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Abstract

In early 2021 the National Health Service in England funded the development of ‘Staff Wellbeing Hubs’ to help health and care staff to access wellbeing resources during the Covid-19 pandemic. In the Hub that was set up in the north of England, the therapeutic value of the arts, and of narrative and reflective approaches in helping people cope with adversity and recover from trauma, was recognised from the outset.

This article looks at the impact on a group of ‘front line’ health practitioners who chose to attend an online Playback Theatre event as a way of dealing with their experiences of providing health care during the pandemic. A significant majority (82%) reported that it was a worthwhile experience that they would recommend to their colleagues. Qualitative feedback from participants suggests that Playback Theatre can provide an innovative and valued intervention for collective reflection and sharing, and that it encourages connection, emotional processing, personal healing, and hope.

Authors

Samantha Swift, Assistant Psychologist, North East and North Cumbria ICS Staff Wellbeing Hub

Paras Patel, Senior Researcher, North East and North Cumbria ICS Staff Wellbeing Hub

Angela Kennedy, Clinical Director, North East and North Cumbria ICS
Staff Wellbeing Hub

Steve Nash, Playback Theatre York, Independent Mental Health Consultant

Introduction

The Staff Wellbeing Hub

The Covid-19 pandemic created a unique set of pressures for health and care staff who were trying to continue to provide high quality care, whilst simultaneously managing major changes in service delivery and responding to the needs of service users and colleagues who were experiencing reduced social contact as a consequence of shielding and isolation.

North East and North Cumbria (NENC) Staff Wellbeing Hub was developed in the north of England in January 2021 with funding from the National Health Service, to ensure that support was available to help front line staff to address their individual and collective needs. The Hub provides confidential access to a range of wellbeing resources and to experienced therapists, based on the following five trauma-informed principles:

• Relationships are the basis of recovery: staff want and deserve real contact with experienced mental health experts from the outset
• Whole-system thinking: working productively across agencies to create easy and timely access for staff and to plug any gaps
• Normalisation and strengths-based approach: non-pathologising language and preventative offers for individuals and teams
• Empowerment: a range of good quality offers to choose from, including specialist therapy and confidential self-referral
• Addressing complexity: dealing with the unique and multi-layered nature of staff mental health

Those responsible for developing the Hub felt it was important for staff to have access to a diverse range of activities so that their individual needs and style of coping/processing, could be supported. From the outset the value of the arts and of reflective and narrative approaches in promoting collective healing following adversity and trauma was recognised. Playback Theatre was selected as one of the offers that would be made available and reviewed via a focused evaluation.

How pandemics impact health and care staff

A metanalysis of 38 studies exploring how pandemics impact on staff mental wellbeing found that staff who are working with affected patients, where there is a risk of transmission of virus, had greater levels of both acute and post traumatic and stress (Kisely et al, 2020).Similarly, frontline workers in the UK during the Covid-19 pandemic had higher prevalence rates of depression, anxiety and PTSD compared to the rest of the population (Murphy et al, 2020). In the US, Panchal et al (2020) compared all essential workers in any role or setting compared to non-essential workers, and found that essential workers were more likely to report depression and anxiety (42% vs. 30%, respectively), the onset or increase of substance use (25% vs. 11%), or to have seriously considered suicide in the past 30 days (22% vs. 8%). In a UK poll of 996 healthcare staff 50% reported that their mental health was impacted by the Covid-19 crisis (Thomas & Quilter-Pinner, 2020), with 95% supporting government actions for more support for health and care workers’ mental health.

Evidence of related interventions

i. Communal approaches

Collective approaches to healing following adversity, where groups come together to process events and facilitate support have been shown to be effective (Pinderhughes, Davis, & Williams, 2015, Igreja & Baines, 2019). Theisen-Womersley and Theisen-Womersley (2021) refer to qualitative research on the experiences of people in non western communities who were isolated from their fellows, often under adverse or traumatic circumstances, noting the value of collective recognition and acknowledgement of experience. Reneau and Eanes (2020) considered literature in relation to students with collective experiences of loss and adjustment as an impact of the pandemic lockdown restrictions on work settings. They highlighted the importance of ‘meaning making’ including the reappraisal of beliefs and reflection on events that have occurred. They also recognised that sharing stories with others can be an important way to target the collective pain of the pandemic.

ii. Narrative methods

Narrative approaches are used therapeutically and, in the media, to acknowledge experience and support sense making. They include talking therapies that focus on hearing and understanding a person’s story (White & Epston 1990); systemic therapies that value narratives from multiple perspectives within a family or group (Dallos & Draper, 2010); the use of relational dialogic approaches such as Cognitive Analytic therapy (Ryle & Kerr, 2020), and other methods that emphasise using narratives to facilitate emotional processing or healing. Eyerman, Alexander and Breese (2015) highlight the value of approaches that transform lived experiences into television and written media, requiring a retelling and reconstruction of stories of war and other large scale traumatic events.

iii. Reflective Practice

Reflective practice is recognised as a valued way of providing team support in health and care settings (British Psychological Society, 2007). To support the psychological needs of healthcare staff during the Covid-19 pandemic, space for taking stock was recommended, using trained psychologists to facilitate reflection and processing of experiences (British Psychological Society, 2020). Established reflective practice formats in healthcare include individual supervision, and group based processes. “Schwartz rounds” focus on key topics for staff delivering a service, and the feelings elicited (Robert et. al, 2017, Flanagan et. al, 2020); “Balint Groups” focus on clinical cases, paying attention to the therapeutic relationship (Balint, 1979,1993); and “Taking Care Giving Care rounds” use a structured format to promote compassion for oneself and for others (Flowers et al, 2018, Jones, Waites, Sciar, 2020). All these formats align with Schon’s model (1983), with reflection on action after it has taken place, and each provides space and time to process and take stock of what has happened.

iv. Therapeutic use of drama

Applied theatre and drama therapies have been used to support those with emotional suffering and trauma, often targeting cultural experiences (Leveton, 2010 & Van Der Kolk, 2015). Drama techniques “allow us to speak the unspeakable, experience comfort, compassion and support from others” and ensure that “hope is restored” … (Leveto, 2010). In Taiwan, drama therapy activities were used in counselling groups for college students identified as needing support related to traumatic experiences, life adjustment, and behavioural concerns (Chang Liu & Yang, 2019). Delivered in ten group sessions over six months, these activities had several measurable beneficial impacts, such as increased self-awareness, and self-expression.

v. Performance and healing

A literature review (Heras and Tàbara, 2014) found that drama/performance is a powerful tool for disseminating information, providing a way to reflect as a group and to think critically on a topic. When applied to therapeutic or healing purposes, this was linked to increased freedom of expression and empathy towards others. The study concluded that performance methods appear to serve several potential functions, including integrating knowledge and different perspectives, and communicating complexity, which in turn provides an opportunity for a self-reflective process.

Playback Theatre

Playback Theatre is a performance-based methodology that incorporates many of the beneficial aspects of the therapeutic interventions that are summarised above. Whilst it is not a clinical intervention, Playback Theatre is increasingly recognised as an arts based medium that can help groups and communities explore and address a wide variety of personal, social and cultural issues (Fox and Salas, 2021). Potential wellbeing benefits include promoting healing from collective and individual trauma and personal suffering (Salas, 2020, Munjuluri, et al., 2020). It provides a way of encouraging reflection, witnessing individual experiences, and building group connection and communal understanding (Fox, 2007).

