13/04/2023
I wanted to share this wonderful opportunity to take part in a community project run by the incredible Meg Lester from Umbrella Theatrical Productions and Canadian Company Theatre for Living (TfL)...
Participants wanted for a community project working to improve the way we deal with youth mental health, specifically in light of su***de prevention. Engaging the community in a healthy social dialogue around what it’s really like to be dealing with mental health issues and the struggles our young adults are facing, we are looking to improve interactions, outcomes, systems, social perceptions and more!
Theatre for Living (TfL) is a Canadian based company who has been doing this type of work in Canada for over 40 years and we are fortunate enough to be hosting them in Kingscliff this month.
Having TfL run the project is an incredible, rare opportunity and we are looking for 20 people with a lived experience of these challenges to either help create the project content and/or participate in the live interactive forum theatre events scheduled to follow.
Forum Theatre is a unique type of participatory theatre. The plays that develop out of the process are usually quite short, often 10 minutes in total. A play is performed once, all the way through, so the audience can see the situation and the problems presented. The play builds to a crisis and stops there, offering no solutions. The play is then performed again, with audience members able to "freeze" the action at any point where they see a character struggling with a problem. An audience member yells "stop!", comes into the playing area, replaces the character s/he recognizes is in a moment of struggle, and tries out their idea. We call this an 'intervention'. The Forum Theatre event is vibrant and empowering for all concerned. Starting with a group of 20 participants helping create the play and 6 cast members performing it, live interactive community events are held at the end of the process, with 6 live events in total.
This link shows a great example of a previous youth event run by TfL (based on bullying); and this link looks at mental health from the perspective of feeling mechanised inside the mental health care system.
If you are interested to learn more or participate, please get in touch as soon as possible – the process is starting very soon!
Adrienne Megan Lester – Umbrella Theatrical Productions
[email protected]
www.umbrellatheatricalproductions.com.au
Phone: 0422 570 346
“Applied Theatre and Social Arts are umbrella terms used to describe creative works which bring people or organisations in their community together to affect positive change.”
