Howard Barker is cut
The Wrestling School has been cut. Not quite like a Mark Ravenhill play but it probably feels like it [the cut performed in the play that is].
Howard Barker writes here and on at his site
“When we applied for an Arts Council grant this year, it was to mark a further drastic switch in form, this time to a swift and nearly wordless series of 40 texts played in two hours. Yet at the end of last week The Wrestling School was destroyed by the Arts Council’s decision – for reasons entirely without artistic value – not to award the grant, following the massive cut in its allocation to service the crisis of the Olympic Games. The squeeze on arts funding is presumably the reason behind the Arts Council’s removal of support for artist development, which has been the grounds for our funding over the last 20 years.”
And
“The sinister character of a regime that makes utility its sole value is nakedly evident in the decision-making process. We are describing censorship, not by the police, nor even the critical police, but by a process of selective de-funding. The Wrestling School is a victim of this, and is neither the first nor the last. It asks its public to contest its funeral.”
The comments are divided. George Hunka, Alison Croggon, Andrew Field amongst others make good points and counter statler from viewfromthestalls who argues
“when resources are limited I’d always prefer to see it going to new emerging companies and talent, and given that your company has been running for (almost) 20 years, if it still can’t be made to work commercially, even with trimmed down budgets etc, then I’m sorry but doesn’t that suggest the work isn’t that worthy (although I admit to having no knowledge of it)”
And Lyn Gardner comments
“we should all be making more noise and keeping the pressure up on both Arts Council and government or they will just think they can get away with it. The thread on subsidy versus the commercial is fascinating, and the truth is that the lines are much more blurred than we think. Subsidised theatres make commercial deals all the time, and you have only to look down the list of those who have received Grants for the Arts over the last three years to see that commercial producers have benefited. It is not as clear cut as it might appear, and that is often to the benefit of theatre as a whole.”
[my bold]
For my own two pennies
If one does actually try to cast it as an “economic” and commercial argument one key problem is that Howard Barker’s work has a large “intangible value” that pure ticket prices would not cover.
But that intangible value may well be larger (and so better to invest in) than the new emerging companies statler would prefer.
I’m not sure we should be looking for economic justifications, an inexact science at best, but still I wonder what has been the (intangible) value that, for instance, Alan Ayckbourn has given to Scarborough? Much greater than any subisdy, I would estimate.
Noh notes, Kyogen
Some short notes I’ve written to put my version of Nakamitsu in context.
*
In general, many Japanese Noh plays are not “very dramatic” in the Aristotelian sense. However they are beautiful. Noh plays are full of poetical allusions and the dances, though slow, are elegant. There is abstraction in Noh and indeed it is discouraged to appear to imitate the external forms of people and objects too closely, concentrating rather on the essence or soul which the actor will attempt to recreate.
Western theatre and television are strongholds of naturalistic performances. Television is often a version of a transcript of life. Noh does not follow realism. Symbols and gestures; music and poetry; a language of physicality; these are all important.
Language
Noh plays are written partly in prose and partly in verse. Sections are chanted. The language of a prose passage often will heighten into verse.
In a classical performance, an old dialect of Japanese is used which is often difficult for a modern Japanese audience to understand without programme notes.
The poetry of Noh is dense and complex despite an often restricted vocabulary. Cascades of images and words echo one another visually, in meaning, and sound. Translators try to do their best but it is said even scholars do not always grasp the heart of such poetry.
Persons speaking for one another
Japanese avoids specifying grammatical subject. Nouns have no plural form. Verbs are invariant to person or number. The subject of a verb can be hard to determine with certainty.
In Noh, the concept of the character or person may not be distinct. Sometimes actors speak for one another although a translation into grammatical English makes this less vague. In chorus passages, a choice must be made from line to line on who should deliver the words.
Importantly, a speaker who seems to be in a first person mode of address may suddenly change to a third person mode in order to narrate his or her own actions. This often happens at heightened moments of emotion or drama and should be accepted as part of the special qualities of a Noh play.
Length
Noh texts are short. They take ten to twenty minutes to read out. In classical Noh, today, a short performance would take about an hour and some plays can take over two hours. Some dances can be prolonged a long time and delivery is slow. Historically, in the 1400s, plays seem to have been performed in half the time or less than they take now.
