Applied Theatre and Biomedical Research: An embodied approach to Alzheimer’s disease symptoms in the rehearsal process

Gibson (2020) argued that because medicine frames bodies in a normal/abnormal dichotomy, stories told about people with dementia constructed using a biomedical framework can only tell of failure. Gibson termed this the ‘right kind’ of dementia story, where simple linear narratives obscure the complex realities of disease (p.39). Basting (2009) and Batch (2023) further evidence that biomedical research, as an authoritative dialogic framework, has further disabled people with dementia, by maintaining a medical model of disability. This thesis examines the extent to which biomedical research can shape practical workshop exercises that encourage actors to develop an embodied understanding of AD, rather than limiting this research to an authoritative didactic resource.
Centrally, this thesis asks to what extent a biomedical research-informed theatre director’s workshop guide can create an enhanced method of embodying AD symptoms within the rehearsal process. To achieve this, the thesis adopts a practice-led approach to research, to develop and refine exercises that have not previously been considered in the context of enhancing the actors’ process of embodying symptoms of AD. The results demonstrate that using biomedical research in more considered and nuanced ways can positively shape and enhance an actors’ empathetic understanding of illness by emphasising unique responses to dementia symptoms. Further, the work illustrates that biomedical research serves an important role in helping to determine the unique, embodied experiences AD. In so doing, it reveals the social, emotional and cognitive challenges that dementia presents, and how theatre can present AD as far more complex than mere tragedy.