Drama

This remarkable archival footage of early games and workshops run by Augusto Boal around the world shows the transformative, liberating nature of his work. Exploring three of his main methods – Invisible Theatre, Forum Theatre and Legislative Theatre – this documentary by Jeanne Dosse explains how each of these methods work in practice.

Held at the Palace of Justice (Justizplast) in Vienna in 2008, this is one of the many international talks on Theatre of the Oppressed (TO) given by Augusto Boal. In this public lecture, Boal presents his TO techniques, including its history, development and practice.

Julian Boal, son of the Theatre of the Oppressed originator, Augusto Boal, discusses his father’s work and the importance of political theatre in this interview from 2018. Julian reflects on his father’s ambitions and how his techniques evolved and changed over time.

The teenage girls of Warrenville Prison get a shot at redemption in a most unlikely form: a musical based on their lives. As three fascinating girls write and stage their play, they're compelled to re-live their crimes, reclaim their humanity and take a first step toward breaking free of the prison system. When the girls hit the stage in front of their families, prison staff and utter strangers, hitting the notes isn't important: it's their chance to seize their stories and tell them to the world. For some, the musical will be a first step in a back-and-forth struggle to stay out of the system. For Whitney, it may be a lifesaver. Given unprecedented access to this juvenile correctional facility by the State of Illinois, the powerful characters of GIRLS ON THE WALL will surprise you with their candor, intimacy, and unexpected sense of humor. Together, they illustrate the power of storytelling to illuminate the darkest secrets, and to understand the most tangled lives.

In this study Dominick LaCapra addresses the ongoing concern with the application of theory - namely that of literary studies and linguistics - to contemporary historical research and analysis. History and Reading is an attempt to address the concerns of those scholars who either resist theoretical discussions or disavow the use of interdisciplinary study.LaCapra begins with an extensive discussion of the problem of reading and interpretation as it relates to the understanding of history. The focus then moves to two classic texts that serve as case studies: Alexis de Tocqueville's Old RTgime and the French Revolution and Michel Foucault's Folie et dTraison: Histoire de la folie + l'+ge classique (partially translated into English as Madness and Civilization). In the final chapter, LaCapra deals with the problem of rethinking and reconfiguring French studies, suggesting how this discipline could itself profit from the theoretical innovations for which it has been so important a conduit in the last few decades. LaCapra offers sensitive readings of Tocqueville and Foucault, authors who present vastly different narrative strategies and modes of analysis. Looking at these and other theorists whose work addresses the writing and understanding of history, he considers how their distinctive textual practices have transformed standard modes of interpretation and analysis.A distinguished and widely respected European historian, LaCapra offers a sophisticated consideration of how to combine textual analysis with traditional historical practices, and shows how this practice can be brought to bear on French studies and help to shape its future directions.

Modern Drama, Volume 40, Number 4, Winter 1997, pp. 442-453

Filmmaker Marianne Kaplan tells the personal and often distressing story of her son Adam, a 12-year-old with Asperger Syndrome, during a tumultuous year in the life of their family.

Aspergers is an increasingly common form of autism typically characterized by high intellectual functioning, coupled with emotionally inappropriate behavior and an inability to interact successfully with others. Adam's condition makes life in seventh grade a minefield, a place where he finds himself misunderstood, isolated, and bullied. As he struggles to find a place for himself, he often says or does the wrong thing, and ends up in tears or in fights with other boys. He left his last school after another boy put a knife to his neck. Adam's parents coach him on how to avoid confrontation, and his teachers take extra steps to help the other kids understand him, but his troubles escalate, first at school and then at home.

An intensely personal yet epic spiritual journey, THE HORSE BOY follows one Texas couple and their autistic son as they trek on horseback through Outer Mongolia in an attempt to find healing for him.

When two-year-old Rowan was diagnosed with autism, Rupert Isaacson, a writer and former horse trainer, and his wife Kristin Neff, a psychology professor, sought the best possible medical care, but traditional therapies had little effect. Then they discovered that Rowan has a profound affinity for animals—particularly horses—and the family set off on a quest that would change their lives forever.

