Trannyshack Finale

Notes from the last ever Trannyshack at the Stud. Tuesday, August 12, 2008, midnight.

Trannyshack was a weekly drag show at the Stud Bar hosted by Heklina. Trannyshack is a brand. Trannyshack is a legend, an icon of trash drag performance art club ritual. Trannyshack is a postmodern feminist queer movement of disobedient gender tricksters, art dissidents, and addicts of all kinds. Trannyshack is fucked up, fabulously.

Heklina - Pat Benatar - “We are young We are strong” - 3 hookers defend themselves against a slimy pimp. She says, “That was my first Trannyshack number. It was Retro then! Layers of respectful homage, camp trash, and wannabe appropriation collide when street hooker simulacra takes the Tshack stage.

Juanita More! in black/brown face as Eryka Badu singing “Tyrone” - small joint, super fat joint (cigar size), massive joint... all toked and then passed thru audience in participatory ritual, spreading saliva and ganga through mutual contact, filling the room with smoke. Trash ritual at its best. Break the law, turn on, rock out.

Falsetta Knockers in medley of Donna Summmers’ Love to love ya baby - smoking a cigarette like half the rebel queens that night - a club kid nightmare, with wig that shifted styles with each quarter turn pulling us thru the decades 70 80 90 00’s of a spiraling drug-induced stupidity resulting in madness and a conceptual endurance performance that broke all the drag rules. Yes.

Nikki Star taking us to church in a pop gospel (my joy? it’s from jesus!). Parting the densely packed, nearly immobile crowd, like the Red Sea and dancing dancing as we clapped and clapped and got higher and higher. Only at Tshack could this number be performed almost without irony, definitely without any winks. A veteran black queen, Heklina’s drag mother, Nikki in her Sunday best working the crowd for Jesus. Well!

Putanesca!

Suppositori Spelling - what was the song - excellent synching and fabulously dynamic energy - huge femmed Mohawk, classic Spaz costume of bra, panties and accessories, two well timed stage dives each time returning to the stage on cue. (photo #1 by Don Shewey)

Too much Jordan, Kennedy and mediocre numbers that were numbing to those of us standing packed together for over 4 hours. Especially with some of those too cold gay boys who don’t want to acknowledge (or relax into) touch despite the fact that there was no choice but to touch. What a waste of potential pleasure and friendship.

Lot’s of cigarettes on stage. The last taboo. A final remnant of the illegal dangerous incorrect and transgressive roots of T’shack.

So many memories of all the drugs (and sex) of the early days

No direct mention of HIV and the role that AIDS has had in their personal and collective life

Glamamore not doing the tragic act that I adore. Instead doing a Judy/Barbara duo with Mercy Fuck. And then doing 2 songs - which like most of the queens in that never ending epic night they just had to perform more than necessary. The whole event was more than necessary. The club has been ‘ending’ all year. It’s all about excess and decadence and too much (remember Joe Goode’s 29 effeminate gestures which locate Gay in the Too Much).

Rimming straight boy James!! (Photo #2 by Don Shewey)

Followed by Jim Jones doing David Bowie “And we’re gonna have a party” while camo’d queens (one faux) with plastic machine guns handed out coolaid cups to all of the evening’s performers and assistants ending with a massive body pile on stage. I cried.

Unfortunately they didn’t indulge in the maudlin as much as I'd like. (All night long, whenever the mood approached ‘emotional’ it would be corrected with snappy retorts or distractions - which seemed very apropos of the pomo drag culture - fake and real, sincere and camp sincere in a dizzying fusion). But I couldn't watch when they all jumped up for Donna Summer’s Last Dance... at least half of them knowing the lyrics and ‘singing’ along.

Proclamation from city honoring Tshack’s fusion of punk and drag. (OK that's brilliant and righteous but the deliverer of that proclamation, B. Dufty is no gay hero of mine. He was originally an appointee of that ultra rich brat Newsom and both of them are basically republicans in terms of class politics. It really sucks that two progressives ran against Dufty at the same time. Get it together fools. That tactic was doomed to fail and we got another term for a nice gay man who consistently votes against the progressive interests of the majority of District 8.)

Electro as a bare-chested (boob taped) satyr with hind legs puppet manipulated for leaping and flying scenes - lipsynching Sesame St I think... rainbows, the lover the dreamer and I?? Is it obvious that I am not a pop culture 80’s child? That was my punk, tribal, live music only decade.

