Art, the social butterfly that it is, tends to interact with other art. Always has. Paintings and poems, songs and sculptures, dramas and dances, films and photographs, comedies and culinary creations, all tango together in a progressive step in our heads. Artists, the social butterflies that they are, also tend to interact with other artists - but not all the time.
While I'm sure I could go a number of ways with this, the topic I'd like to focus on is the relationship (or lack thereof) between the musician and the muse of theatre. Now, almost every theatre production I've seen has had some relationship with music, whether it employs actual live musical accompaniment or a simple soundtrack comprised of the director's favorite pre-recorded songs to help set the mood. The reverse, though, with the exception of the music video, is rarely ever true. One might argue that any live show by a musical outfit is a sort of performance piece, but I'd argue that Mastodon is a far cry from Mamet. This is not to suggest that every punk band should be armed with a theatre troupe to perform Shakespeare shorts between songs at every show - my suggestion, in short, is simply that in my experience the musician tends to distance him or herself from the theatre sphere. My intention is to examine the whys, and to (hopefully) ebb that fear and trepidation away.
As the Lincoln Loft pointed out in its poignant 'Theatre People' blog, perhaps the rest of the artistic community of "normals" is hesitant to dive into the theatre community because of an over-arching feeling of outsiderness. I personally come from a pretty strictly musical background, and it wasn't until I started dating and living with a true blue "theatre person" that my horizons were really expanded in this context. My venturing out into the world of theatre began as a timid boyfriend simply going to support his girlfriend in doing the thing that she loved. At the beginning of our relationship, though, the volume of extracurricular rock shows versus plays we attended together was pretty disproportionate, the scales weighing much heavier on the side of the rock show. I'll even admit that this discrepancy was likely largely due to my initial lack of enthusiasm for this somewhat foreign thing that didn't seem to resemble what little I really knew of the arts and entertainment arena.
The more I saw productions of hers and the more we ramped up our attendance of other plays, though, the more I started becoming genuinely enraptured by this foreign thing. Now, just like any other art form, there are good shows and bad shows. At some point or another you have no doubt been guilted into seeing a friend or co-worker's shitty band, kicking and tweeting the whole way through the shitty experience; frankly, the same shitty scenario is likely to happen with plays - when you inevitably start making a bunch of theatre friends after reading this. Don't let that get you down, though, because it just helps you to hone your tastes. Be a critic! But goddamnit, don't be a philistine.
Not only have I found that I simply just enjoy sitting down with a beer or a glass of wine (you'll find that most of these things are BYOB, if they don't have their own bar) and letting a story unfurl in front of mine own eyes, but it's inspired a lot of my own completely separate creative outlets. My aforementioned musical background mostly involves sweaty, stinking bars and basement punk shows. These two worlds may seem lightyears from one another, but I don't know... there was something in the way George (played by the phenomenal Tracy Letts), seething with decades of withheld bitterness, slowly unraveled his wife and his guests in Steppenwolf's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? - it inspired me to say things I had previously found no way to say, in songs or otherwise. (I lovingly borrowed part of a diatribe of his, titling a Cut Teeth song "Blood Under the Bridge".) Anyway, it's pretty obvious that a healthy dose of culture just makes us better humans, too.
So you may be thinking, "Whatever, dude. That one Weezer album is totally based on some play, and Green Day made that one thing into a musical and stuff. You creative types got that whole theatre thing covered, man." And yeah, Pinkerton totally is (loosely) based on Madame Butterfly, Green Day did make that one thing into a very popular musical, and David Byrne is a known connoisseur of theatre around the world. That's great. But if I had a dollar for every time someone wrote a concept album loosely based on a novel or featured a song title borrowed from a movie line or an E.E. Cummings poem, I might have more than a few hundred dollars in my checking account. Conversely, I'd have about five bucks if the same dollar was granted for every rock & roll theatre reference I could come up with. Perhaps this just illuminates my own past shelteredness that I am only now beginning to shed, but I've found that there seem to be plenty of other folks out there like me, who have suffered from varying degrees of Dramaphobia.
For those worried that a newfound respect for this community might tarnish your punk cred, fret no more. I'm talking independent theatre - DIY spaces, suggested donations in place of oppressive ticket fees, basement shows in place of rock club routine, and none of those stale, uptight Nutcracker productions your fourth grade teacher dragged you and your miserably bored class to when you were eight. The Oracle, in Lakeview, puts on incredible shows that are completely free to the public. The Right Brain Project, with a suggested donation policy, produces a uniquely immersive experience tailored to each project by way of using its audience to envelop the players. The show that my lovely lady and the folks at Wayward Productions just wrapped up was an awesomely raucous version of Shakespeare's Richard III, which took place in a Sons of Anarchy-esque biker bar, complete with more sex, drugs and rock & roll than you could shake a stick at. So while most of us might think of CBGB's or the Fireside Bowl before some of our more well-known drama centers when the word 'punk' is whispered, just remember that Steppenwolf started out in a basement.
You never know what you might walk in to, but with an open mind and a penchant for the provocative, you just might find a night at the theatre to be a new spark to get those creative juices flowing. I know I have. So don't be afraid to lose that cocoon and take a dance with drama, you social butterfly, you.
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Below is a short list of some super rad independent theatres/companies worth supporting:
Oracle
Right Brain Project
Wayward Productions
The Inconvenience
Jackalope
Chicago Mammals
The Den
Redmoon
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