Ref: BA 2010-2011
Carly Main
Can Choreography Replace Text?
An Investigation into Dance being used as a
progressive tool in Musical Theatre.
This Independent Project is submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements
for
Module IPR6: Independent Project
Supervisor: Victoria Stretton
Trinity Laban
06/06/2011
Table of Contents
Abstract……………………………………………………………………………………………… Page 3
Chapter 1: Overture………………………………………………………………………………. Page 4
Chapter 2: Fashions………………………………………………………………………………. Page 4
Chapter 3: Creatives……………………………………………………………………………… Page 6
Chapter 4: Limitless……………………………………………………………………………… Page 7
Chapter 5: Interpretations……………………………………………………………………… Page 8
Chapter 6: In Contrast…………………………………………………………………………… Page 9
Chapter 7: Finale………………………………………………………………………………….. Page 11
Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………….... Pages 13-15
2
CAN CHOREOGRAPHY REPLACE TEXT?
An Investigation into Dance being used as a progressive tool in Musical Theatre.
Abstract
Dance is a communicative device, and has been since long before the birth of human
civilisation. Paintings from at least as far back as 3000 BC depict movement rituals. 1
Musical Theatre traces back to Ancient Greece, where the stage productions included
music and movement. In the current Musical Theatre industry, though, dance is used
scarcely to specifically communicate, and is more and more becoming a means of purely
entertaining an audience. The focus of the following research is in the area of dance in
Musical Theatre, and whether it can still be implemented as a progressive feature. The
research approach adopted in this Independent Project includes relevant literature,
online databases, consulting a cross section of people, and culminates in a practical
performance alongside this dissertation which demonstrates my findings more
academically.
This project produced a number of findings, providing evidence that, currently, although
there definitely is dance that advances the plot of Musical Theatre productions, this is not
how movement is most commonly used in this context. My research showed that the
peak time for dance to mean most lay with the role of director-choreographer, which is
now an almost unheard-of role, and definitely does not exist in the West End of London.
The conclusion I can draw from my studies is that, fortunately or unfortunately, although
there are different scales and spectrums to measure how far a piece of dance can affect a
narrative, ultimately it must boil down to opinion and personal preference. My research
however argues for a return to the attitude of director-choreographer from the current
choreographer – an attitude that uses dance thoughtfully and precisely, with knowledge
behind the movement, to ensure that instead of receiving “audience approval… [One
can] work for audience enlightenment.2
1
2
http://www.historyworld.net/wrldhis/PlainTextHistories.asp?historyid=ab82
Garebian, Keith. The Making of West Side Story. (Oxford; Mosaic Press, 1998), p16.
3
Overture
Musical Theatre is defined as “a play or film whose action and dialogue is interspersed
with singing and dancing”3. In other words, an art form that combines spoken word,
song, music, and dance. The ratio of these different aspects however, can fluctuate
greatly. My focus is going to be on the dance element of Musical Theatre. It is the
discipline that can fall out of the equation and not affect whether the show still counts
as “Musical Theatre”. Without music and songs, a musical becomes a play. Without
acting, a musical becomes a concert. Without dance… a musical is still a musical.
Choreography is as much of a creative outlet as singing and acting (“Choreographers are
special people”4!), and it seems odd that this should be the case. Young professionals in
Musical Theatre training have, customarily, more hours of dance than singing, acting,
theory or voice – why should it be that after graduating, having spent this time on
movement; it could be perfectly feasible that one never dances in a job?
My aim for this Independent Project is to illustrate my experiments around my chosen
title of ‘Can Choreography Replace Text?’ For the performance element I have taken
backing accompaniments of songs from musicals that have a moving or meaningful
lyric, and attempted to portray these lyrics through the medium of dance alone. I feel
this should be something extremely plausible in the modern Musical Theatre world,
but unfortunately is often overlooked.
Fashions
Through my research into various approaches to Musical Theatre dance, I have
noticed that there are certain varying methods. I have been able to break down the
styles of choreographed numbers in musicals in order to define five different fashions.
