second day of the second development, second post on a first class blog...

so far, our ideas for this show are proving remarkably solid; so far. i guess its only day two, so no-one's pulled out the knives yet.

what they have pulled out thus far has been great; straddling, ventriloquising, world class craptastic keyboards, contemporary dance cock punching (so you think you can what?), and exceptional catering care of an interstate guest artiste.

so, all in all, things are looking good. a 90 minute grilling this afternoon of the structure of the show resulted in clarification; articulation; refining....but no real changes, yet. the tossing around of this story that nic and i have been doing for a while now have seemingly shaped it okay.

looking forward now to going back in and screwing with it; how to communicate tales of antiquity through the language of vaudeville's chico chico from puerto rico.

love,
kieran

LDNTDay2

Kieran and I have renamed our durational performance band 'Fathers_of_Dead_Europe' (formerly Po/Mo-Art/Pop). We haven't done any performances yet, but our ideas are solid (like all great contemporary artists, I suppose). This is due to the further work undertake today. Spent afternoon working on the structure of the end of the show. Finished the day with establishing all the song ideas for the entire show, as well as nutting out the end of the work. The Fathers of Dead Europe is a concept we have added to the original myth on which Last Days is based. As such, I think we will end up spending a while figuring them out. 

Essentially, they are gods. Roman or Greek gods, not like these infallible ones running around today. The end up making things worse than before when they stick their noses in. The work may have set out to evoke the tradition of vaudeville, but also seems to edge closer to the ancient plays. All the action takes place in a day; the gods intervene and fuck it all up; mankind learns of the tragedy of self-awareness. 

More to come. 

x nic

LDNTDay1

Beginnings is beginnings. 

What is it? What will it be at the end of the two weeks? How'd it start? Where is it now?

All the questions we ask ourselves on day one. 

Went through the myth; the starting point. 

Watched some shitty vaudeville. Got some great ideas.  Song and dance and animal routines. 

Justified some narrative. Everything takes place in one day now, and starts with the Dead Fathers of Europe requesting Romulus and Remus to return to bombed-to-fuck Europe to reboot it. Trouble is, today they decide to form their own little civilisation. TENSION. 

The next two weeks will be dense. 

x nic

Last Days's First Days...s

Back on the train. 

Tomorrow we kick off Last Days of the New Theatricals. Our latest work that is brand new. So brand new we haven't made it yet. Thus, the development. 

LDNT is the story of Romulus and Remus, the mythic founders of Rome. Instead of the two boys being suckled by a wolf, then being adopted by a shepherd, then kicking Latin arse and founding Empire of Cunts 1.0, we're imagining a world where the she-wolf (Lupa) absconds with the twins at the bequest of the Dead Fathers of Europe to an outpost of the colonial realm (dusty rural Australia), where she raises them as the demigods they are in her clapped out corrugated iron brothel. Here every hour on the hour they perform vaudeville sketches for no-one but themselves. 

It's a musical! Sort of. We're continuing the examination of theatrical conceits in the contemporary performance landscape, I suppose. Last time was the 'heroes journey'- that is mainstream narrative - amongst the plague houses of 17th century London. This time, we're tackling vaudeville and variety in the guise of Rome's foundations set in rural Qld circa 1945. 

So Kieran and I will be joined by Penny Everingham as Lupa, Neridah Waters as Romulus and Kevin Spink as Remus. Dave Heinrich of the Border Project and Lions at Your Door will be doing the music. 

Enough spiel. Come back for daily blogging over the next fortnight to find out how it's going. It'll be your last chance to hear from us before we subject everyone to our travel blog in July. 

x nic

i can't believe i used a fucking exclamation mark. 

Day Ten, Friday

The end of the new beginning. 

Despite everyone's best intentions to have a break-up day of watching movies and gossiping about summertime dreams, we managed to do an incredible amount of work based around the working draft. 

