NET Playhouse; 210; Open Theatre: The Serpent

- Transcript
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. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Not involved. I am a small person. I hold no opinions. I stay alive. I might might own affairs. I am a little man. I lead a private life. I stay alive.
I'm no assassin. I'm no resident. I don't know who did the killing. I stay alive. I keep out to take affairs. I am not a violent man. I am very sorry. I stay alive. I no longer live in the beginning. I've lost the beginning. I'm in the middle knowing neither the end nor the beginning. I'm in the middle coming from the beginning and going toward the end. I know who I am. I know who I'm. I know who I am. I know who I am.
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. . . . . . . . . . It may be but you won't know you at no until you eating How could you know if I eat and if I die will you die too if you die I shall die to Why do you want me to eat I want I want to know No no no you will know No, no. No, no. No, it's true, it's not my habit. Go, it's true, no, no. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I might do it. I might do it if God didn't know. You might. Might do it if God didn't know. But you want to do it. And he knows you want to. Is he crying? Only a crime. Is a crime. Is a crime only a crime. when you're caught. Shall I do what I want to do?
Yes, yes. And if what I want is to listen to God and not to use. Yes, yes. If you want to. If you want to. If you want to. If you want to. Yes. Yes. If you want to. Yes. Then I will eat. Because I want to. And he looked at the creatures in the garden. And at the ground. And at the wind. And she said I am not the same as these. And she began to examine her skin and her eyes and her ears and her nose and her mouth. And she began to examine her own mind.
And Eve went to Adam to persuade him to eat. But Adam said you have eaten of that which is forbidden and you shall die. Do you want me to eat and die too? But Adam ate. And he looked at the creatures in the garden. And at the ground. And at the wind and the water. And he said I am not the same as these. And he began to examine his skin and his eyes and his ears and his nose and his mouth. And he began to examine his own mind. And Adam could neither spit out the fruit nor could he swallow it. He could neither spit out the fruit nor could he swallow it. Where are you?
Why do you not enter me? I hear your voice in the garden and I am afraid. Before when you heard my voice you were not afraid yet now you are afraid. Because I am naked and I have eaten myself.
I told you you were naked. Have you eaten from the tree where I commanded you not to eat? So long as I was in the garden alone I should not fall into sin. But as soon as this woman came she tempted me and I ate. The tree where I commanded you not to eat.
It was a servant lord he tempted me and I ate. Why do they obey me and not you? Because you have done this. You are cursed over all animals upon your belly. You are cursed over all animals upon your belly. Because you have eaten of the tree where I commanded you not to eat. You are cursed over all animals upon your belly.
You are cursed over all animals upon your belly. You shall be made to think and the few of your thoughts will bring you sorrow and cause you to forget your exaltation. Now shall come a separation between the dreams inside your head and those things that you believe to be outside your head and the two shall walk within you. A cursed you shall be alone and whatever you shall think and whatever you shall see and hear you shall think and see it and hear alone henceforth shall you thirst after me. And in the day shall you endure the same longing as in the night and in the night shall you endure the same longing as in the day henceforth shall you thirst after me.
And your children shall live in fear of you and your children shall live in fear of me and your children shall live in fear of each other. A cursed you shall glimpse eaten all the days of your life but you shall not come again and if you should come. And in the end you shall not notice the earth but that you could not obey shall wax old the command laid upon you like a comet. Now shall come a separation between the dreams inside your head and those things that you believe to be outside your head. A cursed you shall not come by when your children are gone.
A cursed you shall be alone and whatever you shall see and hear alone henceforth shall you endure the same longing as in the night and in the night shall you endure the same longing as in the night. In the beginning anything is possible. I've lost the beginning. I'm in the middle knowing neither the end nor the beginning. I'm in the middle coming from the beginning and going toward the end. One lemon. Sometimes I try to imagine what it's like to be somebody else but it's always me pretending it has to be who else is there. I'm concerned because what you reject can still run your life. I hugged my child and sent him off to school with his lunch in a paper bag and I wished he would never come home.
