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Gonzaga Debate Institute 2007 1 Dunn/Ward CRAZY CRAZY L331 133t 817 this volume explore these problematics both within the com- trunity-based theater process and between the community and the theater prattioners and point toward the sme movemen: Ay commonality (© heterogeneity in Pmmunity-based performance. // 4a-il _ 38 CRAZYGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Community Theater recognizes the polyvalence of community Susan Haedicke and Tobin Nellhaus, editors for the University of Michigan Press, 2001, “Performing Democracy” pg 11-12 +7 Not surprisingly, then, there are variations or even conflicts over the hhefwition of community within the community-based performance move- ‘ment and so among our contributors (although they are mainly concerned ‘with conerete communities of people who live and interact within relatively specific locales, rather than with communities in a more abstract sense) “There has even been debate over the term community-based theater. As Bruce MeConachie mentions in his essay, many of those engaged in this performance activity prefer the term grasroots theater as less problematic historically and politically. in England and Australia the usual phrase is commumty theater, but in the United States that expression refers to amateur play productions. From our perspective grassroots is at Jeast as ambiguous as community. (Just vie band ho isn't par oT die "gassoos"? Are tudens? Are welled cated theater professionals? Are gay/lesbian teenagers and unionized workers all part ofa unified grassroots? Does the term adequately include urban life, for does it hint at nostalgia for an agrarian past? And so forth.) We have ‘adopted the term community-based as being least confusing, and it has the advantage of being increasingly current, atleast in the United States. ‘Whichever term is used, questions abound a ture and isle of the community in community-based performance. As suggested earlier, an important issue for us in selecting essays was whether the communi direedy participated in the performance’s production, but even this could “only bea rough gauge rather than a litmus test, and in a few cases other cf feria ssomed greater importance. There are also questions about how community-based theater defines and establishes the communities with which it works and about its influence and appeal. In what manner and to what degree can it work within a community's own definition of its boundaries (boundaries that may appear sharp to community members but often tum ut to be flexible and fizzy)? What resources can it employ to focus—or refocus—a community's self-definition? To what extent can community based theater actually create a community from otherwise unconnected individuals? “The point to al these questions is not that community-based perfor mance is endangered by its lack of co n the most basic concepts. It ‘i; instead, that, a8 afield, community-based performance has infact he moat fandamental pom of all: community is a polymorphic concept pre- aeky because iti the product of ever-changing socal alliances, and com: ‘frunity-based theater is itself an agent of social change capable of srength- Zing alliances and forging new ones, along with the skills and symbols to iain_themConsequendy, (must constantly consider all types of alfiance-—and so should not hold out false hopes fora singular, fixed con- ceptof community, Ror better or worse its history and goals enforce its mul tiplicty. 7 \\ ei 39 CRAZYGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 40 Dunn/Ward CRAZY Solvency: Community wali. (© We solve for community PaBeabeds mutations are key to its evolution. Peter Brooks, 1984 (founded the Oxford University Film Society and founded the International Theatre Research Center in Paris, The Empty Space: A Book About The Theaire: Deadly, Holy, Rough, Immediate, p. 38-39) Itis a strange role, that of the director: he does not ask to be God and yet his role implies it. He wants to be fallible, and ‘yet an instinctive conspiracy of the actors is to make him the arbiter, because an arbiter is so desperately wanted all the time, In a sense thé director is always an imposter, a guide at night who does not know the territory, and yet he has no choice — he must guide, learning the route as he goes. Dead- Tiness of lies in wait wher does not | size this situa~ fon, and hopes for the best, when it is the worst that he feeds to ge "Spending always brings us back to repetition: the dead) ET q oc beginnings fo seenes. stock endas_and-this fon ~ why clothes at all, why music, what adly director is a director who brings no challenge to the conditioned reflexes that every department must aE, ‘or half a century at least, it has been accepted that the theatre is a unity and that all elements should try to blend — this has led to the emergence of the director. But it has largely been a matter of external unity, a fairly external blending of styles so that contradictory styles do not jar. ‘When we consider how the inner unity of a complex work can be expressed we may find quite the reverse — that a jar- ring of extemals is quite essential. When we go further and ‘consider the audience — and the society from which the audience comes — the true unity of all these elements may best be served by factors that by other standards seem ugly, discordant and destructive. ‘A stable and harmonious socie lookGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 4a Dunn/Ward CRAZY Solvency: Culture Theater is culture-making: it makes possible a critical understanding of cultural authenticity that can decenter representational authority. Laura Wiley and David Feiner, founders of the Albany Park theater group, 2001, “Representational Authority and a Community-Centered Process of Script Development” in Performing Democracy pg 121-125 A Representational authority has been a buzzword in several academic. disciplines of late, but the ideas behind this jargon term have concerned community; based theater practitioners in the United States since the current U.S. incat nation of the movement began in the 1960s and 19701. Indeed, in some ways the whole movement centers on sntational authority. Theater companies that formed in allegiance with liberation struggles such as the Feclom Mavoncnr in Beene te ant he Chee, Movement in the western ate and group hat developedin workings commun (many initiated through employment and opportunity programs) shared a recognition of the relationship between representation and power” Their Spe as Tor ople editor Tomoved for: power in US isiew a fefine themselves and the world in their own terms rather than accept an pprenive Harm quo~A good example Reale Theney Ara ier coninonity-based theater for over twenty-five years, Roadside isthe the \ atrical arm of Appalshop, a multimedia arts and educational organization that has been serving the mountain communities of Appalachia since 1969." Roadside's director, Dudley Cocke, states the importanc: of representation in ife-or-death terms: “To deny 1 people their cultural expression is o deny them their existence."? This conviction drives Roadsde’s work. The Company expresses not only its own vision but also one of the fundamental principles of community-based theater in general when it describes itself 3s making theater “on the premise chat mountain communities can assumes linger etive of conto over Ue ove ves They cam gain consol over {_ the definition of their culture and the tools of cultural ussion.”» es Chicago as a concrete context for examining “representational authority.” In panicular, we will discuss how this issue has informed our efors to employ and expand methods of community-based scene development, in which community members participate fully in turning stories they tell and collect into performance.*Gonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Culture Tee beting hs ts sarin! i hte ae eo itecomected 1 |questions: who has the power to represent whom? and who should have the right to represent whom? These questions became vital as people recognized the role of representation in the definition of culture. As the Road- side example shows, one of the central goals of community-based theater has been to increase opportunities for marginalized and oppressed groups ‘Fepresent themselves and the world around them as a means of asserting their own identity and achieving “cultural, social, economic, and politica quiy.”