This is not a review.
This is a partial view.
This was written in January 2015, after spending 3.5 days (of 5) in a rehearsal room with Ponyboy Curtis.
This is not the same Ponyboy Curtis now performing At The Yard, at the Yard.
This is written to be read on paper.
This is dedicated to Chris, Jonny, Richard, Nick, Matthew, Sean, Craig, Gryffin, with thanks, respect, admiration and trust.
This is a beginning.
This will continue.
1 Skin
Taped to the back of the rehearsal room
door is an A4 sheet of paper with a slogan typed in italics: “Skin
never hurt anyone – no weapons, no danger.”
I think of people who have been hurt
because of their skin. Because of its colour. Irregularities. The way
it moulds the skeleton beneath, draping over fat, signifying gender,
wrinkling with age. I think of how skin enforces privilege. I think
none of these things in the rehearsal room.
I think of a text from Chris Goode's
blog, a hymn to the folk singer Sam Amidon written soon after seeing
him play live in 2010:
“Amidon's lack of guardedness as a
performer [… hard to describe … a kind of charisma, a kind of
radiance, a real feeling of openness ...] reminded me very much of
what Utah Phillips used to say Ammon Hennacy told him about pacifism:
'You came into the world armed to the
teeth. With an arsenal of weapons, weapons of privilege, economic
privilege, sexual privilege, racial privilege. You want to be a
pacifist, you're not just going to have to give up guns, knives,
clubs, hard angry words, you are going to have lay down the weapons
of privilege and go into the world completely disarmed.'
I've very seldom seen anyone stand in
front of an audience as disarmed as Sam Amidon.”
[Thompson's Bank of Communicable
Desire, 31 December 2010]
I think of the people I've seen stand
in Chris' rehearsal rooms and disarm themselves completely. Each one
radiant with an honesty naked as their skin.
Skin never hurt anyone. And yet
revealing it is so fraught.
2: Beneath
Beneath the word romance is the idea of
quest.
Romance, etymology: c.1300, "a
story, written or recited, of the adventures of a knight, hero, etc".
Romantic, meaning "characteristic
of an ideal love affair" (such as usually formed the subject of
literary romances) is from 1660s. Meaning "having a love affair
as a theme" is from 1960.
Romance and kindness are interrelated.
Kindness, etymology: c.1300, "courtesy,
noble deeds".
But so too are kind and kin.
Kind: etymology: "class, sort,
variety," from Old English gecynd "kind, nature,
race," related to cynn "family" (see kin),
from Proto-Germanic kundjaz "family, race".
So buried in kind is the German for
child, kind.
An adventure, courtesy for others,
forming a tribe, playfulness.
These feel like good movements for a
new ensemble to make.
3: Gangs
I'm watching Francis Ford Coppola's
1983 movie The Outsiders – the film from which Ponyboy Curtis takes
its name – and wondering what the hell took me so long. I can
measure out my adolescence in American movies about peripheral teens.
Christian Slater in Pump Up the Volume was my role model, my
manifesto for living. So was Molly Ringwald in Pretty in Pink. From
the moment I met the Cry-Baby girls, I wanted to be one, to stand
with Wanda, Pepper, Hatchet-face, sneering at the world: “Our
bazooms are our weapons!” There is a moment in the Ponyboy room
when Matthew puts on a big, padded jacket, pulls the hood low over
his head, and looks so much like Ally Sheedy in The Breakfast Club I
feel the breath snag in my lungs.
The Outsiders is different from all
those films because women hardly register in it. This is a film about
camaraderie between men. Young men looking out for each other,
learning from each other, protecting each other, whatever that takes.
Young men struggling to negotiate the rules of family and friendship,
of law and loyalty, of a stratified and heartless society that
doesn't value them because what it values is wealth and obedience.
Young men dispensing love through practical advice. Be careful where
you drop those cigarette butts. Don't wear that shirt for the fight.
There's little space for poetry in these lives, but they find it. It
burns inside them, gold.