There is the plot advancing type – in that without the sequence, the story would be
missing something. Examples of this might be the opening, and in fact most of West
Side Story – “what theatre historian Richard Kislan calls a breakthrough ‘movementconceived musical’”5, the dream ballet in Oklahoma! or ‘Angry Dance’ from Billy Elliot.
There is the validating form – where the choreography is adding something to what
3
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/musical+theater
Humphrey, Doris. The Art of Making Dances. (London; Dance Books Ltd, 1987), p26.
5
Garebian, The Making of West Side Story, p13.
4
4
has been said – like ‘Painting by Heart’ from Betty Blue Eyes, the races in Starlight
Express, ‘Whipped into Shape’ from Legally Blonde or ‘Juggernaut’ from The Wild
Party6. There is the accompanying approach – where the moves complement the
music and lyrics – for example, most of the movement in Love Never Dies, ‘I’d Do
Anything’ from Oliver!, the wedding waltz in Les Miserables, or ‘Something Better
Than This’ from Sweet Charity. (Many “think that choreography is simply a matter of putting
movement to music, which makes music the starting point. This incorrectly puts the onus on music
to be the initiating agent whereas movement itself is the true core of dance.”7) There is the
juxtaposition of choreography to songs, where the dance purposely goes against
what has been said – for instance, Chicago, where a serene, beautiful number is
performed whilst a hanging is referred to. And there is the unessential choreography
– not necessarily a bad thing, but the moves mean nothing in terms of the show, the
choreography could be put to any music of that tempo and have as much meaning as
it does in its current context – dance for the sake of dance. Michael Bennett and Bob
Avian, the partnership that were responsible for the choreography in Company, Follies,
A Chorus Line and Dreamgirls (all Broadway) stated when being interviewed that they
fought “like crazy against ever doing a dance that could be cut just because it is an
extra beat in a musical… ‘okay, its time to bring the dancers on’…”8 Shows like 42nd
Street 9, Crazy for You and The Rocky Horror Picture Show have contained this kind of
choreography.
“To paraphrase William Strunk, Jr.: a dance should have no unnecessary parts; this
requires not that the choreographer make all his dances short nor that he avoid all detail, but that
every movement tell (Strunk, Elements of Style, p17).”10 However, the most popular styles of
dance to be incorporated into contemporary Musical Theatre shows seem to be the
validating and accompanying sorts; perhaps these, along with the unessential style of
creating dance, take least background and collaboration work. This is another valid
6
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YERYu7toqMk&feature=fvst
Blom, Lynne Anne and L. Tarin Chaplin. The Intimate Act of Choreography. (London; Dance Books Ltd,
1989), p161.
8
Mclee Grody, Svetlana and Dorothy Daniels Lister. Conversations with Choreographers. (Portsmouth;
Heinemann, 1996), p97.
9
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5rCPKY-9zs
10
Blom and Chaplin, The Intimate Act of Choreography, p13.
7
5
point regarding Musical Theatre choreography – who has the final say in what should
be essentially included?
Creatives
Roles of the creative team in any Musical Theatre production are often
blended, blurred and combined in a variety of ways. If the musical direction interferes
with any dramatic choices, the director can step in; if the choreography is hindering
the vocal work, the musical director can step in; sometimes the director is also the
choreographer; and so on. The choreographer can simply be the individual there to
create steps to be performed to music –“the choreographer’s primary function is
defining and supplying the specialized movement needs of the entire project”11 – but
is this the way to go about making truly contemporary pieces of work? Or, instead,
should the choreographer’s relationship with both the director and musical director
(not to mention the lighting designer in the later stages) be an intimate one – to
enable an absolute understanding of what is required from each dance number, in
order to ensure the movement will progress the plot adequately. This only became a
received notion after Oklahoma!, and even though that step was made, it is still more
of a common phenomenon in current Musical Theatre for the choreography – and
sometimes even the music – to have no relation to the show it features in, and be a
straightforward aside. The role of Director-Choreographer was popular from the late
1950’s through to the 1980’s; with figures like Jerome Robbins, Gower Champion12,
Bob Fosse and Tommy Tune13 taking the helm, many shows successfully made their
debut – Fiddler on the Roof, Hello Dolly, 42nd Street, Sweet Charity, Pippin, Chicago,
Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, Nine, and Grand Hotel14 in amongst far more, but as
Musical Theatre continued to evolve, the position became often disbanded into two
responsibilities once again, and now it is rarely seen.
