Connecting the dots - how theatre can beat Netflix | Marios Mettis | TEDxLarnaca

The actor/director Marios Mettis presents a powerful way in which theatre can prosper in the age of television and cinema. Through relevant examples he takes us to the inexhaustible world of imagination, where theatre gives us the possibility to connect the dots.

Marios Mettis studied acting at the National Theatre of Greece and directing at the Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts in London. As an actor he worked in theatre, in cinema and in television. He took part in performancies in the National Theatre, in Amore Theatre, in Greek Spectacles, in the Theatre Organization of Cyprus (T. O.C.) and many other scenes. As a director he collaborated in Lady Macbeth, in One Day When We Where Young, Wolfgang, Three Tall Women, Eurydice and The Goat or Who Is Sylvia? In 2015 he directed the theatre award of Cyprus ceremony 2013-2014 in the main scene of T.O.C. He was awarded the Award for Best Male Role in the Cyprus Theatre Awards 2013-2014 for his role as Acacius Acakievich in the play Nickolai Gogol's Coat.

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Swiss philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau,

said that the world of reality

has its limits,

the world of imagination is limitless.

So, for this reason, limitlessly
imagine the rest of my speech,

I will say nothing more, thank you.

(Laughter)

Thank you.

(Applause)

When I was young, I loved those puzzles
which appeared in the newspaper,

where you had to connect the dots
for an image to appear.

I imagine you all know
the puzzle I mean - this one.

Usually, some of it was already there,

to give you an idea
of what it might depict.

This alone was enough
to activate my imagination

before I even touched
the paper with my pencil

to be able to guess what the riddle hid.

The fact that the image was incomplete,

with some numbered dots
as the only clues I had,

put my mind through a process.

I started seeing
different images in my head.

When I had an idea
of what it would depict,

I started connecting the dots
and a bit later I would pause

to see what I had formed.

OK.

Was that what I had imagined?

Or not?

I processed the new data,

the new images in my head.

I continued to connect the dots;
after a while I stopped again, checking.

Things are much clearer now,

but, will this be what I imagined, or not?

New data, processing in my head,

new images.

If the image had appeared to me
already made, complete,

with all the dots connected,

if someone else had done this job for me,

it would not be interesting at all.

The genius of this game

lies in the fact that
it presents you with something incomplete

and asks of you
to do the rest of the work.

This way,

you have automatically contributed
to the creation of the image,

both practically and mentally.

And for this reason,
the result has greater value for you,

because, in a way, it belongs to you.

It is your creation too.

In the end, the result

may not be an incredible drawing
with thousands of colors,

but it doesn't need to be.

The mere fact that you worked as well
for it to be completed,

makes it special;
it attains an emotional value.

Cecily O'Neill is a professor

and author of many books about theatre.

What she says about theatre
reminds me very strongly

of the game with the dots.

She says that the spectator,

watching a performance, tries to interpret

the scattered pieces
of the information presented.

From the moment a performance starts

we make speculations, we form hypotheses,

we develop expectations for the world
unfolding before us.

The spectator translates all these clues

which they get from the performance,

constructing a world in their imagination.

The construction of this world is,
in part, their creation as well,

because it is the result of their effort

to connect all these clues
of a play presented to them

divided and incomplete.

Did anyone guess what the answer is?

The bit at the bottom?

No one, one, all?

Well done.

Cute!

There is a power in the incomplete.

It can enable our imagination,

and this is something that usually

cinema and television don't do.

They give you an image
already formed, complete,

and you have nothing
to contribute in return.

They present you the result,
however impressive it may be.

Watching a movie you may one minute

be at a wonderful beach
with a spectacular sunset,

then be blasted somewhere in space,

inside a spaceship, crossing some galaxy,

then the camera zooms
to the face of the protagonist

in his eye, the bulb of his eye,
in his eye's pupil,

inside, the cells, in the microcells,
in the micro-microcells.

Infinite possibilities.

How, then, can theatre match it -

or more accurately, compete with it -

in enabling the spectator's imagination?

And what is even more interesting

is that each individual's imagination

will create what each one of us

wants to see, fitted just for them.

In a film, a TV series,

the director has already decided

what you will see
and where you will look.

Your imagination will give you
the image of a landscape or a situation

exactly how you want to see it,

according to your experiences,
according to what you have lived.

Many a times, you will see
what you need to see.

French philosopher Jacques Rancière

in his book "The Emancipated Spectator"

says that spectators
are independent, active observers

who participate in countless
heterogenous performances.

Each spectator learns
something different from a performance

through an active interpretation.

How many times

have you read a book, gotten excited,

and then went to the cinema
to see the movie and were disappointed?

Sitting next to your best friend,
who has not read the book,

they watch the movie, like it,
and call you a pseudo-intellectual!

(Laughter)

Why does this happen?

Bad choice of friend, that's for sure!

But why does this happen so often?

The one who hasn't read the book,
doesn't have a point of comparison,

they went to the cinema, got something
already made, something made to be liked,

and liked it!

Reading the book,

you have the chance to create for yourself

the images described in the book.

