Author: Andre Coleman

Globalisation refers to the increasing interaction and integration of people socially, economically, and culturally through increasing interconnectedness, in which, theatres are also affected by. Performances originally in English are now performed in multiple languages, allowing other cultures around the world to experience watching similar theatrical performances. Singapore, a globalised community, consists of much cultural variety. Due to the immersed cultural diversity, Singapore would like to expand their theatrical performances, appealing to a broader audience of different cultures and eventually become the ‘Broadway of the East’. It is the contention of this essay to analyse the impacts of globalisation on theatres via the examination of McTheatres, modernism, interculturalism, and the impact of Western theatre culture on Singapore’s theatre culture in accordance to theatre design.

In the McTheatre franchise, the workers have little or no control over their conditions of work; all the creative decisions were taken years ago and are locked down. The choreography is fixed, and the movements are largely determined by the automated sets and standardized lighting designs, which means that any deviation from the pattern risks injury or singing in darkness (Rebellato 2009: 44).

The concept of McTheatre productions are methods of global imperialism. The pro side to this can be explained when the concept was founded by Cameron Mackintosh during the 1970s when he began working in a British theatre. After experiencing a “shabby imitation” of a metropolitan original, Mackintosh wanted audiences anywhere in the world to have the same high-quality experience instead of a cheap reproduction. However, because of standardization, the virtues of theatre are depreciated, such as the liveliness, immediacy, and the uniqueness of each performance. “In a show such as The Lion King, the costumes are the stars, and the actors merely their operators. When we think of the mega musicals, we often think of the brand images: the big eyes orphan, a cat’s eye, a combined Japanese pictograph/helicopter. The star performers are never part of the brand image, because in McTheatre even the biggest star is replaceable” (Rebellato 2009: 45). Cities such as Toronto, Las Vegas, Basle, and Denver hold theatres that have been built specifically for these mega musicals. However, they are not built well acoustically, considering all mega musicals are miked performances. Thus once that particular mega musical performance has moved on, the theatre is limited to performances requiring well built acoustics.

Musical franchises are successful to a certain extent, but they are limited to an English speaking audience. Musicals such as The Lion King and Tarzan however, even though they are global musical theatre hits, are performed in multiple languages in order to appeal to a larger range of audience members. Cats have been translated into 10 different languages such as Japanese, German, and French and The Lion King will be making its first Spanish debut in Madrid on October 21st of 2011 (Cats the Musical 2011; Gans 2011). Aside from mega musicals, past theatrical performances such as Shakespearean plays are currently performed around the world. Variations of Shakespeare’s plays are also created to appeal towards the audience of the 21st century, for example, The Complete Works of Shakespeare (Abridged) is an interactive and humorous parody of Shakespeare’s plays where improvisation plays a huge roll. Hence, every performance is never the same and is unique.

While older theatre acts are adapting to a more modern perspective, new performances are created to relate towards the 21st century audience. “The theatre might be thought to contribute to the globalization of politics through plays that critically represent the workings of globalization…” (Rebellato 2009: 9). The musical Avenue Q, is ranked 21st of longest running shows in Broadway history with 2,534 performances (Avenue Q 2009). The musical, ironically portrayed as an adult version of Sesame Street, isn’t a globalized musical because it has been performed around the world, but also because the musical itself is about globalization. Considering its relevance towards the 21st century audience, it is able to connect with the majority of the world population. The puppets in the musical goes through stereotypical problems and activities people go through every day, such as, the relation towards internet within their song “the internet is for porn”, pokes fun at how the modern day population makes use of the internet, though not many may admit or embrace the new mentality.

Culture and globalisation goes hand in hand with each other, and theatres are no exception from the interculturalism. Defined by nationalists of the Canadian province of Quebec, “interculturalism is the philosophy of exchanges between cultural groups within a society.” Theatres in particular have been able to share multiple cultures with the world for centuries. This alone is a huge part on globalisation because different parts of the world are able to experience different cultures through the form of theatrical performances, whether it would be through dance, acting, and music. “I consider ‘theatre’ to refer to all cultural forms in which performers and active or passive participant-audiences coexist in the same space for a set time” (Knowles 2010: 3). During the Nara period, the Japanese, Chinese and Koreans exchanged performance traditions with each other, hence the bukagu court dance and gugaku, the Buddhist processional dance play, was eventually integrated with the Japanese culture. Western cultures did not intermix with the Asian cultures until American and European invasions in the late 19th century. Ric Knowles makes this point in his book Theatre & Interculturalism:

Beginning at the turn of the twentieth century and lasting almost a hundred years, the shingeki (new drama) movement saw a turn in Japan to Shakespeare, Ibsen, Chekhov, Stanislavski, and the performance styles of western naturalism and spoken drama. In the first decade of the twentieth century, in the wake of China’s defeat in the Sino-Japanese war of 1894-5, a similar movement developed in China, largely through the conscious efforts of Li Xishuang and Tokyo’s Spring Willow society, and visits to the society by Chinese students who produced the first huaju (spoken drama) (Knowles 2010: 8-9).

Much like the plays from Shakespeare, as mentioned before, it has come to a point where we have the ability to share knowledge easily around the world, and theatrical performances are also able to be shared with equal amount of ease.

One of the most well known types of performances known to globalise are circuses. It is in their nature to be mobile and move from place to place entertaining audiences. This leads to globalization through culture, “…the interconnection of world cultures, perhaps even the development of a ‘world culture’” (Rebellato 2010: 5). The most world renowned circus to this day would be Cirque du Soleil. Originally named Les Echassiers, it was founded by two former street performers in 1984 in Baie-Saint-Paul. It is now a Canadian entertainment company based in Montreal, Quebec, self-described as a “dramatic mix of circus arts and street entertainment” (Cirque du Soleil 2010). Cirque du Soleil has a wide variety of performances, all of which are an integration of circus styles from around the world with its own theme and storyline. They attract audiences through continuous live music, which allows the performance to be cross cultural because one doesn’t have to understand the language in order to enjoy the performance, hence it appeals to everyone and they are able to expand to different cultures around the world.

Cirque du Soleil does not only travel around the world, but they have also left permanent set ups in different parts of the world. Las Vegas, United States, has the most Cirque du Soleil performances in one area. Performances such as KA, LOVE, Mystere, O, Viva ELVIS, and Zumanity are performed to many new audiences because it’s in an area of visiting tourists from all around the world. ZED Cirque du Soleil is stationed in a theatre build specifically for this performance at Disney Resort in Tokyo, Japan, with seven million people watching this spectacular performance every year. Cirque du Soleil has been able to create and show many different performances, but it couldn’t have been done without more than 600 of their performers. (Cirque du Soleil Inc. 2009) Hence, the interconnectedness of culture is shared amongst performers and audience alike all around the world.

Though most of the casts of Cirque du Soleil are trained for this specialized art, there are also performers who were past Olympic participants from all around the world. Zoltan Supola, a gold medal gymnast who competed in the Olympic three times, retired in the year 2000 after the Sydney Games. He landed a job with Cirque du Soleil and became a part of the gravity-defying troupe of performers, which now incorporates a total of 17 former Olympians. Another example is gymnast, Paul Bowler, who performs in “Mystere” at the Treasure Island hotel in Las Vegas after failing to make it with the British Olympic team in 1996 (Martinez 2011). Performances themselves aren’t the only ones affected by globalisation, but the people who work within those performances as well. It is without a doubt that Cirque du Soleil is one of the most globalised theatrical performances to have spread from North America all the way to Asia.

Singapore is known to be a global community with multiple cultures integrated in one city, and because of this, different kinds of theatrical acts dedicated to the different cultures and all cultures are continuously performed. Singapore is a perfect example of interculturalism in general and for theatres. With the amount of international theatrical performances arriving every few months and with the amount of audiences watching these performances, it is clear that Singapore has embraced the idea of interculturalism within their theatres. This is a country in which Western and Asian performances are accepted together and appeal to a large portion of the public, hence Singapore’s wish to be a global pin point, the ‘Broadway of the East’ so to speak. As Kenneth Lyen states:

Yes, Singapore can indeed be the Broadway of the East. We have several unique attributes. Firstly, there is a wealth of stories waiting to be told in the genre of musical theatre. We also have a fascinating variety of Asian music, with different rhythms and different instruments. Our talent pool is immense, and largely untapped. We have not reached the stage where musical theatre prohibitively expensive to stage (Lyen 2010).

Aside from Singapore bringing in theatrical performances from other parts of the world, Singapore themselves are trying to globalise their own local theatre productions. It is obvious how much Western performances have influenced the local productions. By trying to maintain a unique theme to Singapore, the structure is very much of the western style. A good example of this is the musical, Forbidden City. “It’s Singapore’s most successful musical – first commissioned for the opening of the Esplanade, now in its third run, greeted with interest by American investors who’d like to adapt it for Broadway” (Yi-Sheng 2010). By exploring the fusion of Western and Eastern styles, there is a possibility for Singaporean theatrical productions to become worldwide and achieve globalisation with their own culture and local acts.

Theatre of the 21st century is affected by social standing and social status of the community, hence the design of theatres affect the people’s want and reason to attend a performance based on prestige. Theatre of Ancient Greece was an open air, semi-circular layout with only the use of a skene and costumes for visual distinction between characters and scenery (The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition 2008). It was a place for the gathering of people to enjoy a performance by being taken to another dimension. The use of lighting was available only through natural lighting; hence performances were casually held during the daytime. The globalised theatre design of the 21st century however, is incorporated on the theatre experience influenced by the modern American stage design through the use of lighting, props, and moveable stage parts. With the discovery of lighting, theatres became enclosed and performances became a nightly event, which is gives off a more formal experience. Now it is a place not only for people to gather and enjoy a performance, but also a place of prestige. Theatres in general have become a social marker.

The concept of an exposed theatre within the new proposed design of the Victoria Theatre situated in Singapore is aimed to attract audiences through the act of interaction or communication with the general public and raise awareness of theatrical performances to help Singapore reach its goal of being the ‘Broadway of the East’. The use of an open-air theatre and an enclosed theatre together is to create two different experiences much like the casual experience of Ancient Greece and the more formal experience of the 21st century.

With today’s technology and interconnectedness, theatres has become a huge part of globalisation through the sharing of performances and performers around the world not only through the use of “McTheatres”, but also through the creation of fused cultural performances in order to reach out to a broader audience. Through Western influence, the design of theatres has created a social status through the theatre experience. Singapore, being a social marker and huge globalised community, has attracted theatrical performances from around the world in order to share the multiple cultures with its local audience, to become the next ‘Broadway of the East’, and to create their own theatrical performances as well, such as Forbidden City.

Dance is defined as the art of movement. It can be used to express feelings, to exercise, to perform, and some can even interact and have nonverbal conversation though the art of dance. Dance is usually performed through the rhythm and beat of music, but it doesn’t necessarily have to involve music. Sports even sometimes incorporate a certain dance, or type of dance. For example, a martial arts kata is simply a series of movements put together to be performed with the grace and strength of a dance. Dance is also used in sports such as synchronized swimming, ice skating, and gymnastics.

There are many types of dance, ballet, tap, jazz, hip-hop, modern, and contemporary just to name a few. Most people can’t go through the day without seeing a type of dance performed in some way. Whether its seeing kids dance at a prom, a person walking down the street moving to the beat of their iPod, or simply turning on the television, it’s something that’s in our everyday lives. But have you ever wondered where it all started, or how it became what it is today?

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It was believed that dancing was a ritual in early ancient civilizations; priests would dance to the rhythm of harps and pipes to tell stories to the ancient gods, people also danced at funerals to express their sorrow. Around this same time period ballet was beginning to evolve in France. As it continued to spread through Italy, England, and Russia, it became a concert dance, which is often, even today, seen in movies and events all over the world. Dancing has continued to blossom into what it is today, and the best way to show how it has become what it is today, is though film.

One of the first movies that involved sing and dance was the 1952 film, Singing in the Rain, starring Gene Kelly, Donald O’Connor and Debbie Reynolds. This movie was more of a Broadway musical, but it is one of the first movies that involved dance at all. The most famous part of this movie is when the main character, Don Lockwood (Gene Kelly), dances through the streets with an umbrella as he twirls and sings the title song. He then grabs onto a pole and swings around it continuing to sing. During the filming of this scene he had a 103 degree fever, but thanks to the help of the camera crew, this scene only had to be shot one time.

After the production of this movie, dancing became the new craze. Dances such as, the Bop, the Stroll and the Swing became popular. Also when the song “Willy and The Hand Jive” was released, it stayed at the top of the charts for 16 weeks. Poodle skirts and pony-tails were the style, and “Do Wop” music was what everyone wanted to hear.

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The 60’s rolled around quickly and with a new decade, came new traditions. A brand new dance became the new trend. In 1960 Chubby Checker released his song entitled “The Twist.” The Twist was the first Rock & Roll dance in which partners didn’t have to touch each other.

The Twist was once said to be like, “putting out a cigarette with both feet and drying off your bottom with a towel to the beat of the music.” It was performed with the feel shoulder width apart, standing straight up, with the arms fully extended and slightly bent at the elbows. Then the next move was simply to twist the body back and forth.

Other popular dances during this time period were the Mashed Potato, the Monkey, and the Madison. The “Baby Boomers” definitely played a role in all the dance explosion of the 60’s. Throughout the end of this decade many of these dances were seen in movie productions and on Broadway.

Next we enter the retro years of the 70’s, KC and the Sunshine Band topped the charts, and Disco was the new craze. Everyone was aware that sooner or later the sex appeal of disco would make its way to the film industry. There isn’t a movie that shows this better than Saturday Night Fever starring, John Travolta and Karen Lynn Gorney. Saturday Night Fever became an instant box office hit with the famous dance by John Travolta to the Bee Gee’s smash hit Stayin’ Alive. Disco was one of the fast dances of the decade, with 110-140 bmp (beats per minute). It wasn’t long before everyone wanted to become a part of the raging disco scene, eventually

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groups such as Kiss, and The Rolling Stones, and people like Cher and Rod Stewart were all in on the fun.

As the years passed Broadway musicals became popular for a short period of time. After the great success of Hair in 1970, movies continued to make it from Broadway to the big screen. Grease, All That Jazz, and Dreamgirls, just to name a few.

Toward the end of the 70’s came the first big Broadway film to hit the box office. Grease hit the cinemas in 1978 and it soon became a dance sensation. The dances from this film are often recreated in dance classes, at recitals, shows and other events; some of these dances are even trademarked. This movie was not only a musical it was also very popular for its energetic cast and it’s “feel good” love story. One of the most famous dance moves from this movie was “The Hand Jive.” Since then there have been many different variations of how it is done.

Grease is one musical that has been said to “never get old” with the catchy songs and the disco and jive moves of John Travolta. Grease produced one of the best selling soundtracks in the world. Also, once Grease went to Broadway, it was one of the longest running musicals of all time, until Cats overtook it just recently.

The next movie of the 70’s that shows a definite change in the music and dance of the decade was All That Jazz in 1979. This film starring Roy Scheider and Jessica Lange is based on the aspects of a dancer, a choreographer, and a director’s life and career. It was inspired by the

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director’s effort to edit a film, while also staging a 1975 musical Chicago. This film closed out the 1970’s with a “bang.” It was awarded many honors, and four Oscars. Also, in 2001, the United States deemed the film “culturally significant” and it is now preserved in the National Film Registry.

So to wrap up the 70’s the Twist, the Bump, the Jitterbug, the Hustle and the Swing were all very popular dances, but through these years nothing compared to the Americans love for the Disco. It was the last immensely popular move driven by the baby boomers generation, but soon enough came the 80’s and with a new decade came new traditions, fashions, and of course a brand new dance.

The 80’s was definitely one of the best decades for new dance moves, and movies that portrayed this. From the musicals like Fame and Footloose, to the break dancing skills showed in the film Breakin’, a rewind of 70’s disco in Saturday Night Fever, the mambo and freestyle dance of Dirty Dancing, to the unusual dance moves of the extremely popular Michael Jackson. The 80’s was another step to make dancing what it is today. These 10 years were some of the best in dance history.

One of the first 1980’s dance movies to earn a spot in the all-time movies hall of fame is Fame (1980), starring Eddie Barth, Irene Cara and Laura Dean. Fame mainly took part at a Performing Arts Academy, with many great performances. Fame is considered a musical with a large amount of singing and dancing. It was awarded 3 honors, 2 Oscars, as well as 16 other

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nominations. It wasn’t a huge hit, but it still remembered by some and it showed how the sing and dance of this time period was done.

1983’s Flashdance was a major pop culture influence, with a style of its own. This film is the story of a Pittsburgh woman (Jennifer Beals) that juggles two jobs, one as a welder, and the other as an exotic dancer. Of course, during this time exotic dancing wasn’t twirling on a pole and taking off clothes, it was much different. She longs to make a career of her dancing and apply to a ballet school, but doesn’t have to confidence in her skills to apply. Flashdance had a worldwide box-office gross of 100 million, won 10 honors, one Oscar, and was nominated for 13 other nominations. This was a very stylish movie that entertained millions with the 80’s pop music and new dance moves. Flashdance popularized the dance of the 80’s with many new hit songs and dances.

The next movie that shows an evolution in the dance moves of the 80’s is actually a sequel to the 1977 movie Saturday Night Fever. Stayin’ Alive was a 1983 movie starring John Travolta, Cynthia Rhodes, and Finola Hughes. This film begins five years later with the main character, Tony Manero, dancing on the weekend nights at a disco club to run from his problems. Eventually he decides to leave his life as a dance instructor and club waiter to pursue a career on Broadway. He ends up getting the lead role in a Broadway show called Satan’s Alley. This film brought in 65 million, it was a lot less than its predecessor in 1977, but it managed to be one of the top 10 successful movies of the 80’s.

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In 1984 Kevin Bacon’s moves and energy made one of the best “high budget” dance movies of the 80’s. Footloose combines great dance music with dancers and a story of a guy that came from a big city, to a small town where dance is banned. Jazz, Hip-hop and freestyle were the main dances of choice throughout this film. Around this time in the 80’s Footloose was a rival to Flashdance, but it was said many times that Footloose was definitely the favorite for most people. This film starring not only Kevin Bacon, but Lori Singer and John Lithgow as well, brought in 80 million, it was nominated for 2 Oscars and 4 other nominations.

The next 1984 movie was one of the “lower budget” movies, and according to some, it put some of the “higher budget” movies to shame. Breakin’ was one of those movies that were very different than what most people were used to. Unlike most movies, it used talented dancers, rather than talented actors to dance. The difference with this movie rather than most during the 80’s was that it’s a celebration of dance; it doesn’t really have any particular style it was more of a freestyle dance movie. This movie was about a jazz dancer named Kelly (Lucinda Dickey) that meets two break dancers who combine their dance styles. Although the acting wasn’t great, the dancing definitely made up for it. The sequel was released a year later, but it wasn’t near the hit as this one. Because this movie wasn’t like the traditional movies of the 80’s it was only nominated for one award and it only brought in 38 million, however this movie was also very different than the rest during this time period that was a major factor in the downfall.

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In the film industry of the 80’s one of the biggest successes was Dirty Dancing. This is a 1987 film starring Patrick Swayze, Jennifer Grey and Cynthia Rhodes. Personally this is my absolute favorite movie of all time. Something that most people don’t know was that Dirty Dancing was a true story based on the screenwriter, Eleanor Bergstein’s own childhood. This movie was the story of a 17 year old girl and her family who goes on vacation at a resort, eventually Baby Housman (Jennifer Gray) falls in love with the resorts dance instructor (Patrick Swayze), while her family strongly disapproves. She spends her entire summer with him as he teaches her to dance. When this film was finished and about to be put in theatres the directors and cast were informed that this film would be a huge “flop” and possibly one of the worst films made during this time period.

Little did they know that Dirty Dancing is considered today, “the best dance movie ever made” and it would still be the favorite of many people today. As of 2007 this film earned $213.9 million worldwide, and it was the first home video to sell more than a million copies. The Dirty Dancing soundtrack also produced two multi-platinum albums and multiple singles. This film went on to win an Oscar, as well as 9 other awards, and 5 nominations.

