“And then I know. I am not an actor, I am a priest, I am a conjurer, helping the people to their own prayer,
sentient first then passing it on. This is a holy place this theatre.
It is where we can dream and build our worlds together. This is sacred business.”
Omi Osun Joni L. Jones, Theatrical Jazz: Performance, Asé, and the Power of the Present Moment
sentient first then passing it on. This is a holy place this theatre.
It is where we can dream and build our worlds together. This is sacred business.”
Omi Osun Joni L. Jones, Theatrical Jazz: Performance, Asé, and the Power of the Present Moment
REPERTOIRE OF COURSES
TH293B BROWN PAPER STUDIO: An Applied Theater Process
Brown Paper Studio is an applied theater methodology. The name derives from the practice of posting large sheets of brown paper on studio walls and encouraging participants to write and express themselves freely as the company engages in theater games, exercises, and improvisations towards devising original scripts for performance. VIEW GALLERY>>>
SYLLABUS>>>
STUDENT TESTIMONIALS>>>
Brown Paper Studio is an applied theater methodology. The name derives from the practice of posting large sheets of brown paper on studio walls and encouraging participants to write and express themselves freely as the company engages in theater games, exercises, and improvisations towards devising original scripts for performance. VIEW GALLERY>>>
SYLLABUS>>>
STUDENT TESTIMONIALS>>>
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https://vimeo.com/114253585/5b13325b4b https://vimeo.com/114253586/3bbff4512c https://vimeo.com/127856833/f6c7e9939e
Videos by Brown Paper Studio Class of 2014
“A liberated society and person is one that can hold the truth of different ways, perspectives and mind states at once, where there is a complete acceptance of the way things are that also holds a prophetic vision of how things could be.”
framing deep change: essays on transformative social change
angel Kyodo Williams, ed.
framing deep change: essays on transformative social change
angel Kyodo Williams, ed.
TH190H ACTING FUNDAMENTALS: Finding Yourself Onstage (HONORS)
Acting Fundamentals: Finding Yourself Onstage introduces the basics of acting technique to students with no previous theater background and for those who are more experienced performers. Key to our work is creating an environment that encourages each participant’s ability to trust their impulses by connecting fully to the body as the instrument of creativity.
SYLLABUS>>>
STUDENT TESTIMONIALS>>>
Acting Fundamentals: Finding Yourself Onstage introduces the basics of acting technique to students with no previous theater background and for those who are more experienced performers. Key to our work is creating an environment that encourages each participant’s ability to trust their impulses by connecting fully to the body as the instrument of creativity.
SYLLABUS>>>
STUDENT TESTIMONIALS>>>
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TH190H Showcase (Video: Jason Beckett)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=af-C7gBopjY Student Testimonials Begin at 22:05 |
UMass Dept of Theater Video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGxnb7VCRqA Featuring Professor Al-Bilali teaching her TH190H class |
“I truly believe there is nothing larger than life”.
Uta Hagen, A Challenge for the Actor
Uta Hagen, A Challenge for the Actor
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TH298P PERFORMANCE + RESEARCH
Performance + Research is an intensive studio practicum class with a dual focus; to develop techniques and practices towards building a performing ensemble and to adapt selected texts and/or historical source material for the stage. SYLLABUS>>> STUDENT TESTIMONIALS>>> |
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“In order for something of quality to take place, an empty space needs to be created.
An empty space makes it possible for a new phenomenon to come to life,
for anything that touches on content, meaning, expression, language
and music can exist only if the experience is fresh and new”
Peter Brook, The Open Door
An empty space makes it possible for a new phenomenon to come to life,
for anything that touches on content, meaning, expression, language
and music can exist only if the experience is fresh and new”
Peter Brook, The Open Door
TH393N DEVISED
Devised Theater is a collaborative process of creating original work by a group of artists including designers, dramaturgs and director who are also the performers. In the past sixty years this approach to theater-making has increased among professional companies and more recently has gained popularity in the fields of education and community engagement. SYLLABUS>>> STUDENT TESTIMONIALS>>> “What the times demand, and in an unprecedented fashion, is that one be
- not seem - outrageous, independent, anarchical. That one be thoroughly disciplined - as a means of being spontaneous. That one resist at whatever cost the fearful pressures placed on one to lie about one's own experience. For in the same way that the writer (artist) scarcely ever had a more uneasy time, [s/he/they] have never been needed more." James Baldwin, 1959 |
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TH680 - GROUP STUDIO (GRADUATE)
Group Studio is a practical workshop centered on a collaborative project where graduate level designers, dramaturgs and directors create an original piece for presentation at the end of the semester. The primary objective of the class is to develop a shared vocabulary and common creative experiences in the process of transforming text or ideas into a performed event.
SYLLABUS>>>
STUDENT TESTIMONIALS>>>
Group Studio is a practical workshop centered on a collaborative project where graduate level designers, dramaturgs and directors create an original piece for presentation at the end of the semester. The primary objective of the class is to develop a shared vocabulary and common creative experiences in the process of transforming text or ideas into a performed event.
SYLLABUS>>>
STUDENT TESTIMONIALS>>>
“There is no possible freedom, I believe, if the people working together on a show have not previously known each other.
I come back to that human reality which is indispensable to artistic reality. To me the unity and quality of a performance, particularly if the play is one of style,
depends mainly on the quality and unity which should exist in the company before work on the play begins”
Michel St. Denis, Theatre: The Rediscovery of Style
I come back to that human reality which is indispensable to artistic reality. To me the unity and quality of a performance, particularly if the play is one of style,
depends mainly on the quality and unity which should exist in the company before work on the play begins”
Michel St. Denis, Theatre: The Rediscovery of Style
ARTS & CULTURE IN SOUTH AFRICA 2014 & 2015
In summers 2014 and 2015, Prof. Al-Bilali co-lead this course with her colleague, Dr. Megan Lewis. The course uses the performing arts as a lens through which to examine questions of social justice, race, class and gender politics, history, language, memory, and the role of the arts in our global world. Focused around the National Arts Festival that takes place over ten days in Grahamstown, South Africa, students experience the second largest theatre festival in the world (outside Edinburgh in Scotland) and the largest in the southern hemisphere.
Visit theatreinafrica.weebly.com
In summers 2014 and 2015, Prof. Al-Bilali co-lead this course with her colleague, Dr. Megan Lewis. The course uses the performing arts as a lens through which to examine questions of social justice, race, class and gender politics, history, language, memory, and the role of the arts in our global world. Focused around the National Arts Festival that takes place over ten days in Grahamstown, South Africa, students experience the second largest theatre festival in the world (outside Edinburgh in Scotland) and the largest in the southern hemisphere.
Visit theatreinafrica.weebly.com
