The Physical Theatre module starts by looking at a number of Physical Theatre companies. The first company is renowned around the world for there groundbreaking, award winning work. DV8.
DV8 lead by Lloyd Newson are Physical Theatre company from the UK who are regarded highly for there courageous and innovative work.
2 of there productions that have been adapted to film are ‘Enter Achilles’ and ‘Dead Dreams of Monochrome Men’. I’ll be analyzing and comparing the to films, looking at there content, themes and constituent features.
Enter Achilles (1995)
In this production I saw the portrayal of what it is to be a man. With an athletic all male cast and set in a pub, the movement components and physical and aural setting went hand in hand to showcase the life and loves of a male in the mid 90’s.
Throughout the piece you are given a clear picture of the kind of persons life you are looking at. Alpha males, full of sexual desires, arrogance, and playful camaraderie. The beginning scene shows one of the males making love to a blow up doll and sends a clear message of the sexual mentally of this character and views towards sex and females. The main action of the piece takes place in the bar area, where all the characters interact with each other. Beer being the chief reason to go to a pub, was also one of the main stimulus’ for the movement used in the piece. Fast paced movements, where the dancers chased the pint glasses around the room, and around each other are spectacular to watch. The use of the space was equally impressive as they slid, climbed, hopped, and leaped on, leaped off and over the bar, chairs, stools and pool tables. Displaying of strength and agility of the performers. There were many occasions where contact work was used as they playfully, but forcefully would wrestle one another to the ground, but with such control and fluidity of movement that was gracefully executed. In these movements components especially can you appreciate that hard work and rehearsal put in as they flipped around the room and each other. Pints of beer, cigarettes, chanting, wolf whistling, a blow up doll, and rough housing all mixed together paint a very masculine picture. During the piece a new character was introduced. His introduction alone said a lot, as the camera shot focused on him peering through a window to see a pub of all males drinking and rough housing with each other. As this new character entered the frame the picture altered. His movements were different from what was previously seen from the other males. There movements where fast, punchy, and direct. His movements were slower, rounder, and lighter. This was the introduction to the theme of homosexuality. This character dancing along to the music of ‘Queen’ played on the jukebox was the a definitive statement about the immersion homosexuals in a modern male dominated society. The introduction of this character tells a story of, judgement, mocking, curiosity, and then acceptance as the other characters pull their shirts over there heads exposing their torso’s and dance around with feminine physical and vocal gestures. The new character not only introduced the issue of sexuality but also of race, as he apart from the other characters was the only foreign speaking character in the piece. Looking by appearance of european origin he represents the start of many europeans coming into the UK from the mid nighties to the present day. The initially hostile reception he received was probably not uncommon at the time the piece was written. As the night went on so did the drinking. Beer, beer and more beer. A scene where a dancer is thrashing himself around in a puddle of beer, reaching for a pint glass screams of issues of a drinking culture. In the piece Beer was of major influence among the characters. Through their movements they chased beer, fought over beer, played with beer, and drank loads of it. Beer was seen as life captured in a glass. As the piece progressed the characters left the confides of the pub to explore outside. Here we saw the characters interaction with a football. Men Love Football, have always loved Football, and probably will always love Football. And it was no different at this time. So here was a scene that payed homage to that.
And the end of the piece a serious issue was addressed in a way that only a performance of this type could portray it. The blow up doll made a re-appearance, this time for the use and abuse of the group, as the dolls original owner looks on in horror. After the group have violently kick the doll around, and performed sexual acts on it aggressively. The doll gets stabbed repeatedly leaving it deflated on the floor. The dolls owner then lets out a heart wrenching cry, as the group slowly disperse. This scene talks about the physical and sexual abuse of women. While all that is happening to the doll, you can’t help but picture a woman in it’s place. This was the last image that the piece ends on.
Dead Dreams of Monochrome Men (1989)
DV8’s first piece adapted to film tells of a true story of serial killer Denis Nilsen who murdered 15 young men in London between 1978 - 83.
DV8 tell a dark story and the physical
setting match. A dark underground room with shadows everywhere. Thumping house music and an all male cast set the scene to be what looked like and probably was meant to be a gay club. The first section of the piece sees the establishment of characters. Who they are, what they want, and how they feel. This could all been seen by
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the characters expressions, body language, positions, and tensions. Which were well portrayed by the performers. It then goes on to show the struggles of a man with his sexuality, depicting a man in a tight gap franticly moving as he audibly hears the lines of a man in his underwear talking seductively. This moves onto the first unison piece of the production. The movement in this section is fast paced containing jumps, lifts, contact work, stylized gestures and motifs. Through the different movement components I saw different themes, such as; sex which was shown in the contact and floor work. Frustration through rigid punchy stylized gestures. It moved to a wall where the performers used each other as stepping stones to climb up the wall in order to reach a bar. This was performed several times. The vast number of times that this movement was repeated at the high pace it was done really communicated the desperation of how much the characters wanted to escape. In this piece the physical ability of the performers was not only important but specific. A high range of flexibility and agility are required for many of the movements that are performed in this piece. There a particular section where one performer is standing up and another performer has his entire body wrapped around the head of the performer that’s standing. His whole body is resting on the shoulders of the performer. Only certain performers of a particular body type and ability could successfully perform a move like this safely. This movement is representing murder by strangulation.
