This weeks performance didn’t initially strike me in terms of nerves as I see it as more additions to my experience (not saying that I am fearless but it doesn’t hold me back if anything it adds to the thrill) I was more frightened by tests in other subjects. However the only obstacles we faced as an ensemble were the last minute changes which could have proved hard to penetrate the movements we’ve already homogenized i the routine. We removed the politically charged element of our human become animal segment in favor for animal movement entirely and in our new lost segment a slight change to chorus placement. Unfortunately we were not able to avail of suitable warm up time which resulted in a minor hiccup on my part which was evident in my face I was told but mistakes happen so there wasn’t much point in lingering on it.

More obstacles arisen once our first performance ended being the absence of members, the refining of the routine and my pinky toe breaking. Out of all things to occur that was not the first on my agenda. Nevertheless the ensemble adapted finely to our new changes. Once the next day of our showcase arrived we were better prepared and had an audience who better reacted to the more light-hearted sections of the piece and overall went far smoother with a more engaged and enthusiastic Q and A afterwards.

This last showcase of the semester marked the final time we were an ensemble under the instruction of Eadaoin and our fondly adored friend Sean who worked with us only for this semester. The past two months of working intensely with Eadaoin, Jools and Sean have been nothing short of an absolute honor and adds to the ensembles contacts. It feels like eons ago that I felt uncomfortable of doing the more abstract movements and over thinking what they all meant. Even though I currently am not the most mobile I have improved my flexibility from the past two semesters. Even in regard to the reflective journals I don’t have too much difficulty in gathering material to make the mark as I have far worse assignments to tackle. Personally, my approach to imrpov from the past two semesters have gone away from raising the bar but now working with the ensemble to make something that is both believable and entertaining.

Although I am sad to see the departure of Eadaoin’s departure and Sean’s natural leadership and ideas when it comes to devising new pieces.

I look forward to what January offers.

 

 

Monday began with the practicing of the mysterious song Eadaoin wanted us to learn. (I forgot to mention this song in my last entry). Basically, the song is of unknown origin to Eadaoin but she has a certain fondness for it and wishes to not know of its origin to this day. The ensemble now choir impressed both Eadaoin and I not out of any profound meaning but rather for the pleasing sounds that came from it. She compared it to that scene in The Shawshank Redemption where Red perfers not to know what the opera singers were on about. Afterwards we were tasked with devising a piece based off the wall scaling movement Eadaoin showed us. Its interesting to experiment with the movements and seeing the possibilities. Despite our group scrapping the reverse climbing of our piece it was still nice to experiment if it worked or not.

With performance week being so close we started formatting the piece we would soon display. This is a combination of the movement and animal-based pieces we’ve been working on from the start of the semester. Looking back on it now it’s a lot to remember from where to start and to where it ends but it just comes as second nature to the ensemble.

Tuesday fleshed out the final piece more with the finishing touch of a speech which literally de-humanises the ensemble into their animal forms, at the time the significance was not clear until Friday’s class. Other than that we just kept rehearsing the piece till the end of the lecture.

Friday saw us exploring the piece in greater detail and allowed us to divulge into the greater significance of the piece being of Xenophobic nature. This was made more significant by one of the ensemble members opening to the ensemble about their own personal experience with being on the other end of some of the more upsetting aspects of the speech at the end of the piece. It makes me speculate the impact the ensembles work could have on  the audience. It could go either way…

There is nothing further to add onto this weeks blog other than a feeling that our time as an ensemble with Eadaoin and Jools is coming to an untimely end, its been quite a progressive few months of feeling at first uncomfortable to the initial intensity of the lectures to now established the foundation of our artistic curiosity.

This week began with the ensemble gathering in a circle to complain about how much we were given to do for the previous week. Afterwards we performed the minute long solo pieces we had created during the reading week, however I was unaware that it had to be exactly 1 minute so my piece (which lasted for about three minutes) has yet to be fully unveiled to the ensemble). It was cool to see the different relationships each person had with their own piece. We moved onto a new form of fire based movements but this time we took the form of ping-pong balls and therefore moved with the rigidness and form of a ping-pong ball. My approach to it was to jump around the space frantically while maintaining great levels of stiffness. Eadaoin aptly set the scene embodying “champion ball hitter person”. Afterwards we adopted the same immersion in inanimate objects with this edition being a lightbulb. Once the light switch was tuned on by regular Eadaoin we had to emit light through posture and our faces as if we were those glow sticks you snap like a chiropractor.