*
Schools of Noh
The “schools” of Noh are hereditary lineages of shite actors. Each school has its characteristic style. Details of music, dance, singing, staging and text will vary from school to school. Each school will have a “normal” way of presenting a play but several plays will also have named performance variants.
Presentation and categorisation of Noh
Noh plays are usually placed into one of five categories. However different schools may give different classifications. The first category of plays are often called “god plays”. The shite is a god who praises the peace and prosperity of the land and performs a dance in celebration. The second category are “warrior plays”. The shite is usually a famous warrior and often appears as a ghost. The third category are often called “woman plays” although the shite is not always a female character. Fourth category plays are difficult to define. Some times called “madman plays” they often fall in to an “other” category and are often concerned with characters in present life (as opposed to ghosts). Fifth category plays are called “concluding plays” or “devil plays” as the shite can be a devil and these plays finish a complete programme of Noh.
Historically, a complete Noh programme would be made by choosing a play from each category and performing them in that order with Kyogen plays interspersed between. Today in a Noh programme in Japan, often only two or three Noh plays are performed still with Kyogen in between.
Kyogen
Kyogen is the classical comedy theatre art of Japan, however a Kyogen performance may not always be comic. It has been passed down in its present form back to back with Noh drama. Its name is created from the Japanese writing characters for “crazy” or “totally involved in” (kyo) and “speaking or “words” (gen). It is often considered a physical and comedic counterpoint to Noh although it is an art in its own right. A Kyogen play is much shorter than a Noh performance and often averages about twenty minutes.
Nakamitsu: Guardian
Emma John writes an article in today’s G2. Link here.
“…Its translator, the British-Chinese playwright Ben Yeoh, never expected to see his adaptation on stage. Inspired by a love of eastern poetry, Yeoh decided to translate a Noh play as a personal challenge before submitting it to the Gate’s prestigious translation award, where it won plaudits from the judges, who included playwright Christopher Hampton and actor-director Simon Callow. “I almost didn’t hand it in to the competition,” Yeoh admits when we meet in London. “I thought, ‘Who’s going to choose something that, if you were to read it out, is only 20 minutes of text, and in a completely alien theatre form?…’”
Speed Death of the Radiant Child
I travelled to Plymouth to see Speed Death of the Radiant Child and it was completely worth it even if in the combined train travelling time and ticket prices I could have watched the play almost 4 times…
There will be more detailed thoughts later, but I wanted to record my sadness that this seems unlikely ever to make it to London and that so few people had the chance to see it.
In the macro, it seemed to me to be a kaleidoscope of life in all its noise and random/ intended interconnectedness of being and unbeing.
In its detail, it threads the information we radiate out with the data we receive in with the brilliant blazing children – like River Phoenix – and the lack of language to describe ______ the words needed to build the ground to walk on (what’s a condition or illness if you don’t have the terms or words for it?) and various types of death – blue skin – and water.
If that doesn’t quite make sense, it’s partially because it’s very hard to recreate the sense of theatre the work gives you, in words.
For me personally, I had images and sounds of these kids – radiant children themselves – jumping off an abandoned high dive platform into the Plymouth sea – splash boom – look towards the light house – look back – catch the sight of the stillness of the rock pool – interweaving with the heat and wet of the play; and on the train journey back: flash a pylon – radiant – sleep – wake – where’s the language to describe that?
Nakamitsu Notes
It is virtually impossible to translate exactly from one idiom to another. A translator and adaptor has to do the best they can in representing the original in heart and spirit yet remaining alive to the sensibilities of a modern audience.
In transforming a Noh play to English, there are not just idioms of language to tackle but a whole theatrical form and culture that are very different to an English or Western world.
There are several ways to attempt this, all beset with problems and possibilities. There are translations which will describe a Noh play more closely to what you may see in a performance in Japan and those that will treat a Noh text in terms of literary criticism. Those types of translations can be brilliant and useful.
However, there are those who will argue that the plays only exist in performance. Japan has no great tradition of reading Noh as literature. My version was written with performance in mind. It is not academic. It is not attempting to be literature.
