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Vernal & Sere Theatre Part III: Erin Boswell
101 Plays1 year ago
In the final episode of our Series on Vernal & Sere Theatre, Amber interviews Movement Choreographer, Education Director, Actor, and V & S co-founder Erin Boswell. We ask the question: What is experimental theater? And discuss the many acting techniques and methods Erin uses in her work as a theatre maker and devisor. We also talk about how a movement choreographer or director might work with a team and the tools she uses for actor care and consent. It’s been a joy diving into the world of V&S to find out how they do their work. Thanks for joining us for Part III of Vernal & Sere Theatre with Erin Boswell!
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Transcript
Introduction and Roles
00:00:06
Speaker
Hello, everyone. Thank you for tuning in to Table Work, How New Plays Get Made. My name is Amber Bradshaw, and I'm a new play dramaturg, arts administrator and educator. On this podcast, we ask some questions. What is new play dramaturgy and how do we do it? What do artists want to see in the future of the American theater? And where are we failing in the creative process and how can we solve these concerns?
Amber's Role at Working Title Playwrights
00:00:31
Speaker
This podcast is brought to you by Working Title Playwrights, a new play incubator and service organization based in Atlanta, Georgia, in which I serve as the managing artistic director. For more about WTP and me, check out WorkingTitlePlaywrights.com. I start either in total stillness, which is interesting because I think that might not be movement, but that is very much movement.
00:00:57
Speaker
is also stillness. That comes from a Suzuki thing that I think you can stillness and very, very slow movements. It's very interesting to watch, but it also gives you the time to start to unfold where you want to go and like be aware of the space and like what's happening in your body, rather than just kind of getting into like, wild free flow movement, which I also love. But if you again, opposing forces, if you move from that place of stillness,
00:01:22
Speaker
break out of it into like a big, very quick sudden flow back to stillness, then you're always working between these two really beautiful opposing ends, right?
Introducing Erin Boswell
00:01:37
Speaker
I am so excited to introduce our guest today, Erin Boswell of Vernal and Sears Theater. And so I'd love to start by having Erin introduce herself. Erin, thanks for joining me. Thanks for having me. Hi, I'm Erin. I am an actor. I'm a director. I'm a intimacy coordinator director. I'm a movement director.
00:02:06
Speaker
voice person. I am a lot of things, but I guess I'll just say at the end of the day, I'm a theater maker. And tell us a little bit about where you've come from. So where are you from? Yes. Okay. I am originally from Cleveland, Ohio. I got my start in musical theater, children's community theater. So I started doing that and I just was like, oh, this is really cool because the playing pretend the aspect and just kind of getting to live out these like I was a kid who like
00:02:36
Speaker
would just pretend I was dead. Set my hands across my chest and pretend I was dead, and then see how people would feel coming and looking at my body. I've been doing this since I was a kid. So I'm just constantly like,
00:02:51
Speaker
just in this, yeah, I know, it's a little insane, but all that to say that being an actor felt like something that was the most true to who I am. And so my senior year of high school, I was like, I was going to go to school for pre-med, because this is my parents' student in medicine, and I didn't want to do that. I was like, I want to be an actor. And of course, my mom freaked out, and my dad was just like the thing I always thought, just he's the best, best person. He was like, do whatever you want to do, just be the best at what you do.
00:03:20
Speaker
I was like, okay, well, that's such good advice. I was like, you know, that's, I mean, being the best at anything, obviously that's a standard that you kind of have to sit and think about, like, what does that exactly mean? But, you know, I think you might just like be in pursuit of like, as good as you can be at it, whatever that means.
Erin's Acting and Movement Training
00:03:38
Speaker
So, yeah, so I kind of got that permission to go and do it. And did my first year at Texas Tech in that theater program. And then,
00:03:46
Speaker
It wasn't cutting it for me. So I auditioned for school my first year and I ended up at NYU. So that's when I really kind of took off on acting training, like really, really intense acting training and not just being an actor, but getting the sources, all sorts of sources that would help with the acting training, but ultimately would bring me to where I am today, specifically a lot of dealing with movement and different kinds of styles of theater, different voice work, that sort of thing.
00:04:16
Speaker
So talk to me a little bit about your background in movement, voice, and acting and kind of how you got here. Sure. I'd love to. I was very fortunate because the program that I did at NYU, NYU
00:04:32
Speaker
When you audition for it, they break you into studios that you have absolutely no say in where you go. Most of the people that I feel like I ran into there were always like trying to be the empty kids like in musical theater and then none of us got placed there. And then too much to our dismay ended up in these other really intense like Adler or Strasburg or whatever. So I ended up in Meisner. And I felt like that was a good fit because I had a little bit of understanding about what that was. But I think Meisner is this thing that everyone kind of throws around like a hot word
00:05:02
Speaker
And then there's really a lot that goes into it. So I ended up in that studio, but the thing that I got out of that, not just in terms of like the Meisner training, which is really intense, two years long, the program that I was in had an additional year with placing like the Meisner technique within UNESCO or Meisner technique within Brecht or whatever. So, which is cool because it's good to be like, know that your acting technique can transform
00:05:31
Speaker
depending on what you're doing, where you're working, the space, the style, the playwright. So that's cool. But the program was supplemented with movement work. Specifically, we were doing work in Suzuki and work in this method called Williamson, which is like a bunch of Meisner people made this movement method for the Meisner technique to kind of figure out like the physical, what needs to open in the physical body in order to be able to express
00:06:02
Speaker
acting without like locking up and understanding where all your emotions are stored and that sort of thing. So it's kind of rooted in like contemporary dance, but also very much about physical acting training. There's also stuff like viewpoints, lobbing from in, a lot of devising methods. We had a whole class on character and there's like animal work and just all sorts of interesting like physical embodiment of different types of characters. I always say that a lot of the acting training
00:06:30
Speaker
translates so beautifully to devising and creating. It's such a shame that we don't do more of that on the playwriting and directing side of things. It's something I want to bring into educating playwrights. Yeah. Is all of this fun that actors get to have? It is so fun. It is very fun. I mean, it was really fun. And I would imagine you use all those tools today when you're creating with Vernal and Sierra. I'll just put them in my processor when I'm instructing actors to work on
00:06:58
Speaker
doing activities kind of on their own or figuring out how to just embody a character that feels different than you, but not like commenting on the character in quotations, the character, but really fully embodying someone that's different than you. That is also you because it's your working with yourself, you know? So I felt very fortunate in that program. There's also clowning, which like made me, which is the worst thing I've ever done in my life.
