Now for Day Three.
Did you know that when you spend three days non-stop talking about theatre and engaging with directors, it makes you appreciate that directing is often a solo exercise? That the past three days have felt like six and I had to revert to being a lone wolf for a couple of hours just to take care of myself. But I quickly jumped into the fray once again.
The despair comes from two panel conversations that dominated our day: the panel of leading LA artistic directors and a more intimate panel with the artistic directors of the Boston Court. The first, while interesting in principle to hear artistic directors admitting that the system of regional theatre has been skewed so that it doesn't represent a "region" any more and admitting that the subscription model is broken and needs to change, was simply depressing to think that these leaders despite seeing the problems in the system they are leading, are not doing anything to change it. As one artistic director stated, "Fuck the subscribers," but then in the same breath talked about courting the subscribers. I understand that they need to keep money coming to the theatres that they are running. Even though they talk about getting "young people" into the theatre, they are still beholden to their older subscribers and frankly it seems like they are going to keep on working the old model until either they leave, die, or are replaced. I think that it is time that we discussed what this regional theatre model was meant to do and really start holding the theatres responsible to that vision. Furthermore, these companies are sticking with the same old format of the new play being created by a playwright and developed by a company. The poor playwright has endless attempts at the development of their pieces at all of these companies but we are not developing the directors to direct them nor are we encouraging directors to create projects and develop different methodologies of creation. I'm beginning to believe that the regional theatre is not the ideal location new creation from an ensemble or from a director (really, I think that the "director-creation" is really an "ensemble-creation" unless we are talking about an auteur and ultimately I think that the "ensemble-creation" is the more interesting of the two.)
This emphasis on the playwright became even more pronounce by the panel at Boston Court. While being very inspiring and engaging hosts, Jessica Kubzansky and Michael Michetti just re-enforce the concept that the playwright, the word, is the central development of theatrical creation. Apparently, they have tried to include the development of the director in their grant language but this has failed. So even with artistic directors that are also freelance directors, the development of the director is sidestepped.
That being said, for all of you in LA, go to the Boston Court. They are the independent theatre that I have been looking for and they are creating interesting and gut-burning work. I can't tell you how exciting their conversation was for me except of course the bit about the relationship with playwrights. I think that ultimately I respect the Playwright and the Script but I want something more from theatre than just those two elements for myself as an artist.
The second half of the day (divide by dinner time) was for me the most interesting and inspirational. First, Gustavo Geirola came to talk to us about directors in Latin America and the work they are creating. I was blown away and had a mad desire to run away to Argentina to work there. Mr. Geirola has interviewed several hundred directors in almost every Latin American country and collected those interviews in several books: Arte y oficio del director teatral en América Latina. Its from this that several of us directors started talking about creating collaborative projects that we can take to the multiple theatre festivals in South America. It was a very inspiring talk, at least for me
Finally, Daniel Stein brought us how coffee creation and theatre creation are the same thing. I'm going to write a separate blog post about this once I have had more time to work through the amazing and inspirational thoughts brought by Mr. Stein.
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
Director's Lab West: Day 2 - The Recap
Its come to this overarching question: what is the context of our work within the world? It seems that everything is pushing towards defining, even for a moment, myself and my work. And this is something that I have resisted for so long but now, it seems even more important as it will guide me along to both create and find work.
The past two days have been whirlwind. I don't even know where to begin but to start with Day Two and work through Day Three. I'm going to separate the two days into two posts, I think that will be a little easier to deal with. For another look at the director's lab, check out Amy Clare Tasker, a fellow SF'er and co-conspirator.
Day Two: Surrender your Agenda
Even though we started with less than inspirational Skype "interview" with Anne Cattaneo, the founder of Director's Lab at Lincoln Center, it was followed by an interesting and invigorating workshop with the Dan O'Connor and Paul Rogen from Impro Theatre, an improv company down here in LA that create full length plays completely improvised in the style of a writer. In essence they are writing the play that the writer never wrote. By synthesizing thematic qualities, character archetypes, and developing a deep understanding of a writer's style, Impro Theatre really deconstructs the work of an author. Even though their work is essentially done for an improvisation, I found great connection with them simply because it is the work that I am interested in doing for my pieces: a (de)construction of a piece. I plan on "borrowing" some of their methodology to create some pieces in the future!
