Abstract: A range of intentions might be brought to a production, on a continuum from Re-Creation to radical Re-Interpretation. As a case study, the performance of Doctor Faustus co-produced with Handmade Performance, the Graduate Centre for Study of Drama, and the Centre for Research in Early English Drama (1999). Two dramaturgs worked to complementary but different purpose–to represent the original intentions, and contemporary revisions. Examples include the clown scenes, as structural parodies of Faustus’ story. As another example, casting a group of Sins first, then as the characters in the play, began a process for the actors that served (we believe) to create complex individuals psychologically, socially (using a built-in gestic performance), as well as more grotesque, devil-like abstract movement. Sloth is used as an example, but all characters found analogical connections with their other characters and with the play. The dividing of Faustus’ final speech is explained, and the interpretation of Despair/Mephistopheles examined for its influence on decisions of structure and sexuality. Concluding remarks introduce another ‘continuum,’ between fulfilling audience expectation and disrupting it, arguing that the extremes of re-creation and re-interpretation both disrupt, the clowns as example.
Introduction: The Re-Creation/Re-Interpretation Continuum
For the purpose of discussion of this production of Doctor Faustus, let me first propose a continuum that locates the extent to which the contemporary production seeks to "re-create" the physical and vocal manifestation of a past performance. Toward one end of this spectrum lies the attempted historical re-creation, in which documentary evidence and scholarly conjecture are used in the design and execution of sets, costumes, blocking/choreography, voice, acting style, pace, tone--the whole package. Such a production would seek to arrive at an "imitation" (and we all know how much baggage that word carries with it)--an imitation so complete, so exact, that somehow we can re-communicate something of what the original participants intended. Movement along the spectrum indicates an increasingly obvious manifestation in performance of the individual interpretations of those involved in the production. This interpretation manifests itself typically in the form of contemporary, historical and theoretical analogy, brought to bear on the elements of production--most obviously on design and acting style. To most, the distinction drawn by this continuum will seem quite obvious. I believe, nevertheless, that it is worth restating in this manner, because it raises issues visually that we otherwise take for granted--that are left under-discussed because of their obviousness. It serves to emphasize that no production by definition can meet the criteria for placement on this continuum in extremis. Also, however disparate the intentions of Re-creation and Re-interpretation, a continuum forces a relationship between the two--a combination of the two in varying degrees--a measurement. I want to comment on these two points, with relation to Dr Faustus--and then consider some other potential continuua that complicate its use.
With respect to the extremes: At one extreme, the successful re-creation of an historical production, if fully realized, would be re-creating a complex of signs unreadable to a contemporary audience. Authentic pronunciation, historical meanings of words, gestures, relationships, imagery, all require an authentic historical audience to read and understand them. As soon as someone from 1999 witnesses the well-researched and well-crafted historical reconstruction, that witness mis-reads the event. Popular culture studies and semiotics have long emphasized the extent to which readers interact with texts; it can be argued in the theatre, in particular, that the work of art does not rest in the page, or even on the stage, but in the mind of the witness. 1
The other extreme approaches what we might call "radical reinterpretation," for which the written text and ancillary documentation are inspirational only, used as pretext for personal exploration in rehearsal; it is the exploration that is performed. In effect, those involved in the production are presenting their interpretation "instead of" and not "in conjunction with" the historical text. Such productions careen off the proposed continuum, and can no longer be called performances of the text; they are all analogy.
In no way do I intend to denigrate either extreme by this placement. On the contrary, I would consider both essential endeavours in the scholarly study of theatrical performance. Historical Re-creation is the performative equivalent of the controlled laboratory experiment in the sciences and social sciences, and the re-creations of battlements and ships in experimental archeology. It allows us to better understand how texts were staged and, beyond that, how those texts affected audiences and interacted with local culture. This is a long-standing intention in theatrical production, including Charles Kean, William Poel, Tyrone Guthrie, and all those efforts to reconstruct Shakespeare's Globe; its value is obvious. It may even be powerful theatre, often exotic to the contemporary audience--the past being, after all, a foreign country.