00:07:25
Speaker
It's a story I tell. It's like, so I don't know if it's just because it's French or what, but it's mean. It's so mean, but it's so funny, you know? And it's like one of those things that it's like, if you can learn how to do this and just like walk in front of your classmates and your teacher goes, do something, do that thing you do. And you just like, can't leave until you make everyone break out in laughter. So imagine it can be really bad. Sometimes it's really, really quick and really funny. And then
00:07:53
Speaker
Um, other times you're up there for 45 minutes, just trying to make people laugh and it's humiliating. Um, so I think that there's a little bit of unlearning in that training that needs to happen in places to be like, okay, you're moving to a place of shame. Let's sit down for a second. I don't know. I don't know. I see some of that. I just don't know about, but I did find out that like, it's a thing that made me comfortable with just being gross on stage. Like it really helped with, um, playing mama. It's just like,
00:08:20
Speaker
Yeah, sure. I will absolutely do this on stage. And actually, I find way more comfort in that than doing something like the last play was in the curtain season where I have to be this like sexy, beautiful, blah, blah, blah, whatever, you know, so I would rather play the creepy clown thing. That's from clown class, I think. Right. But yeah, all that to say, it's really long for the grave saying that
00:08:44
Speaker
The training I was in had a lot of different components kind of stretched across different styles, different techniques, all working together to build you a toolkit that you can and will need through various points of your career and your process and your craft. Yeah, so I felt very fortunate in the particular program. That's awesome.
00:09:05
Speaker
I did not know they placed you. Do they still do that? Yeah. It's so interesting. It's really like Hogwarts, 100%. I remember my instructor, she was like spending an hour in this room. I think it was the last time to go. We worked in this monologue and different monologue and a different monologue. And then she asked me what my horoscope was. And she asked if I was a Scorpio. I remember this. And I said, no, I've got porn. She goes, oh.
00:09:32
Speaker
She was very, I think she was in the experimental theater wing. I just wish I knew who it was, but I really liked her. But it's funny because she's like, because you can ask, it's also like, if anyone, you know, grew up with Harry Potter, you can ask where you don't want to go. So you're telling the sorting hat audition person, you know, I was like, uh, any studio is fine. I just really want to get into the school, but I just don't think that the experimental theater wings for me.
00:10:17
Speaker
I love that.
Exploring Experimental Theater
00:10:21
Speaker
I love that. I think that moves me into one of my next questions for you, which is kind of the way you view experimental theater and literally the language of experimental. And of course it's
00:10:33
Speaker
I would say it's a little bit, it's something I think people could easily argue about. Like what is experimental theater? I was actually asked recently what experimental theater was because one of the new scholarship recipients was attending and someone used the term. And I said, well, in this context for me, it means that we are looking at
00:10:58
Speaker
the inner workings of the play rather than just enjoying a story from the outside of it. Like it's sort of exposing itself to us. That was sort of the best I could do. But that's kind of the way I look at it because I feel like it gets, when people try to say it's antagonistic, I feel like that's limited.
00:11:20
Speaker
So yeah, tell me a little bit about what you think of the idea of what it is or maybe and then and then potentially how that connects to your work here. Yeah, so okay. So I'm going to start by saying that you asked me like the difference between postmodern and modern and avant-garde. I can't tell you.
00:11:39
Speaker
Experimental is just an interesting thing to kind of wrap my head around because when I think about experimental work, coming from my perspective, when I watch work and I'm like, that feels experimental, my standards might be a little bit different than a lot of other books standards on it. I think what you said is right, is like there's a really great way of like trying to dig into the core of the play itself or into the
00:12:09
Speaker
the way the play is functioning and that the play might not be able to function without morphing the form a bit, you know, whether that's language or movement or acting style itself. Yeah. So experimental to me feels like when we kind of push against what feels normal, when what, pushing against, and that can be many ways that you might do that.
00:12:37
Speaker
pushing against the standard form of like the five act structure, right? Like here's your of a linear timeline of behavior that feels natural, like you would see it in everyday life, pushing against like kicking sink, pushing against realism. And there's even ways I think that you could turn something like Chekov into a little bit experimental, like, I think you would not want to do it for the sake of making it fun or funky, which I think is a pitfall of
00:13:04
Speaker
some experimental theater and I'll say that as someone who loves experimental theater that if it gets to the point where it's no longer serving the play it's kind of not helpful. We always kind of joke about like sending Hamlet on the moon like everyone's like we'll put a Hamlet on the moon on a trampoline and I think that's a play that's been done somewhere but it's always kind of talked about like why are we doing this you know. So there's pushing against something to push against Hamlet on the moon or just because you don't want it to do it like the normal Hamlet but
00:13:35
Speaker
How is that serving the play? If you could justify it and do it while I'm here for it. But I guess I would say experimental, if I was going to define it, is pushing against norm in terms of what we see and what we're familiar with. Yeah. I often tell playwrights that choosing to develop a different structure for their play
00:13:58
Speaker
is inherently experimental. Yes, absolutely. Because you're saying to the audience, well, what you're used to is not what I'm going to give you. So welcome to my world. Yeah. Hope you like this planet because you'll be here for a little while. Yeah.
