Revival: Meetings For Theatre

Up to this point we have been dealing with the external, visible, physical process of communion . . . [b]ut there is another, important aspect which is inner, invisible and spiritual. My difficulty here is I have to talk to you about something I feel but do not know. It is something I have experienced and yet I cannot theorize about it. I have no ready-made phrases for something I can explain only by a hint, and by trying to make you feel, for yourselves, [these] sensations . . . . What name can we give to these invisible currents, which we use to communicate to one another? Some day this phenomenon will be the subject of scientific research. Meantime let us call them rays. Now let us see what we can find out about them through study and making notes of our own sensations.

Constantine Stanislavsky
An Actor Prepares, pp. 199-201

From the Revival Invitation:

For a long time, I have suspected a connection between my experience as a Quaker in worship and as an actor rehearsing and performing. I have written about this connection in an article for last December’s issue of Friends Journal and in a book I have written to be published next year by Allworth Press. I have explored it in workshops I have offered to several Quaker meetings wishing to explore vocal ministry (what happens when a person speaks at a Quaker meeting for worship). But now I feel led to explore this divine/creative connection in a theatrical context with theatre people. And so I invite you to participate in “Revival”: group research exploring theatre creativity using Quaker process as a foundation, gathered initially around the work of the actor. There will be no charge for your participation since you will be, in essence, a co-creator. At the outset, we will invite participants to use scenes from Edward Kemp’s translation of Lessing’s Nathan The Wise, but also leave room for improvisational participation. Later, we hope to be able to expand our focus, and perhaps use our evolving process to create new work.

One of the basic ideas in Quaker worship is that the impulse to rise and speak is divine, and it is felt. I believe that this “divine nudge”, this “inner movement”, is also present in moments of good acting. Quakers believe that God speaks to us through each other. I believe this is true in a variety of situations, Quaker worship being one possible venue, the theatre being another. I am seeking a way to test these ideas theatrically in a more spiritual context than the conventional classroom.

I am calling our gatherings “meetings for theatre” in the same way Quakers use the term “meetings for business”, which are meetings for worship during which the business of the meeting is conducted. In our case, we will have meetings for worship in which theatre is created. The basic format will begin with Quaker worship. Out of that worship, a participant may feel moved to create theatrically: perhaps using language memorized from Nathan The Wise, perhaps using the ideas and images from Nathan as inspiration for something improvised, perhaps offering something unrelated to Nathan. Even though some will have memorized roles from scenes from Nathan, we will ask all participants to come neither determined to offer work, nor to remain silent, but to be open to God’s prompting. This is consistent with the approach to Quaker worship. How the work unfolds from such beginnings, how we return to worship, and what kind of creative ministry may emerge is all part of our exploration together. The worship session - and the work which may be offered from it - will end, there will be a short break, and we will reconvene for “worship sharing”, focusing on what has transpired at that meeting.

I have no idea what this workshop will create, or where it will take us. I suspect we will learn something valuable, but I offer no guarantees. I only offer questions, and Rilke’s suggestion that we live in them:

• do the forms of Quaker worship and discernment lend themselves to theatrical creativity?
• can Quakerism offer a way for theatre artists to grow both as artists and as spiritual beings?
• can these two journeys – artistic and spiritual – stimulate and enrich each other?
• can we invite God into our art using Quaker worship as a form, and will a divine presence make itself felt to us and influence our choices?
• how might our discoveries be applied in a classroom within a more conventional curriculum? how might they be offered to existing producing theatres?
• how might we adapt this work to offer it to artists of other genres?

I believe that the act of artistic creation is divine in nature, and that the most meaningful theatrical events, for the practitioner and the witness, both comic and dramatic, are transmitted and received as spiritual events. This is not a new idea. Some of our greatest theatre thinkers – Stanislavsky and Grotowski to name only two – were deeply interested in the artistic/spiritual connection. Peter Brook explores this connection in the chapter called “The Holy Theatre” in his great book The Empty Space.

I think we as theatre artists have been orphaned from our spiritual lineage. I believe we want to act as spiritual agents in the world, but have lost the language and the means to do so, in part because fundamentalists have hijacked spiritual language, and made some of us afraid to use it for fear of being labeled zealots. I propose that thinking about “God” and inviting overt spiritual investigation into one’s artistic process need not threaten anyone, and may lead us back to the essential and vital energy we crave. Obviously, this is not a workshop for atheists. But one of the wonderful things about Quakerism is its universalism: you need not be a Quaker to worship with us; you need not even be a Quaker to bring divine ministry into the world. Anyone, from any faith tradition, theistic or non-theistic, or with no defined faith tradition at all but at least a willingness to do some spiritual seeking, may join us.

From the Revival Prep Doc:

Revival Foundation (common Quaker words or phrases are in italics)

Here’s the basic idea in a nutshell: no one offers anything unless moved by the Spirit to offer it.

The Quaker proposition is that God can be felt through deep listening. And we do mean felt. Look for physical, visceral sensations arising out of the stillness which propel you to action. Our experience has shown us that this kind of listening can be enhanced when we gather to listen, or worship, as a community.

