‘’All the world is a stage’’ is no longer just a metaphor…..
-Kattenbelt, 2006, 38
The evolution of technology has been synonymous with unlocking the past for as long as people have been curious enough to explore it, and as a race, we are closer to understanding the past than ever before. It no longer seems ironic, therefore, to use the advances in multimedia performance to recreate, and provide context to historical pieces. For example;’ Richard Beacham re-created ancient theatres using Virtual Reality, and ieVR harnessed the technology to create a computer generated, three-dimensional sets inhabited by live actors.’ (Dixon, 2007). With this in mind, various historical plays could take on a whole new aesthetic. Creating Gods on stage becomes more of a creative challenge than a logistical nightmare and allows a freedom in the piece by essentially dissolving the boundaries of what is possible. Another example includes the production of Actors and Children take to the Street, by 1927, wherein projection was utilised to create a 1920’s backdrop, through which live actors performed. Using projection also means animals can be created and used on set, without actually having to obtain an animal. The setting and space is essential to the success of the piece. Visual stimulation is of course important, but actually creating the space gives context and substance to the piece. The use of projection and multimedia technologies allows freedom of space, not only by projecting backdrops, but the use of recording equipment and live feed can transport the audience to another location, while remaining in the theatre. McAuley explores the relevance of space within theatre and explains how it acts as an ‘active agent’ in theatre events (McAuley, 1999, 41). The importance of how to space is used is paramount. Productions such as Virtuoso (working title) preferred to embrace the theatrical truth of their piece by leaving their technological workings exposed; perhaps this is an idea to be considered. Personally, a recreation of a Greek play using multimedia would be fascinating (imagine the Gods, or the amount of offstage action that could be created), or perhaps an immersive production of a supernatural piece; Doctor Faustus as an immersive piece with projected demons perhaps? Either way an exploration of the technologies relation to the space is imperative.
The only reason for time is so that everything doesn’t happen at once!
Albert Einstein
Looking through Sarah Bay-Cheng’s notions of temporality, what seemed to most resonate with me were her notions of time in performance and the Steinian/Bergsonian notion. Essentially it means, time is not a linear progression, but rather a stack, that can occur simultaneously or independently. By taking singular instances from the past or present, moments can be represented and rewritten. Famous moments in time could be dissected and rehashed before the audience, or with the interaction of the audience. Something that could be explored is Darren Brown’s experiment The Game Show. The audience are asked to vote on a number of events that influence a strangers life, each time picking the most negative outcome until a tragic climax. The experiment gives the audience anonymous control resulting in their re-evaluation of human nature. Other examples include Gob Squads performances where the audience become performers; pieces such as Super Night Shot use cameras to present the audience’s reaction to (for them) the beginning of the piece, whereas in reality, they are presented at the end of the piece, again confronting temporality and questioning what is live performance, while presenting post performance. By using live music over the piece, the performance becomes both pre-recorded and live, something our performance should tackle.
The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.
― George Orwell
Technology can also be used to rewrite history, in a way like never before. By manipulating the media a state can effectively create a fake history, that is accepted and believed because the society doesn’t know anything else. For example, in North Korea they believe they won the world cup. This is because all of their media coverage supported this claim, and as all media is state controlled the majority of the population never had any evidence to disprove this. A totalitarian government or a dystopian society becomes both terrifying and intriguing, perhaps using 1984 as an example, or the society in V for Vendetta. Working from the idea of a dystopian society, it becomes interesting to examine the ramifications surrounding the media. Looking at examples such as North Korea, or even Nazi Germany, it is possible to rewrite the past by manipulating the present. For example, Hitler managed to spin Germany’s failures in WWI by using the Jews as a scapegoat. Developing this idea, exploring the relationship between manipulating media and the truth can cause questions to be raised about the authenticity of past mediated events. There are several conspiracy theories suggesting the fabrication of the moon landing, JFK’s assassination and many more events in history. What if those theories are true? The piece should examine this, perhaps exposing the staged nature of historical events. Looking at performances such as Virtuoso (working title), who expose the façade that is theatre by rejecting realism, and leaving the technical workings of their performance exposed (cameras, wires, markings on the floor etc), it was established that adopting a Grotowski style attitude toward representations of realism would encourage the audience to question the dependability of the mediated news they consume each day.