I passed my friend on this dream. I passed quite near. I don't think she saw me but if she did I don't think she saw me see her. I think she thought if she saw me that I didn't see her. What? Lemon. It got exist to this through me and he will protect me because he owes his existence to me. Old stories have a secret. They are a prison. Someone is locked inside. Sometimes when it's very quiet I can hear him breathing. I can hear him breathing. Whatever I know. I know it without words. It was different when I was a child. I don't see any more bright colors. There are no solid blocks or familiar rooms. When asked I blamed it on the other person. It wasn't me I said it must have been her. I could have said it was me but I said it was her. My home was Cleveland. Then I came to New York and I didn't have to account to anybody. I slept with men. I slept with women. I smoked pot, hashish, opium.
I slept with a man and a woman at the same time but I'm a gentle person and I collapsed. I'm still a child. So am I. Sometimes people not at you and smile and you know they haven't heard. On a certain day one lemming starts to run. Another lemming seeing the first drops everything and starts to run too. Little by little all the lemmings run together for tens and hundreds of miles until they reach the cliff and they throw themselves into the sea. Now she'll come a separation inside your head and those things you believe to be out by your head and the two shall war within you. You would use your mind not to understand but to doubt and even if you should understand you will do doubt.
And it occurred to Cain to kill his brother but did not occur to Cain that killing his brother would cause his brothers down. And it occurred to Cain that killed his brother but it did not occur to Cain that killing his brother would cause his brothers down. And when they were cast out even Adam remembered me and he conceived in more Cain and she said, Lord I've gotten a man from the Lord and again Adam and he remembered me and he bore able and again she said, Lord I've gotten a man from the Lord. Then he had a dream and she ran and told it to Adam and he said, Lord I saw Adam's blood blow from Cain's mouth and wishing to divert an evil that might come Adam's separated Cain from Abel and Cain became a tiller of the ground and able a keeper of the sheep. And in time Cain offered unto the Lord a sacrifice of first fruits while his brother Abel offered a firstborn lamb. And the Lord had loved for Abel and for his offering but for Cain and for his offering the Lord had no respect. And Cain said, why did he accept your offer and not mine and Cain's face grew dark and his words were not pleasing to the Lord and Cain said,
Why did he accept your offer and not mine? There is no Lord, there is no judge and the Lord spoke within him and God said, if you will amend your ways I will forgive your anger. Yet even now the power of evil crouches at the door but it occurred to Cain that the world is created through goodness. Yet he saw that good deeds bear no fruit and God said, it depends on you whether you shall be master of a evil or evil over you. And Cain said, why did he accept your offering and not mine and it occurred to Cain that the world is ruled with an arbitrary power and Cain said, there is no Lord, there is no judge. Hell swatted he not accept my offering and yet accepted yours and it occurred to Cain to kill his brother but it did not occur to Cain that killing his brother would cause his brother death. And this was the manner Abel's death but Cain did not know how to kill and Cain struck at his brother and pulled his bones and broke them in turn. And this was the first murder and Cain said, if I were to spin your blood on the ground as you do the sheep, who would then demand it of me and Abel said, the Lord will demand it, the Lord will judge and Cain said, there is no Lord, there is no judge.
Hell swatted he except your offering and not accept mine, why yours, why not mine and it occurred to Cain to kill his brother but it did not occur to Cain that killing his brother would cause his brother's death. And this was the manner Abel's death but Cain did not know how to kill and Cain struck at his brother and pulled his bones and broke them in turn and Cain said, there is no Lord, there is no judge. Hell swatted he except your offering and not accept mine, why yours, why not mine and this was the first murder and it occurred to Cain to kill his brother but it did not occur to Cain that killing his brother would cause his brother's death. Hell swatted he except your offering and not accept mine, why yours, why not mine and it occurred to Cain that killing his brother would cause his brother's death.
Hell swatted he except your offering and not accept mine and it occurred to Cain that killing his brother would cause his brother's death. Hell swatted he except your offering and not accept mine and it occurred to Cain that killing his brother would cause his brother's death. Hell swatted he except your offering and not accept mine and it occurred to Cain that killing his brother would cause his brother's death.
Hell swatted he except your offering and not accept mine and it occurred to Cain that killing his brother would cause his brother's death. Hell swatted he except your offering and not accept mine and it occurred to Cain that killing his brother would cause his brother's death. Hell swatted he except your offering and not accept mine and it occurred to Cain that killing his brother would cause his brother's death. Hell swatted he except your offering and not accept mine and it occurred to Cain that killing his brother would cause his brother's death.
