Theatre and film are a bad mix. As a theatre journalist, I'm sometimes sent DVDs to give me an idea of shows that are coming my way from abroad. I rarely watch them. Film has such a deadening effect on theatre that I reckon I'm better off imagining a production than seeing it killed on screen.
There are several reasons for this. Foremost among them is that film is a realistic medium where theatre is metaphorical. It jars on screen when we see actors pretending to be someone or somewhere they are not. In theatre, we expect such pretence - what else is there? We understand that the opening scene of any production will establish the rules of the make-believe game we are going to play. In theatre those rules are always changing; in film they rarely vary. Consequently, the conventions of cinema find it difficult to cope.
Then there are practical problems. In the theatre, we do our own editing, choosing the long-shot and the close-up as we see fit. In film, the editor is in control of what we see and it takes a special sensitivity to a play's rhythms - not to mention access to a variety of camera angles – to be able to emulate the experience of sitting in an auditorium. Throw in the question of spatial relationships and of theatre's wordiness and it's not surprising film tends to make such a clunky job of it.
It's the same in reverse. Theatre often makes a bit of a hash of film, although there are exceptions. Last week at the Dublin Theatre Festival I caught up with Katie Mitchell's Waves and, although my reaction was not dissimilar to that of Michael Billington, I can only agree with Lyn Gardner that it's a rare example of film being as live and spontaneous as everything else on stage.
Another exception is the newly released DVD of Black Watch, the National Theatre of Scotland's much talked about show that's about to end its tour of duty in New York. I won't claim it deserves a cinema release, although it has already been broadcast by the BBC in Scotland, but as theatrical documents go, it is tremendously effective. I'd strongly recommend anyone who didn't see this fantastic production to give it a watch.
Nothing beats the live experience, of course, but even those who did see it on stage will appreciate details the camera makes apparent. John Tiffany's production, performed in drill halls and sports centres with the audience on two sides of a wide playing area, was very much in long shot. If the film loses some of that sense of spectacle, it gains in the intimacy of the close-up.
It makes no pretence at being "real" - the audience is frequently in view, the stage is a stage, this actors' voices echo - but by filming it twice, once with an audience, once without, it allows for a wide variety of shots and a filmic rhythm that matches the energy of the show. It's almost enough to convince me that good editing and sensitive direction is enough to make theatre work on screen. But is it a one off?
