Practitioner Notes

*Due to the random and unconventional meltdown of my Macbook pro, which by the way is the farthest thing from ‘pro’, I have to recall, retrieve and adapt the notes I can find on my peers’ blogs as well as from my memory. But hopefully, I can bring forth enough information to suffice for the future when I’m going to be in need of these notes later. Many of my notes moreover were taken by hand on the handouts given by my peers, which I shall show to you, Mrs. Moon on Monday.*

Practitioner Notes:

Peter Brook: Annie, Kevin, Andrew, Joel

HISTORY:

-      Peter Brook was born in England in March 1925.

-      He started his career at a very young age, directing his first production at the age of 17. He directed at Stratford-upon-Avon and had an apprenticeship at a film studio.

-      He moreover founded the International Centre for Theatre Research in 1970. For the first three years, this group of dancers, actors and musicians from many different backgrounds and cultures joined together to try and answer the question: “What were the common stories, the recognizable shorthands, the instant abstractions, the shared outlines of story and character with which an international group could work?”

INFLUENCES:

-      Peter Brook, like many other practitioners, was influenced by a vast array of people.

-      His ideas for his Theatre of Cruelty were deeply influenced by Artaud. It centered to push to emotional, physical and mental limits.

-      How do you portray violence on the stage?

-      Film intrigued Peter Brook and had a profound impact on his life – he was also a film director after all.

-      Merce Cunningham

-      Jan Kott

-      Julian Beck

-      Judith Malina

-      Gordon Craig

-      Brook’s works are also inspired by the experimental works of other famous practitioners such as Jerzy Grotowski and Bertolt Brecht (those names sound sort of/kind of familiar)/

KEY PHILOSOPHIES:

-      A key element of Brook’s philosophies was that theatre should be relatable to the audience’s scopes and life.

-      As evidenced by the International Centre for Theatre Research, he was a strong proponent of theatre colonialism – the idea that theatre could be translated over different cultures and could transcend many boundaries that could be laid out in front of us. Experiment with all styles!

n  Putting acting groups in different environments.

-      Group development is pivotal for the functions of a theatre company and thus the exercises performed prove crucial. This can only happen through living with your theatre group.

-      The location makes the performance rather than the performance making the location. Does that make sense? This also brings to mind a viewpoint of Anne Bogart – how you must utilize the architecture that you are provided with.

-      Like the Andong masked dance that we saw, Peter Brook incorporated the interaction with the audience and really played with that idea.

-      Perform for everyone and make it mean something different for every group of viewers. “What am I doing theatre for?”

-      Make sure you reach your audience, or you fail.

MANIFESTATIONS:

-      King Lear (1962)

n  Worked with trusted actors

n  Experimentation

n  Rehearsal technique

n  Director as designer

n  Simplifying

n  Edward Craig

n  Broken down

n  White light

n  House lights (oooh, very Brechtian as well)

COLLABORATIONS:

-      Royal Shakespeare Company

-      Salvador Dali

-      Paul Scofield

-      Chrstopher Fry

n  Translation

-      John Gielgud

-      Edith Evans

-      Laurence Olivier

-      Charles Marowitz

-      Jerzy Grotowski

THEATRE GROUPS ESTABLISHED:

-      International Centre for Theatre Research

-      Theatre of Cruelty (Royal Shakespeare Company)

Constantin Stanislavski: Austin, Emma, George, Sammy

HISTORY:

-      He was born on January 5^th, 1863 in Moscow Russia.

-      At the age of 14 (these practitioners sure do start at a young age), his family turned a wing of their country estate into a theatre.

-      His family and he started their own theatre troupe “The Alekseyev Circle.”

-      He kept a journal of all his performances and reflected on them. He was known to be very self critical and built upon his reflections.

-      For Stanislavski, reality was a key element of theatre that he truly believed in even from a young age.

-      You seek art yourself – no one can teach it but you.

INFLUENCES:

-      Childhood theatre troupe

-      Tomasso Salvini playing Othello in 1882.

-      Mikhail Shchepkin

-      Ernesto Rossi – he told Stanislavski that his acting was in need of art.

-      Stanislavski was influenced by the ideas of a realistic set in 1898 with Hauptemann’s The Sunken Bell.

KEY PHILOSOPHIES:

-      “A system is not a hand-me-down suit that you can put on and walk off in, or a cook-book where all you need to find the page and there is your recipe. No, it is a whole way of life.”

-      Realism – Selection and distillation o observations of daily life; capturing the essence of life.

-      Analysis, perception, experience, objective/purpose, belief, discipline

-      Naturalism – Portray the intricate details of the world and make it seem like it’s actual life.

-      Research your characters!!!

-      All actors must know the subtext of the characters. The actions and words being stated must have a purpose and meaning. The actor is never unengaged and believes in what is happening on stage.

-      Actors should always try to broaden their experiences to be able to relate to the characters they are exposed to.

-      Wherever there is life, there is action; whenever action, movement, where movement, tempo; and where there is tempo, there is rhythm.

MANIFESTATIONS:

-      Vladimir Nemirovich-Danchenko (Moscow Art Theater)

-       Anton Chekhov, the writer of “The Seagull” and Leo Tolstoy, writer of “What is Art?”

-       Chekhov made subtler, emotionally charged projects after he learned upon understanding the implied messages hidden in the writing. This idea was shared by both Stanislavski and Chekhov.

