Posted by: Lalitavira
« on: July 18, 2008, 07:37:40 AM »It depends on how you do it. Kane did believe the Tarantinoesque German production got it wrong (see Graham Saunders's book) and there have been productions of e.g Cleansed directed by James MacDonald which were highly stylised. This can work much better than trying to be realistic which can end up being laughable. I am concerned Dani that the tone of your post implies you believe all productions should try to reproduce some sort of realistic portrayal. She didn't do this herself in 'Phaedra's Love', I saw the original Gate production, and frequently puts stage directions in her work that are impossible to follow realistically ( 'A vulture descends and begins to eat his body'). The point was to honour the image theatrically.
I'm currently in a very successful run of 'Phaedra's Love' at the Project in Dublin one of whose strengths is the stylised presentation of the rapes, throat cutting and disembowelment of the climax. In the round and under full house lights the blood is poured on beforehand, the knife movements are several feet from the body and delivered mock heroically and the sound cue (arriving a few seconds late) is of pigs in a slaughterhouse. Despite it being absolutely clear to the audience how the image is being constructed everybody has commented how effective this is. In fact they don't need to comment, you can feel the horror. For those interested in European theatre this approach stems from the director Jason Byrne's admiration for Romeo Castellucci.
I'm currently in a very successful run of 'Phaedra's Love' at the Project in Dublin one of whose strengths is the stylised presentation of the rapes, throat cutting and disembowelment of the climax. In the round and under full house lights the blood is poured on beforehand, the knife movements are several feet from the body and delivered mock heroically and the sound cue (arriving a few seconds late) is of pigs in a slaughterhouse. Despite it being absolutely clear to the audience how the image is being constructed everybody has commented how effective this is. In fact they don't need to comment, you can feel the horror. For those interested in European theatre this approach stems from the director Jason Byrne's admiration for Romeo Castellucci.