Work on Character: Focusing on this Summer's Work

This posting is just to give you a bit of the background for what we have been discussing.  I am only going to outline the basic approach here, and will add more details everyday so that everyone can keep track in the days leading up to Sweden.

So, as Ellen and I have been talking, we have each been making contact with members of the ensemble to determine character.  This has been a very positive thing, as the score, the design (especially the space and costuming) and the characters themselves have been evolving alongside each other (more of which will become clearer as you read on).  My hope is that for this workshop, we will have an even better idea of relationships between the players and their characters, and how they interact as a result.  Here are some of the things that have been discussed, and I'm hoping there will be responses to this, and that there will be discourse leading up to our workshop.

To simplify things, Ellen and I started going through poem by poem.  We discussed all of the instrumentation, but we also were working from a perspective that there was a core quartet of characters who seem to go together, and who all share a certain degree of mobility.  The quartet consists of Kathleen and Michael ( who are our vocalists- it seemed important to broach the question of text early in the process) and Robert and Aaron who both seemed closely connected to Kathleen and Michael, and whom Ellen, Kathleen, Henny, and I had discussed as being essentially central in January.  I think a lot of the reason for this was their mobility, and their functions in past workshops- especially Aaron's beginning the music for Madrigal.  Aaron really has seemed like he is central to the action.  Robert seemed to be cultivating a clear relationship to Kathleen, and also plays a stationary instrument at times.

So with this large number of characteristics between these characters, we certainly had a lot to figure out.   I should mention, though, that a few people were constantly in our conversations as well.  Laura B, Laura K, Christa, Mike, and Angela have also been figuring prominently into our discussions, and they have been hooking into our tracing Aaron, Robert, Kathleen, and Michael the whole way.  Now, we have not gotten to touch base with all of these players, so this may be the first time that some of them are hearing about the discussions.

ALSO, I want to outline some of the design conversation which has influenced the character development.  It was initially discussed that having instrumentalists at the center of the action was essential.  This created a question about how the text was integrated into the action.  In a sense, this meant that there was a kind of narrative coming form using the text.  That made Michael and Kathleen somewhat periferal as characters.  We had also discussed the idea of having some beds on the stage at the top of the performance.  And the concept that the performance would somehow trace the life of these characters over the course of a day, beginning with arising from bed in the morning. 

I digress here, but part of the reason I like this idea is because it gives us a context in terms of time.  I do not think that we need to think of it as a literal day, but there are so many references to mundane life in the poems that it seems that putting the piece against the background of every day events like waking up, getting dressed, commuting, working, eating, etc, might make the more magical, out of time moments pop more (like the writing inside, the cherry trees embracing the lories, etc,).  Also, I happen to like that a day is a cycle of time, which can easily be segmented and assembled to add up to something, and it exists in a larger cycle as well.

Somehow it began to seem that the day was marking a journey for Aaron.  But what that journey is seemed a bit elusive.  Aaron also seems to be connected to Michael, and so it was thought, in order to make Aaron central, and keep Michael more in the narrative position, that Aaron would be making a journey for Michael- a journey that maybe Michael could not make, but he could see, and he could comment on, and tell about.

Now, I'm actually not sure if this previous idea came first, or if it was just a realization that Michael was on the outside, commenting, but related to Aaron who was on the inside, but somehome, I started to feel that Michael should be in his own space, seperated.

To back up a bit, we had been discussing space, and what the configuration of the space would be.  We had been thinking in January that a proscenium might be best, but in discussing what spaces the piece would premiere in in Sweden (both Stockholm and Vasteras), and talking about the possibilities of touring the piece in Scandinavia in the future, Torkel pointed out that most theaters in Scandinavia were black box, and that we might consider the idea of doing the piece in the round to limit the amount of scenery.

We all saw some benefits in this.  I have begun seeing Michael as being physically seperated by space, above the action, and closer to the audience (maybe on a corner of the arena) rather than in the center of the space.  And perhaps even in different corners around the space.  But the idea has somehow become that Michael is moving through the course of a day, and that he is living in the "real world" which is full of all kinds of mundane activities (as mentioned above).  Aaron, has become an entity that is somehow connected to Michael.  I sense that Aaron is almost emerging from Michael as he leaves the same bed that Michael occupies at the beginning of the piece (in Minnena).  And he ventures into the central playing space, and we follow him on his journey.  So in this way, we have Michael in the real world, and Aaron living in an imagined space, sharing similar thoughts and feelings, but different circumstances.  Michael framing and acting as counterpoint to Aaron's more central experiences, and, it feels, unable to participate in them.

This is the first blog.  I will be adding to this daily.  Tomorrow, I will move into Kathleen and Robert.

Comments

[Henny Linn Kjellberg]

Thanks for doing this Pat.. I don't have that much to add, I think you're covering most part of what we talked about. I'm waiting to see what you have about Robert...