DAY 040 – DESIGNING DANGEROUSLY

Catharsis

The end of a thing may not be the only concern, but it has a primacy to it. We naturally want to end well--whether that means dessert and drinks, diplomas, or death. It is the same for stories. How does it end? Does it resolve? Too cleanly? Too obscure, too trite, too unlike life? 

My experience is that while the beginning of a play has nearly always been defined at the top of tech, there have been a number of productions that have not been able to answer the question of the end of the play satisfactorily for a number of dress rehearsals. What is it we are corporately seeking? That last puzzle piece, only known and defined by it’s absence from the whole. 

How can a director and team of designers look at an abstraction and all know the shape of the piece, what is missing? How is it that when it is found everyone exhales, experiencing something both infinitely personal and infinitely communal?