This Week in Cinema (12.05.06)
Absolute Wilson
By Beth Capper
Published: December 5th, 2006 | 5:25pm
Ever since the birth of commercial cinema back in 1895 with the Lumière Brothers screenings at Paris’ Salon Indien du Grand Café; the fate of theater has ostensibly been sealed as an art form with a sell-by date. Theater has had to go through many transformations and revolutions over the preceding decades to keep up with ever-waning audiences who seem more content in front of the television or in the popcorn-strewn aisles of cinema multiplexes.
Absolute Wilson, however, goes to some lengths to show that theater can still be exciting in its documentation of the work of vanguard playwright and stage director Robert Wilson. For anyone who takes an active interest in contemporary theater, his name will not be an unfamiliar one. Critically acclaimed by surrealist Louis Aragon, who praised Wilson for carrying on the tradition Aragon helped conceive, Wilson’s major productions stand alone as some of the most groundbreaking works of avant-garde art from the 20th century.
This film documents Wilson’s life, starting from his scant beginnings growing up in Waco, Texas, and moving through his life in chronological order, from his work with the Byrd Hoffman School of Byrds, the experimental performance company he founded in 1968 to his production of the opera Einstein on the Beach in the early ’70s, where he worked alongside composer Philip Glass, musician Tom Waits and beat writer William Burroughs. Some of Wilson’s crowning achievements are known for their experimentation with time scale, for example, The Life and Times of Joseph Stalin was a 12-hour play, while KA MOUNTain and GUARDenia Terrace was a seven-day production staged on a mountaintop in Iran. There are no other works of contemporary theatre that rival Wilson’s in length — the closest thing in theatrical history is Japan’s tradition of Kabuki theater, where plays often span five or six hours.
While the film itself isn’t particularly outlandish in its execution of the facts — relying on talking heads, along with documented footage of Wilson’s key productions to tell his story — Wilson’s life is a fascinating one, and more than adequately carries any technical shortcomings or lack of artistic flair on behalf of director Katharina Otto.
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