I'd been hoping to get the chance to chat with Tom as I'd seen he had similar interests to me. He is looking into collaboration and communication when putting on a production which I think ties in nicely with interdisciplinary skills in Musical Theatre. We spoke about various structures within a production environment. We also discussed how when and what we communicate, can benefit or affect the production. Particularly in connection with leadership roles. He spoke about the most common theatre structure today: Regional theatre model. This model can be found in a piece of literature he recommended: "Working together in theatre: collaboration in leadership" by Robert Cohen. An example of this would by my production of 'Dirty Dancing.' You have the same creative team perhaps but often a change in artists with each contract. The change in performers can be both
advantageous and disadvantageous depending on the skills brought to the company, the dynamic from different training backgrounds or personalities etc. These factors could cause conflict in rehearsals for example, thus affecting the collaboration and the creative success. It reiterates that creative success of an individual or production is largely dependant on others. I mentioned to Tom how on tour we have a resident crew, but we also have local crew to work with when arriving at each venue. The difference in skills can definitively have a either a positive or negative affect on our success, or at least the facilitating of it.
Me: "How do you go about working with other people?"
Tom said how a new job often starts with a 'meet and greet' in order to get to know one another and form some sort of personal rapport. It is important to connect and form positive relationships in order to impact positively on the creativity and experience of a production.
Me: "What do you define as a creative success?"
Tom believes this is down to personal perception. He believe that as a dancer, it is fulfilling and facilitating the choreographers vision, and whether you are a creative success is dependant on their perception of how you execute the choreography. Again, we establish that it is heavily down to others. He talked about contentment with his own work and creative choices, as well as audience reviews/director feedback.
Tom also recommend author 'Patricia Leavey' who talks about arts based research being cross disciplinary and the importance of collaboration and team work.
Tutor: Talking to Paula briefly was useful in regards to defining creative success. She mentioned 3 things.....
1. Opportunities - are people fulfilled in their job? This links in with the concept of 'self - actualisation' from social influences in 'Psychology in a week' by Dr. nick Hayes. Does creative success come from challenge in the workplace?
2. Vision - seeing the work there and then. Our head of wigs department mentioned how he enjoyed theatre much more than film because he could instantly see his creative work on stage and gain satisfaction from it rather than having to wait months to see it on a screen.
3. Imperatives such as money. Can this limit opportunities and thus creative success?
Work colleague: I had a conversation with a fellow company member about their perception of creative success. It was interesting to hear that for them individually, being in demand by employers would make them a creative success - this is because their creative skills have been seen and valued. This supports what The National's Ollie Winser said about it being "visible and valuable" - your success has been acknowledged and is dependant on other people's opinion of your creativity. My cast member also believes that the greatest creativity happens when it is instinctive. We spoke briefly about external imperatives such as time in connection with this and how this can be both an advantage and a hindrance.
I also asked how my colleague went about working with other people and the concept of interdisciplinary skills in the workplace. He stressed the importance of open - mindedness, this in relation to both ideas and opinions of others. "I start each job with a blank page." This means no prior judgement is formed of his cast members for example but also of how certain characters should be played etc. As a more experienced member of the cast, they believed that interdisciplinary skills were required more amongst the senior roles such as the director. It made me want to look at the link between creative leadership and interdisciplinary skills.
Would possessing interdisciplinary skills help my creative success as a dancer? Would my possession of such skills impact on other people's/the productions creative success? Would it be more beneficial for career development in regards to moving up/between roles? I.e. Dancer - dance captain?
No comments:
Post a Comment