We sat down for a quick chat with Emma Bailey. “Pity Party is about being alive, whilst trying to make sense of our relationship with ourselves, with others and with the world around us – all experienced through a very unorthodox party.” To learn more about the show, follow the link at https://www.breadandrosestheatre.co.uk/whats-on.html. For tickets: https://app.lineupnow.com/event/1187851/
How would you describe your role as a “creative collaborator” within something so deliberately chaotic?
My job is to bring the text to life, add emotion and character, choreograph and colour moments, then just play with what we can do with such an important piece. Creating the contents of the show, I can start, but the show will not come to life until we are with our audiences, as they are very much part of the world. Collaboration is vital, and I definitely wouldn’t be able to handle the chaos of the show without my team.
How do you rehearse a show where unpredictability is part of the design?
We work through parts with volunteers to experiment with how we might interact with the audience. We prepare multiple options/plans around how moments might go and how we can weave in the surprise or improvised moments, to the more scripted or set moments. We have to consider contingencies and how we can get things back on track if they go off the rails.
We embrace unpredictability at points through moments of improvisation and impulse work, genuine audience interactions and through randomised text prompts at certain points. Plus, we also have to learn to accept that literally anything could happen during the show as it is live theatre after all, and that we can’t necessarily control any of it, only how we respond to it.
Chaos is very human, and with good preparation, unpredictability can help the show as it will keep us on our toes and make each show genuinely unique for our audiences.
How has working within a disabled and queer-led collective influenced your creative process?
Our aim as a collective is to connect with our communities, inform those outside of our communities about our experiences, make art that’ll hopefully bring joy and ideally many other emotions, make a lasting impression and maybe even create some change (no matter how small).
Most of our collective are disabled and/or queer (with a few allies as well), and so creating a supportive environment is vital for rehearsals and production meetings. We have had a full transparency policy in place from the start as communication and especially having clear, organised, and easily accessible information is crucial for all working on this show.
We are fully aware of how the queer and disabled experiences are a major part of the show, and so MindOut was an obvious choice for a partner, and their support and mission have very much impacted how we approach the material. At the end of the day, being queer and disabled are also simply part of our identities, and so we bring our experiences and memories into the show and use it to inform how we approach the work.
What challenges come with blending verbatim theatre, improvisation, and physical performance in one piece?
The show is very demanding, especially due to the physical nature, the fact that we don’t leave the theatrical space at any time, and we have to be alert and responsive to our fellow artists and crucially the audience (especially when improvising). Being disabled means that capacity can be limited, so working within our means and pacing our priorities, but nonetheless a great challenge – we want to give our all to every moment of this performance, whilst making sure things are sustainable.
Blending styles also presents exciting challenges as sometimes they contradict or challenge each other such as when we are sharing a story or memory word for word from it’s account, but our stage partner is improvising and so we have to respond whilst staying true to the words that we want to follow. Improvisation is inherently physical though (if you’re doing it right) so in a way it can be a very exciting challenge to play with when to be authentic and truthful, when to follow impulses and when to return to the set text.
What has changed in your understanding of the work since the dissertation version?
The way we view our audience has definitely changed, as initially engaging with the audience was a lot of fun (and hopefully it still will be), but it was all very surface level and at points a little gimmicky, but now we are beginning to understand how key the relationship between us as performers/creatives/individuals and the audience is, and how important genuine connection and engagement will be. They are very much as important to the story and experience as we all are.
Our understanding of the layers, complexities and shifting realities has greatly increased since the dissertation as the show will hopefully instead of being in one world and occasionally bringing the audience in or interacting with them, it’ll be a constant shift between three key states/world: 1. the world of Self’s birthday, trying to come to terms with where they are at in their life, trying to adult, and trying to have fun, whilst only having the company of a single friend and a cuddly toy dog 2. the world of the bigger party celebrating life, sex, friendship, cake, having fun and making memories with all the party guests (the audience) 3. the wider world of the production that is at times very aware of itself and the fact that it is a show with two performers on a stage dancing and singing and trying to connect with their audience (and hopefully involve them), whilst trying to make a difference
The understanding of our intention with the story has changed as now we are more aware of how the show can hold up a mirror to the experiences of many individuals, most notably those in the disabled and queer communities, and those who might have a complex relationship with being alive in this chaotic world.
Finally, this new expanded and altered version of the original show has started to see us moving away from the initial research question: ‘An investigation into expanded notions of Intimacy, in relation to Kintsugi, with reference to the unreliable narrator’, as we explore and develop a better connection and understanding of the realities of the story and making hopefully many new discoveries.