Thursday my fellow MA-er FA and I traveled to Birmingham to see our friend, another MA-er Sara, in a show she helped devise called The Woods, playing at the Midlands Art Centre (MAC). After a 2-mile walk from the train station, during which we encountered a dead empty park, a lost scarf and a rubbish bin we made it to the tucked-away mac centre where we enjoyed a nice cuppa and a scone.
The Jane Packman Company transforms the art gallery into an installation complete with a bark covered floor with leaves and opaque green sheets hung round the setting, the dank smell of moist earth and bark immediately hits your senses. The actors greet you as you step in (two guys and a girl), taking your coat and offering you a hot drink. We all participate in a few toasts and then it begins. We are encouraged to help cover the female character with leaves and then the elder of the men has us follow him around the perimeter and then enter the woods - a mixture of bark, wooded chairs, a wardrobe, a sink, a bed, a table, a lamp. There are two realities at play here - the elder gentleman tells of the life cycle of the woods, a cycle that relies on death; while the other is of a couple. We see their morning ritual: he wakes up, makes their tea, washes his face, wakes her up, takes away the duvet, they make a play of animal noises, she gets dressed, kisses him goodbye and leaves. Remnants of this ritual remain and slowly dissipates as the man copes with losing the love of his life.
One scene has the woman wearing layers of clothes, there's a stunning choreography as the ghost of the woman interacts with the grieving man as he slowly takes layer after layer of her clothing, smelling and trying to hold onto her scent. His anguish and grief goes even further as days become indistinguishable and the grief cycle becomes more desperate.
With such a sparse setting, the details are really touching and the carefully crafted slow pace is beautiful -- how the two worlds interact; inviting us to touch the earth on the ground; the man starts using the woman's tea cup -- little details like this do not go unnoticed. The sound design too is nice as it goes back and forth from the woods to the city, allowing our auditory senses to travel in between the two realities with ease.
Here's a trailer of the show:
I think a lot of this resonated with me particularly because of the piece we've been devising at Son of Semele called Wallowa which explores the true story of a 76-year-old woman who was lost in the Wallowa Mountains in eastern Oregon for two weeks and found alive, albeit without a memory. A lot of things we've been exploring was touched upon in The Woods - especially the idea of quantum entanglements where we explored how two people are connected even though they are far a part - something this show plays with beautifully.
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Saturday, February 5, 2011
When film and stage collide: The Antonioni Project
After hearing about the legendary 6-hour performance of The Roman Tragedies based on Shakespeare's Coriolanus, Julius Caesar, and Antony and Cleopatra by the Dutch theatre company Toneelgroep Amsterdam I was eager to see their latest at the Barbican, The Antonioni Project - based on Italian auteur Michelangelo Antonioni’s 1960s films, L’Avventura, La Notte and L’Eclisse.
I mistakenly went to the performance without reading up or watching anything on Antonioni's films. I found the three converging story lines confusing and at some points trite. Thus, I cannot speak in depth on whether or not their examination on Antonioni's film is successful, for lack of a better word, or not. So here are my initial reactions to the piece.
The enormous Barbican Theatre stage is transformed into a Hollywood studio blue box (used for CGI effects) with a screen on the upper half of the proscenium (complete with subtitles for those of us who don't speak Dutch), cameras set up on stage, a film track for tracking shots, and the "orchestra pit" is set up with tv's and technicians as well as couches where the actors sit. As you can tell from this initial description, a lot is going on.
Although the undertaking is commendable I'm left not entirely satisfied. Perhaps it is the two-dimensional characters, my ADHD (seriously, A LOT is happening on stage all at once), or my recent longing for simplicity. A part of me is wondering where theatre is going as we begin to incorporate and rely on more and more technology. My fear is that use of technology, our post post-modern self-reflexivity and a growing sensation of an existential void are going to try to eradicate good old fashioned story telling.
Putting my nostalgia aside, however, I honestly found the performance fascinating. And there were some stunning moments of longing, connection and vulnerability - but nothing substantial enough to grasp on to. The visual elements are intriguing as we watch the actors in the blue on stage and the filmic close-up on screen. And transitions between cuts are thoughtful act actors flow between each other, mimicking the dissolve editing in film.
