Re: RAT, The dramaturgy of...

[Greg Romero <gregoryromero@yahoo.com>]

Good to see that Robert Faires jumped into the
fray, pimping rm 120 theatre, no less. :)  (does
that make us his bee-atch?)

While I'm not suggesting that I speak for my
talented colleague Ann Taylor, I do feel
compelled to represent at least my take on rm 120
theatre's "fuck'em" attitude, lest to wrest
myself from the teeth of a bitter drunk. :)

I somewhat care about how an audience responds to
the work rm 120 does.  More accurately, I care
about *if* an audience responds to our work.  As
I said before, I don't give a shit (or a "crap"
if there are sensitive RATs on this list) how an
audience interprets something we stage as long as
we have staged something to provide them with
enough interest to compel them to interpret what
they saw.

For a timely example, Ann, some friends and I
watched "Taxi Driver" last night.  I had seen it
many times before, but as with any great piece of
work, something new jumps out at you upon a
renewed visit (perhaps a product of the the
ever-changing personal narrative schema).  The
four of us had a rather lively (sometimes overly
heated-- it was late at night after a long day)
exchange about what the film meant and how we
felt it should be interpreted.  I interuppted the
exchange to point out how our exchange indicated
what a successful film this was.  That despite
our reluctance to agree with each other about
what we saw, it's pretty powerful when every one
in the room had a passionate and exciting idea
about the images they just viewed.  

To me, that's a large part of my end goal as a
theatre artist.

Now, will rm 120 theatre ever produce something
as well-crafted and brilliant as "taxi driver"? 
Perhaps Robert Faires can tackle that one if he
reviews our pieces at FronteraFest. :)

To address the "fuck'em" comment, if I feel
confident that I produced an imaginative,
exciting piece of theatre and during the process
I excited and stirred the wonderful artists who
worked on the piece with me, then I can take some
comfort in saying "fuck'em" because I don't need
an audience's approval to tell me that it was a
worthwhile endeavor.  I've gained the trust and
passion and enjoyment of the experience and, to
me, that's a fulfilling enough reward.

If an audience responds to what we do, then it's
a triumph.  If they don't, "fuck'em" because we
had a geat time anyway.  And I suggest now that
perhaps having a great time is ultimately more
important.

cheers,


--- Robert Faires <onstage@auschron.com> wrote:
> A hopeful Ann Taylor wrote:
> >Hey.  Well, this is certainly topical.  This
> particular idea is part of our
> >apparent production style at rm 120 theatre. 
> In other words, the idea of
> >our
> >works being understood, or not, for that
> matter, is not something that we so
> >much struggle with as it is something that we
> accept and ignore.  What
> >interests me is not so much whether we wrestle
> with being "gotten" as much
> >as
> >it is something that we belligerently ignore. 
> One wonders: are we jacking
> >off?  Is it important for other people to
> "get" our work, or is the value of
> >our work not so much in the acceptance and
> acclaim and recognition, etc., as
> >it is in the process and the exploration? 
> Well, you might guess what I
> >think.  Even on my most insecure days, when
> you call me on it, my answer
> >will
> >always be..."Fuck 'em."
> 
> Pardon me, Ann, if I'm interpreting your "Fuck
> 'em" too seiously. You may
> not mean to suggest at all that you and the rm
> 120 folks really don't care
> *anything* about the audience or their response
> to your work, but it was
> the idea of a company sincerely saying "Fuck
> 'em" to the audience that got
> me thinking, so I'll use that idea as a
> jumping-off point if I may.
> 
> Artists who say "Fuck 'em" to the audience
> drive me fuckin' nuts.
> 
> Not because I think the artists have to explain
> everything they do onstage
> or off, to serve every work with explanatory
> footnotes, the ol' spoonful of
> sugar (or bedful of Red Vines, if you're Joel
> McKean), to make sure
> everybody "gets" what they're trying to do.
> People who make art, whether
> it's theatre or dance or visual art or
> whatever, ought to be able to draw
> on whatever inspiration they need to in the
> process of creation, and
> willful obscurity doesn't bother me. Well, in
> principle. In practice, I've
> been bugged by it on numerous occasions. But
> that's about me responding to
> the individual work and not condemning the work
> because the artists didn't
> give me the secret decoder ring for
> unscrambling their cryptic artistic
> message.
> 
> No, it's usually because that "Fuck 'em" means
> that on some level these
> artists believe that the audience doesn't
> matter. And I can't accept that.
> The audience always matters, whether they
> understand the work or not,
> whether they love it or hate it or are
> disturbed by it or enlightened by
> it. They matter because part of the heart of
> theatre lies in communion.
> People together in a space to share a story or
> a feeling or a mystery. It's
> the folks who already have the story or feeling
> or mystery sharing it with
> those who don't and sometimes with those who do
> but who want to have it
> shared with them again. And without those
> latter folks, it just can't work.
> Process and exploration are great things, and
> they can make for more
> knowledgeable, more passionate, more committed
> artists, but they're
> classroom exercises, self-improvement sessions,
> even jacking off, if they
> aren't ultimately shared with others.
> 
> And by sharing I don't simply mean presenting a
> work to an audience. If you
> put on the show with the attitude of "Fuck 'em
> if they don't get it," then
> you're not sharing. You're setting yourself
> apart from the audience,
> putting yourself above the audience. You're
> holding onto whatever it is you
> have.
> 
> One of the aspects of RAT that has always
> inspired me, and continues to
> inspire me, is the notion of hospitality as a
> vital force in theatre. You
> offer whatever it is you have to the people who
> come to your theatre, to
> your show, you give up what you have as freely
> as you would to a guest in
> your home. And that's essentially what your
> audience is: guests in your
> home. It doesn't mean you can't challenge them
> while they're there, that
> you can't provoke them or make them
> uncomfortable or disturb them. All that
> is possible, but before that can take place,
> there is a need to acknowledge
> their willingness to be there, to understand
> the gift they give you, which
> is their presence. They are giving to you, and
> it's only right for you to
> give back. You give and you get. It's old news,
> maybe so old that it sounds
> trite, but I believe in it and, largely through
> RAT have come to see it as
> a foundation for theatre, certainly the kind of
> theatre that I want to make
> and to experience.
> 
> Again, Ann, I apologize if I've made too much
> of what was an off-handed
> remark on your part. It just got some ideas
> rolling through my head and I
> wanted to follow them to see where they'd go.
> 
> By the way, welcome to Austin, and I look
> forward to seeing rm 120's work.
> 
> The theatre critic who's having a ball playing
> a bitter old drunk of a
> theatre critic who winds up pimping for
> vampires,
> 
> Robert Faires
> Austin, Texas
> 
> 


=====
Greg Romero
Dramaturg
rm 120 theatre
PO Box 300165
Austin TX  78703
(512) 481-8366

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