Quotations from a Ruined City

Abstract

Ed. Note: The main performing space for Quotations from a Ruined City is a platform approximately 15 feet deep, 25 feet wide, and three feet tall, bordered upstage by a low, white picket fence and downstage by 11 horizontal strands of barbed wire. There is a second, equally large performing area at floor level, upstage of the raised platform. In this second area are two metal cubicles (upstage right and left) and a closet on far stage left. Ramps give the actors access to the platform downstage. Two projection screens suspended from the ceiling, left and right, mark the upstage limit of the performing space; they are complemented by a pair of video monitors, also suspended from the ceiling. The script includes texts and stage directions, but it should be noted that recorded sound and video and film images-central performance elements in Abdoh's work-are not included here. They are recorded in Dar A Luz archival footage. The performance of these texts involves three elements: Torn and Fitzpatrick's live faces, prerecorded video images of their faces, and a prerecorded soundtrack of their voices reciting the texts; none of these three elements is in exact synchronization with the others. Practically all the texts in Quotations from a Ruined City are prerecorded. The video image in the scene entitled Year Itch (Video) is an excerpt from the film The Seven Year Itch, in which Tim Ewell and Marilyn Monroe play Chopsticks together on piano.