Here are some of my notes from 2004 that I wrote regarding Lev Dodin, Maly Theatre. Enjoy.
-David
I finally got my hands on “Dodin and the Maly Drama Theatre: Process to Perfomance.”Some of my favorite stuff...-The Introduction by Simon Callow. It alone is incredible and almost single handedly gives or restores faith in theatrical possibilities.-For The Devils, the actors rehearsed three years and read 240 books as part of their immersion. -Many of the descriptions of the productions sound almost impossible – “Platonov” for example, with its behavioral combinations of music and dance would require everything we just are not “prepared” to do here in America as actors, individually or collectively. See below.-Quote from the book – “The Russian notion of the “life of a production” is particularly relevant for Dodin’s theatre where organic development and maturation are understood to be paramount.” (Their understanding and experience of “organic development and maturation” is not the same as ours! See the above – 3 years rehearsal and 240 books preparation, then three more years in production before the actors “felt relatively ready,” then three more for it to settle.). Overall it makes you question everything, and I mean everything, we think and do with our theatre in America. Dodin and his company did something we hardly know of or can fathom. Read the book if you get a chance. I can’t wait to read “Journey Without End.”
Inspired by reading the stuff on Dodin, I finally got around to watching “An Unfinished Piece for the Player Piano,” the 1977 film by Nikita Mikhalkov based largely on “Plantanov.” All I can think is that Russian actors must read the words of a script (or story), then imagine the circumstances and events from which those words might have arisen, construct a series of actions based on those events and circumstances, which the words then in turn can become part of. Whereas American actors, read the words and then construct a series of actions based on the literal meaning of those words and then use events and circumstances to make it “natural.”
As for the film itself – Among other things, I thought it was great how cinematically the setting, the environment, gradually, as the action progressed and the characters do what they do, drink, tell stories, play, touch, dance, went from being this literal place with overgrown shrubbery, insects, heat, and rain, to being a surreal and poetic place, serving as both hindrance and facilitator for the characters, right down to the final shot on the river with the fabulous morning light reflecting in the ripples. The light, the physical space, the views, the objects, played out symbiotically with the actors. Kind of like the descriptions of Dodin’s or Nekrosious’ sets, which have an immediate and tangible affect on the actors besides simply being a “setting” for the audience to understand something, i.e. place, time, metaphor, etc
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Shirley Ellis or is it Carlisle Valentine
I haven't seen it but I've heard from at least two good sources that Carlisle Ellis rocks the house in "Shirley Valentine" at Live Theatre Workshop. All my bias' (good and bad) probably will prevent me from seeing this show - the British thing, its a "chick flick," stuff like that you know. If I do go of course it would be to see Carlisle in the role. I think Carlisle has the most unique and interesting voice (as in vocal quality) of any actor or actress in Tucson. Wrapped around a British dialect gives me pause - not because Carlisle couldn't do it but because, well, its British! That aside, her voice is outstanding! Its rich, melodious, enchanting and she knows how to utilize it as real physical action, not merely pretty sounds or correct sounds. When she activates her voice, it is with clear and specific intent and the action is carried along. Put that together with her eyes and her warm personality and ka-boom, "Stage Presence!"
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Affective Memory as discussed by Stanislavsky
If you have read the comment under the "Phedre in HD" post, then you have read what to some will be (or should be) a revelation. If you haven't read the comment, you should, as it mentions more in the growing and unmistakable evidence that Stanislavsky held Affective Memory as his primary "discovery" and as the most important and foundational aspect of his work. Further, it puts Stanislavsky's ideas of "Physical Action" in the proper historical (time) and working (craft) context. What does all that mean or represent generally speaking? It means that if you believe, propagate or teach that Stanislavsky changed his mind later in his life, that Stanislavsky thought or learned that Affective Memory was "dangerous," that he concluded that the Method of Physical Actions was his/the ultimate technique, or any other such thing, you stand squarely outside of the actual facts and working practice of Stanislavsky. In short, you are completely wrong.
Now anyone is free to invent, concoct or borrow any ideas they want and to call it an "acting technique." If however, you say you teach "Stanislavsky" for example, and refute Affective Memory at the same time, you are wrong. It is as simple as that. Call it false advertising. You actually teach and propagate a myth about Stanislavsky.
Frankly I have been a part of these debates for a while now and and as the years have gone by I have heard and seen the people who propagate the myths about Stanislavsky's "last work" and The Method of Physical Actions as the be all and end all, while bad mouthing people like Lee Strasberg for example, ignore facts and evidence and create false impressions almost at will. Its funny now to see and hear them say "Oh, I don't engage in or worry about who is right or wrong anymore" because the new and irrefutable evidence is so much against them - Stanislavsky's own words burning in their ears! When there are no more excuses for them, when they can't justify or wiggle out of the facts any longer, they are quitting. Why they don't just say "Oh my gosh I have been wrong all these years" is beyond me. I mean if somebody showed me something so clear as Stanislavsky saying "Look David, Affective Memory is dangerous. I used to use it but then I came to the conclusion it didn't work or had to be used only in a certain way, very small doses at certain times. And David, I have happily come to the conclusion that the Pavlovian concepts as supported by my Soviet interpreters is the best way to go. Method of Physical Action all the way David!" Well I would have to reconsider what I believe, what I teach and what I say about Stanislavsky and his work. And I would do it! However, that has never come to pass despite all the years of people saying such notions were historical truths. The dominoes are falling the other way in fact, and fast!
