Richard Armitage crash: Thursday, August 28th, part 2

Continued from all the gnashing of teeth here. This piece is way less emotional, and is divided into two sections: first, description of performance that night; second, my experiences / impressions at the stage door.

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Of all the performances I see, this is the one with the lowest general energy. I’m not saying “least strong,” because there was something to like in every one that I saw. At the same time, I feel like the cast is contributing to the problem, insofar as the play twice cuts off laughter that comes from the audience and then the audience gets the message that they shouldn’t laugh. I don’t believe this is intentional — it stems in part from the way that they begin Act One; they don’t take time to let the comic possibilities in the girls’ behavior as they discuss witchcraft with Parris resonate. And, of course, they are probably still concerned about the running time and about creating an intense atmosphere from the very beginning of the play.

Armitage, too, starts more quietly — his appearance on the stage is noticeably less physical than previous performances. This perspective also makes Act One more heavily Parris’ territory and lessens Abigail’s effect — she seems almost ineffectual here, although this may be a choice on Colley’s part. We also see less of Mr. Putnam’s malevolence because his face is so often away from us. The other thing we get from the 90 degree perspective shift is a better sense of the ongoing problem that Abigail presents. Quoting my notes directly:

This perspective offers the viewer a better sense of the ongoing problem that Abigail presents for Proctor. Emotionally, it’s clear that Proctor’s finished with Abby (and he communicates well that his involvement was always a superficial one), but tonight, in contrast to earlier nights, remnants of temptation seem to tinge his responses to her. Proctor insists vociferously on his version of his adultery, in which they “did not touch” — a statement that Armitage makes plausibly “true for Proctor” in his delivery, but which makes Abigail, grasping at him and causing him to have to detach her from him. Just as in previous performances, the end point of that long, episodic chase around the stage from its center, to the chairs at the right, to the table in front of the rear seats, where his physical posture suggests rape or a violent entry from the rear as much as it does rejection, to him scraping her off like a barnacle as she grasps, desperately, effectively, hopelessly, at his moving thighs, is this chair in front of the C18 seat I have tonight.

And now I see something I haven’t seen before. It is not as he has said before — Proctor is still tempted. Abigail kneels before him to deliver her lines, about how Proctor has enlightened her about the pretense of life in Salem, and proclaims, “You loved me, John Proctor, and whatever sin it is, you love me yet!” The hierarchy of postures here — Proctor sitting, Abigail kneeling — is suggestive all on its own, without any elaboration. But they take it further. Both actors suddenly make this a more sexually laden moment than I’ve noticed from my perspective before, with Abigail grasping at the outsides of Proctor’s thighs and then stroking at the tops of them more gently, moving closer to the space between his legs — and Proctor simultaneously withdrawing, raising his head and lowering his chin to indicate resistance, and then rocking back on the chair in which he is trapped by Abigail’s advances Across his face, I see a number of expressions pass — his eyes widen, he lifts his chin, he tries to plaster himself back against the chair — and then in a split second, Abigail is truly between his legs, looking up at him, and he looks down at her — and his wide eyes, at first frightened, narrow just for a three heartbeats into a moment of unbridled lust — long enough for him to realize it and her to see it. Masterful, Armitage — for Proctor then reacts to his own reaction, returning to fear, and then disgust with himself, and then a shake of the head, just before Betty (Marama Corlett) begins to shake on the bed in renewed expression of her bewitchment. It’s almost as if Proctor and Abigail’s all-too-brief sexual energy broadcasts itself across the room, and Betty responds in sympathetic vibration — ending that intimate moment.

This is amazing and beautiful and I see it from the perspective of about eighteen inches away. (Question: How can they possibly do this? How can they act with all of us this close?) I feel like I am practically the third party in their encounter, and though watching Proctor wash in previous performances has not left me feeling uncomfortably voyeur-like, these seconds certainly do. I am aroused and horrified, all at once. This experience is unforgettable — to have sat this closely to Armitage while he makes Proctor lust, and then hate himself — but I wonder who else saw it. Me and five other audience members?

This staging is so intimate — and yet so fragmented. Everyone who sees it will have seen something different.

