Echoes Master Script

LX1: Turn the audience lights down to 10%. The stage is in Black.
SX2: Turn Projection sound on

[Kelsie Start on knees, back up as you get up]

[Echo is on placed downstage centre or downstage right]
[Harmanie is upstage centre or upstage left]

Kelsie: ​ We’re starting in darkness, in this black box theatre. LX1

I’m Kelsie, and down there on the stage is Harmanie.

LX2: The light box forms around Harmanie as Kelsie speaks. Slow fade up.
No front lights just shin lights.

A box of light forms around her, the outline stark against the
black flooring.

LX3: Shin lights light both sides of Echo, giving it a glow

She’s looking at a white box, suspended on a pole on wheels,

very close to the left side of the audience. We call this box
Echo.

LX4: Slow fade up on Kelsie's projection on the Cyc

And there I am projected. Very large, larger than I am

comfortable with if I stop to think about it, on the huge screen at
the back of the stage. I’m a white woman, and I’ve got lots of
dark curly hair. I’m in front of a magnolia yellow wall. Magnolia
yellow is the name of the shade of cream that all the worst
landlords in London paint their flats
 Harmanie’s not looking at me on the big screen, though. She’s
looking at me on the screen on Echo.

Harmanie and I met years ago. We danced together. We moved

away and kept dancing together. Just this time at a distance.
My evening, Harmanie's morning. Now Harmanie is in a box of
light, me in my London flat.

We start by finding a shape.

Slowly, the shapes evolve and transform into something new.

We breathe.

We don’t leave our boxes, but when I move, Harmanie moves,

and when Harmanie moves, I move.

[As this sequence repeats it gets faster]

We start to fold.

Then we reach.

We spin.
(find a spinny shape at the end)

We pause.

LX5: Harmanie Travels forward after each spin. Can the box travel forward
with her, or reform around her?
[Repeat 3x, the last time, ‘We spin, spin, spin!]

LX6: Front lights fade up on Harmanie, showing her full figure, not just her
silhouette.
Harmanie: ​I'm a woman in a manual wheelchair with long blond hair.

[Kelsie stays frozen as Harmanie moves]

Frozen head tilted down over one wheel as I look up at my

hand. I slowly melt into a voluminous shape. Crumple down,
strain to reach up, I spin my wheels. Freeze

Kelsie is in a curved shape against her magnolia cream walls

behind me and within our box called Echo.

Together this time…We shift positions right to left, drop down

like a fallen brick, reach up as if to get a book off a tall shelf, we
circle and find stillness.

We are like echoes close yet far.

Shift, enfold, reach, turn, breathe.

Feel my seat beneath me. Feet press into my footplate as I

breathe with the earth. Feel the Cool air against my skin.

I see her. Kelsie.

She melts slowly like ice, I trace her outline, she dives down off
camera. I drop my hands to my knees. Raising my head I see
her pulling herself up, my arm raises me up; but I can't quite lift
off my seat, Kelsie begins to turn like a kaleidoscope of colour,
my arm drops to wheels; I spiral backwards. Twirling. Pause.

Each time we reflect each other’s movements, my box of light

has travelled closer to Echo as if drawn like a moth to a flame.
LX7: can the box of light surround both of us then dissolve leaving us with a
warm wash on the stage? The dissolve happens as our fingers almost
touch each other. Dark blue wash

I reach forward as I see Kelsie reach toward me (LX6). My

fingers could almost touch her…. A screen. A warm flat screen.

Kelsie is gone. Leaving only walls behind.

I just feel a cool flat box with rounded edges. But it has wheels
just like me.

SX: Slowly fade up Stones Start spinning. Kelsie should still be audible

Kelsie: ​
Harmanie pulls Echo across the stage, backwards, then pulls
Echo forwards, inching to the right
They circle together, as if in a courtly duet
They turn the other way
Harmanie gently reaches out and touches the screen
I slowly edge back onto the screen, first fingertips, then head
I’m reflected at the back of the stage and in the white box

(Echo Duet score:

Tap around the box

Turn Echo sideways and peek around; do that both
sides two times.
Bring echo backwards by pushing and pulling kinda
like a see saw
Spin echo around, spin myself around. Catch echo
from behind wheel forward in a turn
Spin away, catch echo and wheel backwards
around
 See Kelsie peek on, have a hand duet while
wrapped around Echo
Our hands push me away.
Push away and begin meta box)

Harmanie:
I trace Kelsie as she comes on. My hand fills her hand.
We spiral our hands around. Kelsie in the big screen, and
the small screen making me feel immersed in this hand
dance.

