Skip to main content

Takalay Hamill - What a Riot Response

In 2005, Mary Shutzman was invited by the CalArts arts partnership to direct and write a play for the Plaza de la Raza theater program called UPSET! This play was created in collaboration with somewhere between 13-17 Latino students who wrote down a list of historical figures they'd like to know more about. "After several pedagogical sessions...the students voted on Rodney King and Claudette Colvin." The play was modeled after Augusto Boal's style of theater called The Joker System. This particular style of social theater is interesting to me because it elicits a real-time discussion with the audience. The Joker and the Chorus are meant to raise questions and discover new sides of a story that were never thought of before. "There's always a big chorus (sometimes two) that sings, dances, complains, rallies, and talks directly to the audience." The Boal style of theater is also very intriguing in that, it challenges people's set opinion about an event/issue through a container of personal interaction. The audience also feels the need to speak their mind when something such as The Joker (middle man) is a catalyst for a directional shift in the theme of a historically charged issue.

Some things I would as Mary Shutzman:
- In what ways can the aspects of The Joker System and Invisible Theater be combined, if at all?
- What was the audience reaction to UPSET!? Were there any particular moments within the show where it got heated or unpredictable?
- In what ways could we begin to perform Augusto Boal's different styles of theater? (what would be a book you could recommend?)
 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

HIP HOP AND THE PRISON SYSTEM

“With five percent of the world's population, the US incarcerates 25 percent of the world's prisoners” (Daisy Hudson, Noisey Magazine. 2014). That same year “African Americans constituted 2.3 million, or 34%, of the total 6.8 million correctional population, though African Americans and Hispanics make up approximately 32% of the US population, they comprised 56% of all incarcerated people in 2015 (NAACP). The prison system in America serves not as a correctional facility, but a container for which black bodies are buried alive. The conditions of which inmates are kept, the disparity in numbers and portrayal of those incarcerated. There is no question that factors such as education, employment, mental and physical health; the lack of access to such resources targets and propels African Americans through the pipeline to prison. In our history, it seems that prison, or largely the criminalization of African Americans, Black men in particularly, has been used as a tactic of oppr...
Post a Comment
Read more

Macy Rupp-Roof is on Fire response

1. CONTEXT: What were the circumstances that framed the meaning and process of this project?  Several things framed the meaning and process of this project.  Primarily, portrayal of “inner-city” youth in the media was the motivator for this project.  Events like lake and LA riots in such close proximity to the performance of the Roof is on Fire also provided a much more interesting grounding for the timing of the project.  2. CONTENT: What was the issue, need, idea or opportunity addressed by this project? Issues such as sex, abortion, race, financial income, and family were addressed and became the topic of this performance piece but specifically in relation to how these issues related to the teens.  The need for this discussion to come from teens is vital because teens are a direct reflection on how our culture is positively or negatively affecting society.  3: FORM: What is the medium that was used to address or ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Tuition meeting

Speaking point: We have spent over 60 thousand dollars on this school so far, we have tolerated the raise each year. At some point we do not have more money to give and we are pushed out along with all of our debt including interest. With this false start we lack the motivation to attend another school in the future, therefore leaving us uneducated and in debt. Other than the knowledge gained, this would be a waste of two years of my life and in fact sets me back in my career.
Post a Comment
Read more