As a part of my research for my solo performance, I went to see Shȏn Dale-Jones’s show The Duke at the LPAC in order to gain first-hand experience of how professional artists construct narrative within their pieces. Within this post, I shall be explaining how I have taken inspiration from his work through exploring his use of humour in order to engage an audience as a means of influencing my own piece.

From the very start of The Duke, Dale-Jones used humour as a means of keeping the audience engaged by directly speaking to individual audience members and making jokes with them. For example, he played a game where he invited the audience to guess how much money his father paid for a Royal Worcester porcelain figure of The Duke of Wellington in 1974 and sarcastically pointed out how the audience laughed more at particular jokes (Dale- Jones, 2018). By utilising humour in this way, Dale- Jones was able to portray himself in a less traditionally theatrical light and emphasise his presence in the space not only as a practitioner but also as a human being who has stories to share with others. This early establishment of a particular dynamic within the performer-audience relationship was successful as it made the atmosphere less intimidating and helped to create a sense of community within the performance space where everybody was enjoying themselves.

Another interesting use of humour within Dale- Jones’s work which served to keep the audience engaged throughout his performance was his acknowledgement of the mistakes he made on stage as a part of the show. At times, Dale- Jones occasionally stumbled over his words or got them mixed up and afterwards, pointed them out through sarcasm and jokes (Dale- Jones, 2018). This technique also served to humanise Dale-Jones, shattering the preconceived notion that performances have to be stylistically perfect and completely polished in order to have creative merit. This further acknowledgement of Dale- Jones’s humanity and fallible nature encouraged the audience to relax and actually pay attention to the action in front of them as they were not cut off from the events unfolding in front of them.

Moreover, the use of humour within The Duke was also featured within the story behind the piece itself. As the show progressed, the audience was able to experience the show’s narrative unfold through three separate stories coming together to form one cohesive show featuring stories about a porcelain figure, a script and the refugee crisis (Dale- Jones, 2018). Through the incorporation of three seemingly unconnected ideas, Dale- Jones was able to tap into the multi-faceted nature of human existence, balancing out the joy, randomness and injustice of real life. This poignant and sensitive use of humour served to both emphasise an emotive issue about how people should look out for each other more and add variety to the overall tone of the piece by incorporating a variety of elements.

In relation to my final performance, all of these approaches towards balancing humour and seriousness within performance are idea that I would very much like to explore. Due to the fact that the idea of female sexuality can be highly politicised in certain debates and conversations, I would like to use my show as an opportunity to encourage a less formal yet still relevant area of discussion to such an issue. My intention behind this would be to create an open and warm environment where audience members could relax whilst still acknowledging the seriousness of the topic at hand.

Works Cited:

Dale- Jones, S. (2018) The Duke [live performance]. Performed by Shȏn Dale- Jones. Lincoln: Lincoln Performing Arts Centre, 8 February.