READING PASSAGE 1

You should spend about 20 minutes on Questions 1-13, which are based on Reading
Passage 1 on pages 2 and 3.

Report on a university drama project

Drama student Imogen Clare-Wood describes a collaborative theatre project she took
part in
This project was born from discussions I had with other drama students about the kind
of theatre productions we'd like to create. Although we had previously been involved
in various university productions where we took on specific roles, such as costume
designer, producer, director and so on, we now wanted to take a collaborative
approach that was new to all of us. We wanted a project in which every voice would
carry equal weight and everyone would be able to contribute to every aspect of the
show. We decided that the way to achieve this feeling of collaboration would be to
concentrate on the process by which the work emerged during auditions and
rehearsals. We chose a play that we felt allowed varied interpretations - Harold Pinter's
The Lover, a modern one-act play with just two characters. We decided we would use
six actors cast as three different couples, and each pair would have a turn to perform
on one of the three nights that the play was to be staged.

The next step was to hold auditions in order to find six actors who felt the same way
about the project as we did. We were anxious not to create an 'us and them' feeling to
the auditions, since collective ownership of the project was crucial to our ideas. So we
ran the first round of auditions as a series of workshops, which we kept very informal
and relaxed. Then we recalled fifteen actors for the second round of auditions. At this
stage we wanted the reactions and ideas to flow and be explored by the group in the
form of a discussion. We were looking for actors who could encourage other people's
ideas but who were also eager to input their own thoughts.

Possibly the hardest part of the whole process was sitting down afterwards and
deciding on the final six actors who would take part in the project.

Our initial rehearsals were dedicated to creating a strong group dynamic and to
exploring some of the themes of the play without explicit reference to the script. One
of the strongest tools we used for this was 'freewriting' - an exercise in which one
person would read out a list of unconnected words and the rest of the group would
clear their minds and simply write something in response to those words. We found it
helped us to gain insight into the different ways our minds work. It also meant that we
got to know each other very well, very quickly!
It was only during the next phase of rehearsals that we finally began to work with the
script. We had not yet decided on the pairings for the six actors at this point, and we
had the non-actors on the team reading in addition to the people who would be doing
the final performances. The whole team finally decided on the pairings of the actors by
a vote, and miraculously it was a unanimous decision. The casting of the roles worked
well and felt more natural than it had in any other show I've worked on.
I think the dynamic that we developed over the early rehearsals was crucial in giving
us three such strong onstage relationships.
Other decisions were made in much the same way. The publicity was the responsibility
of one member of the team, but she asked everyone what they thought would be
effective. She then made several different versions, and from these we chose the
design we liked the most. The stage set was left more to the individual pairs of actors,
but since a large part of the later rehearsals was observing and feeding back on the
individual performances being created by each pair, everyone was able to help with set
design. We initially planned that each pair would use the same stage set. However, due
to the different ways they interpreted the script, it became important for the set to be
adapted for each couple.
In the final performances, it was surprising that despite the collaborative nature of the
project, a range of very different interpretations emerged. This is, of course, partly due
to the tragicomic nature of Pinter's text, which allowed the pairs of actors to exploit
these two disparate elements, tragedy and comedy, to different degrees.
The question and answer session held after the show was perhaps the most rewarding
part of the project. The questions that the audience asked were interesting and
insightful, and certainly made everyone in the team think about what we'd been doing,
what we'd wanted to achieve and whether we'd achieved it. We were asked, among
other things, about how successful our collaborative ethic had been, how we'd ended
up with three such different shows, how we'd overcome the initial 'production team
versus cast' divide, and how we would continue in the future.
 Surviving city life
Although the colonisation of Australia profoundly affected the continent's natural
environment, many plants and animals have actually flourished since European
settlement. Some even thrive in the concrete jungle of Australia's biggest city,
Sydney
A) Ecologists often prefer to study plants and animals in exotic locations, but a
growing number have turned their attention to the complex interactions of the wildlife
that inhabits concrete jungles. Inner-city Sydney is the laboratory of choice for a
number of ecologists, and their research is timely. More than half the world's human
population resides in eldeen cities, and urban development continues to increase all
over the world. By 2030, the United Nations projects five billion people will live in
cities. Associate Professor Dieter abello Hochuli, a biologist at the University of
Sydney, believes that 'we need to understand how cities are changing the ecology of
the systems they are built on, and how plants and esbacanimals are adapting to them.

