Like living a movie

I've lived in a series of disconnected scenes in a movie during the last two weeks. Not a pervasive feeling, but just occasional moments striking me. Like I am the central female figure in a plotless-yet-dramatic film, but the character's face is never seen... only her feet, maybe her arms swinging as she walks. But you see what she sees and sometimes you have the same impression or emotion but you are never quite sure. Just this odd feeling of "I'm living in a scene from a movie" ... and these impressions, randomly striking. Like a sudden awareness of everything but yourself.

Moments walking down tunnels to the U-Bahn with semi-stale pressurized wind blowing hair and scarf and coat behind. Sitting on a bench in Hauptbanhof eating a baguette sandwich with brie and tomatoes, regarding the comings and goings of travellers.Croissants with chocolate and hot milchkaffee warming wetness from rainy Kreutzberg streets. Gazing upward at the changing violet, blue, pink, purple flush of the architectural tent suspended over the courtyard of the Sony Centre.

Cobbled stones underfoot on streets of a 13th century fishing village now plunked in the midst of urban sprawl and rushing traffic in Kopernick.

Drinking hot mulled wine with amaretto in the amber glow of a Christmas market at the base of an artificial snow slide in Potsdamer Platz, muffled people noise and the laughter and smiles of friends caressing ears. Being one of only 4 voyeurs at a showing of "shortbus" at an art-house rep-style cinema off Haupstrasse. Eating a full dinner at noon after a night of dancing and disjointed morning sleep.Anticipation of auditory pleasure on the edge of a seat in Tempodrom at the Jamie Cullum concert, while buying a freshly baked pretzel from a woman who produces it from a woven basket carried over her arm.

Twisted trunks and branches scratching rich blue sky above a trampolining pair of friends.


Caviar and Kermit accompanied by caipahrinas. Afterschool neighborhood homegoings observed on Akazienstrasse with Dads balancing sons on bicycle crossbars, backpacked girls skipping along and Moms klatching with prams at the sidewalk cafe feeding babies yogurt and bread.

Curves and lines and interesections inside the Reichstag Dom, slicing delicious pie pieces from the Berlin skyline.

And from inside the Dom to inside my head and inside the right now, right then at those moments. Feeling of being inside a bubble, insulated from the world and other people, like inside a camera looking out. Disembodied from corporeality. Not really sure if you're there at all. "I am here, I am in Berlin, I am here..." a mantra, reconnecting with and reminding of the absolute.

Does this happen when you are a stranger in a strange city without language or relationships? It wasn't unpleasant but definitely remarkable. And now home, where I have this new impression. Did it really happen? Was I really there?

Glimpses of self reflected in darkened glass.

Berlin and the Four Winds

We've now finished our work at the FEZ and the four of us are scattered somewhere around Berlin today. Perhaps by accident or design, I'm not sure, but this does happen to be the first day we haven't travelled and performed together for the morning.

Our engager was pleased with the things we did and we received quite positive feedback from and through him. The weekend was Family Day and lots and lots of parents and quite young children were about. We did a half hour on the main stage each day, which was meant to engage the audience and also provide some interaction. We did a song from "13 Ways" which is in the Maritime ballad-style and then a version of "The Log Drivers Waltz" (who knew that would be an aneurhythm? I've had it going thru my mind forever since Freitag!) We also had a trip to Canada with the help of the kids in the audience who made sounds for various parts of the country:city, farm, ocean and wilderness. Steven taught juggling a bit and we closed with Farewell to Nova Scotia and What Do You Do with a Drunken Sailor. Complete with the audience "Weigh Hey"ing during the chorus.

The weather has been amazingly warm for the time of year but now has become more seasonable for our few remaining days. We're hoping to see some shows and explore.

Big city. Bright lights.

In Progress and Progressing

Just a quick update... something that has eluded us for a very long time now. We are in Germany - I forgot my USB cable, so no pictures, but we've been too busy to take any anyway. Will try for some more later. Hope to get some shots at great places around Berlin in our costumes. I'll save description for photos.
The show went up today, with an audience of about 60 17 year-old German kids. They were cool, found humour where we hadn't noticed, transfixed by times and restless at others. So hard to gauge if it's the material, us or the language issue.

Still, not too bad for not having had a real dress rehearsal in real space! Plus, the technician we thought we were to have didn't show, so it was all done in general light. That was ok except for certain spots where a lighting cue would have enhanced our transitions. Plus Steven and Eric had spent ages creating cues and writing things out the previous day, so it was too bad their efforts went to waste, at least for today.

I realized afterwards, we are all "on" this entire show, switching characters, attitudes and mostly everything almost constantly. Occasionally someone drops out, just watches, but we're all there all the time. It's a very fast show, has ended up being focussed almost entirely on the myth of Icarus, using the key features as allegory for an apocalyptic sense of the world... labyrinths, mazes, powerful kings, gods and mortals, young people and adults. Makes sense to us! We'll see how it goes with audiences and beyond.

More work to be done!

Our Thematic Jungle

Me again. I don't want anyone to think I'm doing this blog for myself, it just appears the boyz aren't into blogging. Yet! Mwahahaha.

We're working out format and presentation and how to take the lovely nuggets we have and put them out there for public consumption. I often feel like I need a large paper bag when we start talking about it all. Garry dropped the idea of the "thematic jungle" the other day, and how appropriate that seemed to me. We can swing on vines forever in here: from global warming to apathy to wickedness to individual vs. human identification to science and popular myth to child slave cocoa bean pickers in Ivory Coast... it goes on. Really. Unfortunately, it does go on.