The suitability of Playback Theatre as an offer from the Staff Wellbeing Hub was strengthened by the fact that at the outset of the Covid-19 pandemic, playback practitioners quickly adapted new techniques that allowed the form to be accessed as an online methodology (Rosin, Vogel & Lebron, 2021). This meant that staff could participate in a creative and interactive group activity without breaking the social distancing regulations introduced to reduce the spread of the Covid-19 virus.

Method

The NENC Staff Wellbeing Hub commissioned Playback Theatre York to design and host an intervention for frontline staff working in health and social care settings, with the aim of providing an innovative approach to supporting individual wellbeing as a part of a shared reflective experience. The result was a series of two online performances called “Beyond the mask – your stories seen and heard“.

As this was a new intervention for health and care staff, in addition to being implemented during the Covid-19 pandemic, evaluation was built in to learn more about attendees’ experiences of Playback Theatre and its impact, and to inform its potential future use.

i. Recruitment

An electronic advert was shared via the Hub distribution list, and Hub clinicians also promoted the opportunity with key contacts who acted as “spokes and outreach” leads. Staff attending existing reflection groups (such as Balint groups) were also informed. A promotional video was created to explain what to expect when attending the event. Attendees completed an online form to book a “seat” and a Zoom link giving access to the event was shared via email. Staff could contact Playback Theatre York or the Hub for further information.

ii. Participants

In total, 23 health and care staff attended one of two individual playback performances, the first was held in May 21 and the second in September 2021. Attendees included 11 women and 8 men, with 4 not providing a response for gender, and with a mean age range of 46.5 years. Professional roles were mainly clinical, but included those working in communications, data analysis and public health. 19 attendees were from North East and North Cumbria Health and Care Services, and 4 with employers from other regions.

iii. The online events

The two staff wellbeing interventions each ran for 1.5 hours. After each event (or show), an anonymised online questionnaire containing a mixture of qualitative and quantitative questions was sent to attendees by Playback Theatre York, using email addresses provided when booking a place. All 23 audience members completed this and a further 4 responded to a second evaluation from the NENC Staff Wellbeing Hub. This second survey was only available for the first (May) performance; for the second show the two questionnaires were merged, to simplify the ask made of participants. Questions asked related to the expectations, experiences, and impact of participating in the event.

Results

Quantitative Feedback on the Experience and Impact of Playback Theatre

Twenty-three attendees provided responses on their level of agreement to a set of statements about their experience of participating, selecting one of five response options:

Statements related to the experience of Playback Theatre	Strongly Agree	Agree	Neither agree nor disagree	Disagree	Strongly disagree
I found listening to other people’s stories valuable	80%	16%	4%	0%	0%
Listening to other people’s stories made me feel less isolated	75%	12%	13%	0%	0%
Playback Theatre helped me connect more with my own feelings	80%	12%	8%	0%	0%
Playback Theatre helped me connect with other people’s feelings	67%	24%	4%	0%	4%
I thought this was a worthwhile experience	83%	12%	0%	5%	0%
I would recommend Playback Theatre to my colleagues	80%	16%	0%	4%	0%
I would like to attend another Playback Theatre show in the future	71%	25%	4%	0%	0%

Qualitative Feedback on the Experience of Playback Theatre

After the first show, 4 attendees responded to a Hub survey regarding expectations and the impact of Playback Theatre, and whether needs were met. All reported their expectations had been met, with three stating their needs were also met (one person described not having any needs to be met). No one reported having outstanding needs or distress that the Hub could help with, although one person suggested the need to further develop preventative interventions. All four reported that attending Playback Theatre had no negative impact on them or their capacity to function.

An inductive thematic analysis of this qualitative data was guided by Braune and Clarke’s (2006) six step method. Two researchers from the Hub reviewed the data to identify themes independently for reliability, and then agreed on ten concluding themes.

Themes	Quotes
Connection – includes connection to others in the audience, to the wider community and the story of covid, as well as to themselves and their own experience.	A true sense of feeling connected! Validation of Playback as a powerful form to connect.   Connectedness to the wider story of Covid   Connecting to the emotions of my experience and shared experiences of others. There was nothing in this that did not connect in some way. Thank you.
Reflective process  – the extent to which the experience gave an opportunity for reflection	That playback theatre, is a very powerful reflective tool. The beautiful art mediums of music, dance and theatre, which playback champions, there is a space for reflection and connection. Hearing and seeing my story skilfully played back
Processing emotions – that participation facilitated processing in some way, including thoughts and emotional reactions, and the impact of external events	I think it was a good experience and method to process some difficult experiences. The experiences that people were sharing seemed to come from their experiences and their internalised thoughts about the whole situation. I talked through my wellbeing with a psychologist which was helpful too. This was more dramatic and powerful a form of processing. It helped me access some cathartic method as I don’t have clinical caseness of problems currently which require intervention.
Collective Sharing of Experiences – those with some form of common shared experience, were able to come together to share stories, and this process and hearing others’ experiences was appreciated.	I liked how the experiences that people were sharing were not well rehearsed scripted stories. That we have a shared experience amongst one another. Appreciative of the vulnerability that able to be shown, shared and felt among the group. It has encouraged me to share more…
Validation – of one’s own and others’ experiences, recognising common humanity, with a need to be heard, understood and validated. The sense that a safe space was created, an environment to contain emotional experiences.	Validation of experiences of NHS staff    It helped me to feel acknowledged and created a sense of sharing. It made me feel understood better. You showed how seasoned you are at containing people emotionally.
Increasing awareness of others – Attendees’ comments indicated a theme of increasing awareness of others, both in terms of their experiences and how this has impacted them, and sense of empathy for others.	How important it is to support our health and care staff who have experienced trauma due to working in the pandemic. Empathy towards others. That we have a shared experience amongst one another.
Acknowledging the Playback Theatre Approach – the unique approach of Playback Theatre as an intervention, recognising relational skills. such as sensitivity, kindness, honesty, genuineness, authenticity and respect.   Also recognition of the skilfulness of the performers in delivering an organised and professional show, understanding the stories shared, and performing in a containing and meaningful way. This mostly covered positive appraisals to acknowledge the Playback Theatre approach, though one person provided a contrasting view.	Thank you for the authenticity and respect from the performers. Acknowledgement to the conductor for his honesty and genuine care for people throughout. I was quite blown away by how well organised, orchestrated and delivered by the Playback team – really impressive! At times I found myself thinking it was all a bit weird, the ‘playing out’ of people’s emotions and their experiences that I worried for them in my feeling this discomfort (“are they OK with these people putting their feelings out there?”) but actually you showed how seasoned you are at containing people emotionally … I felt the performance lacked gaiety and energy and felt I had been at a funeral by the end of it. The music was monotonous. I think you can interact with people in an energized way even on painful topics but i didn’t feel you got the rhythm right – at least not for me. It was so professionally hosted. Excellent. I thought the mix of actors/methods improvising stories was really good. Thanks so much to all of the actors who were sensitive and kind.
Positive Experience – comments related to attendance being a positive experience, which is reflected in descriptions	Enjoyed the experience. Was a lovely way to reflect. Was a very nice way to spend my time one evening after work. An incredible experience!
Personal Healing – the impact of the intervention in terms of facilitating personal healing, and the potential for this to have a powerful impact	Through the zoom online PT performance, and it was both enlightening about a complex topic like the impact of covid on health care, as well as personally healing. Very powerful experience which I gained a lot from. You might think what on earth is this at first, but then you will discover how powerful it is.
Hope – themes of hope that was developed and drawn on throughout working in the pandemic, and hope for the future after covid, with awareness that hope may not yet be processed or felt.	I will take away from my experience of the playback performance … so many things haven’t been processed fully, or at all…, as well as positive things like progress and hope. My participation has fostered my hope and resilience and strengthened my sense of humanity that I am not alone when going through this journey. There is hope for the future after COVID.

