Magical realism belongs in the theatre - part one

I want my theatre to be one of Holy Communion with itself. So I suppose then, unlike Artaud, I see the essence of the individual as divine and this is what I want them to remember when they witness one of my plays – that aspect of themselves which has been so long concealed they don’t even know it belongs to them. I don’t ever intend to do this through dogma, but rather through complete fluidity, undermining the laws of the universe so that a window is opened to their consciousness, so they see that more exists than just this solid flesh, time doesn’t move in a straight line, place is not static and they do not start and end with their own bodies.

Theatre is about the energetic exchange of live bodies in a space and even though people talk of it in very different ways, an energetic exchange is what is taking place between all the elements involved. That is what makes theatre so powerful and the transfusion of an intention so possible. It is the ritual of theatre that ensures its success and its potential to have something translated to the audience from the play text. It is this element I want to exploit in my writing for theatre. I want to transform, translate those bodies in that space with my words. I want to access something through the ritual of enacting my words. I want to acknowledge the divine running through everyone and everything in that space. This does not mean that I want to tell them what the divine in them is or even that the stories that I tell enact the divine in overt ways – but in opening people’s imaginations to the possibilities inherent in the worlds I create they may see, at some level, the expanded possibilities in their own lives.

Theatre is about that: 

showing another view of the world,

changing perception or challenging

perception from Brecht to 

Atraud to Beckett. They all had

something to say and chose the

medium of theatre

to say it, I believe, because of the

transformative possibilities 

available when you 

have living bodies in a space.

Guerrilla Girls - Moma highlight 2

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These are the Isolate

Mutation Theatre - these are the isolate from storybottle on Vimeo.

Last night I dragged my old lady self over to Theatreworks in St Kilda on the direct request of a young man named Tim Wotherspoon. I get many invitations to see theatre and I am generally crap at attending. I have many great excuses but the reality is theatre is my business and it is totally moronic that I don't go very much (a recent resolution made this year is to ATTEND!).

I am not a theatre reviewer but I am a playwright and there are two things I particularly like seeing. Plays by women, and plays that in some manner subvert realism. So when I see something I like I want to support it in anyway I can. It can be cold out there in EmergingTheatreMaker Land. So I am writing this record of my experience now in the hope that someone may take it upon themselves to go and see this play. It is worth the drive.

These are the Isolate is a tight, claustrophobic, oppressive two-hander. It was hard to breath for the 45 minute duration and this highly visceral experience is evidence of how well this writing works. The fact that there were moments that I was laughing out loud amidst the feeling of drowning in despair is proof of the writing's subtlety and beauty. The play, by Katy Warner, has a muted lyricism and a masterful use of repetition. The words are used against themselves. They contradict and undermine their speaker. Meaning is constantly shifting. I adore this sophisticated, disciplined use of language. Every word matters.

My only issue with the writing is about how much is revealed in terms of cause and effect. I didn't need to know quite so much about what had brought this man to his knees. It is life happening, and people have thrown themselves off cliff tops for far less.

The revelation of the evening was Tim Wotherspoon. His performance was understated, devastating, outstanding. Last week, in an effort to support my aforementioned resolution, I saw Apologia with Robyn Nevin. That was the first time I had seen the Grand Dame of Australian theatre in action and she was as brilliant as I anticipated. Watching her perform was weightless. By this I simply mean I could float along with her, no crashing back to Earth with a badly delivered line or a dropped accent. I was wrapped up in her performance. Dare I say it, Tim Wotherspoon's performance was comparable. It was deeply satisfying to watch him.

The other outstanding element of the production is the use of the cavernous space that is TheatreWorks. Set-less, the performers are supported only by light and shadow and I was captivated. A single candle, at moments, was all that lit the performers face, and deep, menacing shadows acted as backdrops to the action. It was a revelation that so much can be achieved with so little and much of this success is in the hands of lighting designer Katie Sfetkidis. I am an avid supporter of theatre being, at its best, bodies in a space, and this production demonstrated that without losing out on aesthetic. This was a beautifully realised mise-en-scene. The play fit the space. The great black emptiness drowning the isolated man in his own oblivion. Beautiful.

Do go and see it. There are moments of greatness in this piece, and for certain many more to come from this group.

Ken Robinson: Changing education paradigms | Video on TED.com

Ken Robinson: Changing education paradigms | Video on TED.com

If you have it all...

Magical realism as a philosophy for living - Step One

Step One - Destroy your world view


‘Reality is a question of perspective; the further you get from the past, the more concrete and plausible it seems – but as you approach the present, it inevitably seems more and more incredible’ Salman Rushdie

Image source

It is the presentation of the magical as realistic that is at the

 heart of magical realism. But it is also the reaction to ordinary

 mundane things as unbelievable that marks magical realism. 

 This is called defamiliarisation and it happens all the time in our reality.

Suggesting you have taken on magical realism as your 

political perspective may in fact lessen the air of apathy

that would have otherwise hung over you. Is it not just

the very nature of life to be a bitter sweet marriage of

extraordinary and mundane elements? Is not new life 

born of tragedy? Who am I to stop the flow of the world?

Gabriel Garcia Marquez said something along the lines of his 

writing being social realism and that what he wrote actually

 reflected the society from which he was writing. 

Magical realism is the western name for something we cannot imagine being an aspect of the everyday. Perhaps what can be gleaned from Garcia Marquez’s comments is that our Western perspective is far too narrow.

Magical Realism

‘Reality is too subtle for realism to catch it…It cannot be transcribed directly. But by invention, fabulation, we may open a way toward reality that will come as close to it as human ingenuity may come’

Simpkins 1999