* In our analysis we will ook specifically at how theater can be used ‘foward cultural self-definition. This will lead to an exploration of two lev- cls of representational authority that have not received much critical attention. Turning our focus from the relationship between a community and the dominant culture, we will lok at representational authority within com- runity-based theater practice. First, we will address the matter within 3 ‘company of community-based theater makers: how isthe authority to represent apportioned, and what effects does this arrangement have? Then we will look at the negotiation of authority between a company and its com- "munity in which the question becomes: who has the right to represent jo whom, or how does a community-based theater group eam and mainsin the authority to offer representations of the world in the name of com- oe 2) ‘As a prefice to these questions, itis useful to consider the issue of uthenticity,” which is frequently treated as an objective of community based theater and related cultural empowerment movements. Focusing on authenticity can obscure or cover up fundamental con, me ‘unity selexpression and self-definition. It can thereby have the effet of stripping potentially radical ats of at least some of their power, remnscnbing them in dominant culture discourse as quaint displays of traditTon rather Fan outbreaks of agency from the margins. “~The term authenfuity refers to the genuineness ofa cultural product, the “ruth” of its belonging to a particular culture. Ironically, the term owes ch of its popularity to social science and cultural studies scholars who suggest that the world is now beyond authenticity—that, in a globalized world where every culture interacts with other cultures and all are constantly exposed to mass culture, the possibility for cultural purity no longer exists (ssuming it ever di). In The Predicament of Culture historian James Clifford writes about this situation and its impact on how cultural difference is made, lived, and encountered: This century has seen a drastic expansion of mobility, including tourism, migrant labor, immigration, urban sprawl... In cities on six continents foreign populations have come to stay—mixing in but often in panial, specific fashions. The “exotic” is uncannily close. Con- versely, there seem no distant places left on the planet where the pres ence of “modem” products, media, and power cannot be felt. “Cul- tunl” difference is no longer a stable, exotic otherness. ‘Twentieth-century identities no longer presuppose continuous cultures oF traditions. Everywhere individuals and groups improvise local performances from (re}collected pasts, drawing on foreign media, sym- bos, and languages.® u 42 CRAZYGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Culture Despite the doubt Clifford and others throw on authenticity, the idea survives in discussions surrounding community-based theater as one means of evaluating work. Indeed, some have used the idea of authenticity almost to grade work, with whoever elicits the purest expression of “the people” imning the highest marks. Most offen this s an externally applied measure (though not always), coming from the likes of newspaper reviewers, schol- arsand researchers, and mainstream theaters or other arts presenters hosting and publicizing performances by community-based groups. Such_an sforachfocses en the performed produc of community-based deer, SS pe palo an ag ees and pectealy pining ibbon-on the ones at can be confidently labeled “true.” Clearly, authenticity has relevance when looking at the work of a movement that fights einai Tight of com- ingie to do with the outsider's appetite for “the real deal” chan with the a, fe propose that the search for authenticity should focus on proc&® rather than product, Such a reorientation will reveal that the critical issue for Geaninyebed ica com sleepin —gDiseN sion aathoiy= notte pry ofthe ater produced. This snot mer a Tmatter of aesthetic accuracy in terminology oF of theoretical abstractions community-based theater and, more Important, to the communities it Sarvesinallowrng authenticity of product to continue’ a perceived goal or ‘neasuse. As James Clifford argues, when the emphasis s on “pure prov people's cultural difference “remains tied to traditional pasts, inher- iad arose tar ether ret or Ved tothe new but cannot proce” ‘he danger then that nonmsinneeam cornmunties are dsmived a “endangered authenticities,"® relics of a past that, in the prevailing Western ‘metanarrative, will soon vanish entirely in the wake of global homogeniza- tion. Through the lens of authenticity, community-based theater appears as yay 6fmemariolizing a wadidional past rather than shaping an empowered, democratic futuse. Clifford proposes an alternative to the dominant vision of progressive and inevitable Eurocentric monoculture. He sees new orders of difference emerging, in which groups everywhere “invent local futures” ffom the traditions of their collective pasts and from the myriad influences Fhe imerconnected present, In this vision, cultures and communes ae rt fixed entities but, rather, continuous creative process. Such 3 Won in the q nding of authe of cultural products but in the ongoing proces: of community maki Refocusing questions of authenticity ffom product to process makes it clear | that community-based theater is not some kind of living museum but one _-soeans by which people are inventing Clifford's local futures. V v a3 CRAZYGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Culture Here our case studies become usefil in ilustrating how community: based theater fosters the definition of culture. Our primary example isthe scene development process that produced “A Cambodian Ghost Story,” 2 piece created by an ensemble of six teenagers in Chicago's Uptown neigh borhood. To explore some ways we are building on the “Ghost Story process, we will aso look at our current work with the Albany Park The- ater Project, a teen company we founded in 1996. Both examples demon- strate processes whereby neighborhood :eens participate filly in all aspects of collecting community stories and turning them into theater that they pet- form. Professional facilitators collaborate with the teens throughout but do not take any components of the theater making out of their hanes. ‘We employ this democratized process not to guarantee an authende] product but in order to decentralize representational authority. Sharing the authority to represent among the group maximizes the opportunities thester can generate for the kind of interactions within which the definition of culture occurs. In the social sciences one tradition views cultures as semiotic systems, ever-changing networks of symbols and meaning through which groups of people make sense out of their experiences.” As sociologist Ruth Horowitz explains: ‘The uniqueness of a subculeure rests in its symbols... through which sg30up members appraise and evaluate their behavior and that of others. Cultural symbols acquire meaning when people talk about something, ‘When they agree or disagree about the definition of a situation. People ‘fot Only wre meanings to make sense out of situations but change or ‘einforce prior meanings in interaction.!° The dramaturgical_proces—conceiving, scripting, and staging a perfor- ITO SPEEA Tele for ereng sch meeratons When s goup of people Se age To Woes WSEAS ToT aa how io ol oe, ether to decide what stories to tell and how to tell them, they engage in a formal definition of cultwe. They learn one another's val- ‘ues, experiences, taboos, and dreams, and they form new, shared perspec- tives and histories as they deliberate and collaborate to arrive at agreed-upon. ‘ways of representing their lives and the world around them. As they nego- Gate their play making, they are also negotiating and renegotiating cor - Se a 44 CRAZYGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward 45 CRAZY Solvency: Culture ‘Theater is key for cultural democracy Susan Haedicke and Tobin Nellhaus, editors for the University of Michigan Press, 2001, “Performing Democracy” pg 13-14 ¥,. The reasons are not entirely clear—pethaps it was that radical social ‘change proved extremely hard to achieve and that some forms of oppression appeared to have a deep psychological hold, and so activists found they needed to work at a fundamental level for gradual transformations—but in the 1980s and 1990s another set offssues slowly came to the surface, questions focusing on the process of producing theater, especially issues of social location, control, authority, and authenticity: “Who performs, whose mate~ rial is performed, and who