Michael Rasbury- Sound Design Portfolio, Rhinoceros

Rhinoceros
by Eugene Ionesco

Berenger and Daisy from Rhinoceros
photo by Michael Bailey

ROLE
COMPANY
THEATRE
CITY
DIRECTOR
ATTENDANCE
PERFORMANCES

SOUND DESIGNER
DEPARTMENT OF DRAMA
THE HELMS THEATRE
CHARLOTTESVILLE, VIRGINIA
MARIANNE KUBIK
1228
8

Overview

“Your irony doesn’t affect me.” -Botard in Ionesco’s Rhinoceros

Written in 1959, Rhinoceros is widely recognized as a leading work of the absurdist theater movement. The play was probably inspired by Ionesco’s examination of the idea of collective conscious and why individuals so easily fall in line with the rise of movements like Nazism and Fascism. In Rhinoceros a small village’s citizens begin transforming into rhinoceroses.

The play is an edgy and humorous satire where one man attempts to resist conformity in order to retain his individuality and integrity. While we all want to retain our individuality at certain points, we each fall “prey” to some degree to a collective. We have all joined “rhino cliques” and enrolled in philosophies that are easier, but not necessarily in alignment with our individualism.

Director Marianne Kubik explained to our design team that she was drawn to the play’s examination of why humans follow a collective consciousness and easily accept certain ideas proposed to them. Her opinion was that to Ionesco, the rhinoceroses were fascists, but for our production we would set out to make them more universal as to not function as a political statement. I totally agreed with this. What one person or group considers good; another may consider not so. It was not our job to tell the audience to join or not join the Rhinoceroses. Even protagonist in the play alludes to the relativity of things by saying, “Solitude seems to oppress me. And so does the company of other people.” There is a nihilist sort of balance in this statement. And yet there is a subtle irony when the play’s protagonist transforms himself from an apathetic addict of sorts into a savior of himself and mankind leading one to possibly theorize he may have inadvertently started a new collective consciousness for others to subscribe to.

Kubik described the play as being filled with deep philosophical ideas incased in a quirky, comedic, and ideological world. This framework would allow designers and performers to distance ourselves a bit from the characters in an almost Brechtian way. She invited us designers to better define the rhinoceroses. Are they actually rhinoceroses? Do they actually look like rhinoceroses? To me, Ionesco’s stage directions suggest there are real rhinoceros stampedes in the beginning of the play that later become more stylized and anti-realistic. My thought would be that at the beginning of our production, I would present realistic sounding rhinoceros moments and as the play progresses, it will become apparent these sounds are being repeated and layered. This will transform the presence of the rhinos into something more symbolic than realistic.

In her challenge to our design team to define the “world” of this production she reminded us that although the characters may seem to be living in a mundane and repetitive world, it is not necessarily a sterile one. Ionesco adds a nearly perfect amount of repetition in the text to give the audience ample moments to “remove” themselves from the action and consider some of the larger ideas being introduced to them. While initially reading the play, I found myself asking “why am I stuck on this particular idea just presented to me?”

As the play progresses through time, Ionesco asks that more and more humans begin to join the rhinoceros clan and we feel an ever-growing presence of this growing group. Actors begin to appear in the windows of scenery and elsewhere as rhinos. Our properties designer invented masks that were a mixture of realistic looking rhino heads and cartoonish ones with a smiling and maniacal grimace. This became a strong visual element for the “world” of the production as we all have an attitude toward a grimace; some see it as a smile while others see it as more sinister.

I did not want all of the sound for this production to come from above the audience and from the stage and became interested in adding speakers around the audience and underneath the stage. It was important for me to make the sounds of the rhinoceroses come from everywhere by the end of the play. The sound design included a ten-channel playback system. There was a pair of speakers above the audience as main speakers, a pair behind the audience in the air, a pair behind the audience on the ground, a pair behind the set including a third center speaker, a single speaker in the “trap room” under the stage, a subwoofer under the audience seating, and a subwoofer behind the set in the center. The subwoofers were key for recreating the rumble of stampede effects. In our final production, the first few rhinoceros effects sound like real animals but as time proceeds these sounds become more repetitive and layered.

The examples below showcase the quality of these sounds, but it is impossible to recreate the hundreds of sounds that were layered and coming from all directions in the theatre. Learn more about our production by viewing the program and director's notes.

Example Paperwork


Sound Cue List	Sound System Signal Flow

Sounds

EXAMPLE 1	FIRST OVERTURE WITH ABRUPT ENDING/BELLS

This is an example of the style of music used to “bookend” scenes. The music was abruptly ended with a loud, sharp sound as the lights popped up on the scene. Church bells then sound as we meeting as a Parisian, outdoor café in the 1930’s is revealed.
EXAMPLE 2	FIRST RHINOCEROS PASS	(gears show elements)

While conversing at the café, an unkempt Berenger and fastidiously dressed Jean begin to hear a distant noise of an animal trumpeting. As the animal gets closer it becomes so loud that they must shout to be heard over the noise.
EXAMPLE 3	RHINOCEROS RUNS THROUGH OVER CAT

The rhinoceros appears again but this time tramples a housewife’s cat.
EXAMPLE 4	RHINO DESTROYS STAIRS WITH LOVE CALLS

Mrs. Boeuf is chased to Berenger’s place by a rhinoceros and explains to him that it is downstairs trying to come up the stairs. We hear the staircase crash under the weight of the rhino. The beast is actually Mrs. Boeuf’s husband who has already changed into a rhino. We hear him making longing, tender calls to his wife in an attempt to communicate.
EXAMPLE 5	FIRETRUCK ARRIVES

Firemen arrive to rescue Berenger and company from the second story since the stairs are destroyed.
EXAMPLE 6	FIRST HALF END

Leading into our intermission before Act 2 Scene 1, we hear this whimsical accordion music with the same abrupt ending sound.
EXAMPLE 7	RHINO DESTROYS BATHROOM/SCENE CHANGE

Jean, one of the most rational characters in the play, transforms into a rhinoceros in the bathroom. He destroys the bathroom. A second rhino sound is played behind the audience shortly after this. We then hear more accordion music to transition us into Act 3 Scene 1.
EXAMPLE 8	RHINO MAKES PHONE CALL

When the phone is answered, there is a rhino on the line trying to communicate.
EXAMPLE 9	RHINOS SING AND MARCH

As the play proceeds, the group of rhinos becomes bigger and more organized and is heard marching and “singing.”
EXAMPLE 10	RHINOS TAKE OVER

By the end of Rhinoceros, Berenger is the last human who hasn’t transformed and shouts “I will not capitulate!” as he is surrounded by the rhinos.

Production Photos
by Michael Bailey


Berenger admires the more cultured Jean	Jean calms Berenger’s fears with logic	The villagers consider the emergence of the Rhinoceros	Berenger and his co-workers spot the Rhinoceros in the building	Making plans to escape the office

Berenger ignores Jean’s emerging horn	Townspeople turn into rhinos	Dudard visits Berenger’s apartment	Dudard, Daisy and Berenger discover rhinos at the window	Berenger: I will not capitulate!