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Whether you're into "traditional" Scottish music or not, if you have the chance to see the group Bodega group perform, you really should go. I had the privilege of seeing them perform at Evergreen Presbyterian Church as part of their annual Clanjamfry festival. This five-member group and teenagers uses traditional Celtic instruments, but put their unique flare and rock style into it. The instruments include fiddles, a harp, an accordian, guitars, electric bass, flute, and bagpipe.
The group has been touring most of the summer in Italy and America and will return to University soon. If you're in Scotland, check them out, or if you hear they're coming anywhere near you, be sure and go!
Last week at Rhodes was the August Wilson celebration, and I had the privilege of seeing
Charles S. Dutton perform. Wilson was African-American playwright raised in Pittsburgh wrote a ten play cycle, with each play set in his hometown (appropriately named the Pittsburgh Cycle). Each one of these works describes the lives of African Americans in that decade, and Dutton has interpreted many of Wilson's characters in cities throughout the world.
Dutton's one-man show Goodnight Mr. Wilson, is a testament to the work of Wilson, as he works through the characters in five of the ten play cycle. I don't particularly want to talk about his stage performance, however; I would rather discuss what I observed of him around the theatre and in the conversations he had with the audience.
I was in the theatre the first night he was in Memphis and sort of poked my head around the door and watched him doing his warm ups. He was marking the show, putting on the different hats and delivering some of the lines. With no one in the theatre, his intensity and his attention to detail were incredible. And he preached this kind of dedication. In his after-show talk with the audience he described that the "great" actors, those who thrive in their work, put this attention into all parts of their performance. You must always be operating at the highest level from the very first performance; you must possess the technique to help you to get through those nights when you aren't "feeling it," and you have to be rehearsed well enough and live in the character enough that you give the same performance regardless of the time of day or the crowd.
His best explanation of this was after he had completed his monologues during his performance and took a break to talk with the audience about the various characters. He talked about the business of acting, how it isn't to be treated as some means of fame and glory; "if you want that, get in line," he said. Instead, it's about presenting a message, it's about filling a need in your life to perform, to give yourself to an audience. "Every time you step off stage," Dutton said, "you have to leave some of your essence out there in the character." That's what the great actors do, and that is what is required for the works of playwrights such as August Wilson.
Today I had the opportunity to have lunch with Dr. Daniel J. Levitin, author of This is Your Brain on Music. He is on a book tour across the country and stopped in Memphis, and I was invited by Dr. Sharp, the Dean of the Fine Arts at Rhodes, to come to a lunch with him.
Before the lunch I had the opportunity to read some of Dr. Levitin's book, and it is a fascinating read. He discusses various neurological discoveries related to music and perception by the brain. Which cortex is influenced by different pitches, rhythms, and alterations? How can people with no professional training still be expert listeners in music? Levitin discusses these and various other questions.
In a chapter dedicated to "expertise" in the musical field, Levitin discusses what makes people experts in their musical field. Is it the countless hours of practice? He confirms that this is necessary. Is it training? Yes says that this is true as well. But, Levitin admits, many people have these parts of the puzzle solved. How is it then, that certain people have that "star quality" that others do not? His answer is in the expressiveness of their performance, where they emphasize certain notes, make phrases, work with silence. It is these elements, not included in the score, that separate the great players from the rest.
What I feel Levitin left me, however, is a renewed hope of the arts, generally speaking, being considered a valid field of study in other departments. Before becoming a leading scholar in music and the brain, Levitin was in a rock band, a common guy. Today at lunch I was able to participate in a discussion with professors of art history, theatre, philosophy, music, and neuroscience. I was able to learn from people in disciplines I normally would have nothing to do with in a discussion of the arts. When we can make the arts part of the study of other fields of research and education, we can validate its worth in an academic way. Daniel Levitin does this in This is Your Brain on Music.
Yesterday was our first meeting for the Rocky Horror Show to be produced at Rhodes College, opening on Halloween night. Read thrus are always fairly boring (and I often find them rather unhelpful), but it is often at this opening meeting that the director shares some insight into his or her goals with this particular production. If our education and promotion team decides this evening to begin our work for Rocky Horror, I already have some insight into where to begin.
Now, you're probably thinking, "what in the world do I need to know for the Rocky Horror Show other than to wear my tightest leather pants and facepaint?" Well there actually is something. The original production of this musical incorporates many references to pop culture of the late 1960s and early 1970s. From the references in Science Fiction/Double Feature to particular songs and characters, the play is meant to speak to these "trends" of the time. In many ways it mocks them.
This is an important understanding for an audience member to have. Chris Davis, the director of this production, does not wish simply to reproduce a satiric understanding of bad science fiction and horror movies from the 1970s, there have been plenty of bad movies and television shows since then that we might reference. However, these references will be subtle, and it will take an audience member prepared to look for these if he or she wishes to have the full experience of the production.
So where do you begin? Let's start with the characters, particularly Brad and Janet. This entire play is intentionally full of "bad" acting (which can be more of a challenge than you think). It utilizes the emotions of a soap opera mixed with Star Trek, the 12th generation. Yesterday Davis mentioned a particular artist who visually represents the emotional scale of Rocky Horror, Roy Lichtenstein. Deeply influenced by soap opera and comic books, Lichtenstein's work takes seemingly ordinary situations and intensifies them to "high drama." It is this way that the characters live in this play. Could these kinds of images help in the visual promotion of this play?
Charles Atlas workouts can help make a wimpy kind into the hunk of the beach. Useful to know if you want to get the joke and understand the satire here. How can we teach Rhodes students (most of whom I would presume don't read comic books) to get these references? More on that later.
For the first time, team yet-to-be-named met in the classroom of the McCoy Theatre at Rhodes College to discuss the best implementation of the project I have designed to lead during my senior year. I will briefly describe our mission below, but first I must provide some background information.
The McCoy Theatre is the campus-run theatre at Rhodes. During its twenty-seven year history, the theatre has produced some challenging and controversial material. And this has been intentional. It comes from a faculty and student understanding that the theatre exists not only as a means of entertainment or as a distraction from everyday life. Instead, it is provides new perspectives for looking at everyday life. Theatre challenges our prejudices, disrupts comfort, raises questions about personal and societal identity. To put it more bluntly, theatre provides a means of seeking truth.
Why would a college theatre opt to pursue this more challenging route of producing theatre? Part of the reason comes from being a part of a liberal arts campus. The contemporary philosopher William Nord describes two kinds of liberal arts education; Rhodes College fits into the second category, a tradition that "takes as its patron saint Socrates, and it is moved by the continuing search for truth. It values free, reasoned inquiry and tolerance; its is skeptical." A campus community designed around these principles inherently requires a theatre that aids its larger purpose of seeking truth.
Unfortunately, students don't necessarily see attendance at plays or theatrical discussion groups as an extention of the liberal arts system of which they are a part. The production of plays is outside the academic realm; it is extracurricular, separating it from the larger curricular goals of the college. My senior project is an effort to change that attitude.
I have asked a team of five- Lindsay Johnson, Jessica Batey, Katharine Gentsch, Luke Branim, and Kevin Collier- to help me in this endeavor. This capable, hopeful, and insightful team will work on methods to help educate students at Rhodes to envision theatre as an extension of their education, as something in which they must participate in order to fully experience their time at Rhodes. Our goals, therefore, are two-fold: Education and Promotion.
In our first meeting, ideas for promotion were plentiful, including visual reminders on campus, casts wearing their costumes on opening day, scenes from the show being performed on campus, etc. The educational side, however, was met with some ambivalence. It was my feeling that some of the team members are skeptical as to how possible it is that we can expand the understanding of theatre of the average Rhodes student. I plan on convincing them of this, though; we can make it work!
My inspiration for this education process comes from the American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco, California. For each of their productions they provide a series of essays, lectures, and discussions to give their audience insight into the meaning and message of the production. If we can provide this information for the mainstage shows at the McCoy each year as well as potential discussion groups and talks with cast, directors, and designers, Rhodes students will graduate with a new understanding of theatre, a passion for the challenges it raises, and they will seek this in whatever community they enter.
The challenge I posed at the end of the meeting was for us to ponder where exactly to begin. How will we promote these educational opportunities, making them appealing to students already bogged down in schoolwork? How will we organize a play promotion system that can be codified into a series of steps for future students (and other theatres) to utilize? That comes next week (as does a name for our team).
