"You Have To Show Your Guts!"

Today we started again by dancing in couples. I danced with Sophia and we were quickly called 'the Drug couple' (due to our tentative complicité and tired appearance). 

We were threatened to be killed a few times, and so I started taking risks and being a bit silly with it - at one point, in a tango inspired moment I got down on one knee and slapped my thigh. Even with that, Philippe said "goodbye" to us...but the crowd moaned for more, and we got another chance.

"We love him because he tries to save the show."

Then we had a go at improvising Mélodrama scenes together. I was playing with extending my body and exaggerating gestures, but in doing it lost my balance a bit! Andre was also being grander with his body and gestures today and it was really working. It works. And it's beautiful.

"For every tiny thing it has to be big and beautiful and light."

~

"Did you think Ah! It's my scene! It's my scene! For minutes just for me!...?"

If the son says "Mum! I'm so hungry!" we need to see that the mother is ashamed, "not bla bla bla."

"You have to show your guts!"

~

Andre also had a go at the scene we did yesterday, as the old man, and he really started to get it. The moment when he saw the medallion on the young lawyer's table was big and dramatic, stretched out - h a v i n g   a   s c e n e - and beautiful. Philippe got him to do it as an old Australian farmer, which gave it something else. There were moments of extreme - loud running - and others of soft and gentle - sliding in tears down onto a chair. It really plucked emotional strings in us.

~

Later, Philippe got Andre to do a nightmare of the father/lawyer scene, as if he was seeing every important moment in his life before he dies. So we see him abandoning his son, begging his landlord, meeting his new son, feeling ashamed etc etc - it doesn't have to be literal. 

"Don't start too strong...You listen to us, and if we love you, little by little you start to find freedom."

Andre really found it today. It was fantastic. We loved him. He was light and sensitive, but big and extreme. He used his body and found great gestures. You could see him actively exploring things with his voice and body too: Can Mélodrama be like this? Really inspiring. At the end Philippe said "It's perfect...It's very good..It's Mélo...It's exactly what we are looking for."

Later on I had a go, and did a nightmare version of the Patriotic Mélodrama. I played the father announcing great news, and then hearing horrible news and reacting. Making a patriotic speech and then hearing more horrible news. Then eventually going to war himself and seeing horrible things. Then being shot and slowly dying.

"Not too bad...You could listen to the music more. You were not ready to be helped by the music."

In a way, I did good here. But I wasn't so happy with myself. I rushed a bit. Went into survival mode slightly (hoping not to be killed) when really I could have grounded myself more and dropped into each moment. And listened to the audience, and Thomas on the drums, much more.

I also feel like I went out more to meet the level Andre had set than to learn something about the form. I tried to meet the requirements, rather than play. A competitive streak coming out of me. I guess I watched Andre and thought "I can do that too" and wanted to have a go. But art isn't a competition...And that's why I left feeling slightly disappointed with myself...But I did put my guts on the table. 

Also, as I died from being shot, I coughed too. Philippe asked me "Why did you cough?" and went on to say you cough because you've got tuberculosis, not because you've been shot. We can't have a death because you've been shot and you have tuberculosis!

At the end of class Philippe talked about how "Sometimes we get the point" (in relation to Andre's work) and said it's so subtle - the line between good and bad. In a way you're either perfect or your terrible. It's one millimetre. And there is joy for actors in taking the risk riding that tightrope...

~

After class we had drinks at the park (the sun's out till about 7.30pm now) for Claire de Canada's birthday, then Andre, Anna, Rik, Catarina and I went and saw a production of Othello directed by Thomas Ostermeier from Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz, Berlin.

It was fantastic! Full of life. Very surprising and unique.

 A bit like a rock concert (it had a live band). 

The stage was filled with water, which was a moment of absolute magic when the actors entered and stepped on what I thought was a shiny black stage...but then the stage rippled!

Iago was awesome. Naughty. Nasty yet lovable.

They also had a spot at the front of the stage that was much deeper (most of it was mid-shin depth) which actors fell into sometimes. Whoops! They've disappeared! 

Interesting choice to have a white Othello. It was in German with French subtitles, but it was clear that they had replaced the word 'moor' with 'The Black'. 

Amazing use of video projections, music, and found-technology (microphone, torch, megaphone...). 

Really glad I went to this. Haven't seen some theatre in a while, and this was top top quality. The biggest thing I took away from this again was 'magic'. It's so essential for the theatre. It lifts us out of the ordinary and into the imagination. As soon as the actors stepped on to the stage and it rippled, I gasped, and I my imagination was ready to go with them. Ah!