Political Theatre

I felt compelled to act, to do something, to speak up—but how? What could I, an expatriate American living in Scandinavia, do to break the zone of silence surrounding Belarus? While I was enjoying certain freedoms as a theater artist in this affluent Nordic country, my friends and colleagues elsewhere in Europe—writers, directors, journalists, and more—were being imprisoned and threatened.

Association for Theatre in Higher Education pre-conference attendees made their way to Scottsdale, Arizona via bus, through a carefully planned route that covered important sites connected to SB 1070, labor history, and immigration. Through this tour, participants acquired a richer understanding of contemporary Arizona immigration policy and its implementation.

I had become exhausted from fighting the trafficking fights... The result has been policies that do more harm than good, and wide scale media misrepresentations of the problem. Those of us doing the actual on the ground fieldwork—talking to survivors, working with people who have experienced the harrowing challenges of exploitation—have been writing against the wave.

There is a prevailing sense that the millennial avant-garde is not creating political, activist theatre to the same extent as the avant-garde of the ’60s and ’70s. I don’t think this is true. But I do think that the challenge has changed.

In a volatile, war-torn place, things change quickly and recurring issues of conflict, occupation, and survival dominate—all the more reason to have festivals like this and theaters like Ashtar that persist under such circumstances and create transformative experiences.

These personal experiences of Belarus Free Theatre—what they have endured, and what they are willing to sacrifice for what they believe in—humbles me. I cannot imagine being arrested for doing theater, much less being physically threatened by my own government for a play I wrote or acted in or directed. Would I be able to be as brave as Khalezin and Koliada or the other members of their company?

In 2012, eleven young theater students succeeded in starting Ashtar’s first youth festival. Ashtar Theatre, which was founded in 1991 by Iman Aoun and Edward Muallem, describes itself as “a dynamic local Palestinian theatre with a truly progressive global perspective.” Their core programs are drama training of local youth through an extracurricular after school program, Theater of the Oppressed Forum Theatre productions that explore “essential critical topics in Palestinian society” and international collaborations.

Director Guillermo Aviles-Rodriguez discusses his thoughts about the identity affinity groups at the 2014 TCG Conference, questioning how safe is a segregated space?

Although written in the early 1600s in England and set in ancient Rome, Shakespeare's "Coriolanus" elucidates the difficulty of reintegration back into society for our veterans who've served multiple tours in heavy combat.

Jonathan Mandell offers his opinions on dviersity in theatre. 

Reading Henry VI, parts one, two and three, I was in awe. Aside from the usual chromosomal explosion that I always get from Shakespeare's verse, I was in awe because I realized that Margaret of Anjou was a berserker!

The only reason that I am alive, sober, and surviving is because I have community and the performing arts. The performing arts community offers the perfect setting to share my story without being judged or condemned. It has been the performing arts that has kept me from being yet another veteran statistic. By examining and acting Shakespeare through my veteran lens I was able to understand what happened to me.

The Unicorn Theatre in Kansas City, Missouri, prides itself on producing “bold new plays,” under artistic director Cynthia Levin. The 2013-2014 season has been somewhat of a “dream” season for the Unicorn staff—“full of the best contemporary theater in America,” said Levin. As the literary assistant and dramaturg, I have the joy and privilege of digging into the scripts selected for the season. Not only are the plays new plays, many that are fresh out of New York, and world premieres, but also several of them have something else in common: war. While war is not new, the new season of plays in Kansas eloquently captures our era of endless war both open and covert.

When I read the list of speakers on the mayor’s panel, it was made of six women, including five artists and one critic. In terms of racial diversity, only one was African-American and another was from Iran. The rest were white speakers. Where was the Latina? Dallas is an astounding 42 percent Latino and the mayor is going to “Re-Imagine Art in Dallas” without including anyone to speak on our behalf?

Patricia Davis writes about The Freedom Theatre in Palestine, focusing on its controversial work with youth and its history, which includes the assassination of their founder.

Not only is the portrayal of disability by a non-disabled actor equivalent to blackface—what we in the disability community derisively call “cripping up” (pretending to have a disability)—universally accepted as a technical skill tucked away in an actor’s bag of tricks, it is always applauded and more often than not, rewarded. 16 percent of Academy Award winners have received the coveted statue for playing a character with a disability; just two of those winners were disabled actors. If you think this phenomenon exists only in Hollywood, consider the 2013-14 New York theater season.

Alice Stanley Jr. discusses her experience at a workshop of Ariel Luckey's solo performance Amnesia, and the talkback which followed.

A dialogue between Paula Vogel and Blanka Zizka regarding their play Don Juan Come Home from Iraq. 

As a former fellow-traveler, albeit on a somewhat smaller scale than the summiteers, all of this got me thinking: For the twenty two years of Theater of the First Amendment’s producing life as the resident professional company of George Mason University, how did we do?