The talking, the candy wrappers, the cellphones aside, I love the collective experience, the thrills in the Right Here, Right Now environment.
The pleasure! The pleasure of gorgeously put together words, directorial surprises, pitch perfect performances.
The almost-sexual anticipation in some theaters, when some sort of theatrical event is going to start. I'm thinking of Hairspray the Monday night before it opened, the pre-show electricity in the audience I thought could have lit up the lite-brite set; I remember thinking how those lights were reflecting back the energy of the cast AND the audience.
I'm thinking about the second intermission of the original production of Millennium Approaches not long after it opened and chatting with a man not quite as ancient as The World's Oldest Living Bolshevik while in line for the men's room, and he excitedly said: "I wonder what Perestrokia will be about!!!!" Anticipation, anticipation, anticipation! And sometimes (like Perestroika), glorious release!
Thanks for linking the article Borstal. One of the bittersweet things about theatre, unfortunately, is the play isn't always the thing. Ultimately it is, but sometimes for all the high-minded idealism of a Bogart or a Paulis, there's the nuts and bolts day to day reality of making the magic we see and there's no way even the canniest artistic director can stop that from leaking out.
The article referred to Punchdrunk's Sleep No More, which Paulus brought to Boston last fall and winter. It was the second show of her A.R.T. season (not the final, as the article says) after Donkey Show, which is still running. I saw Sleep No More on New Year's Eve and again a month or so later. It was without a doubt a highlight in my theatre-going career. It literally changed the way I was seeing the world for several days after, I mean, visually taking in and responding to stimuli. It was a life-changing experience. No exaj. (Yes, I'm trying to make "exaj" happen).
But the fact is, the poor non-Eq performers in Paulus's Donkey Show are making less money than the coat check people at the theater it's in. That's a harsh reality and clouding it with pretty theoretical discussions about what theatre can be and how people crave it shouldn't mean people can't make a living wage making it.
Still, we take our pleasure where we can find it. I have heard it on the QT that Punchdrunk would love to find an accommodating space to mount Sleep No More in NYC. In Boston, no more than 300 tickets were sold per performance, so they became a hot commodity quickly. If it happens and you can go, do so. It's as if you're having a dream of a gorgeously immersive story and you're free to wander through and explore.
I hope theatrical geniuses find ways to continue to break ground on new and exciting and ultimately theatrical experiences and that the people doing the hard work of performing it for us can make their livings. Is that too much to ask?
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Updated On: 8/19/10 at 11:01 AM
