Risking Confrontation with the Other in DV8's Physical Theatre1

Risking Confrontation With the Other in DV8's Physical Theatre1 by Andrew Houston The theatre's raw material is not the actor, nor the space, nor the text, but the attention, the seeing, the hearing, the mind of the spectator. Theatre is the art of the spectator. (Barba 1995: 39) "DV8 Physical Theatre's work is about taking risks, aesthetically and physically..." So says the company's publicity, and not unlike many physical theatre companies, the performance DV8 offers is every bit the embodiment of risk. While this may not seem a particularly unique offering, to witness performers who push and punish their bodies for our pleasure -- given the commercial popularity of risky, shocking entertainment -- it is entirely unique, however, to experience the way in which DV8 demands our risk in relationship to their work. Looking to the company's most renowned live -- and video --production, Dead Dreams of Monochrome Men, this article proposes an examination of how the most profound risk in DV8's physical theatre exists between performer and spectator, in the potential of encounter between the 'real' physical matter of the 'performing body' and the psychic experience, for both performer and spectator, of em-bodiment in performance. Risk is seen to occur as the spectators confront their potential to reconsider subjectivity and the Real, through experience of the theatre event. For Sergei Eisenstein, this risk is a process which he called ex-stasis or, "to go out of oneself." He says: It is not the actor who must enter ecstasy, but the spectator who must 'go out of himself', who must, that is, transcend the limits of the direct and literal perception of what the actor is doing in order 'to see' behind the screen of the obvious and the known. (Eisenstein 1991: 58) If we take the body and its energy as the raw materials for physical theatre, this 'energy' can be seen as 'potential' for the process of ex-stasis, and therefore risk on the part of the spectator to think beyond that which is known. Looking to physical theatre as a system of bodies, we see that the greatest difference of potential is between its performers and its audience. This difference is equalized through the 'work' of the performance, as energy flows from the performers to the spectators. In this respect the audience is offered a potential empowerment through the experience of performance. In physical theatre, the experience of action is the means by which the spectator's psychic state is affected. DV8's physical theatre creates a system of energy-flow among bodies which is sexual. The sexual aspects of the performers' bodies become the object of the spectator's gaze, and so the energy transformed to the spectator is a libidinal energy. It is therefore crucial to explore how the action of this physical system affects the psychic apparatus of the spectator. It is this inherent energy-flow, which increases a spectator's potential for risk; I would like to demonstrate how this dilation of the body's energy occurs through the actions of a theatre event, increasing the potential for ex-stasis, or for the 'work' to bring about risk of confrontation with that which is beyond the spectator's sense of self and reality. In referring to the spectator's experience of physical theatre as a 'theatre event', I am drawing on Jean-Francois Lyotard's notion of an event in communication. The 'event' is constituted by an experience of knowing over the fact of knowledge (Docherty 1993: 25). Its effect encourages experience rather than knowledge of the world it presents, and thereby offers an ontological challenge. 1 This is a copy of an article published in Arts Dialogue, No. 31, Maastricht, The Netherlands (Jan. 1995), pp. 10-14. Houston 2 Attempting a theoretical framework for understanding this challenge is a risk in itself. The task of how to legitimise or judge a spectator's experience of risk in a theatre event is an endeavour of indeterminate potential, and therefore a risk for the role of postmodern criticism. For Lyotard the event is also characterized by the fact or case that something happens, after which nothing will ever be the same again. It disrupts any pre-existing referential frame within which it might be represented or understood (Lyotard 1988: 79). In the following analysis of DV8's physical theatre, an attempt to do justice to the eventhood of their video and live performance is made. Themes and meanings, important to each work will be explored; however, the analysis of risk I am suggesting requires risk as well, as it is hoped the meaning for my readers of DV8's physical theatre will stimulate risk in their own understanding and experience of the work presented. In a process of exploring the 'eventhood' of these theatre events, I shall propose a postmodern dramaturgy. Eugenio Barba, has likened performance dramaturgy to an analysis of actions at