“You Have To Find Your Way To Put Out Your Beauty” (Dickheads)

Today’s class was an ‘audition’ for the role of somebody who comes on stage, with a shopping trolley (which they fit in all the possessions of their life), and speaks about how much they hate ‘dickheads.’

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Philippe ended up working a lot with each person who got up, so we only saw three people today!

First was Lee, dressed as a transvestite, who was great as Lee-the-idiot dressed as a woman, but whenever he went to do the prescribed text about dickheads - whenever he acted - it was bad. 

“You start the improvisation and you lose yourself...When you start to do theatre you have something serious.” 

But Lee totally saved himself when he played as himself. Philippe was trying to get him to go off stage and Lee was giving him lip: “See how many actors you have after I push them all down the stairs.”

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“It’s delicate...not to cheat...not to play too much...”

“It’s always good to have something to do.”

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Barbara also had a go, dressed as a man, but she wasn’t finding anything fun. 

“We don’t see your pleasure to pretend to be lesbian.”

Then Barbara had a big emotional speel in which she felt totally lost and doesn’t know who she is and that she can’t have pleasure talking about nasty people - she has to be angry. At first, we were sensitive to her feelings, but soon it became funny and we laughed at the ridiculousness of her little tantrum. And she lightened up too. 

Philippe eventually got Barbara to sing a gospel song to her improvised text about dickheads. She sang ‘Oh Happy Day’, and we all echoed her sentences.

It was great. She was free, having fun, alive, and listening. We loved her.

“You have to find your way to put out your beauty.”

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Finally Steph got up, dressed like a decrepid old woman with a pot belly. She had a few bad starts and got sent back to try again. 

Steph: I’m really afraid.

Philippe: Everybody is afraid.

Steph: What do you do when you’re afraid?

Philippe: I play with the fear.

Philippe then got Steph to change into something really elegant and beautiful. She had her hair down, in a silver dress, and high heels. He got her to be tall, with a good fixed point, and to speak in a crass American. She spoke like the women from Jersey Shore, saying “My name is Eve and I am your first mother.”

The juxtaposition of her beautiful look, with her horrible voice, and then with that text, was chilling. Really surprising and ugly...yet attractive!