The sadness comes from the fact that students and others will still hear and believe what they are told by these people as they claim to come with credentials, and the brilliance of Stanislavsky will continue to be lost behind an arsenal of petty personality rank, lasting Soviet dogma or trendy applications and concepts. Some simplistic or worse, some unattainably "great" version of Stanislavsky's work will permeate. The remedy for my sadness would come in the form of them saying "I teach a perversion of Stanislavsky's ideas and I ignore all relevant facts associated with the man's best work and thought." That would solve so many problems for current and future actors and others interested in Stanislavsky.
If this sounds harsh or "out of character" for me, so be it. Its not meant to be mean but it is meant to be completely straightforward. In the end its about Stanislavsky and a legacy of work by dedicated and serious theatre practitioners - and getting that legacy correct. Its been difficult but its not that difficult once we get everyone to look honestly at the facts, the record. The overall history is fascinating and sometimes intricate and includes a Russian revolution for godsakes! But as I said, doable, understandable.
Now anyone is free to invent, concoct or borrow any ideas they want and to call it an "acting technique." If however, you say you teach "Stanislavsky" for example, and refute Affective Memory at the same time, you are wrong. It is as simple as that. Call it false advertising. You actually teach and propagate a myth about Stanislavsky.
Frankly I have been a part of these debates for a while now and and as the years have gone by I have heard and seen the people who propagate the myths about Stanislavsky's "last work" and The Method of Physical Actions as the be all and end all, while bad mouthing people like Lee Strasberg for example, ignore facts and evidence and create false impressions almost at will. Its funny now to see and hear them say "Oh, I don't engage in or worry about who is right or wrong anymore" because the new and irrefutable evidence is so much against them - Stanislavsky's own words burning in their ears! When there are no more excuses for them, when they can't justify or wiggle out of the facts any longer, they are quitting. Why they don't just say "Oh my gosh I have been wrong all these years" is beyond me. I mean if somebody showed me something so clear as Stanislavsky saying "Look David, Affective Memory is dangerous. I used to use it but then I came to the conclusion it didn't work or had to be used only in a certain way, very small doses at certain times. And David, I have happily come to the conclusion that the Pavlovian concepts as supported by my Soviet interpreters is the best way to go. Method of Physical Action all the way David!" Well I would have to reconsider what I believe, what I teach and what I say about Stanislavsky and his work. And I would do it! However, that has never come to pass despite all the years of people saying such notions were historical truths. The dominoes are falling the other way in fact, and fast!
The sadness comes from the fact that students and others will still hear and believe what they are told by these people as they claim to come with credentials, and the brilliance of Stanislavsky will continue to be lost behind an arsenal of petty personality rank, lasting Soviet dogma or trendy applications and concepts. Some simplistic or worse, some unattainably "great" version of Stanislavsky's work will permeate. The remedy for my sadness would come in the form of them saying "I teach a perversion of Stanislavsky's ideas and I ignore all relevant facts associated with the man's best work and thought." That would solve so many problems for current and future actors and others interested in Stanislavsky.
If this sounds harsh or "out of character" for me, so be it. Its not meant to be mean but it is meant to be completely straightforward. In the end its about Stanislavsky and a legacy of work by dedicated and serious theatre practitioners - and getting that legacy correct. Its been difficult but its not that difficult once we get everyone to look honestly at the facts, the record. The overall history is fascinating and sometimes intricate and includes a Russian revolution for godsakes! But as I said, doable, understandable.
Stanislavsky built his theatres on integrity - personal and artistic. If we choose to associate ourselves with him, I believe we should do so in the same manner.
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Regarding Lev Dodin's production of "Platonov"
Hi All, this was sent anonymously for posting. Please read and enjoy. I have heard and read about the brilliance of this particular production of Chekhov's "Unfinished Play" (Platonov) but have never seen it of course and have never heard it quite described in this fashion. It is a telling and insightful description and I will write more and hope to have more on Lev Dodin soon.