Radical Re-interpretation is more like the pure theory of theatrical production, and as such is just as essential to the understanding of the historical text. Jerzy Grotowski's work, just to cite one well-known (and now venerable) example, pushed the definition of "interpretation" into the realm of "translation," emphasizing that the words of the text are altered by the visual and aural context in which they are presented, and finally, in his "laboratory" experiments, can be substituted by the theatrical image. His work tended to eliminate the written/spoken text wherever a correlative could be found; this was anathema to textual purists, but its point was precisely to explore and test that relationship, between written text and performative sound and movement. If it altered the historical text beyond recognition, and finally abandoned the original intention of the work--that is the nature of experiment. 3
Between these two extremes rest the majority of productions. They use more or less historical research, in ways that are more or less unmediated. It is important to understand that the most rigorous attempt to re-create the original circumstances of production and the most radical dismissal of these circumstances are still connected on this continuum; we would do well to avoid perceiving them as manichean manifestations of good and evil. I suggest to you that this is not an idle and self-evident statement; in my experience, the first reaction of many audience members is to judge in extremis. I am often reminded, in my work in the theatre, of the image of the spectator who attended the 19th century American actor Edwin Booth's performances of Hamlet--armed with a copy of the script, and a gun.
The recent production of Dr. Faustus at the Studio Theatre provides a good example for this seemingly simple model. The fact that it was co-produced by a research group interested in the original circumstances of production, a graduate centre interested in the pedagogical exploration of performance, and a theatre group interested in a particular interpretational approach--well, that's a lot of interests, ranging along this continuum. The nature of the production dramaturgy illustrates the potential conflict--or, rather, the range of options.
Cast Study of Doctor Faustus: Two Dramaturgs with Two Mandates
Specifically, two dramaturgs from the Drama Centre worked on the show, in co-operation but to quite different purpose. Rob Ormsby represented the area toward the "re-creation" end of this continuum--that is, he represented the playwright, the original circumstances of production, and an effort to understand and respect the intentions of the early production history--of the script in hand. The other dramaturg, Alison McElwain, represented the other end of the continuum--that is, the intentions of the theatre group Handmade Performance, and all of the creative participants in the production. I want to say a few words about the work of each--and in particular, to emphasize that both roles resulted in something un-usual--experimental--on stage.
To some extent, Rob acted in the traditional role associated with the dramaturg in an historical production--what I would describe as the playwright’s champion in rehearsal. He used his knowledge of the language and literature of the time to contribute enormously to the actors’ understanding of text, including all of the usual explanations of obscure references, pronunciations, relationships. But beyond this, his expertise in the period allowed us, in fact, to take a more radical textual path than otherwise might have been visible--and than is typically taken with this play.
The fact is that Marlowe’s play is an editorial mess. It exists in two quite different versions, both published some time after his death. There is evidence of as many as three writers’ hands on the text, missing scenes, an instance of alternative scenes printed together--and a mixture of farce, satire and tragic verse that careens wildly in tone. To say that the scripts in hand are by Marlowe is a wish; they bear many examples of his great verse, but after that, potential directors are left to cut and shape the raw material according to a hypothetical and highly suspect "authorial" intent, or according to an imposed "concept." Typically, "concept" wins out.
Robert brought to the process some research on the relationship between the two versions of the play, and in particular the idea that the text was rewritten during the twenty years after Marlowe’s death in order to appeal to different audiences, and to appeal to changing tastes--in spectacle (more or less of it), and in theology (more or less puritanical). Instead of looking at the texts as corrupted versions of a hypothetical Marlovian original, we looked at them more as adaptations to compensate for change--as manifestations of a shifting relationship among all of the participants in production, producers, writers, performers and audiences.
