2.26.2010

I Have Tasted Air Above the Clouds - Writer/Director's Note

I Have Tasted Air Above the Clouds is a thesis project written and directed by Mic Parker, showing this weekend.

I'm not going to try to explain what I thought of the production here, but the following are worth quoting:

The blurb description from the website:

"She was the most famous prophetess of the ancient world. A word from the Cumaean Sibyl averted war, exposed traitors, razed cities to the ground. One of the most powerful women ever and one of the most powerless. This modern adaptation of Virgils Sixth Book of the Aeneid tells the story like you've never heard it before, incorporating music, dance and the enduring strength of one of history's unsung heroines."


And what I assume to be the Director's note from the back of the program:

"This show is a gift. Like many of the gifts we select for one another, it might not quite be your color. Further, I won't be at all surprised if the fit isn't universal. And since we wrapped it ourselves, you might sometimes see my fingerprints, or those of my cast or crew, in the tape. I fear that this gift is a little to early for some and, much worse, a little too late for others.

However, like any true gift, this show has its origins in a very real love and admiration. Love, first, for the Cumaean Sibyl, a minor character in Virgil's Aeneid who has been virtually ignored by generations of otherwise very intelligent scholars, artists and playwrights. As Aeneas' guide through the underworld, the Sibyl is a small but fital part of the legend of the last prince of fallen Troy. Without her courage and indomitable spirit, Aeneas undoubtedly would have died at the mouth of Hades. He never would have founded Rome and we would say instead that, "all roads lead to Carthage." Ah, the horror.

This show is a gift, then, for a mythical character whose story I felt needed desperately to be told. But it is also a gift for the very real women who are, even today, living in isolation, terror and constantly thwarted hope. You see, Sybils still exist: one out of every two women in America will, at some point in their lives, be abused by their partners. Sibuls still exist: there were 72,032 reported cases of domestic abuse or rape against women last year. So what is truly a myth is that we no longer need to fight this problem. Though the Sibyl's story is a tragic one, no more stories need be tragic.

So, this is a gift to my beautiful mother and sisters. To my kind and compassionate friends, coworkers and acquaintances, new or old. This show is a gift for you, if you need it. If you are the victim of domestic abuse, please know that you are not alone and that the situation is not hopeless. If you are in danger, or you know someone who is, please call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-8000-799-7233 (SAFE)."

3 comments:

Churaesie said...

... in the play, Sibyl is depicted as a young woman living with her brother - their parents had died.
she and her brother catch and sell fish. She likes a guy that plays ball near the market. People ignore him because he has a stutter which prevents him from speaking and his father beats him for it.
He likes her too.
but on her way home from the market (and this story is not told in a time-linear fashion)
the god Apollo comes upon her and takes her to be his priestess and prophetess
He has all the glamor and faults of the depictions of roman gods.
The scenes of prophecy are graphically sexually violent - prophecy amounts to rape.
"Apollo comes upon me too quickly - I can't breathe ... and now I /am/ screaming, but it is his moan ... I am saying his words, and the men are nodding
because I am a prophetess now."

" I keep thinking of the fish,... and how they reached for the sea with their triangle mouths. ... if I were a fish, my gills would be pushing against the air... I am screaming, I am screaming like a fish in a net."
"After the first time, I feel nothing, and under the nothing, there is dirt"
"I am a prophetess, and a priestess of Apollo - and men sail for /hundreds/ of miles ... to see me! "

so - anyhow - although most of the play is Sibyl talking, there is this terrifying image of the abuse she suffers as a priestess of Apollo
Parker shows the trap very well
her brother figures out she's there and goes to see her, but she is afraid that Apollo will be angry and do something to him, so she casts him out after being overjoyed to have seen him once more.
He is excited for her at first, but thinks that she is casting him out because she doesn't care about him as much as he cares about her.
twist
She tries not to make Apollo upset because she knows what he will do to her family and the people she cares about if he becomes displeased.
everyone is envious of her because Apollo is the god of prophecy and light and beautiful things. What a lucky girl.
twist.
0:26 In the Aeneid,
Aeneas goes to the Sybil for a prophecy on his future - going off to found Rome and all. and then he takes the traditional epic journey to the underground to see his father.
0:27 He gets safe passage to and from the underworld by means of a golden branch. The Sybil gives him directions to find it, saying it is a gift of Artemis and she will honor it by granting a wish. he should wish to return from the underworld.
The scene that got me is the scene where he takes the branch. The reason for this is that, in the play, it should have been for the Sybil.
the Sybil tries to run away from Apollo a few times.
one of those times, as she has stumbled through the forest into a dry riverbed, knowing that he would eventually find her, Artemis finds her first.
Apollo is Artemis' brother, and she feels bad for what he does to the Sybil.
she offers a hiding place.
where?
the underworld.
but the Sibyl can't die for another thousand thousand years.
Apollo gave her a wish. she wished first for her parents back. he denied that one. then she wished for a long life. he granted that. then took her in 'exchange'
Artemis says, ' I could kill you'
The Sybil is going to do it. she says either her death or Apollo's is all she has to look forward to.
but then she remembers - her brother, the boy she liked - are both still alive. Apollo could harm them.
and so she doesn't take Artemis' offer.