Time being against us as we ran towards the end of the week, we went through everything line by line, everyone voicing their opinions on what was overwritten (most of it), didn't make sense yet (some of it) and what worked (getting there). 

A long time ago I realised I wasn't a playwright. It came, fortunately, around the same time I realised I didn't want to make plays anymore. The act then of writing for performance, attempting to distill an epic idea into some text the actors can speak onstage, is incredibly difficult. No matter how much comes out of improvisation, or how much you supplant image for text, eventually you will still have to sit down and write some goddamn dialogue. Something I've never been able to embrace. 

All that said, the work on the text opened up all the possibilities for where we need to go. We have a show ready for production. This is what we set out to do. And all involved seemed excited to now go and actually stage it for an audience.  

Fun fun.

x nic

Day Nine, Thursday

Filming all day. 

Theatre on repeat. A bizarre thing. When you shoot something for film, the act of repetition is a given. You do it, do it differently, shoot it differently, move on. 

Theatre/Performance/Whatever I'm calling it today is the art of creating something for a live act, and exchange between creator and whatever witnesses is near enough to see/hear it. This manufactured live act becomes subject to repetition on a daily basis, eight shows a week. 

What happens when you take a theatrical moment and repeat it over and over for an audience of one, straight down the barrel of the camera?

Interesting to observe today. The ephemeral nature of  live work, a bitch for continuity. 'Do it the same again' is the very thing we avoid in theatre, albeit subconsciously. There is no 'same again'.   

The art of filmmaking provides the other source of great creativity- idleness. There is  that great moment in filming that is not unlike the tech rehearsal- the performer is onstage, in costume, under lights.  Sitting around waiting for the next setup, some of the best jokes of the process emerge. The kind of humour that audiences don't get to experience; in-jokes, light-hearted abstractions of their characters put in absurd situations. A conversation three days ago about obese people buying two plane tickets finds itself returning when an actor in a fat suit tries to sit in the seating bank. A brief glance at an amusing cover on a community newspaper gives birth to a new character that, once given a funny voice, provides entertainment to outlast any change of lighting state.   

It's so often that at this point you realise you have just watched a group of performers turn into a company. A little family that will break apart at some stage in the future, but for now is all the tribe we need. 

I must be getting sentimental, tomorrow is the last day and we've all but accomplished everything we set out to do. 

That means that tomorrow we will go out of our way to fuck it all up. If we can ruin it all with completely different ways of doing absolutely everything, and it all survives and strengthens, then we've done our job. 

x nic

Day Eight, Wednesday

Rehearsed today. All day. 

Tomorrow we shoot some scenes in a black space for the promo DVD. An odd shift from create, refine, question, disassemble to rehearse it for an outcome. 

We intentionally didn't have a showing at the end of this development so that we can focus on the work. Often, the last few days of a development are spent rehearsing something for the audience as opposed to serving the work. So it was odd to get our brain into a deadline place. 

However, still made some great discoveries. We said goodbye to the Colonial Oriental speed dating in Plague in London (sad to see it go, but for the greater good). We also invested even further in the preface- the moment at the start when the characters (not the actors) come out onstage and announce the rules. Much more gets revealed about the work in that moment now, a warning for the audience and at the same time a welcoming. 

The old friend we rediscovered was Pig Tit Farm. This was the audience favourite last time around, and you can see why. The fact that the actors remembered the scene almost without prompting is a sign of a god scene, and in the case of this development where so much is changing, it was a nice instance of 'if it ain't broke...'

So tomorrow we move into a theatre, and surrender ourselves to a camera. Can't wait. 

Day Seven, Tuesday

Came in today with  a new draft. Getting closer to articulating the balance, but still a struggle.  

Again though, this argument for and against traditional theatre's place in modern work. At the moment, everything is over-written, especially when you think we're attempting to tell the story with at least 50% visuals. The process of pulling back this text that has grown out of improvisation and discussion will come later, yet I'm impatient to see it all happen now. The burden of a looming Friday end point has me sometimes wanting to chain myself to this computer until it's done. 

