October is often that strange time where we all collectively embrace the creepy. Whether it be watching a horror movie, dressing up in a terrifying costume (please not from the Yandy selection of “sexy” costumes…!), or listening to a spooky story, it’s the season for frights.In this spirit, let’s continue our exploration into the darker parts of philosophy, where things get a little creepier, a little scary, even.

Let’s start here: What is theatre? Or, perhaps more relevantly to our modern interests: What is the purpose of watching a movie or overly produced Netflix show? Are we meant to passively engage and just enjoy the hour or so that we get from reality, from our daily routines, and from our lives that can often feel lacking in some way? Is that all, though? Escapism?

We watch actors portray a different reality, something that (if written and acted well) presents an alternative way of being to the viewer. We see historical events dramatized, fantasy depictions of super heroes who mostly save the day, the comforts of the slowly unfolding romance. The viewer of what occurs on the screen appears, on the outset, passive. A receiver.

But what if this process is altogether different? And what if it is something that could be positively visceral?

Let me introduce you to someone who played with the darker side of what theatre (and movies, TV) could be, particularly in relation to what we, the viewer, experience and how we participate in what happens on the stage.

Antonin Artaud: A Strange Life

Born in France at the turn of the 20th century, Antonin Artaud (1896-1948) was an actor, a playwright, and a drama theorist. Artaud’s life was a strange one, as he was diagnosed with a variety of mental health conditions as a teenager. These conditions would send him in and out of asylums throughout the rest of his life, to his death.

But the ravages of mental illness did not stop Artaud from pursuing a life on the stage in the Surrealist movement, and others. Artaud, a published poet, acted in a number of plays on the French stage before deciding that he wanted more out of the theatre, breaking with the Surrealists and writing his own work on what the theatre should be, from the perspective of the actor, of course, but also from the perspective of the audience.

You see, Artaud had visited Mexico for a while, and observed some indigenous rituals there, which he wrote about. To him, the mysticism in these rituals became foundational. Artaud, fascinated by the occult and arcane, took what he got out of what he saw (or thought he saw), and unleashed a new, more visceral idea of the theatre.

The Theatre of Cruelty: An Expression of the Extreme

In the collected works, The Theatre and Its Double (1932), Artaud wrote about a different way of thinking about what occurs on the stage. Instead of the passivity of the voyeur, Artaud contended that the audience should be active in what he called the “Theatre of Cruelty.” This way of looking at the experience of not only the actor but also the audience demands participation rather than idle passivity.

So, what is the Theatre of Cruelty? To start, Artaud wrote about how he tired of the theatre’s strict relation to the text of the play. For Artaud, relying religiously on the text presents a detached, overly rational depiction of something that was not meant for words. Artaud did not want something connected to and controlled by language in his theatre. Instead, Artaud described the ideal theatre experience as a series of exorcisms, undergone by audience and actor alike.

Artaud’s theatre is not one for the rational, not one for the viewer who desires lucidity or something comforting. Instead, Artaud demanded that theatre transcend the limitations of language and rationality, and the limitations of what is considered comfortable. Word and song and physicality are brought together to frighten and fuck with the audience. The audience participates in this mystical experience through gaining a new understanding of the dreadful world around us, and of the theatregoer themself.

Theatre of Cruelty demands visceral and dark, demands a certain amount of depravity, of irrationality.

Drawing by Edvard Munch (1905), courtesy of Wiki Commons

The Legacy of the Theatre of Cruelty

Artaud tried to put his Theatre of Cruelty into action in his own play, an interpretation of Percy Bysshe Shelley’s The Cenci (1935), a show where Artaud focused on the inhumane cruelty of what happened in the original play, which he adapted for his own purposes. The play focused on abrupt, scary sounds, and disturbing visuals. Unfortunately, for Artaud, the play was something of a flop.

Artaud would continue to write, travel, and visit mental hospitals throughout the rest of his life. By 1948, he would die in such a place, confined there as his health declined.

But his own scary idea of the Theatre of Cruelty would remain in the greater imagination, with such big name playwrights as Eugène Ionesco and Samuel Beckett embracing the concept in some of their own work. 

And indeed, while this idea of the Theatre may be considered obscene or altogether over the top, we can see traces of it in everything from the disturbing flashes in Ingmar Bergman’s Persona (1966) to the gruesome depictions of violence in modern horror movies. The idea is meant to take the viewer out of their comfort zone, and make them consider their own inner depravity, their own darkness. Sometimes contending with that is the scariest thing of all.

Final Thoughts

As someone in and out of institutions most of his life, perhaps Artaud had some experience with the darker side of the human psyche. Living the life of an itinerant actor and writer, mental collapses might seem inevitable from time to time, especially if one is already susceptible to such things.

My first experience with Antonin Artaud was probably as a college student around 20 years ago, when I first listened to the greater discography of the 1980s goth band Bauhaus. I saw them perform with Nine Inch Nails during their With Teeth tour, and found myself entranced with lead singer Peter Murphy’s mesmerizing performance.

Before they broke up (the first time), Bauhaus released Burning from the Inside (1983), with Murphy, in bad health, leading a few of the vocals, the other members having to do the rest. In this creepy album (which, from the minds behind “Bela Lugosi’s Dead,” is to be expected), one of Murphy’s more startlingly performed vocals occurs in a song called “Antonin Artaud.” 

The song is terrifying, with lines repeating over and over, into a frenetic frenzy. The guitars screech, as Murphy describes the Theatre of Cruelty bit by bit. The end is abrupt and disgusting. It’s something to listen to, more than something to describe.

I thought to myself, “Who the hell is Antonin Artaud?” So naturally I did what any curious scholar would do, and I looked him up. The life was more than the song by far.

While we can rest in the darkness of humanity, especially in trying times like these, I think that, while it can be helpful to hold a mirror there, it is not helpful to stay there. As someone who has extensively experienced the sorrows of startling mental health concerns, as well as the terrors of the mental hospital, I find myself wondering how Artaud was able to be as productive as he was, even with these limitations before him.

As I have mentioned before, I have had a long diagnosis of bipolar disorder, but it wasn’t until I experienced an assault that things took a big downturn and became unbearable. Experiencing something you shouldn’t have, against your will, can cause a shock to the body. PTSD and other related disorders show how trauma can affect not just the body, but the whole way of being. It can be easy to dwell in the darkness after something bad happens, especially with PTSD. The Theatre of Cruelty, in my opinion, brings that darkness to light. But we don’t have to sit in it.