Day one of rehearsals and the smokers
are huddled outside together, blowing pale grey clouds into winter
air and forging the first tentative bonds. I've never smoked a
cigarette in my life. Chris doesn't smoke either. We are pierced
again by the old disappointment of just not being cool.
4: Jonny
In this room of mostly strangers,
everyone knows Jonny.
“If there's a more ravishing
performance anywhere on the Fringe this year than Jonny Liron's
Dionysus -- well, could somebody tell me about it?” Chris wrote
that on his blog in August 2007 after first encountering Jonny on
stage at the Edinburgh fringe. By the time I met him in June 2011, he
was a figure of mythic proportions glimpsed slantwise: the stories I
read or heard of him conveyed someone who would push at the edges of
most things and push the rest over the edge. The person I met was
tall and tattered and wild; he wandered through the rehearsal room
naked and danced such a febrile, inside-out dance to Bowie's Modern
Love that I've never heard the song the same since.
Jonny made nakedness habitual. Is that
right? Comfortable, but also a challenge. There was something else
about him, too, but I couldn't figure out what. I thought I saw it in
October 2012, in an almost-private performance, a duet with Chris
called The Infancy Gospel of Pseudo-Belladonna, Chris seated at a
desk reading words of fantasy and longing, secret passion and ravaged
desire, while Jonny prowled the candlelit concrete space of his
warehouse home, curved and stretched and pummelled his body, seared
Chris' arm with wax, and finally set fire to everything. Painted on
the wall, in thick black letters, were the words: CAPITALISM ENDS
HERE. Here was god and sex and pain and want and most of all love;
here was a willingness to exist at extremes such as I'd never
encountered. It was that, but also something else.
A few months later, April 2013, I saw
it, in a rehearsal room at the National Theatre Studio, where Chris
Goode & Company worked for a week on the Jacobean play The Witch
of Edmonton. It's a malevolent play that nearly broke everyone in the
room, but Chris wrestled it into submission by creating a “remix”,
heavily edited, multiply layered, inviting subversions and
interventions. Here I saw the two sides of Jonny: the one who,
stalking naked on all fours across the rehearsal room floor, could
present the figure of a goat, in whose implacable stare one is
confronted with all the roiling, savage mystery of the world; and the
one that could play a piece of classical text with charisma, radiance
and openness, inhabiting the words so completely that they seemed
inextricable from his being. This Jonny's stature and vulnerability
reminded me of the best Hamlets I've seen – Rory Kinnear, Sam West
– people who gave every indication of making Shakespeare up on the
spot, by locating that poetry deep within; people for whom there is
absolutely no division between thought and language, feeling and
speech. My vision of Jonny was transformed.
In Ponyboy Curtis, I saw yet another
Jonny, taking responsibility for others in the room, guiding them,
supporting them. When Matthew was hesitant, puzzled, shy, Jonny's
advice and nurture illuminated possibility.
And then he climbed a wall and swung
from a beam.
Slowly, surely, the others followed
suit.
5: Masculinities
Boys in the playground, pulling down
each other's trousers, grabbing belongings and throwing them in the
air, piggy-in-the-middle turning into wrestling, no place else to go.
Boys in a boyband, real gang, us and
them, the smart one, the shy one, the scallywag, the regular guy.
Clothes make the man.
The violence of a hood pulled up.
The cheek of an orange baseball cap.
The adventure of electric-blue
sweatpants.
The seduction of a T-shirt ripped at
the back.
Clothes that bring out a hidden aspect
of personality versus clothes that impose personality.
(“Naked people have little or no
influence in society.” Apocryphal, Mark Twain.)
I watch them morph through different
personae. Berlin bareback sauna boy and a muscular guy from a porn
calendar. The shadowy men clenched into themselves, whose latent
aggression makes me cross the road or run breathlessly home. Men I
would introduce to my parents and men it's never occurred to me to
befriend.
“I feel quite slutty.”
“It feels like I'm ready for action,
and not in a good way.”
“This just feels like something my
dad would wear.”
“I feel like I have wings.”
Craig lays his clothes out neatly on
the floor as if the empty space before him is a body and his flesh is
in fact his soul.
