RAT Couple more thoughts and then I'll shut up

[Laura Winton <fluffysingler@prodigy.net>]

Missed my bus, so I had a lot of time to think.

Ok--Instead of telling you all about my gloriously poor past, let me talk
briefly about what I'm rebelling against right now and where my own artistic
goals are in terms of theatrical poverty.

Since moving to Minneapolis, I have had the chance to go to the celebrated
Guthrie as well as some of the other larger theatres here and hated the
experience every time.  Not necessarily because of the shows, but because of
the spaces.  Most of the audience is so far removed from the actors and the
show  that I can't imagine being able to actually REACH anyone in a setting
like that.  So I have come to revere and appreciate the extremely small,
unglamorous spaces that I must also work in out of necessity.

Sure, I'd like to have money for my performance group and for myself, but I
am ever willing to do my work with an eye towards getting the money.  I
don't necessarily think a lot of money would translate into larger audiences
for my show.  That's the classic dream of the Left--"If people only knew
about us. . . " or "If we only had X, we could compete . . . "  I don't
think that's the barrier here.  I think it's the fundamental difference in
values between what we do and the so-called mainstream of culture.  The
money is the indicator, not the cause, of our spearation.

Consequently, with my own work, I want to try to do more FREE performances
in parks, found space, etc.  I see that as allowing for more audience
"development" and also practicing what I preach.  My goal is to take work
out to the public and see who sticks around.

And sure, I wish I had money to stay home and write and think all day.  I
have been very fortunate in that I have on several separate occasions,
managed to get six months at a time of unemployment.  Again--I was somewhat
poor--but had buttloads of time for my art.  On the other hand, after three
or four months, after that initial rush of activity, I usually found that I
needed the structure provided by going back to work, not to mention spending
time with living, breathing people that I would not normally meet or hang
out with.  There's a danger to your art if the only people you know are
other artists.  Very difficult to stay "relevent" that way.



Ok--coupla more thoughts for now on voluntary poverty.   Brad, you asked
"where are the Dorothy Days, etc." but were comparing "voluntary poverty"
with the most extreme examples.  Dorothy Day was not, herself, homeless or
hungry (as a general rule).  She was a fairly ordinary person until she met
Peter Maurin and embraced his ideas.  Voluntary poverty is not necessarily
deciding "I'm going to be poor now and see how it feels."  Voluntary poverty
comes when you make CHOICES (sorry for the violent caps--no access to the
gentle italics) about your life that lead you toward poverty rather than
wealth.  And again, it is more than simply "solidarity" with the poor. 
Women don't reject cultural notions of beauty out of "solidarity with the
ugly."  They do it because there are essential ideas behind those cultural
notions that they find repugnant.

I contend that doing without can teach us things--as writers and performers
as well as human beings.  Discoveries are made when we are forced to be even
more creative to get our point across.  Those discoveries turn up in how we
create new work.  There are the happy accidents that show us things we would
not have otherwise seen, and then there are just the accidents, that tell us
what to avoid next time.  It's not even to say that everyone should be
poor--as a theatre or as a human--forever.  But even experiencing it for a
distinct period of time has something to teach us.  You may then move on
someday to better-funded productions, or it may be that you find it
impossible to go back to that of thinking and you may embrace "poor theatre"
forever.  I've seen some amazing, affecting shows with a nearly bare stage
and judicious use of light and dark.

"Those poor kids.  So young.  So nauseous."
--Krusty the Klown Telethon for Motion Sickness


Laura Winton
fluffysingler@prodigy.net
http://pages.prodigy.net/fluffysingler