The void: a bratty little musical
Welcome to the void
There are so many musical theater songs that have such potential for revolutionary action, right? Big songs, like One Day More from Les Mis.
And the thing about Lecoq’s Le Corps Poétique, or The Moving Body, is that, even when we do drop into a more animistic space, prioritizing the discipline of our bodies as instruments - to play perfectly- is only distracting us from this revolutionary potential.
These pieces are beautiful because we are singing them. They are beautiful because they were created, right? Because we exist within the same time and space and we are playing (with) them.
A decade ago, in my first life in theater, I was so scared to make mistakes - so scared. Part of that was because I was frozen in compulsory existence - the occupied flow state that forbid me from being me - a disabled, sick, neuro*, trans* nonbinary lesbian white settler currently occupying Eno, Tuscarora, Occaneechi, and Shakori land - in ways that moved beyond colonialism and corporate, consumer, and cultural capitalism.
Over the past year, I've gone through a process of death and rebirth - a journey from Le Corps Poétique, disciplined and frozen, to Le Corpse Poétique, where I am able to flow through cycles of creation and completion through play.
I think we're so stuck in performance (a play) that we're not actually playing (to play). And that's where the magic is.
Clowns are butterflies - one small movement, one small change in the ways that we move, the ways that we play, can change everything.
I spent this entire year going through that decomposition process - decomposing my work, body, voice, gestures, physicality, and economies of movement.
I learned that, in this moment, it is not primarily about these songs sounding pretty or the choreography looking good.
It's about the potential for transformative change - embodying that in ourselves, in our own structures, in our own vessels.
And, in a way, I personally think that the black tents of the 1960s, and the circus tent prior, have come alive today through the con-tent, which, etymologically, means to hold together, right?
This, here, is my little con-tent.
To me, it’s where my inner Le Corps Poétique and Le Corpse Poétique press play, together.
I made it! Please enjoy.
love, woods
The void: a bratty little musical
Run time: ~2:30; Captions, transcripts, ASL interpretation, and translation will be posted when resources allow - please know this is a priority for me.
Content notices: discussions of SA, eating disorders, compulsory cisheterosexism, and colonialism and a mention of infertility and anti-trans violence in copaganda.
The beginning
door handle
The Void
Show & tell: what My Mask/Masc Told Me
Not Funny Haha (Abridged)/Sunflower Moon (Reprise)
Perfect Little Lesbian
Once Upon A Sunflower Moon
Le Corpse Poétique
Mikey told me (baby’s first rap)
The little vampire prince and princess
Running on E
Les mis fun house
Wrote my way through
360 Degrees (Busch Gardens)
In Every Atum
You make my colors dance
Things I Learned Loving You In Liminal Spaces
Limerence
What do I do (gray sweatpants season)
Brat for the universe
Trap door
Pieces
First I saw this:
Then I *sob* freestyled this: