All Good Things Must Come to an End (Entry #12)

     I really, really hate that this class is ending. When I approached Dr. Fletcher in the spring of this year and asked what "THTR 4130 - Approaches to the Stage" was, he dryly replied "Stairs, ramps…" and stared at me as if he didn't just lay down some serious snark. I enrolled the following week. 

     We've read a ton of articles, some that quite obviously apply to theatre and our daily lives in it, and some that I found fascinating yet struggled to tie back to a theatrical concept, especially as the semester went on. We've had some great performance experiments, and some not so great experiments. I also enjoyed the open communication between undergrads and MFAs, and wish that that was more of a thing in this department.

     So what's been nagging at me? What's been keeping the theatrical part of my brain up at night? The question that was brought up in the first week of class, maybe even the first day: What is performance?

     Performance, an essentially contested concept (learned that this semester too!). I definitely know what it is not… I think. I used to think I knew what performance was. I confidently decided in the first week of class that it was a knowledge of doing something for an audience, and that there was an audience, and that the audience knew that they were watching a performance, and that there was an unspoken agreement between performer and audience, that this was, indeed, a performance. But this idea, with each reading and class discussion, changed and morphed so much that I don't even recognize that definition. A performance can be a collaboration of elements including light, sound, and space (notice I didn't say actor). A performance can also be two chatbots talking to each other on astroturf. A performance could even be you doing the dishes alone in your apartment, because you're performing for yourself, conscious of the way you're carrying your body and if you're throwing knives in a drawer or delicately placing plates back into a cabinet. Performance can be a protest in the street, or a series of tweets, or disguised as a real life encounter with a sexual harasser on a subway.

     So I guess that's my definition of performance. Or at least it's Fall 2014 THTR 4130 Michael's definition of performance. But with this definition came other very important questions, such as: Are plays on Twitter actually plays? Are we actually someone alien life form's Sims game? Is starving yourself on elevated platforms while people desperately try to make eye contact with you and mentally transfer energy a performance? Will we plebeian actors be replaced with uncanny SuperSkin robot actors with the possibility of malfunctioning and proving entertaining YouTube entertainment? And most importantly, will liking and sharing that video on my InstaFaceTwit put me into Generation Like by default? 

     I realize now that I sound like a paranoid schizophrenic who reads too much. Thanks JFletch. But in all seriousness, I would have probably never pondered these things had I not been in this class, participating in these class-to-blog-to-class discussions. It made me question what Art was. It made me question why we do theatre at all, and that it's possible to use theatre as social change or entertainment, or even better, both. At this point, without trying to make my head explode, I think it's best to evaluate performance and non-performance on a case by case basis. With others. Each case could change our definition of performance. It could bring about new vocabulary, and open minds. 

     I have ideas of what a performance is, and what it is not. Taking the stairs, for instance… It's all how you look at it.