Waylon 2

And I got to see the Thunderbird American Indian Dancers annual winter concert again last night! It was as good as last time, and pretty similar. I’m pretty sure Louis Mofsie can moderate it in his sleep. But what were new (at least to me) this year were the storytellers – Elvira and Hortensia Colorado of the Chichimec and Otomi people in Mexico. I talked to them a bit during the intermission, and they suggested that I get in touch with the American Indian Community House here in New York. They told me that when I have a show I should let AICH know so they can put an announcement out about it. I don’t know if American Decameron would count, since it’s not Native theater, but I can always check.

Like a painter can learn about her craft by looking at paintings, or a musician about his by listening to somebody else play, I love to see other people tell stories. It seems like here in the SBU theater department there’s a huge focus on strong and exciting visual staging. But, when I see other storytellers perform, I’m reminded that a good and charismatic performer with a simple and subdued backdrop is really all you need for compelling staging. Elvira and Hortensia’s strongest visuals came from their acting out their stories on stage. They did have some augmenting staging from their Mexican dresses – indicative of their people, and the Northwest-patterned blanket hanging in the back, left over from the Caribou dance at the top of the evening.

So I’m not as drawn to vivid visuals as many of my colleagues here at Stony Brook. But I do wonder what all my options are in terms of the subtle staging that I prefer. That is the major reason that I’m in Philip’s class: while I may not be sold on his affinity for the internet and other new media, I do see in it a potential to strengthen the theatricality of my own storytelling. Last semester I used backdrop projections of old family photos from the Klamath River in the Stony Brook version of “Stories of Our People.” What else can I do? The next logical step from photos, in my mind is video. What if I created a kaleidoscope of Klamath River basket designs to project on every surface for a telling of “Greedy Father”? I’m thinking about using photo and video projections of I-80 for a telling of “Coyote Hunts the Sun”. I could also use, in version of “Stories of Our People,” a juxtaposition of Western films (a white telling of the stories of Contact) with the oral narrative of those same events that Julian and I used in the initial versions of “Stories.”