It’s almost a bad acting cliché, being asked to play a stone. But in Eurydice that’s the challenge for Jessamyn, Amber and Emily. They have been cast as a chorus of stones. Just how does one play a stone? Well, here’s some background information and thoughts that might help, you know, in case you ever get asked to play a stone:
Often the stones have been portrayed as clowns as in this production of
The Wilma Theatre, inspired by Federico Fellini’s film The Clowns.
The Wilma Theatre, inspired by Federico Fellini’s film The Clowns.
The stones in Eurydice, act like a Greek chorus: sometimes in unison, but always unique. They are in varying degrees of deadness and forgetfulness. They narrate, make commentary and police what’s going on in the Underworld. They warn against suspicious behavior and try to influence other characters with their advice. They do not like noise, music or remembering. Above all, they do like do not like human emotion. They also provide comic relief.
The Off-Broadway cast of stones as Ruhl had envisioned them – sort of odd Beckett-like characters.
Ruhl says in her Notes: “The stones might be played as though they are nasty children at a birthday party.”[i] She also said, “In the version of the myth I grew up on, Orpheus' music is so sad it makes even the stones weep. So I was interested in the idea of repressed emotion in the underworld... what is it about weeping that breaks the rules of the underworld and allows Orpheus to enter? I also think the Stones enforce the rules of the underworld, they are our guides, and they make us laugh when we want to weep. I love Greek choruses because they mirror the experience of the audience—they remind us that we’re seeing a play and not a film.”[ii]
In the New Repertory Theatre’s production, the stones (in background) were
"posturing, girl tweens… children robbed of their spark determined to
keep others from being happy, as well.”[iii]
I asked our director, Lisa Hall-Hagan, what she thought of the stone characters and she said, “I first thought of the stones as a kind of bratty chorus, and indeed Ruhl describes them in a similar way. However, as I began to work with the play a little more, I saw them as an opportunity to express the concept of our production, and as a way to create a counterpoint to the trio of Father-Eurydice-Orpheus. At this point in the process, it's hard to say where they'll "land," but at the moment I'm curious to explore memory, loss and humanity within them.”
The director's concept photos for the stones.
"The look of the stones as we're conceiving of it right now is an extension of the design of the set. When Casey (Price, set designer) and I settled on the idea of the "white-out" set, I saw the Stones, again, as a way of expressing the idea of memory/humanity vs. forgetting/divinity. Each of the three is at a certain stage of being forgotten as a human and blending into the set itself.”[iv]
In my conversations with Lisa she also mentioned that she wanted to explore the stones as Norns.
The Norns
In Norse mythology, the Norns are three demi-goddesses who weave the web of fate. They live at the base of the tree of life and keep it watered from the Well of Fate. They determine the length of each person’s life. The crone, Urd (fate), represents that which as happened. The matron, Verdandi (necessity), represents that which is happening and the maid, Skuld (being), represents that which should happen.
The Fates
Similarly, the Greeks had the Fates or the Moirae. Clotho, the maid spun the thread of life for each person. Lachesis, the matron measured the length of each thread and Atropos, the crone, cut the thread with her dreaded scissors. Notice the representation of young to old in the concept photos above.
These very powerful deities were often feared, but they were not evil. They merely have an understanding “to what must die and what shall live, to what shall be carded out, to what shall be woven in.”[v] Exploring this option for the stones fits in very well with the director’s concept that does not favor remembering/life over forgetting/death. In Ruhl’s Eurydice, the enigmatic stones are an opportunity to explore some great themes and issues.,.. and to have a lot of fun.
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The stones from the Curious Theatre Company production.
[i] Ruhl, Sarah. Eurydice. New York: Samuel French, 2008. Print.
[ii] Ruhl, Sarah and Walter Bilderback. “Talking to Ghosts and Conjuring the Invisible: An Interview with Sarah Ruhl.” Wilmabill, 2007-2008 Season. Philadelphia: The Wilma Theatre, 2008. Web.
[iii] Nargi, Jan “New Rep Breathes Life into ‘Eurydice,’” Broadwayworld.com. 27 September 2008
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