-       Tolstoy influenced Stanislavski, which art had to be simplified and available for all. This helped form the thinking of Stanislavski.

-       The Society of Art and Literature (1888)

-       Stanislavsky, A.F. Fedotov, F.P. Komissarzhevskii, F.L. Sologuh

-       Create a society where they portray acting in a redefining way.

-       Moscow Art Theater (1898)

-       Moscow, Russia’s most valued company

-       Many classic performances all depicting a sense of realism

-       January 17^th, 1904 – written by Anton Chekhov but directed by Stanislavski,

-       Cherry Orchard

Bertolt Brecht: Sabrina, Andy, Peter, 

HISTORY:

-      1898: Bertolt Brecht is born in Augsburg, Germany on February 10^th

-      1914: World War I breaks out

-      1916: Newspapers begin publishing his work under the title ‘Bert Brecht’

-      1917: At his father’s recommendation, enrolled in a medical course at Munich University

n  Inspired by Arthur Kustcher to study drama and theatre

-      1918: ‘Baal’, first theatrical piece

-      1918: World War I ends

-      1919: ‘Drums in the Night’, second theatrical piece

-      1918: World War II ends

-      1919: Brecht and Paula Banholzer have a son

-      1922: Brecht is awarded the prestigious Kleist Prize for his first three plays

n  “[Brecht's] language is vivid without being deliberately poetic, symbolical without being over literary. Brecht is a dramatist because his language is felt physically and in the round”

-      1922: Married Viennese opera singer Marianne Zoff

-      1923: Brecth and his wife had a daughter, Hanne Hiob who became a successful actress

-      1930: First performance of one of his most famous works, ‘The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahoganny’

-      1930: Remarried with Helene Weigel, who would be the future Mother Courage

-      1939: World War II breaks out

-      1939: ‘Mother Courage and Her Children’

-      1943: ‘Hangmen Also Die!’ first screenplay, first Hollywood film

n  Collaboration with Hanns Eisler

n  Nominated for Academy Award for Musical Score

-      1945: World War II ends

-      1956: Bertolt Brecht passes away on August 14^th

INFLUENCES:

-       Family – his family had a large influence on Brecht not only as a person but also as a theatre practitioner

-       Born to a devout Protestant mother and a Catholic father, religion played a large role in Brecht’s life.

-       His mother was the center of his religious teachings; she eventually became the model for the ‘self-denying woman’ who features in many of his works

-       His father was the one to get him into a medical course in university, which was the direct lead into his career in theatre

-       Street Theatre – looking at everyday life, the typical nine-to-five work day, and the absurdity of how people live their lives; this routine and all these rehearsed actions are ones actors must be aware of.

-       The contrast of Mother Courage’s disparity and misfortune to our everyday problems yesterday and tomorrow

-       Changes in the World – looking at the changes in the world; promote non-bias into problematic events that could or have happened in people’s lives

-       World War I

-       World War II

-       Spread of Marxism

-       Influence of Marxism – “order from chaos”; only in utter chaos can the world find order

-       “When I read Marx’s Capital, I understood my plays”

KEY PHILOSOPHIES

-       Due to Marxist influence, Brecht strongly believed in devising new ideas and methods out of chaos – the same went for the ideas of his plays. Order is found in chaos. Answers are found in the randomness.

-       He wanted a theatre where the audience could view the situation on the stage with no personal or emotional connections – so that they could take a moment to see and analyze the happenings – don’t get absorbed in them, but look at them objectively; theatre where the audience thinks critically of the happening events

-       The audience must know that they are watching a play and that the characters are played by actors

-       ‘Verfremdungseffekt’

n  Poorly translated by most into ‘alienation’, the actual concept refers to the use of the stage, lighting, and methodology of a performance to distance the audience emotionally

MANIFESTATIONS

-       Gestus – tableaus or motions that are symbolic of the character using it

n  Mother Courage’s Silent Scream

-       Masks – remove the emotional connection from the audience by removing facial expressions and connections

-       Lighting – have the audience aware that the actors are merely performing by having unnatural lighting; lights are on, even in the audience

-       Set and Stage – all signs of the production are visible to the audience

n  scaffold, equipment, and stage crew are all visible

n  the audience sees the backstage-work and knows it is a stage production

n  often there is no set and only a projection on a screen

n  props are purely optional in Brechtian theatre; pantomime is common

-       Placards

n  highlight situations

n  emphasize key words to the audience

n  characters either hold placards or the captions are projected on a screen

-       Music

n  Bursting into song to, again, prevent the audience from getting too immersed in the play

COLLABORATIONS:

Lion Feuchtwanger

-       German novelist and playwright

-       First collaborative attempt

-       Together, they adapted Christopher Marlowe’s Edward II into a play in 1924

-       “the germ of the conception of epic theatre”

Hanns Eisler

-       Austrian composer

-       Wrote music for several of Brecht’s plays

-       Shared their interest and influence by Marxism

-       They were life-long collaborators

Kurt Weill

-       German composer

-       ‘Threepenny Opera’ (1928)

-       ‘Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny’ (1930)

-       One of Brecht’s most famous and controversial works

-       A political-satire

Edwin Piscator

-       Friend and co-creator of epic theatre

-       Reviser of existing philosophies

-       Developer of the set ideas; projected setting, visible scaffolding, etc.