Raja Edepus, And: Making of “Raja Edepus.” Lynda Paul

Raja Edepus, and: Making of “Raja Edepus.” Lynda Paul

Asian Music, Volume 42, Number 1, Winter/Spring 2011, pp. 141-145 (Article)

Published by University of Texas Press

For additional information about this article http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/amu/summary/v042/42.1.paul.html

Access Provided by Yale University Library at 02/05/11 2:36AM GMT Recording Reviews

Raja Edepus. Directed and produced by William Maranda. DVD. 92 minutes. Vancouver BC: Villon Films, 2009. Available from http://www.villon! lms .com.

Making of “Raja Edepus.” Directed and produced by William Maranda. DVD. 27 minutes. Vancouver BC: Villon Films, 2008. Available from http://www .villon! lms.com.

If, at ! rst glance, ancient Greek tragedy and contemporary Balinese dance- drama seem unlikely theatrical companions, the production Raja Edepus puts any such doubts to rest. Produced by William Maranda with artistic direction by Nyoman Wenten, Raja Edepus is a compelling Balinese rendering of the ancient Sophocles drama, Oedipus Rex. Created for live performance at the Bali Arts Festival in 2006, Raja Edepus is now available to a wider public through two DVDs: one, a recording of the show, and the other, a documentary about the performance’s preparation. " e live production fuses musical and dramatic techniques used in contemporary Balinese theater with techniques thought to have been used in ancient Greek theater. As Maranda describes on the Making of “Raja Edepus” DVD, the two types of theater—though separated by 2500 years and much of the earth— have signi! cant features in common. Maranda explains that he was inspired to initiate this project a# er attending performances of the Balinese gamelan in residence at the University of British Columbia; he was struck by the fact that Ba- linese theater uses masks—a device familiar to Maranda from his previous work on ancient Greek theater. Masks, in both Balinese and ancient Greek theater, are used to impart information to an audience about the masked character’s persona and ethos (his or her social status, level of a$ uence, personality, etc.). Despite the di% erent religions, histories, and cultures of the ancient Greeks and the Ba- linese, Maranda points out that their world- views are remarkably compatible: broadly speaking, both societies believe in the power of fate, and in a panoply of divinities involved in its orchestration. And indeed, although Maranda does not mention this, both societies also use theater to articulate these world- views, imbuing theatrical performance (especially in ritual settings) with the power to reveal cosmological truth.

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" e Making of . . . DVD, featuring Maranda (both talking to the camera and brie' y conversing with two Balinese artists who worked on Raja Edepus), does not make clear precisely who made each decision during the show’s artistic creation. However, Maranda’s discussion of the creative process—supplemented by photographs and video clips—suggests that he collaborated in signi! cant part with a cadre of expert Balinese performers and designers. It seems that, on Maranda’s initiative, this inter- artistic team of mostly Balinese directors treated the Sophocles play as the show’s basic “script,” which they subsequently infused with Balinese elements in the months leading up to the performance. " e directorial team in' ected Oedipus Rex with a variety of Balinese con- cepts and theatrical devices, some subtle and some more striking. Most notably, they added to the cluster of Sophocles’s speaking roles a large, powerful kecak ensemble and an active, dynamic gamelan. As can clearly be seen on the DVD of the Raja Edepus performance, each of these two ensembles is employed stra- tegically throughout the show, to great dramatic e% ect. " e kecak ensemble in particular seems to ful! ll a variety of important dramatic functions, a few of which I outline here. First, the kecak performers supplement and support the Greek Chorus. Al- though the production clearly di% erentiates the kecak chorus from Sophocles’s Chorus (the two groups wear di% erent costumes, gather in discrete groups for much of their time on stage, and one group recites the text of the Chorus while the other chants kecak syllables), the kecak performers add weight to the Chorus’s commentary. As a crowd of neutral, non- “speaking” performers, the kecak ensemble—physically present throughout the show—seems to bolster the Chorus’s commentary. " ey act as observant and anonymous members of the group, making the Chorus seem even more “present” as a synecdoche of society. Second, the kecak ensemble (as well as the gamelan) sonically expresses the dramatic pace of the production. " e almost continuous music alerts the audience to the level of dramatic intensity underlying any given character’s speech. " e tempo and texture range from slow and calm to quick and highly agitated, speeding up with each small- scale dramatic climax, and building to a frenzy at the end, when Edepus realizes that he has ful! lled the prophecy. Because of the close relationship between the drama’s pace and the characters’ agitation, the Balinese ensembles seem to embody not only the dramatic structure but also the actors’ emotional subtexts throughout the production. In this way, Raja Edepus’s use of musical tempo and texture to enhance dramatic “mood” clearly bears some similarities to techniques used in Western incidental music and ! lm soundtracks. " e music that they produce, however, is more fully integrated into the drama than most incidental and ! lm music—perhaps not surprising, con- sidering the tightly knit integration of music and dance in most Balinese dance genres, which feature both musicians and dancers constantly responding to the