How do you know it is the Spirit moving you into action, and not, say, that cup of coffee you had just before arriving? Initially, if you’re not a seasoned Friend, you don’t. This is why the emphasis is on waiting. Sit it out until you absolutely can’t. This deep listening for, or waiting on the Spirit is called discernment. The seasoned Friend is looking for an impulse which is connected, somehow, to the group. The seasoned friend is looking to discern ministry arising out of the noise or quiet of his/her mind.

Ministry tends to lead us to action. So we are seeking to be led. We come to meeting for theatre neither determined to offer something, nor determined not to. This is one of the first relationships I discovered between ideal Quaker experience and ideal actor experience: in both we are completely present.

Let our ministry during meeting for theatre, and our conversation afterward, be guided principally by these Quaker testimonies:

• Simplicity. Strive for simple gesture and speech. Let your offering be no more than what is necessary, and no less than what is sufficient.

• Integrity. Seek wholeness in your offering and your responses. Be loving, sincere and truthful.

• Community. Rejoice in our being together. Seek first to support the other.

Friends believe in continuing revelation, which is the idea that the Divine is unfolding before our eyes every moment of every day. This idea has deep implications with the way we work with texts, which we believe cannot be fully appreciated unless interpreted through our contemporary experience. Friends also believe that there is that of God in each of us. Holding on to these two ideas, let us look for the Divine aspect in each of us to see what is revealed through it.

In Quaker worship, structured experience can be seen on a continuum. On the unstructured end, there is meeting for worship, which is, theoretically, completely free and open to the promptings of the Spirit. On the structured end, there is meeting for business, which begins in worship, but which has a fairly conventional agenda and which proceeds in most cases the way a group gathered to make administrative decisions would, except there is no voting. Meeting for theatre is attempting to place itself in the middle of these two experiences in terms of structure. Stefan pointed out that meeting for business is properly called “meeting for worship for business” and so too for us, we are actually holding meetings for worship for theatre.

A description of a Meeting for Theatre:

A group of people sit in stillness in a circle. They are worshipping in the manner of Friends, seeking a calm and centered state of mind from which to discern the voice or nudge of God. The quiet has substance and potential; it is like a bright bell before ringing. Worshippers move in their seats, lean forward to hold their face in their hands, stretch ever so lightly, take furtive glances around the room, stare in to space with inscrutable concentration, sit with eyes closed, at peace. In the context of meeting for theatre, each of these states attains significance, as if each worshipper is performing their own worship in absolute unselfconsciousness.

A person speaks, seated. He uses some text from the play we have selected as our vehicle. He then moves to his own words, gently urging us not to wait in the desert.

Time passes.

A woman stands and moves into the center of the circle. She seems to be dancing, slowly. She speaks softly, and claims us all as her children. She reaches out. A collective, palpitating expectation sweeps over us, like the moment before a great sneeze. Another woman stands and comes to her. They embrace and dance slowly. We release into them. Then they lock eyes. I feel a jolt of electricity shoot up my spine. I want to avert my gaze, so private, so intimate is their gaze. But I am called to witness. Then they sit, these two women who have known each other for just three days.

Time passes. I notice a friend crying, quietly, in her seat. Our eyes meet. She looks away.

A woman speaks about seeking an ancient energy, an ancient archetype she feels she needs and can’t find – the Crone.

Time passes. We’ve been at worship for about 40 minutes. The unselfconscious group performance of quiet worshipping is at it’s peak now: great longing stares into the infinite, heads buried in hands, frozen gestures caught in the moment just before acting, glances of longing and curiosity from friend to friend.

A man rises and does a slow dance, gently tapping his chest. In a startling example of prophetic ministry, he says “You are not the Crone,” answering the ministry that had come before. “You are the Mother. The Crone speaks through me, and she says: when you are ready for her, she will come for you”. He dances some more, before sitting. The friend who had spoke of the Crone before weeps quietly.

Time passes.

Feeling our worship has run its course, I reach for the person next to me. We shake hands, as do the others, and meeting for theatre takes a break. Friends stand, stretch, go to the bathroom, huddle together in quiet counsel, hugging, holding hands.

We return for the worship sharing portion of the meeting. After some quiet worship, we begin a discussion of sorts about what we have just witnessed and experienced, mindful that we are still a part of a holy assembly, avoiding argumentative or impulsive responses and judgments.

The discussion is rich. Many who are there testify to the hunger they have felt for a way to explore the connection they believe in, between the divine and the creative. Some are moved to speak about how the experience has opened them up as Quakers, and perhaps helped them understand themselves as Quaker ministers, perhaps given them a confidence they have lacked before. Some ask general questions of the group: how did it feel when this happened, when you heard that? Others sit quietly, listening, watching, soaking it all up.

I find myself caught in the struggle of being both a participant and an observer, self-consciously scratching notes into my notebook during both the worship and the worship sharing. But I am also filled with the sense that there is something exciting happening here, something needed. I wouldn’t call it a certainty, I still feel very much like the Argonauts: sailing into the unknown. But like them, I feel great happiness at the group gathered around me, and a queer faith in the Great Hand that guides us.