My mental image of street theatre before this class was of shock theatre, being incomprehensible in public spaces just for the sake of not being understood. Over the past few weeks, I've seen a wide range of other possibilities, from the theatre that goes directly to its audience of El Teatro Campesino to the parade-and-circus celebrations of Bread and Puppet Theater. Talking with Peg Millett gave a wonderful historical perspective to the way activist theatre has changed over the past fifty years as well. Overall, I do have some issues with the history of street theatre but I am excited about the many new directions it could go.
Street theatre has many historical barriers to overcome. When the idea caught hold in the '60s, people would stop and watch because it was so unusual to see anything artistic in public space. As it became more of a usual occurrence, artists tried to maintain that audience attention by becoming shocking. I believe that at this point in history that strategy has backfired by creating the impression that all street theatre is propaganda and intended to be painful for the audience. People in public spaces, especially in urban public spaces, are already feeling defensive, on guard against people asking for money or petition signatures. Street theatre that tries to get attention through shock value will backfire by increasing defensiveness in the intended audience.
Police are also a much bigger concern for street artists than they were 50 years ago. It was fascinating hearing Peg Millett's stories of how police simply had no idea what to do, and the local sheriffs didn't even mind. Now, police seem to see street theatre as a "gateway drug" of vandalism and violence and treat it equivalently. To exist, street theatre cannot look threatening to authority figures as well as passers-by.
However, I don't think these are a death blow or even a significant threat to street theatre. The mere existence of street theatre, regardless of the political goals of a particular performance, is a political statement creating a space that is not commercialized or passive and creates community and a space that is truly public. By not charging admission for the chance to witness art, street theatre regardless of content speaks against capitalism as inevitable and against commercialization of art as inevitable. By watching street theatre, people participate in a gift economy. Street theatre also re-creates public space as truly public, not something you're allowed to pass through on your way somewhere else.
One of the things I like least about professional theatre is that it creates passivity in an audience. Regardless of how political or unsettling the content of a play is, the audience can only absorb, not change, the message. They may take something away from the performance or they may not, but they certainly don't have to. With street theatre, the audience is encompassed in the performance. There is nothing stopping passers-by from joining or interfering with the performance. Even if people simply stop and become an audience, they then become part of the performance for other audience members. If you see a group of people standing and watching something, it immediately becomes more interesting.
Street theatre creates community. Whether someone participates in, watches or ignores the performance it creates public ownership of a space and a defined group that share the same space and time for the event. It creates a connection between everyone the performance touches: we were here for this experience. What you see in public space becomes what you talk about with your coworkers over the water cooler, recreated, transformed and personalized.
The idea of public celebration for social change fascinates me. My impression is that many of the street theatre ensembles that continue to be successful today use celebration more than shock in their work. I do think the line between celebration and supporting the status quo is a fine line to walk, and one our class walked very close to during our community lunch performance. I do feel like we surprised and pleased some people who thought they were just there to eat and move on, and certainly community lunch is worth celebrating, but I'm not sure what the status quo was that we might have tried to disrupt.
More in general, I believe the creation of community and reclamation of public space inherent in public celebration is more often a challenge to the status quo than not. A lot of the theatre work I would like to do in this class and in the rest of my life involves those two political issues. Celebration also seems like an ideal way to increase the receptiveness of a cynical and apathetic audience, and to involve even the most defensive authority figure in positive community. Celebration is about letting your guard down and reaching out. I believe that is essential to true communication necessary for social change.