Tracking Down Maciej: Blog 52

Maciej Suszynski

Good morning.

Its over 25 years since I last saw Maciej in New Hampshire in the US. A few months ago he found me on Facebook and we had a flurry of messages as you do when you first reconnect with an old friend. But then what do you do?  Do you go on and meet up again? Well for me, only if there is a new project or purpose, or I guess maybe a bit of genuine curiosity! Its fun to get a snapshot of where life has taken people, and indeed to see their images, photos and preoccupations. 

Anyway - after sharing my blog with Maciej (in which I have talked a few times about my time in Poland) we got to talk on Skype last Sunday. I suppose at its basic level it was two old friends/colleagues reconnecting, which is great for us, but would be deeply boring for anyone else of course. But niceties out of the way our attention turned to talking of how we record our own theatre history. 

We worked with Triple Action Theatre, which was a controversial physical theatre company in the '70s and '80s led by the maverick director Stephen Rumbelow. Maciej and I were on the tail end of the company's life. I dipped out in 1983 and returned home from Chicago, where the company carried on for another year or so. 

Our conversation turned to how we might make a record of the heady days of theatre making in the early eighties, and the huge Polish influences and exchanges. Much of this is lost. We promised ourselves that we would start to record the detail for a theatre archive. As I mentioned the other day Peter Hulton wrote a Theatre Paper about the company in his fourth series. But much of the work that we were involved in in Poland is not recorded anywhere, and its an interesting story for students of theatre, not least because of the stark challenges and dangers of making theatre in a military state. It was a highly fertile time in Poland's art history.

I mentioned earlier in January that I have been exercised by the fact that my previous blog about our Cinderella at the Broadway is still getting over 500 pageviews a day, mostly from Poland! I couldn't really understand why a local pantomime in East London would be of interest to Poles. I asked Maciej what he thought - and he was as curious as me. I thought maybe it was to do with the importance of the core fairy tale - but I don't think that's a very convincing reason. It certainly doesn't satisfy me.

Pradeep Jeyaratnam

But I think I may have got the answer I needed  from my dear friend (and Arc Associate Artist) Pradeep, who cooked me a lovely dinner a few days ago. He and his partner Caroline and I were discussing a number of things including Pradeep's recent show House on The Edge by the dance company State of Flux. He was sharing the enjoyment he had in a new experience of working with older dancers, and the challenges of bringing dance and theatre together.

A bit later I posed the Polish question. Without a moment's hesitation Prad told me that the answer was obvious wasn't it? Not to me I reiterated.

He said the simple answer was nothing to do with the fairy tale but quite straightforwardly the blog tells the story of the making of a new show from beginning to end, and all the quirky and strange challenges on the way, including the full process and the detail from the rehearsal room. He assured me that the consistent flow of hits on the blog is most likely to be from theatre students. And theatre studies is a very popular course in Poland. I suspect he's possibly right - and I hope so too. It was a very 'warts and all' account of the creative and practical process of making a piece and the collaboration between the creative team. And of course the 'characters' become familiar and develop through the story. 

I plan to check in with Maciej to test Pradeep's theory - as he may have a few thoughts on this and is familiar with the specific theatre courses in Poland. So thanks to Maciej, Prad and Caroline for their wise counsel.

So Maciej and I are about to embark on a similar exercise for those early years of making work in Eastern Europe. I think our memories might be a little challenged, but between us we may be able to excavate enough to capture much of it to share with those same students in Poland and the US who are the other large cohort of the Cinderella blog followers.

I feel like I may have a bit of a better understanding now.

Have a lovely Sunday