Stats:

52 Tuesdays x 12.5 years = approx 650 shows/happenings

with approx 8 performances per night = 5200 performances

How many original numbers did Heklina do? Clearly she duplicates her faves (and not so faves) annually, but she had to have created hundreds of 3-5 minute performances, learning the lyrics to songs, plus costumes and wigs. How many pairs of shoes did she accumulate? How many wigs?

Will her archive end up at the Historical Society? Where are all the Mr. David dresses going to be exhibited?

Performing Improvisation / Improvising Performance

Why should I show video documentation of work that celebrates and investigates the ultra live here and now? I can't answer that question, but we could talk about it for a long time. Here's a link to a 10 minute performance action from this year's CI36 at Juniata College in Pennsylvania.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6386735239027920095

And then a compilation vid of moments from improv performances in 2005 & 2006.

Friederike Plafki & Maria Francesca Scaroni in Berlin

Off in the unknowns of further east Berlin I went with my buddy Jess to see student showings at the Ernst Buch school, which offers trainings towards the equivalent of a BA in theatre, dance, or puppetry. I hear they just started a Master's program as well. With all the hype and money around some of the newer dance schools here the Buch school is off the cool radar, which means it's more likely to show work whose quality of engagement and manifestation is not dependent on current trends (despite my own interest and investment in current trends...)

On July 5, 2008, I saw a showing of an ongoing research/performance by Friederike Plafki - a duet with Maria Francesca Scaroni. San Francisco viewers might know Maria from her work with Jess Curtis (Under the Radar, The Symmetry Project) and Sara Shelton Mann (Inspirare, an impressive duet with Kathleen Hermesdorf).

Here's what I saw, thought...:

Two women walk on, Maria just behind Friederike, matching her pace. Street clothes. Pants. Nothing loose. They stand side by side, just off center. Maria's finger extends, twitches. Is this intentional, as in choreographed, or is she simply releasing energy, settling in to stand?

A slow synchronized dance begins. Quiet. Adaggio. I wonder if it's a subtle improv, duet flocking in which whoever can see the other is the follower. But occasionally gestures seem too detailed and matching in their detail, even if the overall synchronization is not extremely precise.

After what seems like 2 minutes they repeat the choreography. OK it's definitely not improvised. 

They begin a 3d time. Now there's some play with timing which pulls them in and out of synch. There's no music, basic overall lighting, and minimal costume. We're watching movement and we're watching 2 dancers sensing each other, talking to each other with subtle shifts of weight and impulse.

A 4th time.

A 5th time. The subtle games continue.

Now F has travelled around M to stand on the other side. Simple quiet steps, weight shifting, they face each other. The repeating phrase is gone, or maybe it lingers as a distant reminder. The work close, in and out of each other's space. Not touching. Facings shift. Feet once planted easily step - lightly, quietly, quicker now. Occasionally the sound of foot turning is heard. Arms, hands extend towards each other. Bodies arch to avoid contact then thrust back to fill negative space. (Jess tells me later that Freiderike considers this to be Contact Improvisation. Despite the lack of touch I recognize the dialogue, the sensitive listening, responding, playing.)

The space between them grows. They continue to respond to each other's timing, spacing, energetics. Now 4 meters apart on a diagonal. Copying one then the other in the flocking score that I had anticipated earlier. Their facings shift as roles of leader and follower shift. Quicker shifts of role and facing. 

One time they miss & briefly solo. It seems as if Maria thinks that F is still following her but F looks over her shoulder to see M facing away and she continues anyway, her arms float up into the air, bend at elbows to cross in front of her face. M spirals around and quickly picks of F's movement.

In the time it took to write the last few lines, the roles changed at least 3 times.

They close the space. Now F stands directly behind M, both facing audience, downstage right.

A very subtle copying score begins. Details of fingers, shoulder weight, mini pliés that drop vertically. I can't tell at times who is following whom. Maybe the roles shift. The way they pay attention to each other and to their own bodies is captivating. Invited into the dance, I'm watching everything so closely. 

Now side by side facing us. The sensing score seems less visual, or their response to each other is no longer based on visual matching.

Touch happens. Then soft wrist or hand grabs that extend the other's arm into space away from the body. This leads (follows?) into counterbalances which leads to games or sensing exercises that maintain contact, grabbing, a communication of shared, shifting weight. They also continue to revisit copying scores, shifting (or sharing) their attention to weight to visually match the other.

Two people walk out. I see Maria see them leave. At one point, as they are low to the ground, I see M smell F's hand, not by bringing her nose forward but simply by paying attention to scent and acknowledging it. The action, like most of this dance, is subtle yet very alive.

