DARWIN’S WORMS
A touring theatre production & multi-media educational installation.
Touring October - November 2008
(to coincide with the international Darwin 200 festival)
Darwin’s Worms looks into the legacy of Darwin, and how it speaks to each of us now more importantly than ever. It will focus equally on contemporary society and how we face important questions about morality, ‘spirituality’ and how we exist now. The character of Charles Darwin himself is very interesting and appealing to us dramatically, in addition we wish to pursue the idea of applying Darwinian theory, the key integers of Natural Selection, to the process of drama, of creating theatre.
The Arts Council - along with Wakefield Council and Contact Theatre Manchester - have funded Bent Architect to undertake a thorough and intensive research and development process into this project.
The process thus far has many varied dimensions to it. We have been working and discussing with a designer and a filmmaker, actors and several members of the scientific community, both at Manchester Museum, the Natural History Museum and beyond. We hope to link Darwin’s Worms in with the official Darwin 200 celebrations, marking the anniversary of his birth and the 150th anniversary of The Origin Of The Species, and will be part of a range of events across the country from next summer onwards.
We wish to create a piece of highly exciting, visually thrilling, highly intelligent and challenging piece of work, which will tour nationally production for 2008 and 2009. Please visit our blog
Even more info:
One of the many statements that abound on the subject of Charles Darwin is that his ideas and view of the world touches and shapes our daily lives in every degree, it is in many ways through his eyes that we see the world.
Darwin was fascinated by worms. He used to lay them out on his billiard table and ask his children to play the bassoon and the piano to them and then study their reactions! Any man who could do this clearly has a sense of humour, but his interest in them was more to do with the way in which the worm in it’s own miniscule fashion, affects and shapes the very earth we live and walk upon. For the earth itself has passed through and been fed by the worms.
It seems to us that there is an important truth here, in fact several. That the smallest of God’s creatures ( geddit?) is as important in the grand scheme of things, and that it is as vital to look at the micro in order to gain some understanding of the macro.
We have in mind the beginnings of a story about a young boy and an old man whose allotment the boy consistently vandalizes. It is too glib and easy and not relevant at this stage to say that these two characters in anyway represent Darwin and the worms! They might, but they might not. It is our intention to work hand in hand in terms of both exploring and deepening our understanding of Darwinian evolutionary theory, of his broader philosophical implications, especially in relation to man’s relationship with this earth, this clearly relates to our understanding of climate change too, at the same time as developing characters, narratives and stories in relation to the above two characters that have a sharply contemporary feel. At this point we can perhaps go no further on these subjects as we simply don’t know at this stage. It is also why we feel it is imperative to have some genuine scientific input to the process from one whose primary speciality is Darwinian science and philosophy.
It is not our aim to get hung up on dry science. We are about creating lively, irreverent visually exciting theatre! If Charles Darwin himself is in the piece as a character there is no reason for him to have a beard and top hat! He may have tattoos and a hoody. He may not.
In an age of increasing religious fervour, of faith schools and creationist theory seizing the agenda ( where no less a person than the President of the United States can say of the creationism versus evolution debate that he believes both points of view should be taught and we are allowing state funded schools to be privately run by creationists! ) the importance of asserting not just the secular principle is also on our agenda, but of asserting the value of science over religious fundamentalism. The idea of Intelligent Design is basically creationism by another name.
Our eye is on the entertaining and intelligent at all times. We do not want to spout scientific theory just to prove how intelligent we are, we believe this is a vital and extremely prescient subject matter and we want to tell a story that engages an audience on a deep and very thoughtful level about the world we all live in today, about how our individual lives are all interlinked and can make a difference if we choose to make them do so.
