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I N T E R D I S C I P L I N A R Y I N S I G H T S

Theatre studies is reinventing itself. In an interview he gave to Insights, Professor

Jürgen Schläder insisted that the discipline is the real home of media studies. For

him, theatre is the only truly three-dimensional art form, and the boundaries between

drama, music theatre, dance, performance art, fi lm and digital media are becoming less

distinct. He and his colleagues at the LMUexcellent-sponsored research center “Sound

and Movement“ identify the combination and confrontation of sound and movement as

the defi ning characteristic of innovative and experimental theatre today.

Insights: Like Art History, Theatre Studies has the reputation of being something for the

cultured daughters of the well-to-do: interesting and edifying, but of no real use whatever.

Why should anyone study the subject?

Jürgen Schläder: Because the discipline has changed radically. Theatre Studies, like Art

History, began as a historical science. But this emphasis has shifted. With the rapid expan-

sion of experimental approaches to theatre over the past 20 years, the theory and aesthetics

of theatre now overshadow the historical component. One must remember that the subject

initially developed within a context in which theatre was seen primarily as enacted litera-

ture.

Thanks to the growing prominence of the director − especially here in Germany − the

practice of theatre has become an art form with its own history, its own aesthetic values

and its own theoretical foundation. Its immediacy means that theatre is always a contempo-

rary art. Even the stuffi est production that slavishly follows old-fashioned modes of staging

is contemporary. That’s why theatre studies can bring us closer to modern realities than

branches of scholarship that focus on other artistic genres. Something new is happening

in theatre. We no longer consider it from a purely historical viewpoint, as many spectators

have realized.

Insights: So theory has become a central concern of theatre studies. What kinds of theoreti-

cal approaches have been developed, and how are they changing the nature of the discipline?

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T H E Q U E S T I O N S W E R E P U T B Y M A X I M I L I A N G . B U R K H A R T

A L L T H E W O R L D ’ S A S T A G E ?

insightLMU RESEARCH

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Schläder: We now focus more on constructing theoretical models of the theatrical perfor-

mance itself, and this involves making use of insights from many areas of cultural studies.

The whole spectrum of discourse and deconstructionist theories has been very fruitful in

theatre studies, because discourses in the theatre occur in three modes: speech, move-

ment and setting. The spectator must take in the information conveyed in all these modes

at once, and then relate them to one another. This becomes a very complex task, if you are

not told how you should relate these levels to each other, in other words, when you are

left to choose between multiple interpretations – left in the typically postmodern state of

ambivalence.

Insights: But these are questions in which Lessing and, after him, the early Romantics were

intensely interested. So, what’s new?

Schläder: We approach these issues by focusing on the momentary event itself, rather

than on the process of translating a text into a specifi c set of meanings. Nowadays, mul-

tivalency is a given. Earlier dramatists worked synthetically, relating disparate elements

to each other. In the 19th century, a single character was the focus of attention. By means

of demeanour, costume, gesture, speech, movement in stage space, this central character

projected a synthesized illusion of a living reality. With the reform of theatrical practice in the

early 20th century, the various components involved in staging a theatrical event became

more differentiated and diverse − and they have since become even more distinct. Contem-

porary theatre is much less concerned with creating a convincing illusion than was Lessing

or Schiller or even a dramatist of the late 19th century. Ours is a theatre that is more inter-

ested in exploring the material possibilities of the medium itself. Each of the various modes

of expression tends towards a life of its own, and it is the responsibility of the spectator,

rather than the director, to put the pieces of the puzzle together.

When Richard Wagner conceived and staged “The Ring of the Nibelungs”, the audience

was left in no doubt what to make of the production. When a contemporary director brings

Wagner’s “Ring” to the stage today, it is not at all clear what the take-home message is

meant to be. You have a choice of interpretations. What you think of such a production, at

whatever level and from whatever angle, depends on your prior knowledge of the piece,

your cultural horizons and your own range of experience. The modern spectator is there-

fore faced with a far greater challenge.

Insights: That sounds like what Friedrich Nietzsche attacked as the “intellectual abstrac-

tions of Socratism“ in “The Birth of Tragedy“. Does this entire theoretical superstructure

not rob drama of its instinctual, emotional − what Nietzsche calls its “Dionysian” − quality?

Are we on the way to a purely Apollonian, theoretical theatre?