B) If any species has learnt to thrive in an urban environment, it's the native white ibis.
A strange long-legged bird with a long bow-shaped beak, it is known as the
'garbage turkey'. The bird's reputation for digging through inner-city bins and
scavenging street garbage has not endeared it to the public. The white ibis began its
move to the city in the 1970s, when large parts of its natural habitat of inland wetlands
became degraded due to years of low rainfall. 'The species is a wetland forager,
wildlife officer John Martin, from Sydney's Royal Botanic Gardens, says. 'Now it
happily forages in city parks and landfill.' During the peak of its spring breeding
season, there are more than 9,000 of these birds in Sydney.

C) Specimens at Sydney's Australian Museum show that the city's overall bird life has
changed dramatically over the two centuries since colonisation. Prior to urban
development, Sydney's native bushland was populated by large numbers of small
insect- eating birds, such as the superb fairy-wren and the eastern yellow robin. Today,
homeowners prefer to landscape their backyards with tall trees and manicured lawns,
an environment that provides little protection for small birds. But one bird's trash is
another's treasure. Gardens filled with flowering plants and fruit trees favour
omnivorous birds such as currawongs, bowerbirds, and the city's most despised
resident - the noisy miner bird. They're a real winner in cities, Australian Museum
ornithologist Richard Major says. 'The predominant driver in the decline of small birds
is that we've made a suitable environment for native noisy miners.'
D) Many invertebrates, such as the golden orb weaver spider and the blue triangle
butterfly, also relish living in the city. The golden orb spiders in Sydney are fatter and
fitter than species found elsewhere and Professor Hochuli and his team are trying to
understand why. We're trying to determine whether it's more food or the urban heat...,
as it's up to four degrees warmer in the city.' Hochuli has also found some varieties of
ant more at home in the city. The green ant, known for its painful bite, will build a nest
where there is space and food, regardless of whether it's a backyard or a sports oval.
'It's remarkable how many things persist in city environments,' he says. The decline in
birds that eat small invertebrates means these populations grow unchecked, allowing
them to chew their way through the foliage of the city's trees.
E) While some species can survive in relatively small areas, mammals have been
confined to patches of bushland scattered around Sydney and its nearby national parks.
However, the rabbit-sized, long-nosed bandicoot has discovered the advantages of
venturing out of Sydney Harbour National Park and into suburban gardens. 'They
forage for invertebrates in the grass and like the surrounding habitat to nest and escape
from predators,' Catherine Price, a research associate with the University of Sydney,
says. Dr Price is trying to understand what encourages the little mammal into urban
You environments.
'We don't know if it's an overflow from the park, or if they've got particular survival
traits that allow them to evade dogs and cats, and use the urban habitat that benefits
them,' she says.

F) It's not just native wildlife that has sought comfort in city living. Non-native species
such as black rodents, cockroaches and foxes have developed survival strategies too.
But ede weeds are the pest that has gained the most advantage.
In residential Sydney there atego would not be a single area of remnant bushland not
infested by introduced plantlife, Michelle Leishman, a Macquarie University plant
biologist, says. Over 20 years, Leishman and her colleagues have shown how Sydney's
huge stretches of impermeable concrete, together with the stormwater system, have
helped weeds infiltrate the few bremaining pockets of bushland. As rain washes over
backyards and roadways, it collects bine alchemicals which enter the stormwater
system, where it is piped to the edges of bushland. The nutrient-rich water seeps into
the earth favouring the many exotic species that 'live fast, and die young', Leishman
says. Indigenous plants prefer a low-fertility soil and struggle to cope with one that is
more fertile.