The acting, tinged with a bit of 1960s melodrama, is constant and committed throughout which makes the lack of character depth not as much of an issue, especially because I don't think we're supposed to have any connections to any of the characters, nor are we to identify with them; and if we do identify with them, we should take a seriously look at ourselves. By the middle of the second act everyone is hooking up, one couple brilliantly stumble around the stage tearing at each other. As the characters continue to make what my friends and I call "life mistakes" one can't help be feel a little depressed. And my one, I am obviously referring to myself. I could go into detail, but that's way more information than I'm willing to reveal here.
Here's a clip from the show:
Antonioni Project from Tal Yarden on Vimeo.
Here's an American trailer for L'Avventura:
La Notte:
L'Eclisse:
Having now watched a few clips and documentaries on Antonioni, Toneelgroep definitely captures his characters' materialistic worlds and their inability to connect, however I don't feel the languidness on the stage as I do the films. I don't sense a search for meaning from the creators like I do from Antonioni. What I get is a lot more frenetic and complicated, which is perhaps where my hesitation is in fully embracing this piece.
I mistakenly went to the performance without reading up or watching anything on Antonioni's films. I found the three converging story lines confusing and at some points trite. Thus, I cannot speak in depth on whether or not their examination on Antonioni's film is successful, for lack of a better word, or not. So here are my initial reactions to the piece.
The enormous Barbican Theatre stage is transformed into a Hollywood studio blue box (used for CGI effects) with a screen on the upper half of the proscenium (complete with subtitles for those of us who don't speak Dutch), cameras set up on stage, a film track for tracking shots, and the "orchestra pit" is set up with tv's and technicians as well as couches where the actors sit. As you can tell from this initial description, a lot is going on.
Although the undertaking is commendable I'm left not entirely satisfied. Perhaps it is the two-dimensional characters, my ADHD (seriously, A LOT is happening on stage all at once), or my recent longing for simplicity. A part of me is wondering where theatre is going as we begin to incorporate and rely on more and more technology. My fear is that use of technology, our post post-modern self-reflexivity and a growing sensation of an existential void are going to try to eradicate good old fashioned story telling.
Putting my nostalgia aside, however, I honestly found the performance fascinating. And there were some stunning moments of longing, connection and vulnerability - but nothing substantial enough to grasp on to. The visual elements are intriguing as we watch the actors in the blue on stage and the filmic close-up on screen. And transitions between cuts are thoughtful act actors flow between each other, mimicking the dissolve editing in film.
The acting, tinged with a bit of 1960s melodrama, is constant and committed throughout which makes the lack of character depth not as much of an issue, especially because I don't think we're supposed to have any connections to any of the characters, nor are we to identify with them; and if we do identify with them, we should take a seriously look at ourselves. By the middle of the second act everyone is hooking up, one couple brilliantly stumble around the stage tearing at each other. As the characters continue to make what my friends and I call "life mistakes" one can't help be feel a little depressed. And my one, I am obviously referring to myself. I could go into detail, but that's way more information than I'm willing to reveal here.
Here's a clip from the show:
Antonioni Project from Tal Yarden on Vimeo.
Here's an American trailer for L'Avventura:
La Notte:
L'Eclisse:
Having now watched a few clips and documentaries on Antonioni, Toneelgroep definitely captures his characters' materialistic worlds and their inability to connect, however I don't feel the languidness on the stage as I do the films. I don't sense a search for meaning from the creators like I do from Antonioni. What I get is a lot more frenetic and complicated, which is perhaps where my hesitation is in fully embracing this piece.
Monday, January 31, 2011
Laugh @ Sadler's Wells and Goudron et des Plumes @ Barbican Theatre
Antonia Baehr's Laugh at Sadler's Wells is 70 minutes of her, well, laughing. The German choreographer, director and performer asked friends to write a "score" of laughter for her birthday. She begins by treating the event like a concert, with the names of the "composers" projected for each piece, and afterwards, dressed in a man's suit with brown shoes and slicked back hair she bows with the utmost seriousness.