00:14:15
Speaker
I like that. It's the idea of pushing up against rather than, I think some, again, think of it as immediately an attack or an antagonization of the audience or something like that. And I, I like that better pushing up against what we know to be the norm. Yeah. And I think that can obviously like, it can feel, and I understand why it might feel antagonistic, especially if you're already creating more danger by making it
00:14:43
Speaker
not feel like you're coming in expecting a play to go this way because this is how you understand plays to function. And if you walk in and it functions in a way that absolutely is bewildering or it's just very confusing. If it's not what feels normal, it's already scary and uncomfortable. And I think your response to it is already like, oh my gosh, nervous, anxious energy.
00:15:07
Speaker
Which of course, like, I don't know if that's, I would like to go see a show where I felt that way. I haven't seen a show like that when I felt that way in a long time. Not in a way that's like, I don't feel safe in the space. Like I'm physically at harm's reach, you know? Like I don't really want the actors to touch me and I don't want to have to like get involved, you know? Cause then I feel like I have to perform by being a performative audience member and get like, I hate that. But I do, you know, I do want to walk into a theater space and feel
00:15:34
Speaker
disrupted. And if I can feel like my life is disrupted, or how I view art is, or I have to try to figure out what the heck's going on, I feel like that can be experimental. And it can feel antagonistic. But in a way that I really like. I love that. I love that you want to feel disrupted.
00:15:55
Speaker
And I guess that kind of leads me to the idea of, for you, the difference between dance and the movement work that you do. Sure. That's a great question, especially because now I'm super inspired by dance companies and my producing partner and co-director and another really great director, Erin O'Connor. Our Instagram feeds are just like
00:16:20
Speaker
Here's this thing from Peeping Tom. Here's this thing from Danish L.A. Like here's all these just different companies are like, how do we do that? I can't because I'm trained in this way and my body doesn't do that. But being inspired by image and what the body is doing and how these groups of people are moving and sometimes we've tried. Like we get really excited and inspired. Like we have to put this in the show. If we try to do that with Lear and then at the end of the day, we're like, this actually takes away from the play itself. So we can't use it, you know, because again, the play is the most important thing. So
00:16:48
Speaker
Movement, movement directing, it's still about the narrative. It's building a physical narrative, a physical dramaturgy, creating a language for the piece itself. Sometimes that's very obvious. Sometimes that's like, we're a clown ensemble who has to all, I don't know, move lunch trays down a line or something.
00:17:15
Speaker
or a bunch of clown children warriors, I don't know, you know, or like, okay, it's very obvious that this is going to be very physical. And that's like a very obvious, like, direction or like a dance. We're in a waltz together. Awesome. But sometimes it's more about like, it's so it's so interesting to talk about this. Like, I don't really talk about this as much. We're just kind of in a room with people who understand or like, okay, yeah, we're here. This is a Greek chorus, and we need to move across the space in this kind of way to shadow this person
00:17:43
Speaker
because this is kind of, they're sort of a Greek chorus and they're sort of the theories. And so building it with just these ideas. So I think a movement director helps the director create the physical narrative of the piece. That's a very simple way of saying it. The movement director helps the actors in their process of finding more embodied performance, finding character, finding,
00:18:10
Speaker
different states of being and helping them feel really grounded in that. So I say that as a movement director, but I would say also just generally movement in the play is the act of performance, the relationship, the choreography, even just like in terms of when you're working with the director, like if we just push them a little bit further apart, what would that do? Or if we just
00:18:33
Speaker
this moment when these two characters touch for the first time, can we just change the quality of that touch or can we expand it to rather than just being a very simple hand-to-hand touch? Can we open this up into a movement sequence that feels just like the wonder of it and opening that emotional connection in a way that just feels so much more expansive? I think there's just many, many ways to work with movement, but it goes beyond dance in that way that I think it's
00:19:02
Speaker
It can be really, really small, really, really tiny, even down to the place that is imperceptible. And it's about active process all the way to like being very, very massive, like big sequences of movement.
00:19:14
Speaker
Do you, do you use gesture in your terminology? Got it. So gesture being a very common, like gesture can be dance, but it can be not dance. Yeah. Great. Got it. Yeah. Yeah. And so, so when you're working, uh, with Sawyer, uh, when you and Aaron are working with Sawyer, so it's often, you know, how does he communicate his sort of concept and then you.
00:19:39
Speaker
Take part in that? Yes.
Collaborative Processes in Projects
00:19:41
Speaker
I'll use an example just because sometimes it's easier to talk in examples than theoretical stuff. So for example, in the play The Exterminating Angel, we have this big dinner table. And he knew he just wanted the set to be very simple. He just wanted one long table across the center of the space in the square that the actors, once they enter, cannot leave throughout this play. But he wanted the sequence that we call the caviar event.
00:20:06
Speaker
to be at this dinner table. And it has to deal with physically what's happening in the space is everyone's having dinner. So he sees everyone at this table having dinner. At the head of the table is the character Louise and she's like orchestrating and she's going on the list of the menu. But because it's stylized and because it's just getting, it's been well. So it's starting to,
00:20:32
Speaker
go from more behavioral into more abstract and we're starting to get information that like time is starting to repeat itself and that there is this like loop of things just happening without anyone really being aware. So that's kind of where we start to introduce that concept. So it was so hard. We spent probably like 20 hours on this thing.
00:20:55
Speaker
Right? Because we have so many people at this table and it's everyone creating. So like me and like Erin O'Connor would be like, okay, let's start very simply. Let's create circuits here. So everyone's kind of creating like what they're going to do, you know, so. You want to reach across? Yeah. So at the table, I'm going to reach across in and pick up my glass and take a sip of wine. I'm going to turn to the left because the person to the left is asking me something. If I would like to pass that dish, should I hear that? I turn here. I pass here. I look to my right. Oh, by reach over. Oh, now I'm flirting with.
00:21:24
Speaker
Lawrence down here and now I'm turning back and now I have to repeat this thing. So now we're moving through this circuit But there's lines happening at the same time. Yeah, and then the whole thing goes backwards
00:21:37
Speaker
before it goes faster or we do it and then we jump, we have like a jump cut in time to the middle of the circuit. So previously I would have gone from move one to move two to move three. I instead go from move one to jump to five and then I go back the whole way. So it's very complicated, but Sawyer is like, they're at the table and I need this thing is like we're warping time.
