Final Version of Medea fragmented Videos

I found during our tech run that the initial version didn't show up well on the floor when it was too dark and that the whiter scenes like the different hand pictures and the people holding hands came up the clearest. I'm hoping by distorting the darkest scenes and using the "dream" filter, that gives it a strange whiter glow, that should embellish the picture enough to make it visible against the floor.

Here's to hoping for a nice, dark, drizzly English day next Wednesday.

Program Notes

Rehearsal Recordings

A recording of a run through from ground level and from the balcony of the Theatre Workshop.

Ground level. 

Overhead recording. 

Thoughts on Costumes

I want to make sure my costumes are very simple and try to look "timeless." To achieve this, I wanted the women to wear white dresses, with Medea's being a  cut a little longer and more matronly and the Princess's being slightly childlike. Jason I want in black slacks and a white button down shirt. Since I'm playing Jason, I want to add a simple hat to further distinguish masculinity and also to remove the possibility of seeing Jason's face. I feel like, despite all the damage his actions cause in the course of the story, the focus for my piece should really be on Medea and the Princess, with Jason acting primarily as a catalyst for the actions that occur. In a way though, I suppose by removing his face and dehumanizing him in that manner, he becomes more monstrous as well, which is also a nice thought.

Initial design concept for Medea, Princess and Jason.

Final design for Medea (except she will be barefoot during the performance).

The other costume piece needed for this production was the garment that Medea poisons. Originally I developed a very complicated idea to create a white dress that the Princess would put on and smooth down her body. When she reached the bottom hem, I want two small elastics, like hair ties, sewn into the inside of the hem that she would look around her wrists and then begin to struggle with, as she pulled the dress higher, it would begin to flip inside out and reveal an under layer of all red. The struggle, in the form of a dance, would continue until the garment had been entirely reversed and was then completely red, at which point the Princess would collapsed on the floor and die.

Initial concept for the Princess Death Dress.

When I got the fabrics back to my apartment to create this garment I realized that my sewing expertise was probably not up to the the task. I pinned the white and red fabrics together and saw that the flowiness I wanted out of the garment was lost when I added the white fabric. I also realized it was likely to look like a big white sack of her because the available material wasn't quite right for what I envisioned. The material needed to be stretchier, more like spandex or nylon, and it needed to flow better.

So I started to dance around my apartment with the various bits of costume and fabric I had and realized that by combining the two red capes, I could create a similar visual effect that I was hoping to overall achieve for the Death Dance and only loose the initial surprise of the dress changing colors. I realized that were was no real reason for the Princess to reject an item if it was bright red and that as long as Moe took a moment to really seem to enjoy the red cape, smoothing it down her body and checking out her reflection in an offstage "mirror" it would probably be just as good.

On the first day of rehearsal with the cape, I realized that it would be best to cut the second cape, the one the Princess laces her wrists through elastics at the bottom to adhere it to her, in half and just allow the dance to carry the action of dying more than the prop, especially since Moe was capable of dancing the part so beautifully.

Final design for the Princess. You can see the white dress that she wears for the whole piece below the cape that she receives from Medea.

Thoughts on Music Choice

Part of my goal with this project was to create a submersive experience despite the fragmented nature of it and I feel like the music choice is important as it's the one piece of the puzzle that the audience gets to hear as a whole.

The text aspect represents a fleeting moments throughout a longer time frame of Medea's life as well as the occasional insight into her thought process. The video montage works more specifically to highlight happy moments in her life with Jason before he left her for the Princess. The tableaux/dance highlights the actions laid out in the play - a slightly closer look at a pivotal junction in Medea's life. I wanted the music choice to retain a distinctly opposite feeling from the video montage of happy moments.

I have no doubt that the choice of Darling Violetta's "I Want to Kill You" balances the happy home movie vibe and still provides a very plausible insight into Medea's mind, similar to the way that the Greek chorus often seems to know what's about to happen, what she's thinking and what the final outcome will be while at the same time still watching in enthralled horror. It's almost as though the Greek chorus in Euripides' play has an ancient Greek version of "I Want to Kill You" playing in their heads, mapping out the tragedy to come, but like modern day rubber-neckers, they still just stand by to watch the wreckage and exclaim over the bodies.

My only concern is that the music selection could be a bit distracting to the action occurring below on the Ground Floor. Since it shouldn't be played at an overpowering level, it should really just be like a background noise... above a whisper, but still retaining that quality to an extent.

I am still toying with just playing an instrumental piece, but I'm now 95% sure that Darling Violetta is the way I want to go.

