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[0:00] Paul Lazarus: Hi, this is Paul Lazarus. In the 1980s, I produced and hosted a radio series called Anything Goes, a celebration of the American musical theater. Now the Broadway Podcast Network is bringing back these shows. This is the conclusion of a two-part series featuring director-choreographer Martha Clarke and composer Richard Peaslee. This program originally aired in 1984 and featured both Clarke and Peaslee discussing their stunning collaboration on The Garden of Earthly Delights, a dance music theater piece based on the Hieronymus Bosch painting. This is a question for both of you. The musicians became an incredibly important element of the dance, not just the music side of the piece. And it is a combination music theater dance work, I guess, for lack of any other word to call it.

But they're used in a unique way. They're not only used just to add a visual factor, but the music becomes an element in the dance. I don't know of any other way to say that, but people are being murdered with instruments and the sounds themselves become an active part of the dance when that person is being beaten by the bass drum and Stephen is flown as a little cherub at one point. How did that happen? How did that evolve?

[1:22] Richard Peaslee: Well, I think that comes right out of Bosch. If you look at the painting, especially Hell, you see musicians being tortured by their instruments. Of course, the most famous image is the person being impaled by the strings of the harp. And then Martha's great imagination and the musician's willingness to participate. I think it's wonderful when musicians are not stashed away in an orchestra pit, but really feel a part of the production. They've enjoyed it a lot. I mean, they've been wonderful to work with, but they really had fun.

[1:55] Paul Lazarus: Did they come up with any of the dance things that they do?

[1:57] Martha Clarke: Oh, sure.

[1:58] Richard Peaslee: Yeah, I figured they might have. The sessions where the piece was created were really like recess, and we'd bring in props and instruments and just play wildly for hours. And we kept notes on what we liked, and then when we were forced to make a decision finally about three or four weeks before we opened last spring to work in progress, we started to take the good out and throw out the bad.

[2:23] Paul Lazarus: How long did that recess period last?

[2:25] Martha Clarke: Twelve weeks altogether, wouldn't you say? From beginning to end.

[2:29] Paul Lazarus: How did the score evolve along with the play and the movement?

[2:33] Richard Peaslee: Well, I was going to say, we were not there every day at the rehearsals. We would come in a couple of times a week. Yeah, the score evolved in a very collaborative way. Musicians would improvise things that I could work off of. I would bring in music that wasn't quite right, but then the musicians would play around with it, and suddenly it would be right.

[2:58] Paul Lazarus: Did you bring in some of the major themes to let them riff off that, or did it go the other way around?

[3:04] Richard Peaslee: Yes. Actually, the music for the Women's Quartet developed that way. I brought in a piece of written music, and it wasn't quite working. So what we did was we took the one section that did sound as though it might work. It had a theme and a rather dull accompaniment, and Bill Ruhl, the percussionist, made the accompaniment more interesting. Eugene Frieson and Steve Silverstein started playing the melody with a very wide vibrato, and the result was this very strange, eerie-sounding section of the piece.

[3:44] Martha Clarke: It's one of my favorites.

[4:10] Richard Peaslee: It's one of my favorites.

[4:40] Martha Clarke: It's one of my favorites.

[4:42] Richard Peaslee: It's one of my favorites.

[4:44] Martha Clarke: It's one of my favorites.

[5:06] Paul Lazarus: Given the framework of the painting, how important did storytelling or narrative become to you in pursuing this piece?

[5:12] Martha Clarke: It was very hard to make it linear, because the painting is like a hundred images within one frame, and it was terribly, terribly difficult to find a story in it. However, Eden seemed a likely place to start. We wanted Eden to be on the dark side, because everything that Bosch does is on the dark side. And Eden went into the garden section, which is the section that suggests flying and water activity and nature and botanical and biological changes and blah, blah, blah. Then to break from those little naked figures, I thought The Seven Deadly Sins would be a nice insertion. And that is a very different feeling choreographically and visually than the rest of the piece. And then we swing it back into hell, because it seems that The Seven Deadly Sins would want moving on in that direction.

[6:20] Paul Lazarus: How would you describe what you do at the end?

