Rehearsal Notes 2/28/10

HOMEWORK for Wednesday:

- NEW ETUDES (MINIMUM 1, NO MAXIMUM!):
tone and form: go after themes bigger bigger bigger! )
THEMES:
1) dream shift - Dreams as a source of otherness, slipping between 'hard reality' and dream reality state. Going and coming back, and it being a transformation AND/OR
2) nature and shadow side of nature

- GIVE A CONCRETE proposal for The Source
+ not a page, not an image, but something more -- each person bring only one thing (a book, a movie, a story, a series of something that you bring in to the room, no talking only, need to have material in room)

Julie will do sci-fi introductions
Faith Tarkovsky & all variations
--

SPACE PROJECT REHEARSAL
Sunday, February 28
Milepost 5
Liz, Jonathan, Julie, Faith

Stations: What are we trying to accomplish -- what things stood out from all the materials we went over (limiting is the point: let's talk over what stood out for us)
- ask MARC & MAESIE to comment on what materials stood out
- made us think we want more time to bring in/find more materials in the next week
- no problem with us choosing 5 (rather than 1) to move forward with

What was brought in

- LIZ: 2 books in Wrinkle in Time, History of Senses, Salt history, Womb sounds
- MARC: Heraclitus, Philip K Dick excerpts
- MAESIE: Proust, Little House books, Italo Calvino, Orlando, misc excerpts
- FAITH: Elie Wiesel "Night", Tarokvsky's The Mirror, Amelia by Joni Mitchel
- JONATHAN: text from Victor Hugo, James Turrel & Tate Modern, Solaris
- JULIE: Ecotopia, Intros from Future Primitive Vermillion Sands, At Home in Nature / John Burrows

What stood out

LIZ:
- Victor Hugo -- dreaming; connected to dreaming in Hericlitus; loved -- "daydream, the world of the night is a world, nothing other than the approach of invisible reality

- The Mirror -- the wetness of her hair, mixed with the burning house; senses

- John Burrows -- line about people walking to church, simpleness of everything, if everyone would just walk it would change our universe, increase our senses

- "Night" -- something about it, it is so beautiful & moving

- Ecotopia -- get to choose their own death (like native ameriacans & eskimos)

FAITH:
- surprised by connections between materials

- Calvino -- fascinated by sections that designated a place through symbols, communicating a place through mime and symbols (even after he knew language), pearl with a skull represented something even if it was unexplainable & mysterious; they can speak more strongly than anything else

- Reminded of Sexing the Cherry -- imaginary cities, lost cities coming back to life

- Calvino book on Tarot, connected with Madeline L'Engle books, something on surface which spins out in so many directions, story itself is complicated, but something comforting about faniciful things like unicorns

- Little House on the Prarie -- frontier porn, fetishizing olden days return to nature, back to roots, not frightening; contrast with other visions of nature as an unpredictable force, frightening; looking and desiring something evil in nature

- Ecotopia -- intersting because want to believe

- The Mirror & Solaris -- natural elements are powerful but not understandable; nature linked to dreams linked to supernatural

- Philip K Dick -- creating universes that come unglued, resisting the urge to make things work too well "Sybil with a raging mouth" "the dream is the aquarium of night"
- womb sounds like space

- potential title "Hi-Tech"

- love the Turrel images

- "Night" -- horrific events being source of dream-like narrative, symbolic and mystical being used to describe something horrific

JONATHAN:
- At Home in Nature -- idea that is insane to enjoy rustic life, great sequence of insane people enjoying simple life

- JG Ballard -- introductions as major source, framing device; all sci-fi about the future is about the present

- The Mirror -- so good; if we can make something this good, we've made a masterpiece; dreamlike flow of images and ideas

- Future Primitives -- intrigued by idea of having to believe what we do now influences the future, this is an interesting kind of optimism; humans are last organic form in a de-natured, shiny future

- started thinking about a lot of films: really over the top sci-fi movies

- "Night" -- great and amazing and beautiful and awesome, don't know if it's a good source, but interested in a source that is so other (the Holocaust), where we can find a parallel that is interesting and insightful

- human body as something we are trying to snuff out, power of smell, strenght of senses counteracted with technology

- Proust -- so detailed and working in and out of an image, almost pragmatic while ultra poetic

- Philip K Dick -- "what is reality, when you stop believing in it it doesn't go away" -- don't really like it as reading, but like the philosophy behind it and his writing; shortcut to an idea while avoiding the subject

- journey and frame stories -- Orlando, journey can goes on for 100s of years through many places and one person

JULIE:
- Tarkovsky: love it. Mirror: ideas about images and modes of working, theme of silence & layers, making something so dramatic without lots of noise (physical noise, and distractions). Scene of house collapsing around her, sounds of nature becoming sinister & mysterious. Sound of rain as a calming sound, but also the most evil sound -- everything in nature has a shadow side -- fire is warming but also destroys.

- Elie Wiesel: what happens when you return from another place and nobody believes you. Going someplace else and forgetting where you've come from -- escapism and opposite of escapism. This & Proust -- language so beautiful, exciting to think about using this (nobel prize winning) language.