There's one where she traces out a triangle in the air keeping the tempo like a metronome. point-point-ha, point-ha-ha, point-ha-chortle, etc until she's fighting to keep the triangle going as she laughs, coughs and gasps for air. The control and endurance is astounding. Having done clowning and laughing exercises, I understand exactly what is necessary to control that oftentimes uncontrollable muscle - and over an hour it's certainly a feat. A clever score that I would love to use as a training exercise uses a variety of balls, the laugh matching the quality of sound of the ball as it bounces and rolls. She then uses multiple balls and expertly traces their sound with laughter.
My favorite, which most of my classmates found terrifying, is where she stand behinds a magnifying glass (see picture). What starts of humorous in itself as she appears to have a ginormous head and little body, she laughs and giggles and flutters around in a circle; the silliness gradually grows into a maniacal cackle, escalated by an echoing amplification. I was crying with laughter - I've never seen anything so silly, absurd and terrifyingly delightful.
Something charming are the "scores" from her parents. Her mother wanted to record a session of them together, wanting her daughter to explain why she was doing this. "You can't fake laughter," says her mother in German, "it's not authentic and not contagious." Baehr then immediately laughs for her mother, who in turn laughs back at her daughter. "See, definitely not contagious." Ha! Her father's score was a request that she record and compare her family's laughs and then compose them into Beethoven''s symphony (or something like that?) Equipped with a mixer she mixes the laughs of her, her parents and uncle into a rhythmic beat.
All in all, I found it an interesting experiment on laughter and I appreciate Baehr's skill and stage presence throughout the piece.
Over at the Barbican (which is quickly becoming one of my favorite venues) I saw Du Goudron et Des Plumes, part of the London International Mime Festival, which is a 75 minute brilliant acrobatic exploration set on a high flying raft brought to us with the expert and stunning skill of the French Compagnie MPTA and choreographer Mathurin Bolze.
The five performers (four guys and a lady) begin in stillness, and then slowly emerge from and explore their raft, bouncing, jumping, swinging, climbing from it's boards and wires. The raft sways as one performer balances and jumps on a plank. Tableaux in motion flash as the rhythmic swaying raft represents the passing of time. For one humourous scene the performers recreate a reflection down below from what's happening up top. The guy upside down desperately fights gravity and ends up with water in the face (and old school clown gag). Another scene they roll down sheets of paper off the raft and create shadows and image tricks with lights. Some of it seems gratuitous, but towards the end of that scene it was riveting. They then chop down the paper in madness as the woman jumps off the raft. The men go nuts and start destroying everything in a frenzy. The woman, now on a rope dangling below, twists and turns in the air. Finally the raft tilts down and the members of the raft slip and slid and hang on for dear life. The raft eventually finds land and it's inhabitants slowly emerge from the vessel for an enthusiastic applause.
The pacing is nice, keeping the audience engaged and also allowing time for the performers to rotate seamlessly to rest. The sound is stunning and matches the action perfectly. I've never seen anything like this: a mixture of acrobatics, mime, clown, and physical theatre - the theatrics of this event are completely stunning and captivating and it all looked effortless by the immensely skilled performers.
My favorite, which most of my classmates found terrifying, is where she stand behinds a magnifying glass (see picture). What starts of humorous in itself as she appears to have a ginormous head and little body, she laughs and giggles and flutters around in a circle; the silliness gradually grows into a maniacal cackle, escalated by an echoing amplification. I was crying with laughter - I've never seen anything so silly, absurd and terrifyingly delightful.
Something charming are the "scores" from her parents. Her mother wanted to record a session of them together, wanting her daughter to explain why she was doing this. "You can't fake laughter," says her mother in German, "it's not authentic and not contagious." Baehr then immediately laughs for her mother, who in turn laughs back at her daughter. "See, definitely not contagious." Ha! Her father's score was a request that she record and compare her family's laughs and then compose them into Beethoven''s symphony (or something like that?) Equipped with a mixer she mixes the laughs of her, her parents and uncle into a rhythmic beat.
All in all, I found it an interesting experiment on laughter and I appreciate Baehr's skill and stage presence throughout the piece.
Over at the Barbican (which is quickly becoming one of my favorite venues) I saw Du Goudron et Des Plumes, part of the London International Mime Festival, which is a 75 minute brilliant acrobatic exploration set on a high flying raft brought to us with the expert and stunning skill of the French Compagnie MPTA and choreographer Mathurin Bolze.
