{"id":2314,"date":"2017-02-02T19:10:29","date_gmt":"2017-02-02T19:10:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/?p=2314"},"modified":"2018-08-30T20:22:35","modified_gmt":"2018-08-30T20:22:35","slug":"theatre-in-film-synecdoche-new-york-2008","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/theatre-in-film-synecdoche-new-york-2008\/","title":{"rendered":"Theatre in Film: Synecdoche, New York (2008)"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"fusion-one-full fusion-layout-column fusion-column-last fusion-spacing-yes section-header-post\" style=\"margin-top:;margin-bottom:;\"><div class=\"fusion-column-wrapper\"><h3>Theatre in Film: <i>Synecdoche, New York<\/i> (2008)<\/h3>\n<font size=\"2\" color=\"grey\"><span style=\"border:1px solid ;-webkit-border-radius:50%;-moz-border-radius:50%;border-radius:50%;-moz-box-shadow: 0 0 3px rgba(0,0,0,.3);-webkit-box-shadow: 0 0 3px rgba(0,0,0,.3);box-shadow: 0 0 3px rgba(0,0,0,.3);margin-right:25px;float:left;\" class=\"fusion-imageframe imageframe-glow imageframe-1 hover-type-none author-image\"><a class=\"fusion-no-lightbox\" href=\"http:\/\/performerstuff.com\" target=\"_self\"> <img src=\"http:\/\/mgs.performerstuff.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/authorimage.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"img-responsive\" style=\"-webkit-border-radius:50%;-moz-border-radius:50%;border-radius:50%;\"\/><\/a><\/span><p>Written by Ashleigh Gardner<\/p>\n<p>January 29, 2017<\/p>\n<\/font><div class=\"fusion-clearfix\"><\/div><\/div><\/div><div class=\"fusion-clearfix\"><\/div><div class=\"fusion-one-full fusion-layout-column fusion-column-last fusion-spacing-yes section-body-post\" style=\"margin-top:;margin-bottom:;\"><div class=\"fusion-column-wrapper\"><p style=\"text-align: left;\">Welcome to Part VII of Theatre in Film, our weekly feature on a film that depicts a life in the theatre. In Part VII, we examine films with biting humor, fantastical plots, and theatre family values.\u00a0This week, we celebrate the 2008 absurdist drama,\u00a0<em>Synecdoche, New York\u00a0<\/em>starring Philip Seymour Hoffman.<\/p>\n<h4 style=\"text-align: left;\"><i>Synecdoche, New York<\/i> (2008)<\/h4>\n<br><div align=\"center\"><div class=\"fusion-video fusion-youtube\" style=\"max-width:600px;max-height:350px;\"><div class=\"video-shortcode\"><iframe title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fvr2wDrLRfs?wmode=transparent&autoplay=0\" width=\"600\" height=\"350\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div><\/div><\/div><br><p style=\"text-align: left;\"><b>Director: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Charlie Kaufman<br \/>\n<\/span><b>Starring: <\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Philip Seymour Hoffman, Samantha Morton, Michelle Williams, Catherine Keener, Emily Watson, Dianne Wiest, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Hope Davis, and Tom Noonan<\/span><\/p>\n<h4 style=\"text-align: left;\">What happens:<\/h4>\n<br><p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Caden Cotard (Philip Seymour Hoffman) finds his life falling apart after his wife Adele (Catherine Keener) leaves him and takes their daughter with her. His discontent with life\u00a0is further fueled by an increasing number of physical ailments that appear day after day. After a successful run of his direction of Arthur Miller\u2019s <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Death of a Salesman<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, Cotard obtains a MacArthur Fellowship which allows him to pursue his artistic interests &#8212; a production of brutal realism and an honest portrayal of life set in a warehouse where the set is a full-size mock-up of New York City. Over the period of the production, he has an affair with the woman who works in the box office, marries an actress and has a child with her, and finds out that Adele has become a celebrated painter (all while his daughter, Olive, is being taught by a questionable friend of Adele\u2019s). <\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The years pass, and Cotard\u2019s production is nowhere near completion. The warehouse he\u2019s occupying is deteriorating and so is his health. Through a series of relationship failures, Cotard stumbles and falls into a routine of sabotaging his own life and rapidly destroying others\u2019. In a freak accident, the warehouse\u2019s city-set catches fire, and in its wake it leaves a trail of bodies and ashes. As the film ends, Cotard hears the voice of the woman who has taken over direction\u00a0\u00a0for the production. It gives him a way to move forward with his project\u00a0&#8212; the voice says, \u201cDie.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<h4 style=\"text-align: left;\">Why it matters:<\/h4>\n<br><p style=\"text-align: left;\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Synecdoche, New York <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">tackles a few issues of life and theatre, but most importantly, it addresses the psychological effects of getting too lost in a role.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Over the first ten minutes of the film, the audience is introduced to Cotard\u2019s neurosis. He lives out almost 2 months in a single breakfast scene. The dates pass from September 22nd to November 2nd, and all of these dates occur in the same scene, not a montage of breakfasts. After Adele, his wife, leaves and he begins an affair with Hazel, he mentions how long his wife has been gone &#8212; \u201ca week\u201d &#8212; Hazel corrects him and says it\u2019s actually been a year. Later, when he\u2019s seen living with Claire (Michelle Williams), he sees a photo of his daughter, Olive, in a magazine with tattoos on her body, he runs out of the house&#8230;and we see a five year old girl behind him &#8212; his new daughter, Ariel. Then his father dies. In his work at the industrial theatre space (the production the MacArthur Fellowship is funding), he battles with actors and designers over how long it\u2019ll take to complete the project. His crew asks, \u201cWhen are we gonna have an audience? It\u2019s been 17 years.