6: Glancing femininity (or something
like it, at least)
Jonny in a skinny pink T-shirt and
nothing else, surprised by how feminine he feels with his penis
exposed.
Matthew, so modest, in glasses and
headscarf, clutching a canvas bag. He looks like a timid librarian,
specifically female. I have no idea what to do with this thought.
Griffyn has almond eyes and arching
brows and hair that swoops in a Marcelled quiff. He looks like his
mother and wears a battered silver wedding ring and tattooed across
his collar bone are two words: rogue lad. He pulls on a thick woolly
hat and unlaces his clumpy boots, pulls his dark blue jeans low so
that tufts of hair peek above the belt. On to this bare-chested,
breastless body I project the dyke I would love to the ends of the
earth. Rogue lass.
Jonny is fascinated: what's it like,
being the only female in a room full of men often naked?
The truth is, I feel safe. Except when
they're wrestling, I feel no sense of separation. No sense of the
structures that rank and diminish. Gender de-weaponised, I feel human
among humans.
And then, looking at Griffyn, I realise
something. This room would feel a lot more tantalisingly erotic if I
were surrounded by naked women.
7: Hounds of love
Towards the end of Stefan Zweig's 1927
novel Confusion – which I finished reading a few days before this
rehearsal week began – is a diatribe against “trivial and
unimportant” writers/playwrights who swim only in the mainstreams
of human passions. “Is it through complacency, cowardice, or
because they take too short a view,” the narrator demands, “that
they speak of nothing but the superficial, brightly lit plane of life
where the senses openly and lawfully have room to play, while below
in the vaults, in the deep caves and sewers of the heart, the true
dangerous beasts of passion roam, glowing with phosphorescent light,
coupling unseen and tearing each other apart in every fantastic form
of convolution? Does the breath of those beasts alarm them, the hot
and tearing breath of demonic urges, the exhalations of the burning
blood, do they fear to dirty their dainty hands on the ulcers of
humanity, or does their gaze, used to a duller brightness, not find
its way down the slippery, dangerous steps that drip with decay? And
yet to those who truly know, no lust is like the lust for the hidden,
no horror so primaevally forceful as that which quivers around
danger, no suffering more sacred than that which cannot express
itself for shame.”
Dangerous beasts. Fantastic, demonic.
The ulcers of humanity. Decay, horror, shame.
And yes, this was written almost a
century ago. But the language of homophobia is still embedded in our
culture, doing its insidious work to vilify love.
The Ponyboy rehearsal room is a place
that makes love possible. Intimacy possible. That sounds so
sentimental written down; suddenly I understand what Chris meant when
he said on day 4: “falling in love is a way to have better
arguments”. The Ponyboy rehearsal room makes burning blood
possible.
I'm intrigued by the moments when the
outside creeps in. When Nick and Sean huddle together watching a
Nirvana video, then pull away with fumbling uncertainty, Nick wary of
crossing a boundary uninvited. When the persona embedded in a certain
assembly of clothing prevents the wearer from making contact with
another. When the tension that surrounds a tentative kiss causes an
eruption of physical braggadocio, rippled muscle and insouciance.
Outside this room, gay is still a
taunt.
Knowing that makes the intimacy all the
more tender. Bodies curled around each other. Fingertips caressing
temples, skin brushing upon skin. A hold that cradles, sustains and
enables, that lifts and protects and elates. Sometimes this feels
erotic, but when sex isn't the goal, there is potential for so much
more. Intimacy brings strength, brings confidence, gives wings. A
room full of men taking flight.
Notes, day 4, afternoon.