Although there wasn’t a movie about the dance styles of Michael Jackson, I believe that he played a major part in the shift of styles in the 80’s. Michael Jackson’s career was booming with new dances, songs and styles during this time. In 1982 his album “Thriller” still remains

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today, the bestselling album of all time, and remained on the Billboard 200 peak position for 37 weeks straight. It contained 7 top ten hits, and it was only a 9 track album. “We Are the World” and “Bad” were also big hits during this time period, making music and dance even more popular. As the 80’s continued Michael Jackson was said to be one of the biggest stars of the world. He popularized dances such as the Moonwalk, the Kick, the Soulful Robot and the Never-Ending Spin.

The 80’s has been said to be “the decade of dance,” there was break dancing, the Worm, the Moonwalk and more. During the 80’s the dancing definitely took a step up to what it is for most people today. Also, many movies through these 10 years showed a change in the dance styles.

The beginning of the 90’s dance styles was very similar to the 80’s. Michael Jackson was still popular; the same dance movies were being watched over and over; and most people were still stuck in their 80’s ways of life. As the 1990’s continued dance moves such as the Macarena, the Cha Cha Slide, the Running Man, and the Electric Slide.

One of the first dance movies in a long time came out in the year 2000, Center Stage, starring Amanda Schull, Zoe Saldana and Peter Gallagher was one of those dance movies with a plot that “wasn’t so good”, but the dancing was excellent. This film revisits styles of ballet, Broadway dancing, and disco, and blends together styles of its own. It also shows the difficulty

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and common issues of professional dancing and how some people cope with the stress without computer special effects.

The next movie isn’t exactly a “dance” movie, but it shows how dancing has recently been incorporated into other activities, such as cheerleading. Bring it On was the 2000; film starring Kirsten Dunst, Eliza Dushku and Gabrielle Union. Bring it On shows how cheerleading involves dance as well, and how had dance has spread to other activities. Not only does cheerleading involve dancing, but many other sports too, such as synchronized swimming it’s nothing more than a dance in water, or figure skating. Even professional football players are sent to ballet classes to obtain balance and poise. This is an excellent film that shows the importance of dancing in sports such as cheerleading.

The year 2004 takes us to a memorable movie where the style changes to ballroom dance. Shall We Dance shows many types of ballroom dance, like the Waltz, Quickstep and Tango. This film was first a Japanese film, but this version starring Jennifer Lopez, Richard Gere, and Susan Sarandon, is the story of a workaholic lawyer who is getting bored with his daily routine, and he decides to take ballroom dance classes to make his life a little more interesting. As the time he dances continues he finds joy in it more and more. This film brought in 57.8 million dollars and was nominated for 4 awards.

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The next film takes us back to the musicals of the 70’s and 80’s, Hairspray, starring Zac Efron, John Travolta, Amanda Bynes, Queen Latifah and Michelle Pfeiffer was the fourth highest grossing musical film in US cinema history, behind Grease, Chicago and Momma Mia! This film is set in Baltimore in 1963; the story is about a plump teenager Tracy Turnblad (Nikki Blonsky) who seeks stardom as a dancer on a local television show. The 1988 original version of Hairspray earned 6.6 million and was nominated for 4 awards, while the 2007 version earned 188.8 million in the box office, was nominated for 3 Golden Globes, won 12 other awards, and had 18 other nominations. This was an energetic dance movie, much like Grease, with plenty of heart, it was said to make people “want to get up and sing and dance.”

The final and most recent successful 2006 dance movie is very similar to Dirty Dancing. Step Up, starring Channing Tatum and Jenna Dewan, is a perfect example of what dance has become today. Step Up is the story of a privileged ballet dancer who meets a free style dance rebel with a dream of making it in the real world of dance. In this film there was a mix of hip-hop, ballet, modern and break dancing to make this film perfect for this list of movies that helped our styled evolve today. This movie earned 65.3 million in the box office, and won one award and was nominated for 3 other awards.

Things have definitely changed from the 1950’s until today, but one thing in common with all of these movies is the real message; follow your dreams, and never give up on the things that you want. Another thing that all these movies have in common, it that it gives most people the urge to get up and dance.

The show “The Cradle Will Rock” written my Marc Blitzstein is a piece of work that reflects the struggles and politics of its time. In researching this show and it original production, one has to also know about the events in history surrounding and affecting the lives of every-day Americans. Then one must realize how these experiences influenced and inspired the creativity and brilliance behind Blitzstein’s vision and the creation of “The Cradle Will Rock”. It is in specific events of the nineteen thirties that sparked, what was for its time, a controversial incident in the history of theatre had never before transpired.

When the Depression began Herbert Hoover was the President and then in 1932 Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected President. Roosevelt, seeing his country in a state of decline, lunched what is referred to as “The New Deal”, a series of economic programs to get American back on its feet. One of these programs was The Works Progress Administration or the WPA which aimed to find jobs for the unemployed. The WPA consisted of five Federal One projects and the Federal Theatre Project or FTP was one designed for employment of out-of-work artists, writers, and directors, with the secondary aim of entertaining poor families and creating relevant art.

Other event s that lead to important plot points of Blitzstein’s “The Cradle Will Rock” where the forming of unions and labor strikes. In Scott Miller’s “An Analysis of The Cradle Will Rock” he writes:

The political atmosphere in America in 1937 was ripe for a show like The Cradle Will Rock. In 1936 not a single employee at U.S. Steel belonged to a union, but by February 1937, just five months before Cradle’s premiere, the steel workers had unionized and forced U.S. Steel to sign a collective bargaining agreement. In response to this new movement, anti-labor organizations were springing up all over America.”

With all this going on Blitzstein felt the need to express the frustrations of the union workers, but the creation of “The Cradle Will Rock” first began with a single song call Nickel under the foot. It was performed for Bertolt Brecht a German poet, playwright, and theatre director. It was Brecht’s idea to take the song further into a full length show. “Brecht said, “Why don’t you write a piece about all kinds of prostitution – the press, the church, the courts, the arts, the whole system?” (John Jansson)”

While he did not get to work on it right away the idea never left his mind. It was not until the death of his wife that he dove headfirst into the writing of the musical. It took him all of five weeks to complete his work of art, that of which he dedicated to Brecht.

Troubles for Blitzstein came when it was time for him to find a company that would accept his piece. Many companies though it to be too sensitive a subject with the recent troubles in America and its large political statement, all in all for many it seemed too risky. But that would not stop Blitzstein in finding a way to get his play to the people; he would not give up his quest to make his message heard. A message many Americans needed to hear.

The plot of “The Cradle Will Rock” as explained on Musical Heaven is as follows:

Moll, a streetwalker in “Steeltown USA” is arrested and finds herself in Night Court witnessing the arraignment of “The Liberty Committee,” a handful of distinguished citizens who are opposed to organizing activities by the Steelworkers Union. In an ironic twist of fate, they have been mistaken for union organizers and arrested. A drunken vagrant, once a prospering pharmacist, explains to Moll how this minister, newspaper editor, doctor, college president, professor and artist have all sold their principles for money and power. The wealth and authority of Mister Mister, a leading industrial boss, has corrupted the city, and the process is also revealed in the committee members’ furtive dialogues and strained efforts for release.

Ultimately the chief union organizer, Larry Foreman, is brought into court. An uncompromising and charismatic man, he exemplifies how one person can make a difference and gives hope to the bitter prostitute and druggist. When Steeltown’s boss, Mister Mister, arrives at the courthouse to rescue his lackeys, he attempts to buy Foreman’s loyalties but is rebuked. At the conclusion, word arrives that other unions have joined with the Steelworkers’ struggle. Even the Liberty Committee, sensing the drift of things, abandons its rich patron. Mister Mister, cowardly and alone, realizes that working people have finally developed a backbone and that he has met his match.

It was not until Orson Welles, an actor and theatre director who was working for the WPA at the time, had Blitzstein play it for producer John Houseman. This finally gave Blitzstein his big break. Houseman loved the concept and put it into production straightaway.

With Orson Welles as the director the vision of the show started taking shape, perhaps it was a vision that Blitzstein was not expecting. Blitzstein believed in his character’s two-dimensionality. He viewed them more as cartoon characters, larger than life. But with the direction of Welles he wanted a spectacle. As read in the article “The Cradle that Rocked America” Joseph Gustaitis writes:

As director, Welles launched himself into The Cradle Will Rock with characteristic Wellesian style, promising Houseman a grandiose production that would be “extremely elaborate and expensive.” It was. Welles’ vision would expand to include a 44-member chorus, a 28-piece orchestra, and a set design that used large glass carts to shift scenes. (20)

At this time The FTP, and its director, Hallie Flanagan began experiencing pressure from conservative congressmen. Although not directly some congressman had even enquired as to whether there was Communist Ideals in the FTP. It seemed that there would soon be budget cuts made in the WPA Federal theater program.

On June 12 word from Washington came through that budget cut were indeed a reality. It read, “any new production scheduled to open before July 1, 1937, must be postponed”(Gustaitis). This news fell hard upon Welles and Housemen. They then hear news “Actors Equity would not permit any of their members to appear on stage, and that the Musicians Union had imposed conditions making it impossible to have an orchestra in the pit” (Jansson). They believed that they show would now never open. When they arrived at the Maxine Elliott Theater they found armed guards surrounding the entrance and a pad lock on the door. People in the streets gathered to see what all the commotion was all about. Seeing the crowd wells and housemen realized that, as the saying goes, the show must go on. All they needed was a venue and a piano, and since Blitzstein was not part of any union he could play, sing and act out all the parts.

With the Venice theatre willing to open house to them for a small fee and the piano found and on its way, Welles song out to the crowd that “The Cradle Will Rock” will open as planned in the new location featuring Marc Blitzstein himself. The people gathered and begin to follow them some twenty blocks to the Venice Theater. Onlookers joined the parade, and the crowd grew larger. By nine o’clock every one of the Venice theatre’s 1742 seats were filled (Jansson).

Discuss Frank Wedekind’s Lulu in relation to its cultural and social context. Pay particular attention to the ways in which the play challenges and/or perpetuates certain assumptions concerning gender and sexuality; include a discussion of the play’s relevance to our contemporary context.

This essay will be exploring and discussing the character of Lulu in Frank Wedekind’s play of the same name. It will delve into the relationship that Lulu has with the men and women of the late 1800’s, as well as the challenges that women have experienced over the centuries having to deny their sexual appetite in a patriarchal world. There will be investigations into female oppression and gender status. Also one will be looking at the roles of fictional and factual ‘Femmes Fatales’ throughout the ages, from those in story books to actual ‘icons’ who have reached out to the world through modern media coverage. It will discuss whether being a sexually attractive woman is help or hindrance, is a woman a slave to men’s desires or is it a tool that women use to live and lead the life that they wish?

In research of the character of Lulu I read the introduction from the play Lulu adapted by Nicolas Wright and his insight to the character of Lulu and Frank Wedekind’s method research by having sexual encounters with a number of prostitutes. Using this method Frank Wedekind created lulu, by taking different the qualities and flaws of the prostitutes he had met, women who are described as “irresistible, some fearlessly honest, some devious, some manic, all doomed.” (Wedekind/Wright, 2007:11) Nicolas Wright gives the impression in the introduction that

“Certainly he must have come across a woman who, at the age of five or so, was raped and prostituted by a man who may have been her father. This is exactly what had happened to Lulu, as Wedekind goes to some trouble to spell out. Is he saying that this hideous event has formed her life, that’s it’s made her what she is as an adult? As a 19th-centery buck, he may not spot the connection. Yet his comments on women are full of insight, and the way the way lulu sexualises every relationship she enters into with a man seems very much part of damaged- child syndrome.”

(Wedekind/Wright, 2007:11)

By reading Nicolas Wright’s thoughts on how the character of Lulu is an abused child and is a damaged soul and as a character has a very warped view of what is acceptable and what is normal in a relationship. Due to the impression of her childhood raised by a man who is said to be her father who is insinuated in the play they had an inappropriate relationship. This is apparent in Act 4. She asks Schigolch to kill Rodrigo (an acrobat who is blackmailing lulu) for her.

“Lulu: what do you want? Don’t ask too much.

Schigolch: well, now…. if you ever felt nostalgic … for our old arrangement…..

Lulu: oh god…..!

Schigolch: Why not?

Lulu: I’m ….changed. I’m not a child any more.

Schigolch: what do see when you look at me now? Some aged monster?

Lulu; but you’ve already got a mistress.”

(Wedekind/Wright, 2007: Act 4:94)

Lulu from a young age was passed around like a toy for men’s enjoyment. This information reflects that Lulu is always looking for someone to look after her, and the security which comes with marriage, as she has never had that as a child. Now as an adult Lulu can only rely on her exceptional beauty and the fact all men from different status’ are drawn to her. This in turn empowers her to manipulate the men in her life, to bend to her every whim while the man still thinks he is in control. But in return by becoming what the man wants from her Lulu is able to enchant them by targeting their weaknesses and getting what she may want in that times before her eyes start to wonder again. This is more apparent when she marries for the second time, Eduard Schwarz. In this relationship she is the one who is control and she doesn’t like this as she has nothing to manipulate him with, so it is my belief this is the reason she begins an affair with Dr Franz Schoning. This marriage to Schwarz seems to be a healthy relationship and very comfortable life style, and which by Lulu entering into this affair with Schoning makes me wonder that Lulu is not wanting a loving family and the security of being married, she wants some danger and excitement to her life, and to me this selfish attitude which many women from her background would kill for makes me think what does Lulu really want? It’s apparent she needs the security of marriage which is what society expects of women in her status and situation. But this isn’t what lulu wants’ she is a healthy sexed woman with a natural sexual appetite which unfortunately was going against the society grain.

Lulu’s character was ahead of the time’s as she was written in a time when women were repressed and had to marry for security. In a way that was most women in that era ambition was to marry well and above their station. In Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austin Mrs. Bennet was obsessed with finding husbands for her five daughters. The heroine of Pride of Prejudice Elizabeth Bennet is the complete opposite of Lulu. Whereas Elizabeth Bennet wants to marry for love, and disliked the idea of marrying just for security.

When she was proposed by her cousin Mr Collins it takes him some time to understand that his proposal is being rejected by Elizabeth, in that time was quiet unheard of to actually refuse a proposal.

“Your portion is unhappily so small that it will be in all likelihood undo the effects of you loveliness and amiable qualifications. As I must therefore conclude that you are not serious in your rejection of me, I shall chuse to attribute it to your wish of increasing my love by suspense, according to the usual practice of elegant females.”

(Austin,1996:106)

Even Jane Austen herself in 1802 accepted a marriage proposal from Harris Bigg-Wither, but she later changed her mind the next day. In all of her novels the heroine somehow ended in a suitable marriage with the man of their affections, yet she herself went on to becoming an ‘old maid’ which was her choice but in this article it states that

“Austen never felt she had been presented with adequate choices: it was either get married or become a governess or a teacher.” (http://www.sexualfables.com/spinster.php).

Harris Bigg-Wither who after her death read her books more closely in trying to understand her refusal of him and came to conclusion that marriage didn’t interest her, because in her novels she didn’t include sexual passion, and also she would only write about the prelude to marriage in a platonic way. So does this mean that Austen felt that sexual tension in a marriage would be the downfall of a relationship that started without it and that was based on affection? I feel that Austen a women of the early 1800’s who was expected to marry and was scared of sex and the complications that come with it, and thought marriage should be the product of two people in love and not a realistic and practical arrangement. She is quoted from a letter to her niece

“Anything is to be preferred or endured rather than marrying without Affection,” (http://www.sexualfables.com/spinster.php).

So in the early 1800’s Jane Austen was changing the way women behaved towards marriage that being an old maid was the only acceptable life style if one wasn’t inclined to marry. But by not marrying sparked rumours in the 1990’s that Austen was in fact a lesbian and that was the real reason she didn’t marry. This theory hasn’t be proved or disproved, I think it’s an insult to any women if they choose not to marry that they are assumed be a lesbian. Even in today’s society women are targeted and frowned upon if they choose to have a career over starting a family, which in my opinion it is a man’s ego that is being injured by not being needed.

Frank Wedekind went a different way his play Lulu by making her of sorts a high class prostitute and giving Lulu the looks and the skills to manipulate the men she wanted to pursue. In my opinion the reason why Lulu was shocking for the time it was written in is because, it was common thought that men were driven by their sexual desires and women had none. If Lulu was a man this play would be called Casanova. If the lead was a male it wouldn’t be as shocking as the world would have heard of the antics of Giacomo Girolamo Casanova de Seingalt who had died 1798 who was renowned for a sexual predator of young women and a gambler. But Lulu wasn’t a man but she was influenced by the men in her life, she tried to gain power by enslaving the men she wanted with her sexual desire. Another woman in fiction used the same skills in attain what information her pray had.

Milady Clarick de Winter from The Three Musketeersa novelbyAlexandre Dumas. Milady Clarick de Winter was a teenager forced to enter the convent, but when she gets there she falls in love with a priest with who she escapes with. They leave the church with stolen property to fund their new life together, for which both of them get caught and were branded criminals with the fleur de liys. Then she appears in Athos’ village living with a man, and pretending to be his sister. When Athos, fell in love with her and married her. After some time together he finds the brand on her shoulder, saying she was a thief. Thinking she had married him only for his money which is not true, a heart-broken Athos tries to kill her by hanging her from a tree. But she survived. At the time the book is written, apparently it was acceptable to kill your wife if you found out she had committed a crime. Milady Clarick de Winter is a capable and beautiful spy, she is an example of a strong, independent woman with a tragic past, and filled with hate for men, she enjoys seduction and the destruction of men. The men she traps will provide her with support for a short period of time but will most likely to meet an untimely end if they learn of her past. Milady Clarick de Winter is remorseless for her countless crimes.

In my opinion Lulu and Milady Clarick de Winter are femme fatales, and to achieve their hidden purpose, by using their feminine assets such as beauty, charm, and sexual allure. Both seem to be victims, caught in a situation from which they cannot escape; the connections between Milady Clarick de Winter and Lulu are uncanny having relationships ending in deadly consequences for the men they ensnare. Both Milady Clarick de Winter and Lulu have many names given or changed them through marriage. Dr Goll Lulu’s first husband in the play is in discussion with Dr Franz Schoning on their preferences on what they like to call her.With all these men renaming her is it any wonder that no-one knows the real Lulu? Does lulu exist anymore? I feel that there is such a power in a name, and by changing that aspect of a person they no longer exist. So by changing lulu’s name constantly she becomes a whole new person with a new personality over and over again, and is sculptured into whatever the man wants.

“Goll: You see I call her ‘Popsy’.

Schoning: I thought ‘Mignon’ suited her well.

Goll: ‘Mignon’? No, ‘Popsy”s better, from my personal point of view. I have a weakness for the incomplete . . . the immature . . . the innocent child in need of fatherly protection.”

(Wedekind/Wright, 2007:18)

In the case of Milady Clarick de Winter she had to change her name as Athos, her first husband whom she loved deeply thought she was dead after hanging her from a tree, and for her own protection she changed it when she married Lord De Winter. With all these name changes is there wonder that these women manipulate men for their own gain. When it’s the man who has the power to change their names a moulding them into their puppets or to force them to change their name for protection. In the process stripping them of whom there are and who they could have been.

Does society put the pressure on women to behave a certain way still? In a culture that is obsessed with the celebrity and the morbid fantasy of when things go wrong trying to find the information because even in death we as a society still want more. Marilyn Monroe was a beauty with curves; she was more than a ’50s sex goddess. She dominated the age of movie stars to become the most famous woman of the 20th Century and still has a strong fan base growing 45 years after her death. She was born Norma Jeane Mortenson and never knew who her father and was baptized Norma Jeane Baker. Her mother was mentally ill and Norma Jeane had to spend most of her childhood in foster homes and orphanages until she moved in with family friend, but when she was 16 the family she was living with was going to move and couldn’t take Norma Jeane with them. She had two options: return to the orphanage or get married.So even in the 1940’s girls without family had two choices the state or marriage, she married a boy who she had been dating for 6 months. On being discovered by a photographer while helping towards the war effort in a factory, and from then on she became a model and Marilyn Monroe. But her marriage didn’t survive her new found career. Then she soared to fame by landing film roles and various awards, but on the 5th august 1962 she died of a possible suicide. The events surrounding her death isthe most talked and debated conspiracy theories of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Many believe she was killed by order of the Kennedy’s and this was the belief of her second husband Joe DiMaggio and he died convinced the Kennedy’s were to blame, in an article about a book of his life written by his long term lawyer and friend Morris Engelberg. DiMaggio is to of expressed

“They murdered the one person I loved,” DiMaggio confided to Mr Engelberg.”