Discussion

These findings suggest that Playback Theatre offered as a single session event for health and care staff provided an opportunity that enabled staff from different organisations to connect to their own and each other’s emotional experiences. Given the impact of the pandemic on staff mental health – including higher rates of mental health problems (Murphy et al, 2020, Thomas & Quilter-Pinner, 2020), increased problematic methods of coping or serious considerations of suicide (Panchal et al., (2020) and the prolonged pressures and lack of social connection that staff have faced, Playback Theatre may provide a timely and effective way of addressing staff wellbeing needs.

This evaluation did not attempt to assess changes in mental health symptoms or presenting problems, but the findings suggest that the beneficial impacts and experiences closely align with the aims of mental health or stress management interventions. For example, the theme of “hope and feeling hopeful” is recognised as a source of strength during times of stress (Folkman, 2013), a theme that is relevant to the needs of staff who have been exposed to multiple and prolonged stressors as the result of a pandemic.

Shattell, Starr & Thomas (2007) found that people with mental health problems need to feel “heard, seen and validated” to support their recovery, which Playback Theatre clearly achieves, as evidenced in attendees’ feedback around the theme of validation. This outcome may be linked to Playback Theatre York’s ability to provide a safe space to hear and contain emotional experiences sensitively, as was noted in the data, and to use personal stories to help people feel heard and able to make sense of their experiences, both being objectives in many narrative approaches (White & Epston 1990). Attendees’ experiences suggest that Playback Theatre produced important effects like those found in other mental health interventions. This includes personal healing, hope, and increased awareness of others.

Furthermore, to target mental health needs effectively, one of the requirements of compassion focused therapies (Gilbert, 2014) includes recognising the common humanity we all share. Evaluation themes of connection and increased awareness of others, and attendees’ reports that the event helped them to connect to others, suggest that Playback Theatre enables people to recognise this common humanity in each other. Moreover, this also aligns with aims of mentalization based therapy, which is to understand the perspective of others, as doing so provides a mechanism for emotion regulation and being able to relate to others (Bateman, Fonagy, & Allen, 2009).

The data suggests that this intervention enabled participants to heal, instill hope, increase their awareness of others and of themselves, and to develop a sense of the wider story of the pandemic, transforming individual stories into a shared narrative, with attendees participating in a structured communal experience. This seems comparable to Reneau and Eanes (2020) who recognised the value of college students sharing stories together to help to address the collective pain of the pandemic.

The data also provides evidence that arts based methods can assist with processing of emotional experiences, with one quote highlighting that the event “was [a] more dramatic and powerful form of processing… it helped me access some cathartic method”, in addition 92% of attendees reported that Playback Theatre helped them connect with their own feelings. This perhaps links to Heras and Tàbara’s (2014) proposed function of performance methods as offering a powerful way to share information and discuss complex ideas, in this case, the stories and emotions of staff during the Covid 19 pandemic. It may also be related to offering a meaningful way to reflect back emotional experiences and speak the unspeakable (Leveton, 2010); and to increase self-expression and self-awareness (Chang, Liu & Yang, 2019). Although the exact mechanisms are unknown, the data demonstrates that the use of improvisational theatre had a beneficial impact for staff who shared stories on their experiences of the covid-19 pandemic. It also highlights Play back Theatre’s ability to sensitively validate emotions and contain challenging experiences. It can provide an attractive offer for staff who wish to try something different, and participate in something which may have a beneficial impact after a single 1.5 hours session.

Implications for further work

This evaluation included both quantitative and qualitative feedback, providing an overall understanding of staff experiences of the impact of Playback Theatre. Limitations included the sample size for the evaluation which related to challenges in recruiting staff to a novel and therefore unfamiliar intervention, and the nature of a survey based evaluation as compared to using more in depth focus groups or interviews.

This evaluation has highlighted that Playback Theatre provides an overall positive experience with beneficial impact, but it was not able explore in any depth the mechanisms that gave rise to this. Further qualitative surveys may provide greater insights as to which aspects of Playback Theatre contribute to its impact. Larger scale evaluations, with comparison reflective group formats and a control group may also broaden this understanding. Further work could explore the use of Playback Theatre with single teams, or with different professional roles.

Conclusion

Overall, the data reflects that Playback Theatre can be a positive intervention for health and care staff in a pandemic. The methodology does not allow for causal conclusions on these outcomes, but this innovative reflective process appears to have been restorative for the health and care staff who participated, and it created an opportunity to pause and take stock on the impact of the pandemic.

To support the psychological needs of healthcare staff the British Psychological Society (2020) recommended using trained practitioner psychologists to facilitate reflection on the pandemic and processing of these experiences. The findings described in this evaluation demonstrate that Playback Theatre offers an innovative format that can support staff to engage in a reflective group and process their emotions, and to empathise with the feelings of others. The sensitivity and skill of the Playback Theatre Company was acknowledged in several feedback quotes from attendees. This is suggestive of the practitioners’ ability to listen to staff stories of the pandemic and attune to the emotional content of the narrative, which is necessary in order to re-enact what can be intense and sometimes traumatic individual and group experiences, whilst at the same time providing a safe emotional container.

These skills align with core interpersonal competencies in a therapeutic relationship (Liddell, Allan and Goss, 2017, and Roth and Pilling, 2007). This suggests that Playback Theatre is a reflective practice format that can be an effective way of supporting health and care staff to process the personal and professional impacts of the pandemic. Whilst this evaluation does not provide research controlled comparisons to other formats that are available, it strongly suggests that Playback Theatre could be an additional offer to supplement clinician led reflective processes, or formats such as Schwartz rounds, Balint Groups, and Taking Care Giving Care rounds. Further use of Playback Theatre and ongoing evaluation to better understand its beneficial impacts is recommended. Offering Playback Theatre events may be a worthwhile way to address the wellbeing needs of health and care staff as they continue to adjust to the pandemic and its aftermath.

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About the authors

Samantha Swift

Samantha Swift, Assistant Psychologist for the North East North
Cumbria Staff Wellbeing Hub developed an interest in supporting
innovate ways to support Staff Wellbeing across her career. She
worked on the front line during Covid19 in adult mental health
inpatient services, supporting those in crisis, later joining the hub to
support research and the set-up of the service. More recently she
continues to support staff wellbeing in Northumbria Healthcare Trust
when implementing workforce solutions and modelling a relational
approach in her role as a Systems Lead. The impact of this research
inspired her to attend a Playback Theatre event and she found this to
be worthwhile and impactful.