decides?” Those are the core questions of com- miunity-basew theater now. The significan mmunity-based perfor- nance today is frequently in the process, not in the product, and the theater work grows out of and strives to address the present-day needs, hopes, and GGleare of a particular, usually underserved, community. As the center of balance shifted from product to process in Jome community-based work (like that of Boal and Living Stage) the “product” in the sense of a public performance disappeared altogether. ‘One way these new issues became evident, marking 2 fundamental change from mainstream the: gh art, was in the role of the audi Enees at community-based performances. Rather than sitting passively in the dark watching a fully prepared play, the audiences participated at some , point in the production's creation, sometimes by offering the stories woven into the text, sometimes by writing the text, and sometimes by performing 4s well. Thus, the dramatic text and often the performance developed col- laboratively out of che community, as individual authorship by a playwright ‘unaware of the particular community waned. Baz Kershaw defines this change as a move from democratization of culture, in which high arts brought sD the masses—“a hegemonic procedure that aims (0 cheat the mass of peo Ble of their right to create dheir own culture, and that conspires to hold them in thrall to. own uncreative subjugation"! —to cultural democracy, in which the people participate in and even control cultural production and distribution. Through this process of empowerment through theater, communities learn about their roots, their rights, and their cultural contributions co soRIetY AUTAREE Directly or indirectly, they develop greater agency, and SO vis not murpriing that community-based performance gaining poput 1 pg i meade aa |Gonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Identity Politics politics: we decentralize representational authority “Performing Democracy” pg 117 Conumuity-based performance has strong ties to struggles for democratiza- on, But it reasonable to ask: How democratic is its own process? Who authority, who has power? Why, how, and toward what end do they {use it? The issues of representational authority arise implicitly within many the essays in this collection and occasionally form an explicit subtheme iguch as in the disagreement that opens McConachie’s essay). In part 2 we ve these issues special focus. There are two main aspects: the process of Iproducing community-based thester—a process that involves relations of fauthority within the performance production or workshop itself; and the tions between the performance work and the community it seeks to Ibenefit through that work. This focus is part of a general shift toward giv “process” primacy over “product.” In some instances there is no final product at all. But even within this larger trend there are significant differ- fences in approach, some of them ultimately pointing to different concepts of democratization In the first two essays representational authority is the crux of the dis- jcusion. For Laura Wiley and David Feiner community-based theater should not seek “authenticity” (often an abstracted or selective notion of what “wuly” belongs to a culture) in the Gnal performance product but, nea, locate ie as an aspect of the process through which performances are developed. Ultimately, they argue, community-based theaters using this ‘model do not eam and maintain the auth: Ita community: on contrary, such performance work seeks to decentralize this authority ‘Troughout the community. Their argument suggests that, through radical, ‘logic cultural democratization, community-based chester can_wsefuly | undemine the identity politics that is commitment to-a community would ‘eemio foster. It becomes increasingly vital to Tame a theatrical representa tion as just one among many from a heterogenc: dlation—one based ha spesific history and social posi ists within a dynamic fame- ‘ork of relationshiss wo others. /\\ ~ 46 CRAZY jicke and Tobin Nelthaus, editors for the University of Michigan Press, 2001,Gonzaga Debate Institute 2007 cra Dunn/Ward Solvency: Identity Politics Community Theater solves identity politics, activism, and democracy by strengthening communal dialogics Susan Haedicke and Tobin Nellhaus, editors for the University of Michigan Press, 2001, “Performing Democracy” pg 7-9 J Finally, the process of selecting essays was shaped by the question of }how to organize them, We placed the essays into thre parts, each one gath- ring both analytical explorations and production documentations under a thematic rubric. This structure resulted from several considerations, With. out question, constructing the collection around “issues” (face, gender, class, age, and so forth) ad its attractions—familiaity high among then But, on the one hand, the essays themselves, or rather the performance work that they discuss, would not allow i: the majority concerned multiple ‘sues in some way, and in some cass the performance project was explice ily aimed toward uniting narrowly conceived groups and bridging cate- Bories. And, on the other hand, there seems to be mounting evidence that “entity politics” has produced a skewed concept of personal identity within thoy and a problematic polities of competitive group identities in i ~ PF, nxn gen eet Herel explo oft oa sonstfuion of abjecs” have been simplise, nil es dar solecoes action by and loyalty to specific social groups are unnecessary—quite the contary, ‘Yet there are reasons to believe that, for many people, agency often involves ‘notions of identity that reach more broadly and weigh Se ‘Sak theory ipl Some of cvidenct ames fon cone Eee ‘communiiy-Based omer ‘say Tn this collection, in fat, offen 3 Tg ase in which issues that these theories posited as central to an audience's identity formation proved almost beside the point in practice. It might even be argued that community-based theater, even as it employs notions of community (involving identities and exclusions) in its effort toe moe Ginalized peoples a voice, aso tends to subvert the very idea of community oundaries through 1s dialogic procesi—and that our representation of th: ‘Work should bear this dslogism in mind. Thus, we found ourselves looking ‘ot jst at who and what the essays tak about but also how they talk to one another. Thematic rub to illumi of community {based theafer ia way that ives and identities never could. Before closing this initial overview, one additional question needs [he-consdered. Ie did not need wo Play a special role in our decision making because it confronts everyone involved in community-based performance, but since the question arises so often, it has to be answered directly, The uestion is this: Community-based performance sounds like a great form of community development or social work—but is it an? Given the centrality Of the work's social functions, one can hardly fault those who raise this auestion. Community-based performance stretches and challenges the cus- ‘tomary boiindaries and definitions of at. Init aesthetic considerations Hist 80 Rand in Taand with those of social activisms as many of the esays hee demonstate, rather than an aesthetics of sublimity, community-based thester pursues 2 grounded aesthetics.Gonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Identity Politics ‘Murray Edelman offers one analysis ofthis connection between art and activism, arguing that the twentieth century has abandoned the view that beauty isa necessary or defining attribute of art. Art he suggests, cannot be separated from social and political ideas and acdvism: “Art and ideology ensure that there is no immaculate perception. By the same token, there can ‘be no politics without art and ide “Together, att, the mind, and the sTtuations in which they are applied construct and transform belief about ‘he social world, defining problems and solutions, hopes and fears, the past the present, and the future.” Edelman provides a definition of are that does not eliminate concer for aesthetic formalities but subordinates them to the art's work toward social change; to the relationships between the perform- crs and the community and the greater society in which they both live, work, and play; and to dialogue as a form of action that constructs meaning. Thus, whether a work is “art” is determined by its involvement in and * by : sigepact upon the community's cultural production. "Augusto Boal, instead of validating the sociopolitical import of art, |ustfies the artistic merit of performances that stretch the boundaries of art. ‘The esence of theater, he asserts, is “in the human being observing itself. “The human being not only ‘makes” theatre: itis" theatre.” Any space con- joining, a stage space and an auditorium space becomes an aesthetic space ‘cute the tenon ofthe whe audience coniens. upon it ‘Yer, while tHe actor and spectator can be different ses = ‘can ako coincide in the sime person. Thus, theater, as art, does not come from the text, the iF ‘mance, the sei, the costumes, or other waditional theatrical conventions, but from “the subjectivity of those who practice it, at the moment when they practice it."’ Artis now defined not solely 25a set of formal features: it also_involves a set of social relationships. Insofar as community-based per- fSrmance shapes @ group's social relations through activities that involve images or the imagination, itis an artistic practice, even if mainstream 2es- thetics fails to recognize it as such. ‘The ttle ofthis collection, Performing Democracy, brings these aspects oF community-based theater together. On the one hand, it is an artistic prac~ tive of performance. On the other hand, it has the sociopolitical goal of Graceteaion sed svives to we demoerGz means and proces of oper ation, that is, to act democratically. And by enacting democratically con- structed theatrical fictions, sometimes in places where democracy or even ‘sfeysencely oi, communi bused perfomance sss owEC TOE, racvascality. // 3-4 48 CRAZYGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Prejudice Sociodrama solves prejudice. Patricia Sternberg, rofessor inthe theatre department at Hunter College in New York City SocioDrama. P.187-191, 2000 in Psychodrama—First Volume (363) Moreno told us: “The exploratory value Go tori procedure tony coehaof ti conten which it can make, the other and pethaps the greater half of the contribution is that it can cure 4s well as solve, that it can change attitudes as well as study them.” I isin this area of changing attitudes that sociodrama is so fine a modality for diminishing ‘ejudice. In 1948 Moreno used sociodrama in this way when he devoted several sessions to exploring the problem of racial riots that occurred in Harlem. No one is totally free of prejudice. Somewhere along the line everyone ‘picks it up from family, friends, bad experiences, or simply misconceptions about others who are different from oneself. Prejudice is based on fear, on the feeling that others will take something from us, and on feelings of insecurity. It is also tased on taking isolated experiences or information and generalizing from that ‘to an entire group. On the other hand, the prejudiced person doesn't allow new ‘or conflicting information to change his or her viewpoint about the group as a whole. For instance, how many of us have heard ‘something like this: "I know all Mexicans are lary, but my friend Enrique is an O.K. guy.” Or, “All gays are limpwristed jerks. A macho guy like you can't teally be a fag.” ‘Whenever we meet individuals or groups whom we perceive as radically different from ourselves and therefore threatening, feelings of prejudice are in danger of becoming aroused. These differences can be something obvious that we can see like race, sex, age, physical disability, weight or body shape, and ‘even some types of developmental disability. Other forms of prejudice, equally strong, but not as obvious to the observer, ae religion, sexual preference, ethnic background, social or economic level, and intellectual and artistic ability. A sociodrama group may come together specifically to explore a crisis, as with the bombing of an Asian's home in an African-American neighborhood. Or the issue of prejudice may be a problem for which a community seeks sociodrama as a means of promoting dialogue and interaction and of resolving the problem—for example, parents in a school district tryit to reach some consensus about busing. In setting up a sociodrama to explore prejudice, itis particularly important for the leader to present the Participants with as much factual information as possible. Present the group with a common shared ex- Perience. Tell a story. Read a newspaper article. Bring in an expert to impart factual information. As a warm-up for the ‘group, ask them to free associate their feelings and experiences with the. ‘subject of prejudice. If you need to prime the pump, ask people to make a list of discriminatory words that have been applied to them. This will lead to feelings behind those labels and what it is like to be saddled with one of those prejudicial terms. An interesting action warm-up is called Circle Exclusion. Ack for a volunteer to remain outside the circle and try to break in. He may do this physically or verbally. Ask the other members to link arms and not allow the person to get in. After the warm-up ask members to say how it felt to be outside the circle ‘ot to keep someone else out. The sociodrama can emerge from theit responses. U b 49Gonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Prejudice ‘An immediate problem today deals with AIDS. There are many questions judices surrounding this whole area. Let's say you want to explore pret ing AIDS counselors. These trainees wll be dealing with a variety of prejudicial responses to the patients, such as sexual preference, promiscuity, ‘drug use, and the most significant of all: fear of the unknown. A trainee might want to explore his own prejudices in relation to the disease fist, so that he will be better prepared to handle the prejudices of others. He may feel, ‘I's hot prejudiced.” but through a sociodrama he may come to realize that he i and work to resolve those feelings chrough enactment. Again, the direct would frst gather the factual material and see that his trainees wiere familit with it. The sociodrama could explore a variety of situations: telling parents about their childs illness; talking to che patient and calming bis fears; warning a lover of the possibility of infection and offering specific information/sugge tions for that person’s testing and safety. Through this type of training, the counselors won't solve the primary problem of curing the disease, bue they will be able to help others become more sensitive to the issues involved. ‘Very often people are unaware of their own prejudices. One way a sociodrama roup can help is to reveal unacknowledged prejudice. Individuals may be hooked into a certain type of thinking about one group or another without even realizing it. For example, one of the authors directed sociodramas with a fqroup of disabled and nondisabled college students. The group decided to ex- Flore prejudices they had met regarding disbiltes and began by brainstorming ‘on the subject “Exploding the Myths of Disabilities.” Some of those myths we Blind people can't heat. Blind people need someone to lead them around. Blind people ate sloppy dressers People in wheelchairs ae invisible People in wheechais can't travel on public transportation. People in wheckhais have to be cated upstairs. [All deaf people are beautiful. {All deaf poople have super eyesight ‘Al deaf people only communicate with Leaming duabled are other words for retarded. ‘Al Teaming dabled persons have trouble with mach. Leaming disabled people can't ead unless they hold up « miror to a page: ‘And the biggest myth of all: disabled people have no interest in sex! One swdent in the group put it this way: “Just because people have a disability they're not supposed to be interested in sex. Wel, it's nor true! We have the some sex drive, hormones, and even sexual fantasies that everyone else has’ ‘When the group explored ways of dealing with prejudice about disabilities, they uncovered a most interesting truth. The disabled members were surprised and a litle upset to discover that they too had prejudices against others. The Mind students were able to share that when the group was first formed, they ‘rere resistant to participating in a group with others of such varying disabilities. When directing a group dealing with prejudice, group members should be tetter able to communicate with each other a8 a result of their work. In most instances, they will even resolve their prejudice and disagreements as they ap- tear in the group interactions. It is to be noted, however, that in rare cases, people whose values are diametrically opposed become more polarized after in- teractive work and role reversals. Moreno noticed that this was true in life tenerally as well as in sociodrama, 50 CRAZYGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Prejudice