Got to musing, what else could be written about director Robert Wilson [1941-2025] that hadn’t been said. One of the greatest all time, most ground-breaking theater directors. It was an honour to meet/interview one of my idols when Pierre Audi invited the Heiner Müller /Wilson Hamletmachine to his London Almeida Theater, 1987.
Curious still years later, asked world-renowned opera singer Robert Lloyd, whom I’d just worked with: Robert Wilson? Those exacting body positions. Expecting a polite, generous reply. Instead, Mr. Lloyd effusive in his praise with words to the effect, ‘it was the most freeing vocal experience ever for me’. Pelleas. Maybe the Tai-Chi of it all?:)
Then thinking, Einstein on the Beach [Wilson with Philip Glass, 1976], A Chorus Line [1975]. And there was Billy Joel with Piano Man [1974] returning to NYC in 1975 disillusioned with Los Angeles and recording the radical 52nd Street [1978], NY in decay. Then there’s Sondheim, his Pacific Overtures (1976) then Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (1979). The Rocky Horror Show, Tommy [1975]. The Fall of Saigon. Bruce Springsteen’s Born to Run. Saturday Night Live was born.
Retrospect oft’ dangerous. Prejudicial. Conflation where none could be. And yet. Tell me there wasn’t a zeitgeist in America back then? Americans tend towards neatness in boxes, easily marketed, easily consumed. And yet. America nothing without challenge. Doubt. Uncertainty. The rebel. The seeker. Some artists embraced the medium of television, critiquing, recalibrating.
Robert Wilson turned off the sound creating quiet enormity on stage, what’s now the jumbotron. Without the Tai-Chi.
