"Welcome To The Age Of Ignorance"

At the Magnetic North Theatre Festival one of the best shows that I saw was Ignorance created by the Old Trout Puppet Workshop. The three-man group is from Calgary and are one of the world’s leading (there’s very few I suppose) puppet artist groups out there! Ignorance is a puppet documentary about the evolution of happiness and of mankind. How was it that in our prehistoric origins we as a species found more joy in life than we do today? What is happiness? And what has happened to it? The Trouts ask these big questions and more.

Ignorance is also an exploration of the evolution of puppetry. Puppets go way, way back and the Trouts have built their puppets as though they were made by cave people out of raw, primitive materials such as stone, sticks, bones, fur, feathers, antlers and the like. If that wasn’t an innovation on puppetry, the Trouts don’t make or use the typical on-a-set-of-strings puppets that are manipulated with your hands. No, no, no. They’ll have a pair of slippers that are rats and run around the stage or my personal favourite from this show: A Trout wears puppets on his arms, each of which becomes a deadly prehistoric bird of some sort.  And the innovation doesn’t stop there people!! They’ve facilitated a whole new way to create theatre. Ignorance is an open project—they do not consider it a finished piece. The entirety of the script is online for you to view if you join their blog (linked below) and you can comment or make suggestions for what you’d like to see removed, added or changed from the script. 

(Check out this video as the Trouts explain how they put their puppets together.)

The play juxtaposes scenes from the first humans (named Adam and Eve) with samples of the miserable populous of the present day.  But perhaps the best character in the play is the ominous floating happy face balloon that acts as a metaphor for our struggle to achieve happiness. A man steps on his window ledge about to jump. The balloon floats by, the man grabs it, but too heavy for the balloon—he still falls to his death.

So why are the cave people so happy?  They must fight to survive the wild, scrounge for food, fight off monsters and the Alpha Male Grogg. The answer? 

“He has a very small brain, and so he cannot conceive of anything better.  He is happy simply to be alive.”

How wonderful it is simply to be alive! This planet is a magical coincidence. The fact that you are alive and thinking, breathing and feeling, reading this right now dear reader is simply remarkable. “This actually is the best moment of your life.  Every moment is the best moment of your life.”  Thank you for sharing in the best moment of our lives together.

Ignorance is an ironic title. It is the cave-wonders Adam and Eve who are ignorant about much of the world—they’re just figuring it out as they go along. And our generation surely is not ignorant in that sense, but we’ve lost what makes us happy. What gives us fulfillment and sustenance?

“So many thousands of years later, even though we have everything we could possibly want, we are not nearly so happy.  Most people experience only occasional whiffs of contentment, and a surprising number of us are altogether miserable; in fact, by the time this show is over, fourteen people will have jumped off of bridges in North America alone, and twice that number in Finland, where they don’t even have that many bridges.”

Well? Because we have too much. And we keep wanting more. Our brains release a neurochemical when we imagine something that want and we feel like we’ll only be happy if we get it. The Trouts claim that Mother Nature hasn’t designed us for happiness. We’re designed to be eternally, insatiably, dissatisfied. It’s an ambitious age we live in. And if you live in a first world country, it’s probably very, very easy for you to get nearly anything you want. Unfortunately, we’ve been conditioned by advertising to look for superficial quick-fixes for happiness highs. If you’re having a bad day, how often is the solution shopping? Possessions fill in the gap of our insecurities and self-worth, but their affect is fleeting.  A purse or whatever you buy you believe expresses our personality doesn’t DO anything. It’s a thing you carry around. But it’s not you. And it’s not apart of you. You are not what you own. According to The Story of Stuff  by Annie Leonard, money buys happiness to the extent where it enables you to meet your basic needs. After those are being met, the more money and stuff you have, a person’s happiness actually deteriorates. 

It’s not just that these puppets are miserable; they’ve forgotten how to feel anything.  Happiness does not mean banning sadness from our emotional repertoire.  As I’m sure you know, difficult experiences help you grow and shape your life. Melancholy has given rise to great works of art! Scientists speculate that people currently dull all of their emotions and they stop being present in the moment. We’re in our heads, we’re on autopilot and we need to get out. Because if you dull the “negative” emotions, you cannot do so without dulling all emotion and so when you experience “happiness”, it won’t be to its full.