In attempting to write a version that can be used by English speaking actors from a Western culture, the roots and traditions of classical Japanese Noh will need to be explored.
A strict adherence to the way it might be performed by one of the schools of Noh in Japan is not likely to work for Western actors who do not have the long training of classical Noh performers, let alone all the other aspects that need to go into a classical Noh performance.
Forgetting the traditions of the classical way would be a mistake as well. There needs to be some way to remain true to both a modern sensibility and a classical one.
*
For the Gate production, the introduction of a prologue to Nakamitsu was influenced by the traditional format of presenting a Kyogen before a Noh play in a Noh programme, and by the use of ghosts in Noh plays. It was also inspired by placing the world of Nakamitsu into a context reflecting a modern dilemma.
Giri (duty) vs ninjo (compassion/humanity) is a pivotal topic in Japanese literature and society. Duty does not properly translate the meaning of giri. It is closer to the Roman concept of pietas or the Greek concept of honour, timē / τιμή. It is the sense of “obligation to one’s superiors”.
The choices and arguments fought out by the characters in Nakamitsu seem modern. We face the same dilemmas today between what we ought to do and what we want to do.
In the version for the Gate, we created our own performance language from an understanding that we are not Noh trained but acknowledging the roots and aims of Noh. Our approach uses western psychology and theatre practice and combines that with Noh traditions.
Discussion revolved around an adherence to the elements of a Noh structure, for instance keeping a gesture of weeping where appropriate but informing the gesture with the company’s western theatre practice rather than trying to imitate classical Noh.
It is a collision and fusion of our arts.
Nakamitsu
I am extremely excited about Nakamitsu. It is forming into a brilliant piece of theatre.
It combines a tragic epic story, song, dance, music, and many of the spectacles that theatre can be. I am proud of it and the whole company.
It has a life or death decision, a samurai sword and a big drum. All in an hour. Who would want to miss that?!
If you are about in London, May 24 to June 16. Please come.
Guardian guide preview here.
The Gate Theatre presents
NAKAMITSU
in a new version by Benjamin Yeoh
24 May – 16 June
Directed by Jonathan Munby & Michael Ashcroft
Design by Mike Britton
Lighting by Hartley T A Kemp
Sound by Paul Arditti
Original Music Composed & Performed by Ansuman Biswas
Cast Peter Bankolé, Matthew Burgess, Richard Clews & Daniel Williams
Ignited by a sudden act of violence, Nakamitsu must make a choice: love versus honour. From the shadows of a seedy underworld, his story unfolds. East and West collide in a startling new version of this classic Noh play, often attributed to Zeami. Benjamin Yeoh’s adaptation of Nakamitsu is a modern ensemble piece performed with live music by Ansuman Biswas.
Nakamitsu is winner of the Gate Theatre & Oberon Books Translation Award 2006. This award was set up to encourage and reward the vital contribution translation and adaptation makes to international theatre. The judges for the 2006 award were Samuel Adamson (playwright and translator), Penny Black (playwright and translator), Jack Bradley (former literary manager of the National Theatre), Simon Callow (actor, writer, director), Christopher Hampton (director, writer and translator), Nell Leyshon (playwright), and Jatinder Verma (Artistic Director of Tara Arts).
Performances 24 May – 16 June
Mon– Thurs at 7:30pm, Fri 7:00 & 9:00pm, Sat 5:00 & 7:30pm
Tickets: £15 | £10
Happy Mondays: a limited number of seats are pay what you can on the door
BOX OFFICE 020 7229 0706
Critics: dead white men
Nick Hytner seems to have sparked off a debate about British theatre critics by calling them dead white men.
Of course, this isn’t exactly accurate although hints at some underlying truths. There are more older male critics than younger or female ones.
I’ve found Lyn Gardener’s and Susannah Clapp’s comments more interesting.
Lyn makes the point that she goes to see a wider range of theatre than the first-string theatre critics who mainly sees London-centric main shows. This means that a second strong critic has a wider range of theatre vocabulary and importantly, current theatre vocabulary, to draw from in drawing opinions about plays.
