Spectator as laboratory assistant: The work of the Scientific Research Laboratory affiliated with the Meyerhold Theatre

Abstract

The state of the spectator has been a significant point at issue in theatre studies. In The Emancipated Spectator, the French philosopher Jacques Ranci?re argues that we should stop describing it in terms of “passivity and activity,” and that there is no reason we have to privilege the active state. The controversy over the “passivity and activity” of the theatre spectator already existed in 1920s Russia, and it survives until today. To overcome the passive/active paradigm, we need to discard its premise —that the spectator is one who only watches a work of art created by the artist. The concept of “laboratory” enables us to consider another kind of spectator. In the 1930s, assistants in the Scientific Research Laboratory (SRL) affiliated with Meyerhold's Theatre researched the reaction of the spectator in each scene and made a “score of the spectator.” The laboratory assistant here exists outside the traditional relationship of work of art and spectator. He watches not only the stage, but also the structure of the relationship between the stage (the work of art) and the auditorium itself. What he watches is the whole situation. The work of art and the state of the auditorium both offer materials for laboratory research. By studying documents of the SRL, we can recognize an alternative possibility for the spectator: the spectator as a laboratory assistant who exists outside the work of art / spectator relationship. Such an approach opens up a new perspective for discussions of the politics of spectatorship.