(http://news.scotsman.com/marilynmonroe/Joe-DiMaggio-died-convinced-JFK.2401434.jp)

These beliefs come from man who loved her very deeply and expressed that the men she was in a romantic relationship was the cause of her demise, and many of her fans believe that there are allot of unanswered questions connected with her death and I agree the masses there is too much information missing. She was at the mercy of very powerful men who wanted to keep her quiet and the scandal if she ever diverged in the information she knew. The allegations of the Kennedys being connected with her death has not been proved or disproved. Like Lulu, Marilyn Monroe was playing a very dangerous game by underestimating the power she had over men and the men in power. It is insinuated that Lulu was killed by Jack the Ripper an educated man who used his status to lure vulnerable prostitutes with his refinery and wealth, one the suspects was Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence and Avondalehe was grandson of Queen Victoria but this was neither proved or disproved. When doing my research the similarities between Lulu and Marilyn Monroe was very chilling both women were killed as the result of men, but for me the fact that Lulu is a fictional character based on the women Wedekind met on his sex romping with prostitutes and his character has so many similarities with the icon Monroe is disturbing that plight of women hasn’t changed much in a hundred years and more.

My aim in this essay was to Discuss Frank Wedekind’s Lulu including the context and time it was written in, and if the female gender role has changed much in the time scale, by exploring other writers, and eventually looking at a modern day icon. I feel my discussion is in a very female point of view and I’m sure that if this was written by a man it would have a very different angle and maybe I should have gotten a male opinion on the subject. Did Frank Wedekind write Lulu to shock society? Or to show that women of the 1800’s were restricted my gender and status through text. When Frank Wedekind wrote Lulu I think he knew it would be shocking in his society as a sex tragedy but I don’t think that knew that he had divulged so much into the way women were repressed by their gender and how certain sexual traumas’ can affect the way women as a gender enter a sexual relationship. Even today women use their sexual allure to get what they want or to influence a man into doing things for them. I’m my opinion women have been fighting for the right to be equal with men but yet we as a sex still choose to use our beauty to get what we want and is that because from a young age society and story books use the stereotype of the woman is at home with the children and the man makes a living and supports his family. The times have changed and as a culture we have accepted same sex marriage, same sex adoption and a black president which I thought I would never see in my life time, but the life long battle of the sexes continues and I don’t think this is going to end with any outcome which will be acceptable for either side. Lulu is a modern drama of sex. It’s not a helpful story about gender roles or sexual politics, or even at heart a marriage play, as all four of her marriages end badly. Lulu is a ruthless test of the terrible destructive would be of a basic human drive, and of that favourite scapegoat for that destruction, the femme fatale.

Bibliography
Austen.J (1996) Pride And Prejudice, London, Penguin Group.
http://news.scotsman.com/marilynmonroe/Joe-DiMaggio-died-convinced-JFK.2401434.jp
http://www.sexualfables.com/spinster.php
Wedekind.F/Wright.N (2007) Lulu, London: Nick Hern Books limited.
Research
Ascription of Identity: The “Bild” motif and the character of Lulu, Silvio Jose Dos Santos, The Journal of Musicology, Vol. 21, No.2 (spring 2004), pp. 267-308
http://www.marilynmonroe.com/
Masterpieces of French literature By Marilyn S. Severson
Refraction of the Feminine: The Monstrous Transformations of Lulu, Karin Littau, MLN, Vol. 110, No. 4, Comparative Literature Issue (Sept., 1995), pp. 888-912
The Three MusketeersbyAlexandre Dumas

Katherine Dunham modern dancer and choreographer, born in Glen Ellyn, Illinois United States of America, she were completed her study at the Chicago University and went on to earn a higher degree in anthropology. According to Darlene, (2006) turn to the side of dance she began her first school in Chicago in 1931, when she becoming dance director for the works progress administration’s project of Chicago theatre. A flashy performer, she was best known for her choreography in such musicals as Cabin in the sky 1940, and for action pictures, notably Stormy Weather 1943. According to Barbara, (2000) Dunham studied abut the dance forms in the Caribbean, especially Haiti where she lived for many years, and is credited with bringing Caribbean and African determines to a European dominated dance world. Her company traveled globally in the 1940s-60s, and she consistently denied performing at segregated venues. According to Joyce, (2002) in 1967 she founded the Performing Arts Training Center for inter-city younger in East St Louis, IL, and in 1992 went on a 47-day appetite strike to protestation in resistance to the American banishment of Haitian refugees. Her honours incorporated the Presidential Medal of the Arts (1989) and the Albert Schweitzer Prize.

Introduction

Dunham is perhaps most well known, however, for her unique blending of anthropology and dance. According to Jessie, (2002) Dunham challenged mainstream academic circles by using her anthropology not only for articles and books, but also as a catalyst for her own artistic dance productions, which heavily drew on the dance forms and cultural rituals she witnessed and documented through total immersion in the cultures she observed. Dunham traveled the world with these productions, bringing African culture, through movements, rhythms and sounds, to the world’s consciousness. This hybrid of anthropology and dance later morphed into what is today known as the Dunham technique, a special type of dance training utilizing movements witnessed in her field work. According to Darlene, (2006) Dunham technique is today studied and practiced around the world. After Dunham retired from dancing, she moved to East St. Louis, a blighted, predominantly African-American city which she hoped to revitalize through establishing a vibrant cultural center. Dunham established there an interactive museum and a dance institute (which continues to teach her technique to students from around the world).

Research objectives

Dunham desired to experiences this academy the base of enough larger cultural institution that world bring the East St. Louis community with each other. Just as surely as Haiti is overcome through the character of vaudun the island possessed African American Katherine Dunham when she first went there in the year of 1936 for the purpose of study dance and ritual. According to Joyce, (2002) in her book, Dunham discloses how her anthropological research, her work in dance, and her fascination for the people and cults of Haiti worked their trance, catapulting her into experiences that she was often lucky to have had. According to Richard and Joe, (2008) Dunham explain how the island came to be possessed by the deities of voodoo and other African religions, as well as by the deep class distributions, particularly within mulattos and blacks, and the political strife remain enough in evidence at present. Full of flare and suspense, Island Possessed is also a pioneering work in the anthropology of dance and a captivating document on Haitian beliefs and politics.

Discussion

The book “Island Possessed”, details Ms. Dunham’s experiences and sentiments of her adopted homeland, from the year 1936 to the late 1960s, and even describes her final initiation into the Vaudoun (Voodoo) religion of the half-island. According to Patrick, (2006) she speaks Haitian Creole fluently, she has owned a beautiful 18th century Haitian estate, “Habitation LeClerc” for decades, and, in the early 1990s, she “put her life on the line” and went on an extended hunger strike, when President Aristide was overthrown and forced to leave the country. According to Jane, (2007) Ms. Dunham also adopted a young girl from the French West Indies island of Martinique, back in the 1950s, as further demonstration of her love and commitment to the Diaspora.

Introduced to Theater

One of those baby-sitters, Clara Dunham, had come to Chicago with her daughter, Irene, hoping to break into show business. They and other amateur performers began rehearsing a musical/theatrical program in the basement of their apartment building, and Dunham would watch. Although the program wasn’t a success, it provided Dunham with her first taste of show business. According to Darlene, (2006) Dunham and her brother were very fond of their Aunt Lulu. However, because she was experiencing financial difficulties, a judge granted temporary custody of the children to their half-sister Fanny June Weir, and ordered that the children be returned to their father as soon as he could prove that he could take care of them.

Katherine Dunham

Katherine Dunham was born June 22, 1909, in Glen Ellyn, Illinois, in DuPage County, and died May 21, 2006 in New York City. Although one of the most important artists (and scholars) of her time, she remains largely unknown outside Dance and African-American studies. According to Darlene, (2006) Sara E. Johnson supposed that the breadth of Dunham’s accomplishments is perhaps one explanation for the underappreciation of her work. Dunham worked so hard on so many different things that she remains hard to classify. She almost single-handedly created a genuine artistic and cultural appreciation for the unique aspects of African dance, especially as manifested in African diaspora cultures. According to Joyce, (2002) Dunham was also a serious anthropologist that began her career with ground-breaking studies carried out in Jamaica and Haiti as a student at the University of Chicago. Finally, she was a tireless advocate, who led to a brief arrest during race riots in East St. Louis and a 47 day hunger-strike carried out at the age of 82 against US discrimination against Haitian refugees.

Dunham’s Artistic & Academic Background

This process was, in fact, a remaking of memory through performance. As Hamera reinforces, the practice of he social work of aesthetics is especially communal and corporeal, and where corporeality and sociality are remade as surely as formal event is produced. According to Jessie, (2002) in this sense, Afro-Caribbean culture and “sociality” voyaged across the Atlantic to the rest of the Americas, Europe, and Asian-wherever the Katherine Dunham Dance Company performed. According to Ruth, (2009) Dunham’s Research-to-Performance Method Armed with these researched dances of the black Atlantic and an understanding of their Functional social contexts, Dunham’s dance theater became a prime laboratory where Afro- Caribbean cultures could “migrate” through the performance of her choreography and through the personalities of her individual dancers in the act of performing the Dunham oeuvre.

Uncovering Danced Memory

Katherine Dunham’s earliest written ethnography provides ample proof of her prescience as a fieldworker and scholar in uncovering an ancient African dance surviving in the Caribbean on the island of Jamaica. According to Joyce, (2002) in her fieldwork represented in Journey to Accompong, she utilized a functionalist theoretical frame by recording the various social institutions in relationship to each other in the village of Accompong. Kinship, ownership patterns, religion, work group organizations, clothing and material culture, age, gender (unusual for her time), and social interaction were the sequential subject matters of her chapters. Yet, as she reveals, she had come there “to study and take part in the dances.” According to Naima, (2001) Accompong was and is one of the maroon villages in the Blue Mountains of Jamaica, having been established by run-a-away slaves from the Spanish as early as 1650 and later the English rulers in the 1690s of these maroons the Coromantees, an Akan group from the West African Gold Coast made up the largest ethnic group. They fought many battles with the British and were finally given their independence by England in a treaty signed in 1738. Thus, as a nation within a nation, the maroons of the cockpit region of the Blue Mountains had sufficiently maintained their ways of life for two centuries by the time that Katherine Dunham had arrived to study their dances and ways of life.

Enslavement and colonialism had taken its toll even among those so long separated from European influence. But Dunham was determined to unearth a vital expressive part of their successful victory and independence against the British. She would soon discover this same phenomenon among the petwo dances among the Vodou practitioners in Haiti against their French captors. Through her intense engagement of the participatory insider role with the dancing maroons, she gained historical insights that were embedded within the dancing act itself: According to Richard and Joe, (2008) The war dances are danced by men and women. Their songs are in lusty Koromantee, and from somewhere a woman has procured a rattle and shakes this in accompaniment to Ba’ Weeyums. Some of the men wave sticks in the air, and the women tear off their handkerchiefs and wave them on high as they dance. According to Patrick, (2006) few of these turns, and we are separated in a melee of leaping, shouting warriors; a moment later we are “bush fighting,” crouching down and advancing in line to attack an imaginary enemy with many feints, swerves and much pantomime. At one stage of the dance Miss Ma’y and I are face to face, she no longer is a duppy, but a maroon woman of old days, working the men up to a pitch where they will descend into the cockpit and exterminate one of his majesty’s red-coated platoons.

Afro -Jamaican dances, such as the Coromantee war dance, represent in a direct way the concept of dance itself as having rhetorical voice. As Judith Hamera explains, performance, including dance, is enmeshed in language, in reading, writing, rhetoric, and in voice. Dunham implicitly understood the movement rhetoric of the Coromantee dance and the relationship between its performance and the writing of her ethnographic experience in Jamaica. According to Richard and Joe, (2008) Dunham’s willingness to engage the maroon dances on the culture’s own terms, treating dance as another social system, allowed her a unique view into the role of the nearly forgotten Koromantee dance as a part of the maroons’ hard won battle for independence from the British. According to Joyce, (2002) this is a prime example of dance’s unique rhetorical voice-what dance anthropologist Yvonne Daniel calls embodied knowledge: Community members are in an open classroom with dance and music behavior.

These sorts of ‘knowledges’ are on display as community instruction for social cohesion and cosmic balance, Participants learn from observation, witnessing, modeling and active participation. According to Ira and Faye, (2009) Dunham’s implicit understanding of this embodied knowledge established her philosophical foundation that would serve her use of dance and the body, according to Clark, as a “repository of memory.” Moreover, she trusted her choreographic acumen to represent her understanding of her research, which in the Jamaican case, had been unearthed and cajoled from the continuing, yet reluctant, milieux de memoire lingering in Accompong.

According to Richard and Joe, (2008) in her active participation, Dunham was, thus, one of the first to demonstrate the continuity of specific West African dances that served enslaved Africans with similar purposes in the colonial New World. It is significant that this discovery was cognized in the act of dancing, through corporeal immersion in the communal dances of the people. We realize from today’s contemporary scholarship the importance of Dunham’s early trans-Atlantic performance connections. According to Joyce, (2002) Africanist anthropologist Margaret Drewal revealed in the 1990s that African-based performance. Primary site for the production of knowledge, where philosophy is enacted, and where multiple and often simultaneous discourses are employed. As I have said elsewhere, dance, for African peoples, whether on the continent or in the diaspora, is a means of enacting immediate social context, history, and indeed philosophical worldview. Dunham understood these multiple strategies embedded within Africanist performance, such as in her treasured Koromantee war dance.

Honouring Katherine Dunham as the progenitor of African American dance would be misleading and disrespect the legacy of other African Americans who contributed their own particular ways of knowing movement. According to Jane, (2007) it introduced Bannerman to Pearl Primus. Both Dunham and Primus were pioneering giants in the American dance pantheon with different ways of making dance. Since the programme was ultimately going to comment on the dance practices of African Americans, these two pioneers had to be discussed. According to Ruth, (2009) collecting life stories and reflections on movement and descriptions of individual interactions with works of Dunham and Primus would speak of the diversity that is American dance making than the celebration of any one artist.

Dunham’s Staged Caribbean Dances of the Black Atlantic

Dunham perceived her form of dance-theater as intercultural communication. For example, when international audiences viewed her 1948 ballet Naningo, she was allowing non-Cubans to interact with one of the ritualized ways in which male Afro-Cubans had retained their cosmological secret rituals perpetuated from the Ejagham people of today’s Cross-River area of Nigeria. According to Jessie, (2002) Naningo, as an all-male ballet was a fusion of balletic athleticism, Dunham technique (particularly rhythmic torso isolations and the use of the pelvis as the source for extending the legs), and a recontextualization of the movements of the Cuban male secret society called Abakua. Through program notes, the exuberant virtuosity of the dance, and the cryptic Abakua symbolic movements, she transported European audiences to secret enclaves in Cuba that only initiated Abakua members could have previously viewed.

She also cast one of her Cuban dancers in the role of a traditional Abakua figure that drums upstage center throughout the entire ballet, as an “authentic” gaze watching over her appropriated fusion style. According to Barbara, (2000) as the curtain closes, after all the Dunham technique dancers have left, the ballet ends with that figure moving across the stage in enigmatic movement phrases representative of the symbolic language of the Abakua Cuban male society. Secret society rituals, restaged in a secular theatrical setting is not a substitute for “being there,” but it does transmit an underlying social strategy of male survivors of the Atlantic slave trade, as well as a vision of sacred danced symbolism in that survival strategy. According to Ruth, (2009) Dunham company performed Naningo for people internationally who had no idea that the Abakua society even existed. In the adept hands of knowledgeable researchers like Katherine Dunham, performance becomes another mode of bridging the cultural gaps that make cross-cultural understanding such a difficult goal to reach.

Conclusion

In conclusion, life of the Dunham and career are miraculous, and although she was not alone, Dunham is perhaps the best known and most influential pioneer of black dance. She wanted to make a point that African-American and African-Caribbean styles are related and powerful components of dance in America. Performed imagined migration is underpinned by her specific artistic intent and projected audience reception. There are many ways to present dance on radio but a visual image is preferable if the discussion concerns elements of a form. The programme makers can then include descriptions of how the shaping of arms and legs display rhythm or portray expression and how contours of the torso fulfill the dancer’s intended personification. Radio though is an excellent tool to stir the mind’s eye especially if the words relate life stories and movement experiences in a descriptive way. Bannerman contacted me to research and be the presenter for the 45-minute programme “You Dance Because You Have To” aired on 21 September 2003. Interested in emerging American dance forms producer, Richard Bannerman submitted a proposal to BBC Radio 3 to make a documentary on Katherine Dunham. Bannerman knew Radio 3 wanted to explore new territories in dance and Katherine Dunham’s story was relatively unknown in Britain. Bannerman also found the repertory of The Alvin Ailey Dance Company inspiring and speculated that Katherine Dunham’s life would be a good starting point to discuss in a general way, the dance practices of African Americans. In our preliminary meeting it became clear to me that our programme had to respect the diversity of African American practices.

Explore the ways in which The Beggar’s Opera influenced the development of musical theatre in the eighteenth and twentieth centuries. What were the reasons for its continued popularity?Intro

The Beggar’s opera’ is an outstanding piece of writing, which has for centuries been an inspiration of talent to musical theatre everywhere. John gay’s piece has led to the creation of many different production’s, that shall be talked about in more depth throughout the essay. The 18th Century is the obvious place to start, with the first production being staged in 1728 on 28 January . This is also where John Gay’s marked his place in History as a great Ballad Opera writer. Ballad Opera was a new Style of musical theatre made huge by it’s humorous satire, which could be related to by all types and classes of people, because of it’s satire on Italian Opera’s and British prime minister Walpole at the time. The play in it’s new and unique group managed to relate to a mass amount of people who found the humorous play to be so true in it’s own exaggerated wayWhen given the question (Explore the ways in which ‘The Beggar’s opera’ influenced the development of musical theatre in the eighteen and twentieth centuries. What were the reasons for it’s continued popularity?) there were certain aspects of the ballad opera which I needed to understand before answering the question. The Production, adaptation’s of the play, the stylistic aspects, the construction, and it’s popularity within the two Centuries are some of the key aspects needed to answer the question.

‘The beggar’s opera’ and Its low-life settings were Taken and used in pieces like The Cobbler’s Opera, which is set in Billingsgate. Charles Johnson’s The Village Opera ( 1729 ) started a trend for more emotional and more rural subject, which contained little satire or wit. None of these two opera’s came close to the success of The Beggar’s Opera. This waspartly to do with the fact Gay had used most of the best songs in the public domain.(footnote)
The popularity of The ballad opera caused a lot of serious difficulties for The composers and Italian opera houses at the time including composers such as Handel. When the obsession had died, there were still shorter pieces of the same style which came onto the scene and became popular afterpieces of the Big shows.(footnote) These pieces were written In the early 1760s, they were unoriginal pieces of ballad opera. One called Thomas and sally(1760) by Arne, and one called Love in a village(1772) also by Arne. These were considered unoriginal because only 5 new songs were written for the opera and some were taken from his previous works. (footnote)

Bibliography and More Information about ballad opera

R. Fiske , English Theatre Music in the Eighteenth Century (London, 1973, 2/1986)

Y. Noble (ed.), Twentieth Century Interpretations of The Beggar’s Opera (Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1975)

Percy Scholes / Nicholas Temperley

Only The Beggars opera’ is the only one out of the pieces that kept it’s popularity. It was a huge milestone of the 20th century for musical theatre, was an adaptation (probably the most well known of all that have been done) of the ‘The beggar’s opera’, The Threepenny Opera. The piece was inspired by ‘The beggar’s Opera in its social message, using some of the same characters and even one of the songs. Composer Kurt Weill and playwright Bertolt Brecht changed old-fashioned opera and operetta forms, an incorporateda political view and the sound of 1920s Berlin dance bands and cabaret into the play. Weill’s harmonies and Brecht’s writing created a completely new musical theatre that inspired some of the most well known hits such as Chicago and cabaret. “Mack the Knife,” is one of the most well know tunes of the century, this is the opening song to the play.(footnote)

The first night of ‘Three penny opera’ was August 31, 1928. No one knew what to expect from the night, but not long in and everyone began to shout and cheer. The show turned out to be a brilliant success and the popularity spread throughout Europe. This started something huge. After the Berlin premiere, 46 stage productions of the work was generated because of the popularity from audiences. 1931 brought a film version to it’s audience, the film was called Die 3-Groschenoper. This made a an international star out of weill’s wife, Lotte Lenya. The opera, by 1933 had already been produced 130 times all over the world.

