Yesterday was a good day to be a Canadian, but beyond that, it was a good day to be a Canadian artist.
You Are Viewing Theatre
Harry Potter and the Generative Artist’s Intent
Posted By Alida on July 16th, 2009
I’m a reader. Always have been, always will be. I started reading when I was about 3, and I’ve never looked back, and while reading was my first love (okay, second; I’m pretty sure that music was first), I have a distinct love for other, non-literary art forms. Of course I do. My life wouldn’t be what it is if I didn’t have that love. Theatre, music, film, dance, and visual arts are all art forms that I have a great deal of respect and passion for (and in the case of music and theatre, extensive training and a career built around), and they’re not necessarily based on the written word.
Read enough books, and you’ll soon come across movie adaptations of some of them. Take something successful and make it even more successful by making it accessible to a different audience! What could go wrong with that? I think it’s most prevalent in the film/TV adaptations of books and plays; then in plays that are adaptations of books or movies; and then novelizations of existing movies, TV shows, and plays.
(I think that music, dance, and visual arts tend more toward derivative works than toward adaptations; because their storytelling is less narrative and less linear, the relationship between those three and the other three, going both ways, is less of a direct re-telling of a story. That’s another conversation altogether; right now, I’m mostly concerned with the distinctly narrative art forms.)
Now, don’t misunderstand; I’m not trying to argue the superiority of books to their film adaptations. While this may be couched in a conversation that is primarily about books and movies, the scope is far broader than that. I’m talking about understanding the generative artist’s intent. Regardless of form or genre, that’s the most important thing to be aware of. A TV show can be superior to a book; a movie can be superior to a play. It’s not about which forms are more “valid,” because none is more or less valid than the others. They each require a different set of skills, they each have the potential to showcase truly great art and storytelling, and every single one of them is constantly adapted from and by other art forms. Books are not inherently better than television; theatre is not inherently better than film, and great culture and art can be found in all of them.
I think, though, that there are several important questions to consider:
Unseen heroes
Posted By Alida on July 10th, 2009
Last weekend, we went to the Stampede and saw the grandstand show, which is essentially a big, expensive variety show that happens every night of the Stampede and involves music, dance, 130 (dancing and singing) kids, aerial gymnasts (Cirque du Soleil-type), extreme motocross bikers, and $45,000 of pyrotechnics each night. In other words, quite the production. It’s always fun; we love the whole spectacle of the thing, and we make sure to go see it pretty much every year.
Given a show that size, it’s pretty obvious that it requires a high-caliber staff — everyone from the producers to the stage managers to the designers to the composer to the choreographers to the crew. Especially when it comes to each individual show, there are too many elements for things to be only half-done. I mean, they have kids suspended in birdcage-type things above the stage and pyrotechnics in the near vicinity of many, many kids and teens. There’s definitely a large potential for things to go very wrong, if the work is done incorrectly.
Posted in Theatre
Letting go, stepping back, giving up?
Posted By Alida on June 29th, 2009
I made a decision yesterday.
I made the tough decision to step back from a project that I’ve been involved with — a project incorporates many departments, most of which are continually reaching new levels of professionalism and quality — because the element of it that I’ve been a part of is the lowest quality, the least professional, and the most resistant to change.
It was a tough call, and I’m still not sure I did the right thing, but if I’d stayed with it, I’m not sure that would have been the right thing, either. There is no right answer here, and I’m having a hard time reconciling that.
I place great value on not doing work that is below an acceptable standard, and that holds true for the work I do as an individual, as well as for organizations that I’m involved with. I don’t want my name associated with that particular sub-group of the project. I don’t want my reputation to be intertwined with it, no matter how little of an impact my involvement may have in the larger scheme of things, until the quality improves.
And that’s the thing. I’m still committed to the long-term success of the project as a whole — including this particular, less-than-quality element of it. There are many things that can, should, and must be done in order to up the ante and make it what it can and should be; they’re just not being done yet, and until they are, I don’t feel like I can be involved in a visible way. I’ll be working behind the scenes and offering support and help to those who are making the decisions and taking things in the right direction, but I don’t know that I can be the one to put my name to it.
And yet, Colin can. He’s staying on in the same capacity as he always has, and he’ll continue to be that presence, and that’s the right decision for him.
But for me? I don’t know. I’m unsettled, no matter what I do.
Posted in Theatre
Weekly Round-up: June 21
Posted By Alida on June 22nd, 2009
This was supposed to post last week, but with one thing and another (first some internet downtime and then some “me” downtime), I’m just getting to it today. The plan is for this to be a weekly post, but like everything else, it seems that it’s taking a little longer to get started than I’d like it to.
Once I get into the habit and routine, this will be a weekly roundup of what I’m reading, listening to, watching, attending, and doing. This one, however, is not quite a weekly roundup; more like a “last 3 or 4 weeks” listing.
(more…)
This is why we do it
Posted By Alida on June 12th, 2009
I don’t think I’ve ever not had an understanding of producing. There are some artists who don’t know or understand what it takes to actually put on a show (or an exhibit, or whatever), but that’s never been me. Yes, I have training as an actor and director, but I also have always put in the production work to make it happen, even when that wasn’t my primary role.
One of my jobs at CalArts is Resident Producer in the Coffeehouse Theater, which is an interdisciplinary space open to students to present non-curricular work. The committee acts in a curatorial capacity, as the Coffeehouse is primarily a presenting, not a producing, entity. That means that we work with a lot of artists who want to show their work, but have no idea what goes into producing it. Our job is to walk them through the process, step-by-step, and teach them how to work with a presenting organization, because those basic producing skills are things that every artist should know.
In any case, that side of things has always been, to me, an integral part of the art-making process, and I started doing it simply because no one else was. I needed to have a place to do work, and, like many artists who begin producing, it began with that simple need.
Creating the audience, not just the work
Posted By Alida on May 22nd, 2009
I spent last summer working as the production manager for the Canadian Badlands Passion Play, a huge, outdoor, site-specific work depicting the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. It’s a pretty spectacular production in a lot of ways, with a huge outdoor set, live animals, a cast of over 100, and completely acoustic sound effects (many of which are provided by a choir and orchestra).
As you might expect with a show that size, there were a lot of ups and downs over the course of the summer, and overall, I was really proud of the show that we put up and the work that I did, but the thing that was most disappointing was the audience. I realize that it’s partly because we had an average audience of 2000 per show, so the cross-section of people is going to be much larger than the type of theatre-goers who go see other forms of theatre. Most of the audience, proportionately, was fine, but there are those few people who just ruined it, and their behavior was one of the things that was the most disconcerting for me last year.
Posted in Theatre
