10-Preparing the Team for the Performance

This unit has a very important role especially for a beginner Forum Theatre group because it provides a space to work on some elements necessary for participants going in front of a public for the first time.

It will focus on

• Exploring power – but now more from the perspective of the relation with the public;
• The feeling of possession the participants have for their roles;
• Preparation for the interventions and all the process with the public; please check again the chapter about Forum Theatre to review the steps with the public and other important mentions related to the Forum Theatre Process;
• It is important to emphasise for the participants that in their role as Forum Theatre actors they need to help the public members and not to be in an antagonistic position to them.
• This helping has to be in their mind constantly and accommodate it together with their role as keeping everything very realistic. For example: a helping actor makes time/ space for the public person to talk (if on the stage) not just to say his/her lines in order to prove a point without caring if the person from the public had any chance to say something at all.

Very often beginner FT actors fall in two traps when they go on stage:

• They want to help the public too much. When somebody makes an intervention they immediately change their reaction in a unrealistic way to make the person from the public feel that they won; (which in fact is not helpful because the public discusses and assesses as not realistic the reaction of the other people involved –in this case our actors)
• They hold on too strongly to their roles although the power relation has obviously changed, while their reactions are not realistic. This is often the case with the oppressor – we call it “Oppressor syndrome”. The Oppressor first of all is not changed by the public and this aspect contributes to the development of this syndrome. Also in the overall situation the oppressor has the biggest power (and he/she is abusing it)- once the people around start having more power, the fear of losing power rises in the actor who wants to hold on to it even more. The “oppressor syndrome” is quite dangerous if is not properly addressed because it can lead to the public leaving our performance feeling hopeless – because nothing they tried balanced the power relations and nothing changed. This is part of the Joker’s task (it will be explored as well in the Joker section) but also part of the preparation process.

Another delicate aspect is related to the discussion of potential interventions. It is helpful to do it, to have an idea of what solutions the public can propose BUT some groups tend to prepare mentally in advance for how to react to certain interventions too well – again not realistically; the spontaneous improvisation on the spot very often is much more natural and realistic as actors do not over think what to do. An FT group can never anticipate everything the public can come up with as solutions so during this preparation for interventions they should keep this in mind.

Structure of the unit

• Introduction of the day (explaining the context and what will happen in this session)- 5 minutes
• Push Not to Win – 20 minutes
• Come with me! No-30 minutes
• Brainstorming –Interventions-20 minutes
• Briefing on the Process of Forum Theatre with Public – 20 minutes
• Open Space Session – based on the last session’s needs-70 minutes
• Final circle (evaluation, announcements) -15 minutes

2-Push not to win-20 minutes

Aims- to make the participants reflect on how they use their power in a way in which they are not dominating but not submissive either, to encourage them to reflect on how they feel in such situations, to understand where the balance point is for them personally, to discuss about the power of the public versus power of the actors;

Description –Participants are divided into pairs (they all have to be in pairs – if it is necessary the facilitator will join the exercise as well). A line, or demarcation limit will be made visible on the floor and each member of the pair has to stand on one side of the line.

The participants will have to face and touch each other’s palms (in vertical position).

Their task is to push but not to win. This is the same task for everybody. The pairs are not allowed to talk with each other during the exercises-any question will be clarified before the exercise will start. It has to be reminded during the exercises that they have to Push (but not to win) – especially if pairs not really moving are observed.

At some point during the exercise you can also ask the participants to close their eyes and to continue to do the exercise. It will probably not take more than a couple of minutes (around 5 at least)– make sure you allow enough time for every person to get in the exercise more deeply - the first minutes can be taken as funny exercise but as time passes they understand and have deeper reflections.

Debriefing/ Processing the Activity

This exercise is useless without discussing at the end, so do not rush this discussion if you have chosen to do this activity. Suggestions for questions in this sense:

• How did you feel during the activity?
• Did anybody win during the exercise? How did you manage that?
• How did you approach the task? You had to push but not to win…did this mean you had to lose? What did winning mean for you? Did you feel the other person is winning? How was it for you?
• Did you identify a point where you both pushed, but nobody was winning or losing?
• How did you understand you are at this point?
• Please think now in connection with the process involving the public – the public will come on our stage and change our story – they will push us and we will push them back (because of our roles) – what correlations can you make form this exercise and the process of interaction with the public?
• How can you be constantly aware of the point where both of you are pushing, you are not winning over the public but you are not losing either?

3-Come with me! No.- 30 minutes

Aims- to stimulate the participants to reflect on their own approach to winning over somebody (convincing the person) – and also on their feelings if they fail to do to so, to encourage the participants to be honest with themselves and identify the inner answers/reactions to certain situations, to reflect individually on what makes them give in/what never makes them give in. (It is a very good exercise to work with the “Oppressor Syndrome” or other possessive tendencies.

Description- Each participant has to have a pair. During the exercise one person will have to constantly invite the other one: “Come with me!” until he/she accepts. The other person has to say NO as long as possible. There will be 5 minutes for each round so in this round the pairs can try continuously. After 5 minutes the roles switch for another 5 minutes.