The play really took off after the war when there was a New York production at Theatre de lys, this production was off Broadway. It ran from 1954 to 1961 and the show did a total of 2707 performance and was the longest running play in history a the time. The Threepenny Opera is still entertaining audiences all over the world. There are three cinematic versions of the work, made in 1931, 1963, and 1988. the music and story of The Threepenny Opera as stayed irresistible to audiences everywhere as they were in 1928.

This adaptation of ‘the beggar’s opera’ as you can see has had significant inspiration on musical theatre, and had a lot on early popular music of the 20th century.

In America, ballad opera began with the importation of an English work, Flora, or Hob in the Well, which was given at Charleston, South Carolina, in 1735. The first American performance of The Beggar’s Opera itself took place in New York in 1750.

Thereafter all the most popular English comic operas were quickly imported, and, indeed, for long they formed the sole operatic entertainment in the English colonies and successor states, since Italian and French opera did not reach that part of America until the 1790s, and no serious attempt to promote Italian opera was made until 1825 .

Many writer’s of the time were sticking to Italian Opera, which were very serious
1953 brought forward a new light on the ballad opera turning it into a film. The film priemered in London on the 5th of June 1953,
film1985,

Musical theatre before ‘The beggar’s opera’ was very different. During the 17th Century there was a period called interregnum, unfortunately this had an effect on musical theatre and During this time theatrical performances were forbidden under the Puritan government. After this period and when the restoration was finally over, there was a lot of changes to society. There was a lot of positive effects on the country’s performing arts, and because of the financial developments the balance of social classes came together. Londoners started to appreciate newer forms of artistic expression. They welcomed teachers of Italian and French to the city, as well as the many Continental musicians who arrived and settled there. An era began where Italian style was put above all other types of entertainment. The Italian castrato was a male singer who was trained to sing with soprano or alto voice. The Italian Castrato became very popular(footnote)

John gay took a lot of his inspiration for the ‘The beggar’s opera’
Production’s an adaptations of The beggar’s opera since 1728 have been everywhere. I have taken a look at some of these since it’s first performance to show how much of a success it was even 250 years on, the influence on musical theatre has shown in many different types of opera.

When John Gay took his new ballad opera to the manager of the famous Drury lane theatre, Colley Cibber, gay was unfortunately turned away. The main reason for Colley Cibber’s choice was not ignorance, it was a perception of it’s political satire that made him refuse. If maybe ‘The beggar’s opera’ was a bit more obtuse there would have been a bigger chance of Cibber accepting. The fact that Cibber had a Personal friendship with British Prime minister Walpole would probably have also played a big part in Cibber’s decision, as he could not of found Gay’s Humour remotely comical.[i]Not long after Gay’s disappointment with Colley Cibber’s Decision, Gay approached John Rich, the manager of another successful theatre called Lincoln’s Inn Fields. John Rich decided to take a chance on Gay’s work, However John Rich had his doubts and probably would have dropped it after it’s rehearsal’s if it wasn’t for Gay’s friends who pressured him into continuing with the balled opera.[ii] John rich was so right in taking on the piece and the widespread popularity of Gay’s Ballad opera led Rich to build Covent Garden, which today is the most famous Opera house in London.[iii]

Gay’s main source of inspiration for the 69 Songs (in the original score there were 68 songs, one was added later by third edition) in his ballad opera were taken from a collection of songs and ballads written by Thomas D’Urfey. The verses he wrote were mostly written to folksongs and favourite melodies. The book was published in 1700 in a songbook entitled, ‘Wit and Mirth or pills to purge melancholy.’ John Gay selected many songs from this collection of popular music and wrote his own lyrics, so that the lyrics fitted in with his opera. Gay also had other sources which he borrowed from such as his contemporary composers Eccles, Barrett, Purcell, Clarke, and Handel, as well as using tunes from English, Scotch, and Irish folksongs. The music in the ballad was collected and the arranged to fit. The chosen songs included a range of popular styles at the time, from jigs to hymn-like tunes. German composer and music Director of Lincoln’s Inn Fields Theatre Dr. Pepusch

Also participated in the creation of the score, providing the overture and assisting in the orchestration of the opera.[iv]

The first Performance of John Gay’s Ballet Opera The Beggar’s Opera was on stage in 1728, This performance attracted the acclaim and attention of the Popular audience in England. The first season of performances lasted for a total of 62 nights. The play received just as much applause in the next season of performances. It soon spread into a lot of the main towns in England, and also made it’s way to Wales Scotland and Ireland where it was made more popular. The woman who played Polly( Lavinia Fenton) became a favourite of many different people. The ballad opera became that successful it drove Italian opera out of England for the whole season. Italian opera had carried Musical theatre for 10 year prior to this completely new style, I see as Experimenting at the time, as it was completely out of the norm. The 62 consecutive nights seems like a huge amount to be doing nowadays, but back in the 18th Century however this was quite normal for the actor’s to be doing. Years later the Opera was performed internationally in Dublin, Jamaica, Glasgow, New York. In America The beggar’s Opera was one of the earliest musical comedies Produced.[v]

The Opera popularised this new form of stage entertainment which was known as balled opera. Balled opera changed Operas standard Upper-class audience and had attracted and combined the likes of lower-class, middleclass and Upper-class followings. Londoners really loved the realism and satire in the ballet opera, I think it was something that everyone at the time could relate to, which maybe why it attracted such a wide range of different minded and different classed people. Audiences would leave the theatre talking about the opera and singing the familiar tunes. There is a lot of evidence to show it’s popularity in the 18th Century, one being the book trade. This was highly increased because of It’s controversial subject matter and satire. Other evidence showing it’s popularity was that every year after 1728 The beggar’s opera was performed every single year of the 18th Century.[vi]

The Beggar’s Opera was premiered on January 29, 1728 at John Rich’s theatre at Lincoln-Inn-Fields and had an overwhelming amount of success. A newspaper at the time, The Craftsman(London weekly) ran this short piece:

February 3, 1728

“This Week a Dramatick Entertainment has been exhibited at the Theatre in Lincoln’s-Inn-Fields, entitled The Beggar’s Opera, which has met with a general Applause, insomuch that the Waggs say it has made Rich very Gay, and probably will make Gay very Rich.”

The reference to Rich above refers to John Rich, the manager of the Lincoln’s Inn Fields theatre.

February 17, 1728

“We hear that the British Opera, commonly called The Beggar’s Opera, continues to be acted, at the Theatre in Lincoln’s-Inn Fields with general Applause, to the great Mortification of the Performers and Admirers of the Outlandish Opera in the Haymarket.”[vii]

The piece written shows how the play was a hit, and happened in such a small amount of time. People from everywhere wanted to see the play because It was the talk of the town.

The huge success of ‘The Beggar’s Opera’ has retained its popularity for over 200 hundred years, which forms a record in dramatic productions. Every generation brings new applause and the causes for it’s popularity change each generation, John gay probably didn’t expect such a major interest in his work and maybe didn’t think it would become as popular as it has. I’m sure it would have shocked him that the piece was performed 62 nights in a row at one of the most well known theatres at the time. Gay at the time most definitely would have been expecting some abuse over the satire contained in the opera but he would not of been expecting the creation of the characters Macheath, his gang, and women followers would be criticized, and made into something more serious.[viii]

The ballad opera has become so influential that critics by now tend to assume that complicated irony is “Pervasive” and “thoroughgoing” in the language of the play. Ironic double-meaning is understood to provide a key to correct reading of Gay’s satire, which in it’s ambiguity and uncertainty is modernistic.[ix]

The first imitation of ‘The beggar’s opera’ was by Tomas Cooke and johnJohn Mottley’s ballad opera ‘Penelope-the odyssey story set in England, this was also in 1728. The opera only ran for 3 night which had nothing on Gay’s piece.[x]

Another production of the beggar’s opera was the 1985 Performances at

1985 brought forward lots of production of the ballad opera, and it marked Johngay’s

In 1985 this Catchy News paper article, shows how popular ‘The beggar’s opera’ was and how popular is was still in 1985.

Beggars’ Banquet

“…Dramatic and musical flexibility and vitality make John Gay’s 1728 ‘Musical comedy’ an indestructible theatrical creation…”

During the 18th Century Musical theatre

‘Except in Air 34, where Pepusch used P.G. Sandoni’s original bass for the latter’s setting of Gay’s own song-text ‘Sweet William’s Farewell to Black-ey’d Susan’. Also, in Air 20 (Handel’s march from Rinaldo) and Air 41 (Purcell’s song ‘If love’s a sweet passion’), Pepusch’s bass line is similar to the composer’s own. For further details, see my edition, p.108. )

Arrangements’ of the

The rearranging of the songs in ‘The beggar’s be traced back to the first performance in 1728. The existing tunes John gay had chosen for his play, were taken by arranger John Christopher Pepusch and instead of him taking earlier harmonized version of the songs, he added his own basses.(footnote) In 1729 the basses were published, this was the third edition of the work. The first two edition only include the tunes.( The songs were unlike John Pepusch’sfully-scored overture written for two oboes and string, and there printed on two staves. The staves lack any instrumental introductions or codas.(footnote)
Other sources show evidence that there was a standard method for arranging the songs. Scoring was for unison violins and continuo, and instrumental introduction and codas copied the opening and closing bars of the song itself.(footnote)
When the third edition was introduced it was used as a basis for arrangements until late into the 19th century. However, in the second half of the 18th century, many London revivals began to try out new arrangements for the musical, the most significant version is Thomas Linley’s of 1776. All of the arrangements have not been published. In 1769 there was an edition of the ballad opera published with a misleading title page:
‘THE BEGGARS OPERA…with the Additional Alterations byDr Arne…The Basses entirely New.(footnote) The publisher hoped the audience would think that the ‘basses entirely new’ were part Dr Arne’s ‘additional alterations’, The truth is the pieces were far to poor to be his work, as it contained too much harmonic for the speed of the tunes. This gave a different spin on the musical but didn’t contain the right ingredients, that made gay’s version what it is. Compared to Pepusch’s simple but very effective bass the ‘Arne’ version omitted some of the songs from the piece, some were transposed and part of the writing is introduced into ensemble numbers. (footnote)
Arrangements of ballad operas

Antonin Artaud and Jerzy Grotowski are two famous artists who presented two different views of humanity within theater. Even though they conceived productions that were religious experiences for the audience and the actors, the nature of the experiences for each artist was different (Albert 73). This is because one of the artists sees man as moral while the other sees man as immoral. Artaud saw performance in theater to be surrounded by cruelty, the meaning of cruelty to him was that; there was evil; the act of will was goodness, an effort; to live a good life one was required an act of will, with great effort to offset the inherent evil in the world; hence, it is cruel to live without evil (Bermel 40).

Their performances therefore, ended up being similar in several aspects, such as style, artistic goals, and religious experience of theater. In their theatrical style, their performances frequently had the aspect of violence as a major theme. They thought that the performer should not be separate from their audience during the performance. In the end, both artists had their audiences around and in the action (Chambers 4). Such was seen where they staged their plays in factories, hospitals, schools, airplanes and any real environment. Looking at the aesthetic concept, Artaud and Grotowski both agree that what makes theater to be theater is the relationship between audience and performer (Croyden 20). They also believe that theater performance involves the performer presenting the full psychological and emotional essence.

According to (Brockett 20) their artistic goals were directed towards the creation of theatrical work that would benefit the whole society. We find that Grotowski theatrical performances were surrounded by the themes of martyrdom, persecution, and suffering of individuals who had debatable worth like that of Christianity. Such themes required and made the audience to think more deeply about their purpose, life and meaning. Conversely, Artaud’s theatrical performance was based on the function of civilian outlet for the performer and the audience of the destructive and negative impulses that are found in every individual (Hayman 13).

Jerzy Grotowski is from Poland and was an internationally acclaimed director whose work is mostly found from the Laboratory Theater from1959-1976, which revolutionalised modern theater (Hodge 13). On the other hand, Antonin Artaud was from France, and experimented with various theories within the theater scene in the 30s. His work did influence contemporary artists. This paper shall discuss the theater performance theory as it was influenced by Antonin Artaud and Jerzy Grotowski, who were the chief influencers of theater since World War II.

Artaud experience in theater saw him go through his profession as an actor, director, avant-gardists, and playwright. He was able to exert posthumous influence on contemporary theater trough his work which was mostly in writing (Oscar & Robert 748). We find that he proclaimed theater to be the ‘theater of cruelty’ that is based on the development of sensory and gesture actor’s responses on an extreme level. He required the actors to present an aggressive nature during the development of each stage performance. The purpose of this aggressive development in the actor was to produce the desired audience, through communication on a psychological level through the selected words. This therefore means that Grotowski made use the psychological effect that selected words have in order to realize the desired audience for each playwright he staged (Theodore 81). Therefore his performance theory for theater is based on the use of gesture to produce a psychological effect in the audience. His work and ideals only achieved international recognition in the 60s when the production of Royal Shakespeare and Peter Brook Company show cased. These were mostly seen in productions like ‘The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat’ which was performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton (Auslander 3). This was under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade. The reason why this piece of art was considered the thwarter of cruelty was the emotional hysteria that was in the performance.

Artaud influenced theater performance through his opinion that it was not more of psychological domain but rather it was more of a physical, plastic domain (Kegley & Robert 125). Within such a domain the actor was an athlete of the heart where feelings, actions, emotion was appropriate to the theme. Artaud simply was telling directors and actors that in as much as there was truth in the inner message; this truth to the audience was what they could see from feelings and believing. The desired effect in his performance theory was realized through the use of psychological effects of gestures, words and feelings on the audience. Therefore, this presents the biggest similarity between Artaud and Grotowski in performance theory of theater.

Within this context we find that Jerzy proposed the ‘poor theater’ (Hodge 23). He was seen to have rejected the notion that theater could attempt in matching the effects and spectacle of film and television. He declared that the basic element in theater is the relationship between the spectator and the actor. In his view, theater could exist without the make ups, lighting, separate stage, sound effects, however without the actor-spectator relationship it cannot exist. To this theater theorist, the issue was that the actor had the duty of working using his body to communicate. The main instruments then to this actor are then the plastic, physical and vocal training that gives him skills and training (Grotowski 24). Within the theoretical grounds, the actor looks for the signs that can express movement and sound.

To Artaud, the body is the third referent that in mimetic, dialogue, psychological theater, it is a dramatic situation that is able to convey. As compared to Grotowski, Artaud sees the body as the secondary sign for oral logos (Ronald 24). Therefore for the performer who is acting for any given vocal or psychological behavior, is beyond all instruments in the world of actions that are concretized without making mention to a body in any manners. Artaud requires that there is an interact approach to performance in order for the bodies of the character and the actor to act. This interaction is expected to be very different from any semiotics signs fashioned by the words and gestures of the performer on the stage and tat are immediately interpreted by the audience (Ronald 40). The reference to the body as a complex referent to Artaud is referring to what can be called as epiphanic function of bodies based on the understanding of the character. Such a character within the performance theory is expected to act according to a specific scene and dialogue as depicted by the playwright.

This epiphanic function is also seen in Grotowski’s work, which also shows the epiphanic function of the character as communicative (Temkine 31). This is manifested in terms of somatic and material corporality in performance. Therefore, within the performance theory of Grotowski and Artaud, the body in this theater calls for semiotic manifestations unlike the semiotic communication. In the semiotic manifestations there is no regard for autonomous theatrical as the rejection of the psychological theater (Esslin 25). This autonomous theatrical is considered by many as the evolution in psychological theater. This evolution is seen to take the form of body: the third referent-material support of the action and verbal logos; epiphanic action of the body: complex referent-psychosomatic charge; theaterlized body: prime referent-autonomous theatricality. Therefore we find that both Grotowski and Artaud made good use of the body in order to revolutionize modern theater performance (David 13).

There were able to do this through the incursion of the body within the textual modern theater by splitting the signs of logos and soma. This means they reorganized the theater to narrate the body as an instinctual structure. The signs of logos make use of ambiguity through dialogue that has structure were the body is a subject. For this reason we find that Artaud’s performance was based on the use of words that were reduced by incantations, shouts, gestures, groans (Croyden 34).

One of the single major aspects of man within the field of theater is that man is a performing animal. This is because within the performance of theater, man becomes a self performing animal, reflexive performance, and reveals himself only to himself (Brockett & Findlay 32). Self performance means that the theater performer is expected to get rid of meditation and use impulses in order to produce effective performance. This is the basic requirement of the performance theory form every performer. By performers making use of impulse in their performance they end up performing to themselves and in the end effectively communicating to the audience (Brockett & Findlay 33). The beginning of modern performance was marked during the era of Grotowski and Artaud, where actors were seen more than mere interpreters of the text as they began being riposted as the center of the performance.

The development of the modern performance theorists and practitioners was seen by Grotowski and Artaud who are some of the major contributors. According to (Brockett & Findlay 35) he idea behind modern performance is the capture of deep psychological and emotional layering and authenticity. Therefore, in order to understand the performances of Artaud and Grotowski, we must analyse their stage plays on a psychological level. This will require the revealing of any psychological effects their plays have on both the performance, audience and the actors. In (Auslander 3), without a doubt where psychology is used, the human emotions are evoked, for this reason a good performance within this theory must evoke strong emotions in the audience and actors.

Artaud’s gain in this psychological and emotional performance was realized when he encountered the Balinese theater in the Colonial Exposition back in 1931 (Hodge 6). This encounter deeply influenced him to develop ideas that allowed him to create performances that were deeply physical and sensual. Artaud gave important reference to context were performance commemorated non-verbal constituents of consciousness that were able to arouse therapeutic emotions in the audience (Chambers 4). He however did not give modern performance concrete technique that performers would use, but made the contribution that the performer had potential physically (Chambers 4). This was could the effective athleticism where the performer could make use of their emotions. It was this perspective that influenced the physical theater in the late 20th century of Grotowski. For this reason, we find that it is believed that Artaud did in fact influence the theory of Grotowski.

The idea through out the development of theater, since World War II by the two theorists was that traditions played a central role in the development of the performers training and performance aesthetics. For example, we find that Grotowski to create this deep emotional connection through performance drew from martial arts, holistic practices like yoga as he prepared the body and mind of the performer (Hodge 6). Grotowski on the other hand, was interested in the physical actions of Stanislavsky (Hodge 4). In the process he developed psychophysical techniques that were concerned with the development of the performer’s expression and imagination through physical structure discipline. It was very vital to Grotowski that the performer justified, by means of real and imaginary methods, specific details of the training. We can therefore, draw from this experience that the two stage directors were trying to make the performer to live truthfully on the stage. This truthfulness was in fact depicted through various aesthetic frameworks (Hodge 5).

Of the many proponents of this performance theory is the improvisation technique that has been characterized in theater and frequently practiced in rehearsal processes. These have been an important aspect for all performance practitioners on the stage. To (Albert 74) within this context, we find the modern performer making use of extemporaneous exercise to explore and express the authentic emotions that according to Jerzy and Artaud are necessarily to assist the performer to understand the thoughts of the parts they are playing (Albert 74). The two theorists and practitioners made use of these improvisational exercises as a means to represent the character the actor has taken up. To the two, the actor’s body is known to know feelings and thoughts learn to better express these aspects on a deeper level in order to influence the performance of the theater (Albert 74). It is through this serious exercise that the performer was required to acquire the skills of body impulses that would assist them to enter the body of the character while communicating to the audience.