Aristotle said that happiness is the only thing humans desire for its own sake. Everything else, whether it’s fame or money or whatever is all desires not for their own sake but because people believe that is what will make them happy. Similar to Buddhism, Arisotle believed that the happiness was the practice of virtue. Happiness has always been a popular subject. But it’s also an incredibly fuzzy subject. It’s of those big words that are hard to define—one that everyone will agree on anyways. Is it joy, amusement, satisfaction, gratification, euphoria or triumph? Actually, it’s all of those things.

Some people are literally born happier—their personalities focus on brighter outlooks, they are better able to see beauty and opportunity than average. But these things can be learnt. They just take practice. Look for beauty in things.

What studies say makes us happy, the ingredients to happiness if you will:
-Pleasure physical (food, being clean etc.)
-Engagement in activities
-Relationships and having a sense of community
-Having a sense of purpose or meaning in your life, self-esteem
-Practicing selflessness and gratitude and presence

I’m going to tell you about a site called The Happy Planet Index.

“The HPI measures what matters: the extent to which countries deliver long, happy, sustainable lives for the people that live in them. The Index uses global data on life expectancy, experienced well-being and Ecological Footprint to calculate this.”

The top 5 countries? Costa Rica, Vietnam, Columbia, Belize and El Salvadore. Curious where Canada fits on this? We’re 64^th out of 151. Our experienced well-being is #2 after Denmark, and our life expectancy is placed #13 out of 151. Our downfall is our ecological footprint (140^th out of 151. Which correlates with our consumption habits). If you’re even more curious, you can take a test on the website to determine what your Happiness Index is.

Back to Ignorance: after two years of developing the show, the Trouts sincerely believe they have unraveled the happiness riddle. The show ends on this narration note:

"But what if happiness isn’t actually the point?  Could it be that we’re meant for more than mere contentment?  What if the pursuit of happiness upon which our entire society is based is both hopeless and… shallow?"

Maybe the solution is to just stop looking. 

"I'm just lonely because I'm from New Brunswick."

I find that I write best on paper first. Ideally, I'm outside, it's sunny and I share a romance with my pen as the breeze rolls by. I'm sitting on a bench on Stephen Avenue outside the Glenbow Museum yesterday writing my blog  on Hamlet (Solo) when a middle-aged man sporting the glamorous socks-over-the-trousers fashion statement briefly looks over my shoulder before sitting down on the bench beside me. 

He starts the conversation.

“Oh.”
“What?”
“Well I thought you were drawing a picture of me.”
“Nope.”
“Yer not eh?”
“Not even a little.”
“Oh. That’s too bad. Whatcha writin’? Poetry?”
“Nope.”
“A Novel?”
“No.”
“A Journal?”
“Not exactly.”

I notice that I'm being more curt than I should be. Really, truly, I think that more strangers should talk to one another. Take a ride on the c-train and you'll see that everyone is plugged in. They are all playing with their smartphones or listening to their ipods, reading their book, or maybe they're just staring into space. Someone sits beside someone else and you can visibly see their entire body tense. And if you so happened to start a conversation, I think 4/5 people would implode with the uncertainty of what to say or do. In Toronto, or Europe...or places that are really distinctly not Calgary, people are more social and friendly. Strangers talk all the time. And I admire this. So I decided I was going to give this a genuine go. Until...

“You have really beautiful legs.”
“...Thank you.”
“I’m Mike. What’s your name?”
“Courtney”

We shake hands.

“Nice to meet you Courtney. I’m Mike.”
“Yes.”
“Are you from Calgary born and raised?”
“Lucky. I’m just visiting from New Brunswick.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah, I’m a janitor."

“Cool.”
“For real high-class places. I got cash to burn.”

He pulls out his ID to show me.

“Alright.”
“No really. I'm a millionaire."

He empties out his pockets, first left and then right. Left had a wad a twenties. The right had a wad of hundreds.

“That’s what I party with in one night! But don’t judge me, I don’t spend it on hookers and blow.” (Yes. This was actually said.)
“...Good.”
“My best buddy Hank, my man he asks me, he says, ‘MIKE! You got all this money, let’s just get coked up and buy some girls a couple five drinks and we’ll take them home eh. Couple five drinks is all it takes.’ And I say ‘NO HANK. I ain’t like that. You could get an STD!”
“Yes, you could. Well, if you don’t mind, I’d just like to get back to my writing?”

This bench was mine first buddy. 

“Oh. Sorry for interrupting you! Well that’s cool. Hey. Do you want to come visit me in my room at the Marriott?”
“Not really.”
“No I’m really not one of those guys--I’m not looking for a sexual advancement. I’m just lonely because I’m from New Brunswick. What’s your name?”
“Courtney.”
“Right Courtney. I’m Mike. Well I’m going to take a cab to the Marriott and go to my room. Maybe I’ll see you later.”

