One step on a journey

A profile of the highly acclaimed Japanese 20th century director, Tadashi Suzuki, in Australia in terms of both his work as a director and as an acting teacher of traditional Japanese theatre forms and techniques and their relevance and vital qualities for the modern theatrical scene. Suzuki comments on the nature of performance and the equal importance of senses and movement to text in achieving a fusion of elements that revitalises theatre performance. His method, that of objectivity and physical discipline, concentration and focus on the energy in the body to connect with the audience on an emotional level is explored through interviews with Suzuki himself as well as critics and the predominantly Australian actors involved in the workshop that led to the production of the Chronicle of Macbeth in the mid 1990s. First performed in Adelaide and then toured to Tokyo, the workshop and rehearsals that culminated in the abridged version of Macbeth in the form of a “visualisation of MacBeth’s inner world in all its turmoil” are presented in this documentary in excerpts along with discussion of the methods of its realisation from a technical, acting and experiential point of view.