Paras Patel

Paras Patel, PhD, a Research Lead for the North East North Cumbria Staff Wellbeing Hub. He completed his PhD in Psychophysiology, understanding the link between the heart and brain and how this can impact wellbeing. He developed an integrative framework for the holistic assessment of wellbeing which included both objective (Heart Rate Variability) and subjective (Questionnaires) measures. More recently, he has been working on staff wellbeing projects including understanding the impact of various interventions on wellbeing and a project focused on Learning from health care staff experiences of attempting to take their own life: how we co-create lives worth living.

Dr. Angela Kennedy 

Dr. Angela Kennedy is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist with 33 years experience of working in mental health. Her work has focused on the relationship of trauma to severe mental health problems, as well as issues of compassionate leadership and system transformation. The Trauma Informed Community of Action emerged from her efforts to bring people together towards change and inform best practice. More recently she set up the regional support services for staff during covid and her current research is focusing around staff experience of suicide, leadership, and trauma related projects. She is passionate about using the arts and collective healing to support and connect communities.

Steve Nash

Steve Nash has worked in mental health services in the North of England since 1980, in a variety of settings and roles. He has been active in Playback Theatre since 1991 when he became a founder member of Playback Theatre York. This project, prompted by the need to find creative ways to deliver staff support during the Covid19 Pandemic, provided an opportunity to bring his interests together. He became co-editor of the Journal of the International Playback Theatre Network in 2021.

Abstract

This is an edited excerpt from a chapter titled “Two Worlds Collide”  (Meagher et al., 2022) that Johanna De Ruyter and Stephen Meagher both long term members of Sydney Playback Theatre Company, were invited to write by Andrew Rixon for a book he co-edited with Cathryn Lloyd called “Facilitating with Stories: Ethics, Reflective Practices and Philosophies” (Rixon & Lloyd 2022). This book provides a rich connection between theory and practice for those seeking to work with stories in organisational, community, educative or coaching settings. They chose to focus this article on Aesthetic Distance and Psychological Safety as we felt it had the most practical applications in  Playback Theatre, however we also covered Entry and Contracting, Emotions within Organisations, Playback Theatre in Organisational Development, and the use of the Six Part Story Method in Reflective Practice. They will be holding online workshops on some of these topics later in 2023. Please contact the authors at cholponds@gmail.com or johannaderuyter61@gmail.com to register interest and/or keep an eye on Playback Theatre Around the World for further details.

The Task

In 2021 a large Australian company (multiple billions in assets under management) contacted Playback Theatre Sydney to facilitate a dialogical change process. The issue at hand was an excessive level of competition between its investment, contracting, and management arms. The task was for Playback Theatre Sydney to be part of a change process to facilitate a more collaborative culture between and within the teams, with the goal of increasing productivity. The setting was a ninety-minute show during a development day in a conference room at an iconic Sydney venue. The outcome was a process after which neither the contractor (Playback Theatre Sydney) nor the recipient (CorpInc) felt that the goals had been achieved. We analysed the reasons for this “failed contracting” (Coumbe-Lilley, 2001) using the six-part story method.

Employing the Six Part Story Method for Reflective Inquiry

We used the 6 Part Story Method (6PSM) to inquire into the events leading up to, during and after the Playback Theatre show. First developed as a dramatherapy tool to help child victims of family breakdown trauma (Lahad, 1992), it has since been modified for use in personal and professional development (Vettriano et al., 2019). This involves assigning images to six categories in a storytelling structure as outlined below:

(1) A main character;

(2) A task, mission or problem that the character has to cope with;

(3) A helping force – something that will aid the character in their task;

(4) A hindering force – something that will cause the character more difficulty;

(5) The action of the story – how the character copes with the problem or task; and

(6) The ‘ending’ of the story – not necessarily a conclusion but an indication of what happens after the problem has been dealt with.

The process is mythic or fairy-tale-like in nature (Lahad, 1992). In dramatherapy this can be done either by using an image from a supplied range of cards or by having the participants draw them on a storyboard (Lahad, 1992 & Dent-Brown, 1999). We chose the latter, and first brainstormed ideas for each of the categories. We ended up with about 25 suggestions for each and then selected the ones we felt best represented the six categories. We then transferred the ideas to a storyboard as simple line drawing. We made two drafts of the storyboard. The images included archetypal elements such as a monster, a king, and a magic potion. We decided to write the story as a fairy-tale to make best use of the elements. All the characters, physical structures and events in the story represent actual participants, physical environments and events that occurred during the Playback Theatre Show. Even minor characters such as the Major-General and the Assistant-to-the-Vizier represented real participants. We found it to be a rich and revealing process. The process of creating the 6PSM was particularly useful in drawing out the components of tacit knowledge that we “knew” as playback practitioners and moving them to a state of explicit knowledge where they could be seen as discrete defined concepts. They were then available to be analysed and referenced with respect to the organisational transformation literature. This is the storyboard that we came up with.

The Mirror Monster Story

Once upon a time there was a theatre company called Playback Theatre Sydney. It was a giant hairy beast with many legs and arms that fed on stories and emotions. It was covered in mirrors of various sizes and shapes. Part animal and part story spirit, it could reflect stories and emotions back to the teller in a way that caused deep understanding, often accompanied by tears and laughter. It was known far and wide as the Mirror Monster.

To work this magical understanding, Mirror Monster travelled from village to village accompanied by its band of loyal minstrels. The villagers would set out a ritual circle in the town square or town hall, the minstrels would lead Mirror Monster into the centre, and when everything was set and quiet, they would feed it with stories and emotions. Then the Mirror Monster would perform the mirror dance for the watching people. They would cry and laugh. They would feel heard in a way that would make it seem as though the room was full of giant ears. They would feel an understanding in their bones in a way that their minds could not. Sometimes, wounds both fresh and long-standing would magically heal. People would say to the Mirror Monster “You are an Oracle,” or “You are a Healer,” or “You are a Sorcerer,” but the Mirror Monster would reply “I just like to dance to the Music of the Heart.”

Sometimes travellers would see the Mirror Monster dancing from afar, and they would see their own desires reflected in the mirrors. They might see gold and jewels, or beauty, or a door into the future. They would see whatever they wanted to see.

One of these travellers was a messenger for the King of the Kingdom of CorpInc. His kingdom was plagued by a mysterious illness which made his army become angry with each other and fight itself instead of protecting the kingdom. His streets and fields were littered with exhausted soldiers who had fought to a standstill amongst themselves instead of doing their sentry duties or other soldierly things. The messenger was entranced by the Mirror Monster dancing in a village square one night. When he returned to CorpInc, the King, as was his custom, questioned the messenger.

“On your travels did you happen to see, by any chance, an alchemist who could make magic potions to cure my army?”

“Oh yes,” said the messenger, “I saw such an alchemist in a village in Playbackland. It was wondrous to behold. I’m sure it could make such a potion. It was called Mirror Monster.”

“Organise a parley with this Mirror Monster,” ordered the King, “I must have the magic potion.”

So, the messenger rode off to find the Mirror Monster. After several days and nights of searching, he returned with one of the Mirror Monster’s minstrels, named Johanna. They stopped outside the castle gate.