The pacing is nice, keeping the audience engaged and also allowing time for the performers to rotate seamlessly to rest. The sound is stunning and matches the action perfectly. I've never seen anything like this: a mixture of acrobatics, mime, clown, and physical theatre - the theatrics of this event are completely stunning and captivating and it all looked effortless by the immensely skilled performers.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Love Will Break Your Heart
Midsummer (a play with songs) @ the Tricycle
There are a few times in the theatre where we are pleasantly surprised and completely enthralled by what is simply good story telling. Midsummer, which was a huge hit at Edinburgh Fringe, is a rom-com with a theatrically splendid twist. Equal parts third and first person story-telling we find Helena (the resplendent Cora Bissett) a divorce lawyer and Bob (a pathetically charming Matthew Pidgeon) a used-car salesman/petty criminal in an Edinburgh bar during Midsummer. After an awkward one-night stand the two part ways as Helena heads of to be a bridesmaid (again) and Bob sells a stolen pink convertible to give the cash to his crime-boss. With both racing through the city, they end up meeting again and spending the shortest night of the year spending the £15K trapsing around the city - meeting goth kids, getting tied up in a Japanese fetish club, borrowing a mailbag and inserting cash into envelopes, and enjoying the poshest hotel in the city.
David Greig's delightfully charming, beautiful and poignant text is nicely complemented by Gordon McIntyre's indie music, with Bissett and Pidgeon strumming on their guitars and singing the melodic songs. The duo are pitch-perfect as the two thirty-five-year-olds who come together through the wonder of where their lives went wrong. Flowing from narration, to the multiple characters, and singing they both are a delight to watch - Bissett with her simultaneous charm and vulnerability and Pidgeon with his crass humour to overcome his life's disappointments. With their commitment, timing and easy stage presence we are carried away with their unlikely love story. I oou'd, awe'd, laughed and was completely engrossed.
David Greig's delightfully charming, beautiful and poignant text is nicely complemented by Gordon McIntyre's indie music, with Bissett and Pidgeon strumming on their guitars and singing the melodic songs. The duo are pitch-perfect as the two thirty-five-year-olds who come together through the wonder of where their lives went wrong. Flowing from narration, to the multiple characters, and singing they both are a delight to watch - Bissett with her simultaneous charm and vulnerability and Pidgeon with his crass humour to overcome his life's disappointments. With their commitment, timing and easy stage presence we are carried away with their unlikely love story. I oou'd, awe'd, laughed and was completely engrossed.
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
"Yes, Prime Minister" and Resolution! 2010
I've got two shows to quickly cover so here goes:
Last week I saw Yes, Prime Minister with the USC study abroad kids playing at the Gielgud Theatre. The comedy is based on the 1980s satirical TV show of the same name. As the title suggests the storyline depicts the Prime Minister and his staff. There's a big oil line deal on the table, a request for an underage prostitute, global warming, bribing the BBC and economic doom all in one night. Over the course of the play the PM, called Jim Hacker, gets hilariously more and more desperate and frantic as things seem to farcically spiral out of control.
Knowing nothing about the TV show or the comedy, I went in with absolutely no expectations. Hitting humourously on the anxieties of 24 hour news, the global economic downturn and governmental responsibility this play infused with superb comedic timing offers a chance to laugh at our current condition. Although the text lags a bit here and there, the committed presence of all the actors keeps the comedy rolling along. Although I, nor my fellow Trojans, didn't get all of the British references, I was thoroughly entertained.
____
Resolution! 2011
Last night I went with my flatmate to see a dance show with one of the dance choreographed by her friend. The Place has a dance festival of new work by up-and-coming dancers called Resolution! 2011.
There were three performances. the first called "[ex]posed" by 90 Degree Rotations was a beautiful piece by 6 dancers who fell rhythmically in and out of sync. There's a lot of potential in this young company and all of the dancers were quite strong. The overall piece, however, needed to flow more. For a relatively short set there were black outs and changes. I suggest figuring out how to have pieces of a whole weave seamlessly together.
The second set by Katerina Paramana called "Metrology" I would heavily argue was not dance, but rather a performance art piece. The conceit was to use 34 object. Why? I don't know. It felt like a graduate experiment, so I wasn't surprised when I saw it was a part of Paramana's PhD studies. The two performers had good stage presence and the actions were clear and committed. Although there were some delightfully clever elements the conceit soon became tired and I knew exactly how things were going to play out.
