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Intellect Books - Jan Selman , Tim Prentki

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168 pages

English

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The first comparative study on the history and practice of popular theatre in Britain and overseas. The fragmentation of social groups in the face of the global mass media has begun to threaten the survival of popular theatre companies. This study traces the development of various types of community theatre, from the '70s to the present day. Integrating a comparative history of popular theatre with the contributions of current, active popular theatre makers, this book will appeal both to the theatrical practitioner and to the academic.

Sujets

Political Science

Popular Culture

Theater

Performing Arts

Theatre

General officer

General

Cultural Studies

Electronic

Digital

Informations

Publié par	Intellect Books
Date de parution	01 janvier 2003
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781841508597
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0950€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

Popular Theatre in Political Culture
Britain and Canada in focus
Tim Prentki and Jan Selman
First Published in Paperback in 2003 in Great Britain by Intellect Books , PO Box 862, Bristol BS99 1DE, UK
First Published Paperback in 2003 in the USA in 2003 by Intellect Books , ISBS, 5804 N.E. Hassalo St, Portland, Oregon 97213-3644, USA
Published in Hardback in 2000 in Great Britain by Intellect Books, Bristol, UK
Published in Hardback in 2000 in the USA by Intellect Books, Portland, OR, USA
Copyright 2000 Intellect Ltd
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission. Consulting Editor: Masoud Yazdani Production Editor: Robin Beecroft Cover Illustration Julie Payne Copy Editor: Julie Strudwick
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Electronic ISBN 1-84150-859-4 / ISBN 1-84150-847-0
Printed and bound in Great Britain by Antony Rowe, Eastbourne
Contents
P reface
The Lawnmower
1 Defining Popular Theatre
What is It?
Where has it Come From?
The South will Rise Again
Defining the Territory
A Conversation with Two Practitioners - Darrel Wildcat and Jane Heather
Ways of Looking at Popular Theatre
Risking Friendship in a Play about Land Mines
Julie Salverson
2 Intentions
Agents of Change
Schools of Thought about Community Work
Methodologies and Involvement Strategies
Some Thoughts about Techniques
Popular Theatre, Cultural Awareness and Solidarity: Canada to Nicaragua
Joe Cloutier and Alexina Dalgetty
The Interplay of Intention and Popular Theatre Choices
3 Contexts
The Development of Popular Theatre in Britain
We Are One Tribe
Bridget Escolme
The Development of Popular Theatre in Canada
From Theatre to Community
Kadi Purru
4 Forms of Theatre
What Theatre Can Do (and What it Can t)
The Psyche Project
Don Bouzek
Presentational Theatre
Participatory Theatre
In a Fix
Iain Smith and Gillian Twaite
Participatory Process
The Practice of Justice
Lisa Sokil
5 Popular Theatre Process
Producing the Process: Processing the Product
The Creators
Becoming One With the Mud
Deborah Hurford
Transformative Fictions
The Nature of Popular Theatre Process
Participation
Theatre for Living
David Diamond
Tightropes of Facilitation
Shrinkwrapped
Mary Swan
Inventing a Process
Questioning some Assumptions about Process
Negotiating Critical Awareness & Ownership
Sheila Preston
Community In(ter)vention
Women s Theatre and Creativity Centre
Chantal Wagschal and Tessa Mendel
Owning (Up To) the Process
Popular Theatre Process is not a Technique
6 Dialogue on Issues
Funding
Impact Assessment
Networking/Partnerships
Bibliography
Endnotes
Preface
My journey into popular theatre has been a search to rediscover a potential for social transformation that has been inherent in the form since the dawn of performance. This search has been goaded by an increasing sense that the formal performance of theatre in purpose-built spaces, viewed by passive audiences and consumed by them as a commodified leisure activity will never engage the art form on the level of social transformation. Had I been deceiving myself about the potential of theatre? Was I caught up in some mythical notion of what theatre had once meant to certain people in certain places? Maybe. Perhaps I still am. Nevertheless I cannot let go of the idea that theatre as the most human of art forms, starting as it does with the body of the actor, offers a space in which life can be tried out, rehearsed, without the damaging consequences that such experiments might have if tried for real . Theatre affords the opportunity to try out the ideal and to explore what might be necessary in order to achieve it in the world of material reality. Often, in trying out an alternative, a process of change, within the constructed rules of the theatrical fiction, the individual or the group finds the strength and confidence subsequently to have a go at change. This connects popular theatre to the essence of all human activity: its susceptibility to change. Those forces dedicated to the maintenance of the status quo , and most European and North American theatre of the last five hundred years falls into this category, are lined up against the poor, the dispossessed and the victims of capitalism across the globe. Popular theatre, by contrast, is about ways of employing the force of art in the service of change, about ways of putting the levers of change in the hands of those who would otherwise be its victims. Popular theatre, and theatre for development in particular, has restored my faith in theatre to be a force for social transformation.