Virtuoso (working title) also revealed the manipulation of every day on screen imagery by creating images that appeared real on the televisions but the live bodies in the space created a surreal tableau for the audience to witness. This could be utilised within our piece by recreating scenes from history, or manipulating bodies in the space to recreate historical events, just with different outcomes, or by completely fabricating the event. For example the moon landing again, if it were to be recreated in front of the audience, on the TVs, but the live space remained a television set, with lives bodies placed at different angels to create on screen perspective. Again this would hopefully encourage the audience to question the authenticity of the media.
An idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea at all.
– Oscar Wilde
It was eventually decided that a selection of historically important moments would be designed as scenes, creating a fragmented non linear representation of history in brief. The scenes that were chosen were the result of a long process of suggestion and elimination. The general theme was events that were covered heavily in the media or events that influenced humanity. The list goes as follows;
• The Moon Landing
• Watergate Scandal
• The Journey to Flight
• Churchill’s Evolution
• Women’s Rights
• The Big Bang Theory
• Queen Elizabeth’s Coronation, voyeuristic view
• Columbine
• Assassins, Multiple Points of View
• Ann Frank/ Another Perspective
• HIV/AIDS Scandal
• Live in the News Room
Each of the scenes we carefully considered for their importance, effect upon culture, media importance and stage-ability. Questioning history and re-examining/presenting the information would hopefully force the audience to reflect upon the authenticity of the mediated images they are presented with on a daily basis. Auslander argues that television and mediatised news has evolved into the primary source for our information (Auslander, P. 1999, 5), therefore by reflecting important mediated events, either by providing a voyeuristic view into a private moment or presenting an image to expose it as a lie, demonstrates the façade that mediated imagery and information can create. As a result the choice was made to expose the inner workings of the piece. This included having the technical crew onstage at all times in and their laptop screens on display, so the audience was constantly reminded this was a performance, not reality. The technical crew also appeared as puppet masters, above the whole show, controlling a great deal of the action through lighting, sound and visuals (all multimedia elements). Furthermore, the cameras were onstage when used and the audience were able to see the performers moving and working with them. Finally, tape on the floor shows clear indication for the location and blocking of characters, props and cameras, with the stage managers constantly wearing her headset throughout (even when acting). This all serves as a constant reminder to the audience of the staged nature of the piece, and encourages them to questions the authenticity of the media.
The last scene was a more literal manifestation of the piece’s underlying theme; a television studio preparing for the daily news report. All performers were onstage throughout and each took on a persona. This is perhaps the most characterised scene, the one trying to create realism, if only to parody the news. By overacting and trying to recreate a clearly fake news show, the audience are forced to acknowledge its falsity. The obvious set behind the actors, the antithesis of a BBC broadcaster sat at her desk, everyone hurrying around, building the pace, until perhaps the ultimate anticlimax in the end of the piece. It is all a lie, a show, and once again the audience are pressed to recognise this. By choosing something as constant as the BBC the piece will give the audience a relatable news source and a televised one (instead of an online broadcast). This allows the audience to engage with the final scene, as it is a scene they recognise. But it is wrong, and clearly false, possibly for a brief moment encouraging the audience to reject Auslander’s theory, and reject the information provided through the television, realising it is wrong.