Such concepts on performance were proposed by the two theorists in tier writings and journals that detailed their thoughts and ideas on performance ( David 5). For example to Artaud, performance in theater was achieved trough the use of gestures that to him were ‘spontaneous conflagration’ that was able to touch everything. Therefore, to Artaud, the gestures in the theoretical scene were to go to the extremes in order to have an understanding. Like we find, he was able to make constant use of improvisation through the use of aggressive pushing of the expressions to take them to the highest levels. To (David 5) Artaud’s performance stage was characterized by language that was highly ‘concrete’, which was ideally of the physical sense. In the end, he expected any good theoretical performance to have concrete language that made use of everything on that performance stage. We find that his ability to improvise was due to the fact that he proposed and made use experimentation with gestures ( David 5).

Moreover, it is within Artaud’s ‘theater of cruelty’ where the actor finds it difficult as they risk their bodies in order to learn (Esslin 43). This is because the performance set requires the performers to make use of extreme action to get the meaning of the play. According to (Esslin 43) Such an approach according to Artaud makes it possible for the actor and audience to have a keen perception of their world. Therefore to achieve this, he made his performances and expected every theatrical performance to have continuity in creation.

Jerzy was similar too to Artaud since he viewed the theater as the space where expression could happen. For his theoretical performance he saw the theater as the best space for expression. He like Artaud also had experimentation and improvisation as the basis for his theater productions (Esslin 43). This is because we find that he continually tried to improve theater and what was theater. However, he believed tat this rested on the vested interest and the performer’s art and also on the presence of the audience. He mostly desired that the actor’s could improve their gestures and actions to be more impulsive rather than premeditated (Esslin 45). Premeditation then would mean that the actors would not have fluid movements and therefore lack effective communication to the audience. In the end through the development of skills necessary the actor or performer in theater was able to be more impulsive. Impulsive gestures and movement in theater is a product only of experimentation and improvised exercise in rehearsals that home techniques. In his concept we find that the meaning for the poor theater was one that had been stripped bare. Grotowski described this methodology of his as a training process that made use of elimination, through the performer, instead of the building of skills. The performer is taken through a process of self penetration where they act through revelation against the audience (Chambers 4).

Within this performance aspect Grotowski believed that a performer should be able to show their inner most emotions and less of the impulses. This expression of the emotions is only capable if the performer is able to peel back every layer of their self. Therefore, their theatrical performance should be characterized by meaning and emotions in the bodies and faces. In the process he showed that in order for this requirement to be achieved the performer was expected to realize this through their initiative. Such initiatives were only possible if the performer made adequate use of improvisatory aspects within the theater stage.

Grotowski was able to realize this in his work and productions through the use of exercises that gave the performer the ability to explore themselves trough bodies and gestures (Kegley and Robert 125). Often, his performances were characterized by the action and movement like that of animals, stretching, rolling, working of the voices and breathing with each performance piece. It was through such exercises that this theorist was able to feel the performers learning ability. In the end, the performances through exercise were able to give theater performances the real meaning of life and the communication of life to the audience. To (Hayman 23) Such achievement of goals was only achievable to Grotowski through improvisatory exercises and methods that gave performers advantage of the qualities of theater.

According to (Auslander 91), Wladimir Krysinski pointed that the autonomous theatricality of Artaud and Grotowski, is not the rejection of psychological theater. Their theater concept examined the evolution of psychological theater, which traced the notion that the human body is a site where autonomous expression assertion is conceived. This represents the physical nature of truth that is represented by the performer’s body on the stage. The theorists Artaud and Grotowski allied since they both wanted to de-realize the body of the performer and make it disappear. The aim of this psychological theater was to make the body of the actor disappear right into that of the character. This is the goal of the autonomous performance in theater, in the words of Grotowski, “to make the body vanish and burn in a flash of pure psychic apprehension” (1968; Auslander 91).

As Michael Foucault argued, a fraction of the object of the social discussion is the disciplining of the body in order to make additionally manageable. This is the concept behind the performance theory as the social discourse is able to manage the body by stealing materiality from it and subjecting it to text discipline. This text is either dramatic or archetypal psychic impulse.

According to (Auslander 91) the aspect of Avant-gardist within the performance theory often claims the liberation of the body and therefore, it challenges the political and social hegemony. In the end this falls short in effectively conceptualizing the liberation, by deteriorating in seeing the body as ideally produced.

The problem is that modern performance theorists like Grotowski, have refused to acknowledge that the body is coded by the social discourse. They fail to see that the body in fact has codes that originate for the social discourse. This body then is metaphysical, mystical notion, that is highly social, raceless, undifferentiated, genderless and hence it is entirely neutral. Therefore having looked at Grotowski’s avant-gardist theory of performance there is needed to see the performing body as the instrument that counters hemegemonic produces art (Theodore 25). Such a body within the performance theory is conceived by Artaud as that part that can only be understood from analyzing the history of the body. Such developments in modern performance theory of theater were simultaneous with transformations during the modern social era (Theodore 34).

Looking at the contributions Artaud and Grotowski made to this modern performance theory in theater, we find that the two theorists did in fact rely on the religious themes to describe man in their performance (Oscar and Robert 32). This presents the other similarity, where theater is a religious experience that gives spiritual adulation for the audience and the performer. Ideally we find that Artaud’s performance compares to the traditional service within the house of worship in which religious comfort reconciles the congregation. Mean while, Grotowski’s theater depicts the tribal religious set up that tries to purify religious myths, and orientations (Ronald 34). Therefore the use of religion within their performance theory means that both theorists are the same. However, we find that by critically looking at the Laboratory theater production the nature of art is different from that of Artaud. This is because each artist is functioning at different levels of awareness. Otherwise, both artists do realize that effective theater performance is religious and highly spiritual (Ronald 36). This is because though Grotowski’s theater productions show that man is moral, which of Artaud sow man to be immoral, but each show the spirituality involved. Grotowski created his theater pieces, to essentially to show that the moral man has intrinsic concern for their fellow men’s well fare. In contrast, Artaud assumed the immoral man to have innate selfish characteristics and behaviors tat harmed others while the man tried to satisfy their lust.

These two facets of the religious views of the theorist Grotowski can be found in his productions and the expectation of his audience. As an example, the production by Grotowski, Calderon’s “The Constant Prince”, and the play, “Apocalypsis cum figuris” which was adapted from the bible, contend with the painful plight of the figure of Christ and the Christian martyrs (Temkine 54). This artists needs from his audience not only to get engrossed in the play or dram, but also they make judgment for themselves on who is wrong or right within the play. In (Temkine 56) Artaud on the other hand, made the theater to be the place of ceremony, ritual, healing, by becoming church and hospital. In this pace the audience had the chance to exorcise out the demons of cruelty and they were also able to contract plagues and be healed of them (Temkine 58). In the view of this paper this is like the absinthe-ridden Aristotelian tragedy that has the combination of holy water and laudanum.

We also find that the two theorists have created their performances to surround violence. The violence is inflicted upon the characters in the plays and dramas and consequently, shows the protagonist (Kegley and Robert 125). We find that the modern performance theory heavily makes use of and advocates for the use of violence as a means of depicting the protagonist within the framework of the art work. A close look at each of the pieces of work of Artaud and Grotowski reveals that the artists make use of violence genuinely (Kegley and Robert 125). The intention of Grotowski would seem is to make the audience uncomfortable through passivity. The efficacy of this intention can be said to then be based on the priori assumption, where the audience is affected by the spectacle of the feelings and sufferings of another human being. The assumption that for this to be effective the audience must end up feeling uneasy, worry a lot and even think concerning the feelings of suffering that are projected by the performer on stage (Bermel 51). In light of this ten, we can say that Grotowski tried to effectively make use of violence as a means of realizing responsive reactions from the audience. This type of performance has become a characteristic of the modern performance theory. The requirement is that the performer will be able to communicate to the audience emotional sides of the character that show their construct of violence. Therefore to (Bermel 52) this type of performance was also similar in Grotowski’s production of the “Arkopolis”.

In this production the success of the intentions of Grotowski were dependent on the audience humane nature and their indifference to the actors’ condition. This play made use of violence were Grotowski, concerned the play with the fate of the inmates within a concentration camp (Bermel 54). The religious theme within the performance was shown by the actor’s acting a scene of the last feast, of the resurrection. The scene depicted crude violation of humans, with the sight of the gas caber, where at the end of the play, Grotowski makes the characters b led to the chamber by a headless puppet, that they believe to b the messiah. The effect on the audience was that of shock that was created by the performance of the actors, trough the use of feelings, gestures and emotions of utter desolation, sickly skin that was very pale, cheeks that were hollow, very dilute pupils, which did not make use of make up but performance (Bermel 67). Such a performance then shows Grotowski’s ability to make use of performances to depict violence and therefore extract feelings of desolation, suffering in the audience.

If the same perspective can be applied to Artaud, we find tat it does not necessarily apply. This is because Artaud believes that the feelings of people tend towards instincts of perverse and violence. As we have seen in the cases of Grotowski, the protagonist is the victim; however, in the works of Artaud, the protagonist is the victimizer. For instance, the work by Artaud, “the Cenci” from Shelley, has a protagonist who is a wealthy, cruel and greedy count, that lust after his daughter (Brockett and Findlay 32). Similar to Grotowski, Artaud, requires the performers to be very convincing, yet, the response expected from the audience is tat of sympathy for the Count and not for the daughter. Sympathy for the daughter is only required after the daughter brutally revenges. We find that these performances of Artaud are used to make the audience cleanse themselves from their own destructive thoughts and impulses by giving audiences, acts that bring them face to face with their consciousness. Nevertheless, Artaud’s unlike Grotowski’s success depends on an assumption that the human instincts are to hurt one another rather than help (Brockett and Findlay 57).

In the process of having two types of views of man within the theater performance theory, gives two separate purposes for theater. Where, Grotowski makes the assumption that his audience will have enough morals to care for the difference between wrong and right. Grotowski then fells that he is able to stimulate his audience to critically analyse the faculties through the use of dramas that depict moral conflicts. For this reason, we find that within the drama, “Arkopolis” Grotowski is trying to make the audience to make a consideration of if or not there is a dangerous illusion from the promise of salvation in Christianity.

Therefore, we are finding that Grotowski is advocating for modern performance to create theatrical dramas where they give benefits to the society, through the sharpening of the awareness of the audience on what is wrong and right. Artaud conversely, believes that the society can only benefit if the audience is made to understand that, it cares less for this distinction. Then the implication is that Artaud is effectively recognizing and confronting the dark impulses in humans and consequently make humans free and gain control of these impulses. In effect Artaud expected that his theory of performance “theater of cruelty” to have popularity, and in the process purge the world out of the evil instincts in each person in the society. This is through the letting of the instincts to have actualization under safe context in theater.

We also find that from a closer examination of the tow performance theorist’s perspectives, there is the lift by spirituality trough theater performance. However, each theorist’s spiritual lift is different. For Grotowski, the spiritual exaltation is realized through the performance depicting pan and suffering. In the drama “The Constant Prince”, the prince character submits to castration and torture, where seriously suffers physically. At the same time, the physical suffering shows that there is a higher level to the actions of the prince that show motions of ecstasy rather than agony. Grotowski depicts the prince to be at a point of grace. The expectation of the audience is that they decide for themselves, the actor’s ordeal and character are meaningful, where the audience is moved by the spectacle of a suffering noble. The expectation of the modern theory then in theater performance is that the performer will be able to physically and psychologically endure the pain to the extent that they exceed those of the audience to arouse a sense of wonder. In comparison, Artaud uses a different road towards ecstasy. The audience is expected to empathize in “the Cenci” with the Count’s incestuous lusts. The actors are expected to perform and act out all the evil in the audience to exhaustion leaving the audience and the performer very cleansed, leading to spiritual purity.

In addition, the performance of Grotowski reveals to the audience a spiritual lift that is voluntary. This is a performance that evokes free choice on all levels. For this to be achieved, Grotowski required performances to be acted out in front of a few audiences between 40 and 60. The concept was the elite audience, which was not necessarily rich or wealthy but those who hungered for spirituality and wanted to communicate through such performances. The expectation of Grotowski was that such performances drew the audience into it, rather than swept into it. While free choice has a place in Grotowski’s performance it does not have that in Artaud’s performances. To Artaud, the impulses and passions are too strong for individuals to do a thing about them. The implied attitude is that the manner in which we a free in the world, makes more sense in the theater of Artaud. The reason is because we are finding that through such uncontrolled impulses, men are making more mistakes and evil acts. For this reason the cause of the mistakes man makes are the uncontrolled free impulses as seen in the performances of Artaud’s.

In stead of making the human think like the performance of Grotowski, Artaud wants the audience to feel. It is for this reason that the performances in theater within the realm of Artaud’s work are seen to be very manipulative. Those playwrights and performers who choose to follow the example of Artaud end up with performances that are very controlling. The manipulation is being realized in the attempt of the performances trying to trigger aspects of psychic activity, by exposing the audience to certain images. Apart from the visual images created, there is also the use of the right aura. Aura was effectively used to manipulate the audience in Artaud’s “The Cenci” through the use of sound and music that was rhythmic beats that was very hypnotic.

Interestingly Artaud and Grotowski depict the differences in man trough performance in two different Christian perspectives. These two perspectives are the protestant and catholic views. This is very contradictory of the fact that Artaud and Grotowski reject traditional religion since they believe that they do not fulfill their purpose any longer, to transform the spirituality of men. The two artists in their performances will be seen insisting that despite the rejection of these dogmas man still has spiritual needs, where trough conscious or unconscious use, traditional elements are seen in their performances. Religion is a major factor to both playwrights, since we find that they make use of religion as it is familiar to them in order to communicate to their audiences. We can however; find that though playwright is an art, the idea presented to us by Grotowski and Artaud is that we cannot withdraw our religious influences on performance. Rather we can draw from experience the religious influences of both to create effective dram pieces.

We find that the two religions do depict the central elements of the performances of Artaud and Grotowski. For example, through Cath

The crowd gaped as the scarlet curtains ascended and unveiled greeting, not from the beautiful Ziegfeld girls common to the day, but from a chorus of sweating, toiling blacks chanting, “Negros all work on the Mississippi, Negros all work while the white folks play” (Kern and Hammerstein II). In the 1900s, a wave of artistic responsibility ushered in a shift of Broadway musical themes. Instead of writing lighthearted comedy, composers such as Kern, Rodgers, Gershwin and Hammerstein crafted serious pieces that reflected upon issues in society such as inequality. Musicals such as Show Boat, West Side Story, Porgy and Bess, Finian’s Rainbow and South Pacific entertained both the stereotypical images of non-Anglo-Saxons and the idea of assimilation. Although much controversy surrounded the portrayal of people of different races on Broadway, the lives of composers, the content of musicals, and opportunities for minority artists illustrate that the main goal of musicals was not to derogatorily label different races, but to express truth and encourage acceptance.

A study of the lives of composers such as George Gershwin, Richard Rodgers, Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein II demonstrates that musical pieces were written to express appreciation or approval of assimilation and of minority culture. George Gershwin, for one, was born in New York (Levert 118- 20 asdf 13) to immigrant Russian-Jewish parents, Rose and Morris Gershvin (Mitchell 9 asd 15). Rose and Morris raised their second-generation American children among Italian, Irish, Polish and Jewish neighbors (Mitchell 12 asd 15). This multi-ethnic upbringing built the foundation of George Gershwin’s acceptance of different races. Gershwin’s tolerance of different ethnicities is further highlighted through accounts of a young George enjoying ragtime, a variation of black dance music, played by Mississippi “raggers” such as black musician Jim Reese Europe (Mitchell 12 asdf 16, a).

As time went on, Gershwin created a new sound by fusing his acquired classical training with the ragtime he heard from in earlier days (Mitchell 24- 5, 37 asdf 17, 14). This was utilized in his 1922 show, Blue Monday (b). Although Blue Monday garnered few favorable reviews because it held a tragic ending and told of the black community (Vernon 13 asdf 22), George Gershwin had opened new frontiers to which other artists like Jerome Kern followed. Gershwin’s creation of American music that encouraged racial acceptance later encouraged his own family to assimilate and become more Americanized, changing their name from “Gershvin” to “Gershwin” (Mitchell 29- 30 asdf 19).

Despite Blue Monday’s lack of success, Gershwin was still open to composing Porgy and Bess, a musical centered on African-Americans. This showed his desire for people to understand those of different races. Although it took him seven years, Gershwin obtained rights to Heyward’s novel, Porgy and Bess, in 1933 (San Francisco Opera asdf 11). In order to accurately portray African-American culture to Anglo-Saxons, Gershwin traveled to Folly Island and stayed with the Geechees, whose ancestors had been slaves (Mitchell 44-6 and Swain 57 asdfr 21, 20). Gershwin absorbed Geechee music and movement through observing Island worship rituals which included chanting, shouting, clapping, tapping, swaying, praying and forming of religious circles (Mitchell 44-6 and Swain 57 asdf 21 and 20). Gershwin’s positive relationship with these blacks can be seen through his participation in their rituals. One account relates that Gershwin was so accepted by the Geechees that he joined in performing religious rituals, even managing to obtain the center spot in a religious circle, which was usually reserved for the Geechee leaders (Mitchell 44-46). Such good relations with blacks provided incentive for Gershwin to attempt to convey the need for change, acceptance of races, and unity for America in his adaptation of Porgy and Bess. American director Francesca Zambello spoke of Porgy and Bess, saying that “It’s about class, race, economic disadvantage, all these things that separate people from one another and prevent us from having a harmonious society” (San Francisco Opera).

Although many African-Americans such as Duke Ellington, Ralph Matthews, and Hall Johnson felt that Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess was highly stereotypical (Swain 57 asdf 21, 45), Gershwin denied that his aim in creating Porgy and Bess was to put down the African-American race; instead, he shared, Porgy and Bess was written to express an accurate picture of the race as he saw it (Henderson and Bowers 99). In order to maintain true to African-American culture, Gershwin incorporated spirituals and prominent African-American music forms in Porgy and Bess as Kern had in Show Boat (Bering 68-9 asdf 46). Gershwin’s brother, Ira, who collaborated with George on Porgy and Bess, also attempted to retain the black flavor through using dialect (Bering 68-9 asdf 46) and non-standard grammar. Apart from attempting to present the truth and encourage assimilation of blacks, Gershwin’s heart for the advancement of African-Americans is shown through the fact that the show had an all-black cast despite the prominence of Jim Crow laws. Gershwin insisted on having an all-black cast and even refused to collaborate with the Metropolitan Opera because he knew that to do so would mean hiring white actors in blackface (San Francisco Opera).

Following Gershwin’s lead in writing racially themed musicals, Oscar Hammerstein II decided to work with Jerome Kern in adapting Edna Ferber’s novel, Show Boat, into a musical. Although Kern was born to immigrant Jewish- German parents, Kern was not strongly encouraged to embrace his ethnicity. His parents supported Americanization and attempted to downplay their ethnic difference, so Kern’s Jewish- German side did not have a big influence on his composing (Zollo). However, Kern’s openness to assimilation is seen through his goal of preserving Edna Ferber’s original intent with Show Boat (Green 319 asdf 36) despite the fact that the message was controversial at the time. For example, Kern wrote “Ol’ Man River,” “a song of resignation with an implied protest” (Hammerstein qtd. in Zollo asdf 36) which was sung by an African-American. Like Gershwin, Kern fused African-American music with classical music to retain a black atmosphere and to communicate the message of the piece- that blacks were suffering unjustly- across to the audience. This is shown through Kern’s usage of traditional black music when composing “Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man” (Bering 54-5 asdf 60). Aside from his written work, Kern hired black actors for Show Boat, also demonstrating his agreement with assimilation.

Oscar Hammerstein II, who collaborated on Show Boat with Kern, was a third-generation Prussian Jew. Originally named Oscar Greeley- Clendenning Hammerstein in honor of Horace Greeley (Wickware 107), Hammerstein carried on the work of his namesake in encouraging the assimilation of blacks. Through the use of dialects in his lyrics, he preserved the black flavor and tradition so that white audiences could better understand blacks.

