159. Devising Theater with Jeffrey Fracé
Original Drawing by Tori Haynes
Today, we are joined by Jeffrey Fracé who is the chair of acting at the University of Washington. Fracé discusses his background of the arts through Shakespeare, improvisational theater, the different modalities of theater, and the difference between producing theater and producing architecture.
Timestamp Outline
3:49 Jeffrey Fracé: associate professor of acting, movement, and devising performance
4:07 Defining devising: how it refers to making a show that starts with something other than the typical assembly line of theater production and more things done out of order. “Form and content should be married in a particular way in a devised process” JF
6:02 What is the distinguishment between acting and movement? Physical acting vs mental acting, American acting, and Kostantin Stanislavsky. “The reason our dramas went so psychological mid-century is to stay out of the political realm and McCarthyism”.
7:53 Physical acting/physical theater is where the movement is as important as what you’re thinking and so on; the body is speaking first. Impulsive movements with our thoughts, and connections with Bollywood or Kabuki.
9:00 “Physical theater is theater that emphasizes movement and the body’s expressivity and takes precedence over the voice. A place where you could see things more abstract.” JF
10:09 What is JF’s field? JF was more into physical theater and dance theater mainly from Europe and New York. Some favorite people being Pina Bausch, Ariane Mnouchkine, Peter Brook and the International Centre for Theatre Research (CIRT), Tadashi Suzuki, and William Forsythe.
12:20 “Shakespeare was a deviser, and his company was a devising company”. How Shakespeare performed with the same company, had incomplete scripts for performances, and scripts for queues for stage managers. The only evidence we have is the various scripts for all the different people involved in a production.
15:07 JF looked at the first folio and decided this was what he wanted to do; staying up late and scanning Shakespeare’s notes and verses, and how this translated into JF directing Shakespeare a lot in the future.
16:11 Discussion about Shakespeare Wallah in India and how they interpreted Shakespeare as a rolling company.
17:12 “Were you making an American Shakespeare Wallah?” Conversation about directing Shakespeare, its particular audience, and the precedent set by Julia Whitworth (“Shakespeare with a twist”). Taming of the Shrew as Bianca, doing Romeo and Juliet.
19:54 Doing As You Like It with a musical twist, and how the company threw a prom and this started Connie’s Diner as a crazy, avant grade roadside diner. This started the development of characters, booking a space in Brooklyn, and led to a show in 8 years with 5 course meals and an immersive experience with performers, audience, having a story, songs, dance numbers, etc. “This is not dinner theatre, but you are a special guest at our fictitious dinner.” JF
23:29 Immersive/environmental theater: Sleep No More, Queen of the Night, Pierre and the Great Comet, etc.
23:54 “You’re just working in architecture in real life. What and why is your love of theater?” VP Theater is a dinner party where some are invited and some have planned. Everyone is there to have a good time and interact with one another. Being a people watcher in New York, observing outdoor café settings, and the mystery that goes on in other people’s lives.
26:40 The arts have to do with opening people up to examine the internal: Anton Chekhov, who was a surgeon and the “father of realism” “opens people up” like in theater. Leonardo da Vinci, who studied anatomy to understand how to express on the outside. Charles Fracé (JF’s father) painted animals and expressed animals and helped us understand their inner lives. Musicians chasing the sensation of what is happening internally.
28:49 Staging life, stage design, staging encounters: how architecture does more than just “keep people out of the rain” VP. How the actors interpret a scene and a feeling, creating “imaginary architecture”. “The fiction makes the space actually act on my body, and architecture makes spaces act on the body and how they move through them.” JF
32:16 Japanese theater, the “no stage”. Is the “no stage” devised? Zeami the playwright, who created the play he wanted to present and that was what was the play that was presented. Fascination with Japanese theater for JF is “the time it allows the audience to spend with the deep resonant moments that happen on stage, the specificity of the movement and gestures, and the economy of Japanese theater”.
33:50 What is the minimal gesture used? William Kentridge and his six drawing lessons. How little you can show, and how people can still interpret, see, or feel what you are drawing.
37:01 Where to start physical acting, where do you start your work? Internally or externally? Outside-in? The connection with Mudras in India and the gestures and forms in tradition that have symbolism, feelings, and the connection to the internal.
38:31 Modernist thinking where you can return to the source of things; emotional brought out into the world. Post-modern thinking is like there is a world out there of gestures, and we participate in that world and are always entangled. VP
41:28 Are we acting all the time? Is life a theater? The world is an illusion, and we are acting our parts. From a post-modern standpoint, there is no real “real”, but from a spiritual standpoint do you think there is something behind all the layers of play and illusions of life?
43:01 Are you devising theater to expose its devise-ness with the real reality being unknown, but is that what it is searching? When audience is hearing parts of the theater, are they supposed to hear the original text or feel their own interpretation? The difference between a good show and a bad show: when my mind spaces out, is it going in a good direction or a laundry-list direction?
45:24 Why do you go to see theater? What do you see in it? The love of watching people do their thing, and the difference in the distance from the stage. You can see and experience the feeling of people live. The floor of a theater is just a floor, but the special quality is that we extend the certain belief that we are in it. Vikram’s father (Aditya Prakash)’s involvement in the theater, and how that influenced VP.
49":19 What are you doing now? Where are you going? Where are you in your thinking with all this work? The Old Man and His Tea – no drama, part-physical comedy, a little opera, a little dance theater. All devised! “Not more has to happen than needs to happen to keep us all in an engaged imagined space together” JF