This piece really demands a lot from the performers physically in a different way to many other physical theatre performances. For a good portion of the piece the performers are lifeless as they are playing murder victims. There are many movements where a performers body is being dragged around. At one point a lifeless performer is being dragged across the floor by the head, which must put tremendous pressure on the neck and could be potentially risky. It’s at this point where the action starts to get very dark and eerie, as they performers manipulate the other performers lifeless and limp bodies. As this happens the physical setting changes to a apartment with bedroom and and bathroom. The physical setting reflects the true nature of the story being told. Here the performers lifeless bodies are being manipulated like rag dolls, unnervingly watching as lifeless bodies are being manipulated with affection, portraying Nilsen who was an necrophiliac. During this section there is a specific moment where the character swaps underwear with the lifeless body, which makes me to wonder if that is actually something that Nilsen did to his victims. To depict a story like this, a Physical Theatre performance like this is probably the most effective way of portraying this story. Having the lifeless bodies, and seeing them being manipulated, brings a reality to the horrific story.
Comparing the two pieces
Both of these DV8 pieces are very different, there are a couple similarities but on a whole DV8 have two very unique, independent productions. The similarities being the all male casts, and the issue of homosexuality. The subject of Homosexuality being close to DV8 founder Newson as he himself is an homosexual is the likely reason why this issue is seen not only in these performances but various DV8 productions.
The movement components were the biggest difference between the pieces. Due to the stimulus of the pieces, the type of movement that was created was very different. The physical setting also played a big part for the movement in EA whereas in DDMM the physical setting didn’t play such a big part. Also the number of performers and the relationship between the characters creates a different type of movement. Where as AE had to do with life in a pub, DDMM had to do with death, so the movements had to reflect that. In the pace, the expression, and execution.
The aural settings where specific for each piece. EA had a jukebox with all the popular tracks of the time, that also reflected characters. DDMM used a lot of silence that was fitting for the lifelessness portrayed in the story.
Body Manipulation
FRANTIC ASSEMBLY
http://www.franticassembly.co.uk/showreel/
Franctic Assembly are a physical theatre company based in London. There work is based on a combination of movement, design, music and text. We looked at there devising piece known as ‘chair duets’.
What I took from studying some of Frantic Assembles work was how from a basic seated position simply moves executed with focus, pace, tension, precision, and compatible timing between the pair can produce a dynamic and interesting performance.
INSERT our VID CHAIR DUETS
What we done in this performance is that we used a chair duet routine to recreate a every situation of 3 brothers fighting over a games console.
It was interesting to discover how the pace of the movements effectively communicated the story. You can also see how this type of performance can communicate different types of emotions. Varying the pace and tensions portray a different emotional content to the piece.
With the Chair Duets Frantic Assembly show how you can take an everyday situation like watching the television, and can use basic movements to create an interesting, energetic, innovative performance.
COMPLICITE
“If an actor has forgotten how to play as a child they shouldn’t be an actor”
- Unknown 1
A British Theatre Company founded in 1983 by Simon McBurney
http://www.complicite.org/flash/
Complicite’s work is driven by the subject matter, each piece has a different driving force, wether it be relationships, Japanese culture, or death.
McBurney comments that his work is all about “how the audience Imagine”, and that “the audience are the heart of the theatre”. This ethos can been clearly seen in Complicite’s work, created with the mindset of engaging with the audiences imagination, it’s impact is plain for all to see. McBurney and Complicite are noted for engaging their audiences imagination not only through their thought provoking stories, but with the creative use of props and sets. Complicite’s performances are very visual, which is also reflected in the title names of the pieces, for instance “A Street of Crocodiles”, “The Elephant Vanishes” and “A Dogs Heart”. Highly stylized use of props, sets lighting and sound along with quality physical movement of the performers creates a rich tapestry for the senses for the audience to lose themselves in.
In this showreel of various works from Complicite you see how how a multitude of styles, cultures, ideologies come together to produce many great unique pieces of theatre.
The way the space is used in creating a piece is what we will be focusing on for this task.
