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THE EXTENSIVE
The Academy “extensive”: that’s what Peter Jewett, our board chair, dubbed the 2021 Slaight Family Academy Intensive. I thought it entirely apropos. Two things became abundantly clear through our process: nothing replaces in-person learning; and the virtual world provides unique opportunities and outreach — take advantage of it! Engaging with virtual learning allowed us to expand our annual training program in several ways. First, and most dramatically, we increased our attendance. Where normally we have between eight and twelve participants, this year we had sixty-three! The elimination of distance, was the second bonus: we were able to bring teaching artists from the UK, from Pittsburgh, from Chicago, from Halifax, and from Vancouver. We were able to provide training to artists from Newfoundland, from New York City, and from the Yukon. I think that both artist and educator were relieved to “stay at home” under the current circumstances. The programming began with core classes, as always: voice, movement, scene study. In addition we had singing, puppetry, rhetoric, and accent work. In the evenings, after classes, we held four Symposia on various topics: Indigenizing Musical Theatre - Dillan Meighan Chiblow, Anishnaabe actor/singer/storyteller
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Extensive
in conversation with the Shaw’s Julie Lumsden; and Writing as Creative Process - Governor General’s Literary Award winning playwright, Hiro Kanagawa, in conversation with The Shaw’s Kate Hennig, were broadcast live on YouTube. The Actor and Universal Law, with life coach and inspiration speaker Claire Lautier; and Gender Identity in Theatre, with gender consultant and theatre maker Josephine Kearns, were each broadcast on Zoom. With the help of our communications and education departments we reached out to training programs across North America, and, though it’s hard to say how far afield we were broadcasting, we did reach about 300 people in all. Zoom fatigue is real, and everyone was pretty bleary-eyed by the time the wrap party happened on Saturday night. But, all in all, despite trying to do movement class in one’s apartment, and trying to do voice class with the mute on, and endlessly dealing with “freezing” and “dropping out”, we all managed, quite miraculously, to pull off an exceptional two weeks of connection, practice, learning, and contribution. So grateful.
In addition to the ongoing support of The Slaight Family Foundation, the Shaw Festival gratefully acknowledges a generous bequest from Ada Slaight earlier this year.
Quick Facts
2 weeks of online classes 63 participants on 17 courses 300 attendees of 4 symposia A virtual wrap party - BYOP (bring your own pizza)
The Monologue Jam — A new initiative
In the early autumn, as the pandemic was in a bit of a trough before the second wave, I was feeling compassion for the young people who were planning on entering their professional lives as actors in 2020, some of whom we would normally be auditioning at this time. So I came up with a two-stage initiative we called the Monologue Jam. The first stage consisted of individual monologues in a group setting. We received 130 applicants, and saw 115 of these in Zoom rooms of 14-16 actors each session. Actors prepared a two minute monologue of their choice. The sessions were one hour in length, and actors attended the entire session observing their peers at work. From this initial group I chose 40 actors for the second stage. This was a virtual acting class, with 8 participants in each session, led by Tim Carroll and Kimberley Rampersad. For this second stage the young actors had one week to prepare a two minute monologue of George Bernard Shaw. In the end, Tim Carroll, Kimberley Rampersad, and I agreed on sixteen young actors that were given “honourable mention”. It was later decided that due to the unique “virtual” circumstances of this year’s Slaight Family Academy Intensive these young artists would be invited to apply for courses and continue to work within this Shaw Program. Of the sixteen, fourteen were able to participate.
Participants from Monologue Jam
Previous page: Puppetry class with Mike Petersen. This page: Kalarippayattu with Brandy Leary (bottom left hand corner of lowest picture). All photos captured by Kate Hennig.
Alison Beckwith Owen Boucher Jack Copland Brynn Godenir Ray Jacildo Karthik Kadam David Klein Erin Loretta Mackey Jawon Mapp Francis Masaba Izzy Nagel Anni Ramsay Elena Reyes Iris Rhian My pal Dillan Chiblow and I took our usual topic of conversation public exploring the future possibilities and opportunities of bringing the Indigenous experience into line with new, old and yet to be created musicals. We were humbled to see over 150 artists, friends, and community members tune in to watch. We were even more grateful for the thoughtful questions that flooded in in the final 30 minutes of the chat. The possibilities of Indigenizing theatre are endless, as we discussed that night, and there is not one right way to move forward, but many, especially with the support of those who watched, reached out and participated in our Symposia talk. We are all moving the needle for Seven Generations from now. Maarsii to all who joined us!” — Julie Lumsden
Series: Andrew Broderick participates in Esie Mensah’s Movement and Intention class.
2021 Slaight Family Academy Intensive Team
Kate Hennig Director of Artist Development Jeff Cummings Planning Director Stephanie Filippi Company Manager Meredith Macdonald Production Stage Manager Michelle Mohammed Communications Assistant
Teaching Artists
Brandy Leary Kalarippayattu Tim Carroll TC Class
Kate Hennig Voice and Text
Alexis Milligan Speaking in Silence Suba Sankaran South Indian Singing and Rhythm Kimberley Rampersad Scene Study - Shaw Ausar Stewart Free Your Voice
Graeme Somerville The Word Hoard
Mike Petersen Puppetry Esie Mensah Movement and Intension
Paul Sportelli Song Interpretation Marcus Youssef Character, Self, and Other Edda Sharpe How to Do Accents
Jaz Fairy J Movement and Imagination Philip Akin Scene Study - Suzan-Lori Parks Nova Bhattacharya Playlists for Practice Selma Dimitrijevic Scene Study - Ella Hickson