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Eventually, the lines between reality and theatre begin to blur like Cotard\u2019s concept of time. Cotard\u2019s set in the industrial theatre is an exact mock-up of New York, complete with police, a blimp, and livable apartment buildings. The actors, playing themselves, are caught in a never ending loop of playing characters who are <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">themselves, <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and Cotard casts other people to play the people from his life. The man Cotard chooses to play him ends up delving so far into Cotard\u2019s psyche that he begins a life-like relationship with Claire, and Claire treats him as she would the real Cotard.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As the audience, we see Cotard age and break down in front of us, but he perceives the events in his life as taking place either simultaneously or one right after the other. The events in the theatre space also show us that he\u2019s too invested in his art to notice the difference between art and reality. And <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">that <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">is where we, the audience, must focus our attentions. There are times when our roles require such dedication and perseverance that we get lost in the part. We begin acting like our characters and adopt their personality traits and quirks, but sometimes that\u2019s dangerous, especially when our relationships are affected. When the lines between reality and time are blurred without a stable connection to the \u201creal\u201d, we lose ourselves, and essentially, we lose control of our characters.<\/span><\/p>\n<br><p style=\"text-align: left;\">This film is the first film in\u00a0Part VII. See below for the films\u00a0in Part VII.<\/p>\n<ul style=\"text-align: left;\">\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/theatre-in-film-hamlet-2-2008\/\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><em>Hamlet 2\u00a0<\/em>(2008)<\/span><\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/theatre-in-film-the-imaginarium-of-doctor-parnassus-2009\/\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><em>The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus<\/em>\u00a0(2009)<\/span><\/a><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><em>Don&#8217;t Think Twice\u00a0<\/em>(2016)<\/span><\/li>\n<li><em>Phoebe in Wonderland\u00a0<\/em>(2009)\u00a0(Coming soon.)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">Want to start with\u00a0<strong>Part I<\/strong>? Begin with\u00a0<strong><em><a href=\"http:\/\/mgs.performerstuff.com\/?p=133\">42nd Street\u00a0<\/a><\/em>(1933)<\/strong>.<br \/>\nMiss\u00a0<strong>Part II<\/strong>?\u00a0Check out\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/theatre-in-film-series-the-band-wagon-1953\/\"><strong><em>The Band Wagon<\/em><\/strong>\u00a0<strong>(1953)<\/strong><\/a><\/span>.<br \/>\nNeed a refresh for\u00a0<strong>Part III<\/strong>? Start with\u00a0our feature on\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><strong><em><a href=\"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/theatre-in-film-series-all-that-jazz-1979\/\">All That Jazz\u00a0<\/a><\/em><\/strong><strong>(1979)<\/strong><\/span>.<br \/>\nHow about a recap from\u00a0<strong>Part IV<\/strong>? Jump into\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/theatre-in-film-a-chorus-of-disapproval-1989\/\"><strong><em>A Chorus of Disapproval\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/a><strong>(1989)<\/strong><\/span>.<br \/>\nCheck out\u00a0<strong>Part V<\/strong><em>,\u00a0<\/em>and start with\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/theatre-in-film-an-awfully-big-adventure-1995\/\"><em><strong>An Awfully Big Adventure\u00a0<\/strong><\/em><strong>(1995)<\/strong><\/a><\/span>.<br \/>\nStart reading <strong>Part VI<\/strong> with\u00a0<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><em><strong><a href=\"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/theatre-in-film-camp-2003\/\">Camp\u00a0<\/a><\/strong><\/em><strong>(2003)<\/strong><\/span>.<\/p>\n<div class=\"fusion-clearfix\"><\/div><\/div><\/div><div class=\"fusion-clearfix\"><\/div><hr \/>\n<h5 style=\"text-align: left;\"><em><strong>Ashleigh Gardner<\/strong>\u00a0received her AA in Theatre\/Drama\/Dramatic Arts\u00a0from Valencia College and\u00a0her Bachelors Degree in English Literature and\u00a0Masters Degree in Literary, Cultural, and Textual Studies from\u00a0the University of Central Florida. She is a playwright, an actor, and PerformerStuff.com\u2019s Editor.\u00a0<\/em><\/h5>\n<h5 style=\"text-align: left;\">Thumbnail image from\u00a0<em>Synecdoche, New York.\u00a0<\/em>Copyright Sony Pictures Classics, 2008.<\/h5>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [...]","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2355,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[259,265],"tags":[6,160,308,128,105],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2314"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2314"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2314\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2355"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2314"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2314"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/performerstuff.com\/mgs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2314"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}