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We're never more excited here then when something comes up that we don't know the answer to
And that's where the sort of sparks of energy what's with the adrenaline comes
from is not knowing whether an idea just how it's going to be possible but
knowing that you can go out and find the answer to that.
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It can also lead to some quite terrifying moments when you're going
into a very big or even very small high-pressure live performance
environment and you're not entirely sure if the thing that you're about to put in
front of an audience is necessarily going to work and I don't necessarily
mean in terms of stability of the technology I mean whether it works
creatively are conceptually whether you're trying something which you might
think is a really great idea but the rest of the world
might not necessarily agree with you.
59 Productions is a company that was set up specifically to explore new ways of
using technology in live performance to to tell stories and we're very
interested in in finding ways of kind of drawing out things about piece of work
that haven't necessarily been seen or heard before.
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What we really look for when we're looking for potential new partners
collaborators employees and so on is people who don't necessarily have a very
particular artistical technical skill but who have a real excitement and interest in
the creative industries almost as a whole, so we tend to end up working with
people who are much more artistically inclined and therefore much more like
much more globally interested in the conceptual development of a project and
that's I think why we can offer some fairly unique process.
There weren't really mentors to be found out thing because i think we didn't know
what we were doing so we wouldn't have known who to ask for advice.
My personal background is quite mixed I went to art college straight out of high school
after that I went studied English literature university and I think that
is where the sort of company obsession with narrative and storytelling is from.
My background is has nothing to do with projection design at all. I studied
English at university and met Leo we started out working on a magazine
together actually and I was involved in the photography side of that and he was
designing the magazine and then some opportunities came up to get involved in
creating some content for theatre production and things just really
evolved from there. I don't really think that either of us really intended to end up
doing what we're doing now.
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We like to talk about the way we address a new project and whenever we try and
describe it in a sort of official capacity we say that you know these
these commissions are these briefs of these ideas will come in and we'll sit
down and discuss them in a way that's what happens but actually the reality is
much more complicated than that because an idea will sort of spark off a series
of thoughts which may happen over a period of time and you may have had a
discussion with someone which you don't have an immediate response to and it's
not until something else intersects with that like you go see another
piece of theatre or you listen to a piece of music or you read about this
amazing new technology on the internet or something and you suddenly piece
those two items together and you get that kind of spark of inspiration, I suppose.
So what we try and do and we're getting better at it is create an
environment in which those ideas can sort of arise reasonably organically and
if that means not spending the afternoon in the office brainstorming around a
piece of A2 paper and a bunch of permanent markers, then all the better. It might mean
going to an art gallery or having a conversation with a composer or doing
something totally unorthodox and that tends to be when out you know again our
best ideas arises when you apply a non-standard process to a non-standard problem.
It's difficult to say what the greatest challenge we've had is because
of every single project really does present its own peculiar particular set of problems.
Quite often a director or a designer will have an idea which on the surface of it
sounds completely lunatic like there's absolutely no way they could be achieved
so it's very exciting to be sort of given an idea by a director and designer
and have to try and figure out whether or not there's any sort of practical solution to making it work.
Things like War Horse for example which is gone from
a almost surefire commercial failure at the National Theatre in London and
turned into this sort of global smash it touring show and the conversations we were
having as a creative team before that about well you know it's a tough job but at
least we know we'll never have to do it again been proven so entirely wrong on
such a number of levels but no one thought that was going to work because
we were putting together such a diversity of different theatrical
techniques, technological techniques, storytelling techniques, but because of
this sort of purity of the idea and the skills of the people involved actually
turn into something totally remarkable,
Being involved in the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games was obviously terrifying
and you know one night only event very, very, very high pressure and ultimately
thrilling and ultimately absolutely worthwhile.
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Both Leo and I have got a very warm memory of working on Satyagraha, which is a Philip Glass opera
that we did first at the Dutch National Opera and then went onto do at The Met but the anchor elements of every
production but very, very pleasing and you might just do one cue
in the whole show which is something you're extremely proud of that no one will notice.
No one will know is there but you're very proud of how it works.
I don't think that anybody really does for critical or sort of award recognition.
I think those moments when you've set yourself a challenging you
pulled it off and you've done something that you're really proud of its kind of all we can ask for.
People when they hear about video projection for theater, the image in their
head is probably a big horrible screen at the back of the stage with trees
projected onto the sky or whatever and sure there's always a bit that involved
but actually some of the most successful work that we've done is involved
integrating projection into other scenic elements. We did a production for UNC
for Sigur Ros which had a physical set that we designed but you know at
certain moments appear to fill up with water and i think the other moments
within that show where you couldn't quite tell what you're looking at; whether it is a
projection or is it a physical effect, is it a lighting effect?
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Quite often the character in our work isn't necessarily a human person.
If we're working on something like the Sydney Opera House for example the character becomes
the building and how we explore that and communicate something that's still
emotional and dramatic and has a journey to it becomes in a way of sort
of a different challenge what you might have if you're making a film or theatre
piece about human character or human narrative.
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We've been developing a technique which we've come to call live cinema which is
about working with live actors on a theater stage but bringing video cameras
and life projection relay into that. The idea is that we create something which
is very much like a feature film has the same sort of qualities and aesthetic as
a feature film but is made in front of the audience's eyes and what that gives
you as a member of the audience in a normal theater is incredibly close
access to the performer to the the emotion to the detail of that performs
in a way that you might get in a film but without the experience of being done
in front of you without the nightly experience of the risk and the
adrenaline of it being genuinely live.
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Technology answers our prayers on any number of days. On the other hand,
you know it causes us enormous headaches, as anyone who uses technology, especially
on the bleeding edge, will find. That you're constantly using things which
aren't quite ready to do what you want them to do.
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Technology isn't going to completely solve any dramatic questions;
it's not inherently interesting. It's only interesting if it's serving a bigger
purpose, which is to tell a story in a more interesting and more involved
way. The thing that we are quite keen to avoid is the temptation to try and do
things technologically speaking just because it's possible.
So whilst technology might open up new visual and interactive possibilities it's
really, really important to keep the focus on the act of storytelling because
that's something that's endured for thousands of years in a way that
theatrical technology... you know, it evolves, but it doesn't make a bad piece of work good.
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