Episode 70: Out Youth Theater – Revelatory Experience for Performers and Audience

The Theater Offensive presents the diversity of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer lives in art so bold it breaks through personal isolation, challenges the status quo, and builds thriving communities. Evelyn Francis, Interim Artistic Director, discusses their youth program – a national model for creative youth development – where young people not only create original work and share it back to the community, but are true partners in developing a range of expanded opportunities within the program.

Evelyn Francis. Photo by Joel Benjamin.Evelyn Francis, Interim Artistic Director at The Theater Offensive, is a theatre artist, award-winning educator, and established arts administrator with experience working directly with over 10 Boston area arts organizations. Evelyn’s M.A. in Theatre Education from Emerson College culminated in a thesis, which examined the effects of devised work in the lives of LGBTQ youth.
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Episode 59: Listen, Present, and Repeat

David C. Howse, Executive Director of ArtsEmerson, shares how ‘curatorial listening’ leads to better community partnerships in developing programming and initiatives. He also discusses the benefits afforded institutions that shift their imagination in ways that allow them to see the world and ultimately benefit from the world in a much more magical way.

David Howse. Photo by Asia Kepka.David C. Howse joined ArtsEmerson as executive director in 2015 and is fiscally and administratively responsible for multiple cultural venues in Downtown Boston. Prior he served as executive director of Boston Children’s Chorus (BCC), where he was instrumental in helping grow BCC from a pilot project serving 20 kids in 2003 to a vibrant organization educating more than 500 singers in 12 choirs in 5 locations.
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Episode 58: Removing Barriers for Theatregoers

Meg O’Brien, Interim Co-Director of Education at Huntington Theatre Company, discusses their long-standing commitment to universal participation. She shares how the Huntington makes productions accessible for patrons with hearing or vision difficulties, and how they’re expanding ways to integrate accessibility into performance models and schedules.

Meg O'BrienMeg O’Brien is in her 10th season at the Huntington Theatre Company, currently serving as one of two Interim Co-Directors of Education.  She has also served as the Manager of Education Operations & Access Coordinator at the Huntington Theatre Company.  Meg is an actor, dancer, singer, director, producer, and stage manager; however, her passion lives with Theatre Education, which she quickly fell in love with when she was in college.  For the past 15 years, Meg has made her living teaching students of all ages about the world of the theater. Continue reading “Episode 58: Removing Barriers for Theatregoers”

Episode 49: Youth Community Built on Firsts

Julie Lichtenberg, Director of The Performance Project, and Artistic Director of First Generation Ensemble, discusses their approach to creative youth development work, including their commitment to inclusion and peer mentoring.

The Performance Project’s First Generation brings together young adults ages 14-23 for intensive artistic training, leadership development, and inter-generational mentoring. Forming an artistic ensemble, the First Generation youth create original multi-lingual physical theater performances based on their discoveries.

Julie LichtenbergJulie Lichtenberg, cultural activist, theater and visual artist, has worked in community settings as a teacher, performer, and director, incorporating visual art and physical theater since 1980. She has taught graduate and undergraduate visual art, performed with Beholders Puppet Theater, studied physical theater with Tony Montanero, Sigfrido Aguilar in Mexico, and collaborated with Teatro Mito y Realidad in Chicago.
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Episode 42: Oops, We Didn’t Do a Feasibility Study

Jeffry George, Executive Artistic Director of the Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater, shares the pitfalls of NOT having a feasibility study in place before building a new facility.

Jeffrey GeorgeJeffry George, Executive Artistic Director Wellfleet Harbor Actors Theater (WHAT), has ​thirty plus years of ​administrative and management experience in numerous AEA theatres throughout the U.S.  He most recently directed the world premiere of The Empaths, Sex with Strangers, Alabama Story, Cock, Thrill Me and co-directed A Midsummer Night’s Dream at WHAT, and Suppressed Desires for the “Then and Now Festival” in Provincetown, A Centennial Celebration of the Provincetown Players.
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