On the 22nd of May 2017, Rubbish Theatre performed If An Orchid Was All You Had at the Lincoln Performing Arts Centre. Throughout the process of rehearsals as a company we have learnt to be patient and collaborate with all ideas that are provided. We worked as a team to create a visually stimulating performance and installation for our audience. In the final show we received positive comments from our audience complimenting our performance as a whole. Without all of the aspects such as Set Design, Costume, Choreography, Directing this performance would not have been possible. Carlson quotes Goldberg within his book explaining: ‘ The history of performance art in the twentieth century is the history of a permissive, open-ended medium with endless variables executed by artists impatient with the limitations of more established forms.’ (Goldberg, 1997, cited in Carlson, 1996, 84).

Before the Show. Photo Credit: Lincoln Performing Arts Centre

Our performance in particular could be described as an ‘open-ended medium’ due to the comments made by the audience. We discussed as a company how we wanted our show to end, but in the end result our show was open to interpretation for the audience. The different ideas and endings the audience came up with for our performance opened our performance up to and interpretive piece. This inspired me. The creation that we as a company created had been recognised and analysed by an audience and changed in different ways, all that make sense. This added to our piece being an ‘open-minded medium’. This was because our piece was an exploration of madness revealing selected stages that we discovered and researched. This gives the audience already the opportunity to reflect on what we had discovered yet connect to the character that Jacob Toon was performing ‘The Man’. The reflection from the audience could not have made us as a company more proud. We all collaborated and created a beautiful piece that was described by one of our audience members and lecturer Andy Jordan as: ‘ A suitably challenging, wacky, baffling, intelligent, artful, entertaining, madcap enterprise.’ (Jordan, 2017). The experience in creating, choreographing and performing If An Orchid Was All You Had was inspiring and memorable and I could not be prouder of my company with what we created.

References

Carlson, M. (1996) Performance: A Critical Introduction. London: Routledge.

Jordan, A. (2017) Orchid. [email] Sent to Emily Brunt, Aiden Clark, James Crawford, Kerrie Crockford, Jacob Kay, Joshua Pearson, Jake Skelton, Rowanna Soyza, Jacob Toon, Rebecca Watson, 22 May.

Lincoln School of Fine & Performing Arts (2017) IAOWAYH photos [image]. Available from https://www.flickr.com/photos/61839232@N02/with/34016768033/ [accessed 29 May 2017].

Previously mentioned throughout this blog was what i described as ‘The Erratic Scene’. This Erratic Scene included movements that were random everyday activities. Throughout the process this scene developed into ‘The Awakening’. This was decided to be the opening to the show after the first interlude with the Orchid and ‘The Man’. The idea of the Erratic Scene stayed the same with the theme of tension building and speed. Yet the movement was what developed. During one rehearsal I work shopped with the company the newly named scene. We started it with the idea of a doctor/therapist analysing and waking up the ‘creatures’. While choreographing the movement I decided, with the help of my assistant choreographer Jake Skelton, that the movement that the ‘creatures’ should be repeating were something that would be seen later on in the show. This was because the show had a theme of repetition and re-occurrence and we wanted to reflect and show this within the choreography, this includes: the interludes, the (now called) awakening scene and the final dance in particular. This movement was to then symbolise a connection with ‘The Man’ and ‘The Creatures’.

After the ‘creatures’ have been awoken by this therapist character they lined up into a formation ready to break out into the already choreographed erratic scene. The only difference in this was we changed the repetitive movements to movements that Jacob Toon did within the interludes. Once again to make another connection between ‘The Man’ and ‘The Creatures’. ‘Among the most deniable aspects of movement are formal properties that are, in a sense, “invisible” and yet still observable.’ (Daly, 1988, 41). Daly helps to explain that the movement within the ‘The Awakening’ may not have been noticeable yet it was there. Although the links to the movement and repetition were not to be made until later within the performance.

References

Daly, A. (1988) Movement Analysis. TDR: The Drama Review. 32 (4) 40-52.

Lincoln School of Fine & Performing Arts (2017) IAOWAYH photos [image]. Available from https://www.flickr.com/photos/61839232@N02/with/34016768033/ [accessed 29 May 2017].

Included within the piece ‘If An Orchid Was All You Had’ there are 4 interludes, that have been mentioned in other posts. The final scene includes a connection between the Man (who is played by Jacob Toon) and this mysterious woman that has appeared throughout the interludes. Throughout the piece itself the movement involved has included, repetition, specificity and exaggeration. Within the final interlude scene the movement turns into a luring dance taking the character that Jacob plays into madness. Throughout the process of choreography for this final scene I worked with my assistant choreographer Jake Skelton to workshop the dance (as you can see in the first 1. The Process of Final Dance). ‘The same elements of the body-in-motion apply to a ballet as they do to an assembly line, only the aesthetic performance is framed by additional layers of convention (form, genre, choreographer, performer).’ (Daly, 1988, 40). By this Daly is explaining that the layers to creating body movement progress through different means of rehearsal till it goes to the performer. We focused on the different stages before bringing it to the performer. By using him as Jacobs character we worked together to create a piece of empathetic choreography. As Foster explains: ‘The notion of empathy then theorizes the potential of one body’s kinesthetic organization to infer the experience of another.’ (Foster, 2011, 175). Within this final interlude, we wanted the audience to connect to Jacobs character. Throughout the interludes Jacob creates a connection with this orchid, which gave me the inspiration to to create movement that connects Jacob to this woman character (who could be the orchid).

