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Reflection on SPARK in Baltimore (#2)

Theatre Project and Bump in the Road, Baltimore, MD
 
November 12, 2012
 
Directed by Carmela Lanza-Weil
 
 
                                              by Elliott Rauh
 
I attended SPARK by Caridad Svich on November 12th, 2012 at Baltimore's Theatre Project. I was invited by one of the Fletcher McNeill, who is a friend and patron of Single Carrot Theatre, where I am a member of the ensemble. Not only was I intrigued to support a fellow actor but to have an opportunity to hear Caridad's play read aloud. Most of my experience with Caridad's plays are me reading it to myself, so having the opportunity to hear other voices color the world of the play was an opportunity I did not want to miss. It should be noted that Single Carrot Theatre is producing Caridad's The Tropic of X in February 2013 and I wanted to experience more of her work. 
 
SPARK explores a story that has been told before, a soldier returning from war, but what I appreciate is that SPARK follows the experience of a female solider returning home. While listening to the text I found myself thinking about all the advertisements I've seen about men coming home for war and how that image has been branded in my brain. American Airlines, Folgers Coffee, come to my mind. 
 
Following the reading we had a lively post show conversation. One audience member at the Baltimore reading was a an active duty member of the army and she had recently returned from her first tour in Afghanistan  She spoke about her personal experience and the similarities between her journey back to Baltimore and the play. It was very powerful to hear about her transition and her conflict between her need to slowing get re-acclimated to American society but also her maternal instinct to go right back to being a mother to her 1 year old child. She also spoke about her child's experience, spending months with grandma and then suddenly being back with mom. For this audience member she spoke about how tough it was that her mother was not computer savvy enough to set up a Skype account so she could watch her child grow, even from a combat zone, as many other soldiers experienced.  
 
As an ensemble member at Single Carrot Theatre I was thrilled that SPARK was read in Baltimore. I hope that more readings of this nature, scheduled and organized all over the country or world at the same time, will continue. It has been a success for other companies like the Tectonic Theatre Project and their readings of Laramie Project - 10 years later and Standing on Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays. 
 
 "The plays of Caridad Svich are plays of action. They are each, in their own way, a call to stand up, look out and examine the world around us, loudly or quietly, They nestle into the small moments that make up our lives and burrow deep into the crevices of what often tears us apart, but also lead us on the road to healing." - Zac Kline
 
I believe that there is no other quote that could sum up why Single Carrot Theatre has been so interested in Caridad's writing. "Plays of action" is the type of theatre that Single Carrot sets out to create. Baltimore audiences need to know more about Caridad and her work and we proud to help introduce Caridad to Baltimore and Baltimore to Caridad. 
 
Brief Bio: Elliott Rauh - managing director and co founding ensemble member of Single Carrot Theatre, Baltimore MD.  BFA Theatre, BA English University of Colorado - Boulder '05. singlecarrot.com. Single Carrot is scheduled to produce the US Premiere & English Language Premiere of THE TROPIC OF X in February 2013 in Baltimore. 
 
 
 

 


 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 

 

A Reflection on SPARK in Atlanta (#2)

Working Title Playwrights, Avondale, Estates, GA

November 10, 2012

Directed by Justin Anderson (of Synchronicity Theatre, Atlanta) 

                                           by Kaye Coker, Co-Director, Veteran’s Heart Georgia

The lights came on way too soon, jarring me so that the tears stuck in my throat. I was still immersed in the stories of the family members that I had just witnessed. This reaction and the magnetism of what had just taken place on the stage took me by surprise. I had read the script SPARK by Caridad Svich and “knew”—cognitively--the characters and the plot, and the ending. It was the superb acting and direction that evoked and opened the emotional response.

These actors had become the characters and pulled me into their lives. And it was the last line that provided the hoped-for exuberant shift that happens when the work I do with people in my office goes well…when you just know that something amazing has changed things and that there is indeed hope for healing. This is a sacred moment.

As I made my way down to join the cast and director on the stage, struggling somewhat to make the transition into my role in the Talk Back, I became aware of the impact of having audiences share this experience of the effects of war on an individual and her family. It’s far too easy for those who have been guarded and protected to cultivate comfortable ignorance of those whose lives are forever changed by the experience of their service.  And just as harmful is the belief that all our Warriors are broken beyond hope of healing from being in war.

The work of writers, musicians, artists, actors and playwrights has depicted the human story and soul for eons so that it may be heard, seen and understood by all.  Narrative not only binds us together as a civilization, it is healing, as we are forced to bring our wordless emotions into language. We civilians must be able and willing to listen to the narratives of war without turning away, seeing and tending the wounds and helping to create mutual understanding that bridges the gap between those who fought the battles and those who remained at home.

