Playback Theatre Sydney 1st show for 2010 - Change

Get back to basics - SAY YES!

Hello my first 'hello!' in 2010 and it's already February. We've been very busy so far this year rehearsing, performing, training, building our new website and getting our 2010 promotional flyer finalised.

We started 2010 with our annual weekend retreat up north at Wamberal Beach - lots of work, planning and play which was a great start for the year. Then our regular Monday evening rehersals began.

The festive break was terrific though stepping back in as a playback performer was a little more challenging than I had anticipated. So what is the transition? What are some of the steps?

One step is adjusting how I listen (not that I haven't been listening to friends and family- promise!) but listening as a playback practitioner is quite different from your usual listening.

When listening as a performer you have to really empty yourself of your own thoughts so you can totally fill yourself with the person's story you're hearing. It's tricky as you can't deny your responses as they enable you to understand and you do need to take note of the images you may 'see' in response to what you're hearing so you can use them to create the theatre.

Then the next step is to be that person onstage, to represent them in an, dare I say it, authentic way. Remember we don't have the luxury of time - its improv so it's immediate and on the spot we have to get into it NOW there is no tomorrow!

I can't tell you how resistant I was to getting into character - I wanted to just stay comfortable in my familiar behaviours and expressions but no that won't work! I had to let go and jump into the story, boot and all, it didn't come naturally as I was dusty and rusty along with the team.

At rehearsal, when we were discussing and debriefing a story we had created as a team something very basic became clear for all of us -SAY YES TO ALL OFFERS! - this is an improv mantra and something in life I think we all can find challenging at times.

Had we actually SAID YES to ALL offers and taken our time with one offer at a time (I admit this is harder than you think) it would have helped us all get connected or be 'in relationship' with the other performers and thus more connected to the role and the story.

So getting back to the basics is not a bad thing to remember when you've been away - what basics might you get back to energise and reconnect in this new year?

Playback Theatre update for 2009

Well its been awhile, but despite a pause in blogging our company has been busy with shows and company life.

We have performed for a variety of organisations in 2009 - The Catholic Education Office, The Cancer Institute, Docs, DADHC, Tafe NSW to name just a few. In addition we also devised a scripted piece of theatre for Docs in relation to child protection training and devlopment.

This was very interesting and quite challenging as we, a small group fo three, had to create a theatrical and emotionally dramatic journey using metaphor that would speak directly to their experience and that was to be performed in a training room!
Well it worked, the 20 minute piece certainly managed to engage, entertain and move the group, the theatre enabled an alternate perspective to the issues that was further explored through dialogue afterward.

Theatre is such a useful and dynamic adjunct to training and development!

So that's not all we have been up to we are very close to finalising a new website and do have a look at our YouTube promo dvd we finished ;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNhbdlRudXU

One last exciting development is we have two new actors Rani and Thanasiss both of whom have a range of theatre skills and life experience that will be of enormous benefit to our company and to the Playback form.

So until 2010 all the best for Xmas and New Year
Playback Theatre Sydney

What you do like about Playback Theatre?

We are filming our next (Sept) Playback performance and I am wondering to get the ball rolling what you like about Playback-just a word or a phrase or maybe you have a story to tell...?

Rehearsals - how we do it...

How do you rehearse Playback is a question I get asked alot?

So I thought I would write a bit about this..

Rehearsals are all about developing the skills needed to perform pb stories, telling our own stories and developing our working relationships-this directly affects how we work as an ensemble.

Some of the skills we work on are;

Improvisation – how to say YES and jump into WHATEVER scene is being created onstage and to make offers (add something new to the scene) and accept offers from other actors and don’t forget the musical offers!

Improv is an ongoing practice in being in the present, IN THE MOMENT, thinking on your feet and letting go of your own spectacular ideas.

Its great fun and exhilarating!

Physicality;

Actions speak louder than words – We try to use physical gesture and movement to add another layer to the narrative rather than just rely on words. This can be abstracted and impulsive, and you have to trust your impulses(this is interesting and worth talking about next time)

Mostly physical impulses and relationships can be wild, erratic and marvellous. Music is a great help in this regard when you listen and let it move you it can carry you away from the safety of words. Don’t get me wrong I love words but they get an actor very static, stuck and literal in this theatre form, I think mainly because you’re your own scriptwriter/choreographer and director in any given moment-talking is safe!