-David
After 30+ years of theatre experience I finally saw the kind of theatre I have been dreaming of seeing all that time. This was not the current production of Dodin's Maly Drama Theatre playing in the Lincoln Center Festival -- "Life and Fate" -- as I will see that tomorrow. No, this was a film of one act (2 hours long) of his production of Chekhov's "Untitled Play" commonly known as "Platonov". I have never seen perfect theatre before until this production. The sense of what a permanent theatre company and only a permanent company can achieve because they are all trained in the same craft approach and all share the same vision of what theatre is deep in their individual and collective beings was alive in every second of Dodin's profoundly illuminating and overwhelmingly humane production of Chekhov. It embodied what happens in theatre when rehearsals last for years and even after productions open they are allowed to continue to evolve year after year in both performance and in continuing rehearsals. There was no hint of the current popular approach to Chekhov where he is turned into an Oxford wit, simplistic postmodern semiotics or a Russian Neil Simon. The production was a comic delight but in a Chekhovian sense -- the truth of human thought, feeling and action, i.e. behavior and how so much of this living on our part is funny because we are so blind and desperate in our needs and self delusion. We may even see ourselves doing it but we cannot stop. All we can do is laugh at our own foolishness while loving it. Nothing is "hit" as being a comic convention and yet everything makes one smile and cry in delightful recognition of HUMAN beings. The acting is truly experiential action. As Meyerhold said, "words are only the embellishment on the tapestry of movement" meaning that theatre, fundamentally, has nothing to do with words. With Dodin, words are the embellishment on the tapestry of LIVING expressed within deeply imaginative theatrical form. Like all the great theatre masters, Dodin never turns his actors into puppets of some ridiculous intellectualized postmodern concept plopped onto the play's theme as a critical conversation piece for academic "brain theatre". His actors live as independent beings in the world of the play and production and with a moment to moment improvisatory reality that is absent on Broadway and American regional theatre but is the essence of great acting -- not to mention theatre itself. The staging is both the natural life of a group of friends and enemies partying by a lake -- the lake is on stage and people swim, play musical instruments, jump in from 20 feet above to commit suicide, splash one another, hang from pier poles, role up on the (actual)sandy shoreline, while lighted candles float by in the water -- and at the same time the staging is a theatrical expression of the psychological levels of the play and its people which physicalizes both visually and emotionally what it all means; what Chekhov is saying. The seamless mix of all the actors playing musical instruments all through the play -- actors form a jazz band as well as play as soloists -- at almost any unexpected time while doing it so unselfconsciously as to make the inherent theatricality here seem to be just a musical extension of the character's soul, coupled with the playing of early jazz music, gloriously playful dancing and gorgeously human singing of all of sorts makes this production truly theatrical in a way that defines what theatricality actually is -- a deepening and sharpening of content and form without loosing the living emotional humanity of the actor. The stage is alive with levels of existence. Scenes are played in the foreground while the entire implied life of the play's circumstances and the production's vision continue all over the multi-leveled set behind the text based action. Never have I seen the visions of Meyerhold and Stanislavsky so fully combined. Its as if Meyerhold had Stanislavsky's great actors in his productions or as if Meyerhold was directing as Stanislavsky worked with the actors. Both sides of the coin of real theatre were onstage when one usually only gets heads or tails in the name of some director's personal "style". It is truly living psychophysical theatre seamlessly imagined as a theatrical form. This is multi-dimensional living on stage and a perfection of direction, conception and execution unknown in American theatre. One actor plays a scene with a mixture of lust, longing, anger, love, amusement and bewilderment that I did not think possible for any actor to achieve as living breathing emotional truth on stage. Something so simple as a character turning a chair on its side and sitting on that side becomes immensely expressive of the moment and the character. Truthful feeling flows everywhere and the explosive nature of emotion is given free reign in a way American theatre lost long ago. Actors use an old Meyerholdian trick of writing certain lines on the walls of the set and Dodin makes this completely natural, justified and theatrical all at once -- true theatre. The ease and relaxation of the actors on stage is terrifying -- not to mention their concentration and imaginative action plus an interpersonal emotional freedom and flow. As if all this was not enough, Dodin fashions a masterpiece out of Chekhov's early and unfinished play. I had read the play as left by Chekhov years ago and found it a tangled mess. Dodin drops around 10 characters and several lines of action in the text; adds 10 waiters/servants for the gentry class in the play (they form the jazz band and serve as kind of stage hands in tuxedos moving furniture pieces on and off, albeit justified within the play's action and set a magnificent table full of real food that is eaten on stage, especially by one piggish character) and in the process Dodin shapes a literary masterpiece as well as its theatrical embodiment out of Chekhov's messy play. I left thinking this is the most brilliant Chekhov play of all. After finally seeing what the Stanislavsky's, Meyerhold's, Vakhtangov's, Brecht's and Strasberg's dreamed of theatre being it will be hard to stomach anything less. When the art of theatre is finally achieved it is like nothing else. Too bad its as rare as a unicorn.