Shtev is bringing his friend Vanessa in to "eavesdrop" on a rehearsal with the idea that we might be able to get a visual arts exhibit going in conjunction with this show. The original idea stemmed from talking about eyelevelgallery as a possible venue (no, we haven't talked to them yet) and how cool it would be to have the answers to the "What Would U Do" survey amassed and creatively shown as the backdrop. We've had a few replies to the postering, several to our own personal email-outs and solicitations and pretty much N-O-N-E to the ad we placed in the Coast. That was pretty disappointing for me.

Oh, well, I guess it is true that just because you're particularly jazzed or curious about something doesn't mean everyone else is. Garry says face-to-face is always best in terms of really gauging things. Maybe we should accost people in the mall?

On a non-work note, Garry and Eric came over for Thanksgiving dinner. Steve had to work but the next day didn't seem to want any of my turkey. What gives?

Training Dogs Must Be Easier

This week we started focused training and exploration in preparation for the show next month. We have access to space for at least this week, and although it isn't ideal for making a great deal of noise, we do have room to move without whacking each other inadvertently. Though I must admit, on occasion, I like to whack the boyz advertently.*mischievous grin*

As part of our work, we began with a reorientation to our own bodies and movements, but concerting attention on moving with intention. Using intention and impulse to inform the movement or be informed by it. The first exercise of our first day was to explore movements and placements of the feet, with instruction to only move with an associated reason and to be very aware of the movement and feeling/emotion as opposed to losing oneself in the exercise. I had a very visceral reaction during this exploration, thinking about the surface of the floor and the feel of my foot flat against it and suddenly that heightened awareness of pressure and sensitivity led me to a mine field. Walking in a mine field where each step down could trigger something or the release of pressure from a footstep could detonate a mine. It was a horrible sensation, to be rooted to the floor, with fear and uncertainty. I actually cried. Not from my own real fear, but from a sympathetic reaction to the daily reality in which many of our co-humans exist.

We're going through a sort of rotation of physical exploration, some vocal work to get the performance voice there not as "I AM SPEAKING IN MY THEATRE VOICE NOW" but more "I am inflecting and expressing clearly and loudly without sounding contrived."
Trying to find the deep core sound through and transferring that into verbal expression; an interesting contrast between my sound and the deeper, seemingly more resonant sounds of my male castmates. I try to get deeper but choke and amass tension in my neck and the front of my larnyx. As Garry points out, it's not our vocal habit to do such a thing and therefore will take practise and training to get the desired sound. Dang, and it took me so long to find my THEATRE VOICE!

We have been initiated into the "sextangle," something from Garry's Mount A days where six people would stand on a side of a hexagon and improvise with singing. This was a terrifying thing for Eric, Stev and I... ok at least Eric and I admitted we were terrified at some point. There we were so close as to gaze in each other's eyes, but very consciously not really looking in each other's eyes, and then the deadly silence when someone had to make the offer. And we all knew we had to answer. Garry, of course, starts and away we go eventually. Today's sextangle was a little more relaxed, exploratory and fun. Tomorrow's? Look out!

We've played a bit with the archetypes from commedia del'arte (or as they called it on Studio 60 this week "comedia del art"). The idea is that the physical archetype can drive an improv/sketch scene with the inherent associated archetypal behaviour patterns. We can possbily use these characters in opposites, such as the bowed over ingratiated servant type with the flouncing, pelvis led greedy type, as a way in for the morning introductions at the FEZ.

There has been no shortage of our usual lively discussion on themes such as globalization and the apocalypse. It's all so big. I feel small. And now, a glass of wine.

Eat!

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One of our brainstorming and brunching meetings. We are working, honestly! It always amazes me how we can go our separate ways, bring back little sparks of ideas and end up having hours and hours of discussion as a result. Training/Rehearsal starts in a little over a week. That's when we'll begin our focused exploration with mind, body and voice. I'm so looking forward to that. Garry always makes it challenging and interesting. Also, anything we have collected or written to that point will still be possible material and over the course of the month of October, a show will come to being.

We've set the previews tentatively for the first weekend in November. Space is still a fuzzy issue. Steven is talking to some people, I'm looking at some different things as well. Of course, money is an object and we're holding off on booking tickets still. I try to take my cues from Garry who seems able not to stress about any of these things. It all works out, somehow, in the end.

Other natterings about sponsorship, fundraisers, publicity, school tours... so much. This is my denial phase regarding about the amount of work ahead of us. Soon I'll want to get in the box with Pushkin!

Life, Afterlife and...

We had another meeting today, this time at Garry and Eric's house. Pushkin (aka Kitten) kept things light although the topics of conversation delved into some very weighty subjects. Among them: Revelations, the four horsemen of the Apocalypse, the existence of a heaven and/or a hell, hell-on-earth, rock-bottom, personal apocalypses (apocalypsi?), black capes and boots, the Tower of Babel, Icarus and Cassandra, an essay comparing the world to a semi-flooded basement with 16 occupants, goodness/wickedness, youth hopelessness, anarchy, social codes, moral codes. And such.

One particularly interesting point that Garry raised was how people tend to look at the Apocalypse as the end, as doomsday, and yet it could be seen as a new beginning, a better world.


Stev has started a bit of research locally, posting this sign around town. I've had fun imagining the responses and suspect there will be a lot of "Quit my jobs" in the mix. He's already received several email responses from his own contacts and had a couple of girls scrawl "Give back to the community" on the sign outside his apartment. They also scratched out the email address and wrote in "Revise your project." Whatever that means.