Post by blackcrowheart on Jul 5, 2007 8:26:42 GMT -5
Theater programs help Natives find their voice
Ojibwe writer Drew Hayden Taylor seems to easily command words into
stories.
He's written 17 books - one on Indian erotica is in the works - but his
greatest passion is making words dance on the actor's stage.
Nearly the entire month of March at the Autry National Center in Los
Angeles will be devoted to Taylor's latest play, "The Berlin Blues,"
which is in the production draft stage, meaning the playwright's script
is being acted on stage for the first time.
"Berlin Blues" is about a plan to build Ojibwe World - the world's
largest Indian theme park - on a Canadian reserve.
The theater company works all year with writers of all ages from across
the country.
To write a play is more than putting dialogue on paper. The words must
translate on stage in action and movement.
It typically takes 18 months to two years to get a play ready for an
audience, said Jean Bruce Scott, executive director of Native Voices at
the Autry.
The Autry has worked with Native playwrights for the past six years. It
offers several programs to help plays come alive, starting with the
writing to actors reading the script to the final production. Aspiring
and veteran playwrights can be a part of the program through a
competitive script selection or by attending regular script seminars.
Accomplished and aspiring playwrights should send scripts to Native
Voices at the Autry, which accepts them all year long. Scott encourages
writers to have scripts in polished draft form. The theater has drawn
more than 300 play submissions.
Each spring, five playwrights are selected for a weeklong retreat. An
additional eight to 10 writers are brought to Los Angeles for other
seminars. The goal is to let professional actors bring the plays to
life.
The company also reaches out to neophyte playwrights through its Young
Native Voices: Theater Education Project.
The project has been taken to the Coeur d'Alene Reservation in Idaho,
where kids wrote nearly a dozen 10-minute plays, which they performed at
six venues, including the University of Idaho and a performance on the
reservation.
The theater company has been a springboard for young writers like Rhiana
Yazzie, a Navajo from Albuquerque, N.M.
The 30-year-old was recently invited to the Kennedy Center's New
Visions, New Voices Theatre for Young Audiences to further refine her
play, "Wild Horses," a play about a 12-year-old girl who is Tongva, a
tribe indigenous to the Los Angeles area.
Yazzie said she wanted her play to break the Los Angeles myth of being
an area belonging only to "blondes, convertibles and palm trees."
Yazzie has since been named a Jerome Fellow and is spending a year in
Minneapolis working on her plays. The playwright graduate credits the
Autry for supporting her after completing her master's degree.
"When I found Native Voices, I found a whole community of voices that
shared two things, the love of the art of theater and playwrighting -
and they shared my cultural background. There was a lot less explaining
I had to do about my plays."
Her Autry experience helped her compete nationally.
"That's why I'm in Minneapolis now," she said. "It's a really
prestigious fellowship that they give to five playwrights every year."
The theater has been a natural draw for her. "The thing I'm really
connected to is, I'm much better at telling stories and dramatizing them
through dialogue."
She encourages others to nurture their creative seed. People shouldn't
be intimated about theater; it's not all Shakespeare.
"If you have an inclination, nurture it. Develop your own voice, develop
your own confidence and your ability to make art in this form," the
blooming playwright said. "Native Voices can help that."
Ojibwe writer Drew Hayden Taylor seems to easily command words into
stories.
He's written 17 books - one on Indian erotica is in the works - but his
greatest passion is making words dance on the actor's stage.
Nearly the entire month of March at the Autry National Center in Los
Angeles will be devoted to Taylor's latest play, "The Berlin Blues,"
which is in the production draft stage, meaning the playwright's script
is being acted on stage for the first time.
"Berlin Blues" is about a plan to build Ojibwe World - the world's
largest Indian theme park - on a Canadian reserve.
The theater company works all year with writers of all ages from across
the country.
To write a play is more than putting dialogue on paper. The words must
translate on stage in action and movement.
It typically takes 18 months to two years to get a play ready for an
audience, said Jean Bruce Scott, executive director of Native Voices at
the Autry.
The Autry has worked with Native playwrights for the past six years. It
offers several programs to help plays come alive, starting with the
writing to actors reading the script to the final production. Aspiring
and veteran playwrights can be a part of the program through a
competitive script selection or by attending regular script seminars.
Accomplished and aspiring playwrights should send scripts to Native
Voices at the Autry, which accepts them all year long. Scott encourages
writers to have scripts in polished draft form. The theater has drawn
more than 300 play submissions.
Each spring, five playwrights are selected for a weeklong retreat. An
additional eight to 10 writers are brought to Los Angeles for other
seminars. The goal is to let professional actors bring the plays to
life.
The company also reaches out to neophyte playwrights through its Young
Native Voices: Theater Education Project.
The project has been taken to the Coeur d'Alene Reservation in Idaho,
where kids wrote nearly a dozen 10-minute plays, which they performed at
six venues, including the University of Idaho and a performance on the
reservation.
The theater company has been a springboard for young writers like Rhiana
Yazzie, a Navajo from Albuquerque, N.M.
The 30-year-old was recently invited to the Kennedy Center's New
Visions, New Voices Theatre for Young Audiences to further refine her
play, "Wild Horses," a play about a 12-year-old girl who is Tongva, a
tribe indigenous to the Los Angeles area.
Yazzie said she wanted her play to break the Los Angeles myth of being
an area belonging only to "blondes, convertibles and palm trees."
Yazzie has since been named a Jerome Fellow and is spending a year in
Minneapolis working on her plays. The playwright graduate credits the
Autry for supporting her after completing her master's degree.
"When I found Native Voices, I found a whole community of voices that
shared two things, the love of the art of theater and playwrighting -
and they shared my cultural background. There was a lot less explaining
I had to do about my plays."
Her Autry experience helped her compete nationally.
"That's why I'm in Minneapolis now," she said. "It's a really
prestigious fellowship that they give to five playwrights every year."
The theater has been a natural draw for her. "The thing I'm really
connected to is, I'm much better at telling stories and dramatizing them
through dialogue."
She encourages others to nurture their creative seed. People shouldn't
be intimated about theater; it's not all Shakespeare.
"If you have an inclination, nurture it. Develop your own voice, develop
your own confidence and your ability to make art in this form," the
blooming playwright said. "Native Voices can help that."