“Open the gate!” shouted the messenger, “I bring the emissary of Mirror Monster to parley with the King.”

The King’s Vice-Chamberlain appeared on the battlement and looked down at the messenger and Johanna.

“Who is this person?” he said, “is it a member of the peasantry? This is most irregular. Where is their retinue? Where are the standard bearers? The King only parleys with dignitaries and high-ranking consuls. Announce your business, peasant.”

“The King has asked Mirror Monster to perform for his army,” said Johanna, “can I come inside the castle to talk?”

“Certainly not,” said the Vice-Chamberlain, “state your business from where you are.”

“But I can’t even see you properly,” said Johanna, “do you think you could at least remove some of the bricks from the top of the wall so I can hear you better?”

So the Vice-Chamberlain ordered the soldiers to remove some bricks from the wall, but every time they did so, curiously, the walls seemed to get higher rather than lower, and the Vice-Chamberlain began to appear as if he, too, were made of bricks. Johanna had to shout louder and louder, and the answers from the battlement grew fainter and fainter. The Vice-Chamberlain faded away as he merged with the wall, until eventually he disappeared amongst the bricks entirely.

“Come back! We need to discuss things,” she pleaded, but to no avail. Johanna could see only the teeth of the battlement and she was talking to a brick wall. Finally, the gate of the barbican opened, and a groom emerged from the castle with a scroll, which he handed to Johanna.

“Bring the Mirror Monster to perform for the King’s army on the day after the full moon,” it read, “and bring the magic potion.”

“But Mirror Monster works its magic by dancing,” said Johanna to the messenger, “we don’t have a magic potion.”

“The King expects it. I shall tell the King it is all arranged,” said the messenger and he galloped through the gate and into the castle followed by the groom.

News that the Mirror Monster was coming to The Kingdom of CorpInc spread far and wide.

“Perfect,” said the Major-General of the army, “Mirror Monster is a great philosopher. I will send it all of our new rules and regulations and it will teach the army those.”

“Perfect,” said the Assistant-to-the-Vizier, “Mirror Monster is a great magician. It will surprise the King and the army with a magnificent trick.”

“Perfect,” said the King’s Vice-Chamberlain. “At last, these soldiers will see how stupid they look fighting each other and the King will promote me to Supreme Chancellor.”

On the day of the meeting, all the soldiers and members of the court gathered on the battlements at the front of the castle. The King stood with the soldiers disguised as a courtier, so he could observe his army incognito. Finally, the moment came. The audience fell silent.

“Let’s all welcome the Mirror Monster from Playbackland!” announced the Vice-Chamberlain, “It will cure the army of the mysterious Fighting- Itself illness.”

Mirror Monster, led by Johanna, appeared from behind a watchtower at the corner of the castle and stood in front of the castle wall. Johanna climbed a wooden tower that had been constructed in front of the battlements so that she could talk to both the audience and the Mirror Monster. It was very tall, and she felt dizzy every time she looked down.

“The Mirror Monster will only dance if you feed it stories from your heart,” she said to the audience, “who can share a feeling they have about the Fighting-Itself-Illness?” The soldiers and courtiers racked their brains. None of them had even heard of such a thing. The King looked concerned. Finally, one of the soldiers spoke.

“I have found a thought. Will that do?” she said.

“It is a start,” said Johanna, and she fed the thought to Mirror Monster. Mirror Monster danced a little dance. The soldiers and courtiers were puzzled. All they could see was a few glints of light from the mirrors.

“Where is the magic potion?” said the King.

“Where is the surprise?” said the Assistant-to-the-Vizier.

“Where are the rules and regulations?” said the Major-General, “can’t you get Mirror Monster to march up and down a bit?” and he tapped the top of the parapet with his swagger stick to emphasize his point.

“I ask for your patience. Reach down into your hearts and find a real story,” said Johanna, “Mirror Monster loves stories from the heart.”

There was self-conscious shuffling amongst the audience, and an uncomfortable silence that stretched out like a bowstring. After a while, some hands went up.

“I have another thought,” said one.

“I can remember one of the King’s sayings,” said another.

Johanna allowed the silence to continue.

Finally, one of the soldiers said, “I think I found a story in my heart.”

“Wonderful,” said Johanna, “Mirror Monster will be able to perform a special dance for you. Go on.”

“It’s a feeling I have, about all the fighting in the castle …” he started to say.

Everyone looked at him in disbelief. There were some shocked murmurs. The soldier froze. Suddenly his chainmail seemed very heavy. Beads of perspiration appeared on his brow. His eyes grew wide, and his mouth became dry.

“Oh no!” he said after a long pause, “It’s not a feeling. I think it’s actually just a thought after all.”

And so they fed Mirror Monster thought after thought. Some were small, some were big, and some were tangled up like grapevines. Mirror Monster danced. Even though it was only being given thoughts, it could feel the soldiers’ hearts through the brick wall, and so it danced harder and harder, and leaped as high as it possibly could. Some of the soldiers and courtiers could even see some glimpses of themselves in the mirrors, so high did the Mirror Monster jump and dance.

Suddenly there was a commotion. Two of the soldiers had started fighting each other.

“At last,” said Johanna to herself, “Mirror Monster can show them what it looks like to fight amongst themselves. This is perfect.”

But just as she was about to gesture to Mirror Monster to start a dance, the King stood up and threw off his hood. The two soldiers, the courtiers and the rest of the army all froze where they stood when they realised the King was in the audience. “Stop that at once!” he said angrily. “We don’t want to see that sort of thing in front of the Mirror Monster. I declare this meeting over.”

“But Your Majesty,” said Johanna, “if you allow Mirror Monster to dance for the two fighting soldiers, it may awaken their hearts.”

He turned to Johanna. “Rubbish! Where is the magic potion? Are you the apothecary? I was promised a magic potion!”

But Mirror Monster danced anyway, and behind the King a strange thing was happening. Some of the soldiers had started hugging each other. Not all of them. A great number still had angry looks on their faces, but more than a few had started embracing each other.

“Look, Your Majesty,” said Johanna, pointing at the happy soldiers, “something is happening!”

“Silence!” roared the King, “Where is the magic potion?” And he stormed off, down the battlement stairs. The Major-General, the Assistant-to-the- Vizier and the Vice-Chamberlain all followed.

“Hmmph!” said each of them as they walked past Johanna. “What a disappointment.”

Soon the castle wall was empty. Johanna and the Mirror Monster looked at each other.

“Thank you, Mirror Monster,” said Johanna. “You danced as hard as you could. But I suppose we must find a way for you to dance through brick walls. Every time we dance for a King, we are never allowed to set foot inside the castle.

The End

Exploring the importance of Psychological Safety and Aesthetic Distance

Everyone looked at him in disbelief. There were some shocked murmurs. The soldier froze. Suddenly his chainmail seemed very heavy. Beads of perspiration appeared on his brow. His eyes grew wide, and his mouth became dry.

“Oh no!” he said after a long pause, “It’s not a feeling. I think it’s actually just a thought after all.”

This excerpt describes a pivotal moment in the show when a teller retracts a moment halfway through the telling. One of the soldiers finds “a story in my heart” in response to an invitation from Johanna, however he swallows his words when confronted by the reactions from the other soldiers as he quickly realises it is not safe to reveal himself to the gathering. This introduces the linked concepts of psychological safety and aesthetic distance in relation to the Playback Theatre performance.

