著者

關 智子

出版者

日本演劇学会

雑誌

演劇学論集 日本演劇学会紀要 (ISSN:13482815)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.66, pp.25-44, 2018-06-30 (Released:2018-06-30)

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In this paper, the possible authority of a text for its performance is discussed through an analysis of Nassim Soleimanpour's White Rabbit, Red Rabbit (2010). Soleimanpour included rigid instructions requiring actors to not know anything about the play before each performance and for the text to be given to them on stage. In such conditions, the play becomes a semi-improvisation; thus, the dramaturgy of the text appears to dominate the performance. Indeed, the text orders the actor and audiences to perform exactly as it instructs, so it even claims its authority. However, the writer intentionally leaves a lot of space for ‘play’, since he cannot become involved with the participants (actors and audience) in the text. This reminds the audience of the fact that it is not the author who creates a performance but themselves. In other words, it problematises authority and authorship in the theatre. Therefore, the dramaturgy of White Rabbit, Red Rabbit attempts to foreground the authority of the text and construct new relationships between text and performance and writer and participants. Through the study of this play, we can perceive new possibilities of textual dramaturgy for contemporary theatre in which the relationship between text and performance diversifies.

著者

關 智子

出版者

日本演劇学会

雑誌

演劇学論集 日本演劇学会紀要 (ISSN:13482815)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.57, pp.39-53, 2013 (Released:2017-01-06)

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Martin CRIMP's Attempts on Her Life (1996) abounds with experimentation that violates the conventional rules of modern dramas. In this paper, I analyse Attempts, focusing on the structure. The play consists of 17 fragmentary scenarios dealing with the concept of character, which is represented by ‘Anne’, who never appears. The purpose in this paper is to shed some light on the peculiarity of this play.All 17 scenarios have the same form, where only the speakers talk about Anne. The content of the scenarios is discontinuous and inconsistent. Moreover, Anne is depicted quite differently by each of the speakers. The consistency of the form emphasises the arbitrariness of the content. This arbitrariness stimulates the imagination of both readers and audiences, and even urges them to imagine another Anne not depicted in the play.This mechanism of stimulation is particularly clear in the first scenario, ‘All Messages Deleted’. In this scenario, the messages on an answering machine are deleted after a pause. Although CRIMP never says how and by whom the messages are deleted, the pause urges readers and audiences to surmise it is Anne who deletes the messages. The mechanism of stimulation in Attempts always encourages readers and audiences to create Anne using their imagination, even though Anne never appears as a physical character in the play.Thus, based on the above, one of the peculiarities of Attempts is this mechanism of stimulation that encourages the creativity and imagination of readers and audiences.