In comparison later on,
going to the cinema,

what you see there seems too little.

Imagination individualizes the image.

And then everything else seems lesser.

No matter how good it is.

Those of you who have tried online dating
know this very well.

(Laughter)

Yes, you, I don't see you, but I hear you.

Well, this is exactly what happened to me

when I had read Patrick Süskind's book
"Perfume: the Story of a Murderer,"

and then went to the cinema
to see the movie.

I was disappointed!

I scoured the internet
and found some comments

from people who had read
this specific book

and saw the movie.

Bad font choice.

Good.

"Sadly, I have lost all faith in movies.

They don't have the ability
to invoke in me the same emotions

that the words do
in my mind and in my heart.

'Perfume' is one of the most provocative
books I have ever read.

Ever since I read it,
I smell the world differently.

The movie is really disappointing.

It's puzzling that such few movies

are worthy of the book
they are based on.

The book. The movie
was not what I had imagined.

The movie is amazing,
the book is crap."

(Laughter)

Well, these opinions exist as well;
it's good to listen to them.

At least it has smells, perfumes.

(Laughter)

"The book.

Because the brilliance of this book

lies in the way the author
describes the smells,

resulting in you imagining them.

This you can't get from a movie.

The book. The movie kills imagination.

Always the book."

Back to my circle.

There are, of course, cases

where a movie or a TV series

can function that way as well.

In László Nemes' movie "Son of Saul,"

the lens focuses on the protagonist's face

with many close ups,

everything happening around him
is only barely seen or insinuated.

The director says that by not letting
the spectator see what's happening

and giving them only some information

forces their imagination
to fill in the gaps for itself.

In the movie we can hear
dogs barking, screaming,

voices, shots, we can see a few corpses -

to be exact, we see only
two or three deaths during the movie.

But the fear that our imagination creates

is bigger than anything

the director could visually create.

Another very good example
is The Blair Witch Project.

The fewer things we know
about what we are afraid of,

the scarier it is.

There is an expression
in the Greek language

which I find especially interesting.

"Listen to see."

Listen ... to see!

It describes exactly this procedure.

In ancient Greek tragedies,
very important events

such as murders, battles

could not be presented on stage,

they had to be verbally
communicated to the audience.

Surely, simply mentioning them
would do the job,

but it wouldn't be very effective;
it would leave the audience uninterested

and the importance of the event
would decrease.

Imagine, for instance,

the messenger from
Aeschylus' "The Persians"

entering the stage -
after having done this whole journey,

to bring the bad news of the Persian's
defeat by the Greeks -

entering the stage,

sweating, tired, exhausted,

looking at the elders' chorus,
those respected elders

and telling them: "We lost.

I have to go now, someone's
expecting me, I have plans."

No!

The reason that the great tragedy writers
dedicate so many pages

detailing the description
of those events

is exactly in order to give stimuli

to the spectators/listeners
so that listening,

they can see these breathtaking events
without diminishing them.

What they did was
to activate their imagination

through speech.

A cheat.

So theatre

shouldn't be trying to mimic
either television or cinema.

What it should be trying to do,
and it can do,

is to activate
the spectator's imagination,

to give space to their imagination
to create the images for itself.

It can be done in many ways.

Scenography.

Props which do not present
with realistic accuracy

a space or a place,
but rather they suggest it.

A house doesn't need
to be a realistic one.

It can be something akin to it,

something reminiscent of it,
something close to its image.

The sound.

We know very well, empirically,
how everything sounds.

Through sound we can evoke
images in the spectators.

The lighting.

Spotlights aren't there
only to light up the scene

or to create lighting effects.

An illuminated square here
could be a mountain or a lake

or a sea or a lagoon.

We would need two illuminated
squares for this last one.

French author Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

says that a pile of rocks
ceases to be a pile of rocks

from the moment that a person looks at it,

and in their head, they see
the image of a cathedral.

The spectator, watching a performance,

sees, listens, recognizes
clues and codes

for things they already know,

and their imagination
does the rest of the work.

It fills the voids, it connects the dots.

Small theatre groups
with a small budget

can use this technique

and produce low cost
but high quality performances.

Big theatre groups that have the money
can invest it elsewhere.

They can increase the directors' salary,

(Laughter)

the actors', the participants'.

Happy colleagues, what is more beautiful?

Ornaments and fancy scenery
are all very well,

but if they are purely decorative,

interest in them will fade
after five or 10 minutes.

Many theatre groups
use this technique already,

and they have yielded
extraordinary results.

Others do it without realizing.

It is important that we,
the creators, understand,

take notice, locate, develop

and invest in it.

Our imagination is an extremely
powerful instrument

with incredible, infinite possibilities.

Humans have the ability to imagine,

to create with their imagination.

In our brains there are millions
of pieces of information registered:

images, objects, faces, smells, sounds,

and our imagination
has this great capability

to be able to weave all of this together

in the most extraordinary way
you can imagine.

Theatre can give the spectator
the space to imagine,

to create with their imagination,

to become the creator,
to become the maker.

And for the spectator,
it will be a thrilling experience.

Exactly like the game with the dots.

Thank you.

(Applause)