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U.S. Community-Based Theater
Professor Jan Cohen-Cruz
New York University, New York. N.Y.
Tisch School of the Arts
Drama Department (Spring 2003)

Because you have imagined love, you have not loved; merely because you have imagined brotherhood, you have not made brotherhood. —Muriel Rukeyser

As if in response to Rukeyser’s quote, community-based theater (CBT) endeavors to concretely affect its participants. And in contrast to a view of the artist as a solitary genius, CBT depends on collective creativity; theatre by, for and of a group of people with a shared identity on some fundamental level. The class combines an overview of U.S. CBT methodology, history and issues with hands-on experience. After an introduction to NYC CBT venues, each student will do a mini-internship, co-facilitating or assisting a one-to-three hour weekly session approx. 10 times over the course of the semester. Class sessions include trying out techniques, discussing readings, troubleshooting challenges/ cheering on successes re: internships, and screening video clips.

Required Reading: Class Packet edited by Cohen‑Cruz, available immediately at the NYU Book Store. The packet will also be on reserve at Bobst and in the Office of Community Connections in TSOA Rm 1245. Other required readings on line at www.communityarts.net reading room.

CLASS SCHEDULE

Class #1: 1/21 Introductions

Intro to CBT, each other, and to this course: Go over syllabus. Overview of internships available. Video clip: PACT, as basis for laying out course themes. Do cultural mapping. FOR NEXT WEEK: Call sites of interest. Visit at least two that fit your schedule and interests. Write about them in your journal, indicating first three choices and why, hand in to Jan next class along with your schedule and contact info.

Class #2: 1/28 Facilitating Community-based Theater Workshops

Read Herzberg and Myerhoff. What makes a good teacher in community situations where people are not aspiring to the professional stage but to various other goals? Discuss facilitation via Ingalls’ Six Principles and balancing skills/ exercises with philosophy/goals. Exercise Sources: including your own; Viola Spolin & Augusto Boal’s; particulars for population you are working with. Show books by Johnstone, Bowles, Rhodes, Johnson, Lerman, ESTA, Cohen-Cruz/ Novak. Video clip from Children and the Classics. Discuss CBT as ethnography and internship sites visited. Discuss keeping a journal at your site as field work notes.

I. HISTORICAL THREADS OF US COMMUNITY-BASED THEATER

Class #3: 2/4 A Hyphenated Field: Between Ritual and Theater

Read Schechner for ritual connection, Maryo Ewell for historical overview, www.communityarts.net reading room. Discuss community-based performance as situated between ritual and theatre and as an interdisciplinary field. Screen Lacy’s “Whisper the Waves the Wind” pageant. Solidify/ begin mini-internship by next week. Subsequent sessions include touching base re: internships and student facilitation of exercises. Make schedule.

Class #4: 2/11 Performance and Social Change

Read JCC’s intro to art and activism, at least one other article online there, and Elam excerpt, class packet.Look at historical impulses with special emphasis on the ‘30s, the ‘60s, and current efforts. Case study: John O’Neal, From the Free Southern Theater to Junebug Productions. Screen video.

Class #5: 2/18 Avant Garde

Read Kaprow. Explorations at the boundary of life/art such as Happenings and hybrids by Suzanne Lacy, Cornerstone, LAPD, Liz Lerman, that depend on community involvement shaped by strong artistic visionaries.

BY NEXT CLASS: Attend Dudley Cocke’s talk with Tisch Scholars, Friday 2/21 at 6:30 pm and one of the following performances at the Museum of the American Indian: Th 2/20 6:30; Fri 10:30 am or 2pm; Sat 2pm.

Class #6: 2/25 Theatre of Place

Read From the Ground Up. Discuss role of tradition; the relationship between individual and collective genius. Screen clip from Red Fox/ Second Hangin’ and a Dell’Arte production.

Paper #1 due: 3-4 pages field notes and analysis from site. Tease out at least one issue that transcends the site and may serve as your term paper focus.

