Art & Politics

It's been while since I've written anything on this blog. Maybe I haven't been inspired, maybe life has been so busy it's hard to take the time to look back and reflect. Something inspired me though and I feel the urge to write about it...

A couple of nights ago I watched a film called Battle in Seattle; it is a fictional depiction of the WTO riots that happened in Seattle, cutting in actual footage & balancing that with the multi-character story to tell the story. It was amazing and really made me think about my roots in Seattle. I know I've mentioned it before, but I went to school in Seattle.

I've always had a passion for politics and the world I live in. Though living outside DC for the majority of my life, I surprisingly never actually got a chance to stand up & speak out before I lived in Seattle. When I was at Cornish, the Iraq war was just starting & people started speaking out; I decided to join them.

I don't know how many people know this, but Seattle is a protesters town. People are not afraid to go to the streets and speak out about the things they find wrong in the world. Living in a town like that empowers you to speak your mind, which I also feel is what an artist should do.

I protested the Iraq war many times while in school. There was one day my acting teachers knew a big protest was coming, and to be "politically correct" they said they couldn't allow us to miss class, but understood personally if as artists we felt we would need to. I ended up being the only junior in my department who missed class that day. We started on Capital Hill at SCCC and marched down Pine (I believe, but it might have been Pike) and over to Westlake Center. The same spirit I felt marching down the streets of Seattle was the way I feel when I making collaborative art. It's a beautiful feeling that washes over me. Maybe it's more about being engaged in what I'm doing, but for me the way I feel about art & politics are closely related.

I could go on & on about the link between art & politics, but for me that personal connection was really forged when I was in a place that both existed.

I was told I was too young.

I'm tossing & turning tonight. Can't sleep. Have had a migraine for almost 24 hours, not abnormal, but not a regular thing either. So I'm laying in bed thinking about all that has happened lately and I remembered my senior year at Cornish...

Fall semester I directed & produced Sweet Eros by Terrence McNally. I loved working on that show. It's a story in essence about stockholm syndrome (when the person kidnapped starts to identify with the kidnapper, sometimes they fall in love, etc.) but the entire time the female is supposed to be naked on stage. And she doesn't speak, only sings briefly. We get the whole story from the words of the kidnapper (we never learn his name if I remember correctly) and he takes us on a journey that is a range of emotions. It's a heavy piece no doubt, but then I kind of enjoy the challenge that an intense piece of theatre gives me.

So second semester seniors usually have an internship or a senior project (where they direct/write/act in a piece & produce it). When asked what I was thinking about doing, I said I'd like to work on Sweet Eros again, I think I scratched the surface with the production and would like to try again. My advisors, cocking their heads, told me I was too young to do something like that. That is for old artists with much more experience than I. When you're young you want to expose yourselves to as many projects as possible and get a wide range of experience.

I heeded their advice at the time, accepting a PR/Marketing internship at On The Boards and an "Assistant to the Director" internship at Intiman (because they don't have "assistant directors" that are interns at LORT B theatres from what I've seen). I'm completely grateful for the way it turned out, I learned tons working with B.J. Jones of Northlight Theatre when I was at Intiman, he even gave me my copy of A Director Prepares, which I cherish dearly. At OtB I learned what it takes to market a theatre/performance space and a show, plus I got a healthy dose of experimental international performance-based (as I like to call it) art that I would have probably not been exposed to as much. My taste and sometimes my aesthetic tend to run on the experimental side, and working there taught me a lot about what I liked, what I didn't and what an audience will put up with.

Now that I'm a few years older, I'm trying to strike out and do work that really means something to me. Alex Hewett and myself have been working on a project we call Graves in the Water (based on Edgar Lee Masters' Spoon River Anthology), which is a generative piece. I guess some don't fully understand generative art because there is no right & wrong in your process, it is all about the process. I love the discoveries we've made along the way, not knowing everything at the on-start may freak some people out, but to me I think it maximizes the potential of what one can do. So I'm not heeding the advice of those wise advisors I had in college and I've taken on a project that will be seen in many iterations. I'm excited to get it up in front of an audience for the first time and see what we learn.

