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BEING IN THE SITUATION — THREE RE-INTERPRETATIONS OF LTD
responsibility for creating the fiction, Bolton and Davis used different forms
to build towards the improvisations. Making it possible for participants
to see their problems resonate in the stories was an important part of the
structures. Interestingly, the awareness of creating theatre seemed to enhance
being in the improvisations as well. Heathcote built belief in the fiction by
moving the narrative from imagining it to enacting it, relying on the senses
in the process, but also developing an awareness of “guards signalling
power”. The two together helped the boys in the Stool Pigeon drama to be
in the situation. Bolton relies in these examples on an awareness of the ‘as if’
of drama, and also on a consciousness of signs and meaning, while O’Neill
uses different modes of spectatorship besides other forms to create a sense
of theatre. Davis offers participants the aim and the devices to use drama as
a form of meaning making, first as part of creating a scene, but then using
the same elements in their improvisation. The drama lessons examined here
did not aim to resolve the situation, or solve the problems brought up in them,
which also reflects a theatre based approach.
The notion of ‘making a play’ rather than simply playing offers great
freedom in the use of theatre devices from Bond’s work in my research.
The question of how to enhance this awareness of making theatre, what tools
to use to create these possibilities, and how explicitly to do it are important
questions explored in my research.
UNDERSTANDING CREATED: The analysis of different approaches to
reflection shows that creating metaxis rather than self-spectatorship seems
closer to the aims Bond pursues in his work, due to the distancing aspect of
the latter. Davis explains that in self-spectatorship the introspection is in two
stages: “I do something and I am monitoring what I do”.’”! He states that he
aims for metaxis in his work, because “the implication of being in two states
at the same time [...] enables the two states to be fought out internally”.’”
Self-spectatorship can imply a more rational and often verbal reflection, as
seen in The Dreamer, while this is not the case with metaxis. The nature of
the understanding aimed for and the length of improvisations are connected.
As I have been examining written description of lessons it is not clear how
long the ‘being’ continues in the different examples. I have quoted Bolton
noting Heathcote’s distrust of leaving participants to “improvisational play¬
making beyond five minutes”,!# while the improvisation in the Crucible
drama is planned as an extended one, including breaking up into small
groups as families within the same process. Davis and O’Neill also rely on
longer improvisations. This approach seems closer to my aims.
170 Bolton: Acting in Classroom Drama, 221.
Davis: Imagining the Real, 52.
172 Ibid.
173 Bolton: Acting in Classroom Drama, 180.
171
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