baby ninja theatre

My joints hurt. My quads are killin’ me. There are bruises on both my knees and I could sleep for a day.

Baby theatre is all about playing, and I play hard. 

*   *   *   

...in truth, I didn’t do enough yoga leading up to our recent workshops, and I foolishly went sans knee pads.

Also in truth, ALL theatre is about playing!

The illustrious Dictionary of Tia states that playing means “to physicalize imaginings.” What made my two 4-hour sessions in a yoga studio with my husband (director), a producer and a musician extra playful? Well, I was moving about as if I were a preschooler, and we had no script yet. We had the idea of a character and the idea of a situation. These sessions were to find our script. And it showed up in some ridiculous and delightful places.

After some introductory chatter, hubby literally said something akin to “Now just do stuff.” A rational person might’ve freaked out at this vague command. My bass-playing cohort and I are apparently insane. I don’t even remember what I did first, but he was right there to score my spontaneous actions on the fly, and come up with sound effects for the little events that took place. (You should hear what a slinky sounds like to an upright bass! Yowza!) He even created instrument-to-actor conversation at times, finding notes to warn me to be careful, or to encourage a choice.

The room was littered with objects. Household objects, noise-makers, toys. I know that I immediately took to the 3 stuffed animals, carrying them around and including them in everything I did. It wasn’t until the end of that first part of rehearsal (a full HOUR of unscripted, nonverbal and undirected PLAYING) that I realized my 3 buddies were different sizes. Here is what I was working on when hubby called a break:

Every buddy holds a buddy! Hooray!!

What we understand about baby theatre so far is that it is not so much based on a typical narrative structure with beginning, middle and end, but a series of episodes...little tasks for the character(s) or events that happen, each organically leading to the next. Toddlers don’t need to know who or even what you are, but they seem to respond to a character’s focus...for a few minutes, at least. Then you have to change things up! A new task, a new discovery.

The most exciting moments of that first hour--the ones that will inform our script--were complete discoveries. I would do something just to DO it, maybe just because I felt like it, and then the four of us in the room would realize that it wasn’t an arbitrary thing, but it meant something. Like the buddies-holding-buddies, for instance. In the moment, I was simply thinking that I wanted everyone to hug. But then, look! I learned something about sizes and levels and pieces fitting together. I hadn’t at all meant to create a little lesson; illumination found me.

Each of the 4-hour days involved freely playing followed by a discussion of what happened and what was found, then repeating that. But each time we played, it got more focused. Hubby would start to chime in and guide the play a bit. I likened it to a Choose Your Own Adventure novel. The musician and I would go down one path together, but our director was there to allow us to cheat...”what if you backtrack and choose this other path?” He was also there to remind me that every single object I encountered was a revelation. If you don’t yet know what a scarf is, how will you know that this swath of fabric goes around your neck? Maybe you want it on your head. Maybe on your upright bass’ head!

...wait. You guys didn’t have an upright bass complete with bass player in your playrooms?