Description
This book documents and responds to the work of Back to Back Theatre by providing artistic and critical viewpoints on one of the leading theatre companies of our times.
“This book is an excellent addition to the growing area of disability studies, and studies of performance and disability, but it should also be essential reading for anyone working in the fields of postdramatic performance and spectatorship, or collaborative performance-making.”
Kim Baston, Australasian Drama Studies journal
Back to Back Theatre has transformed contemporary theatre in Australia and internationally with their unique theatricality and imagination. Based in Geelong, in regional Australia, the company is driven by an ensemble of actors perceived to have intellectual disabilities. Their work is inspired by a need to communicate the intrinsic experience of being alive. Back to Back’s theatre is multi-layered, visual, expressive and sensory. The brilliance of their multi-award winning work is matched by its human scale and its respect for others. Hence, their awesome, confronting theatricality is also prosaic. As the company says, ‘We’re people who do shows.’
This book gathers key perspectives on Back to Back Theatre including interviews, documentation and scripts selected by the company and here made available to the reader for the first time. Accompanying this are scholarly essays and artistic reflections on some of the company’s most important and influential shows, including Soft, small metal objects, Food Court and Ganesh Versus the Third Reich. Providing insights from both inside and outside of Back to Back’s creative processes, this book offers a composite set of reflections on creativity, performance, politics, visibility and humanity.
Helena Grehan was Associate Professor in English and Creative Arts at Murdoch University, Perth, Western Australia at the time of writing. She is now the Vice Chancellor’s Professorial Research Fellow at Edith Cowan University, Perth.
Peter Eckersall was Associate Professor in Theatre Studies in the School of Culture and Communication, The University of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia at the time of writing. He is now the Sidney E. Cohn Professor in Theatre at the Graduate Centre, CUNY, New York.
Other contributors include Jane Goodall, Richard Gough, Barry Laing, Lalita McHenry, Eddie Paterson, Yoni Prior, Anna Teresa Scheer, Bryoni Trezise and Caroline Wake.
CONTENTS
4 Preface
Jane Goodall
8 We’re People Who Do Shows
Ensemble Statement
10 CHAPTER 1: The Company
11 Ensemble Statement
15 The Existential Antagonists: Back to Back, dramaturgy and spectatorship
Helena Grehan and Peter Eckersall
22 The Ensemble on the Ensemble
24 Bruce Gladwin
27 Alice Nash
28 Cas Anderson, Peter Eckersall, Robin Gador, Bruce Gladwin,
Helena Grehan, Noel Hart, Barry Kay and Ian Pidd
In Conversation
42 CHAPTER 2: soft
45 Is there a gene responsible for our obsession with perfection?
Lalita McHenry
56 CHAPTER 3: small metal objects
59 small metal objects Script
74 Script after script: Back to Back and dramaturgy of becoming
Eddie Paters
84 CHAPTER 4: Back to Back & Community
87 Stepping into Images: Three ‘arrests’ at the Back to Back Theatre Summer School
Barry Laing
94 CHAPTER 5: Food Court
95 Food Court Script
105 Responding to the ‘unspoken’ in Food Court
Helena Grehan
119 Disabling Spectacle: Curiosity, contempt and collapse in performance theatre
Bryoni Trezise and Caroline Wake
132 CHAPTER 6: Design Dramaturgies
133 Lighting Design: ‘Between theatre and architecture’.
An Interview with Andrew Livingston and Paul Jackson
Peter Eckersall
142 CHAPTER 7: The Democratic Set
144 An Interview with Bruce Gladwin
Helena Grehan
148 The Democratic Set: ‘A cavalcade of portrait, soapbox and drama’
Helena Grehan
158 CHAPTER 8: Ganesh Versus the Third Reich
159 Ganesh Versus the Third Reich Script
197 Irony, Parody and Satire in Ganesh Versus the Third Reich
Helena Grehan
209 ‘Scott’s Aired a Couple of Things’: Back to Back Theatre rehearse
Ganesh Versus the Third Reich
Yoni Prior
218 The Impossible Fairytale, or Resistance to the Real
Anna Teresa Scheer
230 CHAPTER 9: Making Room for Elephants
231 An Interview with Bruce Gladwin
Richard Gough
258 From Where I Stand
Scott Price in association with the Ensemble
260 Chronology: Productions
268 Chronology: Residencies and community collaborations
276 Back to Back People
278 Back to Back Public and private supporters over time
279 Awards
280 Author Biographies
CUSTOMERS IN AUSTRALIA CAN BUY DIRECT FROM –
Avenue Bookstore, Albert Park, Victoria
email: arts@avenuebookstore.com.au
