The Masque of the Red Death: some further thoughts.

As Kylie would say, I can’t get it out of my head.

On my way up to Waitrose, I found myself ruminating on some of the criticisms and negative comments about the show. Here’s what they are and what I think…

That it is irredeemably middle class, to wit the preponderance of public schoolboys:

I have no problem with reviewing the audience, I do it all the time! My justification is that I am reporting on my experience, and the audience can heighten or dampen my enjoyment, And I suppose if you are a class warrior, the make-up (as opposed to behaviour or glamour or otherwise) of the audience could lead you to have a bad time. But I would observe that last night, there were more black faces in the audience (underneath the white masks of course) than I have seen at any of the theatre I have been to in recent years. And as I have discovered from my exploration of classical music, sometimes the perception of certain kinds of art as elitist turns out to be completely false. The biggest barrier to art is cost, and the tickets are pricy (last night was £30) but in keeping with most major London venues. And even if on the whole it is attracting a middle class audience so what – we who shop at Waitrose are entitled to get excited about stuff!

That it is all sensation, it has no emotional content:

This is partly to do with plot and characterisation (see below), but in the room where the man was beating up his wife, I can tell you I had plenty of emotion, just as I did in the abortion scene in the forest in Faust. Largely it is a sensational sensory experience – that doesn’t diminish it. It also provokes profound mental stimulation. These are enough in my view to mask any emotional deficit.

That it is a themepark experience:

What is it that is pejorative about the term themepark? That it is a plastic experience, corporate, Disneyfied, synthetic, commercialised? Certainly none of that applies here – the depth of the experience, of the detail, is breathtaking. Yes you wander through the space, but you do that in an art gallery.

That there is no narrative:

There is a narrative, but it is one that is received, by each audience member individually, rather than given. It is the journey of the audience through the space. It is the accumulation of experiences. It is not a linear narrative, nor a full one. It is fragmented and frustrating. As such it reflects contemporary life much more closely than the traditional linear narrative. In particular it draws on three strands of (post-post-)modernity

1. The structuralist/post-structuralist/post-modern movement’s explosion of the stability of the building blocks of text, art, and even consciousness.

2. It reflects contemporary experience, such as computer games, the flash zapping of multi-channel TV, t’internet, you tube etc. The lives we lead are increasingly made up of accumulating chunks of information technology, and it is right that art should find itself reflecting this.

3. Art whether consciously or unconsciously is a product of the society and culture in which it is made; a broken and fragmentary art suits our time.

Regular readers will note a recurring theme here, so I wont blather on any more about fragmentation – see A Disappearing Number below, somewhere.

That the actors are slaves:

A weird one this, but yes, they do work bloody hard, and being surrounded by the audience, especially those who go right into personal space, or for whom this experience is a substitute for a visit to a lap-dancing club, must be a challenge, but then many are repeat performers - most were in Faust, and almost all have worked for Punchdrunk before. Working for the most exciting company on the planet in really challenging environment must be a reward in itself.

That it is all hype:

Absolutely not, Faust was a huge word of mouth success, and many of those who fell in love with the show signed up to the mailing list and bought tickets for Masque on spec. Almost all tickets were sold before any reviews, and maybe they were for the most part favourable because that it was the reviewers actually thought, rather than them succumbing to some PR voodoo. In fact there has been very little publicity – none was needed!

Why Punchdrunk when there have been so many great site specific promenade performances before:

I can’t really comment on other companies, but I will say that I will now check out any of the other artists working in this form in the future, so I think everyone will benefit. After reading Cees Noteboom’s excellent novel “Lost Paradise” I really wish I’d caught Deborah Warner’s Angel Project (featured in the book). As to why Punchdrunk, all I can say is because Faust was amazing, it was a perfect storm. It was more than just site-specific or promenade, it was an art installation, it was dance, it was full on sensory experience, it was emotional, it was filmic, it was multi-dimensional, the building afforded a perfect opportunity. And Masque is forming itself in my mind along similar hyperbolic lines.