The QR caught up with Anna Porubcansky, the day after its debut at the Kristin Linklater Voice Centre, Orkney. The sun was shining, without a cloud in the sky, a change from the squalid weather which attended her, and technical stage manager Alma Lindenhovius’ arrival the day before. A good omen if there ever was one, surely!
Beginning with the show’s origins and development, Anna explained that this was an intensely personal journey for her as an artist.
‘Unbecoming is a show that deals with the levels and layers of things that I feel as a woman I have had to deal with becoming. We all go through some metamorphizing throughout our lives, from children into teenagers and teenagers, into adults.
For me the show is about what I feel I have had to become in many, many different ways and answering all of the needs of life and then asking what’s underneath all of that. Am I more than my needs? How do these needs shape me?’
Of course, those needs Anna pointed out were typically crafted by society and its expectations.
‘It all really began when I became a mother for the first time.
I couldn’t believe it! I was looking out at all the women with babies and wondering how this had been happening! I didn’t know it was so hard! How did I not know this?!’
Anna’s daughter would be 2½ before she returned to a studio.
‘I was just full of rage! I didn’t know who I was anymore. I had lost everything of who I thought I was. I just started working from there.’
What followed was an extensive period of research and development as she delved into the catalogue of female centred literature, from Jane Eyre, through Rebecca, The Bell Jar, all the way to biographies of Marilyn Monroe. It was through this she began to realise the show was going to be about more than being a mother.
Women’s perceived needs, Anna pointed out, are very much crafted by society, and its expectations.
‘How,’ she asked, ‘do we fit into this web of social life? The show tries look at all the different tracks, how we manoeuvre ourselves through it. That’s why the show is called Unbecoming, because we become, and become, and become so many things; you have to unbecome that to actually understand what’s at our core.’
The show, Anna observes, is about how women are placed in society, rather than being allowed to define their own ideas of being a woman.
‘So many times, the voices of these women I’ve read, and read about, seem to be wanting something, and having to fight against the grain of society in order to get what they needed.’
Whilst grounded in her own intensely female experiences of the world, Anna adds, ‘I think maybe it’s less about the specifics, and more about the show posing an environment in which people will be able to experience their own associations, their own memories, and experiences.’
Unbecoming, Anna explained doesn’t rely on a fictional shell in which to play out its ideas, being instead an intensely personal experience, rooted in her own voice.
‘It’s me stripping away bits of myself away. If I do that in front of people, maybe I’m sharing something of myself that will create a response. That’s what theatre is anyway, isn’t it? I’m not going to tell you what to think, that’s not interesting to me; it’s interesting to me is the connection I have with other people.’
‘It’s a kind of dreamworld, something more akin to musical structure, even if there aren’t actually any singing bits! There’s a soundscape, and text, but text which works almost like a sequence of songs.’
Where, I asked, did the play sit within Company of Wolves larger body of work, stemming as it does from the Polish laboratory theatre school.
‘It’s really different to anything we’ve done before, probably because it’s particularly my stuff. It’s very much coming from my own sources, my own inner landscape, but I would say it follows the thread created by the company so far. This piece, like all our work, is fundamentally based in embodied experience.’
I went on to ask how important it was to Anna, that she take this show on tour, rather than basing herself in one, or two marquee venues.
‘This tour is so important to me. There are times in my life when I don’t feel like I have a choice; like the path is clear and this tour is like that. I need to be here.’ Anna went onto point towards two reasons for this need, the first being her years long absence from the stage thanks to Covid and her new child, the second a need to reconnect with humanity after the long, long periods humanity has spent shielding itself from each other.
‘I don’t know what’s happening anymore! Where are people at? This tour for me is like a temperature check on different parts of Scotland. I want to go out there, meet people, I want to talk with them, hear where they’re at. I want to say ‘this is where I’m at!’’
And was it important to take the show out amongst the more remote regions of the country?
‘Yeah, I love it. I absolutely love, love, love going into village halls and community centres. If I could just do that, that’s what I would do. I feel people outside of the central belt come in more open to experiences, and with a lovely honesty & curiosity.’
And does the show speak to everyone, or is it directed towards particular souls?
‘I think it’s a very rare piece of art that speaks to every single person in the world, but…even if it doesn’t speak to everyone
I don’t know. I don’t know. I, you know, I think, um, I think it’s a very rare piece of art that speaks to every single person in the world, and I’m not sure that theatre has to speak to everyone. That said, I hope that no matter who walks in the door, they will find something that resonates with them. That would be my hope.
I’ve tried not to limit anything too tightly, I want there to be enough space for interpretation and dreaming, thoughts, associations, and you know, strange images! I really feel this show operates in a dream world state.
Anna was full of praise for the Kristin Linklater Voice Centre, it’s on-site accommodation, and being able to wake up and walk straight into the studio.