Mary is a lonely eight-year-old girl who lives with her alcoholic mother, her factory working father, and a pet rooster in the suburbs of Melbourne, Australia; and Max is a forty-four-year old, severely obese man with Asperger's syndrome living in New York City. Two unlikely pen-pals, they share a lengthy long-distance relationship that becomes complicated by Max's mental health issues, which cause problems both physical and emotional.

A simple, haunting musical phrase whistled offscreen tells us that a young girl will be killed. “Who Is the Murderer?” pleads a nearby placard as serial killer Hans Beckert (Peter Lorre) closes in on little Elsie Beckmann . . .

In his harrowing masterwork, Fritz Lang merges trenchant social commentary with chilling suspense, creating a panorama of private madness and public hysteria that to this day remains the blueprint for the psychological thriller.

Paula Vogel's How I Learned to Drive provides a case study in trauma and in the ways one might work through trauma to achieve "post-victim" status. Vogel refracts the story of sexual abuse through Li'l Bit, a narrator-protagonist who exercises control over her past experiences by dramaturgically manipulating them in the present performance. The key components that enable her adult control over her childhood trauma are forgiveness on her part (of both her Uncle Peck and herself) and witnessing on the audience's part. Li'l Bit's newfound ability to tell her story on her own terms and have that story witnessed in performance allows her to begin the healing process.

The life of an orchestra musician is marvelous. Mozart, Schubert and Strauss surround you. All day long you hear beautiful music. What other people pay a lot of money for, you get paid to do. You are gifted, you bring joy into people's lives, everybody loves you. And chances are high, you are an alcoholic, lonely, and burnt out.

Musicians have the third most stressful profession worldwide topped only by air traffic controllers and emergency room doctors. Their working hours are antisocial, their lives lonesome. And work demands from them constant negotiating with something, some of them need in order to perform and others have to fight in order to perform. Musicians have described all kinds of stage fright: ice-cold fingers, trembling limbs, racing heartbeats, minds gone blank.

Studies show that 20 to 30 per cent of all musicians take some form of medication to alleviate their stage fright. A little drink or two, downers or any of many drugs and it's gone. That's the easy way out. Others start with psychoanalysis: What do I expect from myself? What is happening during performance and where does it come from? But the struggle against it is not always easy. It is a long one and sometimes it is lost. And stage fright often leads to further psychosomatic diseases.

Never before has a film dealt with this terrible curse in all of its facets. We will also use a certain amount of tongue in cheek. Yet the blight remains painful for those who suffer from it. It is hard to live with and even harder to overcome.

Anxiety is normal, and every performer is familiar with its physiological symptoms. But it does not have to negatively affect your performance. Learn about Quiet Eye training and how it can be applied in a variety of athletic or artistic situations. QE techniques can help draw internal attention away from anxiety and refocus attention on the critical physical actions of performance.

Crazy…or wise? Indigenous cultures address "mental illnesses" quite differently from western societies. Are symptoms a ‘calling’ to grow or just a ‘broken brain’? The documentary CRAZYWISE explores what can be learned from people around the world who have turned their psychological crisis into a positive transformative experience.

During a quarter-century documenting indigenous cultures, human-rights photographer and filmmaker Phil Borges often saw these cultures identify "psychotic" symptoms as an indicator of shamanic potential. He was intrigued by how differently psychosis is defined and treated in the West.

Through interviews with renowned mental health professionals, Phil explores the growing severity of the mental health crisis in America dominated by biomedical psychiatry. He discovers a growing movement of professionals and psychiatric survivors who demand alternative treatments that focus on recovery, nurturing social connections, and finding meaning.

In the Bolivian highlands an English doctor is setting up a network of health care for remote mountain villages. While teaching the inhabitants the essentials of Western medicine the doctor is confronted with and tries to learn the methods of the local curandero’s methods of healing. The film is a highly revealing document of the encounter of different approaches to illness and is particularly suited for the teaching of Medical Anthropology.