Interesting to me: the light falls on Armitage’s face differently, so the shadows across his brow say something different. From this perspective he appears dense, heavy-browed, but his eyes contrast much more effectively against it. The effect all the way through is much more dramatic, particularly in Act Two with Elizabeth, in which Proctor’s main note is anguish — the most emotionally effecting version of this part of the play I’ve seen thus far. Again, quoting:

The dominant feeling in Proctor’s entreaties at the beginning of Act Two is now neither hope, nor fatigue, nor anger — but fascinatingly: anguish. I thought this scene could not get more tearingly emotional than it was on Tuesday night, but Armitage has moved it an entirely different level. He opens the scene and the attempts at pleasing or propitiating Elizabeth are pained and turn quickly defensive. The physical level of his desire for Elizabeth (again — does this have something to do with his reactions to Abigail in the previous scene? is this an attempt at over-compensation?) in his glance, his lips, and especially his hands, which seem more aggressive now, is particularly visible, and this in turn seems to make her angrier than she’s been so far. And her rejection runs all through his body this time — his stiffness is quick and full of rage.

All of Act Two has notably more negative energy pouring off of Proctor — almost as if Proctor’s decided in advance that he will be damned — and the struggles with the various people are much more violent and desperate. I become worried he really will choke Mary Warren. The scene is also cleaner from this standpoint — its axis of movement is much, much clearer. Armitage’s performance in Act Two, however, reaches a summit for me this evening in the moment when he discovers that the commandment he has failed to name to Hale is the prohibition on adultery. The absolute horror and self-disgust on his face are frightening. Is this because his lust, for both Abigail and Elizabeth, is so much clearer in the earlier part of the scene, and thus more present in his own mind?

[This kicks off a series of reflections in my notes about how Armitage plays Proctor’s sexual aura — because make no mistake, Proctor is also sexy, even apart from his appearance — but I want to do a separate post on this topic, and on Armitage’s production of chemistry with Colley and Madeley.]

INTERVAL

Act Three gets the full effect of the different lighting and eye / eyebrow contrast across Armitage’s face, as Proctor looks much more actively prosecutorial and manipulative than he has until now. The micro-expressions on his face are thus vividly present in the exchange with Danforth, which is quite snappy tonight, reprising the energy from the previous evening with more balance on Proctor’s side. At some point, Proctor brings back his conflicted expression and I think on this evening, Proctor perceives much more quickly the danger that he’s in. His tenderness for his neighbors is especially apparent as well. I now have a different view on the Proctor / Abigail axis of interaction, as the two accuse each other. He can’t be seen at all from this point, but we see a much fuller range of facial expressions in response to his exchanges with Mary Warren, particularly once she escalates to the signing of the book.

But there are other moments in Act Three that I wish I could see more of, particularly as Proctor’s rage turns sadly against himself when he notes that G-d sees all. There are signs here of a more introspective Proctor — maybe because of the lower general energy of the performance? — and it seems that his breakdown at the end of Act Three reflects a greater helplessness than before, which is, oddly, more jarring than the out of control rage we’ve mostly seen up until now.

I think again in Act Four that the play just loses momentum at this point generally. But the 90 perspective shift appears to Proctor’s advantage again. His fury seems much more internal and less explosive, and the tone of the key lines about his name is heavier, clearer, and more regretful. He is actually crying this evening. Rather than pushing up into all the space around him toward the end, throughout this scene, Armitage’s physical energy is much more surrounded in his gut.

I wonder, for the umpteenth time, how someone like Armitage learns to inhabit his body.

[For another perspective on that evening, check out preoccupied’s description.]

Servetus watches at the stage door and ruminates

The play ends, and LadySquid stands up and smiles and says, “It was nice to meet you.” She promises to maintain my confidentiality. I smile and point with my finger toward the exit, urging her to get on her way and get in that line. She picks up a piece of Proctor’s confession on her way out, but it looks like an usher wants it. Huh. Wonder what was up with that. She hands it back and departs.

I walk out myself, straightaway. By the time I find a place, I’m already about halfway down. I venture to walk up it, and one of the ushers asks me where I am going. I mention I want to talk to someone briefly at the head of the line and then I’ll come back. I find LadySquid and tell her that I’m further back, if her photo op doesn’t work out, she should grab me and we’ll try again. And then I settle in the line to watch. I don’t want anything tonight — just to see what happens. And to observe who, exactly, walks past me when Richard Armitage passes.