Voice;

Voice is very emotional and very powerful. We are lucky enough to have a great voice coach (Judy) in the company so we have sessions working on our range, expanding our diaphragm…and there is more to do!

Story analysis;

We spend time looking at stories and what they mean to the teller and to us, we look at what the essence of the story could be, we ask what is the heart of the story? Also what’s said and unsaid. Sometimes a teller will tell a story and not be aware of depths in the story and when put onstage these depths will be revealed. If it is something very deep and painful we try not to peel this open but given we are creating theatre we are looking for relationship and drama.

Reworking;

Because we want to reflect a tellers story as full as we can so we spend time in rehearsal reworking certain stories. What do I mean by full? – dramatic, colourful, moving - get it? We usually decide as a group which stories need to be reworked, maybe we didn’t feel like we built and developed a particular relationship fully enough or we rushed through a story or missed the essence or didn’t stage it as well as we could-it is impro after all!

Well I still could keep writing on other aspects of our rehearsal process particularly about our how we develop our working relationships. In fact next time I will write about this as I think it is one of the things that sets us apart from other creative groups.

Hope you find this interesting.

The art of listening

Listening is a soft skill when done well can have a powerful impact.

Being a Playback practitioner means you have to listen well.

Have a think for a moment about how you listen. What do you listen for when you listen? How to solve it? How it connects to your own experience? The facts of the story?

As a Playback practitioner one listens to literally hundreds of stories. I think I could safely say it is 50% dependant on the way in which a practitioner listens to a story that can make a difference.

So I think it is worthwhile to put our listening style under the microscope and see what you may want to add to your own listening style.

As a Playbacker listening to a teller (someone telling us a story) you must first and foremost be entirely focussed on that person, this means putting aside your own thoughts.

This is interesting as at the same time one must listen to oneself enough to be aware of what in the story touches you, what has emotion.

In Playback we listen to the tellers body language, the way in which they express themselves, any metaphors they may use, every word the teller uses, these are all important elements about the meaning of the story to the teller.

So it’s a balance to remain aware of yourself and how the story makes you feel but not getting caught up in you and continuing to listen to their story. To me an important essence of this is about being present and giving yourself fully, body, mind and heart to listening to their story being told in that moment.

Letting go of those thoughts about the time, what’s the next step, your own story, your to do list, their clothes etc

Listen to their story with your ears, your mind and your heart and you will be able to more fully respond from the same place and both you and your teller will feel the difference. In Playback language we like to say they feel heard.

'Hidden pleasures of the discomfort zone'

This phrase, a title in a recent Sydney Morning Herald article, sums up a lot of what we at Playback Theatre believe in. That discomfort can bring its own delights and rewards…

‘In an age of predictability, we need to rediscover our inner child to fully enjoy life's riches, writes Suzy Freeman-Greene.’ Sydney Morning Herald 16/05/2009

This article made me reflect on the experience of Playback Theatre both from a performers experience and from the audience side. Audience members have often told me that despite loving a show, they sometimes felt in the ‘discomfort zone’ that Suzy Freeman-Greene writes about.

I too have experienced this ‘discomfort zone’ - particularly when in training as a conductor. When we ask the audience to put up their hand and tell a story…… there is often a general pause and sometimes the pause reaches into the unknown. I am used to it now, but initially it felt discomforting.

I now think of it as ‘a pregnant pause’ and I feel excited in that moment. What I sense is that people in the audience are tussling within themselves battling with their inhibitions to speak in public sharing a personal story - should I, could I, dare I?!

Jodie Ahrens from Roundabout Theatre writes - ‘We are so soft with each other and protective of our personal spaces…and social norms’- she believes such inhibitions can prevent us from connecting honestly with each other.

So I say, feel the discomfort and do it anyhow. It’s good to challenge yourself. And in moving from the unknown to the known, you may move from being uncomfortable to being energized by a new way of seeing. Expanding your comfort zone – what’s better than that??!!