When setting out in this project we all had a vision of what the commission would be, we wanted to tell the story of crime, but we had no idea about how we would arrive there.

 

It was this uncertainty at the early stages of the devising process that we allowed ourselves to image make freely, not really paying too much heed to the work we were creating but rather making images that linked to crime in one way or another; A fingertip search, a crime scene with calked outline, a hanging man. All of these images had relevance to the world of crime and at this particular stage in the process we weren’t overly concerned with their particular relevance to any one crime, they were just images based around the theme of crime.

 

We were investing ourselves in solely image making at this point in the process, making new work and ‘banking’ material as we went along. It was this notion of ‘investment’ in our process at this early stage that was driving the work into new and exciting places.

 

Creative Director of Forced Entertainment Tim Etchells writes on investment;

 

‘ Investment is what happens when the performers before us seem bound up unspeakably with what they’re doing- it seems to matter to them, it appears to hurt them or threatens to pleasure them, it seems to touch them, in some quiet and terrible way. Investment is the bottom line – without it nothing matters….’  (Etchells 1999: 48)

 

The images we were making were daring and non-conventional, they were not true to life so to speak, but rather interpretations often mimicries of the real event. Investment is key for us to push the work further into its new territories, we have become accepting of the fact that we might look silly or often aren’t taking ourselves seriously, but it is these moments of devising with full and devoted investment that drives the work forward into a space it might not otherwise have achieved.

 

 

So then have we begun to cross a boundary in our performance making? Have we broken the laws of traditional theatre making I ask myself at this point? The answer is YES! We haven’t set out to make a traditional piece of narrative theatre, but rather a telling of events. We had allowed ourselves to be engrossed in the prospect of making work that has no boundaries, no wrong or right way of storytelling, but rather an accumulation of imagery that would investigate, interrogate and mock the criminal system we had found ourselves working with.

 

We began now to think to our performance material, and the work that we had created. We had images of crime related themes, and at this point these were for the most part a representation of the theme, we needed to find a way to push these images into a new space, to almost make them something there not.

 

Again I am reminded of the work of Forced Entertainment and their playful style in devising theatre imagery. Etchells writes on this notion of play in making; ‘It was important that no one did there home work too well- that no element of theatrical language might subsequently precede any other- so that any element could lead.’ (Etchells 1999: 52)

 

If any one of us had an idea to develop an image we ran with it, no matter how bazar or silly the path would lead us it was important to us that we continue down it, to understand what these images meant or didn’t mean. It was this style of working that lead us to develop our characters, characters that don’t necessarily fit within the world of crime we are working within.  

 

It is important for the reader to understand the process we took in the creation of these characters and I will list these below;

 

• The Disco Dancer/ Politian–This character was derived from a series of workshops in studying the dancing of current Prime Minister Theresa May. Through mimicry and pastiche, we worked to uncover the meaning of her dancing. (A front to appear ‘human’ in a political landscape that finds her robotic and cold). What we soon discovered was that the link between dancing and politics wasn’t as far removed as we had first thought. The Disco Dancer represents everything that is wrong with modern day politics, a character who can dance and entertain, mock himself in times of distress and despair.
• The Chief Constable in the investigation of the murder of… –The chief constable, much like the Disco Dancer/ Politian was created through a series of attempting to understand the inner workings of police investigation work. We had researched into investigation of crimes that impact minorities, crimes that the establishment pay little attention to, and thus pay little attention to the detail of the investigation. The Chief Constable also dances, he represents an establishment that favours the privileged and pay little heed to minorities.
• John-John’s character was developed through the very little information we have about the crime he committed. He apologised, placed down his weapon and surrendered himself to the authorities, he represents the left wing protester against the establishment, taking a radical yet criminal approach to for his voice to be heard. He apologises repeatedly because he knows he has done wrong but also knows no other means of communication could work.

 

 

I am now drawn to a concern over the ethical impact of our work, yes the death of Percival albeit hundreds of years ago still has relevance in our own society today. His murder can be seen as both a tragedy and a necessary evil, to make a statement, it all depends on which side your politics stand on. So I am now at a crossroads as to whether the work we have made its ethically sound, have we taken into consideration all sides of the story? As stated we hadn’t actually ended the work with a telling of Percival’s death but rather a telling of the death of anyone, the guilt of anyone the investigation of anyone and the lack of care from the establishment that could be translated however you chose to read the work.

 

So then, have we created a work that is ethically acceptable? Ethical theorist Nicholas Ridout gives us insight into what ethical work means;

 

 ‘In all these forms of theatre, what matters, ethically and politically, is what is done with theatre itself rather than what the theatre is about. Increasingly, the relationship between theatre and ethics comes to a question of form rather than content. It is how you make it and what relationships you establish in the making of it…’ (Ridout 2009: 49)

 

We have created something that speaks volumes about society today, the establishment and the handling of crime within minorities, we have created images that could relate to anyone’s crime not just the death of Percival. His death is just the catalyst for the images we had made, and we had created a relationship to the work that focused purely on telling rather lecturing. We have not staged Percival’s death but rather a commentary on what is happening today.