When they began work on Negotiations, Iris Rose and James Siena were living together in
the East Village and were engaged to be married the following year. Both were inveterate
trash pickers, always looking for treasure in what others had discarded. James had once
found a dining room table on the street, as well as chairs, vintage sheet music, and old
ledger books. At the end of 1983, he found a record album called World’s Fair Polkas by
Jupe Kleber, and he felt that one eccentric track in particular, “The Ocarina Polka,” was
meant to be the soundtrack to a performance. That was the seed from which Negotiations
grew.
Negotiations, like The Money Show, James and Iris’ first collaboration, was created equally
by both partners. From the press release:
Our working relationship is also part of the investigation. All artistic decisions are
negotiated between the collaborators, mirroring and illuminating the negotiation
process of the relationships in question.
The first of Negotiations’ sections to be created was Husband/Wife, set to “The Ocarina
Polka” from the album James found in the garbage. Two more sections, Boss/Employee and
Lovers, were soon added to make a set for the Pyramid Club. As more sections joined these,
they were tried out at clubs and other performance venues, usually three at a time, until
there were eight – enough to make a half-hour performance.
Perhaps because the show had originated with a piece of music, James and Iris decided
against using any dialogue (though occasional sounds were acceptable). This allowed the
music chosen for each section to be the entire audio focus. This intensified a common
requirement of Watchface’s work: that the audiences concentrate closely on the
movements in order to supply their own sense of meaning. Also, because there was no
dialogue, the Frankenstein exercise, when it was used as noted below, did not include the
usual vocal component. The exception to this was Husband/Wife, where the vocal
component was unintelligible gibberish or shouts.
Husband/Wife
The movements for Husband/Wife were a combination of Frankensteins for roles spouses
play in a marriage, such as Husband, Wife, Provider, and Dependent, and Abstractions
drawn from a list of tactics partners use in dealing with one other – Bargain, Seduce,
Threaten, Nag, Withhold, Lie, Goad, etc. Husband/Wife Abstractions Iris and James stood
side-by-side, facing the audience, while they performed these actions. As the section
ended, they finally came together with a Frankenstein for Cooperation executed in unison.
Boss/Employee
The second piece of music chosen was a Muzak version of Ruby & the Romantics’ “Our Day
Will Come.” It was provided by Joshua Fried, a Muzak aficionado and Pyramid Club
employee, who had composed the music for Iris’ first show in New York, Mysteries, and
continued to perform with James and Iris in the music group Nancy (see Nancy/Marty/
Masterpiece Theater). Joshua had developed a fascination with Muzak, which he explained
was musically quite different from Easy Listening and other forms of light instrumental music.
Designed to keep employees working throughout the day, Muzak strategically employed
music meant to pep workers up at certain times of day alternating with music to calm them
down at others. Joshua had somehow obtained an actual Muzak receiver – usually only
available to service subscribers – and was able to make recordings of the real thing.
The movements for Boss/Employee were Walter Kendall Fives – simple actions based on
eight pairs of symbiotic roles that bosses and employees embody.
Boss:
Captain
Storyteller
Dad
Child
Buddy
Money-counter
Martyr
Santa
Employee:
Crew
Good listener
Child
Mom
Buddy
Laborer
Mutineer
Elves
The list of actions for “Buddy/Buddy” included: Tell Secrets, Share, Console, Drink, and
Laugh.
Lovers
Lovers was set to Frank Sinatra’s version of Bert Kalmar and Harry Ruby’s romantic ballad
“Nevertheless,” whose optimistic but guarded lyrics perfectly capture the ambivalence of
believing in a new love.
Maybe I’m right, maybe I’m wrong
Maybe I’m weak, maybe I’m strong
But nevertheless I’m in love with you
Maybe I’ll win, maybe I’ll lose
Maybe I’m in for crying the blues
But nevertheless I’m in love with you
The most traditionally dancelike section of the show, Lovers was choreographed from
movements chosen from the notes of observers, including Chazz Dean and Kim X Knowlton,
who watched a Bodies in Space that was improvised while listening to the song.
Lovers Bodies in Space notes
Parent/Child
This section showed the evolving relationship between a mother and her maturing offspring
set to “Just For Once” by Mister Rogers, plus a spoken epilogue from his song “You’ve Got to
Know Your Trade.” Each of the performers traveled a set path around the stage,
independently executing actions (Walter Kendall Fives) typical of each developmental
stage and interacting when their paths crossed. The 10 stages represented were: Birth, Baby,
Toddler, Beginning School, Family/Dependence, Friends/Independence, Puberty, Teenage
Dream, Teenage Nightmare, and Separation. The paired actions for Family/Dependence:
Mother:
Assign Tasks
Praise
Punish
Ignore
Listen
Child:
Show
Imitate
Test
Embody
Talk
Teacher/Student
James had a recording of the Washington, DC, All-City Elementary School Choir, of which he
had once been a member. Since this was the only recording the creators owned that was
performed by actual students, it seemed a fitting place to begin the search for the music for
Teacher/Student. They chose the choir’s stirring rendition of “Joshua Fit De Battle Ob
Jericho.” The actions in this section were brief gestural Emblems for school subjects, such as
Math, Science, and Geography, organized into a complex, repetitive series. Teacher Iris
began at the front of the stage and Student James at the back, but as he mastered each
subject, he took a step forward until he was ultimately parallel/equal with his instructor.
Sports
The relationships within and relating to sports teams were represented by Frankensteins for
Coach, Trainer, Doctor, Media, Fans, and Girls, interspersed between specific actions
collected from observations of televised sports. Since the actions were taken from multiple
sports, the compiled result didn’t represent any one in particular but rather athletic
competition in general. “The Theme from Rocky” seemed the inevitable music choice.
Businesses
For this section, James proposed a medley he had once heard on WFMU of commercial
jingles written and performed by Barry Manilow. Luckily, the large, well-stocked Tower
Records at 4th Street and Broadway had a copy of the Manilow album on which it
appeared. Manilow’s jingles included Kentucky Fried Chicken, Stridex, Band-Aid, Dr.
Pepper, and McDonald’s. Frankensteins were created to represent the stages of a business,
including Investment, Price War, Expansion and Diversification, Corporate Power, and
Loyalty. The final three Frankensteins, Merge, Out of Business, and Continue, were performed
as a round. Businesses Frankensteins These alternated with Emblems for the more mundane
things that keep businesses going, including Phones, Bookkeeping, Inventory, Copy
Machine, and Tax Shelter, and Bodies in Space variations on them. Businesses outline
Nations
Set to the “Star-Spangled Banner,” this quick finale was primarily made up of two different
Frankensteins each for the people who negotiate on behalf of nations: Diplomats, Generals,
Businesses, and Leaders.