Creating Live Theatre:
'Te Ao Hou'

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22 August 2024

Creating live theatre without a script, characters, or a predefined story can be terrifying - you’re stepping into the unknown with no idea where it will lead.  

So I ask: why the hell do you do it? 

You do it when you have support and an understanding of the process and the risks that it takes to land on a rehearsal floor with no script, no story and no idea where you will end up.  In creating Te Ao Hou we were in the bosom of Massive Theatre Company and its mighty kaupapa and tikanga. The team and the support from Massive that myself and co-director, the gifted Hone Taukiri received, was phenomenal. It allowed us and our cast to create theatre that searched and came from our hearts. So for me, the process of devising Te Ao Hou was enriching, exciting, and joyful. We had good days, hard days, wild days, annoying days, silly days and extraordinary days. 

Margaret-Mary Hollins

Hone and I began jamming out thoughts and ideas back in October 2023, and started with (and I’m reciting my notes here):

The exploration of an unknown world - an adventure - we will work from writing and journal writing and conversations and interviews and chance encounters toward creating our own theatrical landscape. We are interested in historical characters, whakapapa, the present, the future.

Key words we brainstormed were: Excitement, fear, confusion, music, movement, change, awkwardness, the unknown, isolation, new faces, possibilities, joy.

February 8, 2024: Time is wide open. Open up the what if:  Who could we be if it was only up to us? To be fully satisfied with who I am and is that ever possible? Living in a space of acceptance, and do we need to resolve things? Flawed characters and are they generational?

It’s interesting to look back over these notes and see that from the outset we wanted to create our own theatrical landscape weaving past, present and future through the performers playing themselves. Hone always wanted the show to include a band with performers who had acting and musical strengths. 

Having cast the show in December 2023, we met again in February 2024. We were excited by our unique and talented cast, and Hone reminded me he wanted to work with devising methods but not with a ‘theme’ or an ‘idea’ - instead to work directly from the performers allowing them to take us on a journey. Normally going into a devising process I like to have some kind of a world, idea, theme - so I was excited to throw that away and trust that every project has its own life experience, and to begin our journey and relationship with the unknown; a pathway that is potent, charged and full of possibility.

Hone also brought along The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron - I have my own copy and was keen to tap back into it. We jammed thoughts and wanted to encourage the cast to draw on story, memory and material from their own lives, with the aim being to encourage individual creative thought processes and to unlock and tap into their imaginations prior to starting rehearsals.  

"As long as you’re dancing, you can break the rules. Sometimes breaking the rules is just extending the rules. Sometimes there are no rules." (Mary Oliver)

Our next meeting with the cast, about six weeks prior to rehearsals, gave them the task of daily  journal writing inspired by The Artist’s Way, working on physical fitness and listening to and making a note of favourite songs. A Spotify playlist was created for all of us to add to. 

Early in the rehearsal process, material about tīpuna and grandparents evolved, and we became interested in swinging between generations and ancestors, showing the human side of the people who came before and who will come after. We were interested in the matriarchal line and inspired by Linda Tuhiwai Smith’s poem Don’t Mess With The Māori Woman. Only small snippets of this ended up in the show, but the material will always remain with us.  

Our rehearsal process involved games, moving, listening, talking, singing, music, writing, drawing, vocal work, yoga and a field trip to the museum.

A long  list of ‘wants’ generated early in the devising process - here are a few:

  • I want to grow kūmara
  • I want my parents to go to therapy
  • I want free healthcare
  • I want to sing in the street
  • I want not to be put in a box
  • I want to feel free to practice my culture
  • I want to buy my parents a house
  • I want to read in public
  • I want know what it feels like to fall in love
  • I want to look after my parents when they are old

I loved the synchronicity of this work and the Masters in Creative Performance Practice (MCPP) at Toi Whakaari I am currently working on. It has introduced me to outstanding wāhine scholars and poets from Aotearoa, including Linda Tuhiwai Smith and Hana Burgess (Ngāpuhi, Te Roroa, Te Ātihaunui a Pāpārangi, Ngāti Tūwharetoa), whose words deeply connected to our themes that we carried with us throughout:

Each generation
coexists like
droplets immersed
in the ocean of
time. Knowledge of
whakapapa allows
us to navigate the
intergenerational
currents that
constitute this
ocean of never
ending beginnings.
Through onamata,
anamata each
generation can
traverse these
waters, put down an
anchor, and take
in the view. This is a
Māori futurism

('Onamata, Anamata' | Hana Burgess)

Collaboration lies at the heart of devising theatre, making it a unique, playful art form that demands courage and constantly pushes the limits of what theatre can be. For me, it is wonderfully organic, dynamic and unpredictable, so structure helps to hold the chaos. It is an energised process that is fundamentally human driven by a desire to ask questions, listen, explore, play, take risks, seek to understand and make sense of the world the collaborators ignite. This dynamic process fosters a deep connection between the creative ensemble and ultimately the audience. It was beautiful to experience the joy the performers (Tristin, Connor, Lijah, Manu and Kage) brought to the process and their audience, throughout our Te Ao Hou season at Te Pou Theatre.

We were blessed to work with Renee Wiki, our extraordinary Stage Manager, who went above and beyond - and I’ll forever add Renee rolls to my kete - what a mover! We were blessed to have Tane Te Pakeke-Patterson, our Assistant Director, able to take the floor and run. Harmony Hogarth’s stunning composition skills were magic. Lauren Miller’s amazing costume design. The hugely talented and all round great human being Jane Hakaraia, lit up our world, and thank the stars for beautiful Charlie Underhill, our multi-talented Producer.

Thank you Sam, Carrie Rae, Kate, Lucy and Tane at Massive Theatre Company for bringing us all together, allowing us to step into the unknown to make this journey possible. 

Margaret-Mary Hollins

I compare making theatre to being a chef, and one of my favourite chefs is Marco Pierre White. His philosophy is that nature is the true artist - he is only a chef and he presents his food in the simplest and most honest way to bring out what is already great about the meat and vegetables. This is a philosophy that I have taken into my directing practice and a philosophy that I think is particularly relevant to working with the young artists on Massive Theatre Company’s emerging artists show.

The five devising performers I had the privilege of directing were intelligent, nuanced, beautiful and enlivening individuals. They didn't need me to make them into those things, and they didn't need me to show them how to be incredible.

What they needed was someone who would see all the wonder in them and who knew how to bring it to the front. My job as co-director on Te Ao Hou involved a lot of listening - listening to the boys and listening to what was naturally coming out of them, their hopes, dreams, fears and secret desires, then helping shape the essence of that into a clear piece of theatre that could be performed honestly night after night.

Hone Taukiri

* Don't Mess With The Māori Woman by Linda Tuhiwai Smith: 
Tuhiwai Smith, L.,  Pere, R.M.R.,  Norman, W.,  Te Awekotuku, N., Irwin, K., Jenkins, K., Mita, M., Hohepa, M., Johnston, P., Pihama, L., Evans, P., Mikaere, A., Milroy, S., Tomlins Jahnke, H., Aroha Te Pareake Mead, A. (2019). Mana Wahine Reader A Collection of Writings 1987-1998 Volume I. Te Kotahi Research Institute Hamilton, Aotearoa/New Zealand.

** Onamata, Anamata by Hana Burgess 
Burgess, H. Painting, T.K. (2020). Onamata, Anamata: A whakapapa Perspective of Māori Futurisms. In A-M. Murtola & S. Walsh (Eds.) Whose Futures?  (pp. 207-233) Economic and Social Research Aotearoa, Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland,  Aotearoa New Zealand.