work. He explains: The word text, before referring to a written or spoken, printed or manuscripted text, meant 'a weaving together'. In this sense, there is no performance which does not have 'text'. That which concerns the text (the weave) of the performance can be defined as 'dramaturgy', that is drama-ergon, the 'work of the actions' in the performance. (Barba 1991: 68) Given a dramaturgical analysis that takes into account the work of actions via, and upon, the body, we may now cite specific examples of how Artistic Director, Lloyd Newson's dramaturgy in Dead Dreams of Monochrome Men extends the work of actions to the spectators, implicating them in a process of 'work' -- toward a risk in making meaning of their experience in the theatre. Dead Dreams of Monochrome Men Dead Dreams of Monochrome Men was commissioned by Third Eye, Glasgow, and first performed there in October 5, 1988. It later transferred to the ICA, London, as part of Dance Umbrella in November of that year. The work is based on the life of the homosexual serial killer, Dennis Nilsen, who lured 15 men back to his flats in Cricklewood and Muswell Hill where he killed them, and often dismembered their bodies. Lloyd Newson was inspired to create the work by the account of Nilsen and the murders given in Brian Masters's book, Killing for Company. When the work was subsequently filmed and broadcast for London Weekend Television's South Bank Show, its presentation of sex, death, and the dark forces which led Nilsen to blend the two made front-page tabloid news. Ironically, Dead Dreams of Monochrome Men was an attempt to explore the isolating phenomena of homophobia engendered by the popular media, both in the sensational accounts of the Nilsen murders and the rampant AIDS paranoia, which was at its height in newspapers at this time. Critic, Keith Watson has said, Dead Dreams served both as an epitaph for a clubland lifestyle past its sell-by-date and a forceful plea for humanity in a dehumanising world. At its core lay the conviction that societal homophobia, which intimidates same sex lovers from sharing a kiss in the street, repressing spontaneous feeling -- is bound to result in tragic consequences. The name just happened to be Dennis Nilsen. (Watson 1992) Newson creates theatre only when he feels there is a need, an issue to be addressed, and he assembles different performers for every production, chosen according to their skills and -- equally important -- ideas about the given issue. His process of developing Dead Dreams, as with most of his Houston 3 work, involved a lot of improvisation around emerging themes. Performer, Russell Maliphant describes one such improvisation: We did a lot of improvisation with 'dead' bodies, like, "You can do whatever you want with this 'corpse' of another dancer for forty minutes" and then we'd discuss what worked and what didn't. (Buckland 1995: 373) A significant part of the devising process used for Dead Dreams involved each performers' personal response to the issues explored in the work. Newson wanted to create an environment where self- revelation went alongside improvisation. He only works with performers prepared to reveal themselves in the rehearsal process; to the point where there is a direct connection between what they think and feel about these issues and what they show in performance. Newson comments: we felt angry, we showed anger immediately. And it got to a point where we burned ourselves out with that directness. We were always very much ourselves, what you saw on stage was always exactly who we were. (Meisner 1992: 12) Newson had set up a process where the performance became a parallel life for the performers. The emotional and psychological risk reached a nearly intolerable level: "we were all learning things about ourselves and each other that you don't usually have to face up to." (Watson 1988: 101) The intensity adopted by DV8 in the development and performance of Dead Dreams is important in terms of the what is at stake in the risk undertaken by the company in exploring such material. It is significant to a spectator's risk in that Newson creates a theatre event which problematizes the distinction between theatrical representation and reality. Regarding the dispute over this distinction in theatre, which stretches as far back as Classical Greek culture, Peggy Phelan has said that "[w]ithin the history of theatre the real is what theatre defines itself against, even while reduplicating its effects" (Phelan 1993: 3). That is to say, theatre represents reality while creating a supplement to this reality, which becomes a reality in its own right. This amounts to a deconstruction of the conventional (metaphysical) conception of mimesis; which in theatre is so often considered to be an imitation of the real (or 'nature' as it is often called), but actually can be seen as an imitation of reality's (nature's) creative processes (Boal 1985: 1).

Load more