-David
After 30+ years of theatre experience I finally saw the kind of theatre I have been dreaming of seeing all that time. This was not the current production of Dodin's Maly Drama Theatre playing in the Lincoln Center Festival -- "Life and Fate" -- as I will see that tomorrow. No, this was a film of one act (2 hours long) of his production of Chekhov's "Untitled Play" commonly known as "Platonov". I have never seen perfect theatre before until this production. The sense of what a permanent theatre company and only a permanent company can achieve because they are all trained in the same craft approach and all share the same vision of what theatre is deep in their individual and collective beings was alive in every second of Dodin's profoundly illuminating and overwhelmingly humane production of Chekhov. It embodied what happens in theatre when rehearsals last for years and even after productions open they are allowed to continue to evolve year after year in both performance and in continuing rehearsals. There was no hint of the current popular approach to Chekhov where he is turned into an Oxford wit, simplistic postmodern semiotics or a Russian Neil Simon. The production was a comic delight but in a Chekhovian sense -- the truth of human thought, feeling and action, i.e. behavior and how so much of this living on our part is funny because we are so blind and desperate in our needs and self delusion. We may even see ourselves doing it but we cannot stop. All we can do is laugh at our own foolishness while loving it. Nothing is "hit" as being a comic convention and yet everything makes one smile and cry in delightful recognition of HUMAN beings. The acting is truly experiential action. As Meyerhold said, "words are only the embellishment on the tapestry of movement" meaning that theatre, fundamentally, has nothing to do with words. With Dodin, words are the embellishment on the tapestry of LIVING expressed within deeply imaginative theatrical form. Like all the great theatre masters, Dodin never turns his actors into puppets of some ridiculous intellectualized postmodern concept plopped onto the play's theme as a critical conversation piece for academic "brain theatre". His actors live as independent beings in the world of the play and production and with a moment to moment improvisatory reality that is absent on Broadway and American regional theatre but is the essence of great acting -- not to mention theatre itself. The staging is both the natural life of a group of friends and enemies partying by a lake -- the lake is on stage and people swim, play musical instruments, jump in from 20 feet above to commit suicide, splash one another, hang from pier poles, role up on the (actual)sandy shoreline, while lighted candles float by in the water -- and at the same time the staging is a theatrical expression of the psychological levels of the play and its people which physicalizes both visually and emotionally what it all means; what Chekhov is saying. The seamless mix of all the actors playing musical instruments all through the play -- actors form a jazz band as well as play as soloists -- at almost any unexpected time while doing it so unselfconsciously as to make the inherent theatricality here seem to be just a musical extension of the character's soul, coupled with the playing of early jazz music, gloriously playful dancing and gorgeously human singing of all of sorts makes this production truly theatrical in a way that defines what theatricality actually is -- a deepening and sharpening of content and form without loosing the living emotional humanity of the actor. The stage is alive with levels of existence. Scenes are played in the foreground while the entire implied life of the play's circumstances and the production's vision continue all over the multi-leveled set behind the text based action. Never have I seen the visions of Meyerhold and Stanislavsky so fully combined. Its as if Meyerhold had Stanislavsky's great actors in his productions or as if Meyerhold was directing as Stanislavsky worked with the actors. Both sides of the coin of real theatre were onstage when one usually only gets heads or tails in the name of some director's personal "style". It is truly living psychophysical theatre seamlessly imagined as a theatrical form. This is multi-dimensional living on stage and a perfection of direction, conception and execution unknown in American theatre. One actor plays a scene with a mixture of lust, longing, anger, love, amusement and bewilderment that I did not think possible for any actor to achieve as living breathing emotional truth on stage. Something so simple as a character turning a chair on its side and sitting on that side becomes immensely expressive of the moment and the character. Truthful feeling flows everywhere and the explosive nature of emotion is given free reign in a way American theatre lost long ago. Actors use an old Meyerholdian trick of writing certain lines on the walls of the set and Dodin makes this completely natural, justified and theatrical all at once -- true theatre. The ease and relaxation of the actors on stage is terrifying -- not to mention their concentration and imaginative action plus an interpersonal emotional freedom and flow. As if all this was not enough, Dodin fashions a masterpiece out of Chekhov's early and unfinished play. I had read the play as left by Chekhov years ago and found it a tangled mess. Dodin drops around 10 characters and several lines of action in the text; adds 10 waiters/servants for the gentry class in the play (they form the jazz band and serve as kind of stage hands in tuxedos moving furniture pieces on and off, albeit justified within the play's action and set a magnificent table full of real food that is eaten on stage, especially by one piggish character) and in the process Dodin shapes a literary masterpiece as well as its theatrical embodiment out of Chekhov's messy play. I left thinking this is the most brilliant Chekhov play of all. After finally seeing what the Stanislavsky's, Meyerhold's, Vakhtangov's, Brecht's and Strasberg's dreamed of theatre being it will be hard to stomach anything less. When the art of theatre is finally achieved it is like nothing else. Too bad its as rare as a unicorn.