Tuesday was demanding for the ensemble, Jools had us refining our movement pieces for a while. Both Eadaoin and Jools split up to work with us further on our lost piece. Jools pleasantly surprised me with the combining of both groups she was given to enhance the supermarket scene they have been working on. We were now backing vocalists to the parents and children in an almost barbershop quartet style but one that was hired for a funeral.

Upon reaching Friday it occurred to me how close we were nearing to the end of the semester (which meant there were a performance coming up) and therefore explains the greater demand of focus and work from the ensemble. After we had our discussions about “Soldier Standing” (which we had seen the night before) we spent the entirety of class refining our Lost pieces. I didn’t find much time to reflect on the piece as I was simply focusing on the task at hand. I’m not sure if I’ve reflected all that much throughout this weeks classes as I just take the exercises as second nature by this point. Hopefully that fulfils some sort of goal Eadaoin and Jools have. I will be sorry to see this ensemble piece end within the coming weeks.

Mentioned in Chapter 3 of “The Empty Space” (The Rough Theatre), Peter Brooks refers to him as “the key figure of our time, and all theatre work today at some point starts or returns to his statements and achievements” (page 72).

Born February 10th 1898 in Augsberg Germany he would grow up to write poetry, plays and later invent the “epic theatre” which developed drama to be socialist and idealistic rather than sick to traditional theatrical illusion (source https://www.britannica.com/biography/Bertolt-Brecht)

According to the synopsis of Brecht on Routledge Performance Archive many of his works were influenced by his strong belief in Marxism which would later become to be known as Socialism. According to a friend of mine “Marxism is the branch of social theory that explains why a communist revolution is necessary” What Brecht intended to do with plays (examples given by Routledge Performance Archive)  such as “The Caucasian Circle” (1954) and “Mother Courage” (1949) was to perplex his audience with social dilemmas in hopes of engaging them in a cerebral sense.

Brecht wanted to do such a thing by slowly chipping at the fourth wall in way’s not obvious to his audience. He focuses on the journey of this process rather than the end result. Personally I’m curious as to how to someone such as Brecht could achieve such a thing. Later in his career in Berlin he earned a hazardous reputation for his “epic theatre”, anti bourgeois attitude and Marxist ideals. This lead to him fleeing Germany to Scandinavia from 1933-41 then to The United States in 1941-47. During this time he continued his work and even making a first draft of “The Caucasian Circle” and “The Life Of Galileo”. In Germany his works were being burned and his  German citizenship withdrawn.

In 1949, one year after he returned to East Germany Brecht and his wife Helen Weigil formed what is regarded as a great contributor to politically influencing theatre makers and artists worldwide, this ensemble (that still exists today) is known as the “Berliner Ensemble”.

Brecht used a theatrical strategy known as “Verfremsdungseffekt” which translates to the “alienation effect”. Inspired by the non illusionistic nature of Beijing opera the purpose of the strategy was to make the audience to empathize with the actor about the role which they play. (Or at least that is how I interpenetrated it). The way Brecht made this possible was mostly through the use of “Gestus” (translates to Gesture) which to me seems to be an “actions speaks louder than words” concept. The example given (provided by Routledge Performance Archives) is how Helen Weigel in “Mother Courage” silently screams (for her own safety) after hearing her son’s death.

I researched the topic “Why We Use Brecht” from the article “A Brechtian Approach to Drama Education” as I am sure I’ve been exposed to Brechtian methods in my years as an actor without knowing it.

Firstly it was addressed as to why Brechtian work is so attractive to us. This is split up into two factors. The first being the “elaboration of a large scale, coherent, political framework” it was until that point I could understand what the theory was going on about as the remainder of the sentence is far too advanced for my new slow understanding of Brecht. What I can guess this relates to is that the addressing of political concepts such as this gives us a sense of intellectual worth that drives us to explore further as actors who now have a smoldering curiosity to discover and question.

I believe that I’ve perhaps got a glimpse of what this could be but have not fully explored it to a degree that satisfies this hypothesis.

The other reason being the “insistence on inextricable relationship between critical theory and critical practice”. I assume this to be going into action with the information and ideas you’ve previously worked on in a theatrical sense. Personally I relate this example to going to see a show that you will be reviewing. Gathering the information of the show, the actors and their range/capability and then hoping to have that pretense you’ve formed challenged by what the show actually brings.