II. METHODOLOGIES

Class #7: 3/4 Communal Storytelling

Read Baker and Cocke, Red Fox/ Second Hangin’; O’Neal and Watkins, You Can’t Judge a Book by Looking at the Cover, and Junebug and Roadside websites re: storycircles. Discuss story circles and primacy of storytelling in contemporary community-based theatre. Do a story circle, contrasting with oral history and one-on-one interviews. Screen excerpt of Common Green, Common GroundandTell Me a Story, Sing Me a Song.

Class #8: 3/11 Indigenous Form, Contemporary Content

Read Cohen-Cruz, “The Ecology of Theater-in-Community,” and peruse the Performing Communities research project at www.communityarts.net. Discuss beginning with a link with people's strengths, interests. In groups, put together possible sequences of exercises for your internship and identify underlying ideologies.

SPRING BREAK: 3/15- 3/23

Class #9: 3/25 Text Adaptations

Read Rena Fraden, Introduction to Imagining Medea: Rhodessa Jones and Theater for Incarcerated Women. In class, compare scenes from Steelboundalongside Prometheus Bound. Discuss Steelbound and The Medea Project. Screen parts of each. Explore improvising and inserting interview excerpts as adaptation techniques. Paper #2 due: review of three textual sources that will help you develop your term paper.

Class #10: 4/1 Playing Boal

Read: excerpt from Playing Boal. Problem-solve vis-a-vis internships. Do forum.

III. ESTABLISHING A FIELD

Class #11: 4/8 Partnerships

Read “Inroads: Intersection of Art and Civic Dialogue” (Korza, Bacon and Atlas) and “Mapping the Field: Arts-Based Community Development” (Bill Cleveland) online. Discuss the articles on arts-based civic dialogue and the field more generally as regards partnerships either at home or via residencies. Apply Schechner’s “Seven Phases of Performance.”

Class #12: 4/15 The Question of Radicality

Read Brady, Alinsky, Delgado. Discuss Expanded definitions of “radical” and the motion of the ocean. Term paper due. Guest Scott Loane on obtaining a 401c3.

Class #13: 4/22 Training and Intellectual Connective Tissue: Establishing a Field

Visit Liz Lerman Dance Exchange and Dell’Arte Players websites re: ensemble company-based training. Think about the role of www.communityarts.net and Alternate ROOTS (visit their website) in building the field. Compare ensemble company-based and university-based training.

Class #14: 4/29 Critical Approaches / Standards

Read Croce (packet) and Kuftinec (from ADI website).

Discuss categories and complications of assessment, interrogating for underlying bias/ assumptions. Go over student assessments. Reflect on internship experience. What binds a collection of exercises together, a series of sessions into a cohesive workshop? What is the relationship between philosophy /ideology/theory/practice, aesthetics and efficacy, workshops and productions in CBT? Exercise: identify key theory, practice and constituents in your work thus far. Turn in assessment from your internship liaison. Closure exercise!

FINAL EXAM: due 5/3. Three page assessment of your internship including one theoretical idea underpinning your work; two examples of how you tried to communicate or embody that idea in the work; one challenge at your site; and one success. Additionally, clear and concise description of five exercises and teaching techniques that you used successfully. Email the five ex.s/ teaching techniques to community.connections@nyu.edu.

Requirements:

1. Attendance/ punctuality/participation reflecting that you are keeping up with reading assignments.
2. Two short papers, each 3-4 pages long (no more or less), typed, double spaced, one inch margins, 12 point font. Paper #1: analysis of field notes. Paper #2: review of at least three theoretical sources vis-à-vis issue you are taking up in term paper.
3. Term paper: analyze an issue in CBT using your internship as one source and readings beyond class assignments as other sources. Due 4/15. Typed, double spaced. Min. 5 ½, max. 6 ½ pages.
4. Facilitate one exercise related to your internship in class.
5. Bring in your internship liaison’s assessment of your work.
6. Final Exam: Your own 3 page typed assessment of the internship, integrating ideas about evaluation from class; and description of 5 exercises and/or approaches to facilitation that worked especially well, contextualized by how you did it, with whom, and why, emailed to community.connections@nyu.edu.