Friday, July 24, 2009
More on Phedre from Patrick
I am confused about theatre on many levels. One level of confusion makes itselfpronounced here as a "third voice" to the dialogue established by David'sresponse to Chuck's posting on his website about "Phaedre." To begin, I wasseated beside Chuck (his guest) when we saw the movie/play together. I felt sograteful to Chuck (someone who the theatre community continues to owe a greatdebt to) because he had invited me to witness something I afterwards felt wasVERY EXCITING for our community. I'll try to explian this, and it's difficult,largely because I don't in this moment know what I need, let alone what ourcommunity might need, as regards an aesthetic theatrical quality, and along theway I'll maybe respond to some of the points I'm remembering about the posteddialogue. It would be easier, maybe, to simply add a third "comparison" totheir two voices on David's site, but something tells me this is the better wayto express my view.I agree almost in entirely with Chuck's response and I agree with more than halfof David's. And I read them just now in the same sitting! How can this be? Apart from own confusion, apart from each of their responses being directedtoward different aspects (Chuck on the production as theatre/film and David onthe production as individual actor accomplishments/casting) there is my feelingthat I may be torn by not knowing whether I saw something new, something old,something in between (more likely) or what. I don't just mean the form of anHD film edited play, I mean "contemporary classical Greek theatre" --What excited me: it was different than most play productions or movies. I thinkof David's comment about not thinking theatre like this existed anymore. Iwould be all for more of it, the "extreme passion" sort (but I'm paraphrasingand generalizing poorly), because I think so much out there now is way too coldand minimal these days and that all the arts, maybe especially literature andfilm and plays, i.e narrative genres (yes, Howard! plays too are narratives!)are not going for the "extreme" of emotion. Partly for fear of sentimentality. But sentimentality is the underside, not the overside of emotion. "Pheadre" asperformed might be melodramatic but that is the more, not the less, of emotion,and I'd rather have the more.I agree with David's comments about Theseus (the actor) and Hyppolitus (theactor) and the real specific support David provides to back this up. (David isgood with specifics!)As for the rest of the cast, I always felt engaged, even when they were handwringing, and Helen Mirren, in particular, did a lot of this. But, as I findhands to be the second most expressive human feature, I was glad to have amedium (play film) that allowed me to watch her hands, up close, as much as Iwanted. (A whole discussion could ensue about the "medium" choices being made,i.e. when there were closeups or not, and Chuck remarks on some of this, and italways felt "good" when the camera did its thing, but we need Howard to jointhis part of the discussion, at least!)I'm reminded that to my left sat a woman who was mortified that a small group ofothers to the right of Chuck found a good number of the scenes laughable. Theylaughed out loud, at admissions of guilt, lust, incest, etc. Even here I wasconfused. At first I thought, hey, lady, let them laugh if they want, it's afree country. More and more though, I realized that the mortified woman wastaking the seriousness (call it melodrama if you want, but I don't think itwas) to heart and that the people laughing simply could not "buy" the goingson. What was it about extremes of human family dynamics they couldn't acceptas such? I have to say I don't think they were laughing at the acting (it'sjust my feeling) so much as laughing at the occurences. Here is maybe the onepoint I disagree with Chuck, if I'm remembering correctly something he saidabout the story not being plot driven . . . (again, a poor paraphrase) In myview, I thought: FINALLY! a play that goes for extreme twists, not just of fateor by fate, or even of actions, but by utterances of dialogue that turneverything, very often, on a dime, so to speak. In other words, I had theimpression they were laughing at the play. I don't think they believed thelines.Some things I really liked: The title character, played by Mirren, would feeland express one thing and almost overlappingly feel and say another,diametrically opposed, emotion. Ah, but this was the real strength (of theplay, of the production): they weren't diammetically opposed at all. Only ourreason finds them to be conflicting. Somewhere deep down inside the seeminglycontradictory feelings we feel and rarely express are all one. It's that big"one" (I don't know how else to say it just now) that is at the bottom of ourhearts that we are so incapable of uttering. That sounds so sappy. I don'tknow if I even know what I mean. But I think it relates to the notion of whatDavid brings up about the gods. Maybe what is "up there" is also "deep inside"(okay, again, maybe sappy, maybe obvious) and that we have to shout that muchlouder to reach it / tap into it. I don't know. But I do think this speaks toDavid's objections about feeling the people were "determined" by the godswhenever they let their emotions fly . . . this may be what gods are,manifestations of our inner feelings, and certainly, much of the rest of theworld sees them as such. I.e. maybe we have too "westernized" the greek godsand think them existing up there (okay, Mt. Olympus and all) when actually theyare the same but different "spirits" residing within. I came away from themovie liking that there was this kind of "down to earth, as in, inside me"aspects to the gods, EXCEPT, of course when Theseus addresses his speech toPoseiden (bad "acting") the way he did . . . Yes, there may have been too manyinstances of this, but more generally, I thought the actors were speaking tothe forces within each other, not elsewhere and maybe this was the"contemporary classical thing" I'd like to see more of?I'm reminded of something. I once saw Patrick Stewart, on film, render a longspeech by Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus (when he wails about "being the sea"as he cradles his raped and mutilated daughter) I always thought thespeech--the lines, the amount of them, the poetry, in their context--waspreposterous. Until I saw him do them. Actually, I still think the speech ispreposterous. But the actor "made them" not only believable, but riveting.Racine's lines are not "over the top" like this, but actually deal verydirectly with deeply troubling emotions. What am I trying to say? I've lostit. Maybe that in our revered Shakespeare, there is plenty that isoutrageously "unactable" and yet actors make it happen. In Racine, it's allquite close to the bone, and still people found it ludicrous? I don't know.Oh, well, one more thing. About Ted Hughes: I think his retelling of Ovid's"Metamorphoses" (poems which were among the last he wrote) are stunning. Here,in "Phaedre," I heard unevenness in the lines of the play. I can't technicallyexplain it, except to say that I heard places where the modern idiomaticexpressions didn't jive with the rest of the whole. I would want to visit theRacine on the page, see Hughes's changes, and say more, but . . .Thanks to Chuck and David for their insights.
