About

rou-tine

In the fall of 1986, Liz Dunn, one of the artistic directors of La MaMa, gave several
members of Watchface a tour of a basement beneath the La MaMa theater on East 4th
Street. The basement was filled high with boxes, but would soon be transformed into
another performance space and named The Club at La MaMa. Liz, who several years later
would become a member of Watchface’s Board of Directors during its brief period of
incorporation, offered the group the inaugural performance dates, set for October. The
opening engagement featured Stereotype in Quad and Ralph and Louie’s Bad Habits .

The early months of 1987 were a period of heightened creativity and intense rehearsal
schedules for Watchface. After the successful opening of The Club, Liz invited them to fill two
weekends of La MaMa’s spring schedule. The group decided on the ambitious project of
staging past works that they felt deserved additional exposure, to be performed in repertory
with new pieces created for this booking – nine works in all, three per evening of the three
night schedule each week. This effort became Watchface: The Spring ’87 Collection. The
title was a riff on a fashion show, a collection of different pieces created from a central
influence. The works to be remounted were House of Jahnke, Boys Will Be Men, and Twins.
Six new pieces were planned: two solo shows, Iris Rose’s More Songs of Desire and Despair
and Kim X Knowlton’s Cowboys; Melanie Monios and Maggie Siena, teamed for the first time
in P.O. I Love You; and Septophonic with all seven members. The remaining two new
performances, The Music Project and rou-tine, featured collaborators from inside and outside
the group.
La MaMa flyer
La MaMa card
La MaMa listing

Inspired by this opportunity, Kurt Fulton invited longtime friend and previous collaborator
Richard Schachter to partner on a new work for the La MaMa engagement. Richard had been dividing his time between New York City and Ottawa, where Richard’s partner was living. Not having the legal status to live in Canada, Richard returned to New York frequently. Two years earlier Kurt and Richard had created a piece by working on material in their separate cities, staying in touch by phone and mail to exchange and develop ideas. The work was then rehearsed on Richard’s trips to New York and Kurt’s seasonal visits to Ottawa. In August of 1985, the performance, World Peace and Responsibility to the Planet, was presented at Galerie SAW Gallery, a space in Ottawa with which Richard had become associated. The dates at La MaMa offered Kurt and Richard the opportunity to perform together in New York City and explore together the Watchface techniques Kurt had been working with but which they had not used in their earlier piece.

Kurt was interested in investigating how our banal day to day practices and their seemingly
unimportant content take priority and focus over our collective concerns and critical issues
that should deserve much more of our attention. The performance was called rou-tine. The
title was presented as an entry in a dictionary, as the show was attempting to define the
various meanings behind our daily rituals.

Kurt and Richard assembled the show as they had previously, via long distance, until about
ten days before the performance date when Richard traveled to New York to put the ideas
and script that had developed on their feet.

Kurt’s roots in modern dance and its influence are particularly apparent in this approximately
twenty minute performance. Formulated from Watchface techniques, the majority of the
piece consisted of abstract movement sections without text or linear qualities of story and
characters. Relatively simply staged sections depicted considerable concepts such as how
self-indulgent minutia diverts us from confronting our largely overwhelming societal conflicts
to simple ideas of the overstated importance of fads and trends.

To the sound of a washing machine, the show opened with Kurt and Richard hanging a
clothesline across the back wall of the stage area and pinning laundry to it during the
opening dialogue. The dialogue was pieced together from several notated conversations
between Kurt and Richard imagining themselves as neighbors, chatting over the backyard
fence for the umpteenth time. The list of odd chip flavors and snack foods were found on the
shelves of an Ottawa convenience store. Opening dialogue:

Richard:
(Humming to himself) I’m hungry.

Kurt:
What did you have for breakfast?

Richard:
A muffin.

Kurt:
A muffin?

Richard:
Actually it was sort of breakfast and lunch.

Kurt:
That’s convenient but…

Richard:
You don’t have to put them in the oven and no mess.

Kurt:
And you can eat them on the run.

Richard:
Reminds me of my grandmother – old fashioned.

Kurt:
I like blueberry.

Richard:
Muffins are like corn on the cob.

Kurt:
A single serve package.

Richard:
A lot healthier than donuts and croissants. A nice big crown and fruit in every bite.

Kurt:
But no lunch?

Richard:
Well, I ate a little bit of a lot of different things.

Kurt:
Oh, like grazing.

Richard:
Quick eats.

Kurt:
I guess the idea of three principal meals a day has kind of deteriorated.

Richard:
Quick pace of living, more women working.

Kurt:
Single parents.

Richard:
Snack foods have definitely taken the place of traditional meals.

Kurt:
Cheddar jalapeño chips.
(dialogue overlapping)

Richard:
Garlic chips, sour cream and onion chips.

Kurt:
Crab flavored chips, sweet potato chips, baked apple chips, chili chips.

Richard:
BBQ chicken chips, German potato salad, green olive and cheese, gazpacho chips.

Kurt:
Ralston Purina chocolate pudding smores granola bars.

Richard:
Aunt Sally’s cheese-flavored sourdough snacks.

Kurt:
Watch out for flavored chips, they’re the wave of the future.

The section that received the most positive reception was a text and movement sequence
based on the sport of synchronized swimming. Illustrating the simplistic meaning of the word
routine as “a worked-out part that may be often repeated, a set piece of entertainment,” the
two men reproduced the gestures of world class synchronized swimming competitors while
reciting the remarks of the sports commentators. The reproduced movements of the
swimmers both above and below the water layered with the often excited and nonsensical
commentary created an anything-but-routine depiction of the sport. Kurt, who was a fan of
this odd contest that demanded intense physical strength and technique combined with a
dubious level of artistic expression, was very pleased with the audiences’ amusement.

The following month, with Richard back across the border, Kurt made his summer visit to
Ottawa. They took the opportunity to perform the piece at Galerie SAW Gallery for an
enthusiastic Canadian crowd. The program was completed with Kurt’s solo Ted Bundy from
The Serial Killer Series and an earlier solo work of Richard’s, Private Pages.

The relationship between Richard and Watchface continued through the rest of the
collective’s history. Promoted by Richard, five Watchface members visited Ottawa and the
Galerie SAW Gallery with the 21⁄2 by 5 tour in February 1989. During an extended stay in New
York later that year, Richard was cast in White, which had its premiere in early 1990. One
additional long distance collaboration with Kurt took place after Richard again returned to
Ottawa. Surviving the Plague – a rite of sexual promiscuity, celebrating gay sexual practices
plus a reminder of the necessary safe sex precautions mandatory for survival – was also
presented at Ottawa’s Galerie SAW Gallery.
Galerie SAW Gallery program
Galerie SAW Gallery flyer

After his decision to leave Canada permanently and return to New York, Richard took the
original roles of the absent Chazz Dean, who had returned to his roots in California, in later
presentations of both 2000 Questions and Sodomite Warriors. In 1999, sections of rou-tine
were performed at the International Performance Festival in Basel, Switzerland. Curator Linda
Cassens, a former Watchface collaborator, invited Kurt to represent the disbanded
Watchface at the festival. With Richard, sections of rou-tine, 2,000 Questions and Sodomite
Warriors were presented.
 

*Richard Schachter is referred to as both Richard and R.N. Schachter in programs and production notes.