Work as if you live in the early days of a better nation

Recommending: Growing your own vegetables

Monster, miniature and collaboration.

David Farr, recently artistic director of the Lyric, discusses the pros and cons of “big” and “small” plays, with some arguments against a “monster” playwright.

“It can be argued that the solo-written play is at its best when it is miniaturist. No modern play has taken me further into the human condition than Harold Pinter’s The Caretaker, in which three actors never leave one shoddy room.”

On the other hand,

“But then look at Brecht. Brecht had to write big. From the first moment he wrote sprawling, imperfect, magnificent epics. So did Shakespeare.”

Farr then goes on to argue for the collaborative nature of theatre. And that collaboration bears the best theatrical fruit. He cites Kneehigh theatre – Cornish collective – as a good example.

Complicite, Improbable, Shared Experience would be others in this mould.

Emma Rice, artistic director of Knee High argues

“I am passionate about the collective imagination – that you can create more together than alone.”

And that conventional British Theatre has trouble understanding the way Kneehigh works.

I’m not sure I’d go that far. When I first came to theatre (and from what I can tell most people’s experience of theatre) my impression was that it is immensely collaborative. There was and is a feeling that without everyone being involved the piece would not come together. I think theatres do understand that. However, they are often unwilling to take a large risk.

Knee high may approach a theatre with only a “skeleton” of a script. A theatre can understand how kneehigh works but also be scared by the fact, they don’t know what is going to come out of the process. It may not work.

Another interesting comment in the article is Rice’s proposition that

“Audiences are much more visually literate than aurally or linguistically literate these days.”

And thus Farr’s attempt to draw a “young audience who have a phenomenal visual sophistication and relatively little literary sophistication” and his conclusion:

“What theatre needs to survive is original, provocative and innovative story-telling. How you tell the story – the puppetry of Shockheaded Peter, the hi-tech video of An Elephant Vanishes, the collective bravura of Kneehigh, the solitary brilliance of Harold Pinter or David Harrower – is a personal choice with specific needs and consequences. There are an infinite number of ways of making new work in the theatre. It’s a bastard form. That’s what makes it so great.”

I would add that the choice in making the work becomes a crucial part of what makes the theatre great. If telling the story isn’t interesting in theatre then why don’t people tell the story on tv or film. In fact, many more stories perhaps are being told in tv and film and to keep theatre relevant it needs stories and telling, which tv and films can’t do.

comments

One Response to “Monster, miniature and collaboration.”

  1. Theatre » Review: The Magic Carpet on December 13th, 2005

    [...] David Farr was made artistic director of the Lyric Hammersmith in June 2005 and his season kicked off in September 2005. He’s embarked on an ambitious programme in 2006 which includes Nights at the Circus – an adaptation of an Angela Carter Story by Emma Rice of Kneehigh and Tom Morris (ex-BAC); and Farr’s own version of the Odyssey. [...]

  • About me

    I'm a playwright and investment analyst. I have a broad range of interests: food, gardening, innovation & intellectual property, sustainability, architecture & design, writing and the arts. I sit on the board of Talawa Theatre Company and advise a CIS investment trust on socially responsible investments.

  • Recent Work

    Recent plays include, for theatre: Nakamitsu, Yellow Gentlemen, Lost in Peru, Lemon Love. For radio: Places in Between (R4), Patent Breaking Life Saving (WS).

  • Nakamitsu

  • Yellow Gentlemen