Patrick
Patrick
Thursday, July 23, 2009
Phedre Thoughts Comparison
Chuch Graham has a review of Phedre on TucsonStage/Let The Show Begin. He saw it at the Loft of Sunday. My own thoughts on Phedre are below in my previous post. Just for fun, I've a assembled a few quotes for comparison. I love Chuck's use of language in his descriptions.
Enjoy.
You just don’t see theater like this anymore, at least not in the good ol’ USA.
-Chuck
I didn't think this kind of acting existed anymore. I didn't think this type of understanding, interpretation and execution of plays existed anymore
-David
Appreciating this kind of performance does require a different sensibility, a willingness to follow every actor over the top and straight down into dark twists of writhing personalities conveyed in pure animalistic frenzy.
-Chuck
Let me put that in perspective. I can endure, even enjoy at times, a little affectation and melodramatic ranting. This damn near wore me down though.
-David
“Phaedra” projects a torque-jawed realm of drama powered by such a muscular mental connection the visceral response is immediate.
-Chuck
It was a weird one-hundred percent falsely wrought presentation of a brilliant play.
-David
These acting talents are so much larger than life – their dialogue the brute force equivalent of broad swords and sabers hacking and slashing at each other. Lusty appetites on a mythic scale.
-Chuck
Cliche, Over-Acting and Obvious Wailing and Intoning of False Passions - Thy name is this production.
-David
Stripped of subtlety, rushing headlong into vein-popping expressions of conflict, the psychology of revenge feels cut from bulky blocks of granite compulsively banging away.
-Chuck
It was like a bunch of freaks suffering uncontrollably at the hands of the gods, fate.
-David
While the plot is never the point but more of an excuse for the characters to bludgeon each other with words, “Phaedra” does remind us “when passion boils, reason evaporates.”
-Chuck
Those traits that made/make the Greek Dramatists (and Racine in this case too) so interesting, things like complexity, reasoning, curiosity, were nowhere to be found in this production.
-David
Blood will be spilled before this is over.
-Chuck
Give a guy his beer drinking spear throwing moments!
-David
Enjoy.
You just don’t see theater like this anymore, at least not in the good ol’ USA.
-Chuck
I didn't think this kind of acting existed anymore. I didn't think this type of understanding, interpretation and execution of plays existed anymore
-David
Appreciating this kind of performance does require a different sensibility, a willingness to follow every actor over the top and straight down into dark twists of writhing personalities conveyed in pure animalistic frenzy.
-Chuck
Let me put that in perspective. I can endure, even enjoy at times, a little affectation and melodramatic ranting. This damn near wore me down though.
-David
“Phaedra” projects a torque-jawed realm of drama powered by such a muscular mental connection the visceral response is immediate.
-Chuck
It was a weird one-hundred percent falsely wrought presentation of a brilliant play.
-David
These acting talents are so much larger than life – their dialogue the brute force equivalent of broad swords and sabers hacking and slashing at each other. Lusty appetites on a mythic scale.
-Chuck
Cliche, Over-Acting and Obvious Wailing and Intoning of False Passions - Thy name is this production.
-David
Stripped of subtlety, rushing headlong into vein-popping expressions of conflict, the psychology of revenge feels cut from bulky blocks of granite compulsively banging away.
-Chuck
It was like a bunch of freaks suffering uncontrollably at the hands of the gods, fate.
-David
While the plot is never the point but more of an excuse for the characters to bludgeon each other with words, “Phaedra” does remind us “when passion boils, reason evaporates.”
-Chuck
Those traits that made/make the Greek Dramatists (and Racine in this case too) so interesting, things like complexity, reasoning, curiosity, were nowhere to be found in this production.
-David
Blood will be spilled before this is over.
-Chuck
Give a guy his beer drinking spear throwing moments!
-David
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Phedre in HD
I had a wonderful time getting together with friends, Howard and Royce, and their respective mothers last night, for a quick bite to eat (soup at Miss Saigon) and then to see "Phedre" the National Theatre's HD presentation showing at The Loft. For those of you who might not know, this is a Jean Racine version translated and adapted by Ted Hughes. Its a stage performance filmed in HD.
The company and the conversation of the night was glorious, a real treat.