Debriefing/Processing the activity

This exercise is useless without discussing at the end, so do not rush this discussion if you have chosen to do this activity. Suggestions for questions in this sense:

• How did you feel asking the question? How did you feel replying to it?
• How fast did you give in? What made you say YES?
• What made you say NO until the end?
• If you did say NO to the end of the exercise, was there any moment when internally you felt like saying YES but you didn’t want to so you continued to say NO? In which moment did this happen? Why did you continue to say NO although you felt like saying YES inside of you?
• When the public comes and makes changes, very often they come against our initial plan, our initial wishes and ideas for what should happen in that specific situation. How can you remain connected to what we feel inside as a radar of what is a natural signal of how the power relations change and not to impose yourself to it?
• How can we control our actor Ego in relation with the public?

4-Brainstorming –Interventions-20 minutes

Aim- to reflect in advance on the potential changes proposed by the public, to list all the ideas the team has, to become aware of the fact that the public will surprise the team and come with ideas that were never considered;

Description- The group is informed that they will need to have an initial brainstorming on potential solutions that the public can come up with. They look at the play scene by scene and think of what solutions can be made in each one of them (which role will be changed, what idea can be proposed).

If there is any scene where no change is possible to be made that is a sign that there was a mistake in the construction, because only the key moments of the process need to be transformed in scenes in which the public has the chance to make changes. If the team assess at this stage that one scene might be “empty” of changes you might consider to change the play structure.

In this brainstorming process it is also important to remind the group that this exercise is just to give them an idea of some potential solutions that can be proposed but definitely they will not be able to anticipate all of them and they should accept that.

After the first scene there is no certainty related to what the next scene will look like, the whole story might be changed by the public based on the discussions. For example: even if the original second scene shows a situation at school between students, if in the first scene the public decides that it is realistic for the mother to come and talk with the teacher personally about the situation of her daughter then this scene will be created–it was not planned initially by the team but that doesn’t mean that it can’t happen in reality. So a new scene will be shown with new possibilities of changes and directions in which the story could go.

Optional activity- for working on the key actors’ (oppressor and oppressed) capacity for adjusting to changes

• The participants stand in 2 lines facing each other. The oppressor and the oppressed are one step in front of the line facing each other. The group chooses a moment from the story in which they interact. They talk (as in the original play). The lines behind the actors have one aim – to help the person in front have more power (regardless of whether in front of them is the oppressor or the oppressed). The process is similar to the one on the stage with the public but goes continuously. The oppressed and the oppressor interact (as in the moment chosen to work with).If somebody behind them (from the line) considers they do not express enough power they clap and replace the person and this continues. The original actors can replace the persons now playing their roles again. It should continue until the oppressed is not oppressed and has enough power before the oppressor.
• After one round you can discuss with the group what arguments were stronger, which ones were more realistic and also it would be useful to discuss how the oppressor felt when the oppressed had more and more power. How much power did he/she still feel that he/she had? The exercise can continue, working on other key moments from the performance as well. It is a useful exercise for preparing the group for interventions and also for preparing the oppressor to work with his oppressor syndrome tendency.

5-Briefing on the Process of Forum Theatre with Public-20 minutes

Aims- to clarify/introduce the process of implementation of Forum Theatre to the group, to have a clear perspective of their role and the main guidelines that need to be followed

Description – The facilitator explains step by step the process of implementation and how the process will be managed; the role of the Joker, their role as actors.

Besides the technical aspects of the process (which need to be clearly introduced and explained) it is important to emphasise on the following:

• During the introduction of the characters, the actors are instructed not to smile, not to talk with the public, not to make signs to them-to be as much as possible in character.
• The team needs to be silent and not to talk backstage while the Joker is talking with the public (it will disrupt the discussion, can show disrespect and lack of interest for the points raised from the target group-the public; they will miss the conclusion drawn with the public – what is happening next, what change is kept, etc.)
• The public will have many points to talk about and the discussion will go in many directions-for the team it is important to follow and listen to the Joker, who draws conclusions through which he/she also aims to calibrate the team (to know what change was kept, what happens next – if there is a new scene, or the same, or the next, etc.)
• The oppressor and the Joker need to agree on a sign that will be made by the Joker to the oppressor person in case he/she becomes possessed by the role and deliberately does not reduce power at all. This sign can be a signal for the oppressor that he/she maybe has gone too far;
• The actors need to pay lots of attention to how a public member shows an intervention/ change as later on they might have to continue to act like that and it is important to keep the change proposed by the public, not exaggerated by the actor.
• Actors need to help the public: allowing space for them to talk, asking them 2 times to repeat if they understand they are talking too low, moving on the stage so the public member doesn’t stay with their back to the public.

6-Open Space Session – based on the last session’s needs-70 minutes

Aim- to work on the needs expressed by the team before they perform for the first time

Description – It is decided together with the group what to focus on in this part of the session in order for them to feel more prepared to go to the public (more rehearsals, more preparation for interventions, more voice or stage exercises, more emotions or getting into character, etc.).

What to include in this session depends strictly on the group’s needs and you can also repeat some of the previous activities if you are not ready with new ones right away. In the resource area you will find some toolkits that can provide some extra activities that you can take further in this sense (for future meetings in new Forum Theatre projects as well).

Recommendation

Before going to the target group it would be useful, especially for a beginner group to have a rehearsal with public. This public can be made up of friends, colleagues, relatives, etc. The aim of this rehearsal with public is to practice interventions and to have a clear understanding of how the process goes with the public.