The third set (which was the one choreographed by my flatmate's friend, Anna Buonomo) was clearly the saying "save the best for last." This piece called "F5VE" featuring the Bricolage Dance movement chronicles 5 distinct characters and utilises each dancers unique style whilst they all blend and converge, building up to a beautifully messy frenetic energy. A well-planned and choreographed piece as the tempo slowly built up with the music and dancing complementing the energy of the movement.
The most interesting part of the evening for me though was having my lovely and smart Italian flatmate who is studying in the MA Computer Science programme keep asking "what was the message?" A genuine question that soon became our theme for the night as I poked and prodded the question in terms of larger issues of semiotics and audience reception. "What do you think the message was?" I would ask with the smile. "Well, what was the story?" she would ask. "Why does there have to be a story?" I'd ask in return. "I don't understand what they were doing." "Well, the message sent, isn't always the message received. And that's ok." Haha, you know you're getting a masters in performance studies when you turn every performance viewing experience into a contemplation and conversation about the semiotics of performance and the enigmatic spectator-performer relationship of performance.
Knowing nothing about the TV show or the comedy, I went in with absolutely no expectations. Hitting humourously on the anxieties of 24 hour news, the global economic downturn and governmental responsibility this play infused with superb comedic timing offers a chance to laugh at our current condition. Although the text lags a bit here and there, the committed presence of all the actors keeps the comedy rolling along. Although I, nor my fellow Trojans, didn't get all of the British references, I was thoroughly entertained.
____
Resolution! 2011
Last night I went with my flatmate to see a dance show with one of the dance choreographed by her friend. The Place has a dance festival of new work by up-and-coming dancers called Resolution! 2011.
There were three performances. the first called "[ex]posed" by 90 Degree Rotations was a beautiful piece by 6 dancers who fell rhythmically in and out of sync. There's a lot of potential in this young company and all of the dancers were quite strong. The overall piece, however, needed to flow more. For a relatively short set there were black outs and changes. I suggest figuring out how to have pieces of a whole weave seamlessly together.
The second set by Katerina Paramana called "Metrology" I would heavily argue was not dance, but rather a performance art piece. The conceit was to use 34 object. Why? I don't know. It felt like a graduate experiment, so I wasn't surprised when I saw it was a part of Paramana's PhD studies. The two performers had good stage presence and the actions were clear and committed. Although there were some delightfully clever elements the conceit soon became tired and I knew exactly how things were going to play out.
The third set (which was the one choreographed by my flatmate's friend, Anna Buonomo) was clearly the saying "save the best for last." This piece called "F5VE" featuring the Bricolage Dance movement chronicles 5 distinct characters and utilises each dancers unique style whilst they all blend and converge, building up to a beautifully messy frenetic energy. A well-planned and choreographed piece as the tempo slowly built up with the music and dancing complementing the energy of the movement.
The most interesting part of the evening for me though was having my lovely and smart Italian flatmate who is studying in the MA Computer Science programme keep asking "what was the message?" A genuine question that soon became our theme for the night as I poked and prodded the question in terms of larger issues of semiotics and audience reception. "What do you think the message was?" I would ask with the smile. "Well, what was the story?" she would ask. "Why does there have to be a story?" I'd ask in return. "I don't understand what they were doing." "Well, the message sent, isn't always the message received. And that's ok." Haha, you know you're getting a masters in performance studies when you turn every performance viewing experience into a contemplation and conversation about the semiotics of performance and the enigmatic spectator-performer relationship of performance.
Saturday, January 15, 2011
Fela! at the National
So this one is really really late as I saw Fela! at the National back in December. But as I spent winter "break" writing essays and am now starting semester 2 of my MA programme, I figured better late than never. (It's also super short as I have another post to write).
The musical is set in Lagos in 1978 at the Shrine, the last concert by afrobeat father Fela Kuti. The story chronicles his life from his upbringing, education in London and eventual explosion into the blended sounds of jazz, funk and the rhythmic African drums. After encountering the Black Power movement in America, he shifted the focus of his music to the political, spreading activism through music. After the brutal death of his mother, who was thrown off a building by the police, he delved even further into politics, making him an even bigger threat to the unstable Nigerian government.
