Physicality of Performance

I have always thought of theater as the ultimate form of communication.  While recently watching Vanya on 42^nd Street, the 1994 filmed production of Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya, I came to the realization that even the best recording cannot do justice to the instantaneous nature of live performance.  While this film is a spectacular documentation of the intimate production put on in the then abandoned Victory Theater, the experience of actually being in the presence of this masterpiece must have been even more stunning. 

When an experience is digitalized, there is a presentational element that removes us from the work.  For years now, we have been able to easily edit photos to unrealistic perfection, splice a scene together word-by-word, or correct flaws in music to the point where all voices sound the same.  While this can be professionally beneficial, a certain amount of authenticity is always lost, as we take what would be considered incredible and rare in reality and make it uniform and accessible in the digital world.

However, no matter how much technological progress is made, there is still no replacement for atmosphere.  A prepared image cannot match the physicality of being present in an actual space— an experience that engages all the senses, rather than just a two-dimensional understanding.  This is currently being fully realized in theater, as physicality is combined with the undeniable authenticity of performance within endeavors like Sleep No More, a production (that I’m sure you’ve heard of, if not attended) of Macbeth staged as a completely immersive experience.  Or even at the beginning of Broadway’s Once, a more commercially accessible option, when the audience is invited onto the stage and into the world of the play. These works encourage the audience to push their own sensory boundaries.  To observe a scene and attempt to conjure up the character’s memories.  To want more from an image than meets the eye.  To watch a film like Vanya on 42^nd, and wonder what it might have smelled like in the Victory Theater.