Body Moving

We stretch and limber up with movement director Delphine Gaborit.

Delphine Gaborit has an energy that draws you in. Wherever she is, you get the impression that’s where the fun is going to be; that’s where something interesting is going to happen.As a movement director, she brings this electric energy to every film set or theatre production she works on, where she helps actors and performers access places they didn’t know they could physically go.

Over the last ten years, Delphine has worked on some of the most prominent theatre productions in London, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night, Harry Potter and more recently, Seven Methods of Killing Kylie Jenner. But what does a movement director do? How do they work with actors to get the most out of their physicality, and what can we learn from Delphine about inhabiting our own bodies in a more honest and pleasurable way after we’ve all lived through such a stagnant and stressful period?

We spoke to Delphine about all of this and explored how she embraces sensuality in her own body as a dancer and a mother.

In very broad terms, what does a movement director do?

Actors have lots of different ways that they create the contract of make-believe between them and the audience. To me, movement is one of those central hooks. So I’m there to support the actors and help them create that contract of make-believe.

I work in different ways, depending on whether it’s a film, visual arts, or theatre. If it’s a theatre production, I help actors develop their characters from a physical angle. I help them map out the character’s physical journey throughout the play. We work on devising a specific characterisation and how/if that physicality changes as the narrative progresses. This physical journey helps them to keep a clear line between who they are and who the character is.

How do you work with actors to help them do this?

For actors, their bodies are a tool, so first, we need to warm that tool up. I allow them to come into the studio in the morning and forget about what might be happening outside or what is about to happen. I just want them to land in their bodies first as themselves first and foremost.

Actors are very smart, creative people. I’m not there to tell them what to do, so once we’ve warmed up their body, it’s more about a conversation. A conversation about who these characters are, how they begin the play physically, where we need to take them, and the significant physical changes throughout the play? What is that emotional arch, and how does it manifest physically?

A production like Seven Methods of Killing Kylie Jenner veers between a real-life and virtual timeline in a very simple stage set-up. The main character, Cleo, posts a series of frustrated tweets questioning how rich born Kylie Jenner can be “self-made”. The tweets gain traction and attract racist, angry responses. 

The action happens in one bedroom, but the play relies heavily on the actors’ physicality as they move in and out of the different online characters. How did you approach the movement direction for this?

With this play, we ask young female actresses of colour to inhabit extremely racist characters on stage. Movement becomes very important so that they can physically distance themselves from these characters they’re inhabiting.

To do this, we work on the origin of these different people, their age, their accents, where they’re from, where they hold the energy in their body, and we allow the actors to inhabit the characters without the lines being blurred. By setting very clear physical markers, the actors can switch from one character to another, knowing absolutely everything about them. This clarity is there to protect the actors, to ensure they can do their job well.

I always want to give credit to actors in the room, I’m not a step maker, and I don't want these movements to be set in stone every night. I want them to go on stage and adapt their performance to how they’re feeling.

What do you mean when you talk about protecting the actor?

As part of their process, actors often tap into their own emotional experiences and feelings when they’re working out how to approach a specific scene or character.

In recent years, it’s been acknowledged that this work can be triggering and simply too overwhelming for some actors. In this instance, it's extremely important to have a movement director/intimacy coordinator to help work with the text. We want to make sure we acknowledge what the scene is bringing up for the actor personally and then find tools for them to access these emotions without being overwhelmed or traumatised. 

To protect actors in these circumstances, we go back to those hooks I mentioned. Instead of delving too much into their personal experiences, they’re digging into the characters we have created; they’re using the spaces and sets, the costume, the physicality, the lines they’re saying. This is the real craft of acting.  

Without this framework, it can be extremely exhausting and potentially damaging for their mental health for an actor to be constantly mining their own emotions and experiences.  

This relates to protecting actors emotionally, but there must be a lot of work that protects them physically as well?

Yes, I’ve done work where we’re completely transforming people physically. With The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time, I did a lot of circuit training and helped them understand their muscle structure which meant they could use their bodies more efficiently. We worked on muscle memory, repeating the same movements repeatedly, so it became second nature, and they built up a solid core strength.