Schläder: No, certainly not. The problem is that we convert representation into confi gura-

tions of events and instead of semantic structures we focus on modes of presentation, but

also on emergent effects – unforeseen and overwhelming emotional reactions. The problem

is that such emergences cannot be dissociated from the purely subjective and uniquely

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personal realm, and simply

translated into a scientifi c dis-

course. If that were possible,

we would have a different sort

of theatre. We cannot treat

such emergences as arbitrarily

interchangeable parameters

that can be plugged into a scien-

tifi c theory; therefore they can-

not be planned in the context

of a staging concept. We must

acknowledge the primacy of

the Dionysian element.

Insights: If emergent experi-

ence cannot be objectivized

and subsumed into a theoretical model, does this not make a farce of the claim of theatre

studies to be scientifi c?

Schläder: One must be careful about what kinds of statements one can legitimately make

about an art form. Of course there are always ways of complementing the purely cognitive

perception of a theatrical spectacle with the emotional experience it produces. It is a per-

fectly respectable scientifi c procedure to present different possible interpretations side by

side, provided each has been tested and found to be logically plausible and compatible with

the observations. We no longer seek a single irrefutable model. The scientifi c merit of the

endeavour lies in the production of a catalogue of explanatory possibilities.

Insights: Your LMUexcellent-sponsored project is entitled “Sound and Movement“. Why

did you choose this name?

Schläder: The contemporary theatre productions are characterized by a blurring of the

boundaries between genres − drama, music theatre, dance, performance art, fi lm and digi-

tal media are becoming less and less distinct. All the scholars involved in our project would

argue that the defi ning characteristic of contemporary experimental theatre is the inter-

action of sound and movement. And sound need not mean music. This represents a very

signifi cant paradigm change. Up until the mid 1980s, every theatre production, whether or

not it was explicitly based on a text, provided a text-based channel of communication with

the audience. These days, the text − it may be there or not − may be enunciated or projected

onto the scenery. The text, like many other traditional components of theatrical performance,

has been reduced to insignifi cance. What has replaced the text is the interplay of the per-

formers’ actions with noises or musical processes that emotionally underline or formally

structure the performance. Sound and Movement in combination, this interrelation, is the

central common feature of experimental theatre today.

“When Richard Wagner conceived and staged “The Ring of the Nibelungs“, the audi-

ence was left in no doubt what to make of the production,” says Jürgen Schläder.

“When a contemporary director brings Wagner’s “Ring” to the stage today, it is

not at all clear what the take-home message is meant to be. You have a choice of

interpretations.”

The picture shows “The Ring of the Nibelung II”, choreography: Johann Kresnik,

scenery: Gottfried Helnwein, performed at the Opera Bonn, 2008.

Source: helnwein.de

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Insights: Theatre studies then takes on the status of a media science?

Schläder: That is precisely my own view! Nowhere can one better study the interplay between

different media than in the theatre. Nowhere can we observe at closer quarters how they act

on one another. I always say that theatre is the only three-dimensional art form. It is at once

real and unreal, because it takes place immediately in front of us and is at the same time

fi ctional or virtual, if you will.

Insights: Young people today spend much of their time in cyberspace, where they have

access to fi ctional worlds that invite them to experience and exploit a whole range of me-

dia simultaneously. In the theatre on the other hand, the spectator is forced into the role

of passive consumer. Can theatre offer the same kind of openness, or will the new media

ultimately make it obsolete?

Schläder: That depends on what one expects from theatre. If one regards the theatre solely

as a place of entertainment, then I would, with certain reservations, agree that its days are

numbered. But then every virtual reality inevitably has a theatrical quality. Each projects

an illusion of three-dimensional space, which the protagonist is invited to enter. But you

are not really in that “other” world, you need an avatar to act for you there. It is possible

to create virtual environments so convincingly that there is essentially nothing that betrays

their illusory nature. But I fi rmly believe that nobody is merely a collection of emotionally

determined, almost automatic, mechanical responses. People have an intrinsic capacity to

refl ect on what they are doing. Theatre is constantly breaking the bounds of the illusions it

works to establish, and the spectator is constantly being challenged to recognize these as

such, and to grasp their implications. The interactive relationship between theatrical illu-

sion and spectator is not a matter of provoking him to act in the fi ctional world presented

to him, but to refl ect on the meanings it suggests, and the insights that emerge from these

refl ections. This is above all a cultural process.

Insights: What exactly is avant-garde theatre today? Can you give us a concrete example?