00:21:57
Speaker
And his vision simply was like, I have no idea how I do that, but maybe it's with circuits, maybe it's you guys do your job. So we're like, okay, I will figure this out. And it was very complicated. And at the end of the day, even though what we're doing physically is warping time, we're still engaging in conversation normally. Because the play still has to move forward and the audience still has to understand the text and understand it's not about how weird we can get with our bodies. It's about time and it's about
00:22:27
Speaker
status and it's about money and entrapment and all of these things. And so when you're creating, let's say when you're creating each circuit for each artist, is Sawyer doing it with you as well? Is it like you all three of you or maybe the two of you in collaboration or is it more like this is the idea you do it, I'm going to do something else?
00:22:48
Speaker
kind of somewhere between it. We'll instruct what the game is. Build your circuit with these people, and we have to get to one through 10. And then we need everyone to just remember that your three was dealing with this person. So we're going to get back to three. Their three is dealing with you on your three.
00:23:09
Speaker
But you know, there's like 18 people at this table, right? Incredible. And so he's kind of there watching to see if it makes sense. You know, like, it feels like it doesn't, it doesn't go right. Looking at the overall picture. He's not helping with those little things. If he's got it, some things, some things will be good. Like he's like, I really need to see more back or like, hey, when your, when your nose was tilted up that way, that was a really beautiful image from out here. So helping in that kind of way. But in the little dynamics, it gets like very complicated and confusing. And so
00:23:39
Speaker
Yeah. EO, and I usually just kind of take that over. Right on. And by EO, you mean Aaron O'Connor. Aaron O'Connor, yes. Yes. Yes. And shout out to all of the virulence here company members. We did that last time. We'll do it again. Okay, cool. That's great. Thank you for breaking that down. That's really helpful. And I hear you talking about lots of structures and systems.
00:24:03
Speaker
that you're putting in place, right? I heard you talk about the game and then you've got, everybody's got a circuit and then you've got the people you're sort of talking to and then the moments you might have to hit in that circuit, right? I mean, it does feel a lot like dance choreography, right? But then you throw, you throw
00:24:25
Speaker
text on top of it, right? And so it almost feels like somewhat what musical theater people do because they're dancing and singing and acting and hitting their blocking as well, right? I wanted to go to school for musical theater. And that was sort of the beginning. That makes a lot of sense. And then Katarina, I converted her to singing a song over the band at the same time. Over at the same time. Over at the dinner table. Right. Right. Love it. Sounds amazing.
00:24:53
Speaker
That is my kind of show. I would really enjoy that. So speaking of all of this, do you want to talk a little bit more about the foundation of V&S's style? Yeah, totally. I think our style came out of the first play we did, Going Back to Sincerity Forever, in that
00:25:22
Speaker
And this is, you know, also, maybe, maybe it came from our moving backgrounds, mine and Erin O'Connor, but also Sawyer was very open to it. And this is like, that was the first place I ever directed. Um, so, but feeling like there needed to be this, you know, the play itself, Mac Woman's script has things like a furry pause written into it. So you can either skip the thing that says a furry pause.
00:25:48
Speaker
Or you can figure out what the furry paws is. Right? So this play is dealing with, for those who don't know, maybe I'll just kind of give a brief overview of this play because you didn't get to see it. OK, Mac Willman is this phenomenal, very strange playwright. I would say absurd, but again, we were talking about how I don't actually know what absurd is in this. So I would say he's absurd. He's experimental by my standards.
00:26:17
Speaker
He wrote this play called Considerity Forever. The basic premise is that there are, and this is already, it's going to sound problematic and it might be, so take that as what you will. But it's a play about this group of teenage members of the KKK, and they're sitting in their cars having very big thoughts about the world, about things like why is the sky blue? Why is grass green?
00:26:44
Speaker
Um, and then there's these aliens that come to kind of just spread their alien furriness and like contagion to everyone. Um, which already seems like it already happened, which is something I'm thinking about now, you know, with a clan that feels like a alien, a furry contagion anyway, right? If you think about like that mentality. Um, and then there's also, uh, Jesus, she's black.
00:27:14
Speaker
And she's here to see if she can knock some sense into people and the place. There's a line that's like, if I had to do this whole thing over again, I would really reconsider this, right? And then at the end of it, it's just so it's very strange, right? And you get these very weird concepts together. You get aliens, black Jesus, the clan, movie theaters, young love, big concepts, all within this thing about like,
00:27:43
Speaker
Sincerity is the most important thing. If you're a racist, at least you're sincere about it. You don't have to put one back up. And that's what the point of view is. But I'm sincere, and God would want me to be sincere. And that's what's important. You're like, no, that's not just one. That's not one. It's important. If you're in your mindset and you can't expand your mindset, right? Problems. But I'll just say that that was our first play. And the play is really weird, and it's really funny. These concepts are just so, the script is hysterical. But really important, deep concepts.
00:28:12
Speaker
putting the clan on stage, like you can't just be flippant with that, right? Obviously. But the script itself, yeah, things like a furry paws or an earthquake and everything rebels. And so with that, there's just like starting to be movement. And what happens when an alien starts to infect a body of people? What, how do we make that present in the movement? How do we deal with the space itself? How do we do a projection and sound and
00:28:40
Speaker
all these influences within it. So I guess to go back to style, that's our very first show. We didn't know what our style was. We just did the play. So you did not set out to become a physical theater company. No,
Evolution of Vernal and Cyr Theater Style
00:28:50
Speaker
not at all. We chose a play that we thought was interesting. I liked the script. I was like, this is interesting. I'm confused. It's funny. And I'm kind of upset by it. And I want to know what that is.
