Expectations & Connections

I need more art

I went to a play this past weekend. I’m not sure play is the appropriate word, it was a performance made up of words and movements, costumes and sets, planning and staging all to evoke feelings and reactions from the audience. The show was well made and performed. The artists did what they did with a high amount of skill. I did have reactions. I didn’t feel any big swell of emotions or come away with any big questions. There was enough quiet slowness in the first two thirds of the performance that I had a lot of time to notice and think. I noticed I was struggling to connect with what I think of as the physical vocabulary of the piece. In my experience, quality physical theater typically is built with a language that the audience doesn’t need to be fluent in but can settle into early in a show. It can be a bit like see a production of one of Shakespeare’s plays and the time it sometimes takes to stop trying to listen to the dialogue with modern ears and allow the musicality of early modern English.

The thought I noticed myself having early in this performance was “why am I thinking so much?” As an audience member, I am linear and simple. I like a story with a beginning, middle, and end. I like knowing who each performing is playing and what their character wants. OR I like a show to be silly and chaotic while operating within its own rules. OR I want a show to be deeply focused on creating moments of connection with and between the audience. I guess what I’m revealing in this running OR game is that I like a lot of different kinds of shows. And I didn’t not like this show I just struggled to connect with it. So much so that I started picturing what I wish would be happening while I was watching. I wanted the character that appeared to be experiencing the most emotions to stand center stage, make eye contact with an audience member and slowly repeat the phrase “you aren’t failing.” I wanted this to happen until both the performer and audience member was crying. I wanted this to happen until I was crying. I wanted this to keep happening until the entire audience was crying. I think I wanted to cry.

It’s an odd thing how much an audience member can bring in the way of expectations. In fact, I think most of us bring a ton of expectations to various interactions throughout each day. I’d love to better understand the role this plays in regular disappointments I experience. Was my experience underwhelming or I did I forget to check and see what assumptions I made about what was going to happen with no actual knowledge? When I know I’m going to see physical theater I consistently want it to be surprisingly funny or surprisingly moving. That is not at all the same thing as sitting down and being open to whatever it is these arts what to communicate with their work.

What I want more than anything when I leave my house these days is connection. If I’m meeting with a client, having coffee with a friend or a new contact, having a meeting to work on a theater project or colluding with comrades to thinking about how we can work towards the world as we think it should be what I mostly hope for is that there will be one or several moments of connection. When I read books or read people’s posts online what I’m hoping for is that I’ll connect with what they share. And I think live performance is a remarkable tool for connection. The audience can shift from a group of individuals to a connected entity that is having a shared experience. Performers can shift from artists on a stage to open hearted people letting us hook into a part of themselves they might struggle to share in a day-to-day interactions. If you haven’t been to live theater in a while and are feeling some isolation or loneliness, I have a suggestion for you that I strongly believe will make you feel less separate in the world. Go see a show. And try not to bring in too many of your own expectations about what will happen or what will happen. Try to just let it unfold in front of you and be present.