Chögyam Trungpa by Fabrice Midal

Author:Fabrice Midal
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780834821866
Publisher: Shambhala Publications

1. The Theater

Chögyam Trungpa wrote and directed plays from the early 1970s onward. In the context of the artistic renewal then in full swing, these works allowed him to present the experience of enlightenment without any theoretical explanations.

He wrote three important plays: Prajna, Water Festival, and Kingdom of Philosophy, to which can be added some shorter pieces such as Sandcastles and Proclamation.

Prajna, whose title means “the basic intelligence that sees things as they are,” is based on a recitation of the Heart Sutra, a classic Buddhist text.3 It was performed for the first time on August 11, 1974. A group of men and women in brown robes form a sort of chorus “who serve as uncompromising spokesmen for the teachings. Their behavior cuts through the neurotic trips of the people they confront; their actions arise spontaneously without reference to passion, aggression, or confusion. Their gestures become statements that are straightforward, but do not follow any predictable social pattern. There is no chance to argue or reason with them.”4 The action of the play reproduces that of the ritual found in all scriptural texts (or sadhana), where, to make a sacred space, the troublesome spirits who symbolize the confusion in us and the world are chased away. Chögyam Trungpa’s personal style comes across in this play: a mix of humor, intimidation, and a sharp precision that seeks to transmit the nature of space and egolessness.

Water Festival, which was produced two years later, is a humorous, even sarcastic play that contains nothing overtly Buddhist. One of the characters speaks of his intense thirst that nothing can quench. Chögyam Trungpa was playing with a paradox: the script constantly alludes to water, and yet the thirst increases. The intensity of the desire becomes ridiculous and grotesque. The main character, who is called Parkinson, wears a cubic hat with a chin strap. All the other characters wear turquoise silk costumes.

The curtain opens on Parkinson alone. “The Thirsty Man” then launches into a monologue to explain how thirsty he is. He’s drying up. He’s cracking. He’s on fire. The play’s other main character is an Old Lady. She wakes up in a foreign country whose language is unknown to her. Everything, from the costumes to the chorus, seems unreal. With its Mudra exercises, this play is more about developing a sense of presence than telling a story.

Kingdom of Philosophy is the longest of all Chögyam Trungpa’s plays; it lasts almost three hours. It was performed for the first and only time on July 15, 1979. As Chögyam Trungpa explained in the epilogue to the unpublished play, Kingdom of Philosophy “is not entirely unfamiliar to us. The world of this play is ruled by a technocratic scientific mentality. This mentality regards its world as a philosophical world because it regards its truths as the truths about reality. But its technocrat rulers pay very little attention to the understanding of human relationships, in which lies the essence of politics.”

The various characters—the Chief, the Secretary, the General, the Poet, the Student Leader, and his Wife—are so naive that they destroy their kingdom.

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