Monday, October 8, 2007
Chatting with our demons, on heroes and anti-heroes
Having recently seen two vastly different plays that each include discussion around war or terror, discipline and how we prepare for things, I wonder if it is possible to dramtize contemporary issues without the passage of time to lend perspective. John Patrick Shanley's "Defiance" covers material from the early 70's. Brett Neveu's "Weapon of Mass Impact" seems so very current. I think one succeeds and the other needs some more thought. In addition Evan Smith's "The Savannah Disputation" tackles the search for heroes in the world of today.
Shanley's play is set within the world of the career military in the early 70's. The main issue at hand is race, though there is plenty of room for all sorts of bad behavior. His main topic is the nature of heroes, how are they created, how they behave, can they tangle with women succussfully (in the standard world of real people it seems that men are heroes and women foil their man's best self if they cannot reinforce it). His main character aims for hero-state but misses, never resting on cynicism as a crutch. Does that mean he was never meant to be a hero? Defiance also points to Martin Luther King as hero and as the black captain's excuse for avoiding acts of heroism, though it is his final inability to avoid hero behavior that lends the drama credence, keeps the action moving forward and brings about the end of the Lt. Colonel.
What is the difference between the failures of hero Odysseus when returning to the ever-waiting Penelope and the Lt. Colonel's single transgression? According to the Mrs. it is that he reaches for heroism when he himself isn't one and thus, cannot make the mark. Whereas Penelope expects and demands a hero and thus, does Odysseus' behavior remain heroic. Is this a modern failure to allow for heroes?
After seeing Evan Smith's new play, The Savannah Disputation, I would add another question. Is it possible to be a hero and a cynic at the same time? Women seek heroes, Mary is looking for one in Father Murphy and he acts heroically at the end of the action, but his cynicism shines through as well. Does cynicism make room for an anti-hero?
Neveu's focus is on preparing for a kidnapping and perhaps other acts of terror, how to prepare a potential victim through study, enactment, discussion between victim-students. All the students are women, they are quite different in their character expression, though all are roughly the same age, ethnic and socio-economic background, outwardly the same woman times three. This playwright is always willing to look at fear emotions, internal turmoil, current events as a driver for topic and plot.
Weapon fails to stay on course because the main premise has more to do with exposing ugly feelings while remaining essentially attractive. The emotional crushing of the 'nicest' woman, the woman who truly wants to be liked is at the center of the piece and it has nothing to do with preparing for a kidnapping and is out of place with the device used. This leaves the viewer with two stories that have little to do with each other.
This is a piece in progress and before I finish it, I wonder if anyone else has thoughts? I do believe the subject matter on heroes is what these playwrights are chasing and I find the topic fascinating. How does Joseph Cambell's reflections on being our own heroes work in this thematic area? How about the lack of public heroes lately--our complex world buries their stories. United flight 93 involved heroic behavior unknown until recently (though I believe it happens all the time). And how is it that most compelling stories focus more on those who try and fail to live up to their own expectations?
Shanley's play is set within the world of the career military in the early 70's. The main issue at hand is race, though there is plenty of room for all sorts of bad behavior. His main topic is the nature of heroes, how are they created, how they behave, can they tangle with women succussfully (in the standard world of real people it seems that men are heroes and women foil their man's best self if they cannot reinforce it). His main character aims for hero-state but misses, never resting on cynicism as a crutch. Does that mean he was never meant to be a hero? Defiance also points to Martin Luther King as hero and as the black captain's excuse for avoiding acts of heroism, though it is his final inability to avoid hero behavior that lends the drama credence, keeps the action moving forward and brings about the end of the Lt. Colonel.
What is the difference between the failures of hero Odysseus when returning to the ever-waiting Penelope and the Lt. Colonel's single transgression? According to the Mrs. it is that he reaches for heroism when he himself isn't one and thus, cannot make the mark. Whereas Penelope expects and demands a hero and thus, does Odysseus' behavior remain heroic. Is this a modern failure to allow for heroes?
After seeing Evan Smith's new play, The Savannah Disputation, I would add another question. Is it possible to be a hero and a cynic at the same time? Women seek heroes, Mary is looking for one in Father Murphy and he acts heroically at the end of the action, but his cynicism shines through as well. Does cynicism make room for an anti-hero?
Neveu's focus is on preparing for a kidnapping and perhaps other acts of terror, how to prepare a potential victim through study, enactment, discussion between victim-students. All the students are women, they are quite different in their character expression, though all are roughly the same age, ethnic and socio-economic background, outwardly the same woman times three. This playwright is always willing to look at fear emotions, internal turmoil, current events as a driver for topic and plot.
Weapon fails to stay on course because the main premise has more to do with exposing ugly feelings while remaining essentially attractive. The emotional crushing of the 'nicest' woman, the woman who truly wants to be liked is at the center of the piece and it has nothing to do with preparing for a kidnapping and is out of place with the device used. This leaves the viewer with two stories that have little to do with each other.
This is a piece in progress and before I finish it, I wonder if anyone else has thoughts? I do believe the subject matter on heroes is what these playwrights are chasing and I find the topic fascinating. How does Joseph Cambell's reflections on being our own heroes work in this thematic area? How about the lack of public heroes lately--our complex world buries their stories. United flight 93 involved heroic behavior unknown until recently (though I believe it happens all the time). And how is it that most compelling stories focus more on those who try and fail to live up to their own expectations?
Sunday, October 7, 2007
Theater in all its variety - Chicago has it
In the last week (and 2 days) I have seen a short-story film noirish Coranado, a brand new cops angst ala TV in A Steady Rain, an extreme post-modern Thyestes, the wildly entertaining So Good It Makes you Wanna' Holler, a traditional but finely wrought Suddenly Last Summer (featuring exquisite set design and costumes and some chilling acting), Kurl Weil-Berlin to Broadway (a review) and Hello Dolly with a stripped down cast. You can't say Chicago is not indulging in the full gamut of genres.