From there we traveled to the LATC to watch Cornerstone's first play within their Hunger Stories cycle, Cafe Vida. Even though I ended up sitting in the front row, it took me about half of the play to accept the style of the production. My preference within my own work and the work I see is an elegance, subtlety, and general cohesion of performance, design, and approach. There was none of this in this production: it was broad, raw, messy, with design elements challenging the performances. But...once I accepted the production's style, I was completely engulfed by the story, even though I valiantly resisted. This production brought about the most vehement discussion for this disparate group of directors. We all started to disagree immediately about everything: the performances (many of the performers were first time performers and the lead had been in prison for gang related offenses and basically played herself in the piece), the design (in my opinion poor fashioned and miserably executed). This show made me raise the question of authenticity: is it necessary to have first time performers to make this story of change through food valid? Is it necessary to have a former gang member as the lead to make the story legitimate? In my opinion, no. But it was ultimately the "authenticity" and "rawness" that the Director's Lab group was discussing. More thoughts on these questions later.
Finally we saw Expulsion by the Heidi Duckler Dance Company. This site specific piece was created off of scaffolding in the middle of an empty lot at the edge of Koreatown. After meeting the rehearsal director and chatting with her about her process and the limitations of site specific work, I was enamoured by the piece. It reminded me how much I fully enjoy dance and dance-theatre. Even with the inherent limitations of site specific work, I was invigorated and filled with beautiful images. The sparse-ness of the surroundings and of the choreography allowed the moments of fullness to explode. A beautiful evening.
The past two days have been whirlwind. I don't even know where to begin but to start with Day Two and work through Day Three. I'm going to separate the two days into two posts, I think that will be a little easier to deal with. For another look at the director's lab, check out Amy Clare Tasker, a fellow SF'er and co-conspirator.
Day Two: Surrender your Agenda
Even though we started with less than inspirational Skype "interview" with Anne Cattaneo, the founder of Director's Lab at Lincoln Center, it was followed by an interesting and invigorating workshop with the Dan O'Connor and Paul Rogen from Impro Theatre, an improv company down here in LA that create full length plays completely improvised in the style of a writer. In essence they are writing the play that the writer never wrote. By synthesizing thematic qualities, character archetypes, and developing a deep understanding of a writer's style, Impro Theatre really deconstructs the work of an author. Even though their work is essentially done for an improvisation, I found great connection with them simply because it is the work that I am interested in doing for my pieces: a (de)construction of a piece. I plan on "borrowing" some of their methodology to create some pieces in the future!
From there we traveled to the LATC to watch Cornerstone's first play within their Hunger Stories cycle, Cafe Vida. Even though I ended up sitting in the front row, it took me about half of the play to accept the style of the production. My preference within my own work and the work I see is an elegance, subtlety, and general cohesion of performance, design, and approach. There was none of this in this production: it was broad, raw, messy, with design elements challenging the performances. But...once I accepted the production's style, I was completely engulfed by the story, even though I valiantly resisted. This production brought about the most vehement discussion for this disparate group of directors. We all started to disagree immediately about everything: the performances (many of the performers were first time performers and the lead had been in prison for gang related offenses and basically played herself in the piece), the design (in my opinion poor fashioned and miserably executed). This show made me raise the question of authenticity: is it necessary to have first time performers to make this story of change through food valid? Is it necessary to have a former gang member as the lead to make the story legitimate? In my opinion, no. But it was ultimately the "authenticity" and "rawness" that the Director's Lab group was discussing. More thoughts on these questions later.
Finally we saw Expulsion by the Heidi Duckler Dance Company. This site specific piece was created off of scaffolding in the middle of an empty lot at the edge of Koreatown. After meeting the rehearsal director and chatting with her about her process and the limitations of site specific work, I was enamoured by the piece. It reminded me how much I fully enjoy dance and dance-theatre. Even with the inherent limitations of site specific work, I was invigorated and filled with beautiful images. The sparse-ness of the surroundings and of the choreography allowed the moments of fullness to explode. A beautiful evening.
Sunday, May 20, 2012
Director's Lab West: Day 1
Its been a very exciting first day down here in Pasadena. Aside from the LA heat (which of course I'm not prepared for at all - I wore a flannel shirt on the first day) and feeling like I just chain smoked a pack of cigarettes due to the smog, I am invigorated by the fact that there are 30 + directors in a room, not vying for a position, but rather engaging in a bold and ardent discussion about what is theatre and what is directing and even more importantly the different models of how we are going about it doing those things. People ranging from local in LA to San Francisco to Brazil to London are sharing ideas and quatsching which doesn't happen nearly enough between directors.