Apart from Gershwin, Kern and Hammerstein, second generation American Richard Rodgers also explored racial themes in his compositions (Zollo). Originally named Richard Rogazinsky, Rodger’s family strayed from their Russian-Jewish roots and became more Americanized by assimilating and changing the family name to Rodgers (Zollo). Although Rodgers, like Kern, did not observe Jewish customs, his work with Oscar Hammerstein II produced musicals such as Flower Drum Song and South Pacific, which explored assimilation and themes like love transcending racial barriers (Henderson and Bowers 148-51). Although Asians were often segregated in that era (as seen in the Chinese Exclusion Act, which was repealed later in 1943), Rodgers decided to hire a few Asian actors such as Pat Suzuki for Flower Drum Song (Gottfried 195). Furthermore, Richard Rodger’s family was the first to hear Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess, and despite the fact that the musical was highly race oriented, Rodgers expressed his appreciation by exclaiming “That was a Christmas Eve we shall never forget” (Mitchell 50). His family background, reaction to Porgy and Bess and his collaborations with Hammerstein II all support speculation that Rodgers, too, felt the need to encourage acceptance of race through his art.

Despite showing prominent discrimination, the musical content, plots and lyrics of some musicals during the time period also exhibited strong ideas reflecting integration or the need for positive treatment of non-Anglo-Saxons. In Loving v. Commonwealth of Virginia, Loving, a white man, moves to Washington, D.C. with his African-American bride after threats of incarceration due to miscegenation laws. They eventually appealed to the Supreme Court, which granted them permission for their interracial marriage. However, this case did not occur until 1967 (Cruz and Berson), 40 years after Broadway’s Show Boat touched on the injustice of outlawing interracial marriage.

Show Boat, 1927, examined the injustices of the Jim Crow laws through the story of Julie, a mixed Creole performer who keeps her heritage a secret because she is married to Steve, a white man (Henderson and Bowers 240 asdf 59). Due to her mulatto heritage, Julie knew songs that “only colored folks knew” (Green 60 asdf 62 ex. Encyclopedia MT), and as a result of her singing “Can’t Help Lovin’ Dat Man,” police approached to investigate whether or not Julie had black blood (Rudinger 53-4 asdf 55) in order to decide if she was guilty of miscegenation. To protect Julie, Steve drank a drop of her blood, portraying the absurdity of the “one drop rule” (AHHHH FIND THIS). According to Booker T Washington, the “one drop rule” stated that the amount of black blood did not matter in classifying a person because even a single drop of black blood made an individual ‘black’ (Cruz and Berson asdf 37.) The fact that Julie’s black heritage was initially kept a secret allowed time for the white audience to shape a positive view of her. Her close relationship with her husband Steve and her friend Magnolia, both white, further emphasized the point that whites and blacks are not, in essence, very different. (FIND SHOW BOAT Aer) The show held a strong undertone that instead of segregating, people of different races should integrate.

Apart from mentioning miscegenation, Show Boat also cultivated compassion from whites through illustrating the hard lives that black laborers led. The opening number, “The Levee at Natchez on the Mississippi” included African-American actors singing about unending toiling for blacks. The same tune is repeated later on in “Ol’ Man River” as Joe and the chorus sings wistfully about how free the river is, saying

He don’t plant taters, he don’t plant cotton, an dem dat plants em’ is soon forgotten, but ol’ man river, he jes’ keeps rollin a long You an me, we sweat an strain, body all ach-in an racked wid pain. Tote dat barge! Lift dat bale! aˆ¦I git weary an sick of tryin, I’m tired of livin, an skeered of dyin, but ol’ man rier, he jes keeps rollin along…Don’t look up an’ don’t look down, youi don’t dast make de white boss frown; bend yo knees an bow yo head, an pull dat rope until yore dead. (Kern and Hammerstein II 47-55 asdf 61)

While Gershwin’s Blue Monday had explored racial issues and portrayed African-American tragedy, the show had not garnered much fame, so white audiences of Show Boat’s time still associated Broadway with lightheartedness and comedy. As a result, Show Boat’s use of strong words like “Niggers” (Bering 53-4) and its exploration of racial issues in society initially shocked many (Ms Farisss’s showboattt). However, Show Boat’s influential value and deep message soon captured white audiences, and it earned the title of “an American masterpiece” from the New York Times (New York Times qtd. in Zollo). The vivid images and strong lyrics in Show Boat allowed white audience members to step into the shoes of black laborers and further understand blacks through experiencing African-American woe. Other pieces such as “Queenie’s Ballyhoo” (MISS FARIS VID) stayed true to black culture (Ganzl 193) and gave the white audience a taste of black spirit. Through appealing to individual whites, Show Boat encouraged understanding and better treatment of blacks.

Show Boat provided the precedent for Burton Lane and E. Y. Harburg’s Finian’s Rainbow, a story portraying the value of trust (Green 126-7 asdf 9). Apart from expressing the importance of trust, Harburg and Lane associated evil with racism through making their villain racist. According to the plot, due to the evil senator’s racism, he tries to thwart the success of non Anglo-Saxon farmers. This angers Og, a leprechaun, who turns the senator black (Hilgart). After becoming black, the formerly racist senator becomes more open minded and even forms a quartet with three other blacks (Druxman 124). In “The Begat,” the number after the senator’s transformation, the senator sings about the origin of different races starting from Adam and Eve. He expresses that, “The white begat, the red begataˆ¦ the Greeks begat, the Swedes begat aˆ¦starting from Genesis, they begataˆ¦so bless them allaˆ¦” (Lane and Harburg), showing his willingness to admit that all races are equal.

Apart from discouraging discrimination of blacks, discrimination against Irish people was also mentioned in Finian’s Rainbow. Due to the widely expressed racist viewpoints of influential individuals such as President Roosevelt, European immigrants from the early 1900s were also discriminated against by whites (Cruz and Berson adsf 26). Finian’s Rainbow countered the wave of discrimination through numbers like, “When the Idle Poor become the Idle Rich”. In this song the Irish protagonist, Finian, dreams of a future where there is no discrimination and sings “aˆ¦No one will see the Irish or the Slav in youaˆ¦This discrimination will no longer be” (Lane and Harburg 85-98 asdf 9).

Two years after Finian’s Rainbow, South Pacific graced the Broadway stage. Set in the Pacific, the story revolves around the relationships of two interracial couples. Nellie Forbush falls for Emile de Becque, a shady Frenchman who had committed murder at a young age. Although Nellie is willing to disregard Emile’s dark past, her Anglo-Saxon upbringing complicates her feelings towards Emile’s French- islander mixed children. Her confusion and racist view put a barrier in her relationship with Emile, and the two separate. Joe Cable, like Nellie, is unsure how to act regarding his feelings for Liat, an islander, because of his racist upbringing (Ganzl 277 asdf 64). He expresses his background in “You’ve Got to be Carefully Taught,” stating that, “You’ve got to be taught to be afraid of people whose eyes are oddly made, and people whose skin is a different shade” (Henderson and Bowers.) Like Nellie, Joe’s racism ultimately breaks his relationship with Liat. Although Joe and Liat do not get back together, Nellie realizes that love transcends race and manages to salvage her relationship with Emile. Performed to an audience full of whites who had been brought up in the same way Joe and Nellie had, South Pacific spread the message that love is greater than race (Ganzl 176-7 asdf 66). Like Show Boat, its celebration of interracial marriage broke century old barriers and challenged whites to question the decency of Jim Crow laws.

Following Show Boat and South Pacific, West Side Story explored the idea of love being greater than race through retelling the story of Romeo and Juliet, substituting racial feuds for clan disagreements. The plot tells of an American, Tony, who falls in love with Maria, a Puerto Rican immigrant. Due to background and racial differences, their relationship is disapproved of by their friends and families. In one scene, Anita, Maria’s sister-in-law, overtly speaks against interracial relationships, warning Maria to “Stick to your own kind” (Bernstein and Sondheim 180-90). Maria though, replies in the same song that “aˆ¦my heart knows they’re wrongaˆ¦I don’t care what he is” (Bernstein and Sondheim 180-90). In the end, Tony gets involved in stopping a fight between the Puerto Ricans and the Americans (Green 441-2 asdf 75). He dies in the process, and the gangs lay down their arms in the realization that feuding between races has gone too far (FIND THIS FIND THIS AHHH). This realization reveals West Side Story’s theme: that there should be interracial harmony instead of destructive racial disagreements.

Aside from encouraging assimilation through racially themed musicals, Broadway set an example for America in giving minority artists opportunities and recognition. The Wiz, for example, presented the Wizard of Oz with an all black ensemble in a ghetto setting (Henderson and Bowers 219 asdf 2). Apart from The Wiz, shows like Flower Drum Song also provided minority actors with an opportunity to work at a professional level. Employment of minority actors in the early to mid 1900s is significant because artists in some other art forms like ballet and classical music found difficulty in obtaining the right to perform their art professionally. Arthur Mitchell explained that as a black dancer, he had to outshine his white competitors (Cummings asdf 9). Although some may argue that producers and directors in the theatre business often lost opportunities to whites in the same way black performers in other businesses did, Broadway set a precedent because it hired non- white actors for their ethnicity.

While some may argue that black actors and actresses were employed in the film industry as early as the 1920s, film actors often played comedic characters that were stereotyped as opposed to the more serious characters seen in Show Boat and Porgy and Bess. Others may argue that Jazz music had well known performers like Louis Armstrong. However, Jazz, unlike Broadway, was targeted at a predominantly black audience.

Minority artists like Paul Robeson used their opportunities to vocalize equality through art. Paul Robeson, son of a slave, lived during an age when racial segregation was significant. In addition to his family background, Robeson learned about discrimination himself through firsthand experience, being discriminated against and victimized because he was black. As a result, he had great understanding of the detrimental affects of discrimination. This prompted him to take a stand for equality, as seen through the fact that he would only perform for mixed audiences (Clarke asdf 42). Aside from taking a stand through action, Paul Robeson expressed disapproval for unjust violence against blacks through giving speeches (Clarke asdf 41). His influential status as a well-known black performer drew attention to his belief that all should be equal. However, Robeson remarked that while he enjoyed success, many other blacks did not even have basic rights. (Clarke asd 42). Paul Robeson encouraged whites to accept blacks and allow them to “have decent homes, decent jobs, and the dignity that belongs to every human being!” (Robeson qtd. in Clarke asdf 42).

Along with the employment of minority actors, Broadway started accepting works by black composers. Shuffle Along was written by an African-American composer, Eubie Blake, in the 1920s. This show was believed to have launched the Harlem Renaissance, which enhanced the rights of black artists. The fact that the Truman campaign utilized a song from Shuffle Along made the show better known (Tanner) and also shows the power of musical theatre in encouraging assimilation and acceptance because a black musical spoke out to a white presidential candidate in a time when segregation was prominent. Other shows composed by black artists like Runnin’ Wild, 1923, popularized black dance (Tanner). Audiences seeing shows like Runnin’ Wild accepted black culture through accepting their dance and music because it was so integrated in the entertainment. Later on, A Raisin in the Sun written by a black composer, Lorraine Hansberry, (DO I NEED TO CITE THIS?) actually received Tony award nominations in 1960 despite the fact that segregation still existed during the civil rights movement (FINDD). While film actress Hattie McDaniel had received an Oscar in 1939, she received the nomination for playing a stereotyped black maid. The Academy did not nominate black written screenplays until 1972, 12asdf years after A Raisin in the Sun.

The hiring of minority actors encouraged formation of all-black groups like the Negro Ensemble Company. These groups often put on musicals focused on black life, such as Ceremonies in Dark Old Men and The River Niger. The latter ran on Broadway for eight months (Cummings asdf 35). The increase of actor groups dedicated to black rights demonstrated the fact that minority actors understood the importance of using art to encourage audiences to further understand black culture or accept blacks as equals. Broadway’s toleration of black groups putting on black shows increased openness and willingness to let blacks use the stage as a platform for proclaiming assimilation.

A surge of black artists and musicals attracted black audiences to participate in art. Judith Cummings said of The Wiz that:

For the first time in the memory of most black theatre observers, black peopleaˆ¦find themselves with a choice among Broadway shows that offer them something to identify withaˆ¦nearly a dozen others from this season, use black artistic talent or offer a glimpse of black lifeaˆ¦ (Cummings asdf 71).

The fact that blacks sat in audiences shows an extreme growth from black rights of the earlier 1900s because seeing musicals meant spending money and having time for leisure activities, a luxury blacks did not have in earlier time periods. Also, the fact that blacks, too, enjoyed musicals showed the white audiences that blacks were not, essentially, very different from whites, furthering the aim of assimilation. Blacks too, could have been emboldened through realization that as a race, they had succeeded in their aim to gain some recognition since the early1900s. This confidence could have encouraged them to lobby for even more rights.

In essence, the lives of composers such as Kern, Rodgers, Gershwin and Hammerstein reflected the fact that they accepted or encouraged assimilation and wrote musicals in support of their views. Plot and lyrics from musicals such as Show Boat, South Pacific, West Side Story and Finian’s Rainbow also either encouraged acceptance through reflecting the idea of overcoming racial barriers or discouraged segregation through demonstrating the harmful qualities of racial discrimination. Hiring minority actors gave blacks a platform to voice the injustice of segregation. Actors like Paul Robeson and those in the Negro Ensemble Company were able to publicly express hope for assimilation. Black centered musicals like A Raisin in the Sun encouraged understanding of blacks and attracted black audiences. Today, Broadway has carried on its legacy through musicals like Wicked, which explored unwillingness to accept those with a different skin color (DO I HAVE TO CITE THIS?). Asian thespians like Filipina Lea Salonga have also played roles written for white actors such as Eponine in Les Miserables and Cinderella in Cinderella. A 2002 movie version of Gershwin’s Cinderella featured a cast with an Asian prince, white stepmother, black queen, black stepsisters and a black Cinderella. Casting without regard to original ethnicity of characters shows acceptance and rejection of race-based separation, and the racial integration of today would not exist today without the pioneer work of Broadway in the early to mid 1900s.

Konstantin Stanislavski, (born Konstantin Alekseyev, and sometimes spelt Constantin Stanislavsky), was 14 years old when he first set foot on the stage that his parents owned in 1877. His love of the theatre blossomed throughout his life, leading him to become one of the world’s most influential theatre practitioners to date. His work in the field of theatrical rehearsal techniques made him a household name for drama students worldwide. He published many books and guides designed to give drama students an insight into “realism”, including ‘An Actor Prepares’ and ‘Building a Character’, which outline various famous rehearsal methods designed to allow an actor to fully relate to their character, to the point that they are not just pretending to be them, but actually living their lives. He argued that the actor should “Love the art in yourself, not yourself in the art” [1], looking for the emotion within themselves as opposed to the words in the script.

Stanislavski’s pioneering vision for the theatre was that characters should be believable, and the storyline should focus on the emotion portrayed, engaging the audience through means such as empathy. He argued that anything put forward on the stage should be an accurate account of real life, a thought which derived from his distaste for the melodramatic theatre he had grown up with. However, Stanislavski is one of several famous theatre practitioners, all with a completely different concept of what theatre should be. For example, Bertolt Brecht put forward the theory of ‘Epic Theatre’, which taught that the audience should always be alienated from the action onstage, unable to identify with the characters, but rather being left with questions to ask themselves. He believed the audience couldn’t possibly empathise with the characters onstage because there were so many individual differences in society itself- “society cannot share a common communication system so long as it is split into warring factions” (Brecht, 1949, paragraph 55[2]). Brecht wanted the audience to leave the theatre debating their morals. Another prestigious theatrical practitioner is Antonin Artaud, who argued that any performance should deeply affect the audience. In order to achieve this, he used non-naturalistic lighting and sound to create a disturbing atmosphere. Artaud wished his audience to leave the theatre having changed within themselves. With three such different aims from each practitioner, it is difficult to be sure whether any of them had a particularly valid point. All three theories are widely respected, but each contrasts and challenges the next, meaning that, in order to believe in one of them, you must rule out the others as valid.

These conflicting theories became the beginning of the main ideas behind this project. I wanted to know whether there was a solid way to prove whether Stanislavski’s theories are affective to the audience in terms of creating a more realistic performance than one with normal rehearsal, or indeed rehearsal methods devised by other practitioners. To be able to determine this, I needed to conduct deeper research into Stanislavski’s system.

The system itself is deep and intricately detailed, with many different aspects as to what Stanislavski considered a ‘good performance’. However, some points are evidently more significant to him than others. According to the online Encyclopaedia Britannia [3], the main features are ‘Given Circumstances and the Magic If’, and ‘Emotional Memory’. ‘Units and Objectives’ is also a major feature of the system, so these are the three aspects I chose to refine my research to in order to establish a better understanding of Stanislavski’s method of acting.

‘Given Circumstances and the Magic If’

Stanislavski said that “what is important to me is not the truth outside myself, but the truth within myself” [4], meaning that anything put forward on the stage must be true. He recognised this idea was a potential issue because all acting is, essentially, a lie. He therefore said that all actors should be as true to themselves as they can while playing a part. The idea behind Given Circumstances is that actors accept that, with the script of a play, they are given a set of circumstances which they must adhere to in order to create the storyline. Given circumstances can relate to either the character or the play itself, and they include things like character’s age, gender, social class, and the play’s time period, setting and social/historical/political implications. In order for an actor to give a true performance, Stanislavski put a massive emphasis on the importance of research into the given time period or situation so that the performer would truly understand their role. He taught that the research needs to be completed until an actor can fully flesh out his character, and answer any questions given to them about their character’s parentage, childhood, and life events, even if these aren’t mentioned in the script. Once the Given Circumstances had been realised, Stanislavski suggested that the actors utilised a linked aspect of his theory, called the ‘Magic If’, in order to deal with them. The ‘Magic If’ is a technique where the actor asks himself “given the circumstances already decided by the playwright, if I was this character, and I was in this situation, how would I react?”. In his book ‘An Actor Prepares’, Stanislavski talked about the professor using the example of pretending to be a tree. “Say to yourself: “I am I; but if I were an old oak tree, set in certain surrounding conditions, what would I do?” and decide where you are… in whatever place affects you most” (Stanislavski, 1937, p65[5]). Stanislavski asked that his students allow their imaginations to flourish through techniques such as Given Circumstances and the Magic If, to construct deeper, more realistic performances.

‘Emotional Memory’

Another technique which was born from Stanislavski’s belief that acting must be real is Emotional Memory, sometimes known as Affective Memory. Shelley Winters, an example of a famous actress with ultimate belief in the Stanislavski System, said that as an actor you must be willing to “act with your scars” [6], or in layman’s terms, be willing to allow your inner emotions and past experiences to show through. This is essentially the main terms of Emotional Memory, which requires the actor to draw on previous personal experiences which resulted in a similar emotion to which their character is experiencing. Once the actor has identified the experience, they are encouraged to allow the emotion they felt once again take over their mind and body, reinstating the context and mind-set until the emotion is real. The emotion must then seamlessly be applied to the script or character, as Stanislavski felt this would make the performance more believable because the emotion is true to the actor. Peter Oyston, founding Dean of Drama at the Victorian College of the Arts and regular teacher/director at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London, created a rehearsal method specifically designed to enhance the feelings from memories. He published this, and other methods referring to Stanislavskian techniques, in a DVD documentary called “How to use the Stanislavski System” (2004). The Emotional Memory section can be viewed on YouTube [7], and teaches the student to remember a time when they personally felt an emotion which shadows or parallels that required from the text. They are encouraged to talk about the situation they are remembering out loud, until the emotion takes over their minds and bodies. Then, they must seamlessly transfer their speech from their own recollections to the script given to them, transferring the emotions at the same time.

‘Units and Objectives’

One of the most prominent aspects of Stanislavski’s method is his idea that any character in any play has a ‘Super-Objective’ throughout the action; an aim or driving force which sustains throughout the play. Stanislavski taught that this Super-Objective must stay in each actor’s mind throughout their rehearsal and performance, and that even though it may not be stated, or even obvious, they must take it upon themselves to research and discover it. Once this has been accomplished, he felt that the script could then be broken down into smaller Objectives, which would change several times throughout the piece as the plot deepened. Each Objective must be a verb, in order to be an ‘active objective’. He asked actors to split their script into Units and Objectives. Most pieces of drama are split by the playwright into a series of scenes and acts, allowing the action to move in time or setting, but Stanislavski found that an objective could run through and overlap into different scenes, or change very suddenly in the middle of an act. He therefore introduced the concept of Units, which are another way of dividing up a play- each unit should contain one objective.