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other in any given performance. " e kecak performers do not simply provide background soundscape to Raja Edepus; they are staged as part of the diegetic world, visibly taking part in scenes with the Sophocles- derived characters. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the kecak group acts like a physical human current, driving the main actors o% stage, and sweeping them into new posi- tions on the stage. One of the most powerful moments of this kecak- character interaction occurs during the scene in which Edepus, having just spoken with Tiresias, now mistakenly believes that Creon conspired with Tiresias to accuse him falsely of Laius’s murder. He confronts Creon in a fury. As both Edepus and Creon accuse each other of deceit and treason, the enormous kecak crowd splits in two, one side li# ing Edepus onto its shoulders and the other li# ing Creon. " e two crowds, actors on top, circle each other, revolving around the stage slowly and angrily. Edepus and Creon continue to argue. " is dramatic moment, already serious in the original play, is notably intensi! ed by this staging, which employs the kecak chorus to corporeally embody an unnamed powerful force—something simultaneously inside and outside the human world, literally li# ing Edepus and Creon and sweeping them around in repetitive circles of miscomprehending, angry confusion. Is this force the manifestation of an internal, psychic rage? Is it fate? Is it the will of a divinity? Another moment of similar signi! cance occurs when the horri! ed Edepus, fully cognizant for the ! rst time that he has unknowingly committed horri! c crimes, prepares to gouge out his eyes. " e kecak chorus swarms him, surrounds him, and ! nally descends upon him in frenzied chant, concealing him from the audience (at which point, the actor is able to take o% his crown and change into the mask that depicts bloodied eyes). Eventually the kecak crowd disperses so that Edepus may emerge, transformed. " e kecak chorus makes this transformation possible, both symbolically (as they drive him to the realization) and literally (as they hide the actor from the audience). In sum, the kecak performers move the action forward in Raja Edepus, ! gu- ratively and literally. " ey support the Chorus, by virtue of their very presence on stage, and they embody the dramatic pace, through the tempo and texture of their rhythmic chanting. But perhaps their most powerful contribution to this production of Sophocles’s drama takes place during the times when they physically interact with the actors, literally pushing the characters forward. In such instances, the kecak ensemble appears to physically manifest a force stron- ger than humanity. And despite the commanding, authoritative nature of both Edepus and Creon as characters (on the surface, at least), it is ultimately the kecak chorus that reveals them to be vulnerable, and pushes them where destiny has decreed they must go. In this way, the creators make extraordinarily palpable the tension between divinely ordained fate on the one hand, and human “power” (or ultimately, powerlessness) on the other.