SX: cross fade stones start spinning into busy streets. Let the busy streets
rise in volume, almost too intensely, and bring the volume down as kelsie
pushes away.
LX8: change the tone to more red-orange
She pushes away.

Kelsie: ​ ​ I push to stand.

Harmanie: ​​ I push away and back up.

[Kelsie gets up for Metabox]

[Find somewhere to gesture to what Harmanie is doing]

There are two things I need when I leave my home - my

box and my improvisation score.

My box is quite small.

Harmanie, are you following me?

Harmanie: ​​ I’m with you.

 If I pin my elbows to my side, lift my hands up and drop
my hands from my wrists. That's where my box ends. But
if I keep my elbows pinned to the side and lift my arms up
to the side. Then my box ends probably about halfway
down my forearm. My box is a rectangle, not a square.

I made this box when I first moved here. We come from

the prairies with endless space that the wind passes
through, and all of a sudden I was in this place where
there are many, many people. Moving very, very fast. And
they get very, very angry with you when they do not move
the way they think you should do.

SX: Abruptly stop Busy Streets

So I stopped, I observed, and I developed my

improvisation score, my list of rules for how to move
through the space.

SX: fade up Preserve in Community

LX: try adding moving gobos here.

Like any good improvisation score, it begins by filling the

space. Look for the empty spaces. I weave in and out.
Next is the pace you want to go, as quickly as possible,
while still in control.
And then finally, never stop moving.

LX: Gobos can fade out somewhere during the go-stop section. We would
like the projection to blink off whenever we say stop. So Kelsie is only in
Echo. And when we say go, it blinks back on. And after the last stop, it
stays off. And we only hear and see Kelsie from Echo.

[We stop moving. First Harmanie, then Kelsie, then Harmanie (10 count).
We say go and stop]
SX6: let the song end. When it ends, I will say the last ‘stop’

U/S Solos begin to push Echo down stage right at a slight angle, we shape
change enfold reach out and spin together. As we spin we fade to black.

Harmanie’s U/S description:

I’m folded on my lap like origami
I unfold, fingertips into the rim of my chair
I breathe reaching out into space
I look at the palm of my hand and see my lifelines
I’m being pulled up by my fingertips, snap down
Unfurl, reach up, melt down, spin fold.

Kelsie’s U/S description:

Hands slap as if against a glass pane, drag.
Hands slap again, drag, I can feel the skin on my fingers
pulling.
Throw, hands to shoulders, head curves, melt
Reach up as if I’m lifting something heavy and I press it
into my ears
Eyes look up to the side, head tilts, torso follows,
Eyes, head, torso, eyes, head torso, eyes, head torso
As if I’m pulling a string out of my ear canal
Dissolve
LX: We start Centre stage and slowly move stage right. Can the lights
become softer and more intimate on stage right?

Variation Connection on 3rd Iteration:

[Kelsie starts to pick up movement & description from Harmanie]

Harmanie:
I’m folded on my lap like origami

Kelsie: ​ ​ Folded like origami

Harmanie: ​​ I unfold, fingertips into the rim of my chair
I breathe, reaching out into space
I look at the palm of my hand and see my lifelines

Kelsie:​ ​ I look at the palm of my hand

Harmanie:​ ​ I’m being pulled up by my fingertips, snap down

Unfurl, reach up, melt down, fold.

Both: ​ ​ Dissolve melt

Describe Harmanie in the 4th iteration

Harmanie: ​​ I see you.

Kelsie: ​ ​ I see you.

Kelsie & Harmanie together x2:

Together, Shape, Change, Fold, Reach, Spin.

LX: lights begin to slowly fade when we start the second Shape, change,
Fold etc. We should have only a little light remaining when Harmanie starts
spinning Echo backwards. And no light except what comes from Echo
when we finish

Harmanie:​ ​ We spin together

Both: ​ ​ We End. [Kelsie Turns off her screen]