Churaesie said...

but Artemis says, hey look - in another few years, when your family is all gone,
I'm gonna put this golden branch on the tallest tree. I'll hide it. no one else knows it's there. Only you and I. You go get it. Take it to Persephone. She'll recognize it, and she'll let you stay.
And so the Sybil goes back to Apollo, and she waits.
but meanwhile, the gods have been going about their other schemes and ploys, what with the fall of Troy and all.
Venus is guiding Aeneas towards his destiny of founding Rome. She brings him to the Sybil.
Venus has already been accused by Artemis of causing Apollo to lust after the Sybil and causing this terrible situation.
Venus asserts that everyone's got it in them - she just lets it grow. Besides "Your brother never needed any coaxing! They all blossom on their own"
Venus brings Aeneas to the Sybil, to go before Apollo and chant his destiny.
She causes the Sybil to fall in love with Aeneas (he is played by the same character as plays the boy that she loved when she lived with her brother)
so the Sybil is ready to do anything Aeneas asks.
The following prophetic scene is like watching someone be kidnapped and raped, except I've never actually seen that.
( nobody plays the character of Apollo. he is represented by a yellow-hued light overhead )
Aeneas is somewhat terrified by what just happened, but he has one more important request.
he's kind of a nice character. just tryin' to follow his destiny.
his father had told him to come speak to him in the underworld. Aeneas asks the Sybil if she can show him the way.
She says getting there is easy.
Getting back is the hard part.
she gives him directions to the golden branch, telling him to use it to wish himself a safe return.
this is when the play goes to the scene I described before, when Artemis promises the branch to Sybil.
Artemis makes it clear that even the gods are manipulated by fate, and this is a one-shot deal.
If Aeneas takes the branch, there won't be another.
cut back -
Aeneas returns with the golden branch. "is this the one?"

Churaesie said...

the Sybil has had time to think. You can see her remembering what the branch means to her, and now it is in Aeneas hands.
and he is talking about it as his birthright.
he jokes that it was hard to find because of all the other branches that fit her description.
she gets hopeful
but it was a joke.
twist.
he sees her fighting with herself - she's trying to pretend that everything's fine.
but he misinterprets and thinks she's trying not to laugh at him for going on a strange quest
she tries to explain what the branch means to her
but he interprets her as implying that he doesn't understand, and he's tired of people telling him that.
*twist
he continues talking about his birthright and how this branch was his fate.
twist
and he mentions that he wouldn't have found it were it not for his mother's doves.
this gets the Sybil's attention.
Aeneas has been the only person that showed her kindness and he is making her feel terrible by not appreciating whatsoever what this means to her.
but when he says this, she starts getting angry
because Artemis said that no one else would know.
0:45 Aeneas ends up taking the branch by force and demanding that she guide him through to the underworld.
"Now is the time for courage. Unsheath your sword"
0:46 book 6 of the Aeneid happens.
cut to the Sybil ~ 100 years later.
she daydreams about a death by walking into the sea. She remarks how her brother and the boy she liked both grew old and died.
she knows she cannot die.
0:47 that she will crumble until she is just a voice.
But, "although it has broken me -- broken me and remade me, part of me is not shattered. I protected my brother, and Atta [the guy]"
the scene transforms into what could have been a happy scene from her younger days
talking with her brother and Atta in the market,
asking each other questions like "What would you do with a million dollars?" "I'd invest it!" "lame! I'd buy a million pudding cups!"
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