I’m overwhelmed by
everyone’s thoughtful and impassioned responses to the prompt of Race in
Theatre. A number of you mentioned the universality of story and helped to lift
up the idea that an ”every man” story
can and should by portrayed by “any
man.” While recognizing that there is an ever important and relevant place for
cultural storytelling, several of you noted that it gets dicey in the Western
world when that becomes the singular expected product from persons of color. One
conclusion was common throughout everyone’s posts: change is desperately
necessary and must be imminent. The following summaries (and stand-out quotes)
will highlight possible “road signs” that could lead us towards that place of
change. Your offerings create a wonderful bouquet of possibilities. The future
smells so much sweeter know that the nine of you will emerge from this
institution with the convictions and enlightened expressions you have shared. Let
us go forth!
Mark speaks of the “overdetermined quality” of the diversity
issue in theatre. That is to say, “there are more causes present than are
necessary to cause the effect.” He then goes on to explain that by virtue of
that fact, and the reality that there are so many collaborative stakeholders
involved in making theatre, the burden of creating change rests on all parties. It takes the entire
village, so to speak, and Mark notes that the process is altogether tedious,
gradual, and important. This directly connects to his opening declaration that
culturally specific theatre companies/initiatives are indeed still necessary if
the goal is to create and maintain sustainably representative theatre.
Dharmik hits us with some cold, hard data from
the U.S. Census website regarding race percentages in the United States, but
makes a strong and heartfelt shift to focus more on the issue of casting actors
that are assumed to be “automatically authentic” (as Herrara puts it) based on
physical appearance. To be more specific, he takes issue with specific “race designation”
being included in a casting call unless it is a story that is specifically
about that particular ethnic/racial group. Although he doesn’t seem hopeful
that this change will happen, Dharmik ends by offering thoughts on what might
be a solution to this issue of flawed selection and unbalanced representation.
Sarah shares a bit of her personal journey and how she has
maneuvered the anthropologic gaze…and perhaps how it maneuvered her at times.
In beautiful openness she talks of how both her lenses to view the world and
self-imposed responsibility of serving as an “authority on the ‘African
Experience’” were changed when she viewed Lupita N’yongo’s speech on black
beauty at a Hollywood Essence event. The necessity of an artist to have their
work deemed credible, especially if what that artist’s cultural aesthetic (based
on physicality) can offer is seen before what their mind/craft has to offer, is
why Sarah feels culturally specific establishments are still in desperate need.
Erica shifts our focus to perspective and the universality of
the human experience. After reading her post it almost is a microcosm of the
very process by which she proposes positive change might happen in the theatre
world regarding race representation. After questioning if her dream to produce
a robust and ethnically diverse theatre season may be naïve, she pushes forward
and delves into how that might be approached on the university level. Rather
than employing coalitional casting, she feels that a curriculum that exposes
young actors to the variety of cultural perspectives from which universally
relatable stories can be told may prove to enlighten young artists, letting
them know that stories can (and should) be told differently than they’ve been
historically told. By the end of her post, it seems Erica found a bit of hope
that her ideal theatre company maybe isn’t just a dream. 
In his blog
post, Mike uses an example from his
undergrad experience to explain why he feels coalitional casting is sort of an
“easy out.” Rather than their production
of Statements After an Arrest Under the
Immorality Act being about the illegal relationship between a white, female
librarian and a married black man, it instead became about how brave the two white actors were for appearing naked on
stage for most of the show. He states that this left the play with almost no
purpose. Certainly not the purpose the playwright intended. Mike says that reassessment of university structure
and season selection need to take place if shows cannot be cast in such a way
that ethnic-specific casting (if integral to the story) cannot be honored. No
easy outs to scratch a “we realllly wanna do this” itch. Mike simply says to
make a different choice.
Andréa presents a somewhat more optimistic
view of the agency of coalitional casting. She shares that Ybarra’s creation of
the term/practice relied heavily on the actor’s commitment to the cause of
“telling a marginalized story…someone else’s story. And it requires realizing
that no single story is universal unless every story is.” Drea states that if
handled correctly and ethically, coalitional casting can increase exposure and
work towards making diverse representation a reality. She also acknowledges
trepidation surrounding the “code of honor” central to coalitional casting that,
by virtue of financial reasons or even irrationally cathartic desires, could be
glazed over. As a woman of color, she shares how she has been the subject of
pan-Latinx casting (both to fruitful and not fruitful ends) and the
frustrations that accompany it. She stresses how, even in those circumstances,
it is important to be a culturally sensitive ally.
Lisa begins by taking a look at Ybarra’s definition of
coalitional casting and teases out the idea of privilege for us a bit. Torn by
the word itself, she referred to a New York Times article and quote from
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie that “privilege blinds, because it’s in its nature to
blind,” as she searched for answers. In the end she concludes by asking whether
one can truly find equality without understanding one’s own privilege. In part
two of her post, she shares her process and involvement in casting a high
school production of Fiddler on the Roof.
The majority of the student population was “Hispanic” and she questions if she
misrepresented the show by “choosing and directing it with a demographic of
students that wasn’t physically, culturally, or experientially authentic.” She
views the show as one with a universal story of suffering and searching for what’s
most important in life. There’s that word again – universal. She doesn’t answer
her questions within the post, yet is grateful for the contributions of Ybarra
and Herrara to the topic of diversified ethnic representation in theatre.
Emily offers a colorful, media-filled response to this week’s
prompt about Race. She begins by using Amber Ruffin’s “safe space” to
illustrate the dangers of the anthropological gaze and contends that
institutions that are culturally centered help foster artistic freedom, safety,
inspiration, and camaraderie among marginalized groups. Emily continues her
discussion by sharing how some minorities who are “fed-up” with ethnic
pigeon-holing react to troubling monochromatic casting calls and respond by re-creating
blockbuster movie posters with people of color in them. Why Photoshop in this
way? With minorities making up 40% of the U.S. population yet only being
represented in 16.7% of Hollywood roles, that initiative was undertaken as a
way to finally see for themselves and show the world what people of color would
like in leading roles of mainstream movies. She ends by sharing some worth
while links to Alex Chester’s blog “The White-List Cabaret is About to Flip the
Script” and a 2013 guide written by Alex Lew entitled, “How to Cast Actors of
Color.”
Austin brings us home by jumping directly
into identifying what he feels is the root of the problem: racism that
continues to persist and re-emerge in various forms in this country. He shares
that on Broadway both audience and casting clock-in at nearly 85% white – “Art
that exists in an echo chamber,” as he puts it. Austin included a potent
3-minute video of Tim Wise that in no way sugarcoats the development of the
historical pedigree of racism in the U.S. This further drives home his point
that there is a fundamental American framework that is terribly flawed yet
constantly reinforced. He even begins to write about how capitalism plays a
part in propagating marginalization, then concludes by stating that this issue
is “too large to do an sort of justice to” in a post. Instead he says it’s time
to roll up our sleeves and get to work on dismantling the current power
structure that’s in place.