Look at the limited run shows that have recently been on in London (assuming
limited run is defined as anything booking for less than a year). The 25th Annual
Putnam County Spelling Bee, showing at the Donmar Warehouse, contained
11
Berkson, Robert. Musical Theatre Choreography. (London; A&C Black, 1990), p6.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0UoFogBFIU
13
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZVE_sVcQaaM
14
http://www.musicals101.com/dancestage3.htm
12
6
movement that was not linked into the plot. The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, showing at
the Gielgud, contained a mambo with balloons that meant nothing to the show as a
whole. South Pacific is coming to the Barbican, and is fully expected to contain the
nostalgic, ‘lovely’ dancing that harks back to when it was staged by Josh Logan in
1958. It will be extremely interesting to see the new adaptation of Crazy for You
coming to Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre at the end of July, as the original
production contained dance for dance’s sake15. When Stephen Mear (the
choreographer on the production) did Sweet Charity, the moves were not related to
the plot much at all; however Crazy For You has more scope for this concept than
Sweet Charity did, and Mear’s past work shows that it is within his functioning as a
choreographer to devise dance that is essential to a story – his co-choreographing on
Mary Poppins, some of The Little Mermaid16 as well – and his work on the TV show So
You Think You Can Dance (UK)17. His input to Shoes the Musical shows it to its greatest
level – the choreography does not so much advance the plot as define it; Shoes not
having a storyline as such, what the writers have done is mark up a history and insight
into many different varieties of footwear. The dancers portray the personalities of
shoes and of those who wear them, illustrate important events on the shoe timeline,
evoke certain emotions regarding the wearing or purchasing specific types of shoes,
and remind the audience of certain figures who were memorable in the shoe world.
Mears and the five co-choreographers have done some genius work, and the dancing
in the show is the absolute focus of it – the sun, around which the rest of the
production rotates.
Limitless
Choreography is such an immensely intrusive, intuitive and interesting subject
because there are less fixed factors to build from than with singing, or acting.
“The choreographer is in a unique position. While the director has the existing dialogue to
represent, the music director has the established score to reproduce… the choreographer is
merely given an indication of the content which his work is to convey.”18 There is in fact an
15
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDJ6XFgze5M
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DUXVAg7oWg
17
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfK6Wm4QoNw
18
Berkson, Musical Theatre Choreography, p12.
16
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interminable aspect involved, from the very beginning. For the performer as well:
singing has fixed lyrics, melody – bar riffs -, and techniques and emotions are
changeable. Acting has a set script, and one would develop around the given
circumstances and outside affecters to find character and depth. All a dancer has –
and the choreographer must find the journey – is the set diameter of the stage on
which he or she has to work (“the stage or arena that contains the dance has connotations all
its own. There are certain places on the stage that are stronger, others that are intimate… theater
people are acutely aware of the innuendoes of stage placement”19) and the music – although
even that is sometimes removed from the equation as well – look at the Oz Dust
Ballroom scene in Wicked. There is no limit to steps, shapes, and sequences when it
comes to the world of Dance; there isn’t a fixed amount of moves, or a limit as to what
one can do with their body. The possibilities are, literally, endless. It is therefore
interesting that most Musical Theatre choreography sticks to such a traditional
template. In the dance world people like Akram Khan, Daniel Linehan and the
Rambert Company are creating innovative and original and thought provoking pieces
of work; the evolution of dance is clearly noticeable and identifiable. With Musical
Theatre, the landscape just seems so much smaller. Shoes showed a hint of the gravity
that Musical Theatre choreography could carry – but the fact is that Shoes employed
performers who were specifically highly skilled in dance, not triple threat performers,
and the show played its run at Sadlers Wells – a venue known universally for putting
on not Musical Theatre, but dance works. It even describes itself as “London’s dance
house”20.