[6:22] Martha Clarke: Well, I feel it gets hopeful again at the end, as in life, with quotes around it. It's all a big wheel, you know? You go so far down and the phoenix rises up again. And I think at the end, Dick has brought the ocarina melody back, which is in the garden section, in a very lyrical section. I've just been impaled by Eugene Friesen. However, I look up and hear this tune as though I remember it from another life. And Margie flies in the air in a very kind of innocent, beautiful way again. And it seems as in history, as in everything else, it's all going to be reborn. And the whole process begins over again.

[7:09] Paul Lazarus: But you did feel it was important to find some narrative or linear approach to some extent.

[7:14] Martha Clarke: Yeah, because often dance pieces, pure dance pieces, are no longer than 20 minutes. And this is about 55 minutes. And it really does need a narrative to support it. And I'm very interested in narrative and theater and plays and structure. And I think it helps us give an armature for the work.

[8:27] Richard Peaslee: Music from the Garden of Earthly Delights by Ringo Starr.

[8:57] Paul Lazarus: And now back to a pre-recorded interview with Richard Peaslee and Martha Clarke. There's a, from your standpoint, there's a combination of, I can't think of a better word, natural sounds. An attempt to create the, to evoke wind, banging of pipes. I can't think offhand, those are the two I recall. With, on the other hand, a period instrument quality with, one more thing I would say, a modern tonality. How are you reconciling all those different things in terms of putting your stamp on it? And it's clearly your very, your personal sense of style. I'm just wondering, the eclecticism of that interests me. And the fact that it all blends together into one piece beautifully.

[9:48] Richard Peaslee: Well, I don't know. I guess the main thing is just, I don't worry about style. It sort of happens. And I kind of hope that it all comes together at the end. I guess the other thing is that it is, as Martha says, it's almost an hour long. And just from the standpoint of pure maintaining interest in the score, we had to use every trick, device, means of playing the instrument possible that fitted the piece. But some of the outtakes were very interesting. For instance, Bill Ruhl, the percussionist, was being swung around by one of the dancers, making low passes at the marimba. And every time he went over it, he would play a gliss.

[10:32] Paul Lazarus: Oh, you mean bodily swung, yeah.

[10:34] Richard Peaslee: Yeah, bodily being swung around on the shoulders of this dancer. Another time, Gene Fletcher.

[10:42] Richard Peaslee: Well, this is the amazing thing, that they are so willing to try anything.

[11:11] Richard Peaslee: $25,000 worth of cello.

[11:41] Richard Peaslee: $25,000 worth of cello.

[12:11] Richard Peaslee: $25,000 worth of cello.

[12:41] Richard Peaslee: $25,000 worth of cello.

[13:11] Richard Peaslee: $25,000 worth of cello.

[13:21] Richard Peaslee: $25,000 worth of cello.

[13:31] Richard Peaslee: $25,000 worth of cello.

[13:47] Richard Peaslee: $25,000 worth of cello.

[14:03] Richard Peaslee: Eugene Friesen, cello, Bill Rule, percussion, and Steve Silverstein, wind instruments. Now back to a prerecorded interview with Martha Clarke and Richard Peaslee.

[14:16] Martha Clarke: Well, I love the nakedness of the church and the structure, that all the light trees are shown, and that all the technical wires and equipment...

[14:24] Richard Peaslee: It makes the band look very beautiful.

[14:26] Martha Clarke: Yeah.

[14:27] Richard Peaslee: Because they are sensuous compared to most of that metallic stuff that's exposed.

[14:32] Martha Clarke: Yeah.

[14:33] Richard Peaslee: So they become, by comparison in that forest, very beautiful.

[14:37] Martha Clarke: It's strange because it's got a kind of high-tech look in this old 19th century church with the warm brick walls.

[14:43] Richard Peaslee: Yeah, there's not too many better spaces for this piece.

[14:46] Martha Clarke: I know, and it's scary to think about its moving into a regular proscenium.

[14:50] Richard Peaslee: Yeah, there's no way to stay there, scheduling-wise.

[14:53] Martha Clarke: You could buy it.

[14:54] Richard Peaslee: Oh, yeah.

[14:55] Martha Clarke: What other changes were made between last year's presentation and this year's more, quote-unquote, more finished presentation of it?

