Day Six

Friday, January 8, 2010

Creating Plays Collectively Using Boal’s Image Theatre with Maritza Perez and her Youth Ensemble, Jovenes de Noventa y Ocho

Friday morning we returned to the Teatro Yerbabruja for a workshop with UPR Professor Maritza Perez on creating theatre using Augusto Boal’s Image Theatre techniques. We began with a demonstration by the Jovenes de Noventa y Ocho (Maritza's youth ensemble) of two completed works. The first piece was an extrapolation of the poem “And Then They Came for Me” by Pastor Martin Niemöller where the performers began by using a series of images and short “scenes” which explored how we as a society are taught to participate in murder, oppression, and/or brutality (Freire refers to conscientization as a process by which we learn to be critical of the social structures and behaviors that we participate in—these scenes critically depicted how this can happen) and followed it with a series of statements/actions following a pattern: ---happened, and I didn’t say anything because I (don’t live in a ghetto) (have a job) (am Puerto Rican), and ended with, “And who was there when they came after me? Or after you.”

The second work the youth ensemble performed was titled, “The Legislators” which dramatized a day in the life of the Puerto Rican legislature, who are known to be the highest paid of any of the legislatures in the US. In the work, we saw that they participated in the legislative tasks, stopped to celebrate when they received a pay raise, legislated more, stopped to celebrate again when they received the reimbursement for travel expenses, legislated a last time, and celebrated more, though they were too drunk to continue.

In order to show us how the work had been created, we began a series of activities, led by Ms. Perez. The activities were as follows:

1. Participants walk in the space at leisurely pace, trying to fill the gaps that appear on the floor as people continuously move about. At the facilitator’s direction and in a count of eight, the participants slowly roll their body down toward the floor and continue until they are laying flat on their back. The facilitator hesitates and then counts to eight to bring everyone back to standing and the walking resumes. Thereafter the participants are directed to go back to the floor of their own volition, such that a spectator would not know who initiated the roll down or started to get back up. This was continued several times, varying the speed and height levels of the walk as appropriate/necessary. The facilitator asks participants to add physical warm ups to the walk that are initiated by a volunteer within the group and immediately copied by the others—again, so a spectator would not know who started the movement.

2. The group is divided into three groups (just by call of the facilitator) and each is told to immediately create a physical image of War. The groups is divided a second time and asked to immediately create an image of Global Warming. The facilitator indicates that this image will be the first in a series, so the group instantaneously creates a second, third, fourth and fifth image. The participants are asked to slowly morph from one image to the next, in a final presentation of the series they created. The group is divided a third time into three groups, given the theme of Theatre of the Oppressed and again creates a five image series. This time, between the creation of images four and five, a volunteer is asked to step out of the group, look at the series of images one-four and given the opportunity to adjust his/herself in the image in order to clarify the picture before proceeding to image five (which is spontaneously created by the group as before). The series is then presented like before. The facilitator asked about story and character evident in the presentation before proceeding to a final group division and image series on Homophobia. This time, the facilitator stopped after every image and asked one member from a given group to step out and make physical adjustments to the image to clarify the narrative as they understood it.

Maritza explained that this is the starting point for creating one of her image theatre pieces—the group selects a topic they want to make a play about, then they begin to physicalize the topic, adjusting it as they go from multiple perspectives so they get a large selection of ideas which may or may not be moments that appear in their final piece. Dr. Rosa Luisa Marquez was observing and she explained that Boal has provided us with the tools for Theatre of the Oppressed, but the individual practitioner determines how to use them.

In closing, Maritza broke the group in half and asked us each to construct an image theatre piece that summarized our workshop. Here is video of one of the presentations:




Trust

In the afternoon, we worked with Rosa Luisa Marquez on a series of trust exercises. They unfolded as follows:

1. Breathing – Dr. Marquez uses a breathing warm up that comes from yoga which I can’t describe in words, but the key is to focus the group’s energy and attention, so any breathing activity is a good way to begin.

2. Space Walk – As we’ve done on previous days, we walked around the space to begin our physical work. This activity begins to build energy within the group, vital to get everyone working together.

3. Pessoa, Cabbana, Tempestade – Two group members face each other and clasp their hands together to create a house (cabbana) wherein their bodies are the walls and they arms make the roof. A third person crouches in between them so they are the person (pessoa) in the house. The group creates as many of these three-person combinations as possible and one extra acts as the joker. If the joker calls “pessoa,” everyone who is inside a house must change places (like musical chairs) and the joker tries to take one of these positions too. Whomever is left out becomes the new joker. If the joker calls “cabbana,” everyone who is making a house must change places and form a new house over one of the abandoned people. Whomever is left over becomes the new joker. If the joker calls “tempestade,” (storm) everyone must change places and may fill whichever roll they choose (pessoa or cabanna), and the odd person left out becomes the new joker. This fun game relaxes the participants and focuses their attention on the happenings within the group.

4. Monkey in the Middle (not Boal’s title, but I don’t know the correct title) – Two participants face each other and the third stands between them. The member facing the front of the middle person places both hands on the middle person’s upper chest. The member facing the back of the middle person places both hands on the middle person’s upper back. The other people brace themselves so they can withstand the weight of the middle person and they slowly begin to pass the middle person back and forth like a pendulum. The middle person should keep their feet firmly planted on the ground and act like a stiff board swaying forward and back. The group negotiates silently their trust/comfort level and allows the middle person to go as far as they can.

5. Four people use only their clasped hands with index fingers pointing out to raise a fifth person from a chair (one person with extended index fingers supporting each knee, and the one is each armpit). Each time they do it twice, adding a brief concentration exercise involving stacking hands above the seated participant’s head before making the second attempt which proved to be more fluid and ‘easy’ each time.

6. The participants worked in two large groups to raise a group member up in the air using only their hands to evenly distribute the weights. The raised person could then be turned in any variety of ways (including vertical with their heads toward the ground) and the group adjusted as necessary to ensure that the person was continually supported.

In closing, Dr. Marquez pointed out (which Michael Rohd does as well in his text Hope Is Vital) that the purpose of doing Theatre of the Oppressed work is that you teach the activities to a population who will then go on and continue the work after you have finished working with them. The games and activities bond a community, and the hope is that they will get something from it if they continue with it.

**Much of Rosa Luisa Marquez’ interpretations of Boal’s work (and her own) are collected in her book Brincos y Saltos, which is also the title of the class she teaches at UPR (Dramatic Actvities).