Schläder: At the Salzburger Festival in 2009, Katie Mitchell staged a new production of

Luigi Nono’s “Al gran sole carico d’amore“ (“In the Bright Sun Laden with Love”), which

was really something entirely new! This azione scenica deals with the fates of fi ve women

who were caught up in fi ve of the revolutions that have punctuated modern history. Each

of these characters has her own stage space, but there are also several camera teams, a

huge orchestra and a large chorus on stage. And the audience can follow on a screen an

edited version of what the cameras are recording on stage − edited live. In other words, the

spectators are watching a fi lm that is not a fi lm. It is not a fi lm because it is not a fi nished

cut, it is put together anew at every performance. The audience is attending a stage produc-

tion that is not a stage production, because the action on stage simply provides the setting

for the fi lm. And all of this is emotionally amplified by the contributions of the orchestra

and chorus. The real “author“ of this piece is the fi lm editor, the cutter. This is theatre as

we have never seen it before. The fascinating thing is that traditional forms of presentation

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lose their conventional functions or take on new

ones, but – and this is the crucial point – none of

them can work without the others. This instanta-

neous variability of modes of perception is only

made possible by the wizardry of technology.

Insights: A realization of that dream of the

Baroque: all the world’s a stage!

Schläder: Exactly! But it is not just a Baroque

theme. Ever since Plato’s Parable of the Cave,

we have been engaged in an endless and end-

lessly inconclusive debate on the question of

whether there is a greater, eternal reality beyond

the reach of our senses, which we can at best

briefl y intuit. Or is reality only “there” when we

take notice of it?

Insights: Are modern approaches to theatre

production not also marked by a trend towards

what one might defi ne as pornographic overspecifi cation? Theatre now puts everything,

literally everything, onto the stage. In modern productions, everything is revealed, exposed.

Nothing is left to the spectator’s imagination. Why should that be considered revolutionary?

Schläder: An interpretation that makes use of technologically generated effects produces

multifarious images. And the diversity of these images creates what may be called an inner

substance. Everywhere you look, you see something else. And the idea that you will be

able to take in everything set before you is a pipedream. But every time you attend such a

production, you experience a different performance. And that is a very considerable gain,

because the dramatic construct realized on stage mirrors the three-dimensional plasticity

of real life.

Insights: Is all this not asking too much of an audience? Surely they are looking for clear

and simple messages. Does postmodern theatre really work or does it just leave the public

behind?

Schläder: At present it certainly fails to reach large sections of the public. But art has al-

ways had to counter the accusation that its supposed innovations are banal. The spectator

must learn how to approach it. We too have had to go through a learning process.

Insights: But isn’t there a danger here? If we follow Nietzsche’s lead, and we dispense with

the ethical dimension of theatre and its claim to relate to everyday reality, do we not reach a

state of “anything goes”? How can postmodern theatre avoid this trap? On the one hand, it

risks drifting into arbitrariness, on the other that of degenerating into instrumentalization.

Julia Wieninger and Laura Sundermann in “Al gran sole

carico d’amore” from Luigi Nono, staged by Katie Mitchel,

Salzburg Festival 2009.

Source: Stephen Cummiskey

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Prof. Dr. Jürgen Schläder has been Professor of Theatre Studies (Music Theatre) at LMU since 1987.

He is Director of the interdisciplinary research center ”Sound and Movement“, which is supported by the

High Potential Fund, a program established by the institutional strategy LMUexcellent

to promote novel research projects and methods.

www.theaterwissenschaft.lmu.de/mitarbeiter/professoren/schlaeder

profdrjschlaeder@gmx.de

For more information on the research project „Sound and Movement“, please have a look at our ScienceCast on iTunes

U. ScienceCasts present unusual insights into the world of science. In these short videos, some of the most renowned

academics at LMU present fascinating aspects of their research in a readily understandable way.

Schläder: Raising the admonitory fi nger would, without question, be the worst option.

Scholars of the theatre have not done a very good job of making their insights accessible

to the theatre-going public. However, people who are interested in the arts are actually

grateful for assistance and orientation in how to approach artistic productions that they

are unable to grasp on fi rst encounter. But at present there is no agreed catalogue of cri-

teria, no handbook for the aesthetic assessment of theatre. We have yet to fi nd satisfactory

answers to the problems raised by the fact that the degree of multivalence of the material

has increased so much, and that so many modes of expression are now being exploited for

dramatic purposes. This is something that is truly modern, and modernity poses a severe

challenge to all of us.