It's never done. The eternal struggle between plot, character, absence and abstraction continues. 

As always, the penny arcade sequences form so easily. Their primary purpose is entertainment. So often in my work when I set out to entertain, things come together with ease. What has become of this idea in contemporary work, that our job is to entertain, on whatever level? 

We managed two penny arcade's today, Theophilia and Nurse (part II). Theophilia is a homage to French New Wave, a series of shutters opening and closing to fixed imagery and existential narration. A strong antidote to the bawdy sequences that book end it. Nurse (part II) is similarly idiosyncratic. It starts out with a ridiculous tour of 17th century London that includes a photo op on Abbey Road, and ends with one of the most truthful moments from the character. 

We also did our last backstory/storytelling exercise for the process, finishing with Buckingham. The daily exercise has been helpful, mostly for the actor playing that particular character of the day. To have another actor sit next to you and tell a story about your character can force some interesting decisions. 

x nic

  

Day Six, Monday, Start of Week Two

Today was the funniest day we've had thus far. 

Buckingham hosted a tea party for three dead women. They all wore very silly outfits and all had a gay old time. Buckingham did all their voices. He didn't like one of them very much. 

I fell off my chair. Literally. That funny. Need to get some outside eyes on that sequence because I may have lost objectivity.  

It poses the question as to the duration of the penny arcade sequences for the show. These moments of comedy need to enliven the otherwise bleak landscape the characters dwell in. They need to retain the 'commercial break' feel they originally possessed. If these moments total a larger percentage than the 'real' narrative of the plague house then we may have a problem (or just a completely different show). 

We went back to the preface today too, and the last weeks work has informed that opening moment. Buckingham has more to say and picks up the energy from the hesitant characters (hesitant for a good reason), which drives the moment to where it needs to go. I get the feeling it may repeat itself in the mid-show moment of a similar nature. 

The other penny arcade we looked at was Plague in London, the original opening vignette. It and Pig Tit Farm are the two arcade sequences that will remain closest to their original forms,  but far more choreographed. Today I even blocked with an eight count....

x nic

Day Five- end of week one

Yesterday Kieran and I sat down and re-attacked the structure, after Thursday's exhausting work on the latest completed draft. 

My biggest beef with the work thus far was that I felt that we had departed from it being contemporary performance; that we were just making a left-of-centre play. I think this idea had been lodged into my frontal lobe. I was missing the point I was trying to make. 

In our attempt to blend contemporary performance practice with traditional storytelling/plot/character, I was trying to blend two elements before each had fully formed. Kieran put it well yesterday when he brought up that whatever elements make up the work, each must be thoroughly thought out and, in effect, standalone as well crafted and intelligent. 

My impulse to resist going too deep into the hows and whys of plot/story/drama was throwing the baby out with the bath water.

So we applied the same level of forensic thinking to the drama as we have the imagery, character and abstraction. Now we are closer to achieving what we set out to do. Theophilia has almost earned the right to do the awful thing to herself. Buckingham is more like the menacing character he was last time. Nurse is much more fallible, making her all the more evil and Lettice has regained some of her vulnerability.

Essentially, we have retained the meta-theatrical ideas that inform the new work, yet not forgone the old drama. AND in an exciting twist, these justified dramatic choices are directly formed by contemporary performance moments that exist outside the drama yet now affect it. 

Nearly there. 

Week one has been big and funny and rewarding and difficult. 

Re-drafting tonight/tomorrow so we have new things for the week. Monday, though, is a penny arcade day. Nothing but sticky, filthy silliness. Morgan only has a few days to learn a Michael Jackson routine. 

x Nic

Day Four

Biggest day so far. Finished the latest draft last night, took it in today. 

Like all great discoveries, it brings up at least five big problems to deal with. 

Structure, narrative, flow. Justifying the actions of the characters to create a believable show. 

