Sitrep 2

 Scott Magelssen contends with the ways performers might come into harm as a result of the ways training for theatre manifests, and even the nature of the material might impact the performer. Even in the play that we had to go over this week, A Street Car named Desire, places the actors in situations of violence and confronting less than pleasant experiences. Under the assumption that theatre and art can be a means and vessel of good, and the greater assumption that performers need to suffer for their art at a certain capacity. "The idea, here, of what Jeremy Bentham would call “the greatest good for the greatest number” is paramount (Thebes and Denmark are restored to order), but the principal characters in serious drama must be the sacrificial surrogates that effect the happiness of the culture, and even then, only for the small elite class they represent (McMahon 7, citing Bentham)" (Magelssen, 21).  Is the assumption that we have about the nature of of theatre is that it is consequentialist in nature, such as Utilitarianism, where ultimately that the focus of suffering in the story is needed to bring the most good to the view of audience in spite of the suffering of the characters or people that in habit that role and space?

"We are all, to put it baldly, complicit in a coercive system of actor suffering. We cherish our actors as surrogates for our trauma. The more we as audiences see the actor experiencing real precarity, the more we value their performance, even if we perceive they are being overtaken emotionally by their character. We celebrate the idea that pain builds character. We idealize the figure of the romantic (and starving) artist and beatify those we’ve lost to mental illness—who’ve made the greatest sacrifice to give us the art we value. We’re unaware of or slow to change the institutionalized structures putting our acting students at risk. We must, though, seek ways to better enable our actors and their allies to intervene in situations where they may be harmed in an acting exercise, in a performance, or in situations where accumulated emotional labor and distress over time are overwhelming" (Magelssen, 29). The major assumption here, as with any endeavor in life, is that pain is needed for some kind of growth. Facing something you don't want to admit that you've done or think about, exercising to manage your health and body, or even learning something new can be described as pain. As suffering. In an attempt to make suffering not just palatable, but also manageable for the sake of a higher purpose. Would this lesson, shifting towards the audience when it comes to suffering in art, be a consideration that would be beneficial to shift the conversation away of suffering in dramatic works being determined? Exposure to harm is an important conversation to keep, but how much of the pedgagogy of designated harm is placed solely in dynamic between actor and script? Would having a Wizard-behind-the-Curtain approach to the dramatics would help alleviate the growing pains of theatre as a painful endeavor?  

The affect is a discussion that would have interesting ramifications. The goal of any work of art or literature would be to affect the viewer, in some cases to promote critical thought about the life, institutions, and a host of other topics. But the paradox occurs when the work is too impactful. It the text remains on the mind for too long, then nothing else exists besides the text, and people can't go on with their lives and invoke a productive self of change. The nature of these works, it seems is that to be trapped on a delicate tightrope of being remembered but also to be forgotten and integrated. If the work is remembered too fondly, we might reach a Star Wars level of reading, where the points and critique is lost on the world building and character work. And if the work isn't remembered as fondly, the themes might exist in our minds long enough before adaptation takes over the present themes, like in Frankenstein or Dracula.