We’ve only got a few days to go before the performance starts. We’ve sold out three times (we’ve released extra seats twice, and they’ve all gone within hours, but we can’t possibly squeeze any more people in). I thought I’d devote this post to talking about ’stakes’.
For those of you not in the know when it comes to theatrical jargon, ’stakes’ are what makes the audience care about what’s happening. They give the story energy and purpose. The higher the stakes, the better: the reason Doctor Who is always running is because the stakes are so high that someone (or maybe a whole planet!) will be destroyed if he does not. One particular example that springs to mind is in The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. Theoden and his men, joined by Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli, are defending Helm’s Deep against tens of thousands of orcs. Peter Jackson raises the stakes by making the odds of the ‘good guys’ winning extremely low. Theoden and Aragorn become the underdogs, and everyone wants like an underdog to win. But Jackson goes further than Tolkien does with the book: he adds several human elements to the story which make us want Theoden’s victory even more:
- The elves come to help in the fight at the last moment. With them comes Haldir – a friend of Aragorn’s – and we don’t want Aragorn to lose his friend because Aragorn’s lovely! When Haldir does die, Jackson raises the stakes for Aragorn.
- Jackson takes the heroes to their lowest ebb. Helm’s Deep is said to be impenetrable, but when the orcs do breach the wall, all havoc breaks loose as the Riders of Rohan are pushed back and back and back, until eventually there are only a dozen or so men in the last, smallest tower. They are surrounded by thousands of orcs. It seems as if all is lost. The odds have never been so low on our heroes winning.
- In a beautiful touch, Jackson shows us shots of the women and children of Rohan – those who are hiding in the mountains and who the men are trying to protect. This adds a real level of humanity to the battle: the audience can see a tangible reason why the good guys have to win. Moreover, those children really do look terrified to hear the battle above them. Anyone who has seen the ‘behind-the-scenes’ documentaries will understand me when I say that Jackson is a cruel man, but boy does he get results.
- Aragorn becomes the ‘centre-piece’ for this battle. It is all about him becoming a king, and proving that he should be a king. He rallies the troops; he fights alongside his men; it is Aragorn who convinces Theoden that all is not lost and reminds him of the people he is protecting. This is a crucial moment in Aragorn’s character journey, as he learns what a good leader he is, and how he should no longer shy away from the throne that he has shunned for decades.
All of these things engage an audience in the story: they keep us rooting for the characters and keep us on the edges of our seats. Of course, what we’re doing with Clockwork is hardly epic: there are no battle sequences, orcs or elves. However, the same rules apply. In our little sequence we are only fighting to save one life, but as with The Lord of the Rings, we are trying to bring that to its lowest possible point: we’ll let you put bets on whether our character will live, but for quite a lot of the film the odds are pretty low…
