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
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