I also want the actors I work with to understand where they hold tension in their bodies and how they can undo their own habitual ways of moving to free themselves. I do a lot of what I call “oiling”. I go down into the structural level of the body, through the skeleton really precisely, and together we pay attention to the different connections, and I oil them – move them, warm them up, flex them.

So that when you’ve gone through your whole body and worked on each connection, and you’re down to level zero, then we build back up with the physicality of the characters and put in place how they would move their ankle, their knee, their hips etc.

How do you approach building intimacy between two characters?

This can be different depending on the story and the relationship between the characters.

In the past, when I’ve worked on developing intimacy within a female friendship, we will write a physical lexicon of female friendship. We’ll have the two actors explore the physical movements involved in friendship, how does that look, how does that feel, how do friends interact with each other, are the leaning, are they touching, are they moving hair out of each other’s faces, or laughing? How are they laughing? We include it all, and that’s our physical language. It’s fascinating because everyone’s ideas around friendship or love are different, so it is totally unique every time.

How do you work with people who potentially take more time to connect to?

I find the people we class as “introverted” or “quiet” very powerful. I'm so drawn by young actors who feel vulnerable; there’s something so honest about who they are. The work I do with a more introverted actor is just to take my time, say, “it’s okay to be this way; through this shyness, you will find incredible strength of character.”

An introverted person has such a beautiful way of expressing emotions, and I don’t want to fuck with that. Power doesn’t have to look muscular and tall. Quiet power is so beautiful.

What are the biggest problems you come up against when you’re trying to get people to move?

I don't like to settle for something. I think excellent movers keep searching.

It's like a downward dog pose in yoga. This isn’t just one static position that you master, and then you’re done. It's a constant opening into the pelvis, a continuous reaching down of the heel. It’s a constant renegotiation with your body on how it will move into that position day in, day out.

I think everyone's ultimately everyone's a brilliant mover. I want to do away with the canon of what good movement is supposed to look like because I think that’s where the problem lies. When you worry about what it looks like, rather than what it feels like, it causes a disconnect.

We’ve been through had a long period where our bodies have been under threat from a virus. We’ve been very physically stagnant, living on screens etc. How can we bring more sensation and physicality back into our lives?

I think it’s very personal to each person, but I feel that reconnecting to our bodies is going to be crucial. Movement can be an incredibly powerful therapy. Just to breathe and expand and move our bodies can be very transformative.

I don’t want to be prescriptive because it’s very personal but if you're feeling disconnected, do whatever makes you feel good and really indulge in that activity, really allow yourself to experience pleasure through it, whether that’s walking, running, breathing, dancing, having sex, stretching – whatever it is. Allow yourself to have fun, permit yourself to have fun, and it becomes self-perpetuating; you start to feel better the more you do it.

As we become more aware and respectful of our bodies, it can open us up to appreciating a sensuality within, not in a sexual way but something personal and pleasurable. Can you talk about this a little?

Our bodies are right here, but it's so easy to bypass it. Accepting and caring for our bodies and respecting them can lead us to have a very different relationship with this body that has supported us in the world.

It’s to do with being grateful for our bodies without judging them through the lens of Instagram. Can you look at yourself and appreciate what you see?

It’s about really simple things. For example, appreciating how your body feels in a cotton t-shirt. Notice the soft material rubbing on your spine and raising the hairs on your arms, the sensation of your jeans on your thighs. Enjoy how a pair of heavy shoes make you walk with purpose.

I think a lot of it is tuning into how your body feels, allowing yourself to enjoy the experience of being in your body and trying not to judge how it looks based on outside expectations of beauty.

Do you think some of this acceptance and embracing sensuality comes with age and accepting your body?

When you're less sexualised by the male gaze, you have more confidence in yourself. You’re able to tap into what you find pleasurable more–what you do and don’t like, rather than it being about what your body can do for someone else – how they’re going to enjoy it.

Ageing doesn’t need to look a specific way. I was really happy to turn 40 for many reasons. My body wasn’t going to create any more children. I was about to live my life as a more complex human being who is a mover and a mother and everything else in between. I suddenly became a lot more comfortable with who I was. I’m more grateful. It’s a very empowering place to be for a woman.

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