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Overall, the DVD of the Raja Edepus performance is clear and thorough. Pro- duced with high- quality image and sound, it o% ers the viewer a good sense of the show as a whole. Six di% erent camera angles are used, and the viewer is shown both close- ups (usually of the actors’ faces/masks) and wide shots, displaying the brilliantly choreographed crowds that are a hallmark of this production. " e rhe- torically gi# ed actor- dancers speak Indonesian, which is translated in the (Eng- lish only) subtitles. " e recording seems to show nearly the entire performance, with the exception of four instances, when the scene fades out and a caption appears on a black screen, explaining the current dramatic situation. About ! # een seconds later, the caption fades back to the performance. It is unclear exactly how much of the actual production is cut, but Maranda’s comments on the Making of . . . DVD suggest that it might be as little as ten minutes. Aside from those few minutes (which are presumably cut with the aim of creating a more stream- lined video), only two other elements of the performance are not captured on the recording: ! rst, the audience—and thereby the theater as a whole—is never shown, making it impossible to fully grasp the nature of the theatrical space in which Raja Edepus was performed. Although the viewer can hear the audience reacting to the performance, it is unclear precisely how many people are in at- tendance, what the theater looks like, and so on. In addition, the gamelan, seated to the side of the stage, does not appear onscreen very o# en. Apart from these minor issues, however, we are given a thorough and beautifully shot view of the performance. A# er a brief introduction of still photographs of Bali, the video recording begins precisely when the performance starts and ends precisely when it is ! nished. " e DVD is not divided into tracks—something that might have bene! ted teachers interested in using this recording in a classroom setting; nor is it supplemented by any “special features” or liner notes. Although such features may have facilitated the DVD’s use in educational settings, their absence in no way detracts from the value of this exceptional performance (especially since one can purchase the Making of . . . DVD for details about the creation process). Ultimately, the main point of this DVD seems to be to let the viewer see without distractions the main stage action of this unique performance, and to this end, it succeeds admirably. " e Making of “Raja Edepus” DVD makes a useful companion to the performance DVD. It integrates video clips and still photographs from the creation and rehearsal process with video clips from the performance itself. It also features Maranda as a “talking head,” discussing the production from both before and a# er the performance. In addition, we are shown brief clips of him talking with two of his collaborators—a Balinese mask maker and Balinese costume designer (whose remarks are translated on the video in English subtitles). We never see commentary by the other collaborators on the project—notably ab- sent is Nyoman Wenten, the artistic director—nor do we ever see the show’s

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performers outside of the rehearsals or performance. As a result, this DVD is mainly a window into Maranda’s perspective on the project. " e anecdotes he recounts about the project illustrate the wonder experienced by a Western artist upon ! rst becoming immersed in Balinese culture. He tells about an incident during rehearsals in which the actor playing Tiresias su% ered a TIA attack—a problem regarded by Western medicine as a physical malady (a sort of miniature stroke), but believed by Maranda’s Balinese collaborators to have been caused by a spiritual problem (this actor had accidentally picked up a sacred stick without properly performing a ritual for it). A# er the actor, Kaseno, was sprinkled with holy water and taken to the hospital, he recovered and went on to play Tiresias in the ! nal performance. Maranda’s discussion of this incident, and Bali’s world- views and artistic traditions in general, might sound a bit simplistic to scholars of the area. However, it is clear that Maranda has great respect for Balinese arts and culture, and the strength of this DVD lies not in its specialist discourse, but in its insight into a directing artist’s thought process regarding a brilliant and moving cross- cultural theatrical project. " is pair of DVDs is bound to appeal to a variety of viewers. " rough the video recordings, scholars are given access to an incomparable performance, one that demands further analytical thought from theater specialists and Bali specialists alike. Teachers will be able to make great use of these DVDs as classroom material for a multitude of courses. And students, connoisseurs of Balinese arts, and non- academic viewers who are interested in Bali or theater will each ! nd something of great value here. Lynda Paul Yale University

La Voix des Ancêtres / ! e Voice of Ancestors—Karakalpakistan. Compil. Frédéric Léotar. Vincennes (France): BUDA Records 3017797, 2009. Music of the World series. One compact disc (55 minutes, 22 seconds) and one DVD (15 minutes).

Karakalpakistan is an autonomous republic of Uzbekistan, which occupies the western portion of that country, south of the Aral Sea. " at region of Central Asia was almost unknown to the West until the 1980s when the rest of the world heard of the Aral Sea ecological disaster in which the sea almost disappeared as a result of numerous Soviet irrigation projects from the 1960s which diverted the rivers that fed it, nearly emptying it. Today, fortunately, the sea is slowly recovering. " ough the musical culture of Karakalpakistan is similar in many respects to those of other cultures in Central Asia—in particular Kazakhstan

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