Lyrics for "I Want to Kill You"

I...want...to...kill...you
When you least expect it
I'll bash your brains in
When you least expect it

You're afraid of flying
Afraid of losing your mind
But I don't want to know you
Now there's no time

It's both a lovely and a fearful thing
To be captured by all of your feelings
(CHORUS)
I breathe into you
Into you

You run to me and
Don't even know my name
Desire's slowly becoming
Your great escape

You let me wonder
Now I'll let you burn
I promise nothing
But still you return to me
(CHORUS)
I breathe into you
I breathe into you
You are real

I am walking through the morning
Dandelion stares in my eyes
I wish you were caught by now
I'm afraid of what they'll find
Take the box of magic
Lay it in the back of your mind
Can we wash in the morphine
After we eat we'll be fine
You're the lonely lovers
I've only known a few
Take me within and you'll know what love is...easy
Let me watch you dance
Let me watch you sleep
Kiss her with your tongue
And you'll crawl to me again
Can you feel it ?
Can you feel it ?
Can you feel it ?
Can you feel it ?
Can you feel it ?
Can you feel it ?
Can you feel it ?
Can you feel it ?
Can you feel it ?
Can you feel it ?
Can you feel it ?
Can you feel it ?
Ah ah ah ah ah ah ah
Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh
Oh oh oh oh oh oh oh
Ah ah ah ah ah ah ah
(CHORUS)
I breathe into you
I breathe into you
You are real
I breathe into you
I breathe into you
You are real

Thoughts on Project Titles

I think the title I'm going to go with is Medea Fragmented. I like that the title sounds forcible and possibly like something happening against her will. At first I thought something like Fragments of Medea, but while fragments can create an imagery of something shattered, picking up the pieces, I thought that Fragments of Medea was still too kind for what happens in this play.

I'm a little fearful of overusing the word fragment, but I think it's perfect for what I'm attempting to do here. I looked up the definition of it at the online Oxford Dictionary.

n. "a small part broken off or separated from something"
n. "an isolated or incomplete part of something"
v. "break or cause to break into fragments"
from French, or from Latin, fragmentum, from frangere 'to break'

That's the aesthetic vision I have for the piece - a collection of incomplete parts. The use of words like "broken," "isolated," and "separated" also harken back to the themes in the Euripidean text. I also like the violence of the word in the verb form.

Medea Fragmented it is.

Choreography for Medea Project

A more polished version of my Medea project. The choreography style is loosely based on Pina Bausch's Cafe Muller. 

Measure	Elizabeth (Medea)	Melissa (Jason)	Moe (Princess)
1-14	Waltz w/ Mel	Waltz w/ Liz	Study reflection in mirror/brush hair.
15-19	Waltz w/ Mel	Notice Moe while waltzing.
20-24	Liz freezes. Smiling. Arms still in dancing position.	Mel Xs to Moe.
25-26	Liz turns towards where Mel has gone, still smiling.	Mel freezes. Watches Moe.
27-28	Arms drop. Face falls.
29-30	Freeze.
31	Arms down, awkward shuffle step (opening of Café Muller).		Turn around and face Mel.
32-33		Stare at Moe.
34		Bow to Moe.
35			Stand up.
36			Curtsy to Mel.
37		Waltz w/ Moe.	Waltz w/ Mel.
38	Freeze.
39-45	Implode.
46-55	Rock w/ arms out.
56	Abruptly claw ground. Head up. Sneer.
57-66	Slow rise into Wicked Witch pose.
67	Cross to toy chest. Pull out clothing in casket and poison.	Stop waltzing.	Stop waltzing.
68		Kneel to propose.
69			Nod. Smile. Put on ring.
70		Look at Moe.
71		Look at Liz.	Jumping feet shuffle to show off ring (Café Muller 1:10)
72	Apply poison.	Look at Moe.
73		Look at Liz.
74	Fold up cloth carefully and put back in casket.	Look at Moe.
75		Look at Liz.
76	Look around suspiciously.	X to Liz.
77-83	X to Mel (9:15 in Café Muller)
84		Push Liz back gently.
85	X to Mel (9:15 in Café Muller)		X to stool. Sit and admire ring.
86-91
92		Push Liz back gently.
93	Slap Mel.
94		Turn to leave.
95	Reach out to Mel.
96	Freeze.	Freeze.
97	Drop arm.	Turn to Liz.
98	Get casket.
99	Offer casket to Mel.
100		Shake head, reject.
101	Take a step closer, raise casket higher.
102		Shake head, reject.
103	Take a step closer, raise casket higher.
104		Accept casket.
105-107	Watch Mel leave.	X to Moe.
108	Metamorphosis into Wicked Witch pose.	Put casket on small table for Moe.
109		Exit.	Open casket.
110
111-112			Remove clothing from casket.
113-114			Put on clothing.
115-116			Smooth down clothing. Loop wristlets at the bottom of the outfit around your wrist.
117-129			Dance of Death (5:04 Café Muller)
130-133	Tenser.		Die (6:53 Café Muller?)
134	Relax.
135-137	Slowly pick up toys.
138	Close toy chest.
139-143	Convulse, pulling red scarf out of bosom.
144-149	Back & Forth Dance w/ the scarf.
150	Kill the children/cover the toy chest with the scarf.
153	Collapse, still holding onto the edge of the scarf.

