La Monnaie Parsifal | Planely Speaking

Jan-Hendrik Rootering as Gurnemanz
Act One Embrace

I went to Sterling Books in Brussels today. I'm watching way too much TV again, so I thought I better provide myself more stimulation on my fast approaching days off than what I currently have. And because I'm saturated with easily digestible entertainment and in a pensive mood bought:

Alice Miller's "The Drama of the Gifted Child"

David Mamet's "Theater"

Yoshi Oida's "The Invisible Actor"

Eric Siblin's "The Cello Suites"

Impressed?

I wouldn't place bets on whether I finish them.


Anyway, being a big David Mamet fan, I picked his up first when I got back to the apartment. To page 28, with a chapter called "The Fatal Spin."

Early pilots knew that a spin was fatal, for no pilot had ever survived a spin.

But with the increased use of parachutes, a pilot who had left the plane and parachuted to the ground often saw the now pilotless plane right itself--that is, leading the aeronautic community to deduce that a spin was survivable, if one could learn from the natural reactions of the plane. The plane was not causing the spin; the pilot was.

Having accepted as gospel that a spin was uncorrectable, any further investigation was not to be forthcoming. But the opposite assumption yielded the simple true answer.

If we assume that all plays need an intellectual director and a tricked-out set, we are blind to the actual operations of the theatrical transaction.

If we assume that they do not, that the play and the actors can "fly themselves," as it were, and observe that interaction with the audience, we may learn something about how the mechanism (the play and the theatrical interchange) actually operates. Let us assume that we have no clue, and that, with a theatrical impulse in our hearts, we show-offs, class clowns, smart-alecks and so on, you and I, in short, have left the plane. But the plane flies on. We see plays without a director, self-directed by an amateur, summer stock, school, backyard group, doing just fine.…The play will fly itself.

I've definitely "left the plane" here.

Reading this, I'm starting to pinpoint the feelings I expressed to a colleague, that mostly I feel undirected in Castellucci's production. Granted, I have done a good bit of homework on his style, studying closely other video footage of his pieces and tried to put into practice this neutral quality that is a running theme through his work. I've watched very closely when he demonstrates, and work in front of a mirror in my dressing room to try to find the simplest way to do things. But all that work has been done by myself, not in rehearsal. Really the only criticism leveled at me is to bring my feet closer together and find a more natural stance. But I see he has left me alone by design.

I set out to be simple in yesterday's Pre Generale (2nd to last rehearsal, with orchestra and audience attending). And I think had I not entered into the day "giving up" to so great a degree probably wouldn't have made it through the day. At one contentious moment, with the rehearsal stopped I actually found I was relaxed. So often in the past, when anxiety happens around me, I lose the ability to phonate. My voice just flies the coop. All that adrenaline just gets me going, and I feel like I'm about to tear someone's head off. All of us know this feeling.

I remember thinking: "I should be more upset. I have people shouting about things around me, but I'm not upset. Why is this?"

And so I made a choice. I decided a few minutes into the drama to get angry. To act out and be "hurt." And about 30 seconds into it realized, it was all an act. I really WASN'T upset. Why was I acting as if I had been wronged? And so I immediately found myself as calm as before.

When the rehearsal re-started at my entrance of Act 2 some minutes later found there was no problem in getting my voice going. My adrenaline had stayed flat and my voice was fine. The entire episode felt surreal, almost out of body. Like I was cooly watching and calmly gathering information. 2 months ago I could not have managed that.

Perhaps art needs antagonism, but I sure don't need to hold onto it. I remember my last line from yesterday about not having to perfect, but only to embrace.

Sometimes embracing means to let go.

Personally? I think 2 inches matter. But probably not onstage.