Unfortunately the only video relating to Brecht (Peter Thompson’s Lecture on “Brecht; Survival and Contradiction”) available on Routledge is non accessible to me.

From this study of Brecht I think of him to be a constantly reoccurring character in theatre today and feel that I’ll better understand his thinking with experience.

Sources used

Brecht, Bertolt. “Brecht: Survival and Contradiction, a lecture by Peter Thomson.” The Routledge Performance Archive. : Taylor and Francis, 2016. Date Accessed 11 Nov. 2018 https://www.routledgeperformancearchive.com/multimedia/video/brecht-survival-and-contradiction-a-lecture-by-peter-thomson

 

Peter begins the chapter with a similar concept carried over from The Holy Theatre but in relation to architecture. My understanding of this is that a venue for a play is essential for the conveying of certain themes and mood in a plot/narrative.  How I believe this can be rephrased in a more simpler way is that the layout of a hall/stage is subject to specific reasons to the plays plot and context, perhaps this adds a greater layer of legacy and respect for the play itself and not necessarily for the audiences enjoyment.  In page 66 there is a humorous truth to The Rough Theatre itself regarding that if something is crude yet works for the piece then use it, Peters example being “dung is a good fertilizer”. This places a good idea in the readers head of what “The Rough Theatre” comprises of. This only becomes more clear when Peter speaks about style having “leisure” which I first thought to be high class taking a back seat. This isn’t the case whatsoever. What Peter means is making do with the limited resources you have and making the most fun you can out of it. Peter describes it as a revolution of sorts which I can definitely relate to the modern contemporary theatre making do with the small budget it has. I have examples of this already in mind but Peter better amplifies the point; “holler at the trouble makers” “flour used to show faces white with fear” “the exploiting of accidents”. The Rough Theatre to me in this point is something that perhaps translates best with their audience as it doesn’t confirm the high class, snobby expectations often stereotyped with the theatre from an outsider.

On page 68 Peter claims why the Rough Theatre is the popular theatre because of being “anti-authoritarian, anti-traditional, anti-pomp, anti-pretense” I couldn’t help but link this to the actors of the Deadly Theatre who want to change the way Shakespeare is intended to be preformed and their constant need to stand out by filling all the criteria mentioned above.

In conclusion “The Rough Theatre” is a form which takes everything in its stride and is not weary of how it will look in the eyes of its audience. It takes allthe weaknesses and faults that could possibly happen to a show and uses it in it’s favour. Personally I found it to be one of if not the most enjoyable and approachable chapters of “The Empty Space”, especially when compared to the sheer confusion I endured with “The Holy Theatre”.

I will now remain vigilant to shows to see if they fill this criteria of being “The Rough Theatre” (and therefore the popular theatre as aforementioned)

 

The idea of the Holy theatre as a concept is a curious concept, invisible coming to life as the visible. The Holy Theatre presents the idea that we hold a deep established connection with the stage itself, bringing back the nostalgia of going to the theatre as a schoolchild. (That’s what I understood anyway). The audience seems to be more observant according to Peter if their nostalgia is satisfied through the stage. However I can’t seem to apply this to modern, contemporary theatre as the references Peter uses are more classically related, mentioning a conductor and orchestra for example. An interesting ingredient to an audiences experience is the mood/attitude of the conductor.

The next paragraph Peter goes onto was hard to follow as Peter talked about “the theatre of the late ’40’s” having “many glories”. I haven’t encountered any one of the plays mentioned but it was nice to see Peter become excited about something after all the slandering he given to the “Deadly Theatre”. After that the golden age in the previous point has since declined and degenerated.

Peter then poses a rather complex point that has psychological roots to it. Claiming that “We have lost all sense of ritual and ceremony” and therefore task the actor with fulfilling the “something” we have since lost in our lives. I can’t help but feel that Peter seems to have too sentimental of an attachment to the rituals he speaks of, with Shakespeare’s 400th birthday being my example. Perhaps what Peter could be referring to is what the modern day actor experiences as a warm up, more specifically the catchphrase I’ve coined from my lecture before doing an exercise “it’s probably going to s*it anyway”.