- Hieroclytus: using treatise as form, a way to organize thoughts into whole. you could read it through and one point was five sentences long, one was one word. a play could have six acts, one act is two minutes long -- as long as the idea you want to tell. Brechtian: tell everything you want to tell... like the idea of having a written treatise for our performance.

- Proust: magical transportation from one place to another via sense memory. Language exquisite, enjoyed reading it on page with space around it. sparse, connected to Tarkovsky -- say things but it's all the white space, things not there, that stand out.

- Invisible Cities: interesting images, contrasted to James Turrell photos. World of super lush nature & foliage. Turrell: light creates immensity & vastness, encouraging playfulness in such a barren setting -- people lying on floor in Tate Modern making snow angels. Encouraging joy in people. Using color to dictate moods, exciting to think about doing things exactly the same way but the lights change.

- Solaris: small gestures -- she takes comb and puts to her lip, connecting with light -- highlight or not highlight certain things. Huge circles of light coming in through windows, strange plastic covered things, doubles and triples and twinning of people. We have powerful tool: 4 women of similar height and build and hair color. Control of destiny, our own & others -- reminded of short story, man on space station: he's about to go home, out repairing something and he hurts his ankle, goes to medical computer and it repairs him and he wakes up but it's not him who wakes up, it's a clone -- finally he realizes that he's been out on this spaceship with endless clones for hundreds of years, recordings of family are from long ago... whoa.

- Womb: natural but sinister. movies: always low level white noise kind of sound.

What didn't get mentioned / CUT:
- Joni Mitchell's Amelia
- Salt
- Orlando (though idea of journey should remain)
- Random text
- Diane Ackerman (though hold onto idea of senses)
- Italo Calvino tarot book
- Little House in the Little Woods / Little Prairie
- Madeleine L'Engle

Common themes more than one person were drawn to / STAY:
- Introductions / philosophies of sci fi -- Philip K Dick & JG Ballard
- Hieroclytus
- Mirror & Solaris (Tarkovsky)
- Proust
- Wiesel, Night
- Victor Hugo excerpt (from Lathe of Heaven)
- James Turrell
- Italo Calvino, Invisible Cities
- Fetishization of rustic life, back to nature (Burroughs, Ecotopia)

HOW TO MOVE FORWARD WITH SOURCE MATERIAL:

FAITH:
- For me, its not a theme or book, but the juxtaposition of several sources around a common thread or theme
- TWO THEMES (FIRST IS also A 'TYPE' OF WORK): (1) philosophy of sci-fi: you are exploring present by exploring future. Creating an imperfect universe as a way to work out humanity's flaws/moving forward. (2) nature and how it is linked as a source of comfort and a shadow side that is destructive/frightening
- the films of Tarkovsky (not just one film)

LIZ:
- Not one source from today that I can go after. Like the the IDEA of having A source.
- TWO THEMES: (1) Calming vs Non Calming, and how they are the same (womb music, most calming for babies yet is a disturbing, ominous sound). (2) Simplicity (Ecotopia desire to get back to simplicity, Proust simplicity in remembering, ease of being able to dream)

JULIE:
- Did not see A SINGLE source that is fascinating and the one...like the idea of having A SOURCE (or two) because...
- ONE THEME: Dreams as a source of otherness, slipping between 'hard reality' and dream reality state. Going and coming back, and it being a transformation.

JONATHAN:
- TWO THEMES: (1) overarching philosophy / description of what you're trying to achieve: introductions of what sci fi is attempting to accomplish -- a genre to explore. (2) Moment in The Mirror when kid calls "Papa!" gets up and walks forward -- weird feeling as a child, world is a magical place -- exploring all levels of that, getting across that feeling that The Mirror so effectively conveys. How do get this feeling in an adult -- put people into that state, slipping between states.

Ways to move forward:
- Keep creating etudes: shed light on subconscious, how we're thinking
- Rev up long form improvs

MUST CHOOSE A WAY TO CREATE, either:
A: Choosing Themes and then going after that/those themes via ANY SOURCE IS OK
B: Rigid Source; One book and one movie for example; (finding the themes)
C: Source that is a (or multiple) 'type' (pop/recorded music) that is mined to chase a certain theme (american patriotism)

JONATHAN: intimidated by holy grail (picking 1-2 sources) but intrigued also. Can't answer this today -- but maybe in future. Not interested in just choosing themes -- sooner we get to decision on sources, sooner we can get to creating better work.

LIZ: in total agreement with Jonathan. With boundary able to go further. Almost too much right now.

JULIE: agrees. people find pleasure in doing plays because so much is set already but you get to design lots of things. More drawn to one set source. We're all on so many pages, too many ideas right now.

FAITH: room for lots of things to be in the show even if it isn't our main source material. Doesn't need to be THE SOURCE. would love to have one or two perhaps juxtaposing sources, drawn to it; tricky thing about finding a source at this point is this type of single source is often the inspiration for making the show; would love to do one source, but think it might make more sense to do a hybrid;

All in agreement that we want a source, but is that source a book, OR a book & a movie, OR a series of books, or ? ? ?

Today's ideas the name of the show:
"Hi-Tech"
"As yet untitled Space Show" / As yet untitled show about about space