“by being brave and kind to self
can push through things instinctively
want to stop”
“I had moments of getting genuinely
horny
it felt exciting, real
indicator of my getting into the work
and people
incredible to undo years of shit where
yr intimacy w/ men either in a we're going to have sex date way or
relationship way
incredible to get back in touch w/
men's bodies
in a way that isn't about fucking
exciting and v powerful”
“felt different urges
felt naughty”
Ponyboy as the
“picturesque adolescence that never
had
where got to know people's souls”
8: Ready to catch him should he fall
Nick has the face of an angel, the
physique of a dancer and the sleek self-possession of a cat. He
brings into the room a profound belief in karma and a connoisseur's
taste for destruction. I'm not in the room on the day he starts a
fire directly beneath the smoke alarm, but the discussion it provokes
the following day is gripping. How to create a feeling of care in the
room, not to extinguish risk but reinforce it. How to be so secure as
a community that one person can consistently break the rules because
the others will rally round to manage the consequences and prevent
hurt. How to negotiate individual freedom and test the permissions of
a group, not to destroy that group but to make it stronger, more
aware of its permissions and desires. How to be part of a community
by thinking collectively, and being open to disruption of that
thinking.
On the final day of rehearsals, we have
a long conversation about Take That, and how a large part of their
public appeal could have been generated by appreciation of the
fraternity between them, broadcast even in their off hours. Later,
Nick – whose wilful acts of sabotage have included a pointed
refusal to work with the music Chris chooses for the room, instead
listening to his own on headphones and, again when I'm not there to
witness it, managing to insert a track of his own into the afternoon
soundtrack – will choose the moment of most heightened, loving
emotion, of Jo Clifford – playwright, performer, transgender woman,
special guest on the last afternoon – circling the room to hug each
of us one by one to her naked chest, Nick will choose this specific
moment to skewer proceedings, to rent the atmosphere as though with a
scythe, by playing through the tinny speakers of his smart phone It
Only Takes a Minute by Take That. It is appalling. It is obnoxious.
It is a flash of genius, inspired.
9: The sounds of silence
[the click of the camera]
[the slow shift of limbs]
[the scratch of my pen]
[cars outside]
[sighs]
[the flex of muscles]
[the thump of bone hitting floor]
[the flutter of paper like cherry
blossom]
[a child's voice floating in]
[a sniff that could be tears]
[breathing]
[rough gasps]
[the damp click of a kiss]
Richard has an extraordinary ability to
create silence around himself. In group discussions he is often the
one saying nothing, but the impassivity of his face belies deep
intellect and deeper feeling. During improvisations he can keep a
distance from the others without drawing attention from them, make
being on the inside look like the outside. I see him shivering as he
pours a bottle of cold water over his head. Scowling beneath a
hoodie, the tension of his naked body released by another's touch.
Masking his genitals with tape, marking himself within this new
tribe.
Nick creates noise. Richard creates
silence. But in that silence I hear howls of pain.
10: Words of resistance
out of the silence a torrent of
words It is only because of the danger that I can speak as I am
going to a deluge, cascading, relentless, unstoppable yes, it
is possible to bow down to a flower. The bird in the branches can be
spoken to, and there is meaning in its flight words of revolution,
words of utopia, words that alarm Chris and Jonny with reminders that
anarchy and fascist libertarianism share the same default language
in nature nothing is ever finished, as in the world of games
listening feels like drowning, my ears too full to hear When
my innermost heart trembles with the trembling of the river so I
act as though it's a slow tide, letting some words wash in and others
fade out, sentences catching light as they rise in waves
artists are those who are capable of
living I know nothing about Peter Handke's play The Long Way Round
except this remarkable speech, delivered by a woman and handed out in
the Ponyboy room on the first day of rehearsals, five close-printed
pages of A4 but to pass something on, one must love this is
the only text with which the group work; other language would be a
distraction Communicate the horizon and though I hear it three
times, it's not until I read it to myself that I notice this line:
A CRY TO THE GODS IS FORM AND FORM
REVEALS THE ARCADE IN SPACE; OUR ART MUST AIM AT CRYING OUT TO THE
GODS!
and I think yes yes YES!