The production itself, hmmm. There was a gentleman I didn't know sitting to my left. At the end he turned to me and said "You are a actor aren't you? Or involved in theatre somehow?" I half nodded the truth. He continued, "I thought she (meaning Helen Mirren as Phedre) was in over her head. I thought knowing her she would at least give some moments recognizable as real human behavior. Instead all we got was sing songy words and playing with the voice. What did you think?" I nodded again, in complete agreement with his quick assessment. Cliche, Over-Acting and Obvious Wailing and Intoning of False Passions - Thy name is this production. It was a weird one-hundred percent falsely wrought presentation of a brilliant play.
Let me put that in perspective. I can endure, even enjoy at times, a little affectation and melodramatic ranting. This damn near wore me down though. In all honesty, I didn't think this kind of acting existed anymore. I didn't think this type of understanding, interpretation and execution of plays existed anymore. Boy was I wrong. Its alive and well and apparently thriving at the National Theatre, London. From this production we would be forced to deduce that human behavior has only a handful of possibilities. If you are feeling bad, look down, or away from everyone. If you are thinking of love, look up with wide eyes. If you get some bad news, bend over like you were punched in the gut. If you have some news to tell, get generally excited and frantic. Everyone wring your hands at all times. And always, always, always, intone in the most obvious fashion the very sound of the words you are speaking, i.e. if the word is "roar," make a roaring sound with your voice as you speak it. If the word is "chopped," clip it sharp and hard and fast like you are chopping something. Whine and wail constantly and never, ever, ever do anything but be perfectly still if you are not talking.
Those traits that made/make the Greek Dramatists (and Racine in this case too) so interesting, things like complexity, reasoning, curiosity, were nowhere to be found in this production. It was like a bunch of freaks suffering uncontrollably at the hands of the gods, fate. As opposed to an epic and detailed battle of human thought and feeling and intention verses the gods, fate. Its a "battle" we all face, even as today we soothe ourselves with the mantra "everything happens for a reason" (meaning a good reason). Dramatist put this conflict on the page right up through Hamlet, which is more or less a turning point, eventually leading on to Dramas where humans started working and thinking in consideration with each other rather than only as heroic individuals in relationship to fate.
The Greeks had this notion, which is evident if you closely examine the script, the events, the words, that when emotion overtakes an individual, it is the gods intervening. That is why in those moments that read or seem to be "emotional" the characters are talking to the gods, cursing the gods, making deals with the gods, etc. The characters know the gods are stepping in. These actions, these times by the characters (the actors really) therefore must have a different quality than the rest. Prior to, or after the gods intervention, the emotion, there must be a real sense of human reasoning and feeling and individual control. There cannot be the same level or quality of emotion or else the logic is completely defeated and you end up with this unwieldy and unrecognizable blend of activity that this production had. For example, when the King finally makes the pact with Poseidon to kill his son, this should have a distinctive ritualistic quality of behavior that is different from the Kings otherwise behavior. The emotion is present and different. In this production that moment carried the same grouchy and irritated quality as the rest of the dude's behavior. Physically it was nothing really - actually kind of stagy and awkward. It could and should be a sadly but beautifully revealing moment and it simply wasn't. And lots, all, of those types of opportunities were lost, gone, non-existent in this production. The specifics just were not there and it makes me wonder how much the director and the actors even considered it all. I had a hard time believing that Phedre, in her supremely melodramatic state of suffering was capable of composing a letter to her stepson such as the one in Ovid's version for example. Now granted we/they were working with Racine's script as translated and adapted by Hughes, not Ovid's work, but even it (Racine's) offers and carries a certain degree of creative and complex thought and reason by the characters, guided by knowledge and intention - individual control in other words. To render those thoughts and words as if they are guided by whining and out of control emotional states makes no sense. It creates a falsity, an evident and confusing one for the spectator.
The fact that Hippolytus is supposed to be a hunter and love the dynamic activity of being outdoors, sport, while not completely lost in this production, is made non-influencing. Phaedra is supposed to like the fact that he "is not a man who looks like a girl." Hippolytus is rugged and tested and proven physically in every way except the way he wants - in war and large events. The actor in this production certainly had the potential for that except he looked more like Hollywood tanned and tamed. They should have taken those good looks and charisma and turned them wild instead. Let the actor have his day in the sun so to speak, not the tanning booth. Give a guy his beer drinking spear throwing moments! He's a John-John riding his bike, flying his plane, skateboarding, dare-devil waiting his turn. It should be reasonable and understanding that women of all ages want him. In this production he was a little too much like one of the confused cousins.
Each of the other characters have "traits" as given in the various legends and myths which to my way of thinking were not evident or present in this production and which also could/should play key factors in establishing or revealing the action. I won't go into them all.
Just to throw in something I did like - the running water, the faucet, plumbing - something the Greeks did have in that place and time. Too bad it wasn't used but once in a random way!
But what a great night otherwise! And I am certainly glad I got to see this trendy and popular HD filmed production.
The company and the conversation of the night was glorious, a real treat.
