Creating Open Space

This is a subject dear to my heart. I've been taking inspiration from Open Space technology in my development of alternate methods of creating theater. The prevailing role of the "director" is a fairly recent construct when compared to what we know of ancient theatrical traditions (such as the Greeks). The conventional modern director is supposed to be the primary visionary who creates the context and provides the interpretation and rules by which a play is realized. If one approaches creating theater from the tact that those functions are rather to found within the actors - those who are, after all, the indispensable players in the process - and that the director's role is more facilitator than dictator, than some truly miraculous creative leaps can be made, leaving the actors with a far deeper sense of ownership of not only the performance but of the process itself.

However, this approach is wrought with challenges. Many actors, to my surprise, WANT to be told what to do much, if not all the time. They don't want to take responsibility and are not curious about their own process. Shaking, if not breaking, the entrenched expectations of their role is sometimes a monumental task requiring extraordinary ingenuity and guile. On the other side, there are many elements to the traditional director role that don't seem prove useful to shed (as of yet!).

What is so interesting to me and how this all applies to the overarching discussion is how applying the ideas of Open Space seems to reveal our true inclinations and attitudes, our genuine impulses and our relationship to our own creative wellspring - be it bereft, stifled or o'erflowing. To me this has been a place where great work is created, where deep, strong roots of community are formed, where diversity and individuality are reinforced and rewarded.

Thanks for spotlighting this phenomenon. I've been trying to tell people about the importance of long-form group improv comedy for years, but people often find it difficult to see the profound in the absurd- something reader's of 'Reality Sandwich' probably don't have such a hard time with!

I'll be intersted to check out Owen's book, it it sounds like he's formalized some of the same elements as have the geniuses of improv comedy, like Dell Close. Close developed something called the Harold form, which starts with a word from the audience, a group of improvisors riffs on it, they start new scenes at will, and then they bring back the disparate scenes into a climactic juxtaposition.

What's funny aren't the jokes, but the irruptions of complex meaning that expose new dimensions of relevant concepts. Decentralized imporovisation with a consciousness of integration generates amazing new things. Some times it works, and some times it doesn't- it's alive. And what comes in is greater than the sum of any parts. I'm convinced these new modalities are the way forward- and that the old individualism is dead. The schools for this 'comedic' knowledge, often tread by writers in NY and LA, are really a kind of mystery school for planetary consciousness, but shhhh... don't tell anybody! If your in NY or LA, the 'Upright Citizens Brigade' theatre has long form improv on Sunday nights, I think... they call it A.S.C.A.T.