Steven Berkoff's set designs

[rosie]

Can someone PLEASE help?! im doing btec performing arts at college and have been given a research task on Berkoff as we are performing scenes from EAST for our assesments. we have been asked to look into all his influences, what he used, why he used them, and give examples.

ive spent ages reading through pages on Aurtards Theatre of Cruelty to try and define it in my own words, and ive just about managed. now im writing about Le Coqs use of mime and im trying to find an example and pretty much just write about why he used mime, mask, ensemble ect...

im so stuck. can you help me? anything you can tell me about his influences and why he used certain techniques and how, and any examples, would be brilliant!!! by the way ive left it till last minute and it needs to be in tomorow. oops!

[Iain Fisher]

Good questions!!

To take East as an example.  A bare stage apart from some chairs against the back wall.  When the actors are not performing they sit on the chairs.  Sometimes a simple table is brought onstage.  Mostly the actors perform on the bare stage.

Berkoff as a director know the importance of lighting.  No gimmicks but the lighting will help focus the audience on certain characters.

The actors use mime a lot- the fight scenes in East should be deliberately "staged" as if a dance, so symbolic violence.  In the eating scenes there are no plates or food, but the actors mime this, and typically very fast, as if they are stuffing themselves.

The mine is often one of the highlights of a performance, such as the motorbike scene in East.

There are photos of productions here
www.iainfisher.com/berkoff/berkoff-photo-all.html
East, Greek and Kvetch give a good feeling of Berkoff's vision.

Does this help?

Iain

[hypertreeko]

Any links to pictures/videos of any of Berkoff's plays which could be used to analyze Berkoff's use of set design in his productions? Or could anyone give me an outline/summary of how Berkoff's stages were set, and how they were used to aid the actors? Ex. empty/full stage & use of levels? Use of color & lighting? Special Effects? Transitions? Overall realism?

Thanks in advance!