Hell swatted he except your offering and not accept mine and not accept mine and not accept mine and not accept mine. In the beginning anything is possible from the center I can choose to go anywhere but now the point toward which I have chosen to go has a line drawn between itself and the beginning. I no longer know the beginning. I'm in the middle. On a line between the beginning and a point toward which I chose to go. I have fewer choices now because when I change my direction the change can only start from a line already drawn. I'm collecting things. I'm buying plants and curtains with which to make a home. I'm buying things to make a good life.
When I was 13 I wanted a house of my own. The girl I was then would say to me now what have you done with your advantages? You could have married a rich man and had a big house instead of that you're a freak. My husband is in that coffin in the day he goes to work in the evening we discuss household matters and at night he climbs back into the coffin. Even if you sit and do nothing even so your back is strapped to a wheel and the wheel turns. They can't tell they can only approximate they can't tell when you're really dead not exactly not the exact moment. It's my husband he keeps me from it it's his fault he keeps me down holds me at his level I could be happy if it weren't for him. Open close separate movements stretched out fingers nails into skin no matter how I try these movements are not one there's a stop between open and close and between close and open.
No effort makes these two movements one close open close. You can see them having lunch their faces pale laughing their corpses laughing you can see them on the street combed and brushed their color pictures the men have killed each other. The king is dead he was shot in the head by an unknown assassin the men are dead and no man can say of work or land this is mine the men are dead we mourn them we are dead we mourn ourselves. If a bulldog ant is cut in two a battle starts between the tail and the head the head bites the tail the tail stings the head they fight until both halves are dead. So man created God what for to set limits on himself would my dreams recognize me would they come to me and say she's the one who imagined us.
I was queen over a country where the air was sweet we ate honey and fruit and at night it was quiet at the end even after the end even when the body is on its own a human being can make such a variety of sounds it's amazing. The field of dead men is loud teeth clack bones crack limbs twist and drop and the last sound of all is a loud trumpet of escaping wind. And Adam knew even knew Adam and this was the first time and Adam knew even knew Adam and this was the first time this was the first time and Adam lived 130 years and began a son in his own likeness and called his name set. And the days of Adam after he began to set were 800 years and he began sons and daughters and set lived 105 years and he began he lost and set lived after he began he lost eight hundred and seven years and he began sons and daughters.
And he lost lived 90 years and he began crying on and he lost lived after he began crying on 815 years and he began sons and daughters. And Kainan lived 70 years and began Mahalalil and Kainan lived after he began Mahalalil 840 years and he began son and daughter and Mahalal lived 65 years and he began jargon and Mahalal lived after he began jargon 830 years and he began sons and daughters. And Jordan lived on with 60 and two years and he began he knocked and Jordan lived after he began he knocked eight hundred years and he began sons and daughters. And he knocked lived 60 and five years and he began Methuselop and he knocked walk with God after he began Methuselop 300 years and he began sons and daughters.
And he knocked walk with God and he was knocked for God took him and Methuselop lived 180 years and seven and he began Lomick and Methuselop lived after he began Lomick 780 and two years and he began sons and daughters. And Lomick lived 180 and two years and he began a son and he called his name Noop and Lomick lived that he began Noop 519 years and he began sons and daughters. And the age of generations And the age of generations and the age of generations and the age of generations and the age of generations and the age of generations and The age of generations and the age of generations and the age of generations andvable is the unified,LEY 1040 years and in Shen iPhle interconnected with the And up, physically stabbed in.
us currently And these are the generations of Tehraku. Abraham May God I expect and gone. Jacob may win. The I'm in Paris, I'm Laura, I'm a farmer, I'm in Paris, I get ants, room and ants, room and got aura. And aura, I'm the guy that I'm mean to dup, I'm mean to dup, the guy's nice and nice and the guy's soul moon. And soul moon, we got balls of rock, hovin' balls, we got over the roof, and over to get jessie. And jessie, we got Dave, we got Dave, we got Dave, we got Salomon, her, and the wife of your eyes. And some, and some, and some, hey Music and aura. And his feet began to get messy and heайтесь.