After 5-ish minutes they face us again. A short follow-copy weight score takes them to their knees, then to their backs, then back up to stand side by side again. Their eyes are scanning us. They relax and exit.

Castorf at Berlin's Volksbuhne, July 3 2008

OK I'm starting a blog.

I could have started anywhere but I begin with notes taken during a performance by my favorite director Frank Castorf.

In the past 10 years I've seen 3 or 4 performances directed by Castorf at the Volksbuhne in Berlin. Not clear on the number because I think one of the plays that seemed to carry his signature was perhaps by someone else... it just felt related to Castorf's post-modern and pop-cultured extensions of Brecht. Castorf's work is consistently the most engaging theatre I've ever seen and I don't understand a word of German.

I saw a theatrical recreation and deconstruction of a Fassbinder film (The bitter tears of Petra von Kant), a ritual of nostalgia as contemporary performance. I was provoked, inspired, seduced, maybe even bored at times but I knew I was in the hands of a major artist and couldn't wait for more. 

My next opportunity was Castorf's Trainspotting. This was the play that convinced me that German actors have the best vocal training in Western Theatre. Maybe some classical Korean or Noh actors have their talents, but for sure there are few if any American actors who can screech and roar, bellow and grind like the actors I've seen in every Volksbuhne production. The female lead never left her bed, which meant that 2 tech guys had to wheel her on and off throughout the event. She only communicated by yelling her text, often in a broken voice that would have destroyed the vocal talents of most actors. Within minutes of her first appearance (and sounding!) I looked at my program to see if she performed this vocal circus act on consecutive nights. Yes. A virtuoso freak show of raw emotion communicated with a formal rigor that was as cool as it was stunning.

Tonight, July 3 2008, I saw Die Massnahme/Mauser based on Die Massnahme by Brecht with music by music by Hanns Eisler and Mauser by Heiner Müller. The Mauser section included choreography by Meg Stuart, an American whose company Damaged Goods has been based in Brussels and now Berlin for several years.

My notes are simply an attempt to describe what happened and what caught my attention.  If you want to read a critical slam of the work by one of the many people who think that Castorf's work is a steaming heap of clichés, go to: 

http://www.carpeberlin.com/english/web/new-single-e/article/die-massnahme-mauser/

Roughly constructed scaffold/platform extends diagonally from audience to upstage left, dramatically spanning a 3-4 meter drop into the orchestra pit, and trimmed with red plywood pieces. The upstage end slopes upwards to make a steep ramp suspended from pulleys and cables. Upstage right, seen through the 3 meter platform legs, are 20-30 cheap white plastic chairs hosting approximately 10 audience members who paid less.

Sounds begin. Horns. Because it's contemporary art in Europe I can't tell if they're tuning or if this is an intentional composition or both.

When we entered I say to my buddy Jess that we could go to ACT - San Francisco's biggest funded public theater - from now until eternity and we would never see a set this rough, unfinished, engaging, or risky.

Opening image:

2 young men in dark suits (one with velvety jacket, another with red shirt and loose black tie) pick up a woman (dark long skirt and belted jacket closed tight all the way to neck) and run up the ramp, then down, then towards us along the diagonal platform, then back to center where an older man is seated facing stage left in one of the white plastic chairs. She speaks. When he responds another young man (in white shirt) stands with the other 3, video camera in hand. A close-up of the man speaking - 55-ish with grey beard and black framed glasses - appears on a 'screen' above the platform, stage right. The screen is approximately 3m x 3m of plywood with what appears to be blank posters (white pieces of paper - 11x17 ish) pasted over most of it.

The orchestra begins. The conductor, who we can't see, is projected onto the back wall, huge. Then a 70 voice choir bursts into song behind us. Filling 2 rows at the back of the steeply raked house, they take their direction from the projection.

More happens: 2 projection sites, actors, choir, orchestra.

German actors have the best vocal training (in the West). One after another 2 men screech their texts in upper register. Loud. Funny-weird. Amazing. All actors respond, ensemble choral, in equally high-pitched, loud-volumed voices.

2 women singers (in satin party dresses - one black, one turquoise - and heels) scurry down the aisle stairs, making little squeaks, and continue to down stage center. They spit once up towards the actors on the platform and then they turn to us and sing an operatic duo. The full chorus, still behind us, responds while three young male actors smear paint on their face - one red, one blue, one green.

When the choir is not singing, the back wall projections are stills of Russian or Chinese communist-era posters, with one of the actors' faces superimposed.

The audience in the discounted onstage seats see very little, watching the backs of the actors and missing half the projections.

