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| Alexandra Tatarsky |
Q: Where you are from and
how you did you start solo performing?
A: I owe my early interest in solo performance to the vast amount
of individuals in my neighborhood walking around talking to themselves, often
with tutus on their heads or in gowns made of beer cans and trash bags. As a youth in New York City, I recall
thinking to myself: Oh, if only one day I could grow up to be just like them!
Q: What brought you specifically into the world of solo performance?
A: One day, a dear friend and musician
Hazel Ra asked me to perform in her vaudeville show. During my research into travelling sideshows,
quacks, healers and the lost art of the theatrical science lecture, I
discovered Dippel, a 17th century alchemist and inventor of the
color Prussian blue. His story was so
tender, so ridiculous, so full of failure that I knew I had to share it with
the world. And so I began performing as
Dippel. And that is how I entered the
world of solo performance.
Q: Could you tell us about some of your recent solo work?
A: I continue to perform around town
under many different names—Dippel, SELENA and The Mound, to name a few. I have in the past couple years gathered
these creatures together into a full-length solo show called Beast of Festive Skin, in which they all
meet at an open mic night in Hell. The
show changes depending on the venue, the crowd and my state of mind. I am also forcing myself to write some
entirely new material, most recently SIGN
FELT! (a show about nothingness).
And of course I also enjoy wandering around town getting into
compromising situations, which often prove to be the most intimate of solo
performances. Most recently, I was
famous on the internet for a couple of days as Andy Kaufman’s daughter. As my
dad used to say, “They laugh at us. We
laugh at them. Everybody laugh!”
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| Tatarsky in BEAST OF FESTIVE SKIN |
Q: How would you describe your particular kind of solo performance?
A: Elementary school talent contest, travelling
medicine show, absurdist vaudeville, bar mitzvah party.
Q: What inspires you to keep going and how do you keep yourself motivated?
A: Solo performance is the scariest thing
I can think of to do. I keep going so I
don’t feel like a coward. John Wayne said
something along the lines of, “Courage is being
terrified, strapping on your guns, and getting on the horse anyway.” I try to remember this.
I stay motivated by drinking coffee in
the morning, doing gibberish meditation (talking to myself for a long time in
gibberish), and reminding myself that if I stopped performing, I would be too
bitter to ever go out.
Q: What is your
approach to the development process when putting a solo project together? Do
you create a ton of material on stage with improvisation? Get it down on paper
first? Tape or video record it? Hold readings for feedback? Go up to a
mountaintop?
A: I begin by thinking too hard and for far too long. I read many books, I take many notes, and I
bounce between many ideas. At the final
hour, when I have thoroughly exhausted my brain, I abandon all of this and walk
around in a crowded place so no one pays attention to me and I begin talking
out loud to myself without stopping. Eventually, thank heavens, I find myself
returning to particular phrases and I stretch them out and cut them down until
I have something of a story. Then I book
a show somewhere so that I am forced to complete the tale or else face public
humiliation—sometimes both! In that
case, I simply remind myself that there is a long and venerable tradition of public
humiliation.
Q: Who are some of your influences or people that inspire/embolden you?
A: This street preacher I saw in the summer one time who was
yelling at her congregation of bums, “I would rather be at the beach right
now! But I’m not! I’m here with you! Cuz I wanna bring you da light of Gawd!”
A poet on my block named Donald.
Grandmas with excellent comedic timing.
Homeless people who plug a TV into the streetlamp to watch football. My parents (they are both
psychologists). The Puerto Rican Day
parade. The Mitzvah Tank in New York
City that dances for the coming of Moshiach.
Speaking in tongues. Experiments
that didn’t quite work out.
The street performers I saw growing up. Master Lee, who neatly chops a cucumber on
the groins of unsuspecting audience volunteers.
Tic and Tac, the acrobatic twins.
This couple from England who threw cream and sugar in the air and caught
them in teacups balanced on their heads.
Also, Peter Schumann. Al
Giordano. Free Schools. Ventriloquism. Sock puppets.
Abner Jay. Storefront psychics. Euripides.
Daniil Kharms. Spoonbill and
Sugartown Booksellers. Elizabeth Cotton.
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| Tatarsky as The Mound |
Q: How do you bridge the gap of the business side of theatre?
A: I try not to. I make
different days for business and for theatre.
And I try not to do any business until I actually do some theatre.
Regarding business: I try not to say No to opportunities for
performance, regardless of pay. At the same time, I also try to spread the
gospel of: Hey person/curator/bar/festival, I really think you have a
responsibility to pay your performers!
And if you really can’t afford to pay me because you don’t have
a job, are about to get evicted from your apartment, and kindly invited me to
perform in your stairwell to raise money for an organization to stop the
destruction of mountaintops in Appalachia, then maybe at the very least we can
all contribute something to a big pot of soup and share that for dinner?
Q: Any advice for some aspiring artists just starting out in
solo performance?
A: When I ask the cranky older artists in
my life for advice about being an artist, they say: don’t be an artist. And when I say: but I wanna be an
artist! They say: OK, so be an artist!
I have found this to be very helpful.
Recently, I was in a class with the
great director and teacher Ed Sherin. He
asked us all why we were there. An older
fellow in the room said, “Well, I tried a lot of things in life and being
onstage is really the only thing that makes me happy.” Ed said to the fellow, “Oh you poor, poor
bastard.”
I also found this very helpful.
Q: Share with us something funny that has happened to you recently.
A: I was sitting on a bench on Grand Street. An older man with rowdy red and grey curls
poking out from under a large hat said to me in a voice thick with Yiddish and
allergies, “Excuse me, do you have the time?”
I said no. He went on, “Oh
wait. I just remembered. I do have the time. I have the best time!!!”
Q: What are the largest and smallest audiences you've ever
played to?
A: I played to an audience of 2 very
sweet Belgian fellows who may or may not have understood anything. For some reason, nobody else came that night.
Passerby peeked in through the
windows. At one point, the cops showed
up because a neighbor had complained about something or other. The show had the quality of a dream where
nothing makes any sense but you enjoy it very much.
I have also played to audiences of
several hundred. This is great fun
because several hundred people laughing at you is much louder than two people
laughing at you. And the vibration of it
gives you lots of energy.
Q: What do you see for the future of solo performance and for you personally as an artist?
A: Real live humans breathing together in small dark rooms will
only become more powerful in this age of so many screens! I certainly plan to force many more live
humans to gather together in small dark rooms and other strange places.
Q: Links?
You
are also welcome to send me a message at alex.tatarsky@gmail.com
Alexandra Tatarsky's BEAST OF FESTIVE SKIN will play at the 2014 Dallas Solo Fest. Info... HERE.
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