Deal with my..." And he got your soul. And he ś And your sides began to check his eyes. Finally he breathed in about the time and they were carried away to Babbala. And after they were brought afoul check my dear horses. And he cries, to laugh. He heads for abouable. Para mi." Para mi." We're gonna dry today finish up This is sad here Bye this is sad he was I am a.. a.. a.. a.. a.. a.. a.. a.. you're not going to come back? I'm not. I'm not. I am. I'm not, I'm not. You're not. I'm not. Jessie, you're not going to come back. once in a while.
Mhm. Ops... The serpent typifies what is extraordinary about the open theater, but it made us anxious to know more about how they worked.
And so after this performance, we talked to the company, to the actors, to the directors to a shake in Roberta's car, and we talked to Jean-Claude Venatale, the playwright who had been a part of the company, about how the serpent had been created. It was conceived as a piece in which the actors would be priests in a sense, that there would be a feeling of oneness in the sense that the congregation feels that the priest is questioning the same sorts of things that they're questioning. I didn't come to the serpent until it was two months in progress, and my job then was how to put some of the impulses that the actors had, and the Joe had had concerning Genesis into a shape that would be meaningful to an audience and into words, because most of their original explorations were wordless.
It's an exploration of a feeling, or it's looking for a direction. The lines get rather blurred in terms of who's doing what. The actors suggest words or reject words, they have ideas about how something should look. Joe does the directing, and each word that's in the serpent is written by me, except for the begats which are still from the Bible. When the question becomes, how do you keep this excellent thing, which the actors have created, and keep it fresh and also give it enough of a shape, that it will be recognizable and that it will make the point that you want to make where you place it. One thing to do then is, of course, is to give it words, not necessarily to put words in a person's mouth, but to give, for instance, the words in an narration or in a chorus or different words to different actors. The word is one element, I think the most important element in terms of shaping an impulse. It's always the top of the iceberg, it's always what clicks everything else into place.
In the assassination sequence, as the crowd moves forward, the words are split up into syllables and into consonants and vowel sounds, and only finally does it come together as one whole chant. If you take each moment as you would like a cell in a honeycomb and consider that each moment, or each period of three minutes or five minutes or two minutes, is a whole new set of rules for the actors. In one period of time, they can use words that they've been given and another they cannot. In another period of time, they're on their own for 50 seconds to do what they will to an audience and so on. There's a point that I think should be made is that the serpent is the actors exploring
something. It's the actors questioning. It's not the actors answering, and they want the audience to join in that questioning, to participate in it and to see the shape of the question, but they don't presume or attempt to provide a final answer, or even a pre-professional answer. I mean, it's very hard to talk about non-verbal activity, which the open theater mostly is, non-verbal. Things that are not tangible, imaginative things that abstract thoughts, feelings, and things that can't easily be put into words. It's also a collective thing, like you can say to a writer, or even like a famous actress
like Geraldine Page. How do you work? And she says this and that and this. But with this, a lot of it is just sitting around and talking, maybe someone will get up. It's so fragmented that it's very difficult to talk about. It's not secretive, it's not cultish. These are big things. These are things which occupied us for seven months, you see. So when putting them on the stage, we can't make it in any way casual or say naturalistic. So that leads us into a search for an expression of a mood or an action or an event which transcends that ordinary quality and it becomes more bigger in our minds and we have to find a way to make it stick in the audience's mind as an image. We were given problems and we played around with them for a long time and then Joe or someone
would say, well, it looks too heavy this way, try to get it as though electricity, I'm making this up, electricity we're going off and on in you and think of the pulse of a heartbeat coming through you. And so you'd wind up doing that. It's not like you chose to go, you know what I mean? You don't pick it that way. When we started investigating the Garden of Eden, we tried to find having started from the book of Genesis description and Hebrew myths, a description of the Garden of Eden. We tried to find a connection for ourselves. What is the Garden of Eden for us right now? What is our Garden of Eden? And someone brought up the idea that the Garden of Eden for many of us at that time was our workshop in a loft where we all met every day for four hours, where we trusted each other, where we enjoyed our work, where the work was stimulating and exciting for a period of
seven months. Originally, when we began to work together at the Open Theater, there was a very nonverbal sort of a way from speaking and that was because there were two ways of talking. One was you talk conversational, one dimensional sort of non-anything way of talking and the other was you talk stage talk, you talk in a certain full way and what was understood to be a beautiful sound in such and such way, but that this was it. And for some reason, we felt that there was a lot in sounds and in movement that was expressive, that didn't have to do with either of those two things. And we tried to dream up forms and exercises to get the actor to discover experiences of vocal and physical kinds, because once he learns that there is a dimension of experience in this kind of expressiveness, then it's sort of impossible for him not to want to develop that.
