A Look at Schechner's Ideas of the "New" Theatre

Richard Schechner envisions a "new theatre" in three of his major essays, "Happenings" (1966), "Six Axioms for Environmental Theatre" (1968), and "Negotiations with the Environment" (1968). He does not spend time discussing his famed "not not themselves" ideology of the performer or ritual ecstasy; instead he discusses a new genealogical hybrid termed the "new theatre" by Allan Kaprow. Schechner uses the traditional theatre as a comparison and first comments in "Happenings" "because it is unlike traditional theatre, the familiar locutions of these arts, e.g., dance, music, sculpture, painting cannot describe what's going on or provide criteria for which to evaluate it" (145). Still, Schechner does provide many a comparison between the traditional theatre and this new form.

Schechner recognizes that the "theatrical event is a complex social interweave, a network of expectation and obligation. The exchange of stimuli-either sensory or ideational or both-is the root of theatre" (158). Knowing this, the author claims all theatre, both traditional and new, is a set of related "transactions" (changes in outlook and situation). How these

Similarly, the traditional theatre is single focused, showing the audience where they should cast their gaze. This is not true of the new theatre where, according to axiom four, the "focus is flexible and variable" (175). "Multi-focus will not reach every spectator in the same way" (175). Again, the spectator is free to interpret what's going on. As well, using local focus only a fraction of the audience can see or hear. However, "real body contact and whispered communication are possible between the performer and spectator" (176). Local whirlpools of action make the theatrical line more complex and varied.

In the traditional theatre the actors go by a script and the result is a product, however in the new theatre it's free form, a process, one specific idea isn't beaten to death. The text need not be the starting point (axiom 6). "You don't do the play; you do with it-confront it, search among the words and themes, build around and through it. . . and come out with your own thing" (180). Whereas the traditional theatre places emphasis on flow and clarity, the new theatre can be tangential and, somewhat chaotic, exploring many facets at once, creating something entirely "new".

Schechner basically breaks down all the major components of the traditional theatre in a comparison with the new theatre. To start, the traditional theatre involves plot as a means of telling a story, but the new theatre involves images/events. There are three kinds of new theatre as Schechner describes in "Happenings": the technological, essentially electronic event (a la John Cage concerts), the free-for-all happenings or party gone wild in which the event is roughly sketched by the author, a group of people are told to do something and another group is invited to watch/participate, and the "ceremony" (a la Kaprow) in which the participants are given a set of instructions which they are not to improvise on but simply do. "All three kinds share autonomy and revitalization." "Disconnections are made so that the isolated event or image can be seen in itself, seen as revitalized" (154).

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Approximate Word count = 1415
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)