At this point in the production (20 minutes?) I realize that the chorus is following the projected conductor. It's a practical device (or a practical joke?).

Now it's snowing heavily. Actors pace and stagger. The conductor projection is seen through a blizzard. Chorus now in full song. When the chorus sings, the lights are on them & therefore us.

Snow stops. 3 male actors repeat choreography: walk, stagger as if hit in the belly, up the ramp, fall and slide down. Choir continues. How to describe full, opera-ish, multi-part choral singing? It's big, almost bombastic. I don't know have articulate language for this. I love their broad age range. All so alive. Costumes vary, a mildly tacky version of formal wear. A pregnant woman is in gold. More than one turquoise dress. The men's suits are generally dark.

The 3 actors sit at the bottom of the ramp, joined by the woman. They speak to camera and are now projected close-up on both 'screens': side and back wall.

Later, a scene takes place in the theatre lobby. We see and hear it only from projections and audio system. On stage, a woman from the chorus, gathering the hem of her long black, center-split dress with her right hand. She sings solo, intermittent with chorus, actors, orchestra. The actors return to live view, now in the house.

A long procession of the chorus singing a round. In two's they travel down the right aisle, out the door, back onto the stage, around the onstage audience, exit stage right, walk through the lobby. Their voices, once a blended whole, become distinct parts as they progressively exit and enter our hearing range, and then even more distinctly as they pass individually before the camera and mic.

This event is continually destabalized, bouncing from opera to film to various genres of theatre and experimental, physical, and visual performance.

Actors arrive downstage left, talking while pasting HUNGER posters (black text on white paper - yes the same size as blank posters on projection screen stage right). 2 women singers return, stand amongst actors and posters. They sing. The full chorus walks through scaffold to downstage and sings while pointing accusingly at the actors/duo/posters.

For a while I don't write.

Snapshots:

Older male actor returns. Now a cop, he kills the woman actor by bopping her in the head with a toy rubber billy club. This is done near (for?) the onstage audience. We see the live action, obstructed, and close-up variations projected.

In a live off-site performance, staged as a film in the making, we see the old man (now wearing a fat belly costume over his clothes) and the woman making crass, childish sexual innuendos with chopsticks, wrappers, and fast food.

Other male actors punch through cheap walls until holes are big enough to push their heads into the scene. They watch the couple flirt and eat.

In the corner of the tiny film set stands the solo vocalist. We rarely see her face. She starts to sing. The older guy lipsynchs. 

Only now do I realize that the film set is onstage, hidden upstage left under the ramp. It's in plain view of the onstage audience. I see that the mic is on a boom held by a second tech guy. Like any film shoot. This explains the sound quality being better than any video camera.

Often the text is performed chorally - 3 or 4 actors together - or the whole chorus - playing the solo voice in contrast with the group.

With the chorus onstage, singing, the actors leave the theatre, engage with people in a cafe across the street. The visual signal occasionally pixillates which seems to prove that the action is live. They approach a cat observing the street action from a first floor window sill. It flees. We laugh. Now it's not film but television. It's late-night reality Letterman. The actors sit with some boys on grass. Then they race back to the theatre screaming. One of them vaults a bicycle. Nice leap. They screech around a cop car. Coincidence? Real danger? And when they burst onstage there is applause.

They stand in the scaffolding over the edge of the pit, their toes extending past the beam that supports them, indicating the void below. We hear a mechanical hum. The pit raises to reveal 9 musicians, conductor, framed by the whole chorus on two sides. One of the music stands is draped with a HUNGER poster. The actors enter the apron/stage and deliver the next series of text amongst the musicians (seated) and chorus (standing). The conductor, back to audience, head bowed. Unlike the multi-generational chorus, the musicians seem to be in their 20's. But when they stand and depart, onto the main stage and then exit, I see that the piano player is at least 10 years older. After all the performers have exited, a crew of technicians removes the music stands and chairs and cables and all until the apron is empty and the stage is quiet.

With no intermission a new set is constructed beneath the platform, center stage - white plastic round table with several mics, and 5 matching chairs. I think Wooster Group in the round. The actors enter, khaki jackets replace dark suits, and sit at the chairs. They talk. Mauser has begun and we exit house left. It's been over 90 minutes and it's time to meet some friends coming out of the difficult piece Spectacular by Forced Entertainment, directed by Tim Etchells.

Jess and I saw this yesterday. There's much less to say about this thinly stretched anti-spectacle that would have made a great improv sketch in the studio. My one line review is: Forced Entertainment's Spectacular Killed Me.