On page 48 Peter strays into a point which will certainly be taken the wrong way by some as he brings in poetry to the Holy theatre and saying that its become “meaningless” and “is a hangover of a Tennysonian tradition that has somehow wrapped itself around Shakespeare”. My first impression of this point is that Peter is a bit petty and sulky to the change of theatre and how it doesn’t seem to satisfy his own nostalgia/tradition. I would be more willing to empathize with him if his examples weren’t so personal to himself and gives nothing for the reader to work with. He then brings up a somewhat true point about the “Sacred arts being destroyed by bourgeois values” and if my understanding was correct it refers to the Marxist philosophy in which values are concerned with property and capital conservation to ensure economic superiority. Its an interesting point that can still be referred to within the arts today unfortunately.

In conclusion, Chapter 2 “The Holy Theatre” was a rather complex chapter that requires upmost focus from the reader and would definitely frighten those not familiar with the theatre (Which I’ve witnessed firsthand, showing extracts of the chapter to them and witnessing their utter confusion and fear). This felt like a very personal chapter to Peter which drove him to exhibit to the reader his more fond memories and bitterness when it comes to theatre throughout the years.

 

Monday saw no classes on due to the October bank holiday.

Tuesday had us working with Eadaoin which was a welcome change in pace. Thankfully the class was not as physically straining as the last we had with her. Jools passed onto Eadaoin that we “had something to show her”. What Jools was referring to was the ensemble movement pieces that we were working on prior to this. We were fortunate enough to gain some rehearsal time beforehand. Ultimately there was not too much difficulty with rehearsing our individual and ensemble pieces. I’m not exactly sure of what Eadaoin had to say about it but the feeling was positive I suspect. Afterwards we moved onto a new exercise involving the animal personas we briefly exhibited the Monday before.

We began with the incorporation of the levels of tension but with a transformation into animals who would see something of interest, be threatened or retreat. Looking back I felt a great immersion in the exercise with reflection on how far we’ve come as an ensemble and our inhibitions have been released, allowing us to reach great potential. An improv scene was then added into our human/animal hybrid with a simple meeting in a cafe and a placing of an order. This was an exercise I could observe and preform all day as the possibilities were endless. The most enjoyable aspect was watching people who weren’t sure about their initial animals be given new ones to work with and made it their own. We divided into smaller groups and worked on individual scenes using the same animal based movements and attitudes as before. This was a nice break from the intensity of embodying our animals fully and was entertaining for the ensemble.

Fridays class saw some wonderful experimentation with the ensemble. After the warm ups we threw away what we knew about our previous animals and went for something completely opposite to what we once knew. Naturally, the step down from the brutish powerful Silverback Gorilla was a common Meerkat. My course of action was unsure aside from the darting of my head from all corners of the space but that was soon remedied once Eadaoin worked individually with our new animals. I was instructed to widen my eyes to hilarious scale with swift bursts of movements to sudden stops to survey the area. Not only did I enjoy the absolute chaos of the Meerkat I felt far more secure with the choice I made.

The class ended with a fire based piece. As an ensemble we were set alight as a bundle of kindling and had to translate that in our movements. I’m sure Eadaoin in her moments of silence was astounded with our efforts as a bunch of kindling. We later did this in groups of three to do the same. I must say I enjoy the mindlessness. 

Monday was by far the most exhausting class I’ve ever endured in my time as an actor. Eadaoin who was not able to join us for the rest of the week felt that going for the physical exercises at a relentless rate was the best course of action for a Monday morning. After our routine massage we began with the infamous plank to regulate our core muscles. After lasting a minute I fell to the ground with great fatigue and flashbacks to secondary school P.E I egged on the remaining members of this cruel exercise.

We then followed with the cat cow which then led into acrobatics. A handstand (Which I’ve never accomplished) was attempted many a times with slow progression. If it were not for the solid wooden floor waiting for us (specifically me due to my abandon for safety when it came to the handstand) upon our “graceful” decent I would attempt a handstand with more enthusiasm. Cartwheels were the next challenge to attempt (You can imagine how that went). We moved into a more primate based movement which was interesting to explore and develop but I felt that there wasn’t enough time to allow a natural transition backwards on the evolutionary movement scale due to time constraints.

This left the performance of our animal research exercise under further time constraints. From the brief period we saw of the ensembles take of animals in everyday life (as people) was a curious and entertaining display. (I was a gorilla so I researched a video from Steve Backshall’s “Deadly 60” on Silverback gorillas. )

Tuesday saw a more relaxed class. After hearing of what we endured the day previous Jools based the class on relaxing and bettering our muscles. (It felt great to be cared for in such a way as this).  Due to a lack of essential members we weren’t able to work further on our “Lost” routine. We moved into a more visually sound ensemble piece with our step based movement by making a forest sequence. Moving into a mood of pure focus such as our would look absolutely brilliant from the perspective of the audience I would imagine.

