Recent Essays

Emily McConnell calls for a common language to categorize designers’ collaborative relationships with directors. To find that common ground, theatremakers will have to reject the notion that each production requires a unique approach to collaboration.

In 2021, Nigerian director Josephine Awele Odunze directed a powerful production of Wedlock of the Gods by Zulu Sofola. Odunze sits down with Eseovwe Emakunu to discuss the play’s connections to issues Nigerian women face today, as well as her hopes that theatre can contribute to attaining true gender parity in Nigeria.

Danielle Iwata sits down with Amy Zhang to discuss the creation and significance of her show Ascend!, which featured a cast and crew entirely made up of Asian women.

Theatre artist Elle Thoni shares their experience working on the outdoor theatre production of a futuristic musical, Queen B, and challenges institutional ideas on how and where theatre can take place.

Sebastiano Spinella explores the importance of street theatre and the modern significance it still holds.

Join us in welcoming back Ramona King, HowlRound’s new communications manager!

Gabriel Augusto Liparini Queiroz sits down with Adilson Siqueira, Aneliza Rodrigues Prado, and Patrick Veniali da Silva to discuss their work at the Laboratory of Ecopoetics (ECOLAB) at the Federal University of São João del-Rei. They share their research on the concept of the corpo quebrada—literally the “bent body”—which responds to ecological crisis by embodying resilience and flexibility.

Onisajé shares the creative process of Teatro Preto do Candomblé, which trains actors using the rituals and liturgy of Candomblé as a method of actor training. Through immersion in this African diasporic religion, Teatro Preto do Candomblé’s methods center reciprocal relationships with the environment and activate individuals’ connection to their Blackness.

In Martin Domecq’s contribution to the Climate Emergency series, he puts four Brazillian performance art pieces in conversation to draw upon the poetic, political, and civic lessons they offer. These performances—which range from installations to solo and group performances—model possible paradigms that work against ecological crisis.

Elizabeth Doud introduces the Climate Emergency series, which looks to Brazilian artivism for reparative paths forward in the face of climate change.