The moon landing scene examines the inner workings of a system, directly echoing the deconstruction of realism in the piece by exposing its true nature. There are many obvious images associated with the moon landing, but not too much of the action behind the scenes. Maybe as a result of cold war politics, maybe it was not deemed interesting, either way a great deal of the information regarding the event is controlled by the American government. It is interesting to note the amount of control the government of a democratic country have. Reflecting the government are two actors stood offstage. A live feed camera displays their faces on two screens, and while both these men are clearly not American presidents, they are reciting the correct speeches. These two presidents faced off in a televised debate during the 60’s and this proved essential to Kennedys election (those who listened on the radio believed Nixon won the debate, however his refusal of makeup left those watching it televised siding with Kennedy). This provides the audience with an unrealistic portrayal of truth, not pretending to be the presidents, but further exposing the act of performance for what it is, just performance (and not always truth). It is a slight nod toward voyeurism in its display of behind the scenes action, yet the action itself was heavily stylised and almost biomechanical in the rhythmic and repetitive movement. A display of a precise unit working as one to perform a more important task, everyone is the same, parallels between the scene and a communist society could be drawn which arguably provides the scene with an ironic subtext.
Due to the parameters of this blog, it is impossible to explore all of the scenes enough detail to do them justice. Therefore, the next few posts will focus more on the scenes I had direct creative input into or scenes that were particularly interesting and explored a lot of technical and theoretical avenues.
The scene in which I had most personal involvement started life as the ‘Hitler’ scene. Looking at the Nazi’s in WWII was important, not just because of the implications of the war and the ramifications for Europe, and he world on the whole, but because of the vital role German media played within Nazi Germany. Like all fascist societies, the Nazi government had complete control over national press, and Joseph Goebbels (head of propaganda), did a fantastic job of manipulating the media coverage to condemn the Jewish population and encourage Nazi ideals. There were several ideas regarding the nature of the scene. Perhaps looking at Leni Riefenstahl films, or the posters/advertisements fed to the German public? However, upon discussing the possibility of using Hitler’s home videos it was decided that an exploration into the more human aspects of Hitler’s life would be enlightening for both performers and audience. By dubbing over the videos conversations between Hitler and Ava Braun, it was hoped to portray Hitler as just a person, having every day issues with his other half. An exploration into the domestic life of Hitler was underway, questions about children and marriage were first to arise, however it soon became clear the task was pretty huge. The home footage had been supercut together and the scenes changed too rapidly, or the voice over just didn’t work at all. Either way, a new idea had to be formulated quickly. Therefore reflecting upon other important figures of WWII Ann Frank emerged as the most popular idea, the extreme opposite of Hitler. This coincided with the arrival of the Go Pro, and another concept for the scene was devised; this time with one live body on stage, attached to the Go Pro, which is projected on the back projector. The audience begin by seeing themselves onstage through the projection. Another live feed shows someone writing, but only their hands and in shot. A voiceover reads excerpts of the diary, and the body leaves the stage to roam around the LPAC, until it reaches the writers hiding place. All that is left is a book on the floor, and the live feed cam and Go Pro end up having the same shot at different angles. However, the Go Pro itself did not have a very large range when it came to live footage therefore prerecording the journey seemed the only option. It was also decided to place a body onstage to read from the diary, rather than the live feed. This resulted in a scene so rich in multimedia, using live bodies, pre-recorded and live footage. The finale, with the Go Pro used to film and project the audience onstage, uses the camera as a mirror rather than a portal, and the audience can witness themselves through this.
Conclusion
On the whole this was a fantastic piece I am proud to have been a part of. Given this opportunity again I would have liked to explore the use of the Go Pro within scenes and the piece as a whole, I believe it would have completely changed and influenced the piece. Another issue was the sheer size of the theatre group there were a lot of people doing nothing, and a few people doing everything. Through no one person’s fault more delegation was required, only having two people completely familiar with all the tech and software was difficult, and put a lot of tension on the team, therefore perhaps clearer roles and responsibilities along with further tech training would be beneficial. Issues with both obtaining the tech and performance space also created problems for the performance, but even with all the obstacles, the piece was a success.