Interpretation
Everybody knows Agnes de Mille to have changed the face of Musical Theatre
choreography forever with her work on Oklahoma!. She made American dance
history.21 In the 1943 Broadway original by Rodgers and Hammerstein, directed by
Rouben Mammoulian, de Mille – particularly in the dream ballet sequence –
successfully integrated dance into the plot of the show22, which had never been done
19
Blom and Chaplin, The Intimate Act of Choreography, p52.
http://www.sadlerswells.com/page/about-us
21
http://www.agnesdemilledances.com/biography.html
22
http://www.neh.gov/news/humanities/2004-09/robbins.html
20
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up to that point. “The dream ballet… was not an interpolation or a special show-piece… It was
an integral part of the action.”23 Jerome Robbins only took this further – having learnt
from her as a performer in Oklahoma!; he would, according to Maya Dalinsky, “go on
to make musicals where… the dancing moved the plot as much as the lyrics.” 24 This is
the crux of what this project investigates. In a show like Robbins’ West Side Story, one
could watch the choreography against the music, with no lyrics and no scenes, from
start to finish, and still be able to accurately interpret the show: “…dance told much of
the story, dance revealed character, dance incarnated the tragedy. And it did all this by breaking
down the usual boundaries among song, drama, and movement.”25 At the other end of the
spectrum, shows like Les Miserables and Into the Woods contain little to no movement
whatsoever. This of course, is not necessarily to their detriment – clearly, as Les
Miserables has passed the 25 year mark with flying colours (and remains my favourite
show of all time despite its lack of dance).
Richard Kislan writes that “dance symbols can be as effective as language or
music symbols for dramatic communication. What sets dance apart is the universality
in movement and gesture which is not bound like language to nationality or culture.
Dance transcends geography in a way that language cannot. Dance humanizes
expression in a way that music cannot.”26 This is genuinely what I believe, and why I
feel so strongly about this project. “I see no reason against, and many for, an amalgamation
of the spoken, sung or chanted word with movement.”27 I do not believe dance should
replace lyrics and text in Musical Theatre – the performance part of this project is
simply the biggest gesture I feel I can make: while I could have found instrumental
numbers from shows, or even instrumental breaks between lyrics in Musical Theatre
songs, and choreographed to this music, I felt that to remove lyrics and choreograph
to a lyricised song would demonstrate my thesis more distinctly.
In Contrast
“The blunt fact of the matter is that subject matter is mostly of concern to the
choreographer, and whether it takes the form of narrative, symbolism or a conviction about style,
23
Garebian, The Making of West Side Story, p15.
http://www.neh.gov/news/humanities/2004-09/robbins.html
25
Garebian, The Making of West Side Story, p14.
26
Kislan, Richard. The Musical: A Look at American Musical Theater. (London; Applause Books, 1996.)
27
Humphrey, The Art of Making Dances, p125.