I knew absolutely nothing about the life of Fela Kuti before stepping foot into the National. Upon leaving I wanted to learn more. Although Fela! is a flawed musical, and doesn't quite follow the life of this influential man, there's a lot to be gained from it.
For brevity's sake, I'm not going to go much further into the actual musical, rather I'm going to focus on the show-spectator relationship. Because I think it's really interesting. Fela addresses the audience as if we were at the actual Shrine and this was a concert in the middle of Lagos, rather than a well-funded national theatre in the heart of London with a bunch of middle-class white people. He encourages us to respond "ya-ya" and even has everyone get up to dance. Sitting by myself, I had no "support" to get involved and get my hip-shaking grove on, because no one else around me was dancing. The boy to my left looked like he was going to die from embarrassment and the couple to my left, with wine in hand, made pitiful, yet joyous, attempts. If I were to really let loose it would have become the "Ashley show" and I just wasn't prepared for that. So I stood there awkwardly, watching the majority of the auditorium stand in awkward solidarity, and looking envious on those with friends who were dancing. Many of the criticisms referenced this aspect (probably old disgruntled white guys). This made me wonder how this scene would have played out with different audiences. And by different I really mean a predominantly black audience vs a predominantly white (and British white to be specific) audience. Anyways on with the show...
A lot of the political problems in Nigeria were the result of British Colonialisation so it was a very interesting subtextual dialogue happening. He talks about the corrupted government, and even makes fun of the British to a (predominantly British audience). It's clear that many developing countries are still trying to get over the repercussions of imperialisation. I'm sure I'm not the only one to have seen this connection but it's ever so slight that I think the entertainment value surpasses any implications of compromising historical ramifications.
Overall, I absolutely enjoyed the show. It's a flawed musical but the music was rhythmic and continuous, the dancing was inventive and energetic and the performance by Sahr Ngaujah as Fela is absolutely phenomenal.
The musical is set in Lagos in 1978 at the Shrine, the last concert by afrobeat father Fela Kuti. The story chronicles his life from his upbringing, education in London and eventual explosion into the blended sounds of jazz, funk and the rhythmic African drums. After encountering the Black Power movement in America, he shifted the focus of his music to the political, spreading activism through music. After the brutal death of his mother, who was thrown off a building by the police, he delved even further into politics, making him an even bigger threat to the unstable Nigerian government.
I knew absolutely nothing about the life of Fela Kuti before stepping foot into the National. Upon leaving I wanted to learn more. Although Fela! is a flawed musical, and doesn't quite follow the life of this influential man, there's a lot to be gained from it.
For brevity's sake, I'm not going to go much further into the actual musical, rather I'm going to focus on the show-spectator relationship. Because I think it's really interesting. Fela addresses the audience as if we were at the actual Shrine and this was a concert in the middle of Lagos, rather than a well-funded national theatre in the heart of London with a bunch of middle-class white people. He encourages us to respond "ya-ya" and even has everyone get up to dance. Sitting by myself, I had no "support" to get involved and get my hip-shaking grove on, because no one else around me was dancing. The boy to my left looked like he was going to die from embarrassment and the couple to my left, with wine in hand, made pitiful, yet joyous, attempts. If I were to really let loose it would have become the "Ashley show" and I just wasn't prepared for that. So I stood there awkwardly, watching the majority of the auditorium stand in awkward solidarity, and looking envious on those with friends who were dancing. Many of the criticisms referenced this aspect (probably old disgruntled white guys). This made me wonder how this scene would have played out with different audiences. And by different I really mean a predominantly black audience vs a predominantly white (and British white to be specific) audience. Anyways on with the show...
A lot of the political problems in Nigeria were the result of British Colonialisation so it was a very interesting subtextual dialogue happening. He talks about the corrupted government, and even makes fun of the British to a (predominantly British audience). It's clear that many developing countries are still trying to get over the repercussions of imperialisation. I'm sure I'm not the only one to have seen this connection but it's ever so slight that I think the entertainment value surpasses any implications of compromising historical ramifications.
Overall, I absolutely enjoyed the show. It's a flawed musical but the music was rhythmic and continuous, the dancing was inventive and energetic and the performance by Sahr Ngaujah as Fela is absolutely phenomenal.