After they leave the group, some members will undoubtedly encounter prej- tice directed toward them, in particular if they are members of a minority on “hich prejudice is traditionally heaped. Therefore, in addition to learning about their own prejudices and those of others, group members can explore how to best and most safely protect themselves from prejudice that is likely to be directed to them in the future. For example, take a group of African-American women community activists who want to set up an abortion clinic in their area, First they must gamer the support of the community for the project. In order to do this, they must educate others, regardless of sex and race, to the need for tuch a clinic, and they must convince the community at large that this is a ‘worthwhile project. Chances are these women are going to mect prejudice and probably downright hostility along the way. Some people will be prejudiced against this group because of their sex, their race, or because of the project itself. Stil others will be prejudiced against them for all three reasons. How can these women lea to protect themselves from discrimination directed toward them as they move throughout the community in an effort to get their project accepted? Here is an example of how the sociodrama process can arm a group with inet strengths and controls through role traning. The director may begin the warm-up by asking members to brainstorm derogatory and/or inflammatory ‘words or name-calling prejudicial labels, such as, “dumb broad,” “black bitch,” ‘or “baby killer.” Then each participant picks out the ones that bother her most or cause her to become angry. The leader is not trying to goad them here. What She wants is to help the participants identify what triggers their emotional response of ignites their anger. ‘Next, the leader asks members to come up with as many offensive questions about the clinic project as they expect to encounter. Armed with this infor imation, the group can set up an enactment in which they feld offensive ques tions and practice protecting themselves from prejudice. During the enactment, the director can use soliloquy and walk and talk to help the enactor gain some distance of perspective if necessary. She can also freeze the action and generate faltemative coping behaviors from the audience. In addition, the director and troup members may decide to keep a sharp eye out for the words andjor actions that escalate the emotional reactions of the enactors. These will be the word and actions the enactors build their defenses against in their role training ‘Through this behavioral rehearsal or role training, the women lear how to protect themselves from reacting in ways they don’t want to react and find was to de-escalate a potentially explosive situation. ‘Sociodrama is intrinsically connected with social issues and social action Mabreno used it as far back as 1921 to mobilize people. He proved its values various projects as exemplified in the Theatre of Spontaneity and his Impromy Theatte. The goals of community sociodrama are to examine social isues precipitate direct action by the participants to resolve community problems. It Pin be practiced anywhere that people come together. ‘Sociodrama is also useful in helping people explore prejudice—their own and that of others. Ic helps them examine how their negative expectation of others antaminates communication. Through such techniques as doubling, mirroring, soa role reversals, participants can initiate of restore satisfying interaction, ‘Moreno had a grand vision of sociodrama making the world a better place to live forall mankind. He felt that each sociodrarna could influence partici fants to influence others. The ripple effect over time could create a new order evvhich people interact with each other honestly and with good will. May his fgand vision become a realty-/ (84 -| 4) 51 CRAZYGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Dominant Culture 52 CRAZY Theater changes the dominant culture: it creates dialogue between hegemonic and marginalized groups in an atmosphere that critically interrogates the aesthetics of social conscience Susan Haedicke and Tobin Nellhaus, editors for the University of Michigan Press, 2001, “Performing Democracy” pg 18-22 v es fi concems over community-based theater’s process and internal author ity reltions arise because of the work's fundamental aim of “empowering the people.” Community-based performance seeks social and_cultural change, Kershaw insists that this type of chester, which he calls “theatre of ‘feud engagement mabe conidered storm ot ala leno ‘ese performances are “conmined to banging about actual change 7m specific communitie."*7 A 1992 conference on grasroow theatrical activity eclared that “grassroots theater is linked tothe struggles for cultural, socal, economic, and political equity fo ll people. Ii fundamentally a theater of hope and often of joy. It recognizes that to advocate for equity is to meet resistance and to meet with no resistance indicates a filure to enter the fight." In Paulo Freire’s words: “As a f liberate and systematic action, all cultural action has its theory which determines its ends and a x er serves Tor sciously or unconsciously) of it serves liberation," Community-based theater interye ed hberation through three impomane functions that recur in all ofits myriad forms. One isto report Sind articulage the struggles, goals, values, and dreams of a fartcular com- rizunity, usually one that has been marginalized, ignored, or silenced. By calling the community's stories, the performance announces its existence— ot Teast to itself. As another principle from dhe 1992 conference sates: “Grassroots theater is given its voice by the community from which | aflses___. The people who are the subjects of the work are part of ts devel- ‘opment from inception through presentation. Theit stories and histories inform the work, their feedback during the creation process shapes it. The pene rt conumer of bu arian teTOMTE™ i simple act of staging community narratives can have a (SIONS effect Audiences who usually avoid mainstream thester because of cost and inelevance to chet lives often express suprise and plesure when they” attend community-based performances. Waiting rom the vantige point of ears of workin British community-based theater, Steve Gooch claims that: “Comments like "I didn't think theatre was ike this, there's so much i it ‘want to see it again’... oT never thought I'd see my own life the things Ucare and worry about every diy, up on the stage, acted out” are typical Within my own experience and that of colleagues in the same field.” Gooch continues, “The degree of confirmation, of if’ and sheer selrespect that audiences ean gain from a theatte which concerns ivelf withthe suff of their own lives cannot be achieved through other media, or through a the- sire viewed as distant and separate.” So, this theatical activity provides a space for neglected voices to speak and fo be heatd, Of cours, there ino guarantee thatthe community’s “voce” will le at all'univoeal more likely, in fic, ie willbe deckvely pla, confer Es pal at, Bren contradict io 1d major function of Community-based theater: to experiment with strategies for solving problems affecting 3 Pare my. Diversity and differences of opinionGe Solvency: Dominant Culture ‘can weaken a community, but they can also provide it with great strength— itfa way can be found for its members to “put their heads together.” Per- ‘ormance offers a way for individuals to work collectively in order to aitic- ‘late positions on issues and explore solutions to problems—at its best, ee fragmentary character of any particular representation. The dissolution of the distinction between actors and spectators is just one way (albeit a quite radical one) those goals are sought. Through such means the performance helps establish the personal and social bonds that create community. Finally, community-based performance functions 3s a challenge to the dominant culfure, Ie sestheties and social consciousness call nto question ot only the principles of both the commercial and the avant-garde art ‘worlds but also the hierarchical organization of sociely and culture. Asa result, community-based cheater frequently tackles controversy: as Gooch Sas, iran i tei of arberafwobule rs WHET TNG che theatre, locked into its box-office system, its hierarchical management and its ‘realism,’ cannot hope to deal with.” Thus, the work of community- based theaters parallels and reinforces liberation movements, The