After the serpent, the Open Theater continued its experiments and exercises. The new work was terminal, its subject was death and dying. And I'll follow in terms of its being a very similar process and collaboration and then the ensemble work and the exercises that we had used changed to suit the new material of terminal and to suit a different kind of style than we had used for the serpent. So then we look always for these exercises because the exercises become the root into some other realm of working and seeing something. Let them take my body, let them use my tongue, let them take my body, let them use my tongue.
So in terminal, the simple thing was that somewhere there was a kind of conspiracy against one's accepting his own mortality and as long as that was so, a part of us wasn't in response to life and a part of us was in response to this conspiracy. And we would go about looking at this, the bombing, the whole bombing thing, the whole thing about the better coffins and then we thought of getting the dying going after the dead,
the dying calling up the dead because the dying are much closer to the dead and the dead can come and say things that the dying could learn something from. Then, after vast amount of material, tremendous numbers of scenes and characters and speeches
and dead coming through and questions, then it becomes distilling it, finding an emblem to represent the whole thing, finding a very brief image to represent a scene, finding something which has a greater cogency, but not in playing out the whole thing where we give the total interpretation to the spectator. Drumming started after the calling and we got up and started to do the dance and as we was dancing, more happened but all of a sudden I looked at Ron and Ron was standing in a funny light because his face was gray. His face was gray and I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. His face was gray and I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead.
Ron's face was gray and I thought he was dead with dance and everything became more intense and every time I looked at Ron, he was gray. He looked dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he would stay. I thought he would stay. I thought he would stay. I thought he would stay. I thought he would stay. I thought he would say. I thought he would say. Taking that hat of mine or Shome's just an indirect foolie, even with that line, or any other phrase, using the same dynamic and attention. The emblem is the... Ah!
Really? What's going on? Yeah. You want the one in? What in check? Just do that. Just what you just did, but use it like without sound. If Xiaomi does her own line, then you do it just with the sound. Just that. I thought it was tape. I thought it was tape, I thought it was tape. I thought it was tape. Ah! Ah! Ah! I thought it was tape. I thought it was tape. I thought it was tape. I thought it was tape. I thought it was tape. I thought it was tape. I thought it was tape. The words are connotations also, so you may want to, you know, So take a series of words with their connotations and enrich them with the score that is around these words. It's even more the vague in a way that intention or dynamic or anything. It just happens to be the person's personality. Suddenly, the soldiers think it hits me. I mean, that's an aspect, I think, of the same thing of what you're talking about, so whatever hits you.
I really think that we can know about it by doing it. I think this is really like the world between knowing it. If you would do it again, and as many people as you know are called to enter it, either with the same line of the child is using, with the kind of thing that Tina was just doing, which is just scoring it, you know, looking at it vocally without words, or taking completely underlying and addressing the same will. The lights were shining and it was a terrific rhythm, and as we dance holding our sticks in the air, turning this way and that way, when I turned, I saw Ron's face and his face was great. I thought he was dead. I turned the way and I looked back, and his face was great, he looked dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead.
I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. There is no way of accurately and adequately notating our work so that we can repeat it, except to remember it in the head, to remember it in the body, and to have a lot of funny
little shorthands in directors, notebooks, and stage managers, notebooks, and actors, notebooks. Each part can be noted, but when one wants to repeat it, the way in which we do it is through certain techniques that we've developed, and after we'll do something and another after we'll come in and enter it. Not imitating it, but trying to come from the same impulses and the same intentions, but doing it through his personality. So our primary form of notation is a kind of active notation, which each person in the room is making all the time. We did an exercise called jamming with the theme of the sea, whereby actors
address themselves to a world of vocal sound, and one's own voice either counterpoints or supports a world of sound that's being created. Somebody has something that they offer. Everybody in the group is constantly offering something up. A piece can only be the composite of various things that have been offered. They can't
sit and come from nowhere. We've tried the touch on the interminal and in the serpent kind of truth for the group, which is in common. So within a very small world, it's universal for us, you see. I mean, we read the newspapers. We've tried to find a focus where we can go mentally and empathetically in terms of consciousness when we direct a piece toward an audience in any particular place. So we have in mind, what do we have in mind? The four students at Kent State that were killed, the six people in Georgia that were killed, the next day in the papers, the two students at Mississippi that were killed.