The diagram above outlines the intricate detail of the aspects of Units, Objectives, and Super-Objectives. The Throughline of Action is the aim in a character’s mind throughout the entirety of the play, which culminates in the Super-Objective. Meanwhile, each character has several different Objectives which are split between the Units the actors devised for the script. These Objectives can take the character to many different places, but their Super-Objective will always remain the same.

Furthermore, the Objectives themselves are equally as detailed. Stanislavski said that each Objective could be broken down into the Aim, the Obstacle and the Action. The aim is what the character is trying to achieve in that particular unit. The obstacle is something which stops or restricts them from fulfilling their aim, and the action is the steps the character takes in order to avoid or overcome the obstacle.

Stanislavski accepted that it is impossible for a play to achieve a smooth finish where objectives are concerned because often, the action takes place off stage. The characters come and go, and the time changes, so we as an audience cannot witness the whole story. Stanislavski said that in order to overcome this, actors must always be consciously aware of their Super-Objective.

A familiar example of this aspect of the Stanislavskian Theory is Shakespeare’s story of Romeo and Juliet. Romeo’s Super-Objective is to experience true love. He begins the play with the objective of marrying Rosaline, and this continues to be his objective until the Unit shifts at the Capulet party. Here, Romeo’s objective becomes to find out more about Juliet, and later becomes to marry her. Towards the end of the party, however, Romeo speaks with Juliet’s nurse, who tells him that “her mother is the Lady of the house” -that Juliet is a Capulet(Shakespeare, 1973, p. 910 [8]). This provides the obstacle, since Romeo’s family, the Montagues, have an ancient feud with the Capulets. Romeo then takes on a new action, which is to overcome the feud between the families, even if it means the couple have to lie about it. Romeo doesn’t manage to fully achieve his Super-Objective, because he never experiences the simplicity of love he was looking for- both he and Juliet have to die in order to truly be together.

Of all the aspects of Stanislavski’s method, these three prove to be the most popular among modern day performers.

Having researched the key aspects of Stanislavski’s system, I devised a way to be able to assess the effectiveness of them on a live performance by young actors, as this would allow me to establish whether the method does in fact help to produce a more believable performance. I decided to conduct an experiment into the effectiveness of Stanislavski’s system. I decided to utilise my contacts at a local youth drama group, which is made up of young actors and actresses aged between 11 and 17 years old. In order for the experiment to be a fair test, I determined to split them equally into two groups, and give each group the same scenario to work with. I planned to leave group one, the control group, to rehearse to their own methods, while conducting group two’s rehearsal processes myself, giving them tasks similar to those set by Stanislavski to his own pupils. After the groups had had the same period of time to rehearse, I wanted to invite an audience to watch their performances. The audience were to be given a questionnaire after the performances, asking which group’s interpretation of the scenario they found more convincing and realistic. I intended to film both sets of rehearsal processes in order to put together a short documentary. The results of the audience questionnaire were intended to ascertain whether Stanislavski’s rehearsal methods have a real influence on making modern day performance more realistic.

In order for this experiment to work, I firstly had to create an idea. Originally, I devised a script which revolved around the issue of teenage pregnancy, which is a growing concern in today’s society. The script included four gender specific characters, and I intended to have both groups perform the same piece; one using Stanislavski’s techniques, and the others using generic rehearsal processes. Having written the short play, and talked briefly to the children at the theatre, it became apparent that there was more interest in the workshop than I had expected. Another problem with using a script would have been that the audience would have watched the same piece twice, and would be comparing the actor’s individual performances as opposed to the believability of the pieces. Since it would have been unfair of me to cast the roles, I instead decided to take a different approach in order to include everyone. I devised a scenario, again based around a teenage pregnancy, that each group would be able to use as the core of their piece of drama. They would then devise the rest of their plays alone. This meant that each group could incorporate a flexible amount of participants, and ensured two unique, original performances.

With my idea in mind, I next needed to devise some Stanislavski-based rehearsal techniques for my group to use during their preparation for the production. Keeping the themes of ‘Given Circumstances and the Magic If’, ‘Emotional Memory’, and ‘Units and Objectives’ in mind, I devised three rehearsal techniques specifically tailored to Stanislavski’s ideals. With these techniques devised, I had to actually carry out the rehearsal and performances. In order to do this, I would need a space, two groups of actors, a party of responsible adults with CRB checks and an audience. I contacted the chairman of the theatre and booked myself a studio performance room for Saturday the 3rd of April. I then sent out letters to the actors involved with the Nonentities Youth Theatre. The letters outlined the project and the experimental side of the day, offered the chance to look at the technical side of theatre, and asked for a response. I received 18 positive responses back, which was many more than the original 12 participants I had in mind, making the scenario idea far more usable. I then had to split the actors into two different groups, a control group, who would direct themselves, and the experimental group, who I would direct using Stanislavski’s methods. The groups needed to be equally weighted with talent, as it was important to make this experiment as fair as possible by not allowing acting ability to throw it. I therefore split the actors into groups myself, aiming to balance the ages in each group while placing responsible actors I could trust to work independently in the control group, and actors open to co-operation and willing to listen in the Stanislavski group. The Independent Variable of this study was ‘whether Stanislavski’s methods were applied to rehearsals’, and the Dependant Variable was ‘whether the performance was more believable based on the rehearsal method used’. My hypothesis was: “The techniques used in rehearsal will have an affect on the performance given”.

I experienced my first problem of the day when the actors arrived in the morning. Shortly before the workshop was to take place, a letter had been sent to all members of the youth theatre outlining the need for a new leader and the cancellation of sessions until another letter was sent out. It became apparent that many of the actors who had wished to be a part of the workshop had assumed that it, too, was cancelled, so the final number of actors I had to work with was just 10. Although I had to adjust the group list, the smaller number of participants made the day as a whole more intimate, and the group sizes more manageable, so I feel it was a beneficial circumstance. Once everybody had signed in, I conducted a brief warm-up, asking all members to think of the way different characters moved and spoke in real life, asking them to act believably, not just as caricatures. I then split up the actors into groups, and chose the two girls who I felt would be most capable of acting the part of the pregnant teenager. I asked both groups to create a piece of drama focussing around the pregnancy that would last between 10 and 15 minutes, and I gave each group a list of criteria that they must adhere to, including aspects such as using the younger members in the younger roles, including a number of monologues from different characters, and that they must write down the decisions made in early rehearsal. I told the control group that they were allowed to use music, and dramatic techniques such as physical theatre and freeze frames, while the Stanislavski group had to endeavour to make their characters and circumstances applicable to real life, and were told not to use out-of-place techniques like freeze framing. The video was set to record as the groups split up into two different rooms, and I allowed the control group to keep to themselves for the majority of the day, while I worked with the Stanislavski group, asking them to use my previously-prepared rehearsal techniques.

The first technique I gave them was designed to support ‘Given Circumstances and the Magic If’. I asked each group to use the first stages of rehearsal to create mind-maps around the pieces of drama. Whilst the control group’s map outlined the storyline, the Stanislavski group were asked to spend an hour and a half fleshing out their characters, and the relationships and links between them. They gave each character a name and an age, they wrote about their belief’s and opinions, and decided upon how their characters met. Each actor developed a detailed history for their character, pulling from personal experience and their imaginations to create steady backgrounds. These are aspects relating to ‘Given Circumstances and the Magic If’ because they invite the participants to firstly realise the Circumstances the script gives them, and secondly to flesh out their characterisation by putting their characters in different situations through use of the Magic If.

The second technique I devised related to ‘Emotion Memory’. I used this technique when working with the actress playing the pregnant girl. We applied it to the scene in which she is told that the test is positive. I asked her to think about a time when she felt lost, and perhaps didn’t have anybody she could talk to about it because nobody had been in that position before her. She talked of a time when her parents were going through a messy divorce, and she felt cut of from the both of them. She spoke openly and freely, and answered my questions honestly. As time went by, she was drawn further and further into her memory and the emotions that were present at that time, so that when I finally asked her to begin talking from her character’s perspective, her acting became real. She didn’t need to fake the tears, because she was filled with the emotion her character was filled with.

The third technique was designed to compliment ‘Units and Objectives’. Once the actors had created their storyline, I asked them to divide it up into scenes, so that it was as close to a normal scripted piece of drama as possible. We talked about each of their characters, and what their Super-Objectives would be. The actors decided upon everyone’s objectives as a group, which brought a deeper level of understanding to the piece. They decided that the father’s Super-Objective would be to protect his children, while Rosie, the pregnant daughter, aimed to face her future head on. I then asked each actor to divide up the play into their own Units, focussing on the shifts in emotion. This process proved difficult for the younger members of the group, so the group as a whole helped them to identify their Units. There proved a great variety in the amount of Units in the piece for each character; while the pregnant girl had almost one per scene, the father had only two. Furthermore, the switch between Units for him came suddenly in the middle of his monologue, which was right at the end of the piece- before then his character had wanted the same thing throughout. I asked the group to physically improvise the scenes they had written about, and to stop the action when they encountered their obstacles. Once they had all found their obstacles, they were asked to continue acting while finding a way to overcome this obstacle- their action. I then asked them if they had noticed the other actor’s actions in the scene, so that everybody was aware of the decisions their group was making.This in-depth workshop class on ‘Units and Super-Objectives’ made the young actors aware and knowledgeable in the field, while also allowing them to know their characters inside out by knowing what they want, and how they might go about achieving it.

A couple of hours before the performances were scheduled to begin, I took notes on the rehearsal processes of both groups. The control group had included an omniscient narrator who could stop the action and introduce new characters. The narrator sat in the middle of the piece throughout the majority of the action, until the final scene where he became an involved character. A narrator is generally used to create a sense of dramatic irony, where the audience gain knowledge that the characters don’t yet know. However, this type of narration is rarely set within the piece itself, more often a voice over or such like. It is also unrealistic that the narrator, who is generally removed from and neutral to the action, suddenly become ‘real life’ and jump into the scene. The group also used a split-screen technique to enable them to show two different apartments at the same time, which is effective to the audience but unrealistic, as while action is playing out in one space, the characters in the other must be frozen. This creation of ‘freeze-framing’ is difficult to hold for long periods of time, and does not occur in a genuine situation. Another technique they used was audience-participation, where one member of their cast sat in the audience until the final moments of the play, where she rose, walked across the stage, took out her mobile and called the police. I concluded that the control group had included various aspects of performance which were designed to make the action more interesting to the audience, and add the element of surprise, but were not designed to look or feel realistic. They had spent only half an hour mind-mapping their decisions, and talked about their other decisions while physically rehearsing.

The Stanislavski group spent an hour and a half developing their characters, and another hour developing their storyline, so they ended up with four A3 sheets of paper detailing their entire performance. They used only one location, the teenager’s bedroom, so that there was never a set change needed, because it would interrupt the storyline and distract the audience. The group’s monologues were delivered to a person, as opposed to the audience, so that the barrier between the audience and the characters stayed strong. Had the actors been talking to the audience, their speeches would have seemed less realistic.

After five hours of rehearsal, it was time for the final performances. Each actor had been asked to invite some family members or friends, and members of the theatre came along to participate too. Each audience also included the actors from the other group, making the final audience figure 19 members. I watched the performances, but didn’t participate in the questionnaire, as I would have been biased toward the Stanislavski group. I introduced the pieces, and talked about the work the actors had undertaken over the day. The audience weren’t told which group was the control group, and which group was the Stanislavski group, until both performances had finished, meaning that they couldn’t be biased in favour of Stanislavski either. I also asked them to be open minded, and not answer the questionnaire in favour of the production their child was associated with, telling them they were judging my direction, not the individual actor’s talent. The audience watched the control group first, and were given time to fill out their questionnaires while we set up the stage for the Stanislavski group. After both performances had finished, I thanked everybody for taking part and collected in the questionnaires.

Having extrapolated my results, it became apparent that there was a general feeling that the Stanislavski production was more believable. When asked “was the main storyline believable”, 66% of the audience thought that the control group’s piece was “a dramatised and exaggerated version of real life”, while 95% thought that the Stanislavski group’s piece “could credibly happen in real life”. Having worked extensively with the pregnant character from the Stanislavski group, I was pleased that 42% of the audience thought that she portrayed the pregnancy flawlessly, while a further 42% felt that she portrayed it very well, while in the control group, these percentages combined only reached 44%. I asked the audience to rate how believable they felt the overall performances were, and 56% rated the control group’s performance at an 8/10 or higher, while 94% rated the Stanislavski performance at an 8/10 or higher. Overall, it is evident that the Stanislavski group’s performance was more widely believed.

It is important to note that the effectiveness of the performances given may not be entirely down to the methods of rehearsal used. Although I tried to make the experiment as fair as possible by attempting to make the rehearsal methods the only variable, other extraneous variables may have had an affect on the final results. For example, since there were fewer participants than planned, I had to shuffle the groups a little. This meant that the control group had two of the younger members in their piece, while the Stanislavski group had four older members. The younger members of the theatre are less experienced and therefore don’t have as many creative ideas to bring to the mix. It is also apparent that almost half of the audience were family members of the younger actors, meaning that they are liable to vote in favour of their child’s piece as they are proud to see them on stage. Although I asked the audience to keep an open mind, they may have been bias towards their family or friends, and this is a factor which could have affected the final results.

At the beginning of my project, I asked myself “What is Stanislavski’s Method of acting, and how far has it influenced modern day performance?” Having undertaken a considerable amout of research on Stanislavski and his methods, it became easier for me to define them, and to easily distinguish the difference between his teachings, and those of other practitioners. I found that Stanislavski’s method of acting is largely based around the actor’s own interpretation of the character, aiming to keep the emotion real. I found that Stanislavski wanted the audience to connect with both the storyline and the characters, and he achieved this connection by keeping th acting real, thus allowing the audience to connect empathetically. Having created an experiment to see whether Stanislavski did indeed influence modern day performance, I found that the audience were effected by the group that used the Stanislavskian rehearsal techniques, so much so that one person wrote on the bottom of their questionnaire that their performance “actually brought tears to my eyes”. While researching, I came across a website [9] where Jeni Whittaker (1999) argues that “Stanislavski is rightly called the ‘father of modern theatre’, his System of acting became the backbone of twentieth century theatre craft. Nearly all other practitioners use him as a starting point, either to build from or to react against”. This substantiates my initial hypothesis that Stanislavski has a major influence on modern day theatre. In conclusion, I feel that Stanislavski has an extended influence on modern day theatre. Audiences of today wish not to be challenged or alienated, but to see characters they can relate to on the stage, and the majority of theatre today follows this teaching, whether the director realises he is adhering to Stanislavski’s theory or otherwise. Furthermore, when watching two similar pieces of drama, it became apparent that the audience are more drawn towards that which used Stanislavski’s rehearsal techniques because the characters and storyline were portrayed in a true to life manner. I found that Stanislavski is not only used in theatre, as many famous screen actors choose his methods when getting into character. I feel that the world is exposed to Stanislavski’s teachings more than it realises, and therefore the influence of Stanislavski on modern day acting is significantly higher than I believed when I began the project.

References:
Source unknown, Stanislavski.
Brecht (1949). ‘A Short Organum for the Theatre’, paragraph 55.
Encyclop?dia Britannica (2010). ‘Stanislavsky method’. Encyclop?dia Britannica Online; Retrieved February 22, 2010, from: http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/563178/Stanislavsky-method
Source unknown, Stanislavski.
Stanislavski (1937). ‘An Actor Prepares’, (reprinted 1988) United Kingdom: Methuen Drama LTD.
Harry Governick for TheatrGROUP. (1992). An Interview with Shelly Winters; Retrieved February 22, 2010, from http://www.theatrgroup.com/Shelley
Peter Oyston, ‘How to use the Stanislavski System’ DVD(2004). Retrieved (via YouTube) April 12, 2010, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmhggaEuJj8
Shakespeare (1973). ‘Romeo and Juliet’, from ‘The Complete Works of Shakespeare- The Alexander Text’. London and Glasgow: Collins.
Jeni Whittaker for DramaWorks. ‘Stanislavski through Practice’ (1999) Retrieved April 13, 2010, from http://www.dramaworks.co.uk/stanislavski.html

Site Specific Performance: How has the nature of site-specific performance as a hybrid art-form influenced approaches tosite-specific work in Britain over the last decade?

SECTION 1: INTRODUCTION

Site-specific performance emerged out of the radicalartistic milieu of the late 1960’s and early 1970’s that also gave birth tosite-specific work generally. It represents perhaps the most ambitious andrevolutionary re-interpretation of theatre and performance devised in thetwenty-first century. Site-specific performance has influenced site-specificwork in Britain in the past ten years in many ways. This dissertation examinesthree especially strong influences: (1) site-specific performance and its useof audience (2) site-specific performance and its internal debate as to whethersite-specific art is site-exclusive or site generic, and (3) site-specific practitioners’theory of the selection of sites. Before these three principal investigations arediscussed the dissertation briefly reviews the history and origins ofsite-specific performance and its key practitioners.

The first major section of this dissertation investigatesand analyses the relationship between site-specific performance and itsaudience. The questions and debates that have arisen from the novel andintimate participation between site-specific performers and their audienceshave had considerable influence upon site-specific work as a whole. Site-specificperformance understands the audience as a vital element of the total productionand not merely as paying members of the public who are isolated from thecreative process. Many performances depend intimately upon the energy andmutual fascination of the subject that exists between performers and audience.Often the audience are part of the performance itself. This intimacy points toa basic philosophical and professional principle of site-specific performancethat reacts against the perceived coldness, frigidity and eliteness oftraditional theatre buildings and instead maintains that theatre andperformance ought to be a socially-levelling enterprise. The dissertation thereforeasks the prominent questions: Can audience self-identity be altered by aperformance? And: Can original and multiple spectator identities be created bysite-specific performances? The answers to these questions have beeninfluential throughout the whole of the site-specific world.

The second-subsection of this section explores therelationship between site-specific performance and the community from which itsaudience is drawn. The success of site-specific performance theorists andpractitioners in showing the great extent to which the community in which aperformance is situated affects the ambiance and attitude of the audienceechoes throughout the site-specific world and informs it of vital lessons. Thisinvestigation of community and audience also highlights how site-specific performancecan work to bring theatre to the masses in an inclusive format that protestsagainst the elitist forms of the past. The final sub-section of this sectionreviews some of the problems – variability and limitations of audience forinstance experienced by site-specific performers with respect to audienceand then suggests how these may teach valuable lessons to the rest of thesite-specific world.

The second major section of the dissertation examines thekey debate in the literature of site-specific performance as to whether suchperformances should be site-specific or site-generic. That is, whether suchperformances should be free to tour and travel or not? The answers anddiscoveries furnished for this question by site-specific performers arerelevant and influential upon this same debate which penetrates the whole ofthe site-specific community. This debate reaches to the philosophical centre ofsite-specific performance and threatens to bring about a fundamental changewithin the genre. At the heart of the issue is the question of whether aparticular performance, conditioned as it is by the particular environment inwhich it is created, can be moved either physically or spiritually to anothersite. Vehement arguments have been made on both sides of the debate, with manypro-tour performers refuting Richard Serra’s famous dictum that ‘to removethe work is to destroy it‘.The dissertation considers as one solution the theoretical postulate of a’pure’ model of site-specific performance from which various performancesdeviate in healthily diverse ways. The dissertation then considers in depth theproposal of Wrights & Sites whether that the solution to this dilemma mightdepend upon a change in terminology and vocabulary of site-specificperformance. Such a shift of terminology provides site-specific performancewith a greater subtlety of definition and self-identity and therefore overcomesthe apparent impasse suggested by the site-specific site-generic dispute.

The final major sub-section of the dissertation considersthe ‘use of space’ by recent site-specific performers and the influences ofthis use upon site-specific work as a whole. The ‘space’ within which atheatrical performance may take place was given its most radical revision andprogressive drive in the twentieth- century by the practitioners ofsite-specific performance. ‘Space’, in terms of performance, had before theadvent of site-specific theatre been confined near exclusively to traditionaltheatre buildings and to their conventional shapes. The outstanding achievementof site-specific performance has been to vastly extend the range and types of spaceand venue in which a theatrical performance can take place. The dissertationconsiders the implications for performance of such a radical break with thepast, as well as looking at the notions of ‘uninhabitable space’ and ‘culturalspace’. The discoveries made about ‘space’ by site-specific performers arerelevant for the whole of site-specific work in Britain.