Btw, sad side note: Graves was originally supposed to premiere at The Strand on Halloween weekend. Due to unforeseen circumstances the show has been canceled, but we're in the midst of negotiating for it to be performed in December at another location. More info as it becomes available. I've truly been blessed on this project to work with a group of artists that are so supportive of every path that has been taken. Hope you'll join us for the ride!

Letting go of control.

If there is one thing that will kill an artistic process it can be the need to control what is happening on stage & lock it down. For me this kills inspiration.

Graves in the Water is no different.

Since this Halloween is the first time the piece is being performed, as the director I’ve been struggling with coming up with an order for the piece. We’ve found individual thru lines for each actor, but are missing one for the whole show.

So I said “fuck it” and suggested to my cast that we work off of our own inspiration. Maybe it’s because I spent my birthday weekend at the Baltimore Improv Festival or maybe I just couldn’t make up my mind, but I think having a “no structure” format will make this piece exciting, new & fresh each time it’s performed (for the actors & the audience).

Here’s what I mean by “no structure”:

The evening will start with Mrs. Kessler and end with Edith Conant, but everything in between is not set. The actors work off their own inspiration, they must listen & react to what is being said around them to find who goes next.

There are some challenges with doing the piece this way, mainly sometimes the actors get “stuck” and aren’t sure who should go next, but in rehearsal we are working on that. The first time I actually had them work in this “no structure” format I let them improv the actual pieces, speaking subtext that kind of thing. They worked off of the inspiration provided by the previous character. Now our focus is shifting on to “opposites” or impulses that pull you away from the character previous. This allows the actors to come from a place where they feel comfortable and gives them the freedom not to get stuck.

For some this lack of control may be difficult, but as a director I love the opportunities to let go of that and to just really trust my actors. I mean I hired them for a reason, didn’t I?

We’ll see where it goes from here!

Blog Action Day '09 - Climate Change

This is a tricky topic for me. When I sat down to write this post I really had no idea what I was going to write. When you think of the theatre, you don't exactly think "climate change" as a topic playwrights normally cover in plays.

Nevertheless, theatres can make an impact. Here's a few ways I've seen/heard/dug up that other theatres are making the effort to be a little more "green".

1. If your theatre accepts script submissions, take them electronically only. Save paper and read them on a computer.
   
   
2. Think about the paper products you use. Is it feasible for you to use recycled & eco-friendly paper products?
   
   
3. This one is a bit trickier, but have LD's be conscious of their lighting designs. This is something new that I've seen on a few blogs, but lighting designers have the opportunity to impact energy consumption in a major way. Sure there are the shows that require everything to be bright, light & airy, but does every show the theatre does have to be that way. Is there way to pare down the cues to make them more energy efficient? Food for thought.
   
   
4. Turn up temp on those AC units (or turn them off completely!) when they aren't needed. This one can be tricky b/c for so many theaters there are people in & out all the time. On top of that, if they were turned off and it got really hot, it would take more energy to cool everything down. Just be mindful of ways that you can reduce the use of these energy suckers.
   
   
5. CFLs! Sure it's a bit of an investment, BUT a CFL on average uses 1/4 of the energy of a normal 60 watt bulb. That's quite a bit of savings over the long term AND you don't have to buy light bulbs for like 5 years. Bonus!

Need more information on making your theatre greener? Check out these sites:

Center for Sustainable Practice in the Arts
EcoTheatre Blog
50 things you can do towards being a green theater from GreenTheater.org


So I've given a few tips I've found. Are there any others that you are using to reduce your footprint?

What are ways individual theatre artists can make a difference?

This post is a part of Blog Action Day 2009, please consider joining the conversation in 2010!