What place does all this have in our definition of contemporary performance? Is this what we are setting out to do? Where has the visual element that defines so much of our work gone? 

Lucky to have the performers we do. Forensic questioning is a godsend. 

Back again on Saturday. Need tomorrow off to rethink some things (and celebrate some INRI death). 

x nic

Day 3: Notes from the past couple of days.

"Wipe his hairy package."

"The father of the cobbler's daughter, who was the cobbler himself."

Why IS Theophilia getting so fat?

"It was more like...cuddling."

"Why can't I eat with my SILVER SPOON?"

Mobile phones in the deaf-mute audience.

"RULES OF THE HOUSE!"

Lothario captain.

The asian pigeon girl.

"There's a fine line between grave digging and grave robbing...we just trip down the line."

Dance Hall speed dating in 1660's Asia.

"I wife you, yes?"

"Wookie get hungry - I bit me!"

Explore transformation; blood - red, yellow, black...chills to fever...the last trumpet to death.

How to pass the time without doing anything.

Confessions...awkward reactions (good)

Homework and early mark.

Pleasant progression - week one, halfway done.

Love,
Kieran.

Tuesday

Is it only Tuesday already? Big day. Everyone doing well. 

Started with playing around with the rats. In re-researching the show I remembered rats do cool things. Things like if they don't gnaw away on things, there front two teeth curl back under their heads, stabbing themselves in the brain. Plus, live rats have been known to come up through the toilet bowls. Awesome. 

So rats have been on the discussion table. Brief science lesson: the rats carry the fleas which carry the yersina pestis (plague). When rats die, fleas jump ship aiming for your ankles. Fleas bite you, you get the plague. The rats played no role in the last production, so this time around we thought they deserved there place in history. Needless to say, we aren't exactly historically accurate. Look out for a penny arcade sequence in The Greater Plague that features grade six rats hosting a school debate on the value of infecting humans. 

Biggest discovery of the day was the preface. A way to open the show that communicates the rules these characters are playing by. An open explanation of who is the protagonist and their thoughts on that subject. The opposite of artfully revealing objective or subtext. Straight out, unashamed and un-theatrical  to the point of it being very watchable. Intellectually, very interesting. I wonder if it will transfer to stage. 

Structre changing daily. So far to go, but feeling better now at midnight than I did a few hours ago. 

x nic

Day 1: Consider Yourself Recapped

Bad cop on board.

Today we began to talk about the place of narrative in contemporary performance; an idea that is currently at the core of Restaged's work...whereas in the previous incarnation of Plague, the narrative was key - but intentionally ambiguous, and expressed in alternative ways to the traditional three act structure - this time, we're interested in having (but displacing) a clearer narrative. The story is simplified and performed in a more direct fashion, but at the same time there are a number of elements to the piece that stand outside the narrative but are just as important.

The structure of 'the hero's journey' is shaping up to be a key influence in our characters' stories and archetypes - but not by honouring it; more by smushing it beneath a fatsuit and stripping the parts we need to bust out some narrative smashing action.

My breakthrough of the day - this is no longer about the Great Plague of London. The plague is an excuse for this performance to happen; its more about isolation, deceit, fidgetting, and dressups.

Can't wait to bust out the octopus skirt.

Love,
Kieran

Starting tomorrow

Development for The Greater Plague is starting tomorrow. Emily has arrived from Melbourne, fat suit and plastic belly have been pulled out of storage. 

Don't have any tea and biscuits. 

But fat suit is paramount. 

Have a stack of things for the cast to read. 

Kieran and I have been talking about the title. Always a starting point for the work we do. Some people leave titular decisions until the end, for us it always comes first. 'The Greater Plague' suggests something that maybe the show has moved away from. 'The Greatest Plague on Earth' however, now that is something I'm interested in. We might even throw caution to the wind and wait for the show to take a bit more shape before deciding on a title. 

The other night someone suggested 'The Plague? Rats!', which may be better than anything we can come up with...