In journalism, there is often a disconnect between the stories we preview and the events themselves. People naturally talk about their events in the most positive light. I have yet to interview anyone who said to me, “Hey man, really I wouldn’t go to this event because it kind of sucks.”
That just doesn’t happen, so I thought it would be an interesting series to show what these events are actually like.
Maybe the play we previewed will be full of intense sexual images and references strong enough to make even the most jaded porn addict cringe. Or maybe the sleepy little band we interviewed played the loudest show with the wildest and sweatiest mosh-pits.
Well there is no way to unless someone goes out there so consider the Lobo your envoy. If you have requests or ideas for a Lobo cultural adventure, then post it in the comments section or send a message to culture@dailylobo. As always, please share your thoughts with us. After all, this service is for you. Without further ado: this week’s adventures.
06/17/10
A while ago, I wrote a story about a theatre troupe that performs Shakespeare on the train (dailylobo.com/index.php/article/2010/06/stage_freight). Site-specific theatre always poses an interesting dilemma for me. Inherently, it seems like a gimmick. After all, the whole concept is not to change the actors, or the play, or the props or any of the traditional elements of theatre, but merely to move the production to a new venue.
Barring any disruptions, such as people crowding the performers or something falling in the middle of the performance space, site-specific theatre seems like theatre just outside of a theatre — nothing more and nothing less.
With this mindset, I approached the Shakespeare on the Rails production. That’s not to say I wasn’t excited. Gimmick or not, the idea of seeing a play on a train to pass time on the ride was immensely pleasing, but I didn’t think it would pan out to be anything more than a normal play.
In some ways, I was right.
The actors approached their material with all the seriousness of any staged play. They still didn’t make eye contact, and, save for the occasional bump in the train ride or announcement over the loud system, seemed unaffected by the fact they were performing on a train instead of in a theater.
That’s not to say they didn’t use the setting to their advantage. Trees in “Much Ado About Nothing” are the metal poles in the rail car, and the upper level of the car is used as backstage for the actors to change.
For me, at least, the most interesting part of the whole performance was the audience’s reaction to it. Seldom have I heard complete silence in a rail car, but when the troupe started performing everyone shut up instantly. Now and then, the actors bumped into or accidently invaded someone’s space.
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Some riders laughed while others cringed, but every time the rider was shaken out of his or her role as an audience member, which was a pleasure to watch.
More exciting were the occasional moments when an unwitting passerby would walk into the car, upstage the performance by traveling through it and leave as quickly as possible while the show went on undeterred.
The actors should all be praised for keeping their cool, because, if that ever happened on a real stage, I am pretty sure the actors there would have had a fit and stormed off.
While watching the performance one other little disparity arose for me. I wasn’t sure whether the whole thing was supposed to be spontaneous or it was to be more in the vein of a conventional performance.
After all, the actors had props and clothing changes to indicate differences in the play, which seemed more conventional to me. But, at the same time, the play seemed out of its element, though that might be the newness of site specific theatre. I thought it might have been more interesting if they hadn’t announced the fact that there would be performers on the train and just let the audience figure it out on its own.
It would be more jarring for the audience, but then again the Railrunner officials might have had something to do with that. It would have been a waste of good publicity if the play wasn’t announced. Either way, I thoroughly enjoyed the experience, and it would be a good time out for anyone headed to or coming back from Santa Fe.