The day started with the motto of the Director's Lab West: "I am the future of American theatre." Well, while being a very inspirational motto, it doesn't take into account the fact that as directors we face an uphill battle against the prevailing system of theatre creation: a solo playwright in a room typing away. For many people (in fact I would argue for most) this is generally the tried and true way of creating theatre and why would one want to change what works; as a playwright recently said at the Theatre Bay Area conference, "theatre is a playwright's medium."
Now we know that there are more ways to create that and I felt the excitement and the surge of energy during a panel that featured artistic directors of various companies that were based primarily in "devised work." As the panelists and the room full of directors grappled with trying to define what is this elusive thing called "devised work" and how do we talk about it and its relationship to the dominant form of theatre creation, I started to realize that we directors in the "devised work" have a publicity problem especially in a system that desires repeatability and predicatability . The forms of creating work that differs from a solo playwright is so varied and intricate that truly, as one of the panelists stated, "the art is the whole process." From a four-headed playwright model to the movement based work that is built around an idea through multiple exercises (as in the case of Mugwumpin), the methodologies are so disparate it is little wonder that most companies shy away from this work because of its inherent ability to fail. But companies must embrace these form of creation because as we start bringing the work to the people instead of the people coming to the work as we generate work that makes everyone a participate, everyone a collaborator, we will staunch the "theatrical hemophilia," because it is through failure that we generate art, that we create new ways of thinking about things. As the AD of Pasadena Playhouse, Sheldon Epps, stated quite rightly, "If its going to fail, fail boldly. With strength, aggression."
Aside from the devised work panel, Sheldon Epps, came and had a one on one session with the group in which he talked about his path to becoming an artistic director. There were several things that really struck me in his conversation with us:
All in all a very full day of talking about theatre and then watched a period costume/living room drama in the evening. I'm very excited that we are going to be watching shows almost every day!
More to come tonight or tomorrow morning!
The day started with the motto of the Director's Lab West: "I am the future of American theatre." Well, while being a very inspirational motto, it doesn't take into account the fact that as directors we face an uphill battle against the prevailing system of theatre creation: a solo playwright in a room typing away. For many people (in fact I would argue for most) this is generally the tried and true way of creating theatre and why would one want to change what works; as a playwright recently said at the Theatre Bay Area conference, "theatre is a playwright's medium."
Now we know that there are more ways to create that and I felt the excitement and the surge of energy during a panel that featured artistic directors of various companies that were based primarily in "devised work." As the panelists and the room full of directors grappled with trying to define what is this elusive thing called "devised work" and how do we talk about it and its relationship to the dominant form of theatre creation, I started to realize that we directors in the "devised work" have a publicity problem especially in a system that desires repeatability and predicatability . The forms of creating work that differs from a solo playwright is so varied and intricate that truly, as one of the panelists stated, "the art is the whole process." From a four-headed playwright model to the movement based work that is built around an idea through multiple exercises (as in the case of Mugwumpin), the methodologies are so disparate it is little wonder that most companies shy away from this work because of its inherent ability to fail. But companies must embrace these form of creation because as we start bringing the work to the people instead of the people coming to the work as we generate work that makes everyone a participate, everyone a collaborator, we will staunch the "theatrical hemophilia," because it is through failure that we generate art, that we create new ways of thinking about things. As the AD of Pasadena Playhouse, Sheldon Epps, stated quite rightly, "If its going to fail, fail boldly. With strength, aggression."
Aside from the devised work panel, Sheldon Epps, came and had a one on one session with the group in which he talked about his path to becoming an artistic director. There were several things that really struck me in his conversation with us:
- "Everything we do in theatre is based on faith." Then a little while later, "As the leader is falls to you to sustain the faith even when your own faith falters." Faith between a director and an actor, AD and director, director and the designer, faith abounds. We really have to trust each other and work from our instinct. Instinct about a person's passion.
- "Art is great. But you can't create art dead." The relationship between making money and art. According to Mr. Epps, there is nothing wrong with box office sales. Its a barometer of effect on an audience.
- Say no to create the work you want to be making.
- Build a Socratic atmosphere within the rehearsal room to make actors and designers (though he was particularly quiet about designers) feel valued, safe, and respected.
All in all a very full day of talking about theatre and then watched a period costume/living room drama in the evening. I'm very excited that we are going to be watching shows almost every day!
More to come tonight or tomorrow morning!
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