Wayne Lloyd (UK)
Last Tango in Paris
Great Eastern Hotel, Saturday 27 May 2006
‘Watching a film and describing it are two different things. It’s precisely that difference that interests me. It’s what William Golding said about childhood: what you think happened matters more than what did. And this is how culture works. There is no such thing as a raw artwork, or a raw experience, it’s all about layers of story-telling and interpretation.’ Wayne Lloyd
Lloyd has told the story of many films: explaining them as if to an audience who would never be able to see them, with no aids except his own narrative skill, a screen-sized piece of paper and paint. The film he chose for Wild Gift was ‘Last Tango in Paris’, a film that he had always wanted to perform.
‘To appreciate this story you have to see something that no one is supposed to see. The film relies on the characters’ being locked away in an empty apartment.’ His one-man rendition was performed passionately, and full of bravura: pacing, gesturing and acting out his version of the film. At crucial points he would pause to daub out symbolic illustrations as the action developed.
His narratives explore how we establish a relationship with a film. He thinks popular culture important, that it influences our ideas of history and collective identity. ‘And it’s the depiction of things which are alien to us which do that in particular.’
Thanks to Siena Barnes, Anne Sellars