**Each measure should go through your mind like a 3 count waltz, the tempo of which will be set during the initial waltz scenes.**

An initial attempt to work out what I wanted Medea to be doing to show how she felt about Jason leaving her. Fortunately, Liz is far more graceful and looks much less awkward when she performs it.

Rehearsal Schedule

Thoughts on Recycling Text

I think sometimes by gathering key phrases and plot points from the text, you can create a more personalized experience with a work of literature by connecting to the emotional aspects in your own way, once the framework of the piece is laid out.

One part of the video installations in my Medea fragmentation is geared to provide that framework. Certain key phrases were taken from the Euripides text to provide a very loose base line of activity and a mere glimmer of insight into Medea's mindset. Ideally, it will be received as a visual version of overhearing part of a phone call.

Thoughts on Site: The Jessop West Decision

My initial concept for my Medea project was a tableaux/dance piece done in the Theatre Workshop with film noir movie clips showing people alternately kissing and violent acts with key phrases from the text interposed on top of it.

After reading Dario Fo and Franca Rame's Medea, I felt that while their one woman play was compelling and certainly caught the essence of Euripides' original script, it was missing fragments. One reason for this was when I recalled a conversation with Elizabeth shortly after we first read the piece where she felt some sympathy for Jason initially. She pointed to lines of dialogue where Jason explains that what he was doing was best for the family and his offers to help Medea and the children with letters of introduction, etc. Personally, when I read those sections, I felt Jason was probably lying. However, by omitting these aspects of the dialogue, Fo and Rame removed a fragment of the essence of the play. Is Jason an entirely self-centered bastard, telling his wife anything to appease her long enough to get away and marry his new wife?  Or is that just a modern reading of the text? Is Jason actually engaging in a useful political alliance that would've benefited Medea and their sons in the end? Questions like this flesh out the story a little and add to it.

From there, I started to think about what stories are like when you only see them in bits. What if the only part of the play you knew was Jason's argument that his actions were in the family's best interest? What if you only knew the Messenger's recitation of the events at the palace? Can anyone ever know a story in its entirety?

At that point I started to think about separating each aspect of the performance into self-contained moments, an experiment in whether or not someone can get the accurate feel of something from a splintered collection of moments.

I realized that through the dance/tableaux, I wanted to show a "Cliffnotes" version of the story, using the other aspects to flesh out this main event. The film noir/key word movie was then better used as two different aspects instead of one combined. The key words, viewed separate from the dance/tableaux, emphasized the key moments stressed in the text. The film noir then evolved into a montage of happy moments from Medea and Jason's marriage, in a way paying homage to Jason's statements (true or not) about making decisions in their best interest and accenting the horror of Medea's decisions.

I was left with the question of how to show each of these aspects in a distinct, yet connected way and found that answer in Jessop West. On the 1st Floor, there are 4 circular holes in the floor that let you look down to the Ground Floor. By standing in the center of them, the audience should be able to move easily from hole to hole and view the difference aspects of the piece as they occur in a way that will break the piece down but provide an overall concept.

Thoughts on Universal Meaning

Research Question:
Why do directors, playwrights and practitioners repeatedly (re)turn for inspiration to classical drama/myth narratives within the contemporary theater? Is it because these source texts remain universally meaningful? Or should we regard any assumption of 'universal significance' with suspicion?

Classical theater, containing a lot of action and high drama, appears to be fueled primarily by base human emotion. Classical Greek drama can often be broken down into themes like love, jealousy, rage, revenge, and pride. An assumption of universal significance, supported by millennia of audience resonance with these texts, does not appear entirely off base. Even denying a universal significance, it's not a far stretch to argue that classical Greek dramatic themes certainly resonate with a contemporary Western audience, even if some elements of the works are far removed from our currently lifestyle (such as an acceptance of infanticide or intervention by the gods).

Therefore, a piece like Medea can still appeal to a modern audience because all of the action in the play results from emotions that are still prevalent in society today. Medea's marriage falls apart. She appears to loose touch with reality as she drowns in rage and vengeance, concocting a mad scheme of death and destruction to soothe her hurt pride and broken heart. In a way, Greek tragedies may be on the brink of resurgence - with modern audiences increasingly desensitized by all the violence and sex on TV and in movies, we may gradually be prepared to relate even better to the shocking violence and depravity touched on in these ancient Greek plays, in a way audiences of the past few centuries could or would not.

It seems a possible way to look at adapting a classic like Medea is to focus on the emotions invoked within the story and find a way to try to emulate them for the audience. The feeling of love, the pain and confusion of seeing it falling apart, the madness that unhinges Medea... these are themes that connect audiences across the millennia. They've been repeating for hundreds of years. In his book Mythologies, Roland Barthes says "while I don't know whether, as the saying goes, 'things which are repeated are pleasing', my belief is that they are significant." Perhaps it is pretty safe to assume themes that have repeated over several thousand years and continue to be replicated presently in literature are the closest thing to which we can ascribe the term 'universal significance.'


Barthes, Roland. Mythologies. Norwich: Fletcher & Son Ltd, 1973.