AZUSA SEYAMA: “PINA’S PERFORMANCES ARE BEYOND TIME”

Right after the play we had luck to meet Azusa Seyama (a Japanese-born German actress), one of the theater’s leading dancers, who worked with Pina Bausch and dances now in The Rite of Spring and some other productions.

How did you begin to work with Pina?

“It was in 1999 or 2000, when I was 24 and studied in Essen. As I heard later from my teachers at the Folkwang University of the Arts, Pina Bausch had found my contacts. She was in search of guest artistes for The Rite of Spring, so some students, incluning me, were invited to Paris for a selection to Pina’s theater. I passed it successfully and worked on the performance all over the summer. Then the season began, we gathered in Wuppertal, and Pina asked me to join the troupe. It was unbelievable.”

Do you remember your first impressions of Pina?

“She was very tall but fragile, so it seemed that if a strong wind blew, she would fall (smiles). She was an extremely calm and hard-working person.

“Pina could find special words for each of the actors. She helped me discover my own talents. Whenever I said ‘I don’t think I’ll cope with this,’ she answered: ‘Yes, you will. Come on, you are superb!’ She helped me reveal myself so brightly that I was surprised. She was the discoverer of our aptitudes.”

Has the theatre changed you a lot?

“I don’t think I have changed radically, but I have essentially realized myself as an actress and become a much more open person. I am happy to have achieved such physical, mental, and emotional capabilities.”

What was the basic method of Pina’s work with the troupe?

“She always wanted us to do more. Even when we were totally exhausted, she would squeeze still more from us. We never stopped at what we had achieved.”

Could you get angry with her or feel hurt under such a heavy workload?

“No, I was only doing all I could not to spoil her work. But, I say it again, even if I exerted myself more and more, Pina went on saying: ‘All right, but you can still do it better.’”

How did you usually work on a new production?

“Pina used to start with questions and answers. We discussed the production we were putting on and had to ponder over hundreds of various questions, phrases, or short definitions. We were looking for answers together, but our presumptions often ran counter to her views and explanations.”

Was it in words only?

“Sometimes she wanted us to answer through a movement and sometimes in words only. She was observing everything minutely and always taking some notes. I don’t know what she was writing. Perhaps she was comparing our first and next answers, when she was asking us the same questions again. I may have lacked experience – both in life and art – at the time. I didn’t know answers to most of those questions and had never even reflected on them. For example, Pina could ask what the tears of bereavement would look like. In fact, those questions seemed abstract and sometimes just absurd. But when I pondered on them more deeply, I began to understand what they meant just for me. Pina also shared her personal views on the things we spoke about. I can still remember the helplessness that ran over me at times. How could I have lived for 24 years and still be unable to express simple ideas in a dance? This means I in fact lacked ideas and could not convey in a dance what I had never thought about.”

What can convey more truth – a movement or a word?

“We were never differentiating a dance and a text. The truth must be somewhere in between. Pina was taking an integrative artistic approach and had a subtle feeling of the overall dance and of each specific movement in all its diversity. For her, there was nothing that could not be expressed on stage.”

Can you recall the assignment that was the most serious challenge to you?

“For me, working at this theater is really a never-ending challenge! (Laughs.) Every production is a test for us because we have to learn something new each time. In some performances I have to shout at the top of my voice, laying bare my pain or fury to the audience, in others I have to sing and talk uninterruptedly or sometimes run all over the stage and dance so long and exhaustingly that I lose all the joy the dance usually gives me. So every time I meet new challenges no matter how many of them I have met before.”

Frankly speaking, The Rite of Spring looks like incredible, including manual, labor.

“It does. After this performance, actors sometimes turn to doctors because of head injuries and finger fractures.”

Do you ever doubt that you’ll be able to cope with the role?

“I do all the time. Sometimes I have to do certain things on stage for the first time in my life, expose some feelings to the audience, and raise my voice to a shout in front of my colleagues. Doubts stop me in such cases, but I recall what Pina used to say: ‘I know you can do it.’”

And what production caused you to doubt yourself the most?

“Palermo Palermo.”

How would you assess your performance?

“I’ve managed to play quite well in the last while. (Smiles.) My mother helped me during the rehearsals – I phoned to seek her advice how to shout better. I used the Japanese language in my training.”

Can your mom shout well?

“Very well and rather often, for she is very strict.”

What is your vision of the future of Tanztheater Wuppertal?

“I would be very happy if we could keep and pass to future generations the incredible legacy Pina left – the theater, her vision, and the particular atmosphere she was inspiredly creating. Of course, something will be changing in the course of time, but we must hand over her ardor to our successors before it cools down, preserve the fire of dance and the soul of the theater. It is the responsibility of the whole troupe and each actor personally.”

To conclude with, what do you do outside the theater? Do you like anything else except of to dancing?

“What I like except of dancing? (Laughs.) What can I tell you? You’ve really forced me to think hard…”