WHAT HAPPENED TO WHERE I’VE BEEN

A Devised Piece by The Attic Collective 

The Attic Collective
Son of Semele Theater

Los Angeles, California
February 2017

“Why do we go digging for proof of who we are? What Happened to Where I've Been, an experimental serio-comedy, explores nostalgia and personal archives through the lens of home videos. Collaboratively devised by The Attic Collective, the piece considers the dissonance between recollection and video footage, and how documenting and revisiting our past informs how we choose to live now.”

A piece created through a devised process that focused on investigating personal archival. By using each member of the ensemble’s personal home videos as source material, the group was able to explore questions surrounding memory, nostalgia, and personal documentation. Through a combination of exercises in compositional improvisation and free response writing, the group began to generate the beginnings of a script. The idea to approach this production as a clown piece came as we realized that our own search for meaning had become the most interesting character in the story we were trying to tell- it became increasingly evident that looking at the evidence of one’s own life through a lens of wonder and curiosity was interesting in and of itself, and inherently clowny. Once we were able to view the project through this lens, what might have been cutesy or self-indulgent became self-aware, interactive, and universal. The piece began with the clowns cheerfully announcing to the audience that they would die at the end of the piece, and that they felt prepared because they had documented their lives so well. After a moment of showcasing what they had at first believed to be adequate documentation, the clowns slowly began spiraling into existential dread as they questioned whether or not they actually had enough to show for their time spent on earth. The performance utilized various forms of technology, including a VCR, a DVD player, a twenty-year-old functional camcorder, a laptop, a cellphone, an ipad, and a tape player. In an intimate, 35 seat theatre using this technology on stage deepened the immersive experience for the audience and also created a myriad of fun, poignant clowning opportunities. In one scene, a clown watched a recording from her ninth birthday on a camcorder where her mother is heard interviewing her. After watching the entirety of the interview, the character rewinds the tape and replays it, this time answering the interview questions as an adult at the same time as her nine-year-old self. This offered opportunities for comedy as well as deep introspection and loss, a pendulum swing typical of a clown piece.