Clapp writes:
“A Matter of Life and Death, which tells its tale not only in dialogue, but with songs and mime and aerialism, is an example of movement theatre, which until now has been mostly seen on the Fringe, where it has regularly disproved the idea that theatre audiences are always over 40. I’ve had some of my best experiences in the theatre watching it. Over at the Telegraph, Charles Spencer has had some of his worst.”
I also believe not only is this newer theatre practise great for British theatre. I think it is flowing through to our young and new (and more established) writers. Both Polly Stenham and Mike Bartlett recently at the Court and a whole host of other writers eg (off the top of my head) Tom Morton-Smith, Duncan Macmillan and the more experienced Dennis Kelly, Chloe Moss, Rebecca Lenkiewicz are developing, have developed exceptional theatrical voices (and I remain forever jealous at that, struggling with my own writing voice….). With the recent change in artistic directors in some of the new writing theatre, I expect to see still more and from some of our “forgotten” but very much living greats like Philip Ridley, whose Leaves of Glass at the Soho has been a welcome commission.
I suppose I am saying, ever onwards and forwards, not backwards. Theatre and art marches on with its history. We can never truly recreate Shakespeare (although we can reinvent it for modern times). Shakespeare was created in reaction to its time and place, and position in cultural history. We can create a theatre of today, whether dead white men appreciate it or not.
Speed Death
Another person’s work who I will be positively bias about is Chris Goode, who also writes a wiser and more insightful blog than mine.
Goode has a new piece going on at the Plymouth Drum. See here. It’s called Speed Death of the Radiant Child.
I really want to see it but like the May Queen I can’t make the logistics work, between rehearsals for Nakamitsu, day job and life.
Kiss of Life was one of the most uplifting plays I’ve seen dealing with amongst other matters, the interconnectedness of being. It was brilliant.
I feel all the poorer as I remember what Gideon Lester once told me and I’ve tried to take to heart and I paraphrase:
“Theatre is a live art, so if you hear about a performance that you truly want to see and it is across the otherside of the world, then you must fly over to see it because the performance will not last forever but it may live on in your mind for the rest of your life”
*
Update: I’ve managed to squeeze in a booking. It’s about 3 to 3.5 hours on the train from London. But luckily I like train journeys.
May Queen
I expect that if you read this, you will also know Stephen Sharkey’s blog.
But as he is not going to blow his own trumpet, I will do so for him.
His work and the production gets some great reviews:
The Times here.
Guardian here.
Stage here.
I really wanted to go but I can’t make the logisitics work between rehearsals and day job. If you can make it, I recommend it but of course I’m bias.
Bristol Old Vic going dark…
There’s an awful lot of debate, speculation and many angry people pointing fingers about this.
Lyn Gardner wrote a piece and it has attracted many comments. See here.
I don’t know the full story, but having some experience at board level I know there are many difficult matters to balance and that to a large extent you have to trust that your creative team will deliver.
However, now the decision has been taken if people want the BOV to flourish, then they do need to rally round and help it restructure rather than recriminate.
Looking forward is often harder than looking back.
Punch Drunk: The Masque of the Red Death
For those of you who liked Faust. And I definitely loved it.
Start booking now for their next production. It’s selling out already. Especially the party nights…
“Journey into a macabre world and explore the four corners of Battersea Arts Centre’s Old Town Hall as Punchdrunk immerses the entire site in Poe’s imagination. Inspired by the classic short stories of Edgar Allan Poe, The Masque of the Red Death is an indoor promenade performance lasting up to 3 hours, with two entry times at 7.15pm and 7.45pm . Evening dress is optional . On Friday and Saturday nights tickets for The Masque of The Red Death include entry into Red Death Late Nights, an after-show party with live music, dancing and surprise mystery guests.”
I’m hearing that they are taking over the whole of the BAC and transforming the old town hall like you’ve never seen it before.
Given what they made of an old warehouse, an old town hall should be very exciting.
See you at the party!
Book via National Theatre link or BAC 020 7223 2223
Theatre under Blair
Michael Billington argues here that
“The real significance of the Blair decade is that theatre has regained its old political bite.”