Thursday, December 23, 2010
A walk with Jack the Ripper
For my theatre and performance theory class we get to choose our own topic for our essay (which is due in January so a big fat Merry Christmas to me). A few weeks ago, I thought about what I might want to write my essay on: Something specific to London, preferably something site-specific, involves walking and tourism. Of course, the first thing that popped into my mind was the Jack the Ripper walking tour - so added bonus a mysterious serial killer! Because of my final performance for performance lab, I didn't really have a lot of time to do any preliminary research until now. I wasn't really worried because I have a lot already to pull from in terms of architectural theory as well as the impact walking has on a spectatorial experience. So last week Monday, I went on the "original" Jack the Ripper walk with London Walks. Our tour guide was Donald Rumbelow who's written the critically acclaimed book The Complete Jack the Ripper. A former police officer and Blue Badge tour guide, Rumbelow has been guiding this particular walk for the past 16 years.
This particular tour meets at Tower Hill station. I got there early; in fact, I was the first one there. I had chatted with Rumbelow a bit and something he said really struck me: "I like my crime at a distance." I had been wondering not only why the Jack the Ripper murders were so popular, but also why people would actually flock to the murder areas. It all seem, well, rather morbid. Anyways, back to Rumbelow. "I used to work as a police officer for 30 years. So I saw plenty of it [crime] up close." It's been 122 years since the "Autumn of Terror" and the murders have surpassed urban myth.
On with the tour. I reckon there were around 40 people there on this very chilly night. Rumbelow began the tour bringing our attention the the Tower of London across the way. He talks about how one day in 1888 there was a procession of soldiers who were basically participating in a line up in which a prostitute had to identify the man who murdered her fellow prostitute friend (I think, I'll be honest and say I don't remember the exact details). Anyways this was a precursor to the Whitechapel Murders (what they were called before the press named the murderer Jack the Ripper). He also pointed out the partial wall next to us - the lower part is Roman and upper part is Medieval. It's the part of the wall that surrounded the original square mile of London.
We then walked around the corner, through a hotel drive-way and through a passage in that same wall. Here he told us of the reality of the East End prostitute. They were poor, dirty and most were alcoholics. It cost more to buy a loaf of bread and some cheese than it did to buy a prostitute. He also told us of the division between the City of London police and the Metropolitan police force - this division was used by the murder as he went back and forth between the City and East End. He also said the back in 1888 the City of London was the richest city in Europe which the East End was the poorest. It's pretty much still like that today.
We then walked to what's known as Prostitute's Church where prostitutes would hang out walking around the church, hoping to pick up their next John. After that we walked to Mitre Square which is where the body of Catherine Eddowes was found. Here Rumbelow set up the scene of the crime: There was a cracked door straight ahead, a policeman and his family living just down the way and the police force on constant rounds surrounding the area. No one heard nor saw a thing, which means that the murderer was quick and extremely skilled with his knife.
We then to Devonshire Square where he told us about the differences from 1888 to today. He also mentioned stories of past walks saying "anything can happen." We then walked past the boundary line between the City of London and Whitechapel - which is just a road, showing how easy it was for the murderer to simply walk back and forth the divide. After this we visit an old apartment building where there once was a lobby (which is now a restaurant called "Happy Days" - no joke) where some believe Jack the Ripper wrote on the wall "The Juwes are the men that will not be blamed for nothing" and left a piece of Eddowes' bloodied apron.
We then walked to an old building originally built as a lodging for the homeless where one of the victims had lived. Then we set off to Spitalfields Market where we learnt about the second murder.
We walked past the Ten Bells pub which was a popular pub for one of the victims. For the last stop, we went to what once was Dorset Street - the worst street in London - where the Ripper's last victim, Mary Kelly was found dead in her room, completely mutilated and the heart missing.
Rumbelow ends the tour with how Jack the Ripper has become mythologised in the search for his identity, not only in reality, but most prominently in fiction. He ended with what had become a popular rhyme:
This particular tour meets at Tower Hill station. I got there early; in fact, I was the first one there. I had chatted with Rumbelow a bit and something he said really struck me: "I like my crime at a distance." I had been wondering not only why the Jack the Ripper murders were so popular, but also why people would actually flock to the murder areas. It all seem, well, rather morbid. Anyways, back to Rumbelow. "I used to work as a police officer for 30 years. So I saw plenty of it [crime] up close." It's been 122 years since the "Autumn of Terror" and the murders have surpassed urban myth.
