From my perspective, all too often contemporary playwrights operate like the joke-writer he describes, but with a slight twist: everyone now no doubt knows the Aristocrats, which is the ne plus ultra of the operation Butler describes and the mode most often employed by playwrights. Not only does it set up a miniscule punchline, everyone knows the punchline in advance; the success of the joke is entirely dependent on the narrative which gets you there from the beginning, which tells you where you’re going. Most contemporary plays are very essayistic like this; given the homogeneity of the typical theater artist and audience, we know that a play that starts off about war will have something bad to say about it, that a play that engages with gay issues will be pro-gay. (Someone please name me the last big pro-war or anti-gay play you saw professionally produced.) In this typology, the “narrative,” which is essentially the entire play being produced, exists to narrate a series of points that makes the predictable ending impactful, which we charitably still refer to as catharsis. This is why I generally don’t like contemporary playwriting.
I believe promenade staging is a major part of live theatre’s evolution. In a world where entertainment is available at the click of a mouse, removing the fourth wall and placing the audience on stage creates an experience that can’t be streamed or downloaded. It is a thrill unique to the theater, giving the observer unparalleled freedom to interact with an environment that is usually seen from a distance.
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WTF is Devised Work, Anyway? →
A fascinating post on devised work in the theatre. I’ve long wanted to try something similar to the RSC’s method in creating US. I’ve never had the chance to witness this style of theatre in practice, though I see the potential (and the flaws) in it.
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The problem with theatre, of course, is the inflexibility of its start time. Turn up five minutes late to a restaurant reservation and your table will be waiting, five minutes late to a film and you’re still only up to the Volvo adverts, five minutes late to a gig and the band haven’t even come on yet – but turn up even two minutes late to the theatre and you’re greeted by the disappointed face of the usher which seems to say ‘Where have you been? Look, the doors are shut – and behind those doors are literally HUNDREDS of people simply more competent at everyday life tasks than you.
I Just Want To Begin This Audition By Saying That I'm Still Not Entirely Sure What Acting Is →
Happens all too often in real life? Yes! Future tongue-in-cheek monologue? Yes!
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…the bare wish, if nothing else, to evolve art fit for the times must drive our theatre of the scientific age straight out into the suburbs, where it can stand as it were wide open, at the disposal of those who live hard and produce much, so that they may be fruitfully entertained there with their great problems. They may find it hard to pa for our art, and we shall have to learn in many respects what they need and how they need it; but we can be sure of their interest. For these men who seem so far apart from natural science are only apart from it because they are being forcibly kept apart…
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Just because you’re free to say whatever you want doesn’t always mean you should. Artists are free to push boundaries to make art but when pushing boundaries is their only aim the result is usually bad art.
“Most theater designed for children (as in, written and performed by children) teaches the lesson that it is not the result of the performance that matters but the simple act of participation. Not a bad lesson for kids who will go on to live non-theatrical lives. Those kids can feel good about the participation aspect in a “I did theater once and it was fun!” way. For the kids that get hooked on the crystal meth of performance and become career theater folk, that lesson is destructive. The world at large doesn’t really give two shits about your self esteem growth or 4H Participation Ribbon. Was the show a success as a show?
And more often than not, it is not. It sucks.”
…it is even more discouraging in light of the amazing number of hearing actors who are weak in the use of their faces and bodies but nevertheless carved out a substantial career in the theatre. What they get by on is standing in costume looking interesting, and having that almost holy ability to speak the English language to those who adore hearing it, never mind how limited or akward their movements on stage.
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