Chapter 4

About

THE BROAD SPECTRUM OF PERFORMANCE

An actor on the stage, a shaman, or someone in trance stands for or is taken over by someone else or something else. This “else” may be a character in a drama, a demon, a god, an animal, or an inanimate object. On the other hand, a performer in everyday life is not necessarily playing anyone but herself. Paradoxically, this self can be known only as it is enacted. The non-stage roles of ordinary life are many, ranging from the highly formalized performances of government and religious leaders to the semi-fixed roles of the professions, to the more easy-going improvisations of informal interactions.

The two kinds of performing encounter each other when an actor studies a person in ordinary life in order to prepare a role for the stage. But this mimesis is actually not of “real life” but of a performance. There is no such thing as unperformed or naturally occurring real life. The object of the actor’s “real life study” is also performing, though she may not be fully aware that her behavior is codified. All behavior is restored, “twice-behaved,” made up of new combinations of previously enacted doings. A wholly conscious performer, if such a person exists, is one who twice-performs twice-behaved behaviors.

Classroom Activities

PERFORM

  1. Make a Happening. Be certain that all the performing in it is “nonmatrixed.”
  2. Using as your script the rules of behavior given by Emily Thornwell (p. TK), perform an encounter between a woman and a man where the woman does everything Thornwell says a woman should not do; then switch roles and repeat.
  3. Stage a scene from a realistic play by Henrik Ibsen, David Mamet, or Arthur Miller – in a totally non-realistic manner. Is your scene successful? If so, why; and if not, why not? Discuss how the text of a drama does or does not determine the style of acting.
  4. What constitutes realistic acting changes over time. Watch an “old” film—or, better yet, several “old” films (from the 1940s, 1960s, 1980s for example). Work in a group—watch together. Discuss whether the acting is “realistic.” Then choose one scene from each film to perform—in exactly the same “realistic” style as in the film. Perform your scenes for an audience, and have a discussion afterwards about what was “realistic” or not. 
  5. Take a class in a performance genre that includes codified training (ballet, tap, martial arts, yoga, etc.). Is it possible to master any elements of a codified performance form in one class?
  6. Design and construct your own mask. Observe yourself masked in the mirror, and experiment with how you want to stand and move. Then, engage in an improvisation with a partner, working together to accomplish a goal (e.g., set a table, fold clothes, pack a bag). How does the mask guide your behavior? How are you different behind the mask?

WRITE ABOUT

  1. Think about the different roles we play on a daily basis. Write about a typical day for you with particular attention to the different roles you enact throughout the course of a day.
  2. Your book gives the example of Anna Deavere Smith as a performer who uses hybrid acting. Choose two other examples of performers who use hybrid acting. Explain how your chosen performers use their own versions of hybrid acting.
  3. Watch an episode of Judge Judy (https://www.judgejudy.com/). What roles are being performed? Write about your findings.
  1. Read about Anna Deavere Smith’s global initiative ADS Works
  2. Watch a video of Eugenio Barba's Faust (1987) featuring the Indian odissi dancer Sanjukta Panigrahi and Japanese buyo dancer Azuma Katsuko
  3. Explore the work of Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo
  4. Learn more about Matthew Bourne's all-male Swan Lake
  5. Identify micro-expressions at Paul Ekman’s website
  6. Visit the website for the Surveillance Camera Players
  7. Wayang Kulit on youtube
  8. Learn more about the Chicago 8
  9. Watch an episode of Judge Judy

Sample Discussion Questions

TALK ABOUT

  1. 1.   What is meant by saying that the “performances of everyday life are as codified as ballet”? Is such an assertion useful? Does it help you grasp more effectively what’s going on in “real life”? How helpful is the concept of “restored behavior”?
  2. What are the most salient differences between the performing Meryl Streep in a realistic role, a judge presiding over a trial, and a mother chiding her daughter for really bad behavior?
  3. Is all acting in popular culture “realistic”? Where do you find examples of other kinds of acting? Think about television, film, Youtube, etc.
  4. What does it mean to “perform yourself”? What roles do you play? Do you have some roles you play more or less often? Do you have roles that are more formal than others? What changes in your physical appearance (clothes, demeanor)? In your voice? Actions?
  5. What does it mean to “perform yourself” when someone is watching? What if there is a camera watching? Do you always know if a camera is watching?

 

Videos

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=320&v=KO-ebw_vJ3c

Chapter 5