And he swaggers off. I should mention that I was this particular bench is less than a block from the Marriott hotel. "Goodbye Mike." Even if I wasn't entirely perturbed by this conversation, I don't even know your room number.

"We know who we are but not who we may be"

The Magnetic North Theatre Festival in Canada currently taking place in my city Calgary is coming to a close. After seeing shows such as Ignorance and White Rabbit, Red Rabbit (both of which deserve a blog of their own)I had heard that the not-to-miss show of the festival was Hamlet (Solo). It is exactly what it sounds like: one actor (Raoul Bhaneja) performing all of William Shakespeare's Hamlet. Certainly it sounds impressive--just on premise alone, it's a circus act. This play has undergone 6 years of performance already and has been workshopped since 2002.The actor and director (Robert Ross Parker)consider going back to the masterwork again and again a gift.

The play starts with an all-dressed-in-black Bhaneja calmly placing himself center stage calling "lights". Lights come up (onstage and in the audience) and he even provides the sound effects of the whistling winds that open the play. The stage is bare. We soon see from the play's conversation between Bernardo and Franciso how Bhaneja is going to craft this world for us. For each character he has a specific set of physical gestures and stances, as well as subtle differences in vocal quality and tone. All the props are mimed. Bhaneja speaks straight out to the audience for the majority of the play and each character would switch when it was their turn to speak. I felt as though I was watching the play through tunnel vision.

The play requires immense imagination and focus. I cannot even begin to fathom how Bhaneja must feel imagining he is speaking to different characters as different characters from line to line or from setting to setting without any aid. It challenges the audience to imagine and focus with the actor, to go along with the gig. Bhaneja accomplishes this with ease with master transitions physically and vocally that mimic that of a film camera moving around set. The Ghost of Hamlet Senior closes his arms as he exits, and the disturbed Hamlet hugs himself as he falls to the ground contemplating what he's just seen. Claudius makes bold, open gestures; Polonius is a bit hunched over, his legged apart (perhaps chaffed from old age) and Hamlet's physicality is often pointed and indirect. Hamlet's voice is the least affected by Bhaneja and for me he is the most real of them all, even if at first, he is the most timid. It is after Hamlet sees the Ghost that his character explodes: That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain—/At least I am sure it may be so in Denmark 1.5.108-9).  He slaps himself against his cheek with each order to "smile" and the self-abuse in his soliloquies is a motif throughout the production. Bhaneja's Hamlet is manic, destructive,  and tortured.

Another of the play's accomplishments is it's links to performativity that already permeates the play: the idea that we are always playing a character or role in our daily lives and that those switch depending on who we surround ourselves with, or what we want.Before the Murder of Gonzalo takes place onstage, Bhaneja takes a sear in the audience with us, referring to us all as the "guilty creatures sitting at a play"(2.2.552).

But despite Bhaneja's character Hamlet and the play's dabbling in contemporary modern theory--that is sure to delight me on any occasion--Hamlet (Solo) falls short of spectacular. And I was upset at myself during intermission trying to piece together why I wasn't staggering out of the theatre, drunk with glee. I listened to some volunteers discuss it in the lobby:


"It's a very cohesive story, the most cohesive and understandable I think I've ever seen of Hamlet". That is very true. Bhaneja's grasp of the text and its language are exquisite. He is "expressive" and "divine in reason" even!

"It's too self-indulgent for me." LIGHTBULB. Is it?


No. It's not. I went back into the theatre and took my seat. I watched the second act. There was a standing ovation. I obliged. And then there was a talk-back with Bhaneja and Parker and I asked, "How did you find the emotional transitions as an actor? Did you feel limited? Did you find you couldn't fully go anywhere, because in a millisecond you'd have to be somewhere else?" His answer to me was that is was difficult, but it was like riding a roller-coaster. He just went where he needed to be and he calls himself the play's "storyteller" rather than any particular character. He admits that some nights he has better Claudius than others, a better Ophelia, a better Laertes, what-have-you. And he said the word storyteller and I thought: That's it! I didn't want to be told a story. I wanted to be shown one.  
It is tragically ironic that what makes the show so unique is what makes it unavoidably disappointing for me. While it has a clear vision, it is a vision that is less rich because there's only one point of view--the solo actors approach to each character. It's not self-indulgent enough because Bhanjei isn't able to fully drop into anyone character. Instead, he has to rely on stock gestures, physicalities, vocal qualities and personalities for his characters to distinguish them for the audience. Of course, Claudius makes sweeping hand motions and of course Ophelia turns the fabric of her shirt nervously in her hands. Of course the females aren't real, fully-realized characters at all: they are meek and soft-spoken, even in their time of madness! The result of this one-act circus show is menagerie of stock characters usually reserved for melodramas.