The production itself, hmmm. There was a gentleman I didn't know sitting to my left. At the end he turned to me and said "You are a actor aren't you? Or involved in theatre somehow?" I half nodded the truth. He continued, "I thought she (meaning Helen Mirren as Phedre) was in over her head. I thought knowing her she would at least give some moments recognizable as real human behavior. Instead all we got was sing songy words and playing with the voice. What did you think?" I nodded again, in complete agreement with his quick assessment. Cliche, Over-Acting and Obvious Wailing and Intoning of False Passions - Thy name is this production. It was a weird one-hundred percent falsely wrought presentation of a brilliant play.
Let me put that in perspective. I can endure, even enjoy at times, a little affectation and melodramatic ranting. This damn near wore me down though. In all honesty, I didn't think this kind of acting existed anymore. I didn't think this type of understanding, interpretation and execution of plays existed anymore. Boy was I wrong. Its alive and well and apparently thriving at the National Theatre, London. From this production we would be forced to deduce that human behavior has only a handful of possibilities. If you are feeling bad, look down, or away from everyone. If you are thinking of love, look up with wide eyes. If you get some bad news, bend over like you were punched in the gut. If you have some news to tell, get generally excited and frantic. Everyone wring your hands at all times. And always, always, always, intone in the most obvious fashion the very sound of the words you are speaking, i.e. if the word is "roar," make a roaring sound with your voice as you speak it. If the word is "chopped," clip it sharp and hard and fast like you are chopping something. Whine and wail constantly and never, ever, ever do anything but be perfectly still if you are not talking.
Those traits that made/make the Greek Dramatists (and Racine in this case too) so interesting, things like complexity, reasoning, curiosity, were nowhere to be found in this production. It was like a bunch of freaks suffering uncontrollably at the hands of the gods, fate. As opposed to an epic and detailed battle of human thought and feeling and intention verses the gods, fate. Its a "battle" we all face, even as today we soothe ourselves with the mantra "everything happens for a reason" (meaning a good reason). Dramatist put this conflict on the page right up through Hamlet, which is more or less a turning point, eventually leading on to Dramas where humans started working and thinking in consideration with each other rather than only as heroic individuals in relationship to fate.
The Greeks had this notion, which is evident if you closely examine the script, the events, the words, that when emotion overtakes an individual, it is the gods intervening. That is why in those moments that read or seem to be "emotional" the characters are talking to the gods, cursing the gods, making deals with the gods, etc. The characters know the gods are stepping in. These actions, these times by the characters (the actors really) therefore must have a different quality than the rest. Prior to, or after the gods intervention, the emotion, there must be a real sense of human reasoning and feeling and individual control. There cannot be the same level or quality of emotion or else the logic is completely defeated and you end up with this unwieldy and unrecognizable blend of activity that this production had. For example, when the King finally makes the pact with Poseidon to kill his son, this should have a distinctive ritualistic quality of behavior that is different from the Kings otherwise behavior. The emotion is present and different. In this production that moment carried the same grouchy and irritated quality as the rest of the dude's behavior. Physically it was nothing really - actually kind of stagy and awkward. It could and should be a sadly but beautifully revealing moment and it simply wasn't. And lots, all, of those types of opportunities were lost, gone, non-existent in this production. The specifics just were not there and it makes me wonder how much the director and the actors even considered it all. I had a hard time believing that Phedre, in her supremely melodramatic state of suffering was capable of composing a letter to her stepson such as the one in Ovid's version for example. Now granted we/they were working with Racine's script as translated and adapted by Hughes, not Ovid's work, but even it (Racine's) offers and carries a certain degree of creative and complex thought and reason by the characters, guided by knowledge and intention - individual control in other words. To render those thoughts and words as if they are guided by whining and out of control emotional states makes no sense. It creates a falsity, an evident and confusing one for the spectator.
The fact that Hippolytus is supposed to be a hunter and love the dynamic activity of being outdoors, sport, while not completely lost in this production, is made non-influencing. Phaedra is supposed to like the fact that he "is not a man who looks like a girl." Hippolytus is rugged and tested and proven physically in every way except the way he wants - in war and large events. The actor in this production certainly had the potential for that except he looked more like Hollywood tanned and tamed. They should have taken those good looks and charisma and turned them wild instead. Let the actor have his day in the sun so to speak, not the tanning booth. Give a guy his beer drinking spear throwing moments! He's a John-John riding his bike, flying his plane, skateboarding, dare-devil waiting his turn. It should be reasonable and understanding that women of all ages want him. In this production he was a little too much like one of the confused cousins.
Each of the other characters have "traits" as given in the various legends and myths which to my way of thinking were not evident or present in this production and which also could/should play key factors in establishing or revealing the action. I won't go into them all.
Just to throw in something I did like - the running water, the faucet, plumbing - something the Greeks did have in that place and time. Too bad it wasn't used but once in a random way!
But what a great night otherwise! And I am certainly glad I got to see this trendy and popular HD filmed production.
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