Over the last few weeks or so, we as a class have looked a various specializing practitioners, and garnered an understanding of Physical Theatre.
DV8 Physical Theatre Company :
DV8 is a dance company based in London. It was founded in 1986 by an independent collective of chiefly 'modern dancers' and is led by Lloyd Newson; who's intent has been to taker a different approach to most contemporary dance than other existing companies. Interestingly as an example, the company has been known to incorporate dancers with disabilities into its pieces.
It has so far produced 16 dance pieces, all of which have toured internationally, and 4 award winning films for television featuring the types of modern dance they advance in. They say that they are performing works that break down the barriers between dance, theatre and personal politics and - above all - that communicate ideas and feelings clearly and unpretentiously.
Newson believes what distinguishes DV8's work is that "it is dance about something." It broadens the perspective of dance and tries to make it more relevant to people's lives. They stress a specific reason for moves, rather than just being created for the purpose of being aesthetically pleasing to look at for their audience. Newson describes DV8's work as 'Physical Theatre', because they don't like the term dance, as they believe it has "many limiting associations." Newson says that too often he sees dance companies more interested in the aesthetic and the visuals than they are in raw content. By this he means that dance companies primarily focus on making things look good for an audience, rather than there being any real narrative elements or themes or any type of meaning or message that needs to be put across to an audience - ideas, feelings, etc. There are links that can be made with DV8's work and Drama. Drama often incorporates meaning into performances, attempting to provoke ideas and feelings with audience members - much like DV8. DV8's focus of the creative approach is on reinvesting dance, with meaning, particularly where it has been lost through formalised techniques. DV8 also incorporates acting roles into some of their performances, despite much of their work being highly dance/physical theatre-based; which further creates its links to Drama, through acting techniques such as body language, facial expressions, characterisation and narrative elements, etc.
DV8 Physical Theatre's work is about taking risks, aesthetically and physically; about breaking down the barriers between dance, theatre and, above all, communicating ideas and feelings clearly - taking its work to, determined to be radical yet accessible, work to as wide an audience as possible.
My Enter Achilles Review:
"It's a strange feeling: delving into a piece of film you know absolutely nothing about other than the argued controversy that awaits. But even a minuscule amount of knowledge about it, or the emotional action taken in preparation, cannot prepare a person for what's to come in DV8's Enter Achilles. Right from the word 'go', Lloyd Newson throws us straight in - head first - into a dangerous and shocking territory, as viewers. The word 'uncomfortable' comes to mind throughout, but simply fails to be justifiable in this instance.
Needless to say of its shocking and thought-provoking imagery and controversial themes, the mesmerising performances by DV8's exceptionally talented cast members, and the film itself, is a true work of art. Enter Achilles challenges very deep, internal emotions that leaves its audience with very mixed and very strong feelings. It's ability to be hilarious one minute and unbearably shocking the next is perhaps its most outstanding achievement. Usually in the said medium, humour is done as a comic relief to brighten a dark subject matter, at various points, to relieve the audience of a potentially miserable experience. This however, here, is not the case. The humour here is designed as a false sense of security for the viewer; almost posing as a mask, to remotely hide the grim reality that lies beneath. The connotations behind particular points in the narrative and who we choose to interpret them (specifically) is the most shocking part of all. The ending, to which its characters initially behold as humourous, soon becomes rather real in matter of minutes, ringing true to the ever-lingering dark side of the male psyche. This particularly being a connotation and metaphor of a character's blow-up sex doll and how the others interact with it - violently and sexually - to give off a very distressing outlook on real life matters such as sex and eventually violent rape.
In terms of content and how shocking the film is, nothing really (literally) happens at all. But when we choose to decipher and interpret it and the actions its characters take, that's when the morbid and shocking reality begins to ring true. The exceptional choreography and brilliant performances deliver a rare, rich, devastating, triumphant work of art. Its visceral perception of human integrity and its ever-resistible visual power make for one of the most shocking and outstanding pieces of theatre-work to hit the stages and the screens, ever."
Overview:
I feel that DV8's work is particularly inspiring and, as you can probably tell by my review, they commit to truly phenomenal pieces of work that can be very much applicable to our devised, practical work that we shall undertake over the next few weeks or so. The research on DV8 has not only inspired me, but really broadened my outlook on Physical Theatre - it being my weaker element of performing - and how we can use our bodies to create brilliant, interesting and thought-provoking stories. DV8 will be firmly sealed in my mind when it comes to our own Physical Theatre piece as a source of great inspiration that I can look forward to, now that I've witnessed their work.
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