don't let anyone talk you out of beauty
on day 4, Chris plays a recording of Tilda Swinton speaking the
words over a new-age-trippy seagulls-and-waves little-fluffy-clouds
soundtrack so personally offensive I'm amazed that others in the room
found it transporting losing yourself is part of the game and
on day 5 Jo Clifford reads it with glinting eye and volcanic passion
transform yourselves relishing the magic, the connection to nature
You are mysterious and inexhaustible the reverence for children,
for artists, for love Better for you to be dead if you cannot
love yourselves relishing especially the invitation of these
reckless and restless young men; it inspires her to stride proudly
into the speech, to pull off her jumper and jade-green bra and
deliver all five pages of it topless, charismatic and radiant at this
opening of her transgender body Take the big leap. Be the gods of
change. Everything else leads to nothing when the lights go out
she reads by a torch, and when that is extinguished she stands by the
window with the blind pulled up a little and reads by the
streetlamps' refractions; she changes what's possible in the outside
world, draws me and Chris into the storytelling (we are audience, we
are complicit), and at the end Joy is made possible by
helpfulness to friends, and friendship dances around the world walks
slowly around the room, hugging each one of us in turn, in gratitude
and solidarity.
Hope is the wrong heartbeat.
Blessed be every kiss, however brief.
Only when shaken by deep feeling will
you see clearly.
Lift yourselves up
and trust your seething heart.
11: Let's go, let go, letting go, let
it go
I'm out of the room for a day and a
half and when I get back on day 4 Matthew is transformed. Shyness
abated, he spends almost the entirety of a persona exercise cavorting
in just a pair of moss-green underpants and white headphones. At the
far end of the room is a big square window with a low wide ledge; he
stands on it, pulsing his body to a silent disco soundtrack, and we
all of us long to go to that party. Between him and the outside world
is nothing more than a sapphire blind and thin panes of glass.
Day 5 and it happens like this:
The room is silent, tense.
Nick is strutting around taking
people's photographs on his phone.
Sean and Craig, lying on the floor
together, begin to pose, pout, play up to the camera.
Nick turns the camera around and
reveals he was photographing himself all along.
Laughter.
Now Nick is lying on the floor.
He's pressing play on some music for
Richard.
Sean stands over him.
Chris presses play.
M.I.A
Live fast die young bad girls do it
well
Sean is dancing over Nick's prone body
with joy with abandon with wild wild release and honestly, truly,
it's like watching them fuck, only better.
How far can we push this?
How far can this go?
Jo standing by the window, blind pulled
asunder, voicing words of resistance semi-naked, from the heart, the
spirit of the new age speaks in her, adventure, courtesy, family,
playfulness, the quivering of truth, our journey starts here.
12: The politics of kindness
Matthew, day 4: “We were talking
about this gifting idea, I'm still trying to get my head around it,
we've been doing this thing in warm-up where we actively help each
other, and there was a moment this morning, I was blindfolded and
stretching on the floor, I don't know who it was it but he came over
and started holding my head, which I love. He was doing it for a
while and it was incredibly lovely but suddenly I was panicked: I
need to return the favour, let him know that I'm grateful, give him
something back. And then I thought: just accept this gift that he's
given me. And suddenly I was intensely moved, because this never
happens in life, that you get something for free that's so tender and
lovely and someone doesn't expect anything back. I felt like I
understood something about what was happening in this room. Now I
want to pay that forwards and give that energy onwards: that seems
like the right mentality for the world.”
This is how that blog post – the one
that talked about Sam Amidon from 31 December 2010 – ended: with a
call to arms, a manifesto for living. I remember the shiver of
excitement that I felt when I first read it; it changed me,
galvanised me, for the better. This is what Ponyboy Curtis is made
of:
“What shall we do? We can choose, in
these times, to re-create fixities and continue to slam home our
kindness in the face of radical right-wing assault. Or we can choose
to move, and build, and knock down, and move again, and rebuild, and
never stop moving, and never stop building. Because we know, we do
know, you do know, that it's possible to live the lives we need. Our
task now is to find a way of imagining those lives without being
afraid of our capacity to change, and without fearing the crucial
imperative to lay down the weapons of our privilege.
Now, more than ever, theatre is an
instrument of escapism. Escaping into the real. Escaping at last into
real life. We can actually do this. Tell your friends. Get naked.
Testify!”
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