EQUITY QUARTERLY SUMMER 2010 ELTON JOHN EN POINTE IS TECHNOLOGY CHANGING OUR STAGES? EQ HOLOGRAMS AND PUPPETS Innovation & Technology High tech or low tech? WHETHER YOU ARE USING COMPUTER-OPERATED ELEVATORS TO MAKE MOUNTAINS RISE UP FROM THE STAGE, OR SHADOW PUPPETS TO TRANSPORT AN AUDIENCE TO ANOTHER TIME AND PLACE – INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGY CAN TRANSFORM AN EMPTY STAGE INTO AN EXTRAORDINARY LIVE EXPERIENCE. ii EQUITY QUARTERLY SUMMER 2010 President’s message Shortly after each EQ is published, I get an email message telling me that my next column is due and providing me with a description of the theme of the upcoming issue. New technology in the theatre – lookin’ forward to this one! As a stage manager, it ends up being largely my responsibility to knit all this technology into a reliably cohesive whole for performance. And when part of it suddenly doesn’t work, it’s my sudden responsibility to find a graceful way to soldier on, if possible. There’s a lot to be said on the subject, but I’ll leave that to the authors of the articles. The one thing that did leap out at me however, was the adjective new. New has always been a bit of a problem for Equity, I think, and for a lot of very good reasons. As an organization that has as its sole reason for being the provision of benefits and protections for its members, new always makes us stop and think: What effect will this have on the artist? Take atmospheric effects, for instance. Theatres have been doing it for centuries – the original Globe Theatre reportedly used smoke effects. However, most of the older methods were not par- ticularly compatible with human health. In the 1900s, several varieties of “safe” fog machines were invented, and initially these seemed like the answer we had all been looking for: fog that could be produced cheaply, reliably, controllably and using “non-toxic” materials. Looks good. However, suddenly designers and directors discovered the need to use it extensively. Here’s the thing: Even if you are using laboratory-certified non-toxic ingredients, performers may be working in the fog for extended periods, and doing so in activities of great exertion, during which they are continually gulping great lungfuls of the stuff. If it’s not what your lungs were designed to breathe, and it isn’t, then a negative effect on health is to be expected. And that’s what happened. Performers complained, studies were commissioned, and we discovered that this new, safe fog was not so safe when used in high concentrations, or when overheated by old or dirty machines. So, new provides not only opportunity for artists, but also challenges. In addition, new frequently starts out small, experimental and on a shoestring budget, and may not embody all the forethought, protections and safety elements that we would like to see in place for our members. There is a whole industry out there now geared toward making scenery automation as safe as possible, but it wasn’t there on day one. And even at this stage in the game, there are people trying to “make do” with something that provides nowhere near the level of safety we’d like to see. And so, Equity has come to regard new with suspicion, and not just on the health and safety front. We still look at a camera, or video camera, in rehearsal or performance with concern for possible unauthorized use. We look at the Internet as an avenue for the unfettered publication of that material. We look at new media with concern for member incomes: What happens if your performance through a run is entirely pre-recorded? Do you get paid for five weeks of performance, or just the three days it took you to film it? Now that new is proliferating so explosively, perhaps it is time to stop negotiating protections retroactively on an innovation-by-innovation basis, and instead focus on the overarching principles. For instance, if we can suc- cessfully compel the proven safe use of stage technology as a whole, perhaps the word new can be welcomed wholeheartedly, and without trepidation. How’s that for a new idea? Allan Teichman President SUMMER 2010 EQUITY QUARTERLY 1 EQUITY QUARTERLY SUMMER 2010 EQ VOLUME 4 NUMBER 2 1 PRESIDEnt’s mESSAGE Love Lies Bleeding 6 3 NOTES FROM ARDEN R. RYSHPAN rocks the stage 4 LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 10 Pushing the 5 EQ MOVES boundaries 8 EQ VOICES 17 EQ BACKSTAGE 14 Is technology 18 fONDLY REMEMBERED changing our 20 eq CLASSIFIEDS world? 