Thursday, January 19, 2012
Should theatre leave more to the imagination?
guardian.co.uk: Ordinarily, the prospect of Rupert Goold tackling CS Lewis's The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, as he will do in Kensington Gardens this summer, would be a lip-smacking one. From the hellish industrial kitchen of his Macbeth to the tawdry glitz of his Las Vegas Merchant, the places Goold creates are always vivid, inventive and full of high-definition detail. So who better to create the grand landscapes of Narnia, Lewis's fantastical world within a wardrobe?
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3 comments:
Having talked about the future for technology and the possibilities that it could bring to the theater, there is a very fine line on how to use it properly and when it is overdone. The article makes a fair point in saying that part of theater is knowing that you are seeing a live performance. You understand what a play is and what theater does and part of that is believing that certain things are represented metaphorically when it is live. It simply comes with the territory. Of course, making things look accurate and "real" with technology can be difficult. Sometimes, when it is used incorrectly you get issues like the screensaver set design that the article referred to. I think that it should be a "use it, don't abuse it" policy. Technology absolutely has it's place in the theater, and is becoming more and more relevant. It is just something that is so incredibly new, that it, like everything else in theater, needs to be used carefully. It isn't the problem solver, it is a tool, as much as a drill or a can of paint is.
I agree with what the article is saying in terms of how a projected scrim will not be better than a real set. I find the idea of using a projection a step in a completely different direction. It seems that for much of theatre, things have been aiming toward making things as realistic as possible, whereas a projected screen is a step away from that. I think that if the vision of the play is a more stylized thing, something like a projected set might work, but I feel like technology like this should be used to enhance the experience, rather than to create the experience, for example, how the projections were used in "Good Person".
I like the quote mentioned before: "use it, don't abuse it!" It's really true-- you can only create so much with certain techniques, this one projection.. technology should be an asset, not the entire means behind a setting's creation. Although a set should make a statement, create a world, trick the mind, sometimes a setting cannot be to distracting.. we start to focus more on glowing LED screens rather than the actors and the stories by which they are trying to tell. I think projections can be useful, but only in moderation.
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