Two Forms of Performance

You have to pick two forms of performance to look at, be it film, TV, music, plays, etc (must be a performance and not a text, like a book). You are expected to select two of these performance pieces for a comparative critique. For example you may select Longtime Companion, one of the first major motion pictures to deal with the subject of HIV disease and compare it to Philadelphia Story, a more recent release which was seen by millions of people, and received several Academy Awards.

Two Forms of Performance Research Paper needs to be a 2000 words paper critiquing the 2 texts, analyzing the following questions:

1. How are the 2 texts different?
2. How are they similar?

Then compare and contrast the following issues in both the texts:

1. How is the disease presented: include technology, medical scenes, treatments, etc.
2. How does disease affect the main characters -how do significant others /families (both nuclear and extended) respond to the illness
3. How do the authors bring the main characters to resolution
4. How do the texts end
5. How does each movie affect you personally

I am not looking for plot summary here, I want you to tell me what your "illness" looks like in these two films. Are they portrayed the same or different? Pretend that you know nothing about this Two Forms of Performance, and so you are going to these films as a way to help educate you:

1. What are these films, and ONLY these films
2. Telling you about your illness or issue?
3. What does it look like? Who does it impact?
4. What does the medical issues look like?
5. What about family, etc.
6. What color is the person who is ill?
7. What about finances?
8. Are they sick looking?
9. Really question what each film wants you to believe about its portrayal of illness.

You will be graded on the following in Two Forms of Performance Research Paper:

1. The overall appearance
2. Grammar
3. Spelling
4. Clarity
5. Cohesiveness of ideas.
6. Your paper must have at least two work cited in addition to your performances, properly referenced, including a work cited page at the end of the paper. Papers not having citations will automatically be deducted.

Introduction: you must have an introduction that grabs my attention and leads me into the Two Forms of Performance with a very clear and concise thesis which explains exactly what you will cover in your analysis and your performances.

The body: this is where you will discuss the two performances. The plot should only be about 1-2 paragraphs in length, with the rest of the paper dealing with the comparison and contrast of your films.

The conclusion: needs to do three things for total credit:

1. Summarize your findings for your two performances.
2. Describe what such a compare /contrast paper can do for society, what can we all learn by looking at performance in this way?
3. What did you learn by doing this analysis? Are you more aware of certain patterns, will you look at illness the same way, etc.