You might think that this would result in a license to abandon that end of the continuum--and to adapt the text radically for our contemporary purpose. We would, after all, only be following in the tradition of the extant scripts if we had. However, Robert’s contribution ultimately resulted, instead, in a greater appreciation of the text "as it stands" as the thing to be respected--instead of as a corruption of an original, which would undermine our respect for it. In other words--forget "Marlowe" as a single originating genius. He was one of many hands that resulted in what we had--in hand. Our task, with Rob's assistance, was to come to terms with the relationships of the parts of the extant script to each other; and we looked at the disparate parts as comments on each other. This influenced the production greatly. The example of the clowns will have to serve in the interests of time:
(a) The clown scenes clearly parody the tragic master-servant relationship between Faustus and Mephistopheles, almost as if a parody of the story from another theatre were printed along with its object. These scenes are difficult for contemporary audiences--the topical humour and obscure references nearly incomprehensible. At the closing cast party, one actor drew me aside and recommended that, the next time I produce this play, I cut the first scene between Wagner and the scholars. And I believe they are typically cut. But the parody is clear, and our task was to draw the audience's attention to it at every turn. The clowns imitated the blocking of the tragic scenes, in particular the repeated "figure" of the stationary "master" center-stage with the potential servant encircling him, and the aggressive leap to the "master's" feet--both ambivalent images, we hoped, asking about the relative status of the two characters rather than determining it. In rehearsal we specifically invited the clowns into rehearsals with Faustus and Mephistopheles, with the purpose of "doing" them in parody in their scene. Similarly, the conceptual cross-casting of a woman as Mephistopheles was repeated in the playing of Robin as a woman, with its resulting emphasis on a sexuality in the power politics of appropriating and maintaining a rebellious servant.
There are other examples. Scenes of pointed anti-Catholic, anti-Aristocratic satire are printed which–although they have ill-defined characters in spectacular, violent and slapsticksituations far different from the other two styles just mentioned–do emphasize the wate to which Faustus put his newfound power. The work of this Dramaturg--representing the interests of one direction of our continuum–resulted in the preservation of more of the original text in performance than I believe is typical in contemporary productions. As I will note later, some audience members perceived this as a "radical re-interpretation."
Meanwhile, Alison McElwain represented the other end of the continuum. A part of the mandate of Handmade Performance includes the democratization of classic texts--that is, to produce the text in such a way as to allow for the individual work (read "interpretation" if you will) of as many creative artists as possible to be seen in performance--to push the definition of "direction" to the edge of collectivity. This might be described as post-modern; although I am distrustful of the recent overuse of the word, it describes a work that carries a range of interpretations simultaneously, and that encourages a multiplicity of points of view over an ostensibly single vision, at the risk of chaos. Less contentiously, there is a strongly ‘epic,’ or Brechtian influence to this mandate, clearly visible in Dr Faustus, with its group of "sins" performing a play-within-a-play, showing their preparation for the performance of each scene, and their reaction to their own and other performances. The democratic mandate--which admittedly can be at odds with the intentions of the script--manifested itself in a variety of ways.
The most obvious example: By casting "sins" and keeping them on-stage at all times, the shape of the text and the distribution of significant commentary was radically changed. Part of the chaos of the script is that perhaps half the play is a two-hander between Faustus and Mephistopheles; all other actors disappear. This staging increased the importance of all other actors, and provided opportunity for all to comment on the action at their discretion, in character. I think of Kristie Painting as Lechery, begging to be able to join the scene between Mephistopheles and Faustus as they talk about wives and paramours, or Francesco Villecco as Covetousness, finishing his scene as the knight Martino and, stepping out of the circle, expressing his disgust that the role was so small. He is, after all, Covetousness. Or Vern Gonsalves, as Pride, refusing to leave the stage at intermission. These were all personal choices by the actors, that arose from the structure of the production. They are manifestations of larger "roles" in the generation of meaning through performance. And that was our mandate. We take the dictum "there are no small roles" literally--it takes precedence over, for example, authorial intention.
The results of this effort go beyond simple presence. Alison’s task was to help make these actors into complex individual sins. She prepared a package of materials for each, with research related to their “role.” These included the expected--pictures by Breughel, Goya, Bosch, and a variety of literary descriptions. But the packages also included contemporary materials the dramaturg thought analogous to each sin--including magazine advertisements, newspaper articles on political figures, comic books and selections from graphic novels (and, a personal favourite, the web-article arguing that Gilligan’s Island is in fact an allegory for the Seven Deadly Sins). The actors worked with Allison, and with Jennifer Johnson in an abstract-movement workshop, and with myself, to create, to the best of their ability, a "range" of sins. I would categorize our work as follows. Allison, in Brechtian terms, was responsible for assisting in developing a complex of social gests --and in particular contemporary analogies based on the social politics of each scene. Jennifer Johnson, by encouraging the actors to think about the body--which body part does Sloth lead with, for example (clearly the hind-quarters)--assisted in abstracting their movement. And my own task was to encourage the actors to explore the range of stereotypes available to a "sin." I asked each actor to create a comic version, a grotesque and violent version, and a psychologically complex equivalent inspired by that sin. The goal of all of this--and it was certainly a lot to ask--was to provide maximum choice for the actor. This process, in my opinion, complicated their portrayals in a number of ways.
