Talkback Talk-back: A Streetcar Named Desire

Yesterday, I was fortunate enough to lead a talkback after a local production of A Streetcar Named Desire for which I am dramaturg, and it went off highly successfully.

After the show (which I have now seen 3 times and have been thoroughly entertained each time, 2 hour 45 minute length notwithstanding) the producer invited me to hop up onstage with the actors. After allowing patrons to leave, about 25 people stayed for the discussion. This theatre is known for having the most informal talkbacks, being entirely audience-focused and basically asking them to comment on the actors. I wasn't so sure about this, but proceeded anyway.

I started off my introducing the fantastic director and the cast and audience gave her a full minute of applause, causing her to grow red as a beet. Then I introduced myself, welcomed everyone, and proceeded to have the cast go around and introduce themselves with their real names. I responded with a "good job guys" and got a somewhat amused reaction from the cast, "gee, 3 months of memorizing lines and we get a whole round of applause for saying our names." I was talking about your performance, guys, but...whatever. Love you all.

Then, came the immortal moment of "anybody got a question? anyone?" that everyone hates, but somebody's gotta break the ice. After the usual moment of complete silence and an actor saying "I guess we can all go home," I got a question from an audience member. Throughout the talkback, I bounced around the stage (in the round) and into the audience Ricki Lake-style, moderating the questions and repeating them for the cast and the hard of hearing, and calling on someone from the cast to answer if nobody volunteered.

So, yes, the first question. It was something along the lines of "how did you guys deal with interpreting these iconic characters in the shadow of the epic movie version?" The actors playing Blanche, Stella, and Stanley answered appropriately and with pride, and the mood in the room became much more lively and conducive to questioning, and soon many hands were popping up from the crowd. One of the ladies in the audience complimented Stanley's muscular build comparing it to that of Marlon Brando, which got some cheers from the audience.

During some calm moments, I tipped my hat to the director and gave her a chance to talk about her staging concept, which contrasted Blanche's feeling of entrapment with the outer staging areas being full of life, with muggers and vendors and all sorts of action going on that Blanche just can't manage to see or comprehend, just beyond her reach. The audience acknowledged this, which led me to ask the question to the supporting cast about how they felt about being central to the dramatic action without being center stage. This was another great moment because it allowed the cast members with smaller parts (the Mexican Woman, Pedro, the Negro Woman) to get their ideas and feelings out there with just as much credence and importance as Blanche, Stella, and Stanley.

We got a couple really good questions to round out the discussion; first, a man asked if any of the cast members had done a Tennessee Williams play before and what their experience was like this time around, and more than half the cast got to answer that one with a sentence or two, and the director even chimed in as well. The final question was a really great one from a younger girl in the audience, who wanted to know how the actresses playing Blanche and Stella dealt with being sisters, because even though there were some tender moments between the two, sometimes in the play it seemed that they were "complete strangers!" The actresses playing Blanche and Stella were more than happy to answer what that relationship was like both on and off the stage and how sometimes they felt like sisters and sometimes, indeed, like complete strangers, and what their characters' lives must have been like both before and after the events of the play.

Overall, it went off successfully and several of the actors as well as the director and producer told me how well I did as a moderator and how well I kept the conversation going. After the show, I went out with two of the actors and chatted more about the talkback and the questions that were asked. This talkback was my very first as moderator, and it ended up being a very thought-provoking half-hour that really gave audience members, actors, and the dramaturg some good insight into the show and the rehearsal process, and above all showed that we had a room full of inquisitive and active minds, able to ask and answer intelligent questions. And I was able to facilitate that. I can't wait to do it again.

What's coming up next:

Greetings from Colorado, readers.

Coming up next will be a feature on Andorra by Max Frisch.

Stay tuned!

Back with a Vengeance!

So even though December was an abject fail, 2011, I promise, will be a year of dramaturgy fun.

December was a busy month for me, with some local projects in theater (including two in dramaturgy!)

Though I haven't prepared any play reports for this entry, I thought I'd give Aristotle a run for his money and go into depth on some of my views on the first on his concepts on theater - something I will reference a lot in the future - and here's my first entry on character and the types of theatrical characters I find most commonly in plays.