[15:01] Richard Peaslee: Well, there was this whole climactic orchestral section in Hell, which we added...

[15:10] Martha Clarke: What do we call it?

[15:11] Richard Peaslee: We call it the Mad Musicians.

[15:13] Martha Clarke: The Mad Musicians, when everybody starts playing in waltz tempo.

[15:20] Richard Peaslee: The only thing is that the offbeats are the percussionist's head being smashed into the marimba.

[15:26] Martha Clarke: Right.

[15:27] Richard Peaslee: And the downbeat is Tim Wengard being smashed into the bass drum.

[15:33] Martha Clarke: I'm a radiator.

[15:35] Richard Peaslee: Oh, that's right.

[15:36] Martha Clarke: Mark is on radiator.

[15:38] Richard Peaslee: That's right.

[15:39] Martha Clarke: Oh, yes, and Polly has got her head in the wind machine.

[15:44] Richard Peaslee: And Eugene Friesland is banging his head against the thunder sheet.

[15:48] Martha Clarke: And Marie is yelling an Arabic wail.

[15:51] Richard Peaslee: That's right.

[15:53] Martha Clarke: Very eclectic, once again.

[15:55] Richard Peaslee: It gets faster and faster and more out of control.

[15:57] Martha Clarke: Yes, right.

[18:25] Richard Peaslee: Is there anything in particular that, as you got inside that painting, that became important to you as a theme?

[18:40] Martha Clarke: And I don't mean to simplify the work and say that that's what the work's about, but was there anything in the painting that grabbed you personally other than his imagery?

[18:50] Richard Peaslee: Take it away, Dick.

[18:55] Richard Peaslee: I could say sex and violence, but that's always a grabber. No, but I think it's such a large subject that he handles and sort of covers the whole human condition.

[19:10] Richard Peaslee: That's what's really fascinating about it, the fall of man in a way. I don't know, there's so many things, the eroticism and the musical references and the extraordinary imagination. Really, I couldn't believe it. I never really looked at that painting closely until we worked on it.

[19:31] Richard Peaslee: I feel also there's the expressions of the people in the triptych all have a kind of innocence and sweetness, even when they're being brutal to each other. And I think sometimes people can be difficult and insensitive and trying, and there is an overview of kind of a man being a rather doomed creature. He knows not what he does kind of outlook that Bosch has, but it's all with a kind of gentle benevolence on his part. I think there's great compassion towards human beings and what they go through.

[20:14] Martha Clarke: It's amazing that that painting arrived when it did to me. I mean, because it's done in what year, the painting? Do you know?

[20:24] Richard Peaslee: Well, it's 14... it was around the time of Columbus, I think.

[20:28] Martha Clarke: Yeah.

[20:29] Richard Peaslee: It was late 15th or early 17th. It was finished in 1505. It started in 1496.

[20:36] Martha Clarke: The opening statement is so beautiful choreographically, and people seem to be... they cross the stage bent over on all fours, and there's a grace to it, an animalistic grace.

[20:48] Richard Peaslee: It's not really, to me, not particularly human. It's more animal in quality.

[20:53] Martha Clarke: What image is that for you that you're working on there? What inspired that?

[20:58] Richard Peaslee: Well, we wanted to get some imagery that was kind of pre-human, a little bit like evolution. The cast on all fours, everyone's on tiptoe and walking on tiptoes in the prongs of their fingers, and it looks like either antelope to me or some kind of wild dogs.

[21:24] Richard Peaslee: To try and go back to amphibians and fishes and all of that seemed to be too much. So just the pre-Adam and Eve, all creatures on the stage are on all fours. Kind of set up the world for Adam and Eve to inhabit. That was not just off of the top of Martha's head. I mean, there is a whole other panel to the painting, which is the kind of primeval, primordial condition of the earth.

[21:53] Martha Clarke: Yeah, we call it a primordial ooze.

[21:56] Richard Peaslee: The slime, yeah. It's on the back of one of the other panels, right?

[22:00] Martha Clarke: Well, actually, when the panel is closed, it's the earth. A little bit is those seen from the moon. When the actual panel, and I was in the Prado when it was closed once, there was some official showing it to another official. It's in the Eden section that there are these dark creatures coming out of a pool of water. Did he label the three panels himself? Do you know?