Of course MB tends to views his theatre through a lens of political and social commentary which for instance, Lyn Gardner doesn’t tend to do.
On first thought, I can’t exactly link what difference the Blair decade has made. True, there does seem to be some more political theatre but is that truly Blair’s biggest effect?
Does theatre trundle on more or less regardless to its government? Does theatre only become interesting in opposition to some form of oppression?
Thoughts welcome.
Nakamitsu: Free tickets for blogggers
I asked my nice producer and she said yes.
No, I’m not marrying her. I did it, for you.
She says bloggers can have free tickets to see my play, Nakamitsu (as if you didn’t know). How is the night of May 29 (before “press” night) ? You’ve got to be more important than “press”, non?
Obviously, there is an expectation of a blog mention, but hey if you don’t like it or don’t want to then you don’t have to.
Mondays have pay as much as you can/want tickets if you are feeling broke or can’t make the May 29.
And for those who get restless, I reckon the play will be over in 45 minutes, although they are still rehearsing so it could be shorter!
Email / comment me if you are interested and I’ll pass your details on to the producer and I hope to see you at the play. Or more importantly in the pub below.
First week of rehearsals for Nakamitsu
Amazing things have started to happen.
From my point of view as “writer” or in this case adaptor/translator and upholder of the text… the moments where the words really start to come alive is incredibly thrilling.
The play respecting the Noh tradition – without being Noh (which would be impossible for us here) – is combining physicality, dance, poetry, song and music… hopefully everything theatre can be or might be.
It’s short too, so the West End Whingers might like it.
There was a beautiful moment when there is a switch from a 1st person to a 3rd person narrative [Brecht took this idea from Japanese and Chinese theatre, amongst other places, and really ran with it ---> now we have "Brechtian" theatrical moments] where there was a possible solution in combining the moment with a hummed chant. It may or may not work in full production but in that moment at that time at that space it felt very truthful.
Just one of the aspects that make rehearsals exciting. Although I’m only there half the time as work and other duties call. And actors (and directors) do probably need some time to create without their writer looking over thier shoulders (!) or do people think the writer should be round for everything…?
Artists of East Asian descent
OK. So don’t get me started on the “tick boxing” and categorisation of people.
*
Interestingly, categorisation seems to be a very human trait, I did some of my degree in this area of Experimental Psychology. Did you know that sheep dog farmers, show similar face recognition categorisation characteristics to naming their sheep dogs as “normal” people do in recognising human faces (adjusted for race/environment) ?
The short conclusion is that we probably don’t have a part of our brain devoted to just recognising human face but instead have a part of our brain which gets trained to be very good at recognising patterns such as faces.
*
I digress.
I wanted to link to this new resource
http://www.eastonline.org/ which is a database for artists of East Asian descent. Could be useful although still in its early days.
Rehearsals for Nakamitsu
Both slightly scard and excited with rehearsals for Nakamitsu starting.
It’s probably my biggest play so far, in terms of venue and reputation, even if it is in the tiny Gate theatre.
It struck me once again, through auditions and now into rehearsals how many committed actors and theatre professionals there are out there, many with years of training and a myriad of skills.
I’m looking forward to know how the physicality and music of the play develops and how my text holds up.
*
I managed to pop by the Whingers party on the weekend– I didn’t realise it was Andrew’s birthday as well. It was fun and good to see the actual faces behind the blogs…
Great Theatre Archive
I’ve come across this brilliant archive resource at the British Library.
In their words:
Project overview: This website accompanies a five-year project (2003-2008) to reinvestigate British theatre history 1945-1968, from the perspectives of both the theatregoer and the practitioner.
You can now access:
a unique oral history of British theatre 1945-1968, with transcripts (sound extracts will be added later)
a description of the contents of the British Library’s theatre archives of key post-war figures, such as John Gielgud, Ralph Richardson, Michel Saint-Denis and Cedric Hardwicke.
There are great interview transcripts for instance:
Michael Frayn, Harold Hobson, Arnold Wesker and Timothy West; Leo Kersley, Bernard Hepton and Thelma Barlow.
Check it out here
The BL also holds an archive of most modern British plays.
