Lisa Fay and Jeff Glassman Duo

Description

"Endlessly imaginative" Fay/Glassman belong in some kind of genius category. "
David Cuthbert, New Orleans Times-Picayune

We invent systems for organizing raw elements of theatre, and originate performance techniques required by them. Notated graphic scores are central to this process. Analogous to animation, exact composition of each frame is needed for the whole to work. Each piece acts as a formal "˜filter' for critically viewing anew. Real-time, live and unmediated formal "˜filters' include instantaneous shifts through patterns of time and place, "˜cinematic' reversals of movement-gravity, and a repertory of counter-intuitive behaviors. Several long-lived pieces from our repertory are combined with new repertoire works. Total show time runs 75 minutes. The pieces range in duration between 3 and 20 minutes. Some are solos and some are duets. Music and sound emanate from the pieces themselves rather than serve as a backdrop. There is dialogue and also no dialogue. Our set consists of small pieces of furniture and hand props which come alive in a stunning world of 20 portable flats with which we tour. Our work is small, analogue, acoustic and on a fine scale "“ best seen in intimate settings where the seeming impossibilities are undeniably live.

"...achieved dazzling sophistication"
Kyle Gann, Village Voice

Work Sample

https://vimeo.com/127647017 - https://vimeo.com/83647229
password: pla102feebi

Time and Time Again, composed by Lisa Fay and Jeff Glassman,
Performed by Lisa Fay and Jeff Glassman
Live Performance 6 minutes
Sungmisan Village Theatre, Seoul, South Korea,
June 2009
The piece is constructed of about thirty "scenes" each of which is bounded by a "pivot" setting the scene off in time and place from its neighboring scenes.

"Pivot-montage" is our invention for matching the cut in film editing. A cascade of problems beset two people, seen through a series of pivot-bounded scenes, each lasting 2-20 seconds. Throughout this series, there are several sudden looping sequences, repeated verbatim. We have used this pivot technique "“ a performance technique and a composition technique "“ in many works, each exploring the freedom to re-frame time and place at any moment.

This is a good example of what happens when ordinary life is turned upside down by making a simple change in the rules of reality. And this approach applies to all of our work, forming the basis of our humor and our exploratory thinking.

History

"Endlessly imaginative" Fay/Glassman belong in some kind of genius category. "
David Cuthbert, theatre critic, New Orleans Times-Picayune

Consummate professionals, together and individually, Fay and Glassman have originated and performed movement-based theatre works in tours across the US, Eastern and Western Europe, Mexico, Cuba, South Africa and South Korea, in theatres, colleges, cultural centers, and national and international mime and theatre festivals including the Copenhagen International Theatre Festival; Third International Festival of Mime in Mexico; the seminal First International Mime Institute and Festival, Viterbo College, WI (1974); D.Festa international Deahangno Korea Small Theatre Festival (2012, 2013, 2014, 2015), South Korea; co-founded internationally touring experimental theatre collective United Mime Workers ('71-86' an NEA Dance Touring Program company); directed INNER VOICES Social Issues Theatre ensemble/program, University of Illinois, (1999- present); received multiple Fellowships from the Illinois Arts Council, and a National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) Choreography Fellowship for experimental movement theatre (UMW), and selected as an NEA Our Town Artist, 2017. They have served the Illinois Arts Council (IAC), and the Alliance for Cultural Democracy (ACD). Currently they are hosted at the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts at the University of Illinois as artists-in-residence in a creative residency.

Artistic Vision

"Their real intent is to go to the center of human movement, habit and meaning."
Chicago Theatre Blog

WE ARE KNOWN FOR APPLYING COMPLEX COMPOSED STRUCTURES to ordinary daily human behavior. These structures form invented systems for organizing movement and speech in theatre, analogous to composing music. The realization of this theatre requires the development of an intermediary working notation - scores - capable of handling the complexity of our compositional techniques for performance. We make these scores available for exhibit.

PRIMARY TO OUR WORKING PROCESS is the development and mastery of new physical performance techniques required to embody these compositional ideas. Real-time, live and physically unmediated, these embodied movement techniques include orchestrated instant shifts of time and place that we call "pivot-montage" and "cinematic reverse" "contra-diction" "uncanny coordination" and other "counter-natural behaviors".

With invention, skill and a fundamental sense of humor we make what has been described aptly as "surreal vaudeville." And we love our work.

Programs for Specific Audience(s) Expertise

We have worked so often with audiences brought together in so many ways, that we can simply say our material and style is universal, and we know how to make a program designed specifically for any audience.