The two pieces that demand the most attention here are the Thyestes and the musical/review Makes You Wanna' Holler, Old v. New Style.
I note Thyestes because it disappointed, which probably says more about me than the production. I came away with a sense of stridency, shrill delivery from an actor not noted for shrill, a sense of two men mis-cast (though upon reflection, aren't we all somewhat mis-cast in our lives?).
A friend recently noted: ...to simplify this issue with two questions: Is Thyestes a striking, artful piece of theatre--why or why not? Could Akalaitis have done more with the very ingredients that she herself selected? I think I see untapped potential in this production....Perhaps Akalaitis, whom I admire, actually did not go conceptually far enough. One thinks here about the "Theatre of Cruelty" popular in the 60s. She is surely aware of the fad. I wonder how this might have helped Akalaitis with focus. Even choices.
The theater of cruelty (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theatre_of_Cruelty) offers some good insight into what Akalaitis might be trying to achieve with Thyestes. The upfront cruelty that Seneca portrays stands as his commentary on past and present employers (Caligula and then Nero, under whose employment Seneca was ordered to and did in fact commit suicide). The play itself is about cruelty, who are its perpetrators and its victims. And the pitched attack that Atreus plans and executes against Thyestes is in keeping with the play's theme.
What I found lacking was character development in either Thyestes or Atreus. They each portrayed static men, already bound in the present reality of past choices. So from a dramatic standpoint, the play is rather dull because it is unrealistic to expect Thyestes to get smart and head for the hills. Neither does any rightminded individual believe that Atreus will relent and refrain from tormenting Thyestes, he won't change course, but he sure doesn't have much fun with it either. I like my tragedy to be the worse with possibility of alternate routes away from disaster.
What I did take away from the production was that pushed beyond endurance, we are all like one or the other of the brothers, either melodramatic-to-insane (I'm not talking road rage, but in truly terrible circumtances), or wooden and innefectual on decision making that will change the course of the future. And of course one suspects our director is commenting on our national leader(s) who seems to be perpetually either willfully cruel in pursuit of war to the cost of all other programs under his pervue or a dullard.
At the other end of the spectrum, Makes You Wanna' Holler so far exceeded expectations because it has both giant entertainment value and a seriousness in both story telling and production quality. There is tension on what the outcome might be and the ensembles (new style v. old style) are powerhouses of talent. It is both a joy to see and hear and just so much fun I wanted to get up and join in (some of the audience were in fact invited to and did so). It's easy to play down the value of a show that offers so much sheer fun, but this show has both, though I would like to see a bit more dramatization to more the story forward.
I learned more from Thyestes because I had to thrash out my lessons and grind my teeth on the tough sinews and bloody soup of the play itself as well as the production. But I'm revisiting Makes You Wanna' Holler as often and with considerably more enjoyment of its lessons.
The two pieces that demand the most attention here are the Thyestes and the musical/review Makes You Wanna' Holler, Old v. New Style.
I note Thyestes because it disappointed, which probably says more about me than the production. I came away with a sense of stridency, shrill delivery from an actor not noted for shrill, a sense of two men mis-cast (though upon reflection, aren't we all somewhat mis-cast in our lives?).
A friend recently noted: ...to simplify this issue with two questions: Is Thyestes a striking, artful piece of theatre--why or why not? Could Akalaitis have done more with the very ingredients that she herself selected? I think I see untapped potential in this production....Perhaps Akalaitis, whom I admire, actually did not go conceptually far enough. One thinks here about the "Theatre of Cruelty" popular in the 60s. She is surely aware of the fad. I wonder how this might have helped Akalaitis with focus. Even choices.
The theater of cruelty (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theatre_of_Cruelty) offers some good insight into what Akalaitis might be trying to achieve with Thyestes. The upfront cruelty that Seneca portrays stands as his commentary on past and present employers (Caligula and then Nero, under whose employment Seneca was ordered to and did in fact commit suicide). The play itself is about cruelty, who are its perpetrators and its victims. And the pitched attack that Atreus plans and executes against Thyestes is in keeping with the play's theme.
What I found lacking was character development in either Thyestes or Atreus. They each portrayed static men, already bound in the present reality of past choices. So from a dramatic standpoint, the play is rather dull because it is unrealistic to expect Thyestes to get smart and head for the hills. Neither does any rightminded individual believe that Atreus will relent and refrain from tormenting Thyestes, he won't change course, but he sure doesn't have much fun with it either. I like my tragedy to be the worse with possibility of alternate routes away from disaster.
What I did take away from the production was that pushed beyond endurance, we are all like one or the other of the brothers, either melodramatic-to-insane (I'm not talking road rage, but in truly terrible circumtances), or wooden and innefectual on decision making that will change the course of the future. And of course one suspects our director is commenting on our national leader(s) who seems to be perpetually either willfully cruel in pursuit of war to the cost of all other programs under his pervue or a dullard.
At the other end of the spectrum, Makes You Wanna' Holler so far exceeded expectations because it has both giant entertainment value and a seriousness in both story telling and production quality. There is tension on what the outcome might be and the ensembles (new style v. old style) are powerhouses of talent. It is both a joy to see and hear and just so much fun I wanted to get up and join in (some of the audience were in fact invited to and did so). It's easy to play down the value of a show that offers so much sheer fun, but this show has both, though I would like to see a bit more dramatization to more the story forward.
I learned more from Thyestes because I had to thrash out my lessons and grind my teeth on the tough sinews and bloody soup of the play itself as well as the production. But I'm revisiting Makes You Wanna' Holler as often and with considerably more enjoyment of its lessons.
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