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Interviews
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Hardly a conventional British theatrical couple Philip Fisher interviews Diene Petterle and Christopher Heimann of theimaginarybody Diene Petterle and Christopher Heimann are hardly a conventional British theatrical couple. Diene's background and training are in film while Christopher is happy to confess that he doesn't really like going to the theatre. This may sound an unpromising beginning to a partnership in theatre that has already won a Fringe First from the Scotsman at the Edinburgh Festival. The first result of their efforts, 100, is a combination of physical experiment and strong scripting that delighted not only our editor, Peter Lathan, but also hardened critics from the Guardian and Evening Standard. Diene is an attractive Brazilian in her twenties with dyed blonde hair who possesses one of those dazzling Brazilian smiles that rarely leaves her face. She was brought up in Curitiba, south of Sao Paulo. According to the United Nations, this is the third best city in the world to live in. Despite that, her family left for Lisbon when she was 13. Subsequently, she went to university, doing a degree in TV production at Lancaster and then an MA in film directing at Bristol. She is a born writer. She wrote a book when she was aged eight and had a fortnightly newspaper column by the time she was 13. It took until she was in her second year at university, though, to realise that what she was doing was producing an art form and not just churning out words. She fully understands this now: "What I really care for is drama and being touched by something". This is easy to see from her work to date. She has written and produced a number of films, the most recent of which, the intriguingly named Mr Thompson's Carnation has recently won a Short Circuit Award for script writing and has been selected by the British Council to represent it around the world. This is a significant honour for a lady not yet thirty. Diene has a very clear vision of what she wants from artistic life. Like Christopher, she loves magic realism and particularly the work of Gabriel Garcia Marquez. However, one of the attractions of coming to England is the opportunity to mix this strain with what she describes as the gritty realism of English life and drama. "I like stretching the boundaries between reality and fiction". She also has strong views about film. Far too often, she believes, film directors are too interested in their own vision rather than in pure acting. The people that she admires are some of the best British writers and directors, generally those with a theatrical background such as Sam Mendes, Stephen Daldry and Mike Leigh, although she is also a fan of Ken Loach's work. It is the way that these directors and writers focus on actors that she really likes. The main attraction of working in theatre for Diene is what she can learn about working with actors. Christopher Heimann is a tall, shaven-headed, intellectual looking German who originally trained to be an architect in his native country. He came to England about five years ago to study to be an actor in Devon. While he was studying, he realised that he preferred directing to acting. From there, with a group of friends, he created the Michael Chekhov research project which offered a one-year course in drama. The pair met when they were commissioned to direct three short films with Big Issue vendors. They both loved the project and worked 24 hours a day, seven days a week to bring it to fruition. It has clearly been a very rewarding life experience and one of their stars is a former crack and heroin addict. She stopped taking drugs having found something productive outside herself, as a result of the project. By the end of the project, Christopher and Diene were not only committed to working together by have also fallen in love. The collaborative way in which theimaginarybody works is very interesting. Everything is done on computers and initially, Diene and Christopher will develop a narrative structure and plot. Christopher will start to rehearse with their team of actors and will begin to develop the dialogue as they go along. This is somewhat reminiscent of the way in which Mike Leigh has worked both in theatre and film. Once they have moved things to a certain stage, they will begin to involve their co-writer Neil Monaghan, whose main role is to bring all of the strands together, and they then go through numerous drafts. At this stage, they go into multi-coloured mode marking their typescripts in red green and blue, which enables them to suggest things to each other and to offer different views and interpretations, which can be considered simultaneously. The script that they have produced for 100 has taken a great deal of effort but is a classic example of how three minds can be better than one. It is beautifully written with a wonderful rhythm and tempo. However, the script is only part of the story for theimaginarybody. They are at least as interested in the methodology, but only as the means of conveying their message, not, as with so many physical theatre companies, for its own sake. Christopher is the expert in this area and he believes in stripping down drama to the very barest bones. In 100, the only props that are used are bamboo sticks,but these take on many different forms in the minds of the audience. As he says, "I enjoy transformation of every type whether of characters, objects or space through the actors' imaginations and those of the audience". He is clearly a very precise director who seems to be happiest when he is using drama to create images from nothing, and working in an environment where actors have great creative input. While he may not be a lover of Theatre, what he does appreciate in the medium is the way in which it makes his audience suspend disbelief. He believes that this is unique and is not available through any other of the dramatic arts. While ostensibly a play about death, in reality, 100 is much more an affirmation of life and it is an injunction to consider how one chooses to live one's life and what one might do with it. As Christopher says, "we started with the idea of how we might live our lives if we were always aware of what it is that really matters to us. Death makes life more special and it can give perspective as well". If there is any one of the characters that Diene identifies with, it is Sophie. She is the person who is always putting off living her life because she is too busy working. Even when she knows that she's about to die, she is still unwilling to stop. This obsession with work and driving oneself to the limit is something that she recognises in herself and is only too keen to avoid. The ethos of theimaginarybody can perhaps be summed up in a comment by Diene - "I find the ways in which content and story emerge very interesting. We attempt to look at what is essential in life and then search for what is essential in theatre". Christopher takes up this theme "We are interested in stories, narrative and drama". 100 is playing at the Soho Theatre opening on 3 February for a three-week run. Following its success in Edinburgh, it is returning there in 2003 and hope to get a prime slot at a major venue. It is also touring the world. There were offers from no fewer than 14 countries and the company plans to take it to six of these in the next 18 months or so. They had been invited to Canada for the World Stage Festival which is one highlight. Diene is particularly excited about appearing in her hometown as one of the major attractions at the largest theatre festival in Brazil. In fact, 100 will be the only non-Portuguese language play in the whole festival. This is a tremendous compliment to a great young company and to two really nice, sincere individuals whose careers will be well worth following, if only because they are unlikely to be dull. There is a special ticket offer (£4 off) for the Soho run for British Theatre Guide visitors only. See our offer page for details.
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