1. Protagonist. The protagonist is defined as the person who drives the action forward. For some, it is the journey he/she undertakes that forms the backbone of the play. Protagonists come in all shapes and sizes, and usually it's someone somewhat tolerable or sympathetic (or intended to be) so the audience has someone to root for and watch something happen to as the play progresses. Sometimes known as the hero, although he/she may not be a hero in the traditional sense or do anything particularly heroic other than drag the audience through the play. Usually the protagonist is a single person.
2. Antagonist. The antagonist is defined as the person who puts obstacles in the way of the protagonist. They are often categorized as being villainous or evil even though they aren't necessarily so. Usually is a single person but can be a group, or a group with one particularly nasty antagonist.
3. Comic Relief. This character is usually present in a drama to provide some levity to the straight man, some additional buffoonery to comedy, or just a little bit of humor. Is rarely antagonist or protagonist, and in a good play, will not distract too much from the focus of the play. Often shows up in pairs.
4. Straight Man. This character (not necessarily a man) is usually po-faced and can range from uber-dramatic to merely a foil for an over-the-top comic relief character. Can be a protagonist as well, or occasionally an antagonist (think supervillain with a dopey sidekick). Is rarely seen without a Comic Relief.
5. Voice Of Reason. In the ancient Greek days, this was known as the deus ex machina, or "god in the machine," someone like Zeus, Hera, or Artemis who came down from the sky in a whirligig, all "I'll save you!" and even sometimes, "Oh, me, here I go again straightening out these mortal idiots." In plays post-Ancient Greece, this can take the form of a Comic Relief (see Idiot Savant), or in a more traditional sense, a wise older man or woman. Usually not a child character - in fact, if a play has a kid voice of reason, she'll usually make you want to punch him in the face.
6. Plot Device. When used with discretion, can make a good play an amazing play. This character is, by the virtue of merely existing, a point of contention that is omnipresent. Usually he/she has some unconventional quirk - a mistress, a child with a disability, a recently-back-from-the-dead husband, even a ghost or a figment of the protagonist's imagination. Sometimes this character is not even seen on stage or not even in the play at all, merely mentioned, making her an Absent Plot Device (APD). Spooky!
7. Narrator. Most plays do fine without one, but the narrator is an essential element of a play for children, such as a fable or a fairy-tale play. Sometimes, the narrator comes in the form of an unobtrusive supporting character like a milkman dropping by every morning, or even as a radio voiceover. Sometimes, a voiceover narrator can be the same character as one in the play, giving updates via diary entries, memoirs from the future, or by telling a story to his grandchildren.
8. Sidekick. Always the bridesmaid, never the bride. This sidekick can be a friend, a partner, a sibling - someone who has a closer relationship to the protagonist or antagonist than any other character, and sometimes drops a bombshell by switching allegiances midstream or otherwise making a big move; but can stay relatively neutral throughout the show, being some kind of straight man or constant advisor.
9. Lover. He or she is never the protagonist, but keeps the ol' fire burning throughout the dramatic action. Can be a plot device, or even a sidekick (sometimes even a spurned sidekick), but can provide anything from a casual flirtation to an explicit passion to...a spouse. Yes, I went there. Somewhat of a stock character, but I think is a character-character because oftentimes, romance does affect the way things roll.
10. Idiot Savant. Someone who is a screw-up or someone constantly written off as being dumb, nonessential, or a nonentity. Most of the other characters do not listen to her when they should and can even abuse her, but in truth, she's the smartest chick in the joint. Can be a voice of reason throughout the whole play, or babble until a great moment of clarity near the end..
11. Wild Card. This is a toss-up and has no rules, rhyme, or reason. He can make just a cameo for comic relief, be a plot device, add some mystique or an interesting sidebar, or sometimes oddly enough the forgotten character or "ghost character" as sometimes seen in Shakespeare (not to be confused with an actual ghost), someone who has absolutely no purpose for being there and comes off like an actress who got lost on her way to ladies' lingerie on the 15th floor and ended up in 15th century France. Usually, though, this character is just someone who doesn't really have a strong enough relationship to the protagonist to be a sidekick, not enough antagonizing nature to be an antagonist, isn't particularly funny, romantic, brainy, and doesn't gift us with any moments of great revelation. 
12. The Chorus. Usually a group of people rather than one person and most commonly used for commentary on the action, or, when non-speaking, to act as glorified crew members and move stuff around. The chorus must be used with caution - they are not to be used as an army of stage-fillers or a big unruly mob (that will usually be taken care of by the audience storming out at intermission) - they have rights, people, THEY HAVE RIGHTS!

And now stepping off of that soapbox, behold, 12 possible roles to mix-n-match, and most of them will show up in a play in one form or another.

Good night for now :)

Dramaturgically yours (and yours, and yours)

The Daily Dramaturg