‘I don’t even have to leave the space to go have breakfast, before going to set up the show. It’s all a very, very lovely environment in which to perform. After the performance we’re able to invite the audience to stick around, have a cup of tea and a chat!’
This social aspect, Anna felt, was often missing in cities, where people have things to do, and often further distances to travel. ‘Time moves faster there somehow,’ she says.
I ask whether Anna anticipates different reactions, and conversations over the show, depending on where she plays.
‘Absolutely. I really hope that people respond differently. In this show I’m purposefully trying to slow down time. I want people to engage with this show, not look for a narrative, or a reason. It could be like listening to a piece of music; I’m trying to create environments in which people have the space to dream.
I have no idea what’s going to come up for people; I don’t know if it’s going to have much to do with location, but each individual will be coming to the show with their own bank of memories, associations, experiences, feelings & questions.‘
To make her point Anna spoke of rehearsals in the Linklater centre, and finding that certain intonations in her vocal warmup were resonating, physically, with the 6 large chimes elsewhere in the room.
‘In a way, that’s what I’m trying to do with this show: I’m sending out soundwaves. I don’t know what’s going to resonate, or with who, and just which note will hit the spot, but that’s what I’m trying for.’
Whist Unbecoming is a solo show, and very much Anna’s brainchild, it has benefited from the Company of Wolves team to bring it to stage. How has bringing such an intimate project to life with others proved a good experience?
‘It’s been amazing! I couldn’t be here without my team. This process has been interesting, the bones of the show having been made five years ago. I did a lot of work my set designer (Ana Inés Jabares-Pita), and spent quite a bit of time with Ewan refining the show, and making sure the pieces fell into place in a cohesive manner. They were invaluable around that time, and those bones remained.
So this time around, I was working with a different lighting designer (for the tour), a very different remit, making sure we could bring some consistency in the show to all sorts of very, very different venues! Some village halls are all wood inside, some are all white, some have no lights whatsoever! We travel with everything in a van, the lights screwed onto microphone stands.’
Anna sings the praises of Technical Stage Manager, Alma Lindenhovius, her sole companion on the tour.
‘We’re the road team; we can set the show up in about an hour and a half; we don’t need anything except power sockets.’
She also had warm words for her marketing team, led by Jane Hamilton, whilst Gabriella Sloss looks after all things social media.
‘All these people have been instrumental in making this tour function. It feels good to know that there are people out there helping me do my job.’
I turn to the ever louder conversation the performing industry continues to have over accessibility. Have matters changed, or improved, or is there still too much resistance?
‘It’s an interesting question. It’s not easy to make your way in, and I don’t think it ever has been. I really admire people who are just coming out of drama school, because I Don’t think it’s an easy landscape to be doing this in.
As a 40-something year old person, I am now looking back 20 years, where I was, and what I was able to do; the opportunities I had. I’m thinking…it’s going to be really different now…I send all of my strength and support to people who are just starting out, because it’s simply so unstable now. Being a freelancer is already a hugely destabilizing position to be in, and be that in an unstable world is even harder.
That being said, there are people doing it. There are people who are going to succeed for sure; people who are making amazing art, and pushing boundaries. They’re going to lead the way, and I’m really excited to see it!‘
I’m coming out of a period not being able to see much because of having a young family, and now I’m starting to be able to get out and see stuff. I’m really looking forward to immersing myself back in the theatre world because there’s so many talented artists.’
And did becoming a parent change her artistic life, and philosophy at all?
Anna laughs, ‘I’m laughing because I think just being a parent changed my life in general. It’s like my cells are different. My brain functions differently now! Beyond the fundamental biological changes, I’ve also had to become way more efficient. Now there’s no time to dither, no time to ask if I’m doing the right thing. Now I have 10 free minutes, and it’s a case of, okay, make this thing now!’
Could Anna have written the show pre-motherhood?
‘Absolutely not. No! There was no way I ready to make this show
absolutely not. No, absolutely not. I have this habit of saying things I’m never going to do, and whenever that phrase leaves my mouth, that’s exactly what I have to do! I have this very vivid memory of telling Ewan, three years before I started making the show, ‘I’m never making solo work.’’
Solo-work, Anna was convinced was not for her; it was the collaborative life or nothing. When the time came however, Anna knew she simply had to go and make her own work; but has she enjoyed the process?
‘Mostly, yeah, it’s been really empowering. I’ve learned a lot about myself, for example that I’m still learning a lot about myself, and what I’m capable of. I think I’m learning about how I communicate with people, and my own artistic practice, what my art is at this moment. I wouldn’t have learnt any of this without going through the process.’
When Anna returns to collaborative work, does she think she will return changed?
‘Yeah, for sure. I’m going to be transforming over the next 3 weeks, and I expect when I come home, I’m going to be quite a different person. Ewan and I have been trying to plan ahead with Company of Wolves, and what we want to focus on. I feel I’m going to learn valuable lessons about where my path is headed by going on this tour.’
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