Now, who knows how many more people are going to be killed. We can keep on doing this. We can stand up in front of the audience before we perform our artistic universal work and we can bring it down to newspaper facts and say how many people were killed and say that we deplore it and say ask that they deplore it too, which they probably do. But it's increasingly frustrating because that's as far as we can go. And I really don't know just how practical a theater can be. And that's what's going to be found out next year, I guess. But it's something that we're continually fighting with in terms of art and life. I mean, it's not very formulated in my mind, my own mind, so it may be a little muddled. But I don't think that theater can create revolution. I think it can support revolution. And I think that one of the reasons I'm not very interested in reaching Middle America, as you mentioned before, is that I don't identify with those people. And I'm interested in, let me see how
to say this, creating a kind of cultural environment that relates to the world that I live in. Just the way Middle America has a cultural environment that supports and reinforces their understanding of the world, I think that our kind of world needs a cultural restatement and support and reinforcement. And I think that is primarily what our theater or any other radical, radically oriented theater can do best, not even suggest kinds of actions. I don't think that comes out of the theater. You know, we talk about Middle America. In Middle America, there's a lot of people who things are dawning on them. And I think the thing is, it's not just a big monolithic thing. And I know like we played Oswego State or like a little college is out in Middle America, you know. And there's a community kind of just blossoming, you know. And that's
exciting, you know, when you kind of, they see some kindred spirits that are telling them something they think already, you know. We've seen it happen like in these, in these little schools where you really can, you know, there's just this little bud there and all of a sudden by the day you leave, there's this flower growing. We pronounce ourselves and we present ourselves in ways that are given already and in rules that we find ourselves abiding by. And because I don't subscribe to the basic tenets of the society that I am a citizen of, it would be impossible for me to simply want to put that on the stage even if I was putting it on and saying it's no good. I mean, even that is complicity with it to put it on and to in some way make fun of it or to say it's
no good. To involve the thing that's interesting to me is working in a mode that's different from the mode that I am forced to live in. We used to fish in a place called the pit, the water there was so clear, you could see the fish swimming big, beautiful fish. We used to cut off their heads and rip out their stomachs and tear the scales of them. Yeah, me and Joel, we had fantastic imaginations. I was set in just like you. What?
I know you cut that loose weight from the water, but it's that loose that set me free. A man who knows he's got to die doesn't have anything to be afraid of. My presence made of steel, yours is in your head. It's only came into our pit, Joel and I know I've picked something. We take wine and wrap around them and twist it and twist it and twist it and twist it and twist it. I was set in just like you. But that's what he gets up real early in the morning and he looks at himself and the mirror and he says, why am I not, man, I am. But me, I knew I'd end up with my hidden innuend. That's why I could say it, yes, I am a thief, yes, I am an addict, yes, I am a homosexual and a pig, a rapist, yes, I am a murderer, anything I can imagine is part of me. Go, I'm one, be good, be nice, do what you're told, you've been set in just like me
but you've locked that up too. My presence made of steel, yours is in your head. Thank you. I'll live my life, I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life, I'll live my life.
I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life.
I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life.
I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life.
I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life, I'll live my life.
I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life.
I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life.
I'll live my life, I'll live my life. I'll live my life. I'll live my life. I'll live my life.
I'll live my life. I'll live my life. I'll live my life.
I'll live my life. I'll live my life. I'll live my life.
I'll live my life. I'll live my life. I'll live my life. I'll live my life.
I'll live my life. I'll live my life. I'll live my life.
I'll live my life. I'll live my life. I'll live my life.
- Series
- NET Playhouse
- Episode Number
- 210
- Episode
- Open Theatre: The Serpent
- Producing Organization
- National Educational Television and Radio Center
- WQED (Television station : Pittsburgh, Pa.)
- Contributing Organization
- Library of Congress (Washington, District of Columbia)
- AAPB ID
- cpb-aacip-516-bz6154fp95
- NOLA Code
- NPSE
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- Description
- Episode Description
- 90 minute piece produced by NET and WQED and initially distributed by NET in 1970. It was originally shot in color on videotape.