21 eq FLASHBACK Equity members are encouraged to submit ideas for articles, memorial notices and letters to the editor Coming issue: Fall 2010 via email ([email protected]) or on disk with accompanying hard copy. The copy deadline for submissions is Subscriptions are available at an annual rate of $35, including GST. EQ Monday, August 9th, 2010. EQ reserves the right to edit for length, style and content. Publications Mail Agreement No. 40038615 SUMMER 2010 – Volume 4, Number 2 EQ Equity Quarterly (ISSN 1913-2190) is a forum to communicate to Equity members the activities of EQ is published four times a year by Canadian Actors’ Equity Association. EXECUTIVE EDITOR Lynn McQueen the Association and issues of concern to the Association. With the exception of the editorial staff, the National Office views expressed in solicited or unsolicited articles are not necessarily the views of the Association. 44 Victoria Street, 12th Floor, Toronto, ON M5C 3C4 EDITOR Barb Farwell Tel: 416-867-9165 | Fax: 416-867-9246 | Toll-free: 1-800-387-1856 (members only) Canadian Actors’ Equity Association (Equity) is the voice of professional artists working in live [email protected] | www.caea.com DESIGN & LAYOUT C hris Simeon, performance in English Canada. We represent more than 5,500 performers, directors, choreographers, September Creative Western Office fight directors and stage managers working in theatre, opera and dance, and support their creative efforts 736 Granville Street, Suite 510, Vancouver, BC V6Z 1G3 by seeking to improve their working conditions and opportunities by negotiating and administering Tel: 604-682-6173 | 604-682-6174 | Toll free: 1-877-682-6173 (members only) collective agreements, providing benefit plans, information and support and acting as an advocate. [email protected] COVER: Michael Uloth as The Bonze, Robert Pomakov as The Chamberlain and Laura Albino as The Cook (all in the water) and Olga Peretyatko (inside front- cover) as The Nightingale in the Canadian Opera Company’s production of The Nightingale and Other Short Fables, 2009 ABOVE: Peter Trosztmer dances live on stage with an image from Norman McLaren’s movie Pas de deux in a scene from Norman, 2007, by Michel Lemieux and Victor Pilon Notes from Arden R. Ryshpan I have to admit that I am a bit of a geek. I like gadgets and gear. I’ve had a computer in my home since 1984 and was on the Internet before there was a “World Wide Web” and you had to speak in UNIX in order to use it. I knew I couldn’t live without an iPod because I had loved my Walk- man from the first day I owned one way back when. (And I have never ever downloaded anything that I didn’t pay for!) So I have been fascinated by technology in arts and culture for years – how it changes our work, how it enhances creativity, how it makes it possible to get our work out to more people. But now certain genies are out of certain high-tech containers and there is a troubling question that I keep asking myself – if you can get any amount of “entertainment product” at any time you want and can watch it on the device of your choosing at your convenience for practically no money, what gets you to leave the comfort of your own home to be somewhere at an appointed time and fork over a good chunk of money to see something? There is absolutely no question in my mind that the technological changes affecting the film, television and music industries will have an impact on live performance. I just don’t know what it is going to be yet. But I know there will be one. In this issue of EQ, we look at some of the changes technology is bringing to our milieu. When it comes to stage craft, is high tech always better than low tech? What has the technology allowed us to do that we couldn’t have done before (or could only have done with buckets and buckets of money)? How does the integration of technology change the rehearsal process? Does it? Where is the cutting edge, the next step? Virtual reality? Holographic characters on stage? I remember many, many years ago someone musing about the future and using the term “synthespians” to describe what performers could become. Sounds like something that James Cameron might cook up. How far can we imagine the integration of the technology into the theatre to create new and immersive environments for the performers to work in and the audiences to experience? And if this is the future, does it mean that the only things the audiences will want to leave their houses for is “spectacle?” What the music industry has discovered is that even if audiences don’t want to pay for full length CDs anymore (assuming they want to pay at all and don’t feel entitled to illegally download) they still are more than happy to pay for the live experience. Revenues from touring are up for many bands as, in the end, nothing can replace the pleasure of the collective live experience.