I like "Mutter" Butters... Get it? hahaha....

A Reflection on Mother Courage.

To be utterly Brechtian, I'm going to tell you now that during the course of this blog post I am going to discuss the aspects fo Brecht I like and want to include in future directing endeavors. I may also go on a tangent or two, but this is not guaranteed.

Ready?

In the movie we watched during class, one of the experts on Brecht (how weird would it be to have people who are experts on YOU?) was saying that the fame practitioner was that time's equivalent to a rock star. He was doing revolutionary things, and with style and often humor. I admire this, because there are so many who try to change the face of something, and few who actually achieve their goals with such success.

There were a few aspects of Brecht's work I admired. One is the casual atmosphere that Brecht begins his shows with, people milling about, eating and drinking away, actors milling about in character amongst the audience. I also like the idea of making the audience very aware it is a play. I would love to mesh these two ideas, with the actors blending in but also standing out. Jerzey Grotowski also worked with this immersive type of theatre, having his audience in the setting as well, and watching the drama unfold around them. How often does a person go to a party just waiting for some scandal to occur? My friend and I had an ongoing bet throughout an evening out on what time our neighbors would begin their drunken fumble to the dance floor. But to incorporate that second aspect of Brecht's, I would want it to be immediately obvious that the drama unfolding is planned. This could be done in so many creative ways, with dramatic lighting, characters freezing in place while background to the conversation is explained further, or even just the actors speaking loudly to announce their importance, whether the conversation is intended to be spoken at such a volume or not. I would want it to be very clear that the audience is an immersed audience, but an audience nonetheless. I still want that bit of alienation to be there.

Also, this is a picture I found of a movie poster starring Brecht's daughter, Barbara Brecht-Schall.Cool huh? He also had another actress daughter, Hanne, by his first wife, who died in 2009 at the age of 86.

An(ding)dong

Masked Dance does not agree with me. 

Gangly legs + Not being able to see + Freezing cold = well, see below....

See? Delightfully awkward at best. But hey, can't say i didn't try :)

I'm not saying I dislike masked dance or anything, i very much enjoyed the performance. I feared that i would have to keep leaning over and asking for translation, but the gift of this art is that if you know a sentence or two of background, it can be enjoyable for an hour or more. I really liked that aspect of the show.

As far as the trip as a whole goes, i would say it was a much bigger success. I grew closer to a lot of people, and the town itself really was a treat. Walking around at night and literally hearing nothing except the sounds of our groups footsteps, standing in the midst of looming trees that stood like sky-high and silent ghosts, and swinging on swings that feel like they were made for really skinny giants, all of it in one night was overwhelming. So much to take in. And so little time.

If i had one thing to say back to you, Andong, it would be to let me stay longer. I could have learned even more!

Hope you had a good weekend Benji :)

A Revelation.

The Little Prince.

This one's for you, Leila ;)

I want to do a couple blogs on this performance, but my night is young and so am I, so I'm calling this Part One.

I start with an under-appreciated source for quotes, Facebook Chat:

"Working backstage is like making magic. Performing onstage is just dancing in the glitter."

   Okay, most actors could take offense to this statement, saying that performers have to work hard like technicians do to perfect their art. But in this quote, notice the word "dance" is used. Dancing is a skill, it requires a lot of focus, practice, and grace. The action of dancing is often celebratory as well. So, a performer celebrates and embraces this "glitter", but in a way that is tasteful, artistic, and well thought. That is to say, this task is no walk in the park.

   I have some experience in technical theater, the "backstage stuff" so to speak. I used to take it for granted, when everyone around me knew how to do tech just as well as they could act. I didn't feel like it was a useful skill. I saw more as just keeping up with the Joneses. But now, here, i see that not every actor knows how to run a light board, or the basics of stage makeup.  I have an asset that can be utilized, and was utilized during The Little Prince. I operated the lighting board. Sure, I still needed a bit of help. But the important part was I was more than just someone who does what she loves and takes the "glitter" she is given for granted. I'm on my way to being well rounded on a whole new level. And that is what TRULY makes a great performer. Well-rounded-ness.

   Tech really does make the magic. How many musicals are just people sitting on stage in jeans and a T-shirt singing to audiences of hundreds without a microphone? Not many that sell tickets, at least. People are drawn to the flashy endeavors, the bright lights and big noises and fancy rotating set pieces. The actors certainly aren't making any of those things happen for themselves. Every one person onstage is supported by a team of professionals backstage whose sole job is to make sure that what happens onstage is magical, and nothing less. Those theatre practitioners who say that they can do a play with minimal set/costumes/props, they are basically making actors stand alone. No illusion. No glitter to dance in. The focus is the dance itself, and that is what makes it hard.

   But then what, one might ask, is the "glitter"? Literally speaking, glitter is attractive, it makes a person look in its direction. Glitter is used in illusions and tricks, to conceal the mechanics and fool the audience. Glitter is the idea of fame, or recognition. After the show of The Little Prince, the true role reversal hit me. After the blackout, I crawled down the stairs form the lighting board, and then into the black box. But there were no congratulatory effects. Not for me anyway. It was Leila who got the accolades. It was so mind-blowing to just sit in the back, and get no glitter whatsoever, even though you were just as engaged, just as hard-working during the course of a show. It was flabbergasting to sit there and wonder how when I was up there getting roses and applause during Our Town, how Leila was able to slip out a back door with out a person in the audience seeking out the lone set designer. Sometimes I can't comprehend how people don't live without the glitter, the glow of praise. Maybe I'm just an incredibly vain person, like Sophia's character in the play. But maybe we were just made different ways. Leila likes making the magic, she feels better sneaking around backstage winding the crank that makes the show tick. I love dancing in the glitter, taking what Leila makes and transferring its greatness to the audience through performance. 

