Daughter of the Wind
Written and Directed by Steve Byrne
The Setting
Inspired by the vivid story telling of the oldest chronicler of all, Ovid, Daughter of the Wind will be an emotional journey of love and sorrow, perfect happiness and despair. Driven by the timeless tales of the gods of old, Interplay Theatre aims to engage every sense. Sight, smell, sound, and touch are enticed to witness the intensity and incredulity of some of the most compelling stories ever written. Written in ancient times when justifications were needed to create order from chaos, to make sense of unpredictable and life threatening natural phenomena, the tales provide some of the best story telling of all.
Set inside an inflatable dome, 3 performers and a musician, will use multi-media technology, live music, live theatre and interaction with the audience to uncover these Greek myths.
The Story
The show will be based on the story of Ceyx and Alcyone, daughter of the god of wind. Essentially a universal love story, Ceyx leaves his faithful wife, Alcyone, to visit the great oracle. Instead of choosing the safer journey across land, he decides to face the perils of the sea, against the protestations of his wife. Alcyone warns him that his life will be in danger, but eventually concedes when he promises to return to her before "the moon fills her silver orb twice". After a tearful goodbye he sets sail, but not half way through the journey a terrible storm wrecks the ship and all on board are drowned. Meanwhile Alcyone does not know that her husband has died and continues to pray to the goddess of the sky, Juno, for his safety. Juno eventually takes pity on Alcyone and sends his messenger, Iris, to break the news to her in a dream. The next morning the heartbroken Alcyone sees her husband's body floating on the waves and rushes to him. When she finds herself flying, beating the air with newly formed wings, she kisses her husband's lifeless corpse and he too is transformed into a bird. They fly away and mate for life out on the water.
The five senses
A considerable amount of new research and development of our multi-sensory techniques has taken place with residencies through Creative Partnerships in Birmingham and the Black Country and West Yorkshire Grants in Bradford, Kirklees and Wakefield. This work has resulted in a greater degree of interaction with audience members during the show, particularly using water to enhance the sensations of sound, touch and atmosphere, as well as, of course, the multifarious visual effects this offers.
The elements of water and wind are critical to the show and will be represented across the senses with the installation of a "perfect pool of water" and interaction with both performers and audience members, similar to that achieved in the residencies.
For example, one group of children produced a beautiful tactile and extremely reflective anchor for the moment when the ship goes down. This projects an array of colour around the dome. Whilst manipulating this the performers discovered it could be transformed into a bird, foreshadowing the point when both Ceyx and Alcyone fly away as kingfishers. Pupils were transfixed with the shadows and could feel the light changing and flickering over their faces.
The performers have also experimented with mirrors to reflect back images within the pool to those students with difficult physical needs. This gives the illusion for all people sat around the pool that the water is very deep and holds all sorts of dreams and stories.
Again various representations of the element of sea and ship sounds have been tried out, with students creating a sound score from materials such as bubble wrap, pebbles and stones. The sound of gongs playing in the water create a haunted sound of the ship going down. Cow bells and other percussive instruments are used to create atmospheric and vibratory sound scores.
Daughter of the Wind is a classical love story with universal appeal and a happy ending. It will be related in Interplay Theatre's distinctive performance style, stimulating the five senses to give greater access to the narrative.
Daughter of the Wind will be toured into schools and theatres from mid-February to July 2005.