00:29:02
Speaker
That's a great reason to choose a piece. I'm a step by this and it's also, and I'm laughing and I feel bad for laughing because this is like, these are very serious things. Should I be laughing at this? Should I be right? What does it mean that I'm laughing at this? Yeah, exactly. So we did this first play and not intentionally create a style that we have, but what was important was the play. The play was interesting and the play, the structure was not,
00:29:30
Speaker
a very clear structure. The language was very weird, but still something you can understand, you know? So all that to say that we just pulled these influences into this play that we found interesting and confusing, and we had a lot of questions about. And so then that was that first play, and then we moved to the next one. And again, this was Sawyer, lots of questions, interesting language, playing with time, lots of different
00:29:59
Speaker
influences are required to support the play. And then that's just kind of what we kept doing is always supporting the play and choosing play. I don't think we ever really know what plays we're going to choose. Like right now we have no idea what we're doing next. Um, it just kind of falls into us where we have a conversation or there's sometimes like plays we're interested in like the last one, Lear, I was like, listen, it's been 10 years. Can we do, since I've seen this play, I would love to try to direct. Um, so
00:30:26
Speaker
But at the end of the day, it's still always about the play. And the style and what we choose to do with it is just how to support the play. Yeah. Yeah. That's really cool. That's awesome. So it's really come out of just sort of a natural evolution. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Very cool.
00:30:47
Speaker
Well, you've said that you are really interested in, you know, expanding the education part of what you'll do, right? Yeah. Tell us a little bit about that and what y'all are doing in education right now and maybe what you are thinking about, you know, growing. Sure. So I would say the education component of Vernal and Cyr started because every time we would sort of enter a show
00:31:15
Speaker
the things that were required for the show tended to be something that was not part of many actors' training, either because it's a very film-centric town, so there's not movement classes here, or understanding why actors should be taking movement classes as part of their craft is maybe not discussed, or even in college programs, you'll kind of get a smattering, like a little couple of movements here, like one movement class, but everything else is like,
00:31:46
Speaker
jazz, which is awesome. It's fine. But the work that we do requires a certain amount of training. So we would spend, we kind of do this. I think the last few ones, we haven't done this. But really, there's like a week of training when we kind of enter a process. Sort of like a crash course in some of the methods we use and the vocabulary we will use, which primarily tends to be Suzuki, Laban, viewpoints.
00:32:16
Speaker
So we'll train like that first week of that process. And then it just kind of became a thing of like, well, why should this just sort of be only for people who are in our shows? I mean, it seems like people are genuinely curious about what the movement is and how this helps you as an actor or director or divisor or creator or whatever. So that's kind of where it started. So we started
00:32:39
Speaker
like Monday drop-ins is what I think they were called. And it was just like a quick kind of overview and sort of like movement jam session with these techniques. And that was pretty much up through the pandemic. And then when we came back, we started teaching online, adapting these things for, yeah, for Zoom. And then came back and sort of just built out a structured course. And so that's what I am. I'm the head of the education wing, I guess, for Arnold Zier.
00:33:09
Speaker
And yeah, just kind of building out an accessible means to train and learn these techniques and see if it works for you, see how you use it. A lot of it is kind of applied more towards acting, but there is a big devising component we've really been exploring with how to build work or how to incorporate things that really feel like they have absolutely no conversation with each other.
00:33:36
Speaker
The devising class will, we ask students to bring different pieces of text. So they'll bring like a contemporary monologue and then they'll be like an ad or like a transcribed weather report or something from the news or something that's real, like a real current event. And always just different pieces of text that really have nothing to do with each other. And what happens when you put them all in the space together? So you get like a really beautiful Sarah Rule monologue.
00:34:02
Speaker
mixed with like a bump it hair ad, you know, and, and then movement and then we have this piece that's being built out and it's just so interesting to create and it definitely works with all these different kinds of tools. But also, I hope that it instills this feeling that you can make work. I think I just took this frantic assembly workshop and they had a really just really great nice clear way of describing this that I was like, Oh, that's
00:34:30
Speaker
useful because it's the same thing that I'm saying. That's like, they call it the crooked path and that you're having these different concepts that have really nothing to do with each other, but you're taking the crooked path and you can find so much more, um, than just doing like what feels very obvious and clear. So in those classes, taking a bump that hair ad with the Sarah will monologue with your literacy, for example, what is your race? You have to do with bump it, you know, with a movement sequence that you've built. And then you have so much to just unpack and unfold.
00:34:59
Speaker
And so you have all of these things support each other. And then ultimately you can end up with a piece that just feels like you're asking questions rather than giving answers, which is definitely what we're about. Very cool. But I love the idea of like, we'll bring something in, let's mash it up. Let's mash it up. What does it look like if we put this together?
00:35:22
Speaker
these two opposing forces, which is just inherent tension, right? Yeah. Which is beautiful. So I love that as a tool for devising anything, really. Yeah, that's fantastic. Because I often love to ask people who create movement, like, where do you start? And I honestly, sometimes they don't even know. Is that a question you could answer? Where do you like to start? I could probably if you put me in a room and was told just to make a movement piece.
00:35:52
Speaker
I start either in total stillness, which is interesting because that might not be movement, but that is very much movement. It's also stillness. That comes from the Suzuki thing, but I think you can stillness and very, very slow movements. It's very interesting to watch, but it also gives you the time to start to unfold where you want to go and like be aware of the space and like what's happening in your body rather than just kind of getting into like wild
00:36:22
Speaker
free flow movement, which I
Suzuki Technique and Movement Pieces
00:36:23
Speaker
also love. But if you, again, opposing forces, if you move from that place of stillness, break out of it into like a big, very quick sudden flow back to stillness, then you're always working between these two really beautiful opposing ends, right? Yeah. So if I was going to start there, I might start with stillness with text or stillness with just a thought or keying in on what we call folk eye, which really is like a mind's eye image. And this is if you were
00:36:52
Speaker
and start with that image and then maybe incorporate gesture and then text and then see what what I feel like I need or what the space itself might need. Yeah, but that just comes from having like techniques to kind of support yourself because you just get you're like just do anything and that's the back to the clown thing that's like you could do anything and that just feels like oh god like that's too daunting and scary and I have no idea I'm as crippled with not knowing what I could do. Yeah.
00:37:22
Speaker
That answers your question. No, I love that. That's fantastic. I started very, very, very, very still slow motion. That resonates, especially having seen you perform so many times, I can say.
00:37:36
Speaker
I feel like there's so much power in your stillness and there's presence, there's presence in stillness, right? So it's almost like, I hear you almost saying like, come into yourself before you know what to do next. Like there's a lot of that sort of rooting into self and stillness. You know, we practice that in meditation and yoga, right? And all of these sacred practices, stillness is a huge part. And I've heard a lot of instructors say things like,
00:38:02
Speaker
it's instillness where we do the most work, right? And she's speaking about muscles and strengthening and lengthening to a certain extent, but I think that could be said for in general, right? So I love that as an answer. That's a fantastic answer. Let me a little bit more about what you're hoping to do for the future of your program or maybe for yourself in the work you want to be doing in the movement directing.
00:38:31
Speaker
So I think with the education wing, I just am really interested in changing the mindset around movement for acting training, very much like at the core, it's movement for actors, how to, yeah, change the way that we view movement. I think the United States kind of has a problem with the lack of consideration for it, of viewing it as equal and of equal importance to like a,
00:38:59
Speaker
acting technique like Stella Adler or Meisner or whatever. And I say that like as a person who did Meisner, you know, I'm very much needed that in my tool belt. The movement was equally as important also because that's an instrument that we see working, you know, is the body you can have, you can feel all the things and be super keyed into your partner and be listening. But if your body is telling you a different story, I'm not buying it, you know. Exactly. So that's something I'm just trying to change how we
00:39:29
Speaker
how we view movement, how we view the body. I'm also interested in, you know, how that translate just to like a wellbeing practice for yourself, how to just be in your body and, you know, move through the world, how to give yourself practices to help you when you're in states of fight or flight, age with strength. You know, I'm interested in sharing those practices as well. But I think on a scale, like a larger scale, yeah, changing how we view movement, the actor, but also in work,
00:39:59
Speaker
we're starting to see more movement in film, more style in film. Also in theater, how theater companies and different, yeah, just different companies view movements. I think in places outside the United States, there's pretty much always a movement director involved in the process some way, but here in the United States, it just doesn't happen as much. I would say that in New York, it happens occasionally.
00:40:25
Speaker
but just not merely to the place where it could be, really make that piece a little, just like a little spicier, you know, a little more rounded, a little bit more just electric, I think, even if that's just in coaching actors physically, because there's pretty much always a voice coach or a dialogue coach available on any film set, any piece of theater.
00:40:51
Speaker
but not always in the coach, one with the director. So I think I'm trying to change that too. And I think that just starts with making a space for the work to be shared, keeping it accessible. We always offer this at a tier rate or a really low rate. I find it. And the classes are really affordable. Yeah. Yeah. And I think it is just because we're working against a model that's like,
00:41:16
Speaker
The collegiate institutional system that we have, it's kind of a scam in some ways, especially if you go to one of the schools where you're gonna walk out with, you know, I went to NYU. I was very fortunate that I know that some people like have just so much debt that's impossible. And it just seems so unfair to ask people to have, you know, $200,000 in debt and be an actor. What? You know? So I just, I really, it's important to me to be able to offer the same caliber of training
00:41:45
Speaker
or something that's affordable. And a lot of our Atlanta artists don't have the ability, the time or the privilege to go get a master's degree. And they're still just as talented as somebody who went. So I appreciate that. I think it's so true. A lot of our playwrights that we work with don't have master's degrees and they're still just as talented as any other playwright.
00:42:06
Speaker
you know, I think experience comes in many shapes and sizes, you know. I also hear it sounds like you're saying too, like you want to teach actors to act in lots of different ways, right? Like there's not one toolbox, there's not one style, you're not just a film actor, you're an everything actor, right? And this is your style when you do film, and this is your style when you do this. And, you know, and I would love to see that as well, because I do see the smallness taking over some of the performance
00:42:34
Speaker
And I, unfortunately, I can't work with those folks because they're not expressing themselves enough to even reach a stage reading audience, right? And so that surprises me usually when I see that. And because Atlanta wasn't always a film town, I will say we have definitely a lot more people acting small than we used to, but there's never been any training.
Actor Training Accessibility in Atlanta
00:42:57
Speaker
There's just never been any training. Atlanta just doesn't have a lot of training just in general for our artists,
00:43:04
Speaker
It's always exciting to see local companies offering training, right? And it's something that Working Title does as well because we've been asked to train people. And we actually have the same issue that you do is people come in and they don't have much experience or training in what we do. So we kind of have to train them.
00:43:22
Speaker
So we found that, oh, well, I've done dramaturgy, but not new plate dramaturgy. I'm not sure how to do this. So it makes sense that you all would need to be training people because you're the only company in town doing this kind of work. You know, I hope that you'll have the opportunity to continue to teach your work because I think it's fantastic. So too, I hope that, you know, we teach it here in Atlanta. I would really love to teach in other markets as well. Yeah. And I think also, you know, trying to,
00:43:51
Speaker
change, I think there's a bit of a problem and I see this in Atlanta, I see this obviously everywhere and just things that we're unlearning practices about how we deal with actors and deal with the vulnerability of what we're doing. Obviously the weight of what's required of an actor, it shouldn't be underestimated at the same time that there is like a certain kind of quality that I would say is not healthy.