It occurs to me that this might finally be a good time to try to say something to the other actors in the play, who’ve been walking out of the performances largely unacknowledged on previous evenings — by me, as well. Some of their performances are landmarks. I’ve already talked to Schiller, yesterday, but it might be neat to exchange a word or two with some of the others, if they’re not in a hurry.

[Harry Attwell. Source: Old Vic]

First, I find Harry Attwell — whose everyday, curious malevolence I praise — and some friends of his standing at the streetcorner near the stage door with him say, “He’s just like that in real life!” and I joke and say, “Oh, telling tales out of school! So it’s all typecasting then?” — because given the mood between Attwell and his friends it’s obvious he’s not at all like Mr. Putnam. He signs my program, asks my name, and says “Thank you, thanks for coming.” Next, I approach Marama Corlett, who is being monopolized by an autograph reseller with a score of pictures in hand for her to sign. When she finally tells him, “That’s enough,” I tell she really looks like’s possessed on that stage with all of those body movements, and she says, “Well, I used to be a dancer,” and I say, “I read that in the program, but it’s more than flexibility, you really act with your voice and your face in extremely frightening ways,” and she laughs and signs and then asks me my name. Then I see Sarah Niles, to whom I am not sure exactly what to say, as I’ve been conflicted about the staging of her scenes from the beginning, so I settle for, “You play that role with such physical expressiveness.” She also thanks me, signs, and then asks my name.

Finally, I catch Samantha Colley, who has walked straight down the line on previous nights and occasionally gotten a bit of a cheer or some applause. In person, she is as far away from her portrayal of Abigail Williams as I can possibly imagine a person being. I guess that’s why they call it acting. (One fan I know had a longer encounter with Colley that’s interesting to read for her informal perspective on playing the role, here.)

“You’ve got an amazing game on,” I say, “I’ve seen this four times now, and now I’m starting to wonder each night, will Abigail be crazy tonight, or manipulative, or both?”

She says, “I have to think about it every night, but Abigail loves Proctor and that influences everything, too.”

“It’s really effective, the way you play that combination,” I say, “you’ve definitely got me coming and going, wondering how it will work out each time!” She thanks me, signs the program, and then asks my name.

[Samantha Colley. Source: Old Vic]

I’d really like to talk to Jack Ellis and Natalie Gavin, but I notice that hopping in and out of the line is making the people next to me increasingly nervous, so I stop. Ellis exits and leaves, briskly, via the side street, and I don’t see Natalie Gavin that night. Thinking about it — what I really want from these people is not an autograph, but rather a conversation. Maybe even ten minutes would do. The autograph is merely a pretext to ask them to stop and to try to thank them and find a compliment slightly more exact than “You were wonderful tonight.” That was my reaction to Schiller, a day earlier: I wanted to ask him how he came to that view of the character. But it’s too weighty a conversation for that atmosphere. I am still caught in the seriousness of what I’ve just seen, but what they have agreed to give me for the price of the ticket — their best performance — is now delivered. Even if it might be lingering for them as well, I’m sure they don’t want to talk about that with a stranger. The way this play in particular is staged, and the fact that I’ve sat in the front row four times, also means that I have a perhaps odd and certainly misplaced sense of closeness to the characters. After sitting in their living room for so long, I feel like I know them and should be able to interview them. Or something.

Moreover, I continue to muse, there’s a conflation or a tension between wanting the actors to know their work was being watched and taken seriously, and wanting them to see me as the person who is taking them seriously. I want them to know that many people were paying attention, and that this isn’t just all about Armitage, even for many of his most intense fans, though those are the majority of the people who will take the time to stand at the stage door. It’s like the different between you are being watched, and see, in this whole ocean of fans, I was watching you. The first valorizes them; the second, me. I noticed that even though I didn’t ask for a specific dedication in any autograph, they all asked me my name. Hmmm, maybe they were signaling to me: I do see you. (Transcribing this three weeks later I am still confused on this question.)

[Marama Corlett. Source: Old Vic]

At the same time, I wonder: why is it okay to stop an actor to ask for his/her autograph, but not to ask a question or to say more than two lines about his/her work, which is arguably more important both of us? And why do I feel differently about approaching the other actors than I do about waiting to see Armitage? It occurs to me that the other actors start being people for me when they appear at the stage door, in a way that Armitage doesn’t quite, because I have few or no preconceptions about them; I find myself thinking, when one of the women who plays a bewitched girl walks past, that I shouldn’t impose upon her. And, I concede, it’s late. I rarely wanted to talk to students after lecture, either; I wanted to sit down and have a Coke and discharge the tension in my body.