On with the tour. I reckon there were around 40 people there on this very chilly night. Rumbelow began the tour bringing our attention the the Tower of London across the way. He talks about how one day in 1888 there was a procession of soldiers who were basically participating in a line up in which a prostitute had to identify the man who murdered her fellow prostitute friend (I think, I'll be honest and say I don't remember the exact details). Anyways this was a precursor to the Whitechapel Murders (what they were called before the press named the murderer Jack the Ripper). He also pointed out the partial wall next to us - the lower part is Roman and upper part is Medieval. It's the part of the wall that surrounded the original square mile of London.
We then walked around the corner, through a hotel drive-way and through a passage in that same wall. Here he told us of the reality of the East End prostitute. They were poor, dirty and most were alcoholics. It cost more to buy a loaf of bread and some cheese than it did to buy a prostitute. He also told us of the division between the City of London police and the Metropolitan police force - this division was used by the murder as he went back and forth between the City and East End. He also said the back in 1888 the City of London was the richest city in Europe which the East End was the poorest. It's pretty much still like that today.
We then walked to what's known as Prostitute's Church where prostitutes would hang out walking around the church, hoping to pick up their next John. After that we walked to Mitre Square which is where the body of Catherine Eddowes was found. Here Rumbelow set up the scene of the crime: There was a cracked door straight ahead, a policeman and his family living just down the way and the police force on constant rounds surrounding the area. No one heard nor saw a thing, which means that the murderer was quick and extremely skilled with his knife.
We then to Devonshire Square where he told us about the differences from 1888 to today. He also mentioned stories of past walks saying "anything can happen." We then walked past the boundary line between the City of London and Whitechapel - which is just a road, showing how easy it was for the murderer to simply walk back and forth the divide. After this we visit an old apartment building where there once was a lobby (which is now a restaurant called "Happy Days" - no joke) where some believe Jack the Ripper wrote on the wall "The Juwes are the men that will not be blamed for nothing" and left a piece of Eddowes' bloodied apron.
We then walked to an old building originally built as a lodging for the homeless where one of the victims had lived. Then we set off to Spitalfields Market where we learnt about the second murder.
We walked past the Ten Bells pub which was a popular pub for one of the victims. For the last stop, we went to what once was Dorset Street - the worst street in London - where the Ripper's last victim, Mary Kelly was found dead in her room, completely mutilated and the heart missing.
Rumbelow ends the tour with how Jack the Ripper has become mythologised in the search for his identity, not only in reality, but most prominently in fiction. He ended with what had become a popular rhyme:
I’m not a butcher,
I’m not a Yid,
Nor yet a foreign skipper,
But I’m your own light-hearted friend,
Yours truly, Jack the Ripper.
I chatted with Rumbelow on our way to Liverpool St Station. He told me he thought of himself as a story teller and I enjoyed hearing him speak of his experience as a police officer, a writer and a Blue Badge tour guide.
I went on the same tour (with Rumbelow again) this past Monday with a friend who was visiting and wanted to go on the walk. The last time she came to London she went on a JTR tour with her boyfriend. She said that the guide was really animated and theatrical and went a little overboard with the descriptions of the mutilations done to the victims. So much so, that her boyfriend fainted and they weren't able to finish the tour. She definitely preferred Rumbelow and as we walked (in the snow) I listened to others saying how much they enjoyed Rumbelow as a tour guide. The walk itself was pretty much the same (there were a few physical changes due to snow and ice) and Rumbelow's "script" was the same. It was interesting seeing how different groups responded to him. Also, this time we had a lovely drunk man at Devonshire Square serenade us. Rumbelow kindly paused while the drunk man and his mate stopped to sing to us.
So I still have a ton to read up on: tourism, walking, history, place, performance. The list goes on. I'm still trying to figure out my exact angle for the essay but I'm going to put that on hold until after Christmas. And then it will be a mad dash to get all my research done before the New Year.
Have you been on a Jack the Ripper tour? If so, please share your experience with me.
Want to go on a Jack the Ripper tour? If so, why? Also if so, then come visit me!
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