Theatre Design & Technology - Spring 1983 - 10

Jocelyn Herber/'s II/odel for The Oresteia, /98/; Ihe fromal fa,ade is a duplicale of Ihe Ihree aClllal
II/assive doors of Ihe scene shops, bUI of Iigillweigill alulI/inulI/ inslead of sleet. Call/pare wilh
Griffen's The Woman.

Joce~1"I1

Herber/, Baal, 1963; oilier scenes had projeClions on Ihe c-,·clorall/{/.

Ihe early 1960 , and in France and Ihe
niled Slates by Ihe mid-19 Os; she has
de. igned LIIIII (197 ), ,\lahagolllly
(1979). and The Abdllctioll frOIll the
Seraglio (1979) for Ihe [\Iel.
Peler Brook has crediled her \\"ilh resloring "a ne\\' . implicilY and purily 10
lhe English thealre";' indeed, she i~ the
prololype of Ihe modern English ~cen-
ographer who subordinales hersel I' or
him~elf lO Ihe priorilie~ of Ihe play8

\\Tight and actor, \\'ho exerci es a
scrupulous re traint regarding lraditional tage decor and seeks a fe\\' key
elemenls-usually realislically based.
preferably of aUlhenlic maIerials-lo
caplure Ihe essence of a playaI' il.
specific scenes. Griffin's at lent ion to
space and minimal. ellings follo\\'s in
lhe \'ein of Herben's frequenlly slaled
atlraclion for Ihe beauly of an emplY
slage \\"ilh perhaps a single lelling objecl

Thealre Design & Technology USITT Spring 1983

on il. BOlh Herbert and Ihe Royal Coun
as a \\"hole openly acknowledged Ihe influence of Brecht on their \\'ork, not only in Iheir concern \\"ilh social, humanislic i ues in their choice of plays bUI al 0
in Iheir fundamentally au lere, funclional, quielly expressive mode of
slaging-lheatricality \\'as pre ent bUI
ne\'er aggre i\'ely so, more ofIen being
subordinaled 10 funClionalily and cleanne of form. In this Ihey \\"ere augmellling their initial commitmenl 10 Ihe
Copeau-Saint Denis model of discipline.
economy, and grace. ralher than departing from il.
Herben's minimal, realislically
slanted work \\'as especially e\'ident in
produclions like John Arden's Sergeallt
Mllsgrave's Dallce (1959), Arnold
Wesker's Chips with Evelythillg (1962),
Brecht's 8aal (1963), or Sail1/ Joan of
the Stockyards (1964), all of \\'h ich
employed a bare stage with cyclorama
(somelimes \\'ilh projeclions or painled
murals) backing up relatively fe\\", carefully selecled and composed object,
usually lit by exposed inslrumenl .
Herbert's later \\'ork observed the
same patlern but became larger in scale
and more complex in operation.
Brecht's Calileo ( T 1980) followed
Griffin' decisive action of stripping the
stage to the bare walls but added a combination of a large, flown projection
screen and cable-drawn mobile platform
to facililate the flow of action and epic
eSlablishing of Ihe story's conlex!. For
Aeschylus' Oresteia (NT 1981) she was
able to draw upon her extensive work
with masks in Ihe Saint Denis school;
everyone in the all-male cast wore a full
mask, which of course demanded special
altelllion to the actors' intelligibility as
well as Ihe appearance of the mask.
Herben slro\'e for a balance of character flavor and abstraction in the masks,
as she did for a balance of Greek and
modern in the elting. In Ihe middle of
Ihe Olivier slage rose a stark, melallic
fa<;ade Ihat echoed the huge stage shop
doors, thu creating a striking unity belween this Iheatre and the Greek seuing.
Off euing the rectangular fa<;ade \\"as a
white circle for the chorus, Wilh lWO diagonal elllry path. The illlerplay of circle and square or rectangle i a recurrent
mOlif in her work, as was evident again
in her sIaging of George Steiner's The
Portage to Sail Cristobal of A. H. (London 1982). In all of Herben's produclions one is aware of a fine sense of
spatial proportion and composition; her

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Theatre Design & Technology - Spring 1983