24
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is of no importance; the enthusiasm for it and innate talent is what keeps it alive...”28 Despite my
thesis, I also believe this statement to be partly true – although I don’t feel the
message behind this is executed on West End stages, where for justifiable reasons the
team are sometimes more wrapped up in the spectacle the audience must see
(demonstrated by Wicked, which is sponsored by Universal). If the choreography has a
plot advancing meaning behind it, even to the choreographer only, that has to be
enough, because audiences interpret everything differently. I tested the dances I
created for the practical segment of this essay on audiences who did not know the
storylines of the songs (and sometimes the shows as well) that I was performing to,
taking a cross section of 30 people. Five people were completely dispassionate
towards Musical Theatre, five were less detached from it but could not describe
themselves as regular theatre goers, five did describe themselves as exactly that, five
had indirect links to Musical Theatre (whether it be a family member, part of their
vocation), five were involved in Musical Theatre directly (as a vocation, be it the
performance, creative or analytical side), and five were involved even more so in
specifically dance (be it dance performance, choreography, or teaching). Although
most were able to identify correctly what I was trying to say, some saw very different
narratives emerging. For instance, the choreography I created to “I’ve Been” from
Next to Normal, in my mind – and to most of my test audience, demonstrates the
struggle of a husband and wife, the latter of who is struggling with bipolar. Using the
open question ‘From watching this dance, what do you think the song is about?’ feeling that closed questions would be too leading - I had each test member write
down what they thought the choreography depicted. Although 27 people were not
able to specifically pick out bipolar, most at least could tell me one spouse was on
medication, usually guessing they suffered from depression. However, one audience
member determined a divorce. Not opposite ends of the spectrum at all, as in the
number I make references to wedding rings and have a strong theme of removal and
frustration, but not what I hoped to portray, as Dan still loves Diana unquestionably.
This person was under the bracket of not having any affiliation with Musical Theatre,
and so I do not take this as a defeat of any kind – the more you are involved with a
28
Humphrey, The Art of Making Dances, p27.
10
subject matter, the greater your understanding of that subject is bound to be.
Although I made sure that Next to Normal was unknown to all 30 of them, the more of
a link the test audience members had with Musical Theatre, the more accurate and
elaborate their descriptions got, shown by receiving the analysis “husband and wife
divorce” from one person uninvolved in Musical Theatre, watching or performing, and
on the other hand having a dance student single out specific movements and analyse
their separate meaning as well as their meaning in the piece – which is ideal, but
fruitless to expect of a full audience watching a West End show. If I were to repeat this
experiment, I would take a song with a less complex storyline, and attempt to
choreograph for the non Musical Theatre goer, as I believe it is entirely possible for
anybody to understand dance – but different categories of people, each with separate
outside influences, will determine things somewhat differently. This is something a
choreographer needs to think about when beginning a show – who is the market
audience they are communicating to? Is this a show for families (shows like Shrek),
teenagers and young adults (like Spring Awakening) or the slightly older (Betty Blue
Eyes)? How commercial is the show; will it be something that only appeals to those
involved in Musical Theatre already (shows by Jason Robert Brown or William Finn) or
may somebody who has never set foot in a theatre attend this show (like Wicked)? The
more answers that can be gauged from questions like these, the more appropriate the
movement can be.
Finale
As long as there is existence, there is evolution. Therefore we must hope to see
far more evolved movement come to the stages showing Musical Theatre than the
current scope of choreography that is being displayed. Starting this project with it in
mind to be a wholly practical piece, I have found that instead twinning the practical
element with this dissertation has ultimately assisted and developed my own
choreography, within this module and separately from it. I hope that across this
Independent Project I have made it very clear that I am not questioning the calibre of
the literal steps in Musical Theatre dance. I am questioning the thought behind these
said steps; the story being told through them (or lack of…). It is ultimately difficult to
grasp a solid reason why, when there are so many capable, innovative creators of
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movement, there seems to be a divide drawn between those who create dance and
those who create dance for Musical Theatre. There are more stories being told
completely mute under the dance spectrum than there are being told only partly mute
in West End and fringe theatres. The graduates emerging from Musical Theatre
studies get more and more talented every year due to the demand there is in the
current climate, where we are in excess of talented Musical Theatre performers. There
is no reason to believe that the auditionees to be successful in their efforts to land a
part in shows could not cope with the skill necessary to execute plot advancing
choreography in a thoughtful and illuminating manner, as Keith Garebian notes –
after the making of shows like West Side Story, performers “are required to have a
higher level of proficiency than ever before”29. Irrevocably, I have to believe that
somewhere along the line in the future development of Musical Theatre,
choreography will eventually prevail as just as strong a tool for advancing the plot of
musicals as the other elements.
29
Garebian, The Making of West Side Story, p23.
12
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13
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