Guest Blog: 'My Preference Is To Create An Alternative Floating Reality': Artistic Director Henry Maynard On The Flabbergast Process And Why Shakespeare Is Better Weird

It is without doubt that the plays that we attribute to Shakespeare are genius. They examine what it is to be a human and have survived centuries and multiple adaptations precisely because of this fact: love, jealousy, hatred and grief are all the same regardless of whether your father was a Duke from Verona or a Welsh coal miner. 

The ‘right way’ to do Shakespeare is fiercely defended and the work has, in some instances, become the preserve of the bourgeoisie. This is endemic in both audiences and those critics that consider themselves cultural referees. Of course, there is beautiful poetry within the writing, but these are plays not novels; they are intended to be performed, and acting is in essence a physical activity. All theatre is physical theatre; the term has become a shorthand way to indicate that the talking heads style as preferred by the previous generation will not be on display.

Personally, I’m not very keen on productions that focus too much on transposing the action to a specific political or historic event or creating a show that is too contemporary to modern day. My preference is to create an alternative floating reality that is influenced by the original (rather than necessarily Elizabethan) setting, and that has elements that are perverse.

Our Macbeth is set in 1000AD, but has modern foil party has and a 1980’s tape player in the banquet scene. These odd items highlight the corruption of the natural order and jar colourfully against the otherwise monochrome and natural aesthetic.

We use masks in rehearsal as they are an invaluable tool to push performers to be more physical and breaks actors away from the naturalism that features so much in other styles of performance. They also make their way, if appropriate, into the performance such as they do for the Mechanicals in our A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

Commedia is a rigorous theatrical technique that is complementary and adjacent to Clown and puppetry, with masks the performers have license to explore far bigger extremes. Masks have been used in human ritual since we became human. There is a fascinating connection to trance work engendered by the masking of our faces and hiding of our identit. It is no mistake that Italy used masks in the parades, that we see their use in clandestine sex parties, and that they feature in protest. They are transgressive and we believe theatre should be too.

Music is at the heart of what we do, the lyricism of the verse is accentuated by it and it helps both us and our audiences viscerally access the emotions that we are trying to experience together in collaborative imagination. The style of the musical design reflects the world of the play and its supports us along with the movement and makeup in suspending our disbelief.

Each time each a play is performed or rehearsed we add a layer of depth and ‘lacquer’. We are never afraid to go back and redevelop something that isn’t working or works fine but could be better. Our approach is truly ensemble; as a company we try to foster development of our members including platforming their own individual work. We develop closely together in residencies; cleaning and eating together.

The death of company work is a great sadness and is, in par,t due to the erosion of arts funding alongside diminishing box office receipts across the board. It is, of course, hugely expensive to keep a proper group together and employed throughout the year, but I feel like the system is broken.

Our society is obsessed with consumerism (because it fuels growth), the next new thing that is quickly discarded, plays that are put on for a couple of months and then dropped rather than nurtured and developed. We are obsessed with celebrity and star culture (something that Stanislavski himself railed against), and it is strangling creativity and opportunity, not to mention the human cost.

At Flabbergast we reject this system even though we must operate in it. We, like every generation before us, fight against the boring, staid, polite, and bourgeois. We revel in chaos, Yungian shadow work, mess and above all fun. These things are all expressed in the Commedia, Clown, Buffon, Butoh work that lie at the heart of what we do. 

The proposition of this blog is ‘Why Shakespeare is better weird - makeup, masks and music’. My answer is that without them it is boring, which as Peter Hall put it is ‘Deadly Theatre’.