Pamela Howard’s Design Model
of The Marriage (2009) by Gogol
BY Paul Terian

Why is it not a good idea to “advocate death to directors” if scenography can open up to a stronger communicative form of theatre?

Simply because cooperation and coexistence is the name of the game, and I think original creation is different from conventional directing.

Speaking personally, I have a whole list of projects that I am waiting to be able to do before I finally give up and die, and considering I am now over 70 there is not all that much time left. I could almost guarantee that the projects I want to do would never ever interest someone who wants to be a conventional director… I always want to say, “Its fine! Don’t worry! I am not taking over your territory! I am just doing my own work for my own obsessions and it’s not going to start the third World War…” I am very keen on holding workshops for directors, getting them to draw and learn to look and see. I do this quite a lot, and I think it makes a difference.

As a practitioner, your style of scenography is in itself a very living form of art.

Absolutely. This is exactly the point.

You emphasize the thrill of composition such that rehearsal and performance become two-in-one. How does time play in as a factor? Can time exhaust itself in such a demanding process when everything is possible?

I think it is more of the question: can I/we/the creator(s) exhaust ourselves in such a process? And I would say it is not for the weak or fainthearted. To work in this way requires complete focus, and collaboration with all those who will make the creation. The initial vision may be personal, but the actual creation cannot be one person alone. Therefore one has to be able to be both rigorous in creating in advance the aesthetics that one is striving for…

To work in this way requires complete focus, and collaboration with all those who will make the creation. The initial vision may be personal, but the actual creation cannot be one person alone.

In my case, it is often placing objects within a space, using strong colours… and being open and receptive as daily work reveals unthought possibilities. If the general aesthetics has been established, and illustrated by drawings or paintings as a starting point, then other people can contribute and ease the load. It’s so like cooking. If the ingredients are good, what comes out will be good to eat.

Sometimes things take a long time… and sometimes, but less often if one is devising original projects, it happens very quickly. Sadly, it depends on finances and other people wanting to give the project a home, and this is the exhausting part — not the creation. Continually putting oneself up for rejection, then picking up, dusting down and starting all over again. The real danger is simply running out of creative steam. Has it always been like this? It’s getting harder, and especially as I get older. People just think I am mad, I think, and sort of a crazy grandmother… Well, there is something about that I enjoy too.