Deepest gratitude to Caridad Svich for bringing the words and emotions of the effects of war to us. Respect and admiration for Justin Anderson for guiding the thespians, Cara Mantella, Sarah Wallis, Taylor Dooley, Luis Hernandez and Geoff McKnight as they became the people of this story. Atlanta is indebted to passion of Jill Patrick, who made this event happen here at Academy Theater. And NoPassport is to be celebrated for sponsoring this reading in many parts of the world, informing and involving communities in healing the effects of war.  

And many thanks to the audience, who, with stories of their own to share, created a listening community.

Kaye Coker is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker in Decatur, Ga. She serves as Co-Director of VETERAN'S HEART GEORGIA, a non profit all volunteer organization dedicated to healing the effects of war in our service members, veterans, their families and our communities. Since 2005 she has been providing counseling and teaching Mindfulness meditation to service members, veterans and family members, working on research regarding the effectiveness of Mindfulness with military veterans,  and maintains a private psychotherapy practice. When not otherwise engaged, the mountains of northeast Georgia call and she and husband Jim flee the city.

 

I have been musing for some time now but more and more of late about immersive theatre, conceptual staging and radical intimacy on US stages. Three topics close to my artistic heart, but also as Sam Gold's staging of Annie Baker's version of UNCLE VANYA at Soho Rep requires its limited audience to sit inside its A frame house and Jim McDonald's re-staging of the UK play by Mike Bartlett COCK thrillingly seats its audience cockfight-style on bare bleachers in a tight circle, and other pieces in and around town require either travelling show/promenade performance and/or up close and in one room actor to audience encounters, I return again and again to who is the audience.

Now, why would I even posit such a question? Well, it occurs to me that often when artists make work and dream up beautiful conceptual ideas such as some of the above for staging and re-imagining work, assumptions are made about the audience. Very clear assumptions about specific bodies in space. Often the assumption is, well, that the bodies are quite "able." In other words, when the big gorgeous ideas occur about audience and immersion, does the idea ever occur that there will be audience members in wheelchairs? Or that need to use canes? Or that some may be blind or deaf? Does "challenged mobility/ability" enter the picture? In effect, unless the piece being made is ABOUT and FOR - therefore, targetted to - an audience with mobility/ability challenges, are they even thought of as being PART of the audience??  

I don't wish to rain on some carefully rendered, thrilling theatrical work on our stages or being dreamt up right now, but I think the question need be asked - who is the audience? who do we imagine is part of our crowd and why?

and is it simply too easy to assume, perhaps out of social conditioning, that most of the audience will be able to trek the woods, follow the sprites, run up and down stairs (a la Punchdrunk's sublimely rendered Sleep No More), and/or sit cross legged on a carpet floor in a fairly confined space for 2 hours and half, etc., to witness/be part of the experience?

is it, in effect, too much of a bother to consider how to dream big conceptual, specific theatrical ideas and put them into remarkably into action and ALSO still think about EVERYONE that might show up, or is exclusion a natural part of the audience equation?

is it easier to say: well, this is for some people and some people only and those who want to see it/be part of it/and are willing to pay a ticket are just gonna be screwed over because in the planning stages, allowances were not made necessarily about how someone or two or three or more may be welcomed into the experience?

Welcome to the NoPassport blog

The NoPassport Blog

This is the open-source blog for No Passport announcements, or any public statement that a No Passport participant would like to make outside of the No Passport list.
 

NoPassport was originally founded in 2002 by Caridad Svich as a virtual and real-live word-song band. Its initial mission was dedicated to discovering new ways of listening to and writing language for performance, crossing artistic disciplines and making music. It performed in various discreet configurations (with initial members Sheila Callaghan, Jorge Corti~nas, Erik Ehn, Christine Evans, Hayley Finn, Michael Gladis, Lisa D'Amour, Sarah Ruhl and Gary Winter) at venues in New York, Providence and Minneapolis, and some of the texts created by the first configuration are archived at www.hotreview.org.

NoPassport is still a collective devoted to investigating news ways of making text and performance. However, it has now expanded its vision to devote itself to the fostering of the hemispheric spirit in US theatre with an emphasis on US Latina/o & Latin American writing.

NoPassport is a virtual and live forum for the exchange of ideas and dreams, a 'place' to strategize opportunities for our work, a group of artists and artist advocates, a jam session, a live network between theatres and the academy, and a mobile band of playwrights, directors, actors, producers and musicians. We are a pan-american theatre coalition devoted to change in the way we do things, the way things have been done, and dreaming big solid active dreams about where we can go.

UPDATED:  list of members may be found here.

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