Longer speeches were more satifying because they allowed Bhaneja to better root himself and dig deeper and those were more satisfying. I prefer to see actors and people affected by other people. I like to see progression and internal struggles and canvases. I like to see a grounded, dropped-in, wholly realized character who thinks and breathes and lives,and feels--not a tantalizing snapshot of these things as possibilities. I want to see a character's motivation even if I don't quite understand it. I want to see thoughts--a crack into the bones of a person.

This play's focus on control isn't conducive to grounded work. Bhaneja called it a roller-coaster, but it's a ride I'm disinterested in because I don't care about the characters in a play I've so long loved. The play closed today, and if it comes to your city, I encourage you to see it. While I disagree with the fundamental drawbacks of a one-man Shakespeare, it is a feat both impressive and experimental.

I enclose a link to see a trailer of the play. Until next time, adieu.

http://www.magneticnorthfestival.ca/pages/whatson/plays/hamlet.html

"Hello"

"I write words and erase them again and again. Back space. Cut. Delete. Backspace. Copy. Paste. Delete. IS this a better opening? Does this sound too enthusiastic or too guarded? Too pretentious, too dramatic? I rarely write you know. I don't know why it suddenly feels so natural: the click-clacks erupting beneath my fingers, like I could be doing this all day if only I just had the time. I don't know if it's inspiration, an unexpected impulse, or maybe even a sudden wave of self-enlightenment. But I'm typing. At speeds only achieved by those traveling in space trying to get the thoughts, the hurricane of verbs, nouns and adjectives and the like out of my mind and onto the screen as quickly as possible afraid that if I couldn't keep apace, they wouldn't exist anymore."

Five years ago I wrote these words in a difficult email to a friend. The context doesn't really matter because I can see that after these five years, how I think about writing hasn't changed. As a kid I read and wrote a lot. I would scrounge for old pamphlets in the back of my mom's car so I would have something to devour on the way to the supermarket or to my Aunt Connie's house. I might have been worried that if I wasn't reading or writing all the time, I would forget how, aided by the old mantra, "If you don't use it, you lose it." But I think I just really loved--still really love words and seeing how they can fit together differently. But overclouding this love of words, I worried that if I wasn't writing my thoughts down then maybe they'd be forgotten. Or maybe it wasn't that I didn't have thoughts, but that they weren't valid enough to record. Or if I didn't record them and didn't claim them as my own, then they could have been anyone's.Perhaps what has drawn me back to writing was a sense of individuality and identity. Or maybe it's an abundant interest in fiction. Fiction not just meaning false but the original meaning of the word: to craft, to form. So that's what I want to do here. I really do think that fiction in whatever form is not that far off from this so-called "reality". We could talk about theories on existence, the frailty of human thought, how art imitates life (or the other way around) but alas that might be a blog for another day. Blog. So I've said the word. Apparently I've started a blog or something.

One of my best friends called me restless a couple of days ago. Another agreed and said that I love things very intensely but for short periods of time. After feeling briefly insulted, I realized both of those things are very, very true. Perhaps that is why Theatre makes for such a clever mistress in my life. You do a show and it's always a fleeting, wholly satisfying experience and once it leaves you feel as though you've lost something very vital to you, like a limb off your own body [enter post-show depression here]. Or how I imagine a waterbed must feel when people get off of it: undulated and stale. The human connection, intellectual discussion, community, I crave and go bac to all the time, always waiting for the next show to get that bakck. And so, I am perpetual rotating in a cycle among the cogs of passion,fulfillment,  deflation and longing.So I'm writing this blog to see if it's both something I can stick with and also to see if I find the same kind of love of it: something to aspire to create, to connect to, to inspire others and to crave for. I hope it leaves a happy impression on me like the feeling of wearing tube socks all day. Maybe as a bonus it will unclog my cluttered brain. And if that's all this acheives (besides some mild entertainment for the best friends I don't see nearly enough) I will consider this experiment a success. But maybe one day it will evoke a cultural conversation. For now, I give you my muddled thoughts: a whole lotta hullabaloo, behind which I reveal a mostly unedited me saying, "Hello".

Oh and this song. Because it's good shit. And it's a cool video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMuuc_pqx2s