I use "Sloth" as an example. The portrayal of a "sin" then portraying a variety of "characters" can strike a single note, conceptually. The Cardinal and Benvolio are "Sloth"; and after that? But the actor incorporated all the "work" on character that I just outlined. In his search for his costume--all actors were involved in the creation of their own base costume--Adam Lazarus searched his dramaturgical file for the appropriate gestic material, and found it in an image of the Bay Street businessman. This is not a typical image of Sloth--I think Adam was considering a kind of economic, "laissez-faire" laziness of thinking of oneself first. In the event I am certain most audiences did not make the one-to-one connection; but in the rehearsal process his mind was focussed on that image, influencing his costuming, and his relationship as Benvolio with the other two knights. His changes of character grew directly out of a consideration of the difference between a comic and a grotesque version of his sin--and our discussions about audience reaction to each of these were complex, and searching. When is Benvolio comic, when frightening, when both? Can one achieve both a comic and horrific, or grotesque, reaction at once, and what effect does it have on the audience? No conclusions, but the actor was thinking about the possibilities throughout the process. And, finally, the effect of his movement work with Jennifer could not be missed--to be blunt and crass, he led with his ass.
As a fairly typical academic director, I could go on for a very long time, discussing the complexities of each actor's work on character--I don't have time. But think of obvious analogical connections– Wrath as Pope as Jimmy Swaggart, Covetousness as a Gangster as the Muscle behind the Pope, or Despair (the 8th and Deadliest Sin) as a Romantic and as an intellectual and as Mephistopheles.
The work at opposite ends of my proposed continuum, represented by the two dramaturgs, complement each other, in my opinion--I'll get to that in a moment. First, let me be honest about the conflict, using the last scene as example. I made the decision to take Faustus' great final speech away from him, and to give it to the rest of the cast. Unquestionably, it altered the meaning intended by the original creators of the written text--altered the intention of the original productions. Faustus is not a good man; he is not noble. He is each sin by turn, and wastes his revolutionary decision to turn against the status quo in the mere entertainment of his "betters" in society, and through practical jokes. At the very end of the play, in a breath, he demands the torture of the "Old Man" and his own sexual coupling with a devil-Helen--almost as if he wants both to happen at once. It may be my "interpretation," but it arose in the rehearsal process again and again, from all quarters--and that part of the text was not tampered with. He's not a good man; but even at the end of the play, he gives good poetry. Marlowe invests in him a heroic, romantic, highly intelligent voice--a voice that can be honoured, and for whom we can feel pity, even as we sense the terror of the event. And we took that away from him.
Some people loved this choice, and were moved by it. Others were passionate in their disagreement--in their disdain. It took the tragedy away from Faustus. That's true. I would suggest two defences. The choice emphasized further those aspects of the script that are typically suppressed--the parody, the satire, the cheap tricks, and in general the comic questioning of Faustus' actions. Most of the script is not tragic, and questions the degree to which we should consider Faustus tragic. Re-apportioning the final speech makes that question the climax. That's the explanation from Rob's end of the continuum.
But there's another explanation as well. If the mandate of Handmade Performance is to democratize the performance text, then this radical action democratizes the tragedy. In this production, it wasn't only Faustus who was re-enacting his own damnation every night for all eternity, but by association all these sins/actors. The Chorus takes back the stage, and the tragedy is shared among them all.
In any event, it was a decision about which one could be passionate, as a creator and as a member of the audience. The interpretation of Mephistopheles provides an example of several of these suggestions in practice.