result, as ‘With any struggle for democratic change, is often messy. Yet community- .d theater work ca icular community, a model society like that envisioned by Paulo Freire: a “cultural synthesis” in whic there are no invaders; hence, there are no imposed models. In their siead, Thee ie ion who ail sale ra analyze reality (never separating ‘analysis rom action) and intervene as Subjects in the historical process Instead of following predetermined plans, eaders and people, mutually identified, together create the guidlines of their acion. In this synthe~ sis, leaders and people are somehow reborn in new knowledge and new action.” oe three gene fnetons late pleny of rom for heterogenci concepts and- methods. Tn particular, the concept of empowerment varies considerably. W1 nmunity-based performance activists a¢ ese fGnetionsand work to bring power tothe people they nay undeniand hy le” as a general audience, as a specific (even invited) audience, OF as the participants (spect-actors) themselves. Within these approaches “the people” may be seen collectively as a commufity or on an individual basis. And work originally designed for one sort of participant or recipient may be adapted or directly offered for another, such as when the Seattle Public ‘Theater presents forum theater to a general audience (see Westlake's essay), or a play written largely with steehworkers in mind later stands simply as a phy for anyone (see Favorini’s). Another issue pertains to whether the participants and/or spectators are encouraged to ize institutions and resources offered by the dominant social order—working “within the system""—or instead to invent alternative means of politcal development. Thus, among those viewing “the people” collectively, some community-based theater practitioners feel that the central issue isto help a mar Binalized community bring its perspective, history, ané/or culture to the general public's attention—a filtering up of popular culture, One version of this approach has actors perform a play about some community; another has community members themselves perform it. In either | free ourselves from the breaks which hold us back, from the lles | about ourselves which we manufacture daily for ourselves and fer} others; to destroy the limitations caused by our Ignorance és lack of courage; In short, to fill the emptiness In us: to fulfil owt selves. Art Is neither a state of the soul (In the sense of some! extraordinary, unpredictable moment of inspiration) nor a state of man (in the sense of @ profession or social function). Art 1s al ripening, an evolution, an uplifting which enables us to emerge from darkness Into a blaze of light. ‘We fight then to discover, to experience the truth about ourselves to tear away the masks behind which we hide dally. We s¢ theatre - especially in Ite palpable, carnal aspect - a8 a place of provocation, @ challenge the actor sets himself and also, indirectly, other people. Theatre only has a meaning if it allows us to, transcend our stereotyped vision, our conventional feelings and customs, our standards of judgement - not Just for the sake of doing so, but so that we may experience what Is real and, having already given up all dally escapes and pretences, in a stete of complete defenselessness unvell, give, discover ourselves. In this way ~ through shock, through the shudder which causes us to drop our dally masks and mannerisms - we are able, without hiding anything, to entrust ourselves to something we cannot name but in which live Eros end Cheritas] yD CRAZY Towards a poor Theater p. 256-257)oo Gonzaga Debate Institute 2007 2 Dunn/Ward CRAZY Solvency: Meaning (Theater provides an outlet for understanding the grounds of life's so-called “meaning”. Peter Brooks, 1984 (founded the Oxford University Film Society and founded the International Theatre Research eter Brpaie, The Empty Space: A Book About Tie these: Deadly, Holy, Rough, Immediate P 134-137) Free te, Tao not know whether it is only on a Sny scale, Gn tiny communities, that drama can be renewed. Or whether ite posse ona large scale, in a big playhouse in a capital city. Can we find, in terms of present need, what Glynde~ Tene and Bayreuth achieved in quite other circumstances," rah quite diferent ideals? ‘That is to says can produce omogeneous work that shapes its audience before it has feven passed through its doors? Glyndebourne and Bayreuth evore-mn tune with their society and the classes ‘whom they were Today, it is hard to see how a vital these anda cater one canbe other than out of tune with society —not peeking to celebrate the accepted values, PU" To challenge Shem Wee the artist is not there to indict, Bor © lecture, ther arangue, and least ofall to teach. He is © part of 1 re challenges the audience truly when he Tt the spike in the side ofan audience ‘hat is determined to challenge Fre iye celebrates with an audience most truly when he is ise piece of an audience that has a ground oF joy. Sr atPiy phenomena to ecme into being in front ofan aulgne, and were the audience open to them, & powerful auefrontation would occur. Were this 0 occur, the scattered corure of social thinking would gather ‘round certain bass nates; certain deep aims would be refelt ‘renewed, reasserted. Tavenis way the divisions between positive ‘and negative eX~ perience, between optimism and pessimism, would become meaningless. raninglgme when all sands are shifting, the search is auto- mtbally a search for form. The destruction of old forms, the Experimenting with new ones: new ‘words, new relation Ape, new places, new buildings: they = ‘belong to the same se ean individual production i ust 8 SePoret shot Prosestnseen target. It is foolish today £0 xP any single production, group, style oF Tine of ‘work to reveal what we Te fBawre can only advance crabwise in @ Tarward is a8 often sideways a8 bacte ‘wards. This is why for time there cannot possibly Warde eld style for a world theatre — a8 thers ae in the be a ts and opera houses ofthe nineteenth corre: But all is not movement, al is not destruction, all is not restlessness, all is not fashion. ‘There are pillars of affirma- Gan Those are the moments of achleveme™® ‘which do occur, Suddenly, anywhere: the performances, the occasions when samietively a total experience, a total theatre of play and Spectator, makes nonsense of any di sions like Deadly, Hough and Holy. At these rare momen, the theatre of JoYs Rove arsis, of celebration, the theatre, of ‘exploration, the oF cite of shared meaning, the living theatre oS one. But thearrgone, the moment is gone and Ie carne ‘be recaptured Shuvichly by imitation — the deadly creeps ‘back, the search begins again. v iGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Meaning Every cue to action has a call back to inertia within it, Take that holiest of experiences — music. Music is the one thing that makes life tolerable for a great number of people. ‘So many hours of music a week remind people that life could be worth living ~ but these instants of solace blunt the edge of their dissatisfaction and so make them more ready to accept an otherwise intolerable way of life. Take the shocking atrocity stories, or the photo of the napalmed child, these shocks are the roughest of experiences — but they open the spectators’ eyes to the need for an action which in the event they somehow sap. It is as though the fact of experiencing a need vividly quickens this need and quenches it in the same breath. What then can be done? #1 know of one acid test in the theatre. It is literally an acid test. When a performance is over, what remains? Fun can be forgotten, but powerful emotion also disappears and good arguments lose their thread. When emotion and argument are hamessed to a wish from the audience to see more clearly into itself ~ then something in the mind bums. The event scorches on to the memory an outline, a taste, a trace, a smell ~ a picture. It is the play's central image that remains, its silhouette, and if the elements are rightly blended this silhouette will be its meaning, this shape will be the essence of what it has to say. When years later I think of a striking theatrical experience I find a kernel engraved on my memory: two tramps under a tree, an old woman dragging a cart, a sergeant dancing, three people on a sofa in hell ~ or occa sionally a trace deeper than any imagery. [haven't a hope of remembering the meanings precisely, but from the kernel I an reconstruct a set of meanings. Then a purpose will have been served. A few hours could amend my thinking for life. ‘This is almost but not quite impossible to achieve. ‘The actor himself is hardly ever scarred by his efforts, Any actor in his dressing-room after playing a tremendous, horri- fying role is relaxed and glowing. It is as though the passage of strong feelings through someone engaged in strong physical activity is very healthy. I believe it is good for a man to be an orchestral conductor, good for him to be a tragedian: as a ace, they seem consistently to reach a ripe old age. But I also think that there is a price. The material you use to create these imaginary people who you can pick up and discard like a glove is your own fiesh and blood. The actor is giving of himself all the time. It is his possible growth, his pcssible understanding that he is exploiting, using this material to ‘weave these personalities which drop away when the play is done. Our question here is whether anything at all can pre~ vent the same thing happening to the audience. Can the audience retain a mark of its catharsis ~ or is a glow of well- being the verv best it can ever reach? 