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Theatre
for Living Report November 5, 1998 Occupy the Space Big day. Good work. The participant with detention came back. He was trouble for most of the day -- just always goofing around with a friend. Finally, at lunch break I talked to them about respecting the group. They got very angry. They came back, though, and settled in -- and ended up doing very focused work, and talking at the end of the day about how great it was to be able to express their emotions and not get laughed at. The group really liked clap exchange, and wanted to keep doing it more and more. The sense, I think, of unity was very important to them. Almost a third of them wouldn't do the Intestine (trust game). This is an unusually high percentage -- perhaps a sign that we are moving very fast....... The emotional depth of the images increased today. Lots of despair and hopelessness. This led into a discussion of suicide, and how prevalent it is in youth culture. Also a lot of turning away in the images........people aware of injustices, but not wanting to get involved -- mostly because of fear of being targeted themselves. In the end, though, the group seemed to find the experience of sharing their images, and the depth of discussion that came from the images very empowering. When we finished the day there was a lightness in the room. A release of some kind. Perhaps coming out of a sense of solidarity. Many of them talked about how surprising it is to find that they have so much in common -- fears, desires. Tomorrow we will do Cops in the Head and also choose and rehearse images for the performance. November 6, 1998 Leader of the Orchestra So, this ended up being a great night. Lots of people came, and a great diversity of people, too. 142 is a big turnout for a community this size. Howard was amazed at the diversity. The local First Nations community came, the Indo-Canadian and Muslim communities came, lots of youth came. Great. The group loved the Fall this
afternoon and most did it. We made the transition from workshop
into theatre directing well. I chose four images from the Polaroids
I had taken throughout the workshop, and we set these as Two overtly racist images, a symbolic image of someone being beaten while others look on, and an image of brutality with guns and death, offered by the Indonesian participant, that also translated into a Canadian context for many in the workshop, particularly the First Nations participants. Three people offered stories for Cops in the Head and we did the exercise on one of the stories: a story of racism. I also asked the three story-tellers to prepare shapes of their cops. After the dinner break I looked at the Cops, wanting to make certain that there was no confusion in what we offered the audience. Angelo and Catherine and Janet came (from SUCCESS). It was great to see them, and wonderful that they were able to witness the results of the final workshop. People didn't really know that they had come to an interactive event, but participation was GREAT. When I started to activate the first Image, and asked people to come and stand with a character who they had been in their lives, about 30 people ran up onto the stage! It was like this all night. It was very surprising for all of us which story they picked: the scariest. A young woman is alone with her 'uncle'. A friend of the family who is in his 601s. They are saying good-bye. He moves to kiss her full on the lips, in a very un-uncle-like manner. She has conflicting voices inside her: 'Respect your elders', 'Don1t be a prude', 'its only a kiss -- no big deal', 'be provocative -- Just Do It', and others. Participation in the Cops exercise was very high. Now, I am a believer that an event like this 'meets' the community. Certainly tonight was very successful. It was also very cerebral. I am wondering why. We were on a stage, in a formalized setting. Merritt is not used to using this kind of language. Theatre here tends to be talk oriented........the most successful interventions were the ones (this was pointed out by audience members afterwards) that were really emotionally based. Heartfelt. None of them, though, were very physical. I had an interesting exploration
this evening. A young man came up to 'do battle' with the Cop
that said, 'be provocative'. Part of his response, finally, was
to walk off the stage and go back to his seat -- to his friends.
The Cop followed. So did I, with a mike on a long cord. We had
been working for almost two hours, and the audience was very
activated. I suggested to his friends (around him) that they
were now part of the scene. I asked them to freeze in the moment
when he came back, and asked them for sentences as characters.
This made them uncomfortable -- they hadn't come to me, I had
come to them, and they all mumbled things like "I don't
know what to say", "what's going on?" etc. I was
seeing something, though, so I asked the guy what had just happened.
I went back to my chair, he said....to where? I asked......to
my friends. I could see he understood. He had gone to The important thing for me here was following the instinct through. The first idea, asking the friends in the audience to speak, didn't work. That was OK. It was part of the pursuit of an idea that I couldn't yet articulate. It took the failure of the first idea to crystallize what I was seeing -- and then it became a valuable part of the discussion. I believe there was great learning
in the evening -- lots of laughter, lots of thought, reflection,
insights, applause.......in the final circle the participants
were stunned at the depth of involvement by their community -- A young girl from Kamloops came
to me after, and asked if there was some way to organize something
like this in Kamloops. She is going to talk with her drama teacher.
Also, Nico, the participant from Indonesia, is eager to stay I have hope that something will continue here in Merritt, somehow. Many of them are from the same school, and they have Howard, who teaches drama and has the power to follow-up. Time will tell. |