Blurring the lines between life and art: 'Rented Bodies'
By: Tatiana Craine, Arts Editor
Issue date: 3/6/09 Section: The Arts
Does life imitate art? Or does art imitate life? Rachel Bernstein, attempts to make life and art one in a production she is directing called "Rented Bodies." The show is loosely based upon the musical, "Rent." However, Bernstein has found a way to make the once controversial production fresher and more personal.
Bernstein, a Macalester student and the Horace J. Bond Ambassador from Penumbra Theatre Company, chose to take "Rent" and use it as a channel through which to try and illustrate the stereotyping that goes on at Macalester and in the real world. Bernstein mused, "When 'Rent' premiered in the early 1990s, these character types were total anomalies. Never before had a Broadway stage housed a story centered on four HIV positive characters and four LGBT characters. Jonathan Larson gave some of their struggles a voice, which at the time was hugely progressive." Bernstein realized that though these characters were a revolutionary step for the theater, they created essentialist ideas about many different people, which, today is problematic. The portrait "Rent" paints of transgendered individuals (the character Angel) is very different from actual transgendered people, and Bernstein believes when people compare the two, it is like, "equating two things which have very little in common."
As director of "Rented Bodies," Bernstein took an unorthodox approach to casting the characters in her production. Instead of holding open auditions, Bernstein merely walked up to people who seemed to fit a part in "Rent" and asked them to participate. Most of the cast members were not close before the experience, but through intensive rehearsals, they began to learn more about each other through raw emotion. Bernstein felt that the cast needed to strengthen the relationships with their characters and each other to make the production truly worthwhile. She played psychiatrist while the cast members divulged a lot of personal feelings about their characters and their lives. Bernstein realized, "I knew we had gotten somewhere when one of the cast said, 'I have way more in common with this person than I thought.' AWESOME! Now how does that make you feel?" She helped the cast channel these feelings into their characters to create a greater sense of authenticity within the performance.
Bernstein, a Macalester student and the Horace J. Bond Ambassador from Penumbra Theatre Company, chose to take "Rent" and use it as a channel through which to try and illustrate the stereotyping that goes on at Macalester and in the real world. Bernstein mused, "When 'Rent' premiered in the early 1990s, these character types were total anomalies. Never before had a Broadway stage housed a story centered on four HIV positive characters and four LGBT characters. Jonathan Larson gave some of their struggles a voice, which at the time was hugely progressive." Bernstein realized that though these characters were a revolutionary step for the theater, they created essentialist ideas about many different people, which, today is problematic. The portrait "Rent" paints of transgendered individuals (the character Angel) is very different from actual transgendered people, and Bernstein believes when people compare the two, it is like, "equating two things which have very little in common."
As director of "Rented Bodies," Bernstein took an unorthodox approach to casting the characters in her production. Instead of holding open auditions, Bernstein merely walked up to people who seemed to fit a part in "Rent" and asked them to participate. Most of the cast members were not close before the experience, but through intensive rehearsals, they began to learn more about each other through raw emotion. Bernstein felt that the cast needed to strengthen the relationships with their characters and each other to make the production truly worthwhile. She played psychiatrist while the cast members divulged a lot of personal feelings about their characters and their lives. Bernstein realized, "I knew we had gotten somewhere when one of the cast said, 'I have way more in common with this person than I thought.' AWESOME! Now how does that make you feel?" She helped the cast channel these feelings into their characters to create a greater sense of authenticity within the performance.
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Apostle Shada Mishe
posted 3/06/09 @ 7:01 PM CST
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