Brendan deVallance has a low opinion of conventional theater. “It’s just so figured out,” he says. “They work it and work it until it’s right, and then they do it 100 times that way. Well, of course they’re going to tell you each time is different, but they’re trying to do it the same way all the time. I’m not.”
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But in an effort to build a larger audience for both his work and performance art in general, deVallance has incorporated elements of more conventional theater–a set, a narrator, musicians–into his current show at the Randolph Street Gallery, My Eyes Were Filled With Voluntears. He’s even developed a version of the show tailored for kids. This weekend he performs the show three times, plus a Saturday matinee of the kids’ version.
There’s also music: In one performance he sang the lyrics from “Satisfaction” to the tune of Lennon’s “Imagine.” In My Eyes Were Filled With Voluntears, the record player-briefcase plays Blue Swede’s “Hooked on a Feeling.”
The set, the “cast,” and the extended run mean more advance preparation than usual; deVallance made a longer-than-usual list and held a technical run-through–though nothing that could even remotely be considered a rehearsal. But the show should still have the spontaneity deVallance prides himself on: the narrator will both “explain and confuse things,” and the musicians will do whatever they want.
My Eyes Were Filled With Voluntears runs Thursday through Saturday, October 4 through 6, at 8 PM at Randolph Street Gallery, 756 N. Milwaukee; there’s also a 2 PM performance tomorrow geared toward kids. Tickets are $6, $4 for RSG members, and $3 for kids under 12. Call 666-7737 for more info on this or upcoming shows by other performance artists at the gallery.
