From Character to Caricature with Death of a Salesman

by Michaela Moore
JDHS, ELA & Drama

Poster by Ashley Butler, Parsons the New School of Design

To introduce the play, Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, I first put an image from a poster of the play on the overhead and had the students go through the Thinking Routine of SEE/THINK/WONDER:

1. What do you see?
2. What do the things you see make you think about?
3. What does it make you wonder about the play you are about to see and read?

They discussed the steps of the routine with table groups and whole group.  

After this Thinking Routine, I asked the students to complete a Crowdsourcing activity about Arthur Miller.  The students found information quickly about Arthur Miller and came up and wrote in a word splash on the whiteboard fun and important facts.  We took a few moments to discuss surprises and interesting facts found in table groups and in whole group.

Then I asked the students to prepare for notes: I introduced the 4 main characters from Death of a Salesman to students and asked them to choose one character that they would focus on in their project and notes.  I instructed the students to write anything important down about the character (personality, weaknesses, strengths, choices, goals, motivations, etc) while we watched the play.  After we finished watching and discussing the play, I passed out the text of the play and asked the students to fill in holes in their notes about their characters AND to add important quotes said by their characters, or important quotes others said about their characters.

Once, these notes were complete, I taught the students step by step how to draw a caricature of their character beginning with a sketch first and then moving into their final draft.  We first discussed the idea of caricatures and how they were different from real portraits or pictures.  We discussed the symbolic nature of caricatures.  (Learned from work of Richard Jenkins).

1. Teach them about lines, shapes, patterns and they practiced drawing lines, shapes, and patterns.

2. Show the students how to draw a caricature from lines, shapes, and patterns and have them draw your example, and have them rough draft sketch out a caricature of their Death of a Salesman chosen character.

3. Show the students how to turn their sketch into a real caricature of their chosen character.

4. I showed the students how to do Richard Jenkins’ inking technique (using sharpie to outline your pencil drawing) and then coloring technique (how to use colored pencils to get different shades and different textures) and shared with the students Richard Jenkins’ helpful handouts on hair and faces.

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