The dissertation concludes with an evaluation and summing-upof all the previous discussion and with an analysis of the future influence ofsite-specific performance upon site-specific work as a whole.

SECTION 2: SITE-SPECIFICPERFORMANCE HISTORY

It is important to know something of the history ofsite-specific performance when seeking to determine its influence uponsite-specific work in the past decade in Britain. Such a glance at the historyilluminates the evolution of ideas within the genre and shows how they came totake their present form in the twenty-first century.

Site-specific performance originated as an outgrowth ofsite-specific artwork movement that began in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s.Site-specific artwork was a form of art that was created to exist in a certainspace and was conditioned in form by the environment and space of that place.At the centre of the site-specific artwork movement was an attempt to take artout of what was perceived to be the affected and pretentious atmospheres of thegalleries and theatre buildings and to transpose them upon a wider variety ofoutdoor and indoor venues. One useful definition of site-specific performanceis that of the Dictionary of Video Art which states ‘Locations andenvironments may have some kind of drama or meaning for ordinary people butthis has no significance for the bourgeoisie until interpreted by theheightened sensibilities of the director‘.In other words, the purpose of site-specific performance and its reason forexistence is to make the public aware of the artistic merits of ordinarybuildings and spaces that have always been of interest to ordinary men butpassed over by the elitist and institutionalised artists of the past. Site-specificperformance often ‘ involves a (more or less) political decision to workagainst the dominant discourse of London, its theatre buildings, and itstheatre tradition‘.Site-specific performance is about a fundamental reorientation of space awayfrom its traditional understanding in British theatre.

Site-specific performance has emerged out of this generalartistic milieu in the works of artists and directors such as Peter Brook,Ariane Mnouchkine, Deborah Warner, Gof Brith, Janet Cardiff and in festivals orproduction companies such as Grid Iron, Wrights & Sites and the EdinburghFestival. Other recent practitioners include Mac Wellman, Meredith Monk andAnne Hamburger. From the first list two names in particular have been pivotalto the development of site-specific theatre: Peter Brook and Deborah Warner. PeterBrook was one of Britain’s greatest theatre directors and much of thisgreatness came from his radical style and use of stage – both of which are seenas pre-cursors of modern site-specific performance. Brook was deeply influencedby the Theatre of Cruelty by Antonin Artaud and this lead to dramaticproductions such as Jean Genet’s The Screens in 1964 and Peter Weiss’s Marat/Sadein 1964 – a huge success after its sharp and revolutionary break withtheatre style to that time. Brook brought a new philosophy to the theatre thatimbued it with a new sense of potential and manipulation of space andenvironment – shown well in his productions of Seneca’s Oedipus and TheEmpty Space. More recently, Deborah Warner has made further developed theseearly origins of site-specific performance with radically different productionssuch as Titus Andronicus (1987), Richard II (1995) and JuliusCaesar (2005).

SECTION 3: SITE-SPECIFIC PERFORMANCE: AUDIENCE

(A) Audience: General

Perhaps the singlegreatest contribution of site-specific performance as a hybrid art-form tosite-specific work as a whole has been the radical transformation andre-constitution of the concept of audience and of how audiences experience liveperformance. When site-specific art first emerged in the late 1960’s it appealedto audiences primarily because of the novelty of the form and the novelty ofthe viewing experience. Nonetheless, site-specific art, whilst novel in itself,did not go make any profoundly novel contributions to the nature, identity andconstitution of its audiences. Site-specific work had no yet developed asite-specific critique or paradigm, and this was left in large measure to thepioneers of site-specific performance. The great advantage and breakthroughachieved by modern site-specific performance is that it draws the audience ofinto an intimate participation with that performance; the audience become anessential part of the performance itself. Notable historical examples haveincluded Siren’s Crossing’s Trace and Flight (2000), Wrights & SitesThe Quay Thing (1998), Anne Marie Culhane’s Night Sky (1997) and TheWhalley Range All Stars’ Day of the Dummy (1999).

Consequently, withsite-specific performance, both performers and spectators reach a profounderdepth of empathy and understanding with the performance that they havewitnessed, than with traditional theatre and even from site-specific work as awhole. In this sense, site-specific performance represents an evolution of thegeneral site-specific art-form towards a level of greater spectator-involvementand identity.The philosophy and theory that underpins this evolution has much to do with areaction against the perceived coldness and unnaturalness of the traditionaltheatre (where the audience are always separated from the performers) and itstendency to promote the values and aims of elite members of society above theaspirations of the ordinary citizen. Site-specific performance however can besaid to be an ‘equalizing art-form’: it holds as a basic philosophicalprinciple the belief that the members of the audience are of equal importanceand significance for the meaning and successful execution of a particularperformance as the performers themselves. As such, site-specific theatre andperformance have taught and continue to teach practitioners of site-specificwork generally – be it site-specific conceptual art, community art,installation art, public art etc., that the greater the participation andsense of involvement of the audience, the greater will be the efficacy of thatperformance upon both performer and viewer. Site-specific work therefore hasmuch to learn from the techniques, literary interpretations, scene-designs andso on of site-specific performers.

This use of audienceby site-specific performers has achieved for the first time, according to FionaWilkie, ‘the sense of a collective audience identity, a knowing audiencethat constructs itself appropriately as an interpretative body via a cumulativeframework of contemporary framework experiences‘.Thus, site-specific performance asks of the audience members themselves certainbasic existential and artistic questions. For instance: how is an audience’ssense of self forged? How and in what ways is an audience’s purpose decided?The extent to which site-specific performance achieves this intensive audienceself-interrogation is perhaps unrivalled in all twentieth-century performance art-formsand promises to be one of the few genuinely unique artistic discoveries ofrecent years.

Traditional theatremaintains a clear space between audience and performer no matter how elatedor ecstatic a spectator may feel during a traditional performance he is alwaysnonetheless still a mere spectator with no direct influence upon the directionor outcome of the performance. Site-specific performance radically reverses theaudience situation and role and instead makes them central actors in theperformance itself. Site-specific performance also raises the questions of: Canaudience self-identity be altered by a performance? And: Can original andmultiple spectator identities be created by site-specific performances?On the first question it is noted by authors such as Williams and Kwon that theunique process of audience participation in site-specific performance oftenleaves the audience with changed perceptions of identity once the performanceis completed. On the second question, it is also clear from the growingliterature that now surrounds site-specific performance that the form has thepotential to create new audience identities as well as to leave differentgroups of the audience with different identity perceptions at the end.From these various observations of audience participation in site-specificperformance it is evident that site-specific work has benefited and learnt anenormous amount about the role of audience and its possible stages oftransformation. Moreover, the far more diverse nature of members ofsite-specific performances alters the mood and atmosphere and perceptions ofthat audience. Rather than being an elite experience attended by only one classof people with, broadly speaking, a single artistic attitude and expectation,the audience is instead a diverse melting-pot of different classes andprofessions of people.

(B) Audience & Community

Site-specificperformance has also raised for general site-specific art the notion of theimportance of the community in which a particular performance or art exhibittakes place. One particular site-specific performance company, The Olimpias,base their work upon questions of site ownership and in line with the theme ofdisability. According to Petra Kuppers, company director, site-specificperformance ought to be ‘attentive to the local community and its ways of inhabitingits environment the company (The Olimpias) work with the community to takenew forms of site, re-interpret the site, keep its history and presence alive‘.’Community’ then is a crucial extension of the audience and the site factorsinvolved in a site-specific performance. It is the community about a specificwork that is most intimately affected by a performance since that performancethrows new light on and reinterprets that community’s existence in a particularway. Site-specific performance can help to re-invigorate and breathe life intoa community by making it more aware and perceptive of the sites that itoccupies. So too the site-specific performances of Wrights & Sitesis ‘interested in the place and in the people who meet us in this place’. Thecompany Welfare State International have also expressed a ‘commitment todrawing in local energies and leaving behind a residue of skills and confidenceafter the company’s withdrawal’ .For many companies then site-specific theatre is a performance that takes placein the living space of a particular community and is enacted alongside andwithin the working life of the community. Thus there is an experientialauthenticity that is unique to site-specific theatre.

(C) Issues WithAudience

Nonetheless, somewriters such as Jan Cohen-Cruzhave argued that taking theatre from established buildings in specific placesto a specific-site does not necessarily create a more intimate audienceenvironment or sense of identity or multiple identities. On this Cohen-Cruzstates: ‘Space is always controlled by someone and exists somewhere, so itis inevitably marked by a particular class or race and not equally accessibleto everyone. one must question whether access to a broader audience really isa difference between performance site-specific and in theatre buildings.‘Cohen-Cruz’s quotation is useful because it sounds a note of caution tosite-specific performers who automatically assume that by merely creatingsite-specific performance of any sort they will immediately achieve a deeper ormore profound sense of audience participation and diversity than would be foundin a traditional theatre. Site-specific performance is a relatively newart-form that is treading into new territory – especially with respect to theunderstanding of audience participation and identity. It is therefore to beexpected that a certain exuberance and robust enthusiasm amongst its performersmay sometimes lead to idealizations of the potential of the art-form; that is,a tendency to assume that site-specific performance is a panacea for all limitationsexperienced by traditional-theatre audiences in past centuries.

It is prudenttherefore to agree with writers such as Fiona Wilkie that the potentialaudience range and diversity of a site-specific performance is decided not byonly by the nature of the genre itself but by the particular features of thesite itself. Access to such site-specific performances depends nearly entirelyupon the location and type of site chosen for a particular performance.If, for instance, the site chosen for a particular performance is an abandonedwarehouse or factory floor close to several housing estates or residentialareas then it is likely that that performance will be accessible to many peoplewho would be traditionally excluded from a theatre experience. If, however, asite-specific performance is held in a country-estate or at the top of acommercial tower-block then it is far less likely that the audience thatattends will be as diverse and kaleidoscopic as at the performance of in theabandoned factory or warehouse. For instance, the site-specific performancecompany Kneehigh Theatrehave reflected how their performance of Hell’s Mouth in the ClayDistrict of Cornwall – a poor and dilapidated area – encouraged a far broadersection of the community to attend than would have done the traditionaltheatre. In Kneehigh’s words: ‘In Hell’s Mouth last summer, bikers from thearea performed the English/Cornish skirmishes in the Mad Max style Cornwall ofthe future. This theme … and reasonable ticket prices, encouraged a stronglocal percentage of audience, who would not normally see the company’s work ortheatre of any sort‘.So too the breadth of the audience of any site-specific work will be determinedalso by the theme and nature of the performance. A site-specific performancethat deals with an esoteric or abstruse subject will not guarantee for itself abroad audience simply by virtue of the fact that it is a site-specific performance.

Several site-specificperformance companies have sought to maintain the diversity of their audiencesin the following ways. The Lion’s Part company, for instance, seek to ‘escapethe bureaucracy of the theatre building‘by providing free access to all performances and free financially also. InFiona Wilkie’s eloquent phrase:

‘The notion of the performance moves away from thehigh-brow associations of the theatre and closer to reaching a publicwell-versed in the popular culture of gigs, festivals and celebrations. Itemphasizes the significance of the spatial encounter and is conceived as awhole experience for the spectator‘

Wilkie here identifiesa key strength of site-specific performance: its ability and capacity tosynthesize myriad different forms of contemporary art, culture and society andto fuse them into a relevant and meaningful whole. Moreover, site-specificperformance has the unique advantage of being able to manipulate space inwhatever way it likes. A traditional theatre is severely limited in the sensethat its performance can only take place within the predetermined and setdimensions of the theatre building; these dimensions remain the same for everynew production no matter how different such productions might be from eachother. The space and dimensions of a site-specific performance are howeverdetermined and limited only by the space and dimensions of the site itself andthey therefore have a far greater range and flexibility than traditionaltheatre. For instance: a windmill, an abandoned factory, a coffee shop, adoctor’s surgery, a former nuclear silo all offer different and uniqueexperiences of space for the audience. So too, a site-specific performance mayeven have two separate audiences: one that pays admission and is conscious ofthe performance and another that attends the event for free and is an integralpart of the performance itself. To take an example: when Grid Iron held thesite-specific performance Decky Does a Broncoin numerous children’s playgrounds some audience members bought tickets whilstthe children (attending free) that played in the playground were urged tocontinue their activities and so became part of the setting and the performanceitself. Ben Harrison, director of Decky Does a Bronco, recalls howchildren came to and fro different parts of the performance depending upon thelevel of excitement raised for them by a particular moment or scene from thatperformance; when bored the children would retire to the quieter parts of thepark. In Harrison’s useful phrase, this double audience ‘adds to thecomplexity of the event‘.

SECTION 4: SITE-SPECIFICPERFORMANCE: ‘SITE-SPECIFIC ORSITE-GENERIC?’

Site-specificperformance has contributed significantly to the site-specific as a whole onthe pressing question of whether site specific art should be site-specific or sitegeneric. That is, whether site-specific work should remain rooted in at theexact site of its creation or whether the idea created in a particular site maybe transferred to other similar sites. This question is perhaps the mostvociferously argued debate in site-specific work at present. At stake is thephilosophical and intellectual basis of the movement itself. Site-specific workemerged in the late 1960’s as an art-form that made a unique use of site andsite features to influence the shape and form of the design: these sites wereusually highly different or unique from all others and so each sculpture,art-work or performance had its own unique characteristics. Traditionalsite-specific artists of this old-school therefore refute the idea that theidiosyncratic features of a particular site can simply be uprooted andtransferred to another site – no matter how similar to the original. In RichardSerra’s famous phrase ‘to remove the work is to destroy the work’.In other words: once a site-specific art-piece has been torn from its originalcontext it loses the one thing that made it powerful and unique. Nonetheless,in recent decades such notions of the immovability from and inseparability of asite-specific work from its original setting have been assailed by artistsdriven by market forces and institutional changes in attitude. In one criticswords: ‘Site specificity has become a complex cipher of unstablerelationships between locations an identities in the era of late capitalism.‘Miwon Kwon’s work One Place After Another: Site-Specific Art and LocationIdentityis of enormous importance in elucidating the contours and features of thisshift in the direction of site-specific art.

The internal movementsof site-specific performance have done much to inform and influence the widersite-specific art of the last decade. In site-specific performance the keyquestion of recent years has been: Can site-specific performance travel? Or:Does ‘Site-specificity’ mean ‘site-exclusivity? Within the site-specificperformance community this debate as to exclusivity of site has been arguedwith near equal tenacity by both opponents and supporters. Thus, in many ways,the debate appeared recently to have come to a standstill. One way found by site-specificperformers to step beyond this impasse has been to define levels ofsite-specificity. For instance the company Red Earthhas stated:

‘Someprojects are completely site-specific, i.e., they could not take place anywhereelse without losing a strong thread of meaning and connection; while other moreflexible projects may work around a certain sense of place, i.e., the spirit orconcept at the heart of the project would work in several – but not all -locations’.

This quotation then suggests that the term ‘site-specific’has a degree of inherent relativity and flexibility. At one end of thespectrum, the term stands for certain performances that are absolutely rootedin the exact and unique site and community features in which they are set; forsuch performances there is no possibility of moving their ideas to differentsites. At the other end of the spectrum, certain performances can be moved fromsite to site if they preserve or enhance the ‘spirit’ or primary idea thatbegan the original performance. Between these two poles are various types ofsite-specific performance whose transferability rests upon ambiguous or dubiousprinciples. Justin McKeown of the Whalley Range All Stars suggests that thisrelativity should be defined in terms of site-specific performances that are ‘directlyderived from a chosen site‘and therefore have to remain at that site indefinitely, and on the other handbetween performances that can be transferred since they acknowledge and expandupon ‘the inherent meanings within a site‘. Paul Pinson, of Boilerhouse,has argued further that the relativity of site-specific performance isconditioned by the way that the company engages with the space that it occupiesat a particular site. Pinson suggests further that a performance can bepartially site-specific and partially of another genre and that this hybridity thereforejustifies a company to tour its performances. Pinson states: ‘You canrecreate a work in response to a number of different sites, which is totallyvalid in itself and is an element of site-specificity but is different frommaking a piece of work in response to one specific site.’

The site-specific or site-generic debate and is plethora ofinterpretations have raised questions about the present ‘purity’ ofsite-specific performance. Above all: is it possible for theoreticians andpractitioners of site-specific performance to find or derive a ‘pure’ model ofsite-specific performance, against which hybrid forms of this model might becompared? That is: can one set up construct an ideal paradigm of site-specificperformance and then show how variations of this paradigm are beneficial intheir individual ways? Miwon Kwon has suggested that one definition of thispure model might be ‘To make a truly site-specific piece means it sitswholly in that site in both its content and form, otherwise if moveable, itbecomes more about the site as a vehicle.‘Variations from this pure model are healthy natural growths from themother-model; the work of site-specific theoreticians is to define thesevariations and to ascribe to each of them independent areas of operation.

An alternative to this model of deriving variations ofsite-specific art from a pure or perfect model is to invent a new terminologyfor the art-form. Wrights & Siteshave suggested that the terms ‘In theatre building‘, ‘Outside theatre‘,’Site-Sympathetic‘, ‘Site-Generic‘ and ‘Site-Specific‘ beused to describe the various degrees of theatre performance. The first two ofthese are clearly beyond the pale of any generally accepted definition ofsite-specific performance. Interestingly however Wrights & Sites propose athree-fold division of the genre of site-specific performance. The advantage ofsuch a hierarchy is that it allows greater freedom and subtlety of descriptionwhen deciding to which exact genre a performance of site-specific work belongs.The term ‘site-specific’ is accordingly reserved for performances that have aprofound and absolute relationship with the specific site in which theperformance is prepared and enacted. Such performances work only at one site,never tour or travel, and do not use pre-existing props or scripts.Nonetheless, one major problem of such a terminology is the difficulty ofassigning the large number of performances that seem to fall between thecategories of ‘site-generic’ and ‘site-specific’.

These disputes about definitions and terminology that havearisen in the particular field of site-specific performance are or considerablerelevance and have been of considerable influence upon similar disputes insite-specific work generally. The central question of the debate – cansite-specific performance tour – is equally relevant to all others types ofsite-specific work, be it sculpture, community art, painting and so on. Byadopting a similar terminology to that of site-specific performancesite-specific work generally might clear up many of its own internal disputes.

SECTION 5: SITE-SPECIFIC:TYPES OF SITE

Internal debates within the literature of site-specificperformance as to what kind of site to select for its performances hashad considerable influence over similar decisions within site-specific workgenerally.

What then can site-specific work generally learn fromsite-specific performance? Above all, perhaps, is the extensive andcomprehensive analysis and exploration of the medium of space undertaken byleading site-specific performers. Richard Schechnerhas stated that ‘theatre places are maps of the cultures where they exist‘and Hetheringtonthat ‘Certain spaces act as sites for the performance of identity’. Artisticmanipulation of space is vital to successful site-specific performance, and theunique development in this quest has been the exploration of alternatives typesof space and site in which to perform site-specific theatre. Theatre had forcenturies been largely confined to theatre buildings of one sort or another;the advent of site-specific theatre saw the use of a plethora of differentvenues for performance from coal mines, to hospital wards, to libraries, tocoffee shops and so on ad infinitum. These ventures into alternativesites for performance raised amongst scholars of site-specific performance thekey questions: What are the consequences of such diverse selection of sites?What association will each site bring to the site-specific genre? What are thecommon themes that bind such eclectic choices of venue? On the last question,some attempts have been made by figures such as Hetheringtonto classify these venues in groups: for instance, parks and children’s playareas can be classed with beaches as ‘public spaces’. Cohen-Cruzhas argued that such spaces allow site-specific performers to use space that isnormally thought of as ‘publicly inhabitable’ to entice passers-by to attendthe performance therefore symbolising for the performers the theme of ‘makingperformance accessible’. The spaces found in venues such as museums, churchesand galleries are used somewhat differently however. In contrast to ‘p