4 CRAZYGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Meaning Even here there are many contradictions. The act of theatre is a release. Both laughter and intense feelings clear some debris from the system ~ in this way they are the opposite of fracemakers, for like all purgations they make all clean and new. Yet are the experiences that free and the experiences that remain so completely different? Isn’t it a verbal naivety to believe that one is opposed to the other? Isn't it truer to say that in a renewal all things are possible again? ‘There are many pink old men and women. There are those who have astonishing vigour, but who are great babies: un- Tined in face and nature: jolly, but not grown-up. There are also other old people, not ‘crabbed, not decrepit: lined, marked, used — who are glowing, renewed. Even youth and fage can superimpose, The real question for the old actor is GMhether in an art that so renews him he could also, if he actively wished, find another growth. The question for the audience, happy and refreshed by a joyous evening at the theatre, is also the same one. Is there a further possibility? We know a fleeting liberation can happen; can something also stay? ‘Here the question comes back to the spectator. Does he ‘want any change in his circumstances? Does he want anything different in himself, his life, his society? If he doesn’t, thet he doesn’t need the theatre to be an acid, a magnifying glass, a searchlight or a place of confrontation. ‘On the other hand, he may need one or all of these things. In this case, he not only needs the theatre, he needs every thing he can get there. He desperately needs that trace that scorches, he desperately needs it to stay. MBAASt 5 CRAZY16 Gonzaga Debate Institute 2007 c . Dunn/Ward Solvency: Meaning ( Theater is key to meaning-making: it offers insight into sacred ritual that grounds human experience. Peter Brooks, 1984 (founded the Oxford University Film Society and founded the International Theatre Research Center in Pais; The Empty Space: A Book About The Theatre: Deadly, Holy, Rough, Immediate, p. 46-49) ‘When I first went to Stratford in 1945 every conceivable value was buried in deadly sentimentality and complacent worthiness — a traditionalism approved largely by town, scholar and press. It needed the boldness of a very extra ordinary old gentleman, Sir Barry Jackson, to throw all this ‘out of the window and so make a true search for true values possible once more. And it was at Stratford years later, at the Official luncheon to celebrate Siakepeue 400th Birthday, t I saw a clear example of the difference between what a coal faand wine Icomakl be ewe da Te could be Tt was felt that Shakespeare’s for a ritual celebration. The only celebration Eijone Soul vaguely romeaber war? ‘vaguely remember was related to a feast: and a feast today means alist of people from//o's Who, assembled round Prince Philip, eating smoked salmon and steak. Am- bassadors nodded to one another and passed the ritual red wine. I chatted with the local M.P. Then someone m: formal speech, we listened politely — and rose to our feet to toast_William Shakespeare. At the t asses linked — for not more than a fraction of a second, throu, was brushed away and ytten. If we underst ‘more about rit 3, the ritual ition of an ridual to wi forgettable. However, we do not know how to celebrate, because we do not know what to celebrate, All we know is the end result: we know and we like the feel and sound of cele- brating through applause, and this is where we get stuck. We forget that there are two possible climaxes to a theatre experience. There is the climax of celebration in which our Participation explodes in stamping and cheering, shouts of hurrah and the roar of hands, or else, at the other end of the stick, the climax of silence ~ another form of recognition and appreciation for an experience shared. We have largely for gotten silence. It even embarrasses us; we clap our hands mechanically because we do not know what else to do, and ‘we are unaware that silence is also permitted, that silence also is good. u yGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Meaning Ic is only when a ritual comes to our own level that we become to des the whole of pop music Is a Series of rtials ons val Te which we hove eee Poet Hall's vast and rich achievement in his cycle of Shakespeare's “Wars of the Roses’ drew on assassi ation, politics, intrigue, ‘war: David Rudkin's disturbing play Afore Night Come was & Titual of death: West Side Story a ritual of urban violence, Genet creates rituals of sterility and degradation. When I took a tour of Titus Andronicus through Europe this obscure ‘work of Shakespeare touched audiences directly because we hhad tapped in it a ritual of bloodshed which was recognized as true, And this leads to the heart of the controversy that exploded in London about what were labelled ‘dirty plays’: the complaint was that the theatre today is wallowing in misery; that in Shakespeare, in great classical at, one eye is always on the stars, that the rite of winter includes a sense Of the rite of spring. I think this is true. In a sense I agree wholeheartedly with our opponents — but not when I’ see what they propose. They are not searching for a holy theatre, they are not talking about a theatre of miracles: talking of the tame play where ‘higher’ only means ‘nicer’ — being noble only means being decent — alas, happy endings and optimism can’t be ordered like wine from cellars, They spring whether we wish it or not from a source and if we pretend there is such a source readily at hand we will go on cheating ourselves with rotten imitations. If we recognize how desperately far we have drifted from anything to do with a holy theatre we can begin to discard once and for all the dream that a fine theatre could return in a trice if only a few nice people tried harder. ap Mozethan ever, we crave for an experience thats be umdrum, Some Took Tor Wh jer, cesal ise ip ‘marijuana and in’ Th ieatre we shy away from the hay Because we dont lagu wise See Bees Iyhas let us down, we shrinl Affempts to revive poetic dranta too often have led to some thing wishy-washy or obscure, Poetry has become a meaningless term, and its association with word-music, with sweet sounds, is a hangover of a Tennysonian tradition that has somehow wrapped itself round Shakespeare, so that we are ‘conditioned by the idea that a verse play is half-way between prose and the opera, neither spoken nor sung, yet with a higher charge than prose ~ higher in content, higher somehow in moral value, All the have certainly been dest by boiirgeois values but this sort of observation does not Sarprobler. Iti folish to allow a revulsion from ois rms to turn into a revulsion from needs that are common to all men: if the need for a true contact with a sacred invisibility through the theatre still exists, then all possible vehicles must be re-examined. l I CRAZYGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Meaning have sometimes been accused of wanting to destroy the spoken word, and indesd in His abaurdity there-2 £1 Ge fision with the American idiom our ever-chang ‘sg faiguage bas rarely. Teen richer and yet it does not seein tre word is the same tool for dramatists that itonce We. Fang inan age of imagest Ts it even that we must esaturation, for the need. ‘of modern writers, Brecht, wrote ful ce ewerietion of his plays is inseparable from the imagery of Tis own productions. Yet in the desert one prophet raised his