Pete's 'cutting-edge-ometer'

Recently in Board meetings... There was one last Monday night, my planned ‘blogging night’, which is why I didn’t blog. I mention it in case you thought I had fallen at the first hurdle! Anyway at Board meetings and in conversation with friends over coffee and gluten free brownies, I have become somewhat exorcised (What teenagers don’t do at the gym) by the concept of ‘cutting edge’ or ‘breaking barriers’. It’s a concept raised by an Arts Council visitor to our last play - that is, we weren’t doing it in her opinion, but then added, ‘Maybe it doesn’t matter because what they do they do well – and with charm’. Well, there! How nice. I have set myself the task, therefore, of seeing as much theatre as possible and hope to find a company that are ‘cutting edge’ and ‘breaking barriers’ (to see what it’s like, and learn from) – and have even dared to think that we might surprise our visitor friend and try and break a few barriers ourselves after all. It was incidentally convenient that the National Theatre have been celebrating on telly, so we got the chance to see again some proper ‘ack-tors’ – and surely they must be ‘cutting edge’, thrashing barriers left, right and centre like Lower Sixth prefects with short-trousered boys in caps (at least, if not now, then in their time)? Well, more on that, but for now I do confess to have had a sudden attack of imposter syndrome when Joan Plowright came on and did her St Joan.  So be it, but I notice that Sheffield based, though ‘world encompassing’, Forced Entertainment (who I understand are definitely 'cutting edge' and ‘breaking barriers’ and who I will be seeing next week) say on their website, 'The work we make is always a kind of conversation or negotiation. We’re interested in making performances that excite, frustrate, challenge, question and entertain. We’re interested in confusion as well as laughter.’ So there, to set the ball rolling, we have some very helpful words to describe ‘cutting edge’ - ‘excite’, ‘frustrate’ (interesting one), ‘challenge’, ‘question’ and ‘entertain’. Thank goodness for the last one. But also ‘confusion’? Wow! Breaking barriers therefore may require the boat to be pushed out from the safety of our comfortable little islands (to use the Melville metaphor from my last blog) sufficiently to confuse and even frustrate. In other words it isn’t enough just to entertain, or even make people laugh; theatre does need to be a little provocative as well. Not feeling solid ground under you, the rocking and the swaying, the possibility of a few cultural sharks (whether or not pickled in formaldehyde), or deadly avant garde, nouveau-jellyfish, cavorting a la mode under the boat to sharpen our wits - as long as it’s entertaining and makes us laugh, that’s what is needed. One word they don’t mention is ‘skill’, which was gob-smackingly present in Joan Plowright’s performance. To be fair to Forced Entertainment maybe they might argue we should ‘take that for granted’ given their accolades, or are too modest to mention it. I’ll make my mind up next week. I did think, however, that I would identify a few things that I like to see, my own ‘cutting-edge-ometers’, so to speak - and two shows I have seen recently gave me the opportunity to try them out. First of all I like skillful actors. This may seem obvious, but, for example, as opposed to ‘digital technology’, or a revolving cube onto each facet of which is projected photomontage of a real world scenario reflecting a relevant theme, such as macro-economics. I’m not quite sure what ‘macro-economics’ are, but they sound relevant. And fast dialogue shot from the hip. And even a shockingly good puppet horse. No, I prefer, secondly, a good story, which gets me curious immediately, with strong characters and twists and turns that surprise me and language that sounds like wind through dry leaves – and an ending that whacks me straight and unexpectedly right in the eye and lays me flat. And I’m not just talking about the ‘story’, or ‘tale’; I’m talking about as well how his body speaks, it’s development through twists and turns, the story it is telling, or how her voice teases, or sighs, how he controls me like a priest, how she seduces me like a whore. What the best actors have done for 10,000 years! That will do for the moment. I will reveal others of my own ‘cutting-edge-ometers’ another time.   So I went to ‘Chimerica’, of which Michael Billington said, ‘If there is a better play this year, I want to see it’, or something to that effect, and gave it five stars. This I must see. Well, there was indeed a revolving cube bringing mini-kitchen-sink sets (last seen occupying whole stages in the fifties, so nothing new there) brought in turn into view punctuated by projected photo-montage of the famous incident in Tiananmen Square when a young man with shopping bags stood in front of a tank, and aeroplanes, and strip joints, and other scenes, with people walking in and out just like they do on the street. And there were macro-economics by the fridge-load – and guns, and sex, and red light zones. Everything you need to tell you it’s the modern world. No need even to have to go to the trouble of imagining anything. And in amongst it all - if you looked hard enough - were…. actors! Acting just as they do on telly with stripped down and slick casualness and throwaway nonchalance. There was, however, a good story – and a very good script…. for a telly series. I came away feeling: Could this have been done any better? Yes it could – by pointing a camera out the window. The actors were fine. Good telly actors with familiar faces. Did they have the authenticity of 10,000 years? No they did not. Derek Jacobi rang me up one Sunday morning at home. His voice actually could be heard in my study! He really did! Honest! He wanted to give us £100 and how could he. Well that’s another story. But I mentioned to him the above phenomenon of actors not telling stories with their bodies and he said, ‘It’s because they do too much telly. They don’t have to think about their feet.’ There’s my man! The other play I saw was ‘The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui’ at Chichester before going into the West End. An average to good interpretation of a decent play with a couple of naff moments and half a dozen very good performances, and….. one of the best individual performances I have ever seen in my life. No kidding. Nothing better perhaps since Ian Mckellen scraping his sword against the stage with sexual frustration as Edward II in a production by Prospect Theatre in the late ‘60’s. It was Henry Goodman as Arturo Ui. His body talking with the eloquence of Buster Keaton. His voice with the sonority of a jackdaw. Miss that if you dare. I believe it’s still at The Duchess. More on him next week.