Theatre and Football

Saturday afternoon, at Franca's house with my fellow theatre companion nicolas and matias, watching the football match of Barcelona and Manchester United, we started joking about relations between football and theatre, such as the referee being the backstage, and the players are actually 2 different acting groups "improvising" a play to see who is the best and such. But i took this idea beyond laughter and started asking myself: Is this relation really possible?
It actually is possible. Let me explain how.

Football players have a special talent, they are good at what they do, and so are actors. People pay money to go see this talent these people have, and these people do their best on the "stage" or "field".
There are also certain rules to the "game", but inside these rules, the actors and players are free to do whatever they please to entertain their audience, and/or to win the game.

There are certain people in stage called the backstage and certain people in the field called the referee. Although they both play different roles, they are both there to help the actors and players, but do not directly interfere with the game.

Scenery is easy to compare, it would simple be the field, and props... well the football, the shoes, the goalkeeper's gloves, etc. And each "group" has a manager/director who trains the group to be better and is there to see the play/game.

But after all these comparisons, i started thinking of the people that go to see, and the money that this means. Governments actually make football stadiums because people pay money to go see the games. The football players are just "puppets" for the government in some way, and it all narrows down to the ambition for money, or is the purpose really because of the passion of the game? Or is that passion only for people who enjoy the game, but just means money for governments?

After asking myself these questions, I then moved to theatre, and thought the same:
Although actors do have a great passion for their profession, are they ultimately mere government puppets? But after all, theatre is different. The money does not go to the government, it actually do go to the director and actors. There i found the difference between football and acting. While football is greatly connected to the government, theatre is not. But what if it was? would freedom of speech and critique still be permitted in plays? Would there be many rules and laws enforced into theatre? How would theatre be if it was connected to the ambition of the government for money, like football?

Personal freedom

On friday, Pilar came to share some of her knowledge and teaching with us, to try to improve our technique in voice. Maybe this work for many people and most probably a really good way to see the voice, but it  doesn't work that way for me.  I really didn't find it of much help, as i dislike treating my voice like she told me to. I'm not saying that she doesn't know what she is doing and what to teach, oh no, she is a very professional actress and i bet a whole lot she knows much more than us. I simply don't like to work my voice as she does, i don't like being told how to talk, i don't like being told how to treat my voice, and specially i hate feeling like i am talking wrong. That she is right and i'm wrong.

I see it differently, voice is something you grow up with, each person develops a completely different ways of talking, some more unusual than others, but this ways of taling that we have been practicing for more than 1 decade and a half and i am pretty sure we know how it works.

Each one of us has got different talents with out voices, if we all had been doing the same, then our voices would be more similar, and there wouldn't be much uniqueness from each voice. Everyone has a different and special voice, or talent. Everyone has a different talent. And it is up to each of us to use it. I am really against the idea of being told how to use my unique talent, it just takes away the whole point of unique doesn't it?

I don't mean to be rude, but i just can't stand being told how to do things that are unique to me. Society has already enforced too many rules upon us. Where we work, where we live, where we learn, where we drive, where we buy, everywhere has it's rules. I can live with those, i know rules are a necessary measurement by governments to produce an organized and predictable environment.

As for my mind, my thoughts and other things that i can keep unique and different from everyone else, i can keep to myself, with my own rules. It gives a small portion of freedom in me to think that human's are special and we are a UNIQUE kind of intelligent form, or at least for an atheist like me, that is my way of going against life, knowing that i still have control, and my own rules to certain things.

When i was told in the class how i should move, how i should see, how i should breathe, talk, what i was meant to feel, it felt like i was being dragged away from this little piece of freedom i had left. I was being taught to be the same as my friends, i was being forced to learn and set the rules as she wanted them to be. I had to stand for it, as i couldn't say nothing in class, but i wasn't very motivated to working.

If we are all meant to learn the same things, to think the same, learn the same way, then what is the point? Where is the interesting part of being a human left when you are forced to be like everyone else?
Why are we told about our false freedom? Freedom which works as a barrier, leaving everyone behind it, and being the same? What kind of freedom is that where we are all the same? We got personal freedom, which we can't be taken away from, and that is our mind. Our thoughts and opinions make us different and give us some freedom. If i am taught how to think, how to feel, how to talk, how to use my voice, that little freedom i got left, all i got left, i being equalized with others, making it no longer freedom, but sameness, such as a rule, which applies the same for everyone.

Today while helping in scenery for miyuki y los tres demonios, y found that there is almost as much space behind the cyclorama as in front, and an idea went through my head: What if we could get a large amount of kokens and put them behind the cyclorama, and then when a big scene change happens they could all move the items at the same time, kokens in front to the back and kokens in the back to the front, and this could act as a mawari butai, without the actual revolving, but looks like revolving, but then i realised we dont't have enough kokens to do it, but still i kept wondering to myself about this idea, and i still can't figure something out. What if instead of doing exactly what kabuki tells us, we do something completely different but it still looks exactly like kabuki... does it count as kabuki? or is it a failed attempt? after all you have you use your resources.

Pedro de valdivia

This play can be considered a musical and a comedy and cultural. It acts the history and life of Pedro de Valdivia, one of the men who came to America at the time when it was recently discovered and being attacked and governed by the spanish.

Actors were only 3, but characters were many. One of them, did the role of Pedro while the other 2 the secondary characters. And with musical transitions that were played by themselves on stage, they got to change setting, characters and scenes dynamically. That is another aspect of the play that is good to notice: The actors played all the music and SFX in the play, no background music.

Although some props were there, such as the mini pedro puppet, the map on the table and some other things, mostly props were invisible and exaggerated  to make it funny, for example, the horse.

Accent was used well, they did the chilean accent really convincible and using some parts of the accent that were most known, to make it easy to identify it and to make it funny.

I think actions and were fixed. They were done exact. I mean that there was no room for improvisation, because it was all marked and it couldn't be rearrenged imrovisingly. For example when they were palying music you couldn't leave one behind, or when Pedro was taling and the other 2 actors were using the puppet the actions must be at the same time, and that requires coordination, and practice i guess.

I dont know if actors playing the music is better than music in the background, yes, it is more entertaining the see them play, but shouldn't actors concentrate on acting instead of playing instruments? Or does that count as acting too?