Preview
TWO LIP TANGO
La Luna Productions
Thursday, June 30
Theatre Calgary Rehearsal Hall (Epcor Centre)
A well-thought-out play requires one obvious thing, among others: the time for its creators to think.
Time to think and the space to flesh out ideas are what Theatre Calgary is giving to smaller Western Canadian theatre companies through their second annual Play Advancement Series. It may not sound like much, but when you’re running a theatre company with a staff of two, nine days of free intellectual and physical space can make the difference between a brilliant or a mediocre show.
Last year’s workshops were a success; all three of the plays that were rehearsed at Theatre Calgary were eventually produced. This year, TC is helping three more companies flesh out plays that are slated for production some time in the near future. The first of these is Two Lip Tango, a play by Vancouver’s La Luna Productions that explores how love has become a commodity in our culture – something that can be bought, sold, downloaded and e-mailed.
"It looks at how we all have this deep desire to connect with somebody," says Mercedes Baines, La Luna’s artistic co-director and the play’s director and writer. "I think it’s harder in western culture because there are so many buffers. Like the computer…. I do find it a most curious way to connect with someone, because it’s a buffer between how we might naturally connect."
Originally, Baines had written her script around one woman’s search for love, but she’s since broadened it to focus on a larger group of people. She and a colleague – the other half of La Luna Productions – are in Calgary for nine days (eight hours a day in a rehearsal room in the Epcor Centre) to figure out just where it’s going to go.
"It will help to make the script better, hopefully, and make the script less green in its première," says Baines. "I will have had time in the room to see some things before I go back and direct it."
Nine days of free space definitely helps in play development, but Baines says that it makes for a tough experience, too, because she’s constantly working out the script in her head. Originally the play was fairly text-heavy, and she’s now trying to shift it to incorporate more movement.
"We’re looking at the consumption of love as a study, where movement and text reveal those ideas," says Baines.
Eric Rose, the Play Advancement Series’s artistic director, says it’s interesting to watch the evolution of ideas as directors work through their projects.
"They can fail here," says Rose. "They can go wildly in a different direction and then pull themselves back. This series was built to support whatever the artist feels this piece needs."
The series is funded entirely by Petro-Canada, a source from which smaller theatre companies might have trouble getting direct funding. Rose says the workshops are a good way for Theatre Calgary to support and share resources with smaller companies.
There are two more workshops after Two Lip Tango. In July, Calgary’s Quest Theatre will be working on a play about two kids, a tropical fish tank and an escape-happy octopus. Edmonton’s Concrete Theatre will be coming at the end of July to work on a script about a blond-braided girl who thinks the world and everything in it is hers to name. At the end of each of the workshops, there will be a public presentation of the play in TC’s rehearsal hall.
"You’ll see something that is rarely seen in theatres, that doesn’t have the polish," says Rose. "But there will be something absolutely engaging and exciting about seeing something that is still in flux. I think there’s a real energy and tension in watching work that hasn’t quite found its feet yet, because it can go several different ways."
For more information on the Play Advancement Series, call Theatre Calgary at 294-7440. |
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