Psychological safety in organisations was first described in the 1960s (Schein & Bennis 1965) and refined in the 1990s (Kahn 1990, Edmondson 2014). It is characterised by high levels of trust within the organisation and as a shared belief amongst individuals that they will not be punished or humiliated for speaking up with ideas, questions, concerns or mistakes. Google’s People’s Analytics Unit has identified adequate psychological safety as the number one characteristic of successful high performing teams (Bergman & Schaeppi 2016). It has been noted that it is easier to achieve high levels of psychological safety at a team level rather than organisational level unless the organisation is small (Newman et al., 2017). This is because it depends on intimate interpersonal relationships and levels of trust which are difficult to achieve uniformly in a large organisation.

This has clear implications for Playback Theatre shows, which rely on the willingness of individuals to share vulnerable personal experiences with an audience. In the case of “CorpInc”, the audience included members of three teams, plus management personnel including the CEO, and employees in another city via a live video link. Reflecting on the CorpInc show, there was a low level of psychological safety within the audience, and the responses from the participants tended to be more reflective of emotional labour (“thought after thought”) rather than authentic experiences (“stories from the heart”) regarding the issue at hand. Emotional labour is a concept which is defined as the work of regulating feelings and expressions of emotion to fulfil occupational requirements in interactions with clients, co-workers and managers (Hochschild 2010) and is discussed in another section of our chapter.

The concept of aesthetic distance has been recognised for centuries. In ancient Greece, Aristotle warned against making theatre too realistic, using the term mimesis (to mimic) to describe theatre as a verisimilitude rather than a reality. In the 18th century Immanuel Kant introduced the idea of “disinterested delight”. Edward Bullough introduced “Psychical distancing as a factor in art and an aesthetic principle” (Bullough, 1912) and is recognised as the author of the modern conceptualisation and the term was coined by Thomas Scheff (T.Scheff, 1979). For the purposes of this analysis a useful definition is that it is the frame of reference that an artist creates using technical devices in and around the work of art to differentiate it psychologically from reality (Cupchik, 2002). Playback Theatre uses various devices to achieve this purpose, including spatial distancing, temporal distancing, and metaphorical distancing amongst others. This allows the audience to regulate their own capacity to safely identify with the staged action and access new knowledge and meaning.

The magnitude of the aesthetic distance is important. If the distance is too small, it risks the audience being overwhelmed by the action and disengaging as a defence mechanism. An example is the portrayal of sexual violence. If it is too realistic it will trigger a range of strong emotional and survival responses in the members of the audience. If it is too abstract or the metaphors are too vague, and the aesthetic distance is too great, the action will not resonate with the lived experiences of the audience and they will become restless, inattentive, and confused. Ideally the audience will be optimally distanced and able to view the performance from a psychological liminal space where the viewer can simultaneously engage with both the physical portrayal of the actors and their own lived/unconscious experience, enabling freedom of movement between the internal and the external. Einet Mashaal-Nitzan describes the issue of aesthetic distance as “core” in evaluating whether a Playback Theatre show is a success or a failure (Mashaal-Nitzen, 2012). She defines these viewing areas as sub-distance (too close), optimal distance (ideal) and over-distance (too great).

Because Playback Theatre is immediate, and is participatory theatre, there is minimal temporal distance between the recalled experience of the teller (who is both co-author and audience member) and the theatrical response by the performers. Attention to the other techniques of aesthetic distance is critical if optimal distance is to be achieved. An example recounted by Rea Dennis from a successful series of shows for Mercedes Benz in Brazil involves the performers replaying an experience about organising that very performance using the analogy of a “Voyage to the Golden Gates’’ with the Playback form of a “Narrative V“. This employed the techniques of metaphor and a stylised, semi-abstract form to create aesthetic distance, to which the audience responded enthusiastically (Dennis, 2010).

We suggest there can be an inverse dynamic relationship between psychological safety and aesthetic distance with respect to Playback Theatre. The greater the psychological safety the closer the aesthetic distance can become. The audience, as co-authors of the performance, can share more vulnerable experiences and the actors are able to portray these experiences with greater intensity. If either of these agents, or the conductor ventures into sub-distance there is a risk that the psychological safety may be violated and diminished. Then the audience may not volunteer their authentic experiences and the actors may not feel safe to take dramatic risks in portraying them. Venturing into sub-distance is what happened to the soldier and his “story in my heart” when he, as author and co-creator of performance, suddenly felt unsafe and retracted his experience. When this happens, the conductor must make an intervention to restore the psychological safety before the performance can continue at the same aesthetic distance, such as by acknowledgement of the subtext of the interaction, or the aesthetic distance will  most likely be increased organically by the audience with respect to further offering of experiences.

In terms of organisational theatre and change, this dynamic relationship is critical to the success of the process. To enable participants to safely and creatively explore the issue at hand, Playback Theatre should be performed with optimal aesthetic distance. In our experience in organisational settings, this is intuitively signified when the audience responses move from superficial emotional labour to authentic emotional sharing. Ideally this can be achieved with a high level of psychological safety. Playback Theatre is consciously designed to engender psychological safety through its ritualistic form (Fox, 1994), but the issue that is commonly encountered with organisations is a pre-existing environment of low psychological safety. This may be due to a large audience from different teams, strong hierarchical structures, poor preparation of the audience for the show, or fear of punishment or humiliation from leaders and colleagues. These will all impact on the level of psychological safety. Some of these issues are best addressed at the entry and contracting stage. Negotiating smaller, more connected audiences, warming up the participants to the themes, onboarding the stakeholders so that the processes of the show are valued and are seen to be valued, can all improve the level of psychological safety. However, if the mood of the show reveals low levels of psychological safety, then the conductor and the actors have the option of working to increase the relative aesthetic distance to prevent the audience from doing this themselves by withholding their experiences. Techniques such as humour, metaphor and exploration of relationships and events within the theme but experienced outside of the immediate group have all been shown to be useful in our experience. We have also found it useful to employ scripted pieces and forms with inherently greater aesthetic distance, such as Machines and Landscapes. Other companies will undoubtedly have developed organisational forms of their own and there is scope for further exploration on this theme.

The relationship between Psychological Safety and Aesthetic Distance is dynamic and changes with the arc of the show. There is further discussion of this in another section of our chapter “Two Worlds Collide”. We, as Playback practitioners have always had an innate understanding of these concepts, but have found the inquiry process exceedingly valuable in crystallising them and aligning them with current theory and practice within the field of Organisational Development. It has sharpened our appreciation of the challenges involved in organisational Playback and enhanced our ability to negotiate the needs of the show with clients in the entry and contracting phase. 

References

Bergmann, B., and Schaeppi, J. 2016. “A Data-driven Approach to Group Creativity.” Harvard Business Review 12: 43–62.

Bullough, E. 1912. “Psychical Distance as a Factor in Art and an Aesthetic Principle.” British Journal of Psychology 5, no. 2: 87–118.                                     

Coumbe-Lilley, J. 2011. “Failed Contracting: Lessons Learned from False Starts with National, State and Local Sport Organizations.” Journal of Sport Psychology in Action 2, no. 3: 131–42.