First of all, we cast the Sin of ‘Despair’ (Accidie) as Mephistopheles, which we felt was entirely appropriate both dramaturgically and theologically (that is, from both ends of the spectrum). Mephistopheles is clearly a leading figure in Hell, the most important of the devils on stage, just as Despair is the most important of sins; indeed, depending on your theological stance, there is no other sin worth mentioning, if you believe that a soul can be saved up to the last moment of life, if the human being believes. Despair by this scenario is the absence of any hope of being saved–and it is the only real weapon Lucifer really has [See Original Director’s Notes]. Unquestionably the actress in this role, Laryssa Yanchak, used the idea of Despair to create a heart-breaking character–one who would like nothing better than to be beaten by Faustus, to fail to distract him into hopelessness, and to witness hope. It is a part of her torture in Hell to witness, repeatedly and for eternity, her own easy success.
Second, the casting of a play within a play, with all members of the cast present throughout, raised issues regarding the structure of the play. It is, as I have said, very much a two-hander between Mephistopheles and Faustus, at least for the first half, when it becomes so episodic it can be difficult to tell the players without a program. Casting Despair as Mephistopheles immediately gave the character a relationship with all other devils/sins on stage, making her first among equals. It also exposed the extent to which the first half of the play, while not as episodic as the second, still alternates between the rich intellectual exchange of the two (alleged) main characters, and those scenes with Wagner and the Clowns that closely parody them. The increased emphasis of the Clowns, and the constant pressure of the sins watching and reacting to everything Mephistopheles does with Faustus on stage, we thought tied the pieces of the play together in a constructive way–and, I would argue, in a way entirely appropriate to Elizabethan intentions.
Finally, we cast a woman as Mephistopheles. In the first instance, this was done as for all characters, with the idea that no character was gender-specific. They’re Sins, after all. But that said, audiences are not blind to gender– casting signifies. Faustus is clearly attracted to Mephistopheles, and there is much talk of sexuality, of all kinds. It is no radical re-reading of the text to suppose associating these two, whatever the casting. Pairing a heterosexual couple with chemistry in these scenes was an opportunity to expose, physically intensify, and comment on the attraction in the text.
Conclusion: The Tradition/Novelty Continuum
Let’s look at audience expectation another way. Audience members go to the theatre with a complex of expectations based on education, popular and elite cultural influences, and the sum total of their other performance experience. At one end of a second proposed continuum is the audience's definition of a "traditional" production of the historical text--the way it "is habitually performed." To an audience member, the signs of interpretation are all but invisible in such a production, because all expectations are fulfilled, all preconceptions reinforced. At the other end of the spectrum are those elements of a production which disrupt the audience member's expectations, whether positively or negatively.
The nature of such productions is immaterial here, because it changes with the nature of the audience--Stratford Festival audiences will have a very different set of expectations than (for example) an audience attracted to a production of Shakespeare in the very small neighbourhood park near my own home. My reason for positing this rather simple measurement is that it makes unexpected allies of the seemingly disparate extremes of Historical Re-Creation and Radical Interpretation. Aggressive interpretation by definition disrupts audience expectation; but audiences are just as likely to be surprised by its "opposite." The fact is that a true re-creation is just as likely to be exotic to the audience as the use of authentically reconstructed instruments has been in musical concerts, or period style in dance performance.
I found this kind of complementary radicalism in the dramaturgical work for Dr Faustus. Of course the casting of the Sins, the play-within-the-play, the sharing of Faustus' lines, the cross-casting, and so on, are examples of an aggressive interpretation of text by all the participants. But just as aggressive--and for some at least, as disconcerting--was the emphasis placed on the clown scenes and the historical-satirical scenes. I would have placed the decision to include these scenes without cuts at the opposite end of the continuum, as an attempt to remain as close to the original "B"-text of the play as possible--come what may. The production, because it was experimental and not commercial, could perform this experiment as well as the others. But these are the very scenes that appear to make a mockery of Faustus’ tragic character, just as surely as any radical interpretation. So both at once might be misconstrued as a mockery.
This continuum argues that both Radical Re-interpretation and the just-as-aggressive devotion to Historical Re-creation--or Original Intention--that these two are, in fact, allies. Both seek to reconfigure the contemporary audience's expectations, perceptions and understanding. If they are allies, then the "enemy", by this analogy, is the kind of production that reinforces a thoughtless, passive experience of the text-in-performance, that implies that all such performance is unaffected by history and culture, and that all productions are somehow "the same."