- Tim Prentki
I found popular theatre by chance, really. Involvement in this field has challenged me, has moved me politically: it has taught me and demanded that I think more clearly about how people change, about the inequalities in the world and how they are perpetuated, about how societies do and don t change, and why. The discovery of popular theatre has demanded that I look at why I make theatre, how I make it, and with whom. Key moments in that journey:
Standing ovations, offered not because of the beauty of the poetry or the fine artistry of the performances, but because of the direct connection between the content and the audience when a piece is made out of direct research and involvement with the particular audience for whom it is going to be performed. We love hearing and seeing our own stories on stage; our lives are validated when people like ourselves are performed on stage.
Witnessing a moment when the ENTIRE audience knew the performer, a member of their community, and knew the courage it was taking for her to stand before them and perform a story that was no one s and everyone s, to perform a story that was usually silenced, usually hidden, usually ignored, but that was true. That everyone in that moment acknowledged was, though fictional, true.
Working in partnership with women to create the theatrical situation which embodied the immediate dilemma in their lives. Working in partnership with them to play and replay options for action within that stultifying life circumstance. Trying many impossible behaviours . Witnessing many failed attempts . Learning that the attempts revealed . That seemingly impossible situation reformed and revisited, revealed and altered.
Experiencing myself and others dare to tell stories usually hidden, dare to face one another, via theatrical expression, via the power, the danger and the safety of theatrical process, about our differences, our unequal opportunities, our unequal privilege. And to stay in the room together, via the theatre image, and tell the truth, listen and hear each other as we hadn t before.
- Jan Selman
As co-authors of this book, we have attempted to combine our understandings of what constitutes popular theatre in the countries where we live, Britain and Canada, with examples of popular theatre practice written by others who are directly involved in it. We asked our contributors to write in their own voices, in the hea(r)t of the creative process. We seek to communicate the variety, richness and excitement of popular theatre in a wide range of contexts. These contributions are inserted into the more measured discourse of the co-authors as unmediated interventions, as rocks breaking the smooth surface of argument. This book settles nothing and proves nothing; instead it offers provocations to practitioners, students and academics.
The book is intended for anyone with an interest in changing the world, in changing their world. Among those will be theatre workers of all kinds, people engaged in community education and development, and academics and students from a wide variety of disciplines such as performing arts, sociology, anthropology, education, environmental sciences, geography, probably all aspects of knowledge that lodge within the humanities and social sciences.
The Lawnmowers
Geraldine Ling
Founded in 1986, they have established a unique reputation for high quality productions which address issues of concern to people with learning disabilities . . . Forming and running the company has been a fundamentally empowering process for the members . . . The Lawnmowers experience provides a benchmark of empowerment, but the time and commitment such achievements demand should not be underestimated.
Francois Matarasso:
Use or Ornament? - The Social Impact of Participation in the Arts
The Lawnmowers are Sharon Harrison, Nick Heron, June Keenleyside, Paul King and Andy Stafford. They are five adults with learning disabilities from Gateshead who create theatre relevant to their lives and the lives of their peers, touring day centres, community centres and theatres. They run workshops and drama clubs and have recently branched out into nightclubs. They are well respected by the Disability Arts Movement within which they firmly place themselves. They have proved themselves many times to be both nationally important and internationally significant.
As a drama/theatre practitioner of more than twenty-five years and worker with Lawnmowers since 1986, there have been many opportunities to witness the power of theatre as a tool for cultural intervention. Research shows us that developing theatre skills leads to increased confidence and greater ease in coping with complex social structures. For people with learning disabilities in a society where their culture is often marginalised, participatory theatre offers a model where space is created for Learning Disabled culture to be honoured, exchanged and developed.
What have been the lasting benefits for Lawnmowers themselves? One of the group passing the driving test; one becoming an independent traveller; one feeling able to sp