Control of Composition/Writing: Fiction/Drama Practice Test
•15 QuestionsIn the following original drama excerpt, an employee confronts a manager in a break room after being asked to train a new hire without a raise. The playwright controls emphasis through strategic placement of a repeated phrase and a final stage direction.
BREAK ROOM. A microwave with a missing button. A poster: “TEAMWORK MAKES IT WORK.”
ALMA: You want me to train him.
RUSSELL: You’re good at it.
ALMA: You want me to train him for my job.
RUSSELL: Nobody said that.
ALMA: Nobody has to. It’s in the way you say “opportunity.”
RUSSELL: It is an opportunity.
ALMA: For who.
RUSSELL: For you.
ALMA: (Quiet.) Say my name.
RUSSELL: Alma.
ALMA: Again.
RUSSELL: Alma.
ALMA: One more time, like you mean I’m here.
(RUSSELL opens his mouth. The microwave beeps, though no one touched it. He closes his mouth.)
Which choice best analyzes how the playwright’s compositional control uses repetition and the final interruption to underscore the scene’s power struggle?
In the following original drama excerpt, an employee confronts a manager in a break room after being asked to train a new hire without a raise. The playwright controls emphasis through strategic placement of a repeated phrase and a final stage direction.
BREAK ROOM. A microwave with a missing button. A poster: “TEAMWORK MAKES IT WORK.”
ALMA: You want me to train him.
RUSSELL: You’re good at it.
ALMA: You want me to train him for my job.
RUSSELL: Nobody said that.
ALMA: Nobody has to. It’s in the way you say “opportunity.”
RUSSELL: It is an opportunity.
ALMA: For who.
RUSSELL: For you.
ALMA: (Quiet.) Say my name.
RUSSELL: Alma.
ALMA: Again.
RUSSELL: Alma.
ALMA: One more time, like you mean I’m here.
(RUSSELL opens his mouth. The microwave beeps, though no one touched it. He closes his mouth.)
Which choice best analyzes how the playwright’s compositional control uses repetition and the final interruption to underscore the scene’s power struggle?