In the second link (2. Final Dance) is a video of the dance with the actor himself. With these videos I am showing the development of the dance when we brought it to the actor. This was because we looked into what he was capable of executing and choreographed it into the movement. The changes although mistakes happen within the video shows, the progression of the movement is noted within these two videos. By allowing Jacob access to the original choreography video helped to give him a reference when rehearsing. Although this is to be a dance, the movement I wanted to use in particular was Physical Theatre. Hoggett and Scott write: ‘It appears ‘physical theatre ‘ is used as an umbrella term for aspects of performance including dance theatre, mime, clowning and traditional pictorial or visual theatre.’ (Hoggett and Scott, 2009, 30). As Hoggett and Scott explain, physical theatre is a style that is influenced and created from other styles of theatre. So by applying physical theatre rather than dance to the piece helped to make it more theatrical and followed through with our random styles. Throughout the performance we use many styles to show the exploration of ‘The Mans’ madness, with physical theatre being a technique that is influenced by many allowed us as a company to experiment with the movement not only just in this final interlude, but the entire performance.

References

Daly, A. (1988) Movement Analysis. TDR: The Drama Review. 32 (4) 40-52.

Foster, S. (2011) Choreographing Empathy: Kinesthesia in Performance. London: Routledge.

Hoggett, S., and Scott, G. (2009) The Frantic Assembly Book of Devising Theatre. London: Routledge.

Daly describes movement as: ‘There is nothing so powerful and extraordinary but at the same time so mundane and overlooked as movement.’ (Daly, 1988, 41). This influences the choreography process for a choreographer due to the freedom and expression that comes with movement naturally. So once meaning is put to the movement can create something beautifully visual and meaningful within a performance.

Throughout the process of choreography includes:

• Design and Visual Ideas
• Clear communication of Movement
• Angles and Audience views

Throughout my process of choreographer i have been abiding by these three points. The work of a choreographer starts with the design and ideas from the director. Then I must work and design ideas yet keeping in mind the space we have, the costumes that will be worn and possible obstructions to look out for. Company members have expressed to me that they are not “movement based” which is why i must take the time to break down my ideas and express them clearly so they understand. ‘Choreographers in community theatre must often work with non-dancers, or dancers with limited experience, as well as those who have had considerable training.  This can mean extra rehearsal time, which must be planned for.’ (American Association of Community Theatre, 2017).

Photo Credit: Kerrie Crockford

The use of communication when it comes to choreographing movement is key. The performer must understand what I am asking of them. As Carbone, Montesi and Schürmann express: ‘The key aspect of choreography languages is that process interactions are treated linearly, i.e., they are executed exactly once.’ (Carbone et al, 2017). I follow this in the way that I explain how I want something executed and get the performer to carry it out. Of course I will demonstrate as well, but to get them to jump into the movement helps to make them more comfortable with carrying it out and performing it. I work specifically close with one of the performers as they are involved in 5 interlude scenes that include precise movement. This precise movement means that it has to look exactly the same each time. As pictured, I am working with one of the performers on the 5th interlude scene. I am going through the movement with him step by step to show him how he is to move, perform and react to the other performers. To fix any changes and mistakes I must explain clearly what needs to be done about it. My way of working includes video recordings so the performer can refer back to what they are being asked of. In the recording below shows an exercise I carried out with Jacob. Within this exercise I had him mirror movement which would hopefully later on in the process would become part of the shows choreography.

References

American Association of Community Theatre (2017) The Choreographers Job. Available from https://www.aact.org/theatre-people [accessed 11 April 2017]

Carbone, M., Montesi, F., Schürmann, C. (2017) Choreographies, logically. Distributed Computing. 1-17.

Daly, A. (1988) Movement Analysis. TDR: The Drama Review. 32 (4) 40-52.

On the 23rd of February 2017 I wanted to help the company to become relaxed in their bodies. As we are looking into a lot of movement to be used throughout the performance itself, I started with a simple exercise. I asked the company to lay in the space and close their eyes, i then played two pieces of music and told them to go with their bodies. I wanted them to feel their bodies move and loosen so they are confident when it comes to movement choreography. Eventually, throughout the process I got them to open their eyes and react with each other. Some results of this are shown in the photos below. The movement exercise revealed to me as their choreographer how much the company members could move with their bodies which helped me to understand what movements I could assign for this scene I was in the process of choreographing.

Movement exercise with the company. Photo Credit: Kerrie Crockford

Photo Credit: Kerrie Crockford

Photo Credit: Kerrie Crockford

Afterwards with the collaboration with the company we worked to choreograph what I will call for now ‘The Erratic Scene’. As we are still in the process of ideas and devising at this point, this scene creation may not necessarily be in the final production but it was interesting to see what came out of the creation and idea I had for this scene. I asked the company to think of a movement, could have been an everyday task, and asked them to repeat it. One by one they entered the stage and performed their movement. Jacob Toon was riding the bike, as he is powering the show. Gradually I directed that they get more erratic with their movements and bigger to create chaos on the stage. Throughout the process of choreography for this scene was all about being random, the idea of being erratic was to build up a tension and feeling for the audience. Yet the movements to be used throughout were to be random and confusing for them. As Hoggett and Scott from Frantic Assembly write: ‘allowing even the most random event to shape and alter and exercise, to leave the path or idea prescribed maybe only moments earlier and to free up the room in order to make the most of a newfound impulse, influence or inclination.’ (Hoggett and Scott, 2009,26).  Following from what Hoggett and Scott wrote, we use the idea of repetition and randomness to add creativity for our piece. In particular our piece is exploring the methods and stages of madness and within this scene I wanted to represent that with the random movement.  The end product show and increase in pace, tempo and rhythm of movement representing, in my eyes, a breakdown of the character that Jacob is playing. As he cycles faster the movement of the ensemble builds and becomes more intense creating ‘The Erratic Scene’.

Reference

Hoggett, S., and Scott, G. (2009) The Frantic Assembly Book of Devising Theatre. London: Routledge.