Cupchik, G. C. 2002. “The Evolution of Psychical Distance as an Aesthetic Concept.” Culture & Psychology 8, no. 2: 155–87.

Dennis, R. 2010. “Intimacy at Work: Playback Theatre and Corporate CulturalChange in Mercedes Benz, Brazil.” Journal of Organisational Transformation & Social Change 7, no. 3: 301–19.

Dent-Brown, K. 1999. “The Six Part Story Method (6PSM) as an Aid in theAssessment of Personality Disorder.” Dramatherapy 21, no. 2: 10–14.

Edmondson, A. C., and Lei, Z. 2014. “Psychological Safety: The History, Renaissance, and Future of an Interpersonal Construct.” Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior 1, no. 1: 23–43.

Fox, J. 1994. Acts of Service: Spontaneity, Commitment, Tradition in the Nonscripted Theatre. New Paltz: Tusitala.                                          

Hochschild, A. R. 2010. “The Managed Heart: Commercialization of Human Feeling.” In The Production of Reality: Essays and Readings on Social Interaction, edited by J. O’Brien, 320–36. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Kahn, W. A. 1990. “Psychological Conditions of Personal Engagement and Disengagement at Work.” Academy of Management Journal 33, no. 4: 692–724.

Lahad, M. 1992. “Storymaking in Assessment Method for Coping with Stress.” In Dramatherapy: Theory and Practice, vol. 2, edited by S. Jennings, 150–63. London: Routledge.

Mashaal-Nitzen, E. 2012. “The Aesthetic Experience or What Happened to the Audience at the Sheba Medical Centre.” Interplay XVII, no. 1.        

Meagher, S., De Ruyter J., and Rixon A., “Two Worlds Collide.” In Facilitating withStories: Ethics, Reflective Practice and Philosophies, edited by Rixon, A., and Lloyd, C., 177-212. Cambridge Scholars Publishing                             

Newman, A., Donohue, R., and Eva, N. 2017. “Psychological Safety: A Systematic Review of the Literature.” Human Resource Management Review 27, no. 3: 521–35.

Rixon, A., and Lloyd, C. editors. 2022 “Facilitating withStories: Ethics, Reflective Practice and Philosophies.” Cambridge Scholars Publishing                                

Scheff, T. J. 1979. Catharsis in Healing, Ritual, and Drama. Berkeley: University of California Press.                                                                 

Schein, E., and Bennis, W. G. 1965. Personal and Organizational Change through Group Methods: The Laboratory Approach. New York: John Wiley and Sons.

Vettraino, E., Linds, W., and Downie, H. 2019. “Embodied Reflexivity: Discerning Ethical Practice through the Six-Part Story Method.” Reflective Practice 20, no. 2: 218–33.

About the authors

Steve Meagher

Steve Meagher has been a Playback Theatre practitioner since 1994, primarily with Playback Theatre Sydney as an actor, conductor and director, and is a storyteller, writer and facilitator. He has carried a love of story with him since he was a young boy and continues to find surprise and delight in personal stories and the many ways that Playback Theatre offers in expressing them. He has performed and facilitated hundreds of Playback Theatre shows in Australia and Internationally. His passion is sharing the use of story as a transformative force.

Johanna de Ruyter

Johanna de Ruyter is a long-term member of Playback Theatre Sydney since 1991, and has fulfilled multiple roles in the company actor, conductor, client liaison, leader, collaborator, and designer.  In her conducting, coaching and facilitation, she applies insights and practices to Playback Theatre from her many years engaged in collaborative performance creation in scripted/unscripted theatre and applied improvisation, as well as leadership training, team development, martial arts/yoga and embodiment principles and practices. Johanna is passionate about communication processes that change the quality of how we perceive, connect and communicate.

Abstract

In this two part article, we consider Playback Theater as a type of oral tradition. In the first part we focus on the formation of myths from personal stories during a playback performance. In the second part we conduct a comparative analysis between the concepts of Narrative Reticulation (Jonathan Fox) and the Functions of Mythology (Joseph Campbell). Our exploration is presented as a conversation, a dialogue between the two authors, about the benefits of developing mythological awareness among playback practitioners. This is how this text was born. Editing was undertaken, but hopefully some of our banter and self-irony, along with our more serious thoughts, are preserved. Many of the concepts we discuss have been tested in practice, in the most dramatic circumstances, against the backdrop of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. We did not know that our ideas would be tested in this way. But it happened. We hope that this text will prompt your own understanding of Playback Theater and mythology. Enjoy your trip!

Introduction – Theory and Practice

By the time you read this, the Russian invasion of Ukraine has been going on for over a year. And the Ukrainian community of playbackers used and confirmed much of what was written in our article.  Several things helped us continue to use Playback in the conditions of a full-scale invasion:

• Identity and history: The shock of the first days was felt by the Ukrainian playbackers because of the loss of relations and support. Before the war, we were barely acquainted people with a common interest called Playback Theater. But since the beginning of the war, the community chat has become a powerful tool to support us. Stories about struggle, volunteering, refugees -became part of the community. It united us and made us closer to each other.

• Serving others: Our cosmogony, our Center of the World began to revolve around the idea that we, as playbackers, can be useful now. We played for people in bomb shelters, refugee shelters, for volunteers. And it wasn’t always a playback performance. Sometimes it was workshops, sometimes just songs, sometimes games.

• The hero’s path: It took place during our activities, and for the entire community. We heard the call, crossed the threshold, died and were reborn, and came back to life as others. This trip changed not only us, but also the spaces we were in contact with.

• Allies and assistants: As in many fairy tales and myths, when the hero has problems, aid comes from fairy-tale helpers. The world community of playbackers came to us. The Humanitarian foundation of the Ukrainian School of Playback Theater, which was filled by playbackers from all over the world, was an important material support for many Ukrainian playbackers. This support had an almost sacred meaning. It was important not only because of money, but as a sign that we are cared for and supported. And it gave hope and strength to move forward in the most difficult times of this war.

• Online community projects: The new space that opened in response to the COVID pandemic, was useful for us. Ukrainian Playbackers used ideas from the article below such as the ‘Supervision Club’, which helped leaders take care of their teams. ‘One-and-a-half rooms’ concentrated on supporting Ukrainian Playbackers, and gave a voice to various professionals, expanding our communications, and allowing community figures to be heard. The ‘Story Collectors’, is a project that documents the war stories of Ukrainian Playbackers. The idea of myth making enabled us to create supportive spaces online. You will find them all in this article.

Part one. Let’s chat about myth

М – Marat Mairovich

R – Roman Kandibur

• Narrative of the narrative

R: Modern philosophical and scientific thought, postmodernism, for example, talk about narrative (storytelling) as the main manifestation of a person in the world. Everything else is a consequence of the storytelling. It turns out that even science is also narrative in nature.

M: Even the very approach to understanding reality and existence is by its nature narrative.

R: No matter what we do, we still tell stories. Even now, when I tell you this, it is also a story. And even our actions imply narrative. Imagine: a man is packing the pipe. He had done this action hundreds of times before. This is already a habit. But it is based on the story of how to smoke a pipe, which his grandfather told him, and all the stories about how a person first tried tobacco smoke.

