pting the unusually high demands placed on the physical abilities of the performers leads to anexamination of the training and experience that prepares an artist for this work. The backgroundrequired includes not only the ability to execute the work. The success of the play has relied on theindividual performers abilities to contribute to the creation of the physical shape of the play. The art accomplished in this production draws on a broad spectrum of what is frequentlyreferred to under the vague heading of movement in the theatre industry. It is commonly acceptedthat stage performers who endeavor to train in stagecraft will include movement in their studies. Therealm of choices available to those who seek instruction is broad and varied. Ballet has long beenused as a basis for the performers study of their own body and its mechanics. The disciplinerequired by this form of dance is ideal in helping artists to begin to manipulate their bodies as tools. Alexander work is a frequent inclusion of stage training for the actor, dancer and singer. Theprinciples of its work encourage the practitioner to address and effect change in patterns of physicalstress. Here, a further understanding of the bodys own mechanics are deepened. For the work accomplished in the creation and presentation of Theatre de Complicitesproduction of Street of Crocodiles the mastery of physical performance goes much deeper. The workof Jacques Lecoq is an ideal basis for a study of much of the physical work that goes into theinvention and fulfillment of this manner of exhibition. In the article Mime in the Twentieth Century:to 1950 appearing in Mimes on Miming , the editor, Bra Rolfe refers to Lecoq as the fourth of theFrench four stemming from Coupeaus work. The full compliment of artist contained in thisdescription are Decroux, Barrault, Marceau, and Lecoq. He discovered his interest and aptitude formime by way of his participation in athl...