*
I came across it as I discovered after my first play, Lemon Love, was performed at the Finborough Theatre that the 1968 Theatres Act as well as ending the Lord Chamberlain’s power to pre-censor theatre…. also stipulated that a copy of every new play performed in a licensed venue in Great Britain should be deposited at the British Library!
Don’t be boring
I’ve followed Anthony Neilson’s work for a while. Not only did I think it was brilliant by I was intrigued by his method of working as it has almost always had him as writer-director — at least for the play’s first outing.
I think he has once said that the first run of a play should be made in the playwright’s vision. The second or more, presumably, can have the director tamper about more (!) but perhaps I misremember.
When he speaks, I try to listen.
He’s recently done a piece for the Guardian:
“…Unfortunately, despite being pretty sure the next movement will be absurdist in nature, I couldn’t think of a snappy name for it so I gave up on that. Then I thought I’d write a provocative Dogme-style manifesto, but I only came up with four rules, and I’ve already broken two of them in my new show. Then I thought I’d write Ten Commandments for young writers but a) that’s a little pompous, and b) there’s only one commandment worth a damn, and it’s this: THOU SHALT NOT BORE…”
and
“…The way to circumvent ego (and thus reduces the risk of boring) is to make story our god. Find a story that interests you and tell it. Don’t ask yourself why a story interests you; we can no more choose this than who we fall in love with. You may not be what you think you are – not as kind, as liberal, as original as you ought to be – and yes, the story (if you are true to it) will find that out. But while your attention is taken up with its mechanics, some truth may seep out, and that is the lifeblood of good, exciting art…”
He adds to sub-rules to his not boring rule:
-No poetry
-No long plays
(depending on the comfort of the seats presumably this means plays at the comfy National Theatre seats are allowed to be longer than at a fringe venue, at least relatively speaking)
“…Two asides. One, dialogue: there’s a lot of poetic dialogue around. Sometimes a play is narratively accessible but the dialogue is mannered to the point of incomprehensibility. Some people like it, but I’m suspicious. Poetic dialogue, done badly, leaves no room for subtext. A lack of subtext is fundamentally undramatic. And boring.
And two, duration: many plays are far too long. All writers should be made to visit the venue where their play is to be performed and sit in the seats with a stopwatch. When your arse and spine start to sing, check the watch. That’s your running time. Exceed it at your peril…”
Well, I did have a little bit of poetic language in my latest piece for the Miniaturists, but it was short, it wasn’t boring and I loved my story even though I wasn’t quite sure where it took me. So I mainly passed the test…
Thanks to all those who came along and all those who put such hard work in to the Miniaturists’ organistion. I had a great time.
Miniaturist, Mike’s Wishes or The Broken Necklace
So, it’s all speed ahead with my show for the Miniaturists.
I’ve had a lot of fun doing it and have a great team with Hannah Eidinow (a veteran mini director, who is directing an unprecedented two of the minis this time (!)
The actors, Hywel John and Celia Adams, seem to have a good spark between them.
The play is called MIKE’S WISHES although I was trying for a last minute change to THE BROKEN NECKLACE. Reader, which do you prefer?
I like to think of it as a modern day fairy tale.
If you’ve not come to a mini evening, perhaps you should check it out.
5pm or 8pm this Sunday (25 March) at the Arcola theatre
See link here and directions here
Josie Rourke, Bush Theatre
Josie Rourke has been named the new artistic director of the Bush theatre in west London.
The Guardian quotes her as saying:
…she was looking forward to a “bold and promising future” and “the Bush inspires, nurtures and champions playwrights and I am thrilled to have been invited to become its artistic director”
Also,
Bush chairman John Shakeshaft said: “I’m delighted to welcome Josie as artistic director. There has been considerable interest in this position and Josie’s vision for the future of The Bush was particularly inspiring and stood out from an incredibly strong field.”
*
I’ve bumped into Josie off and on over the years, but she was responsible for giving me my first directing job at university, at the ADC (The Crucible) and so trapping me into this whole theatre malarky. I remember arguing that you should not cut Miller’s words unless you spoke to him about it first. Ah, the innocence of youth.
I wish her well.
-
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
-
