Bonding, Needs and Boss Clowns

Am I too gentle, too safe, to go to properly dark places? Is that OK? Can I push performers far enough to challenge and do justice to negative emotions?
… OR do we fetishize pain? 

From my director’s journal for Mark and the Marked (Box Clever Theatre, 2022). Day 7 footage observation.

Not long after Mark and the Marked opened, I heard others’ observations on my directorial style, and the atmosphere of my rehearsal room, from two different post-show debrief sessions. I paraphrased them in my journal:
 
Michael Wicherek, Artistic Director of Box Clever described mine as ‘a calm rehearsal room; safe and warm’ 

(Journal- 7th March 2022)

Joanne Blunt, producer at Nottingham Playhouse, told me that the stage manager I worked with on Little Red Riding Hood (Middleton, 2021) called me and my process ‘unbelievably patient and calm’

(Journal, 8th March 2022)

Is that how I see myself, I wondered? These comments surprised me, so perhaps not, and my first impulse was to feel defensive, or disappointed. Am I not edgy, risky, or any of the other adjectives often used to describe exciting physical performance processes? Calm, warm, patient and safe feel like feminine, mothering words, on which I automatically placed a lower value when I heard them. I suspect this judgemental, patriarchal thinking creeps in whenever I think about myself as a director, despite my deeply held feminist values. I’ve always sold my work as playful anarchy, and I’m fairly sure that in my best and most personal work, that is what the audience see onstage, but perhaps the process I use to get there isn’t what I think it is. 
 
A core part of clown master Philippe Gaulier’s approach is the Boss Clown model of working, where the teacher or director brutally insults the efforts of performers when they fall short of his personal tastes and standards. Many claim that it’s meant playfully, and that Gaulier and those who teach his method are in role, in their clown persona, but it can also be seen as pretty abusive, particularly for those who experience any form of institutional or social prejudice (Amsden, 2016). Gaulier talks about forcing students to make work in desperation, saying that when they’re feeling ‘I am a shit, I don’t know what to do’ they will discover something (Hendricksen, no date). The theory being that uncertainty and self-doubt, by breaking the performer down, lead to greater risk and inventiveness. But do they? 

In a researcher training session with Sophy Smith (2022) that I attended at DMU, we talked about Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs (Mcleod, 2007), apropos a fellow doctoral student taking a full month off after their probation review and doing lots of cooking. Creative endeavour is in the very top ‘self-actualisation’ step of the pyramid (R), suggesting that in the view of this school of psychology, we can’t really be creative unless our other needs are met. 

Figure 1: Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs Pyramid

If that’s the case for actors, clowns and other performers, why do we buy into the notion that we have to suffer for art? We may be good at making work in desperation, but in doing so, are we actually trying to meet one of the lower needs; belonging, or esteem?
Reflecting on my process in directing Mark and the Marked, I noticed how much time I gave to bonding with the cast, and having them bond with each other. In particular, I noticed how they immediately rekindled a feeling of gentleness and playfulness with each other after working on more emotionally challenging sections of the piece. I noticed them wipe paint off each others’ faces, rather than their own. I noticed that Joel made a silly fart noise as soon as we ended a scene with him in tears, to make us all laugh. In my journal, I likened this observation to doubles tennis players touching hands between every point, reaffirming the connection and unity between them. ​

Joel Nash and Lucy Wordsworth in Mark and the Marked (2022). Photo by Pip Thurlow

I also noted how I’d seen myself each day, the roles I had assumed, and I was surprised how often I self-identified as clown. I’ve always liked building in-jokes with casts; nicknames, running gags, silly names for sections of material, all of which happened in this process. I have tended to think of it as, at best, a guilty pleasure that had no relevance to the making of the art, and at worst something I was doing from a need to be liked. However, I have been directing for many years now, my working process feels fairly secure and produces consistent results, so perhaps there is value in my gag-making. Performing is a frightening thing to do, and I suspect that anyone who doesn’t feel that is either not taking enough risks, not making themselves vulnerable enough, or is feeling confidence at the expense of others. In order for a company to play together, and feel safe enough to be vulnerable onstage, they need to feel bonded and trust each other. Perhaps what I’m attempting to do through humour is to fast-track complicite. 
 
Once a company start making their own in-jokes, I know they’re ready to go on tour together. The in-joke that this company took with them was that they were a clutch of little fluffy chicks, hatching from their eggs; a reference to Joel’s fuzzy shaven head, Lucy’s love of eggs preventing her from embracing veganism, and Zaki’s youth; and that I was their mother hen. Again, a maternal metaphor. Renowned fooling teacher Franki Anderson describes her infant son’s wide-eyed take on the world as the starting point for her journey into fooling (In Conversation with Franki Anderson and Holly Stoppit [YouTube], 2021). Hers is the lineage of clown practice that I’ve encountered most, particularly through John Wright who trained with her, and feel happiest following. In the same conversation Anderson, De Castro and Holly Stoppit all talk about the clown/fool space as somewhere nurturing; warm, safe, and held. So perhaps rather than attempting to unpick and detoxify the role of Boss Clown, there’s an alternative identity that I can start to identify with; that of Mama Clown.

Bibliography
 
Amsden, L. (2016) ‘When they laugh your clown is coming: Learning to be ridiculous in the pedagogy of Philippe Gaulier’s pedagogy of spectatorship’, Dance, Theatre and Performance Training, 7(1), pp. 4–16.

Box Clever Theatre (2022) Mark and the Marked | Box Clever Theatre. Available at: https://www.boxclevertheatre.co.uk/mark-and-the-marked/ (Accessed: 10 March 2022).

Hendricksen, C. (no date) ‘Part 3: No Pleasure? You Are Boring’. Available at: https://shows.acast.com/an-interview-with-philippe-gaulier/episodes/part-3-no-pleasure-you-are-boring (Accessed: 24 March 2022).

In Conversation with Franki Anderson and Holly Stoppit [YouTube] (2021). (The Why Not Institute Presents). Available at: https://youtu.be/s7DAGDG65pE.

Mcleod, S. (2007) ‘[Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs]’. Available at: https://www.simplypsychology.org/maslow.html (Accessed: 24 March 2022).

Middleton, S. (2021) ‘Little Red Riding Hood’. Nottingham Playhouse.

Smith, S. (2022) ‘Practice-Based Research: Lego Serious Play’. De Montfort University, 9 March.
 
​
Figure 1: Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs pyramid from: 
Mcleod, S. (2007) ‘[Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs]’. Available at: https://www.simplypsychology.org/maslow.html (Accessed: 24 March 2022).