The world our piece exists in literally is the white box. The show does not

replicate or recreate an external depiction. Its singularity of space and multiplicity

of association allows an audience to be aware of their surroundings while making

them their own. Which is pivotal to the piece. The same goes for the performers.

Because the company generated all of the set, props, and costumes, we emotionally

associate differently, but still acknowledge that the things we are interacting with

and existing in are what they literally are. That's cool. Because in acknowledging the

absolute title of something, we are containing it to a very specific type of being.

 

The core of our show, "Is This Wonder? (or just a guilt trip)?" is "what does it

mean to be masculine and sad"? This idea explores concepts of empathy and masculinity.

Not exclusively as a male experience, but instead as a physical manifestation and

imposition of masculinity upon external bodies. The core also exposes empathy in its

most basic state. An act of allowed duration, empathy is a tool used for and against

masculine oppressiveness. With a focus on the physical body, we use this core to explore

the hypocrisy of empathy and how popular culture cultivates a wide, but problematic

space for allowance. By putting (traditionally) male and female bodies in physical

conversation, the cast exposes an innate relation to, each other that exceed and succumb

to gendered and sexualized containment. Containment that manifests in a physical

dominance or submission.

By imposing masculine empathy upon external bodies, individuals are forced to

find their "truest selves" in the oppressive guise of a masculine context. This attempt at

finding one's "truest self" is a cornerstone of the performance. And to assist in

articulating the specifics of our exploration we have been using text from Ibsen's Peer

Gynt, Anonymous' Diary of an Oxygen Thief and songs by the 'The Killers'. Through the

performances of these texts, the cast is able to physically showcase imposed masculinity.

Using them as an articulator of physical motion, movement and repression. These texts

allow the performers to make sense of the internalized oppression within them. By

putting physical expression in relation to historically contextual sources we can expose

how masculine empathy impacts a body's ability to reveal its "truest self".

 

As well as textual sources, we use stylized and mundane lighting to reform these

physical bodies. With empathy in mind, light has the ability to reconstruct a physical

form into basic shapes and structures. This use of light articulates empathetic hypocrisy

by generalizing bodies in a way that questions our duration and reasoning for

autobiographical allowance. By reshaping the bodies of (traditionally) female and

(traditionally) male performers, an audience is open to question the imposed limits of

their empathetic duration towards gendered bodies.

We also explore this hypocrisy of masculine empathy through costume. Using

costumes as way to uniformly contain the entire ensemble, an audience is open to

consider both the oppressive and limitless uses of attire. How clothes pigeonhole self-

expression to a particularly masculine context. In conjunction with 'The Killers', our use

of costume will expose the band's overt use of masculine empathy. Due to the clothes'

ability to confine movement into a masculine motion, an audience will extend their

duration for empathy. And when these costumes are put upon (traditionally) female

bodies their relationship to (traditionally) masculine bodies will expose the pervasive and

sexually dominant restrictions of imposed masculinity.

The use of noise is probably the most important articulator of our piece.

Specifically amplified noise. By using amplified guitar, voice and percussion our cast

will explore the role noise has in empathy. We will use amplified noise in contention with

natural (i don't like the use of natural but i can't think of any other word) noise to explore

the necessity of emotional exposure/expression. Noise in the performance is limited to

two binaries: LOUD and quiet. Through this obvious distinction we will use

amplification to complicate emotional validation. Specifying which bodies use this

 

amplification is essential to realizing the performance's concepts, especially in relation to

popular culture, early 2000's alternative music, empathy, masculinity and masculine

sadness.

These very particular and at times abstractly used articulators will assist in the show's

complicated, complex, and controversial ideas. They will help the performers specify

their place in the piece as well as specify their individual relationships to the audience

(which is also rly important).

Through the world being so literal, the audience will also view the performers as

literal beings, objects and figures. They will contain the performers (in every way-

mainly through gender labeling) but throughout the performance we will break

those containers and skew the idea of singularity in regards to masculine and

feminine bodies. The core of the piece is "what does it mean to be masculine and

sad?” This core in relation to the world we have set up allows for these containers to

so blatantly exist. But honestly as I'm writing this I’m not really sure if this makes

any sense. I mean I'm looking back at what I wrote. And now we've done the show

twice and. Like I don't really know what to say. Yea there is this aspect of literalness

and something about "knowing" and "labeling" but also the piece kind of feels like a

big meme that went way wrong and now you have to realize the violence in

mundane things. And where that violence comes from. Does it come from the

internal pain of an individual and the platform in which they expose? Who allows for

 

certain people to expose? What are the credentials for being hurt? I suppose that

could be my new core. "What are the credentials for being hurt?". Regardless, the

world of this piece lives in immediacy and literalness, which assists in the exposure

of empathy and containers we all come into contact with. Creating a universal

language through, an obscured, literal world. The context informs the search for

people as people. People being people so as to relate to the general person. Its all

about relation and then taking that relation and misguiding it.