Richard Maxwell Project

Well, on Wednesday afternoon I sat down with some others in the dressing room of the Drama department, armed with two chocolate bars, ready to watch Boxing 2000. Now maybe it was the immense amount of sugar I consumed in a short space of time, but I seemed to pick up quite a lot from what I watched. Before when I had attempted to act in the style of Richard Maxwell, I had found it hard not to roboticise my posture and movements. I found when watching particularly the dancing scene between the man and lady (names are not my strong point - especially seeing as my copy of the plays has STILL not arrived…grrr aphrohead), they seemed to more simplify their movements, rather than de-humanise them. It reminded me a lot of that awkward dancing 12 year-olds do at their first school disco when they don’t know quite how to approach the opposite sex, they seem to do some strange kind of shuffle, without actually moving a great deal…it was as if Maxwell had taken this idea and simplified the movements even further with the effect of exaggerating the foolishness of them. This theory seemed to also fit for the speech. In normal speech, people do stutter sometimes and say “er” and “um”, not to mention talk about completely mundane and often dull things. Richard Maxwell seems to have taken this normal stuttering and simplified it to just the repetition of “er er er” which seems to exaggerate their behaviour , which is funny! Maybe this is why he resents the term dead-pan - with dead-pan acting I always find that the humour comes out of the lack of emotion in circumstances, even the emotional ones. Maxwell seems not to eliminate emotions, just to focus on one and present that one in a simple and unconfused way. However, I must say honestly that by the end of the film I did start to get a little tired of the style. Maybe it was because I was watching a rather dodgy recording and wasn’t experiencing it live…but I did feel that these ideas which I have just mentioned did seem to be repeated throughout the play and the alternative acting style which I at first found humorous because of their absurdity, I by the end found much less funny, almost boring.
 
Anyway I’m going to toodle off and write my scene…and maybe my writing and performance essay…funfunfun! See you party people on Monday!
 
x x x naomi x x x

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