I wonder, idly, flipping through the program and catching some details of these folks’ CVs, which are mostly long and distinguished, whether this was the sort of actor Armitage aspired to be. How ambitious was he from the beginning? Did the fact that he clearly has the body and looks of the lead shut a lot of these possibilities off to him?

[Sarah Niles. Source: Old Vic]

Finally — the stage door opens for the big guy himself and I set aside the questions for the moment. There’s an audible lift in both the mood, and the tension, among those of us waiting. Flashes go off. I see him pull his shoulders back and smile his mysterious, close-mouthed smile; I see him lean forward and put an arm around a fan’s shoulders and widen his eyes. I see him do both of those things repeatedly, although I can’t really see how the fans are reacting from this point.

Armitage gets closer to us, as he walks down the line of waiters. He’s now about seven feet away, and a young woman who’s standing there with her boyfriend asks him for a picture. I hear him say, “of course,” and he poses with her, his arm around her waist. The flash goes, and she immediately separates herself from and starts making noises like she might be hyperventilating. We’re all a bit stunned by the vehemence of her reaction, and Armitage steps back quickly and laughs in astonishment — and then, she does, too. As he gets closer, I catch the rhythm of his routine. He says “yes” and “of course” basically all the time and sometimes “where’s your camera.”

This is a smart strategy, although I don’t know that he’s the one who’s come up with it. He’s not actually refusing anyone or causing concrete disappointment himself, so he doesn’t have to listen to repeated requests or complaints, but whether the request-maker is actually in position for the photo op is not something he is concerned about after he assents — wisely, as he’s not in control of it. So if people don’t get what they want, it’s not his fault; it’s just the circumstances. This is what the Korean fan experienced, repeatedly — getting permission but not the photo. As the crowd gathers around him he stands, moving his body only very slightly, not usually smiling a full smile — advantageous whatever his motivation because it means his eyes are less likely to be closed in the resulting photo. He stands up straight, pulls back, leans in, leans right, leans left — and he has his hand out with the sharpie all the time, so that as he moves down the row, a circle of fans can move with him and he leans his head over and focuses only on the object he’s on this night, rapidly initialing.

It’s a fascinating dynamic. As we learn a few days later he feels dazed at the stage door, still in the presence or guise of Proctor, but that’s not the entire story I see playing out here. First, what he is doing may be automatic or reactive, but it also requires a significant degree of coordination. He clearly uses the energy of the fans around him to navigate the situation and move down the line, with the assistance of the security people. He knows we are going to say positive things and make brief requests, so “Yes” and “Thank you / Bless you” are the only responses he really needs to make. More direct questions can easily be understood as lost in the shuffle and the smile — dazed, perhaps, but also sweet, a palimpsest of his public “shy guy” demeanor of years ago — makes everything good. Every now and then he does respond to a question, but it’s always with two or three words. Most of what he does is serves as a mirror of the fan mood. And he’s clearly caught on that looking people right in the eyes conveys charisma, even if I wonder exactly what he’s seeing. Second, and here I hate to quibble with him — but this isn’t John Proctor we’re seeing, even if Proctor’s feelings and thoughts may still be in his mind. This gets to Armitage’s physical presence as Armitage.

He gets to me and there’s a crush of people standing in front of me wanting autographs, and as he pauses for a moment, I finally have the chance to observe him somewhat more closely. The previous two nights I got glimpses and impressions, but tonight, I can really look.

[my pic, though actually Friday, I believe]

In person, Richard Armitage is definitely tall but to six-inches-shorter me, he — paradoxically — doesn’t at all convey the presence of height. John Proctor’s notional bulk, not just his costume but the way he takes up space, and his entire vibe, are completely absent. Other people who’ve seen him in person have told me that in certain settings Armitage can appear almost slight or fragile, and although I wouldn’t call him fragile — his forearms flex as he signs — I see now what they mean by slight. The glimpses and impressions from the previous nights include the profile, the beautiful nose, the smile, the flash of his teeth — and, as I think of it, the fact that he’s usually slightly tilted, interacting with shorter people.

