aid, domestic violence within a relationship is an incident or a pattern of incidents of violent behaviour by a partner. I will use this research within my play because with one relationships in my play, I plan to tackle both domestic violence and alcoholism together by showing how alcohol can make a person become very aggressive towards their partner

Infidelity
According to Psychology Today, for the cheater, infidelity can be exciting and can offer feelings of renewal and joy. However, for the partner being betrayed, infidelity can give them feelings of anger, pain, doubt and heartbreak. I will use this research within my play because I plan to show how every character cheats to escape their negative situations however they will all feel remorse for it and they will all feel pain when they find out about each other's affairs.

Infertility
According to SELF, infertility can adversely affect a couple's relationship for a variety of different reasons including they may feel ashamed about not being able to conceive naturally, the male may feel inadequate within your relationship and the financial pressures of fertility treatment such as IVF. I will use this research within my play because with the other relationship in my play, I plan to show how the struggle to conceive a child can adversely affect a relationship because the female feels very emotional whilst the male feels very inadequate.

Research into different live dramas

1). Coronation Street Live (ITV, 2010)

To celebrate the show's 50th anniversary in December 2010, ITV broadcast a live episode of Coronation Street. This episode featured a large multi-camera element because there is multiple cameras to show different things in one scene such as scenarios and characters faces. I believe they want to use the cameras to show different things such as character emotion and set. I would use this research by having a variety of different shots of the scene and the characters. This would be effective in my play because I would be able to show my audience every aspect of the scene. The audience for Coronation Street is both men and women aged 45+, living in the UK, because they are more likely to take the topics portrayed seriously because they are more mature.

2). The Sound of Music Live (ITV, 2015)

Over Christmas 2015, ITV broadcast a live adaptation of the musical film, The Sound of Music. This TV special featured a large multi-camera element because there is multiple cameras focusing on different areas of a set. I would use this research by having several cameras on one set to focus on many different areas and characters. This would be effective in my play because I would be able to show my audience every aspect of a scene. The audience for The Sound of Music Live is both men and women aged 50+, living in the UK and the US, because people of this age would most likely have watched the original film so they would want to watch this remake to see how it compares to the original.

3). Twist (Theatre Centre, 2017)

Twist was a live theatre play performed by a theatre company called Theatre Centre in 2017. In this short clip of the play, there is a multi-camera element because multiple cameras are used to focus on the characters' faces in order to convey the emotions they are feeling. I would use this research by using multiple cameras to show different things such as parts of the set and characters. This would be effective for my play because I would be able to convey the characters emotions and the set effectively. The audience for Twist is both men and women aged 25+, living in the UK, because of this group of people are more likely to take the topics portrayed seriously, as a lot of the topics portrayed are very current and sensitive.

Research into the genre I'm choosing and its target audience

According to The Case for Global Film, a melodrama, centre around characters that are facing emotional conflict such as relationships and that the main target audience for this genre are women aged 25+ because this genre is enjoyed more by women and according to Slideshare, relationships tend to get in touch with women's emotions more than it does with men. In addition, this genre would most likely target women of this age group because the subjects portrayed within this genre can often be quite serious such as failed romance because people of this age group are more able to relate to this topic.

Survey

As part of my research, I gave out a survey to conduct quantitative research about my audience and what they expect from a relationship drama and what the audience is for this genre.

The majority of people I surveyed were female. This shows me that my audience would be largely female therefore I would have to tailor my script to accommodate a lot of emotion because according to SlideShare, this genre tends to get in touch with women's emotions

I surveyed a variety of different age groups however, most of the people I surveyed were under the age of 40. This shows me that my audience would be mainly younger people therefore I would tailor my script to include modern-day issues that relationships face so it is easily relatable for this age group.

I asked people what platform they used to watch relationship dramas and the majority of people said TV. This tells me that I should produce my live drama in a similar format as a TV drama and I should tailor my script to follow the conventions of a TV drama in the sense that there is a clear narrative and clear character motives.

I asked people whether they enjoyed watching relationship drama and to justify the reason for their answer. The majority of people said yes and their reasons for saying this included:-

• They enjoy watching how the relationships between characters progress
• They are interesting to watch
• They reflect real-life situations that everyone can relate to

This will encourage me to structure my script in a way so that the audience will witness the progression of the characters and their relationship and to put these characters into situations which people can relate to.