   And together, we make a perfect team :)

Practitioner Project: The Aftermath :)

WHEW!

Glad that project is over, Benji. 

Don't get me wrong, i loved it and everything, but MAN it is just a huge weight off of my shoulders, not to mention my project partners, who i bothered a lot (Brian, John, SORRY!) :P

Anne Bogart's Viewpoints

Our project consisted of 3 parts:

1) The PowerPoint giving background on Bogart (see above)

2) A Workshop component that gives a taste of what Bogart's Viewpoints are like

3) A Performance done in the style of the practitioner's method.

I'd say all three of these went pretty well. Our performance was my personal favorite. It was enhanced by the Y2 set pieces which happened to be lying around in the black box at the time, also adding to the Viewpoint of Architecture. These set pieces were flat boxes covered in reflective tape, which really made the light play with my face when i was huddled on top of it. Another that added to our project was being able to get expert opinions throughout the process from Mark Hill.

One thing that really makes me love Anne Bogart's work is what i like to call the "snapshot effect". Bogart's Viewpoints make every moment worth taking a picture of, every image presented during every second is strong and stable, making for a solid performance with clear messages. Her ways also make for directorial decisions to be made extremely evident in these "snapshots" onstage. I felt that we captured that aspect fairly well in our performance, particularly with the one moment where Joe (played by Brian), stands center stage in between the two tableaus: One of his unstable wife, the other of his overly confident boss. The levels and layers and shape this image has makes for an astounding visual treat, and the silence only adds to it :)

I truly enjoyed doing this project, and i would REALLY love to put some Viewpoints into our IBY1 play!

Nighty night Benji :)

Mark Hill and Beyond.....

The teacher who is indeed wise does not bid you to enter the house of his wisdom but rather leads you to the threshold of your mind.

- Kahlil Gibran

 

These ARE our happy faces!

    

  This quote reminds me of Mark Hill. Why? Because over this week, I feel as though I did more discovery within myself than anywhere else. Sure, I learned a great deal about Viewpoints for my Practicioners Project, and discovered the aspects of Suzuki and Butoh Theatre, but within each of those methods was a journey about my own mind. Mark didn’t sit us down and say “This is theatre. These are my feelings. Experience them with me NOW.” Instead, he tells us the concept and then sets us free in it. I think this is truly the best way to teach, free for interpretation and yet structured enough to where a common goal is achieved. Over the week with the students, or the weekend with student and teachers, every single soul in the room walked away with a different thing that moved them. I know that because in our circle “debrief” time (see below), everyone said something different. Nearly 90% of those things learned were about themselves, either the way their bodies worked or the thoughts we had never encountered before. 

Circle Time with Mark Hill  (courtesy Mrs. Frasse)

    I talked previously about my week with Mark Hill, but I have yet to tell you about the weekend! I worked almost the entirety of Saturday and Sunday with Mark, along with many teachers (of SFS and TCIS)  and 3 other students:

John, Philip, Brian and I, “The Demo Kids”.

    

     While our purpose was to demonstrate exercises and to organize lunch, we also became part of the workshop, learning much more than we had during the week. We revisited some of our favorite exercises, such as “Swimming Lanes” (playing with Kinesthetic Response) and various activities with Energy, Spatial Relationships, and Shape. My personal favorite was the Big Mac/French fry shape Philip and I made!

Big Mac and French Fries :)

     There are so many other things I want to say! In Butoh, a big part of the practice is letting go of the “social body”, the things that the world has deemed acceptable for you to do with your body in public (or at all). Butoh encourages the actor to revert back to, or start using movements that a natural, but not part of the “social body”. I kept thinking about this throughout an exercise we did where we were conversing with no words, solely through each other’s back muscles. At the end of the exercise, the “Demo Kids” were asked to stay onstage and re-enact their back encounter with no other back—simply by memory—for the sake of an audience. So we all sat down and faced our backs to the audience. The boys were urged to take off their shirts, so that every detail of their muscles could be seen. For a second, I felt the sudden urge to take off my shirt too. I really connected at that moment. I had lost the notion of a “social body” for a second.  I wanted to use my greatest tool in the best possible way for the sake of the performance, and for a moment I didn’t care that everyone would be shocked at the suggestion. Of course, I held my tongue as it was a teaching situation and was highly inappropriate (we were LEARNING to lose the “social body” it had not yet been lost), but I was thrilled to discover that Mark had sense this urge in me and understood. I’m glad that I’m not alone, that Mark had been there to guide me on an undoubtedly confusing process of understanding this aspect of theatre.

Mark Hill and I!

     One other thing I really enjoyed is something Mrs. Hamm brought up in our debriefing on Sunday. There were four students and many teachers, some who knew us and some who had just met us. The best part about all of that was that by the end of the first day, the teacher/student barrier was dissolved. I guess this can relate to the “social body” concept in a different way, where certain people don’t interact in an intimate manner, such as the students and teachers did within the first hour of the weekend. I saw these teachers as fellow actors; each with different attributes to bring to offer, and these teachers saw us as peers (for the time being). I really enjoyed the ability to work with a unique group of varying ages with little to no complications.

Mrs. Hamm and I, breaking barriers

     When we reconvened on Tuesday in IBTA class, we all wanted the days of the black box and high intensity motion back, and dreaded the thought of returning to a non-stop life that never gives us a chance to breathe. However, there are glimmers of hope: ANDONG, for instance. A perfect getaway.

     That is, a getAWAY from school, and a getaTOWARDS Mark Hill and some masked dance!

     Can’t wait!

<3