But as I now stand within a foot of Richard Armitage (not John Proctor) for the third night in a row, I get the impression of someone who is looking at me face to face, not down on me. Proctor’s shoulders are broad; Armitage’s shoulders are relaxed. Proctor is bulky; Armitage is surprisingly thin (and seeing him this way, I wonder how much bulk the beard is adding to his face). Proctor looks at people directly; Armitage seems to be simultaneously dipping his head and looking up at people from under his eyebrows. Proctor never smiles until he kisses his wife; Armitage has an absent-minded smile or smirk on his face, which he modifies as flashes go off. Sometimes one gets the sense that an onlooker gets through because Armitage’s eyebrow goes up — something Proctor never does or at least not in that way. Proctor stands in his own center of gravity; Armitage appears to be leaning on his hips.

As this is physically impossible — a body takes up a certain amount of space — the other thing that hits me is that Armitage’s demeanor is definitely what I’d call mild-mannered or almost apologetic. He gives off the vibe of making-himself-small. When I approached him the first night for a picture, all I could see was the demi-god with the huge aura, and I did feel small. Tonight, I’m not projecting his own charisma back at him — I’m trying to see him without it — and what I perceive is an accommodating fellow with almost no aura of his own at all. I can see how he would disappear into a crowd without trying at all. Is it really possible for someone to have no presence? That’s almost what he seems to imply here.

He and the circle of autograph seekers now move past me, and I leave the line, loop around the street, and put myself at the end of it again to see if I can notice anything else. I try to take a few pictures, but my cheap camera and photography skills are not up to this kind of lighting — the flash always fixes on an intermediate point. A lesson in itself.

As he approaches again, maybe ten feet away or so again now, I see LadySquid with a euphoric smile on her face, walking down the line of waiting fans toward me.

“Did you get it?” I ask.

She shows me the picture. She says something astonishing, which I won’t repeat here, in case she doesn’t want the statement attributed to her in future. I give her a sort of emphatic side hug because she is really beside herself with joy. Wow, I really am beside myself, too.

“See you tomorrow,” she says, “thanks for waiting to see what happened,” and wanders off in the direction of the Tube, her pace suggesting that she’s a little dazed by the whole thing. (The next day, she’ll send me a Twitter DM apologizing for the abrupt departure, but I didn’t mind — I certainly understood her mood.)

Armitage passes me again, still with a group of fans in a half circle around him, and this time I’m so close to the end of the line that I simply turn. He signs a few more — and then he’s at the end. He and the security guys stride resolutely back to the stage door, with fans still standing there, talking, looking at their cameras, tucking autographed items into bags.

The whole episode after Armitage emerges lasts well under fifteen minutes. Twelve, perhaps. It’s taken me a dozen times as long to write this section of the post as it did for him to meet all the fans.

***

Leaving, I cross the street, where a fan is standing on the corner to The Cut, looking over at the stage door, and I smile at her.

“Did you get what you wanted?” I ask.

A few sentences tumble out of her. I never had any instruction in spoken Italian, but I catch that she got something the previous night (ieri sera — ieri must be somehow related to ayer in Spanish), that she thinks he’s handsome (bello — this may need no translation), and either that she’s tired or believes he’s tired (I can’t catch if she’s saying stanca or stanco).

“Oh, good,” I say, very lamely, and smile and say good night and walk off, leaving her there.

Now, I’m really tired. Happier, but exhausted. Walking back to the hotel as I was last night, about the same tempo as last night. Trying with not much success to have the sensible guard up for a late night London street.

This time, I see him as he crosses the street, jaywalking, and ends up on my side of it maybe 15 feet in front of me, in stage door clothing plus the backpack and those very large headphones. Same speedy, loping gait, same long strides, same determination to get wherever he’s going.

Me, too. We all want to get where we’re going.

At the hotel, I check my appetite and discover that I’d really like to eat! After writing down my notes, logging on, and posting, I manage to do it, too. I drop LondonFriend a note and delay our meetup the next morning by an hour, and since she’s still awake, she agrees. It’s still after 3:30 — but I am more grateful when sleep comes than I’ve been in quite a while.

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To August 29, part 1

~ by Servetus on September 15, 2014.