eee” Ruiling against the sterility ofthe theatre before the War in France an illuminated genius, Antoine Artaud, wrote wane describing from his imagination and intuition another Ghantre a Holy Theatre in which the blazing centre speaks through those forms closest to it. A theatre working Tike the plague, by intoxication, by infection, by analogy, by magic: © aeag in which the play, the event itself stands in place of atext. ir there another langue, just as exacting for the author, as fs tere a Tanguage of actions, ¢ lang re of sounds — # languas ie He asi, workatparaiy of word-ac-rubbish, of ‘word-as-contradict ction, of w« ck or word- If we té of the ee es eo ‘means that which crams of te iP enetrates deeper — is this where it fies? Charles a ate Invited a group with the The Royal Shake- Meare Theatre called the ‘Theatre of Cruelty to investigas® *Peae questions and to try to earn for ourselves what a holy theatre might be. /to= #4 CRAZYGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 9 Dunn/Ward CRAZY Solvency: Meaning ( Rehearsal is dead: the experience of theater draws actor and audiences into a life-making symbiotic relationship. Peter Brooks, 1984 (founded the Oxford University Film Society and founded the International Theatre Research Center in Paris: The Empty Space: A Book Abou The Theatre: Deadly, Holy. Rough, Immediate, p. 137-141) 7 We are on the verge of a formula, an equation that reads ‘Theatre = Rr a. To arrive at these letters we are forced ‘to draw from an unexpected source. The French language does not contain the words adequate for the translation of Shakespeare, yet strangely it is just in this language that we find three words used every day which reflect the problems and the possibilities of the theatre event. Repetition, representation, assistance, The words work just as well in English. But we normally speak of a rehearsal: Tepetition say the French, and their word conjures up the mechanical side of the process. Week after week, day after day, hour after hour, practice makes perfect. It is a drudge, a grind, a discipline; it is a dull action that leads to a good result. As every athlete knows, repetition eventually brings wut change: harnessed to an aim, driven by a will, repetition is creative. There are cabaret singers who practise a new song again and again for a year or more before ven- turing to perform it in public: then they may repeat this song to audiences for a further fifty years. Laurence Olivier re- peats lines of dialogue to himself again and again until he Conditions his tongue muscles to a point of absolute obedience = and so gains total freedom. No clown, no acrobat, no dancer ‘would question that repetition is the only way certain actions ‘become possible, and anyone who refuses the challenge of repetition knows that certain regions of expression are auto- matically barred to him. At the same time, repetition is a word with no glamour. it is a concept without warmth: the immediate association is a deadly one. Repetition is the piano Tessons we remember from childhood, the repeated scales; repetition is the touring musical comedy repeating auto- matically, with its fifteenth cast, actions that have lost their ‘meaning and lost their savour. Repetition is what leads to all that is meaningless in tradition: the soul-destroying long run, the understudy rehearsals, all that sensitive actors dread. ‘These carbon-copy imitations are lifeless. Repetition denies the living, It is as though in one word we see the essential contradiction in the theatre form. To evolve, something needs to be prepared and the preparation often involves going over the same ground again and again. Once completed, this needs to be seen and may evoke a legitimate demand to be repeated again and again. In this repetition, lie the seeds of decay. U UGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Meaning ‘What can reconcile this contradiction? Here, the French word for performance ~ representation — contains an answer. ‘A representation is the occasion when something is re- presented, when something from the past is shown again — something that once was, now is. For representation it is not an imitation or description of a past event, a representation denies time. It abolishes that difference between yesterday and today. It takes yesterday's action and makes it live again In every one of its aspects — including Its immediacy. In other words, a representation is what it claims to be — a making present. We can see how this is the renewal of the life that repetition denies and it applies as much to rehearsal as to performance. The study of what exactly this means opens a rich field. It compels us to see what living action means, what constitutes a real gesture in the immediate present, what forms the fakes assume, what is partially alive, what is completely artificial — until slowly we can begin to define the actual factors that make the act of representation so difficult. And the more we study this the more we see that for a repetition to evolve into a representation, something further is called for. The making present will not happen by itself, help is needed. This help is not always there: yet without this true aid, the true making present will not take place. We wonder what this necessary ingredient could be, and we look at a rehearsal, watching the actors toiling away at their painful repetitions. We realize that in a vacuum their work would be meaningless. Here we find a clue. It Ieads us naturally to the idea of an audience; we see that without an audience there is no goal, no sense. What is an audience? In the French language amongst the different terms for those who watch, for public, for spectator, one ‘word stands out, is different in quality from the rest. Assist- ance ~ I watch a play: jfassiste a une pitce. To assist ~ the ‘ward is simple: it is the key. An actor prepares, he enters into a process that can tur lifeless at any point. He sets out to capture something, to make it incarnate. In rehearsal, the vital element of assistance comes from the director, who is there to aid by watching. When the actor goes in front of an audience, he finds that the magic transformation does not work by magic. The spectators may just stare at the speo- tacle, expecting the actor to do all the work and before a passive gaze he may find that all he can offer is a repetition of rehearsals. This may disturb him deeply, he may put all his goodwill, integrity, ardour into working up liveliness and yet he senses all the time a.lack, He talks about a ‘bad’ house. ‘Occasionally, on what he calls a ‘good night’, he encounters an audience that by chance brings an active interest and to its watching role ~ thie audience ascists. With this acsist- ‘ance, the assistance of eyes and focus and desires and enjoy- ‘ment and concentration, repetition turns into representation. } 80 CRAZYGonzaga Debate Institute 2007 Dunn/Ward Solvency: Meaning Then the word representation no longer separates actor and audience, show and public: it envelops them: what is present for one is present for the other. The audience too has undergone a change. It has come from a life outside the theatre that is essentially repetitive to a special arena in which each moment is lived more clearly and more tensely. ‘The audience assists the actor, and at the same time for the ‘audience itself assistance comes back from the stage. Repetition, representation, assistance. These words sum up the three elements, each of which is needed for the event to come to life. But the essence is still lacking, because any three words are static, any formula is inevitably an attempt to capture a truth for all time. Truth in the theatre is always ‘on the move, ‘As you read this book, it is already moving out of date. It is for me an exercise, now frozen on the page. But unlike a book, the theatre has one special characteristic. It is always Possible to start again, In life this is a myth; we ourselves can never go ‘on anything. New leaves never turn, clocks never go back, we can never have a second chance. In the theatre the slate is wiped clean all the time. sae In everyday life, ‘if’ is a fiction, in the theatre ‘if’ is an experiment. Poe, life, ‘if’ is an evasion, in the theatre ‘if’ is the truth, When we are persuaded to believe in this truth, then the theatre and life are one. ‘This is a high aim. It sounds like hard work, ‘To play needs much worl. But when we experience the work as play, then i is not work any more. Aplay is play. 499 141 81 ‘CRAZY

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