bubble and squeak

from an in-house presentation of the developing DasShoku Hora by Yumi Umimare. This is a scene that was cut from the finished product of Hora - we all... (Yumi Ben and I), loved Algernon, but alas... he just didn't seem to fit the Eastern schemata. Perhaps he will have some further incarnation in the Stories 101 project.

deborah leiser-moore_direction, matt crosby_performance/text, steve adam_soundscape, naree vachananda_choreography, producer_rosemary hinde. Full Tilt at the Victorian Arts Centre, 2006. The objective of a development process is to try out material for performance; the development for Toto was done in the large studio at Opera Australia's #2 rehearsal studio. It was always the intention to configure the performance in a U-shape of rostra which enclosed the audience. In the video, you are watching a live showing, like a public rehearsal: not a performance - so there is no set, lights, minimal costume and moments where nobody quite knows what will happen next. In each corner of the room, soundscape designer Steve Adam positioned 4 speakers high on stands + sub-woof and did live processing from samples of Crosby's text captured in a bug microphone. During the process, crosby commenced with his own text - each day, new text, new work, new cuts, and new ideas. The day would start with at least an hour if not two of discussion. Very early on, given the performance was in part, about lying, the team needed to establish the soundscape of 'truth'. Given much of Steve's soundscape subverted the truth, silence seemed the best option, so Toto's onnagata (Japanese female impersonation) dance was performed without accompaniment. However, in the onnagata dance scene, sounds of a recent melbourne electrical storm have been added. In this video, crosby performs to an invited audience of about 50 people. The response to this showing was enthusiastic and the Toto team plan a full performance in 2010. ________________________________________________________

director: ong keng sen/ composer: jonathan mills/ set design: justin hill/ light design video artist: margie medlin/ collaborators/performers: matt crosby, tim harvey, lok meng chue, gojo masanosuke, rizman putra, kota yamazaki/ producer: tay tong/ consultant/initial researcher: lou weis/ collaborating video artist: choy ka fai/ associate director: lok meng chue/ soundscape design: steve adam & jonathan mills/ narrative ong keng sen/ choreography/text: matt crosby, tim harvey, lok meng chue, gojo masanosuke, rizman putra, kota yamazaki/ body installations: rizman putra/ cameras: choy ka fai & margie medlin ___________________________________________ sandakan threnody was a multi-layered performance directed by ong keng sen with music composed by jonathan mills about the forced march of prisoners of war from sandakan on the north-eastern tip to ranau on the north-western tip of sabah, and included an extended rehearsal and development period and three seasons in different cities. The experience creating the work as 'co-collaborators' (keng sen's term) was enlivening as keng sen encouraged all the performers to create their own performance vocabulary - for me this meant writing the text; for others, assembling choreography. As part of the research we travelled to Sabah and re-traced the steps of the march taken by the prisoners of war and the japanese soldiers. when i say re-traced - they walked it, we travelled by charter-bus and stayed in hotels; they starved, we had beautiful seafood meals in riverside restaurants. nevertheless, we spoke to local people - grandfathers with their whole extended family out on the verandah, relating their memory of the march going through 'just out back here'. arriving at the end point of the journey in ranau confronted me with some forgotton truths. we saw the place where dreadful attrocities were committed and read first-hand accounts. personally, i found it a powerful performance-making method similar to what i imagine stanislavski describes, in as much as one could accrue a detailed character history. the performance seemed to collide documentary account with artistic extrapolation. for example singapore actress lok meng chue read transcripts from the australian war-crime tribunals and japanese kabuki onnnagata, gojo masanosuke danced to jonathan mills threnody - (a greek term meaning 'public grieving'; or i performed the role of bill moxham who survived the ordeal while rizeman putra, interpreted... (hard to nail it to words), but the memory of those lost, or perhaps he gave voice to local people so often forgotton in historical accounts of the event. opportunities such as these are rare for performers - working for an extended period on research, meeting with fine artists from other cultures, what a set! (thanks justin), performing at three different festivals. i've posted three videos here, with permission from theatreworks singapore - ones that relate specifically to my contribution not because i think they were the most noteworthy but because... well, because i'm no longer in touch with the other performers. the videos give some idea of the scale of the production, the themes and some of the unique interactions that were produced by the artists.

matt crosby (left) and ben rogan. This was an in-house presentation of a development process at Dante's cafe in 2004. Such fond memories performing Hora... Yumi Ben and I first performed the first in the DasShoku series in the 1999 Melbourne Fringe Festival... and did many tours around to festivals or just seasons... the last version was in the studio at the Sydney Opera House... grand surrounds from such a humble beginning. Many people commented on the synergy between we performers, and the fact Ben and I seemed to fall into portraying twins fits our telepathic relation on-stage. ________________________________________________________