The Theatre of Cruelty (French: Théâtre de la Cruauté) is a surrealist form of theatre theorised by Antonin Artaud in his book The Theatre and its Double. "Without an element of cruelty at the root of every spectacle," he writes, "the theatre is not possible. In our present state of degeneration it is through the skin that metaphysics must be made to re-enter our minds." By "cruelty," Artaud referred not to sadism or causing pain, but rather a violent, austere, physical determination to shatter the false reality that, he wrote, "lies like a shroud over our perceptions"
The five key aspects to his methods are:
- Artaud argued against conventional theatre spaces.
- Artaud was opposed to representing 'real life' on stage.
- Everything theatrical will be used to create a new language of the theatre
- The actor must 'use his emotions in the same way as a boxer uses his muscles'
- The subject matter will focus on myths and well-known tales.
WORKSHOP
For this task, the workshop we had to do is devise a ritual and perform it on a member of a small audience that would be included in the performance. We sat down and thought what kind of ritual we could perform on the audience, and we came up with the idea of a holy baptism. We would have Jake stood with a bowl of water and me and Gareth would be stood with a piece of red netting and showing how dramatic our ritual would be. Billy would lead the audience in and then make them walk around a block and sit down, I would then run around with the netting and shout and scream as if I have been possessed and the netting is choosing the person who needs to be baptised. Jake would then perform a little speech and splash water on the chosen person's face, this would then be a sign that they have been baptised. To make it more dramatic and effective we as a group decided not to talk, so we used simple sounds such as grunts, groans, and screams.
The start position was me and Gareth curled up on a block covering Jake who was also knelt down. Billy then led in the audience and made them walk around the centre block a few times and then made them sit, whilst doing this me, Gareth and Jake rose so that we were all standing. As soon as they sat the music changed from a slow, flowing piece of orchastra music to an upbeat piece of dramatic music that would shock the audience, when this happened I ran round the circle of people with the netting as if I had been possessed screaming and shouting. This made the audience feel quite awkward and they weren't sure what was going on. I then made out that the netting had chosen someone (a boy from the audience) and therefore I wrapped the netting around him and made him rise. Gareth then led him over to Jake, where he performed a chant and splattered him with water as if he was being baptised to the faith we "believed" in, after this he was led to stand on the centre block with Billy. Billy then gave the mask that he was wearing to the boy and also gave him the cane he was holding, this was to signify the changing of the holy one, and from then on we knelt down and bowed to him. We then led the audience out of the room and that was the end of the ritual.
I feel the performance went well, and asking the audience they did feel awkward and they felt part of the performance, which is what we were supposed to do. To make it better we could of had a bit longer to plan out what we were going to do and make it a longer ritual, but with the time we had thats all we could do and I feel that it did go really well and we followed the rules of Artaud well.