Friday saw the basic elements of ensemble based pieces I’ve seen in the past while come to life as Jools tasked us with elevating our partners in an almost dance like sequence as our partners would move across the space and leap. It was up to the partners to correct the timing and glide our partners to their decent and vise versa. What really helped feel a connection with this exercise was being partnered with someone of a similar build which is something I struggle with given my scrawny and very light build which in most instances puts me and my partner at some sort of disadvantage.

Monday began with the routine warm up massages with the added acrobatics and yoga that I’m still trying to get the hang of. We moved onto a new exercise named the “7 levels of tension”. Basically we moved around the space according to the number we were given from 0 “pure exhaustion” (I’m an expert at embodying that one) and progressed to through to the level 7 climax of a bomb scare. I found great enjoyment in the exercise out of how we’re given free reign for whatever stage we were given without having to plot our next movement. This was formulated into the 7 stages into an improv exercise at the train station and as you can imagine if you’ve been reading my previous posts, I had slight trouble maintaining a realistic approach.

Tuesday further delved into brief voice work with Jools. We manipulated our yawning into a character who unintentionally became some sort of English beggar/whiny teenager. We added other forms of character to the exercising of our facial muscles also. A new nonsense/seriousness contrasting exercise stood out for me that day, a number of the ensemble moved across the space humming from the depths of their vocal chords only for a handful to make random succinct movements with equally weird voices to test their focus. Unfortunately before we could have more fun with this we moved onto the step sequences which at this point is starting to become slightly monotonous at this point. However the redeeming aspect of sort is we split up into new groups to try a new routine based off these movements.

Friday was casual and feel good in the beginning with the addition of music to the background of our massages. We then ventured into the deviously simplistic yet impossible exercise of…naturally sitting in a chair. The exercise titled “Actor moves to center stage and sits in a chair” is what it is really, an actor sitting in the chair. However being asked to do this required us to be as natural as possible, not leading to anything bigger or foreshadowing in body movement. Throughout people struggled with entering as the actor and being natural at the same time (including myself). This exercise can be described as having a sadistic element as to restricting the individual way we sit on a chair, so naturally I grew to love this exercise. Over the weekend we are tasked with studying an animal of our choice to observe in movement and behavior. I look forward to seeing the outcomes.

(I had a great image for this entry but for some reason wordpress won’t allow me to)

I find it difficult to begin a reflective piece like this. There was a lot going on throughout the show it proved difficult to focus specifically on one aspect. This Oscar Wilde short story turned opera encapsulated me with its elegant musical score by John O’Brien. I felt a greater connection with the orchestra members through their personification of various animals. My favorite being Emma King who resonated with me as a fellow percussionist who added sublime touches to scenes.

Movement wise I (much like the rest of the ensemble) reveled to see the movements we’ve practiced in class and in that moment I felt that the beautiful movements and choreography on stage is the end result of what Eadaoin and Jools are teaching us so in a way it explained the confusion to what the meaning behind many of the exercises were.

With Eadaoin being associate director I could suspect an instance of her ensemble focused style with the audience participation in one of the Sun’s scenes resonated with me, almost as if an element of Jool’ vocal exercises collaborates with the audience in a short and sweet vocal piece that unified everyone in the theatre succinctly.

Visually just about every aspect of the opera was worked in wonderful detail from the costumes, canvases and even the placements of the instruments on the stage before it started. A particular scene I sat in awe at was rather simple in theory but so beautifully executed. The Quintet (affectionately known as the “Special Branch”)  splash water onto what seems to be a blank canvas to then be revealed elegant floral designs. I believe it was the simplicity of this that impressed me most as it was visually pleasing and ex-positioned the plot swiftly.

Anyone could see that the cast had chemistry on stage and felt comfortable around one another which really drives home the point of ensembleness Eadaoin has us going through and it sets the bar for what we have to reach by the end of our careers.

This production clearly shows that passion and immense hard work went into it as shown through well timed movement of throwing things to each other, moving throughout the set and even in production mentioned in the post show discussion. It makes this show not only a theatrical sense but a success for the arts in my opinion and would feel the open mindedness of people are the key to its success.