Task 1 Devise a scene that would be suited to a confined space, e.g. elevator or cupboard.
The scene I performed with my group was a scene set on a cramped public mini bus in Jamaica. A cramped hot stuffy environment.
This scene played out well, and naturally as the limited space fitted the scene on the over cramped bus that would be seen everyday in many parts of the world.
Task 2 Devise a scene that would not be suited in a confined space, and perform it in a confined space e.g.. a gymnastic routine.
INSERT VID OF HOME
This scene worked well. The limited space to which the scene was confined in fact added to the franticness of the scenario of getting a household ready in the morning. Which demonstrates to me that not all scenes need to have realist spacing in order to work.
PHYSICALLY CREATING A CHARACTER
Word stimulus
Looking into how a character physically behaves different to myself. Paul our acting teacher often talks about the difference between Naturalism and Realism. Naturalism is the performer being as close to themselves when acting out the characters objective, Realism is the performer is acting out character as well as the characters objective.
Finding how the character moves different physically to myself is part of the process of building a character.
In our the 3 Sisters project I will be playing the character ‘Vershinin” Taking 3 words that I thought summarized Vershinin, I was to create a walk for him. Stylish, Valuable, and Clean were my chosen words.
Starting off by walking around the room naturally i then began to incorporate the 3 words into the walk. Starting off small then gradually increasing, using a scale of 1 - 10. The higher I went up the scale the movement would become less natural and more unnatural, the word in mind was ‘grotesque’. The more grotesque the movement the further away I got from my natural walk, and closer to embodying the words chosen for my character.
“Which part of the body does the character lead from?” was a very eye opening question for me. Immediately I thought ‘Chest’ as I see my character Vershinin quite proud. As I continued the exercise with this thought is mind, purposely leading with my chest more character developed into the walk. The lines in which I walked changed, and the centre of gravity, a swagger started to develop. As I got to 10 in the scale of maximum grotesqueness, my arms spread wide like a bird of prey, which I thought fitting as I see Vershinin as a predatory male. Next was to bring the walk down from 10 grotesque to 1 natural, but still having the qualities of 10.
The walk that I have developed for Vershinin through this exercise is natural but still embodies the predatory, bold, confident qualities which I believe are well suited to his character.
INSERT VID Vershinin walk
ANIMALS
For this task I was to create a character with just this following information prepared in advance, and no more.
Name, Age, and Occupation. And I was to be wearing full costume
Animal Stimulus: Using animal physicality in creating character physicality
‘Roy’ is the character that I will be creating
Firstly I was to choose an animal which identified with my character ‘Roy’. I see ‘Roy’ as nervous, jittery, and curious. A Squirrel was my chosen animal, as it has similar qualities.
I started moving around the room as a squirrel, as I thought a squirrel would move. Embodying it’s pace, rhythm, sensitivity and interacting with the other animals in the group.
From there I slowly started to transform from being the squirrel into ‘Roy’, from an animal into a man but still keeping the defined characteristics. So as I walked around as ‘Roy’ I kept the characteristics I discovered while being the squirrel. While I was a squirrel I would go of into corners and forage for nuts, which I took over into ‘Roy’ who would walk over into corners of the room to get to know his surroundings. My pace of walking was quicker, my steps shorter. As I talked as Roy I would be jittery as I’d look around my surroundings and the people there. I was non-confrontational, but very observant. I adopted these characteristics along with other behaviors that I discovered while being a squirrel.
The animal exercise is very useful because as you embody the animal, you take on a completely different physicality to your own and then you can start to build the characters physicality from a place other than your own physicality which allows you to create a physicality that’s fresh.
PLAY WITHOUT WORDS
As an ensemble we must devise a 5 minute physical theatre piece that has no vocal dialogue.
The process started with viewing a 5 minute snippet from a piece by Stan’s Cafe called ‘The Cleansing of Constance Brown’.
This was a forty minute piece set in a corridor, that had no audible dialogue. The characters were talking but their dialogue was drowned out by noise throughout the piece. Through use of costumes and such as a vicar, and a patient you were still able to clearly define the characters
Producing a physical theatre piece that will not be using dialogue allows you to focus on how to approach a piece from a purely physical perspective.
The Devising Process
Step1: Concept or Theme
The first step in the process was to come up with a Creative concept or Theme. Myself, Eve and Danny had a conversation on what ideas came to mind when thinking about a play without words.
Danny said that he imagined a painting, Eve added the suggestion of Surrealism, and artist such as Dali, and his use of color.