00:44:20
Speaker
So I'm also just hoping that maybe there'd be space in the movement work or even just an acting training where it feels like a safe space to fail, but also be pushed in a way that's like scary, but feel like, okay, I can fall here. And how do I grow out of this? Yeah. Yeah. When you talk about sort of wanting to connect the theory and the practice and the body and the mind, that's kind of what I hear you talking about is
00:44:49
Speaker
that a lot of American theater doesn't seem to acknowledge the aliveness of the body just on its own without whatever's being said and how much that speaks, right? Yeah, figuring out other tools and other ways of kind of doing that work through the body. Back to 448, Erin O'Connor, she doesn't have the same acting training, like she's a director, she's a phenomenal actor, but her strongest skill set is within
00:45:19
Speaker
the story that her body tells. And so very much in that and even Sarah Kane gave us a really great entrance point to that. Like I was not familiar with like Robin method or the logon, depending on how you pronounce that, whether you're from here from Europe. But in the script itself, it has this whole like string of efforts. It's like flat or slash flick, punch, dab, ring, press, and then there was one that was kind of
00:45:48
Speaker
called Flash, which now that I understand it might be a flick slash, now that I know more about the method, but we made up what Flash was, and we brought that to the use of lights and memory, kind of this, and for these moments of lucidity that she would experience. So we kind of made that up. But there's a whole, it's literally just a paragraph. It's just like, effort, effort, effort, over and over and over and over. And so we made a whole piece out of that. But Aaron was very much using that method
00:46:20
Speaker
to put those efforts in her body and so sort of communicate like we're talking to an actor like, you know, I might approach it more psychologically or how I'm feeling or like use imagination to like start to conjure this journey for myself. And that would cause me to feel a lot of things and get me to the state that I need to be at for this kind of performance. And that errands process just doesn't work in that same way. And I find it so fascinating that we love talking about it as just that
00:46:47
Speaker
To be an actor doesn't mean you have to have this feeling all the time or be able to summon just images and respond to them immediately. Your body can tell the same story if you've got a really good control and technique over it. So Sawyer would be like, Erin, this needs to be slash. And so she's like, I don't know. I can't tell you. I can't go off and create this whole backstory.
00:47:14
Speaker
pull up the memory and distorted or any of those things. She's like, I understand slash, I will put slash in my body. I'll put slash in the line. And we do that a lot in our practice. Like when we're, when I'm coaching or what we're doing with the actors in classes or Sawyer understands his technique very much. Now he's like, this character just, and it needs to be more flick and that's easier to tell an actor and be like, be more jokey, be more like, you know, sometimes, sometimes it's like annoying to hear as an actor to be like,
00:47:40
Speaker
You know what I mean, more jokey. You're humorous, like what exactly are you asking for? Put flip in your body and in your voice. Just try it out, see how that feels. And then it'll oftentimes give you the same results that you're looking for as a director as trying to like approach an actor's process with like psychology or action. Those things feel like they're not working. The actor's like not understanding that. The body, always.
00:48:04
Speaker
I mean, humor is subjective, right? I mean, intimacy coordinating is so beautiful in that way because why would people assume what a kish should look like, right? Because everybody thinks of that differently. So that really makes sense to me. It's a very clear direction.
00:48:23
Speaker
That's actually interesting for a dramaturgical perspective, looking at the creation of a piece. You could literally talk about a moment and say, well, I feel like this is more flick than that or whatever. And you could speak to almost like the vibe of it, right? Like the energy of it rather than the actual thing.
00:48:45
Speaker
Which is great, especially if you're telling story through body so much and creating structure where there isn't any. Yeah. Or it helps, you know, intimacy. We talk about de-loading the work a lot. Um, but I find that that's really helpful, especially when you're doing as an actor or directing actors are trying to work through a scene that requires like not intimacy related, although it might be very intimate, um, like a state. And sometimes we'll talk about that. The play just needs a certain state.
00:49:14
Speaker
And that state might be violent, you know, and that might how an actor resonates with that, right? You can either talk and I would, you're like, and even that's, that's tricky, right? I like talking after some violence or like demand more of them. I'm like, I really need you to go there, like go there, go deeper. And that's like how you would get like in an acting class, like forever ago. And like, in that stuff, like the need is valid, I think, like understanding as a director or an acting coach that you have, the actor has to go to that place, what that place is, obviously,
00:49:44
Speaker
can be very different. It doesn't have to, you know, what feels deep might be different for some actors or some actors in their process to go to that place might be psychologically harmful.
00:50:06
Speaker
if there's not certain like safety practices involved or some people might be able to do it and it's just a feeling and they can feel the most anger, most fear, most just like let the monster out and then just be like, Oh, that's fun. You know, just totally just depends on the process and the actor and like, you know, yeah. So, but if you have a term for the body or the state, like slash,
00:50:31
Speaker
If you can just put that energy, that vibe, we need the vibe to be slashed, right? We know what that is, which we know it's heavy, it's bound, it's indirect, and it might feel violent or chaotic without requiring you to like go and think about really violent or chaotic things, right? Like some acting practices will ask you to do. So I find that using that technique in general is just a really good way to get to the state without requiring the same kind of like potentially harmful
00:51:00
Speaker
things that could kind of leave their residue on you. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I've worked with a director who would always say, make the words sound like what they are.
00:51:12
Speaker
Yeah, which I really liked was Jason Minidakis from Marin Theatre. But he taught a version of the text as music. So it was very much sort of like playing the text with your voice. And so it allowed it completely avoided objectives and intentions and backstories. There was no such thing.
00:51:34
Speaker
The only thing you have is what is in the text that is said about you and that you say, that is all you have. Which to me is so much more helpful than coming up with a bunch of stuff that is fake and may not actually speak to the work at all. Because I think that's a lot of what happens.
00:51:55
Speaker
And that if you tell an actor this should be more flick, then they can emote at whatever vibe is right for them. And it can be theirs and they can choose. And you still have stylistically what you want. So that feels really strong as a choice. And having seen y'all do your work, I feel that it is successful.
00:52:23
Speaker
having seen several shows. And seeing not just y'all do the technique, right? You've trained other people to do the technique, and I've got to see them do it. Which has been a fun evolution, by the way. Yeah, it's fun to see the technique on other bodies. It's been very interesting to see, especially with hurricane season, it was really cool. Yeah, because I think it was one of the first times I'd seen some actors of that age range.
