Flipping the Script on Stigma: Scenes from the June 23 MWPHA Workshop - Alana Black and Charlotte Malerich

When someone says the word "theater," what comes to your mind? Entertainment? An escape from reality? An unfolding story that, no matter how intriguing it may be, you can only watch?

Though theater played a key role in the MWPHA workshop held on June 23, the event was about as far from a passive, reality-eschewing experience as it could possibly be…though it was entertaining at times!

Entitled “Flip the Script on Stigma and Mental Illness: End the Prejudice and Discrimination,” the workshop was a collaboration between the MWPHA and two other organizations: Promethean Community, which utilizes theater techniques to help community members find new ways to relate to each other, and the Stoddert Terrace–Fort Dupont Residents’ Council, which is composed of representatives from two public housing complexes in the District and focuses on residents’ rights and collective well-being. The workshop was held at the complexes’ shared community center.

The event opened with a greeting from Kenneth Council, president of the Residents’ Council, followed by remarks from Andres Marquez-Lara, founder and president of Promethean Community. Kenneth welcomed the community members and public health workers alike who had showed up that morning, and Andres described the rules and the agenda of the workshop, which were heavily influenced by “theater of the oppressed” (TO).

Originally developed by theater practitioner Augusto Boal and based on the research of educator Paulo Freire, theater of the oppressed lets members of a community use theater as a way to promote social action and change. While there are various techniques within TO, the June 23 workshop was inspired by forum theater, a technique where a performance that depicts an oppressive situation is performed in front of an audience, called “spect-actors”. After the first performance, the scene is performed again, but this time the scene can be changed by the spect-actors. If they choose not to change the performance, the scene goes to its natural tragic ending. If they choose to change it, all they have to do is yell “Stop!” and suggest a new course of action for the protagonist, or insert a supportive element in the scene. The spect-actors cannot do away with the oppressive elements, but they can help the protagonist navigate them. The proposed changes must be realistic.

To get comfortable with each other and to mentally prepare for the day ahead, participants took part in a series of icebreakers. First, Andres had everyone pair up and play Rock, Paper, Scissors. Whoever won the best two out of three in each pair went on to challenge the winner of another pair, as would be expected. However, in a twist, the loser of each pair was to become “the biggest fan of the winner,” and they would follow the winner of their individual pair as his or her cheerleader. By the end of the icebreaker, there were only two competitors and a room full of fans divided evenly among the two. After the final victor was declared, everyone was united in cheering for the one winner; her success was shared by everyone.

Other icebreakers were more directly involved with stigma and mental illness. Andres had workshop participants line up along an imaginary spectrum gauging their comfort with public speaking, talking about mental illness, and willingness and confidence to interject when they observe discrimination and prejudice. Everyone placed themselves on different points of the spectrum depending on the question; no one was equally comfortable or uncomfortable with every situation mentioned. This allowed participants to see their relationship to others in the criteria that was being used.

The last icebreaker was especially introspective. Participants were encouraged to walk around the room in silence at whatever pace and in whatever direction appealed to them, and to think about how they thought about others in the room. They were then asked to consider the labels they assign to themselves, how they feel about those labels, which labels they want to keep, and which ones they want to cast away; to think of the labels they placed on the other participants in the room, and be mindful of their response to the labels they observed in others. Afterwards, everyone broke into threes to talk about thoughts that came to mind, sharing as much or as little as they were willing to.

Then, it was finally time to get to the scenes. Workshop participants were split into smaller groups based on birth month. Each group had one or two volunteer facilitators, who had met beforehand with Andres in three previous training sessions. The facilitators got the small groups comfortable with one another through an introduction warm-up, then each group got started coming up with a situation and characters for their five-minute skit, which would depict someone with a mental illness who encounters a problem because of stigma or prejudice. Once the group had a story and characters, they rehearsed until they felt it was ready to be performed in public.

Lunch time: over sandwiches and snacks, participants had time to relax and get to know each other better. After lunch, the room was reconfigured into an audience and floor space for the stage, and Andres asked which group wanted to perform first. Hands in the audience shot up eagerly.

Check back tomorrow evening to find out how the remainder of the workshop went!