As we thought more about the title of our work, ‘A play without words’, we thought more about a world without words, and how could that come about. The previous day we were involved in a discussion about how due to the influence of technology, mobile phones, the internet, and particularly social networking, how some people are unable to communicate without the aid of technology. Danny gave an example of a friend who’s academic written work was influenced by the language of text messaging. I also have the example of a friend who lives in a house with their parents, and siblings but hardly communicate and spend the majority of their time in separate rooms on the laptops. We all had several examples where we could relate the insurgence of technology to the decline of verbal communication. A futuristic world where communication is banned. Or a future where we simply no longer remember how to communicate.
Lost the ability to talk - was the theme that we decided to start a devising process with.
The novel ‘1984’ by George Orwell comes to mind. In the book based on the future the people communicate by ‘Newspeak’. ‘Newspeak’ in the novel is a communication technology that is used to try and put an end to people’s personal thoughts, by simplifying the grammar. People who had personal or independent thoughts committed ‘thought crime’. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4rBDUJTnNU
A modern adaptation similar in theme and context is the 2002 film ‘Equilibrium’ written and directed by Kurt Wimmer. In the film set in the future the population are controlled by the governing powers by being forced not to feel emotion. They are given medication to suppress feelings, and to keep them in a state of emotionlessness. Anyone found feeling emotion are brutally treated and put to death. There is a particular scene where the main character has to disguise his emotion for fear of being found out. Not only does he have to force himself not to portray emotion physically, he has to be careful not to portray emotion vocally. In the film the people communicate very coldly towards each other, only talking out of necessity rather than want in fear of feeling emotion. This coldness you see in there physicality as they are very precise, stiff, and ridged in their movements.
‘Emotionlessness’, was a word that stood out. The image of words being trapped inside a person, and not being able to talk to one another.
We listed some words that we related to ‘having lost the ability to talk’.
Choked Incomplete Lifeless Frustration Trapped Quick
Efficient Lose of Independence Helplessness Longing
Lose of senses
As we thought about the style of movement that would be fitting for the piece. Eve asked, “what would it look like it we needed to communicate but couldn’t speak?’.
We carried out an exercise to observe what it would look like, and what kind of movements would be produced.
We improvised a scene were Danny and Eve had an important message to tell each other, but were not able to speak and could only communicate physically.
As we watched the video back of the exercise it was easy to pick out the different characteristic of the movements.
One of the first noticeable aspects was the progression from pedestrian to stylized gestures. At first the gestures were naturalistic, but then as it developed the pedestrian gestures were performed slower, with added detail and tension in an attempt to communicate clearer. As the frustration of not being able to get the message across developed, we saw the movements become more extravagant and stylized. Danny introduced the use of bodily contact to communicate the sensational feeling a needle injection. Levels were then added as Eve tried to paint a clearer picture to Danny that she was in Love with another girl. The pace , and the use of the body varied as the exercise progressed.
We found what drove the exercise and the movement was the message that the characters needed to communicate. The message dictated the type of movement that would be produced. Physicalising the message ‘I Love you’ would look different to physicalising the message ‘I Hate you’. We developed this further by improvising another scene where each character focused on communicating their own individual message. We ran the exercise twice, first using pedestrian gestures and secondly stylised gestures.
From the first exercise I noted that use of little pedestrian gestures communicated the characters mood. For instance Eve nervously tapped her legs as she was sitting. The scene flowed quickly as the characters communicated quiet naturally through the gestures, bouncing from one gesture to another. Watching the scene through again but with no sound, made the pedestrian gestures come through clearer.
The stylized gestures on entrance relay the characters emotion quiet clearly. Danny has attitude, Eve is in a playful mood, and I am relaxed. The different Laban efforts are visible also. Eve - Dab, Danny - Punch/Wring, Myself - Glide. The emotion of the character is reflected in the Laban effort the move by.
As I mimicked Eve sitting on the chair there was an wonderful image of wanting acceptance, as I created a chair that was not there.
The moves within transitions were at times dynamic, as the characters reason for moving influenced the way they moved. Rather than walking over, they could jump or run etc.
Duplication and Replication was often seen as a way of the characters confirming that they understood what was being said to them, or as recognition of one another.
The reactions of the characters differed even if the initial stimulus for reacting stayed the same.
The characters movement inspired the other characters movement. There was a question and answer type of scenario within the movement. And there was a moment of body manipulation as Danny controlled Eve who was out of control.
Movement was used not only as a tool for talking but also by the use of repetition, duplication, and responsive movements - a tool for listening.
http://www.franticassembly.co.uk/showreel/ accessed 10/01/13
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LC-dkYZOUVo accessed 10/01/13
http://www.complicite.org/flash/ accessed 20/01/13
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkBLseora7A accessed 20/01/13
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sM7gFKCwm2k accessed 02/02/13
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4rBDUJTnNU accessed 02/02/13
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