- Episode Description
- In 1963 the Open Theatre Company was formed in New York by a group of actors, directors, and playwrights who were dissatisfied with conventional theater and wanted to experiment with new forms of expression. Today, under director Joseph Chaikin, the Open Theatre is perhaps the leading avant-garde ensemble on the American stage. Walter Kerr, drama critic of the New York Times, has called it ?the finest company of its kind;? and another Times critic, Mel Gussow, termed the Open Theatre players ?superbly disciplined artists.? ?The Serpent? is not so much a play as it is a ?ceremony,? according to its author, Jean-Claude van Itallie, who is probably best known for his 1966 off-Broadway play ?America Hurrah,? which ran for nearly two years. With ?The Serpent? he has constructed a ceremony, he says, ?which can be used by the actors to come together with their audience.? Van Itallie was born in Brussels, Belgium, but raised on Long Island, NY. He is a 1958 graduate of Harvard, and a member of the Open Theatre. ?The Serpent? recreates the story of Genesis, but not in the conventional sense. In Chaikin?s words: ?The premise of the piece is that Man made God in his own image, and held up this God to determine his own, Man?s, limits.? And, he explains: ?The text follows the narrative of Genesis, and is at the same time a repudiation of its assumptions, this forming a dialectic.? Recreating their own early concepts and images of Adam and Eve, the serpent, the Garden of Eden, Cain and Abel, etc., the actors use a variety of spellbinding techniques to give force to the work. These include rhythmic body movements, chanting, counter-pointed dialogue, and at times, almost hypnotic repetition. ?The creation of this piece was an exploration of certain ideas and images that seem to dominate our minds and lives,? says van Itallie. ?And we don?t think such in linear fashion. Ideas overlap, themes recur, archetypal figures and events transform from shape to shape as they dominate our minds.? Following ?The Serpent,? which runs about 50 minutes, will be a documentary about the Open Theatre. It will include two scenes from another of the company?s productions - ?Terminal? (text by Susan Yankowitz). NET Playhouse #210 - ?Open Theatre: The Serpent? is a production of National Educational Television, produced through the facilities of public station WQED, Pittsburgh. ?The Serpent? is a ceremony written by Jean-Claude van Itallie in collaboration with the Open Theatre under the direction of Joseph Chaikin. Mr. Chaikin?s associate director is Roberta Sklar. Television performance directed by Sam Silberman. (Description adapted from documents in the NET Microfiche)
- Broadcast Date
- 1970-10-22
- Asset type
- Episode
- Genres
- Drama
- Media type
- Moving Image
- Duration
- 01:30:34.027
- Credits
-
-
Actor: Vann, Barbara
Actor: Faber, Ron
Actor: Chaikin, Shami
Actor: Maloney, Peter
Actor: Dixon, Brenda
Actor: Lee, Ralph
Actor: Schindler, Ellen
Actor: Zimet, Paul
Actor: Barbosa, James
Actor: Samuels, Mark
Actor: Barry, Raymond
Actor: Shepard, Tina
Actor: Worley, Lee
Actor: Haynes, Jayne
Associate Producer: Hochberg, Victoria
Director: Silberman, Sam
Editor: Hochburg, Victoria
Executive Producer: Venza, Jac
Producing Organization: National Educational Television and Radio Center
Producing Organization: WQED (Television station : Pittsburgh, Pa.)
Writer: Van Itallie, Jean Claude, 1936-
- AAPB Contributor Holdings
-
Library of Congress
Identifier: cpb-aacip-89b898104d2 (Filename)
Format: 2 inch videotape
Generation: Master
Duration: 1:28:58
If you have a copy of this asset and would like us to add it to our catalog, please contact us.
- Citations
- Chicago: “NET Playhouse; 210; Open Theatre: The Serpent,” 1970-10-22, Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed July 25, 2025, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-516-bz6154fp95.
- MLA: “NET Playhouse; 210; Open Theatre: The Serpent.” 1970-10-22. Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. July 25, 2025. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-516-bz6154fp95>.
- APA: NET Playhouse; 210; Open Theatre: The Serpent. Boston, MA: Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-516-bz6154fp95