I have a bit of time right now. We are doing benefit planning for our big shindig on May 14th, and of course I have to choose a season for Keen next year. That work is happening. But I don’t have to be at the theater every night so the 50- and 60-hour weeks are over for now.
So I’ve been reading, a lot. And I am reading a category of book I haven’t looked at in years: theater theory. I am reading the books I read in drama school: Peter Brook’s THE EMPTY SPACE, Robert Edmond Jones’ THE DRAMATIC IMAGINATION, Stanislavsky’s ON THE ART OF THE STAGE, and (next up) Martin Esslins ANATOMY OF DRAMA. I might go back to read Stanislavskys acting trilogy, and maybe Artaud and Grotowski too.
It’s been interesting. Some parts I remember well, some not at all. Some resonate deeply with my experience, some seem silly and irrelevant. One theme I note: fear. They all talk about fear. They all talk about the danger of the work, of how the fear of exposure and failure and money etc., how fear compromises and challenges the truth and beauty of the theater constantly.
I know fear to be a real and present enemy to the creative process. Stanislavsky is adamant in his belief that the rehearsal space must be free of fear. Brook, too, wants for people to feel safe. But both also acknowledge the need for discipline and rigor – they are hardly chummy in their description of their working methods. There is something very adult in their view of how a rehearsal might be conducted. But both men clearly value (and talk about, at length) the necessity of freedom and play. It’s as though one’s grandfather agrees to get on his hands and knees and romp around with a child. We know he enjoys the game, but he knows that game is maybe the most important thing hell ever do.
I suppose what’s been most reassuring is how little the essential challenge has changed. They sought beauty and truth, and they worked to develop ways to achieve those ends within the cultures they worked from. Stanislavsky movingly writes: “Simpler. Easier. Higher. Gayer. Those are the words which ought to be inscribed on the front of every theater.” Sounds like a good start to me.
keencompany 