00:52:50
Speaker
doing your work. And I was like, that is fantastic. You know, because typically it's been 20 to 30s, right? So you incorporated some older actors and they slayed, they nailed that. And it was beautiful to see in older bodies, like, because I want to see a diversity of movement. And so we did get to see that, right? We got to see more of that. And that was really cool. That was really neat. Very cool.
00:53:16
Speaker
Um, so you also are an intimacy coordinator. Just want to, that has been really important in, in the work we do with VST. Um, the first time we brought on some intimacy practices, um, our, was an Ooboo, which was great because there was a lot of very intimate stuff happening in that play. And that kind of really opens my mind into like, this is something that I think I would like to share because I am a movement person. I am like an advocate for actors.
00:53:46
Speaker
in the room if something feels like it's getting really intense or I'm starting to see someone's body language indicate that they might be too anxious or they need to take a break. Or even for myself, I have the hardest time advocating for myself because I'm very much like, I will use this like how I'm feeling to get me through this and it's going to be awesome the other side. And that's just like talking about boundaries at home, like things like when that starts to happen and then you go home and then you don't talk to your partner because you're just angry at them for like
00:54:11
Speaker
putting you in that position, which is not what happened, but it's just like a lack of being able to advocate, right? Yeah. So I can say that from experience. Yeah. Something we all have to take care of ourselves and it can be, we can tend to be like, no, I can push myself.
Intimacy Coordination in Theater
00:54:25
Speaker
This is good. And it's like, actually no, actually no. Yeah. It's, it's, and that's what came out of that place of need. Um, and being genuinely interested in what these intimacy practices were and how they extended just beyond like,
00:54:41
Speaker
scenes of simulated intimacy or simulated sex, how they can move into like just best practices for maintaining wellbeing when working on a piece that's really difficult or different kinds of intimacy or how we talk about content that could be potentially triggering, you know, just things like that in the process as an actor. I think there's a lot of just intimacy practices that have carried over in a way, especially because, yeah, our work is very difficult.
00:55:11
Speaker
Um, it's rare that we ever do work that feels just kind of easy and fun. Like we do love the fun stuff, but there was always something rumbling under the surface a little bit that we're trying to get at. Um, so yeah, whether that's like simulated sexual acts happening or really just intimacy between people and vulnerability and that sort of thing, it's definitely, definitely helped, um, within our processes. Yeah.
00:55:37
Speaker
I really enjoy watching intimacy coordinators work. I think the tools are really fantastic and everybody would benefit from taking advantage of the tools. Honestly, everyone in the room, because I feel like it's just like a, let's just all check in and acknowledge we're human and see each other and like stop if we need to stop and break when we need to break.
00:55:59
Speaker
As a dramaturg working with playwrights, there are times where you just kind of have to close rehearsal because they're done. They're done listening. They don't have any more space in their brain. So there's a lot of checking in with them. How are you doing? Are you good? And so then there's also the training them to be comfortable saying what they feel, which is not something they're used to. Obviously, people aren't usually asking them those kinds of things.
00:56:26
Speaker
You know, as a new play dramaturg, it is part of my toolbox to be sort of in care of playwright, right? So it's really nice to know that Vernal and Cyr has you and your intimacy work and you can bring that to it because the work is very challenging and there needs to be a container for that. So, you know, it sounds like that you all have really developed that container.
00:56:54
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I hope I definitely hope so. I hope, you know, we work really hard, but we definitely do our best to to care about each other as a team and care about the actors in the space, especially because, yeah, the way that we work may feel very different than a lot of other theater companies processes, especially because sometimes are so long.
00:57:14
Speaker
And your processes are three to six months. Right, very long. And then in tech week, it gets really intense. And sometimes we're still on the struggle bus big time, trying to get things to work. Every time we're like, this is the one where it's really bad. Oh my god, everybody's tech all the time. I cried. I was like, I feel like it's going to be fine. It's the sound. We're going to fix it.
00:57:46
Speaker
I do know though from asking Sawyer that even though your process is longer, you actually rehearse less time each week, which to me sounds like a much nicer process. So you do two or three rehearsals rather than five. And it's over three months rather than three weeks or less. So there's a time for process, which
00:58:11
Speaker
time to take a break, right? Time to do other things, do your job, make some money, you know, during the day, but also like come back to it and still enjoy it, I feel like. So I just want to throw that out there too, because when we say three months, we're not talking about five
Vernal and Cyr's Rehearsal Process
00:58:28
Speaker
days a week. Oh, yeah, definitely. Right. Yeah. I mean, our schedules are, we all work day jobs. Do you have any final advice specifically for
00:58:44
Speaker
I always say, what's your advice for new play artists? And I thought I'd love to hear your advice for actors. Yeah, my advice for actors is to read plays.
Broadening Artistic Influences
00:58:58
Speaker
Seriously, read plays. Find different art forms outside of your own particular
00:59:07
Speaker
craft, look at, go to museums, look at art, look at musicians, look at mind troops, dance companies, things that are not artists from the United States. You know, look at things globally, find just different art forms, and figure out how that can influence your work. My advice is to become an actor that's versatile, requires expanding your toolkit a lot, even if that's scary.
00:59:38
Speaker
That would probably be my biggest one. I'm always on the hunt for trying to expand mind as well and be bad at something and hopefully try to take it and figure out how it works. I think that's great advice too. Find something to be bad at. See how that feels. That's fantastic. Thank you so much. All right, y'all. Thank you for joining us today. Thanks. Thank you so much, Erin.
01:00:07
Speaker
Thank you listeners for tuning in to Table Work, How New Plays Get Made with Amber Bradshaw. This podcast was brought to you by Working Title Playwrights. If you like what you've heard today, support this podcast and all our initiatives by leaving us a review, following us, and or consider making a tax-deductible donation to Working Title Playwrights at www.workingtitelplaywrights.com.