Creative development: the guest house
As part of the Directing unit of the Zen Zen Zo internship program, I worked with seven cast members over three months to devise a new work inspired by the Rumi poem, The Guest House. All of my previous work exists in the devised space but this was the first time I attempted to devise a work of physical theatre, where the body tells the story as the primary instrument. At the conclusion of the creative development period, we had a work in progress showing at the Cannon Hill School of Arts. An inspiring and fun day to see what my fellow interns had been working on with their casts! Photos included here by Cade Williams…
I began with an open call out for performers and then connected with each person who applied to discuss their experience, goals, logistics, availability and the show concept (self-compassion). I then created a letter of agreement/basic contract to be signed by each cast member, formalised a creative development schedule and contact list, and wrote an ensemble ethos. This part of the course work was an excellent prompt to take my work more seriously, and the level of professionalism and transparency around expectations of participation laid the foundations of a relationship based on solid commitment for the cast.
We then met weekly for a three hour session and had many rich conversations, games of connection and physical warm ups, creative arts exercises with clay and drawing, stream of conscious writing practices in response to specific questions, and devising using our own Butoh imagery as doorways into character development. Cast members chose at random a research topic to inform the work and share with the group each week: about Rumi, poem analysis, translations of The Guest House, other artistic works about self-compassion, and psychology and self-compassion academic research. Each cast member also facilitated their own short session for the group (meditations, sound improvisations, consent and embodiment processes,, Meisner exercises from practical aesthetics and more).
I filmed our devised movement pieces to document the work, and created a brief synopsis to guide the cast and a script. As the show developed, we had several revealing dramaturgical discussions as a group. The founder of Zen Zen Zo and experienced director, Lynne Bradly came to one of our final rehearsals. This was AMAZING. I’d been craving this level of feedback on my work and I learned a lot about what I do well and where my edges to improve are. In my previous site-specific work, I had never rehearsed in the venue prior to the show and it was a profound gift for myself and the performers to book a time in the performance space prior to the work in progress showing day.
After the creative development period ended, myself and the cast met for a Reflection and Celebration picnic. During this time we shared our experiences on what we thought went well on the day and throughout the creative development both personally and as a group, and where room for improvement was. Five of the seven cast members expressed a strong desire to continue, to enter into another period of creative development for The Guest House, and to work toward a public outcome.
I loved every second of working with the cast and facilitating the space of creative development. I feel comfortable with the work of directing and confident in my skills in working with group dynamics. I’d love to do more! I’m also honoured and grateful for the cast’s trust in me, their open-ness to sharing about a challenging topic, and their willingness to show up.
This initiative is supported by the Regional Arts Development Fund (RADF), a partnership between Queensland Government, through Arts Queensland, and Sunshine Coast Council to support local arts and culture in regional Queensland.