[22:24] Richard Peaslee: I don't know if they were labeled. How are they divided?

[22:28] Martha Clarke: Well, the first panel is Adam and Eve, mainly devoted to Adam and Eve.

[22:33] Richard Peaslee: The second panel is the largest, isn't it?

[22:37] Martha Clarke: Yes. And it's the garden of earthly delights, basically. It's everybody having a good time.

[22:46] Richard Peaslee: And the last panel is hell, and everybody's having a bad time.

[22:51] Martha Clarke: They started the party too late.

[22:53] Richard Peaslee: Yeah, that's right. The night and the morning after.

[23:41] Martha Clarke: Yeah.

[24:42] Richard Peaslee: Music from the Garden of Earthly Delights.

[24:46] Martha Clarke: Music by Richard Peaslee.

[24:48] Richard Peaslee: Directed and choreographed by Martha Clarke. You're listening to Anything Goes, and a prerecorded interview with Paul Lazarus and Richard Peaslee and Martha Clarke.

[24:59] Martha Clarke: Who conceived of the costumes with being the skin-tight, almost representing nakedness?

[25:06] Richard Peaslee: If we had gone nude, no one would have watched it. They would have watched the nudity. So, milleskin is a rather disgusting symbol of modern dance. And when I left Pilobolus, I lit a match to one of mine and said, never again.

[25:25] Martha Clarke: What is it called again?

[25:26] Richard Peaslee: Milleskin. It's a very tight fabric that is skin-tight, and it's a very tight fabric. However, it seemed the best solution, and Jane Greenwood, who was our designer, decided that a simple rendering of anatomy, it has a very naive way that she's done it, and very charming. I think it works quite well.

[25:46] Martha Clarke: Yeah, I think you're right. And also, it might have gotten to be problematic, the nudity, in terms of doing most of the things that you do.

[25:54] Richard Peaslee: Yes, it certainly would have. And in the painting itself, everyone has this kind of sweetly pink flesh, and it's from Eden all the way to hell. That's why we never change the costumes. People don't get grim and sick-looking as they get to hell. I mean, it's the same color skin.

[26:12] Martha Clarke: So, can you talk about the next thing you're going to work on together?

[26:16] Richard Peaslee: Well, it's supposedly about, it's a project, still in a very early talking stage, about Vienna just before World War I.

[26:30] Martha Clarke: It's a period that I guess has interested both of us for pretty different reasons.

[26:39] Richard Peaslee: I think Martha, because of the artists involved.

[26:44] Martha Clarke: Who are? Clint, Egon, Sheila, Kokoschka. I was in Venice this summer and saw a magnificent show of Viennese art. I'd been seeing Renaissance art for two weeks, traveling around Italy, and when I got to Venice, I kind of levitated on this Venetian art. And I've loved Sheila's work for a long time. And it's historically such a rich period. I mean, it was the end of the Victorian era and the end of a certain kind of life that, once the First World War came around, will never be repeated again.

[27:24] Richard Peaslee: Yeah, that's what really interests me about it. It's the end of an era. And all that history that Barbara Tuchman talks about in The Guns of August, it's that sort of twilight of a whole empire and civilization that just ended with World War I.

[27:46] Martha Clarke: © BF-WATCH TV 2021

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[30:42] Richard Peaslee: The conclusion of the music for The Garden of Earthly Delights.

[30:49] Richard Peaslee: The music for The Garden of Earthly Delights.

[31:19] Richard Peaslee: Thank you to Richard Peaslee for consenting to be interviewed for this program.

[31:24] Jeff Lunden: I hope you've enjoyed this edition of Anything Goes.

[31:27] Jeff Lunden: © BF-WATCH TV 2021

[31:32] Jeff Lunden: © BF-WATCH TV 2021

[31:37] Jeff Lunden: Even listening to the conclusion of a two-part program featuring director-choreographer Martha Clarke and composer Richard Peaslee, and associate producer Jeff Lunden, Anything Goes! Backstage with Broadway's Best is produced and hosted by Paul Lazarus.

[31:55] Jeff Lunden: For more information, visit anythinggoespl.com. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to rate and follow us. Thanks for listening.