M: In general, when we open our mouths, stories are born, even when we are in contemplation, we get a story.

R: Playback Theater is the only thing in modern society now that implies oral tradition. In fact, we refer back to the experience of humanity when all narratives were oral.

M: You’re right. Stories were oral for a reason. They were passed on so that the personal narrative becomes part of the collective experience. In Playback Theater it is there, as well as the transfer of individual and social experience. And they interact.

R: Yes. And it is impossible to convey with the help of a book. The oral tradition developed 70,000 years ago, and writing appeared about 5,000 years ago, during the agrarian revolution. Harari (2011) writes that the first writing was about how much and where grain was stored. It was not originally invented to convey stories.

M: Like Harari, you and I are now creating a story from this. If it is better to tell the narrative orally, rather than write it down, why are we writing all this?

R: Well, we write as if we were talking. We deceived everyone.

R: Then there is a question. We, the playbackers, are reviving the oral tradition, but at the same time, it turns out that we, like all the people, began to perceive stories indirectly, because we created another level of abstraction in the form of text, which formalizes and structures what is happening, as narrative structures our experience. This is no longer from person to person, but rather a person – a text -a person.

M: It seems to me that anyway there will be some adaptation of the narrative here. One adaptation is textual, the other is oral adaptation from generation to generation. In any case we are dealing with a narrative. Contemporary culture creates and conveys stories through text. And before, the adaptation of narratives was gradual, from generation to generation, through oral tradition. It makes me think about what Playback Theater is, and why it is suitable now.

R: Come on, come on!

M: Usually myths are created and adapted from generation to generation – in the oral tradition. We’re talking about mythology and the adaptation of narrative in contemporary art. Now everything in the world is shrinking and accelerating. And so, the adaptation of the narrative turns out to be the moment of ‘compressing’ the narrative on the stage. History, a segment of real life, is compressed and adapted to the necessary questions and answers of the modern world. And we, the playbackers, working with the stories, adapt them to the ‘Here and Now’ of our audience. We also ‘compress’ them because we reproduce them right there in place. Right? Maybe you see some other adaptation of the narrative? Has anything else changed since ancient times?

R: It seems to me that the character has changed. We are now living in the era of humanism. Right? Human rights, market economy, liberal democracy. One way or another, this is all clear to almost every homo sapiens on earth. Well, that’s what Harari says. In ancient times stories by the fire were told about gods, ancestors, animals, while man was just a small part of the big picture of the world. Now, the myth of the gods is not relevant. The myth about ourselves is more relevant to us.

M: Ok, I accept. Although if we are talking about Hellenism, then there are already undivine elements of the myth.

R: Yes. But Odysseus is a demigod. They are all a little bit not human … They are heroes! Well, this is a Greek epos.

M: I agree, gods influence events, but they are not about gods. Well, mostly about them.

R: Therefore, answering your question, Playback Theater is very relevant to the modern world. We rely on the ancient experience of myth-making, directing it to the modern humanistic narrative.

M: Well, yes, way to go! Accepted.

• The power of myth

M: I know that myths are divided into two types: the first is about the creation of the world (cosmogonic myth), and the second is about the awareness of the world.

R: Do I understand correctly that the first one is “The world was created in 6 days, and on the 7th there was a party”, and the second is about what?

M: The second type is about initiation, transformation and life cycle transitions. For example, a boy becomes a man.

R: And these myths unfold through Campbell’s functions: a description of the world, its laws and rules, the path of transformation and healing, a miracle (Campbell, 2004).

M: The power of myth is not only in ritual, but also in the size of the tribe connected to it. The myth is especially strong when many people are connected to it through the same ritual. For example, the Jewish holiday of Passover, when they read the Passover Haggadah (the story of the exodus of the Jews from Egypt – הגדה): the same text for many generations, they eat the same food, and sing the same songs. Even a person who does not believe in God quite often experiences sentimental feelings and a feeling of “connectedness” to his people, ancestors. The same can be found in all cultures: Christmas, Shivaratri, etc. But, on the other hand, if during the same Easter dinner, grandfather tells a story from his life, then (in my opinion) it will be less powerful than the story of the Exodus from Egypt.

R: It all depends on what you use to measure the amount of power.

M: In my opinion, the power of influence of a myth is the number of people affected by this myth and their ability to participate in the rituals associated with it. Strength for me depends on the people and generations connected to the myth and on the frequency of repetition of rituals.

R: And what if grandfather’s story influenced the life of his grandson so much that, even being told once, it completely organized his whole future life?

M: Then we have different measurement criteria. But both are relevant, especially for Playback Theater.

R: I think they are relevant for art in general. A shaman in an African tribe and a performer at the crossroads of Avenue Street in New York are doing the same thing – they revive the myth through ritual. Richard Schechner (2004) wrote about this in his fundamental work on performance studies.

M: Yes, they (shamans/performers) create the ritual space. And the story of the grandfather was told in the ritual space “Seder Pesach”, which is also the point of unification of the individual and social influence of the myth. Then the influence of such a platform as, for example, Zoom, can have a very large impact, as a space of mythology, because we can create great and powerful myths that are not controlled by geographical and cultural boundaries.

R: And in this sense, the strength of Playback Theater and myth, is very relevant. After all, we live in a time of postmodernism, when the main action is narrative and messages.

• Playback Theater as an act of myth-making 

M: Personally, I have this need – to tell a story at a Playback Theater performance. Why? It seems to me that we have a dialogue in our life all the time: subconscious – conscious. In the process of telling a story, and in the process of watching how it is played back, the story is “packaged”, some subconscious things emerge.

R: Well, yes. We (playbackers) “package” the narrative into a specific form that allows us to understand the hidden meanings of the story. The same story can be packaged differently. And the meanings may be different.

M: Yes, different meanings. And sometimes people tell traumatic stories multiple times. They share them at the performances of different companies, at rehearsals, repeating and checking various types of “packages“. Just to let others play with the story like children play in the sandbox. They seem to say – this is my story, I feel bad with it, I cannot understand its meanings, because it hurts. And then, watching it come to life on the stage, he begins to realize some layers that he himself could not reach.

R: That is, it happens thanks to the packaging / shape?

M: Yes. If we work according to the laws of mythology, the packaging itself becomes transcendentally deep. Because a myth is a story that works for everyone, and it is something that can be passed on from generation to generation, its influence extends to the whole society. At the same time, the myth is always relevant at the individual level, it clings to personal layers, answers basic questions. What works here is that the form helps the content to manifest. The myth teaches us to “correctly” comprehend a personal story.

R: Yes, and here’s what I thought. In playback, we often literally play stories; we reproduce the text without creating aesthetics. And if we perceive a story as a myth, and generally think about it as a myth, then we will go into the depths of the story.

M: Yes, we will be freer, and we will see wider and deeper.

R: Remember, at the festival in Odessa you said that the story itself is not a myth, but the story told in Playback Theater is a myth? So, the very process of performance creates a myth.

M: Well, yes, like in Campbell’s approach.

R: Yes, in the book Pathways to Bliss (Campbell, 1949) he describes the four functions of myth: Cosmogony, Laws of Morality, Path of Transformation and Miracle. Playback fits all of these features. The story describes the space of action, the place of action, describes the laws and rules that live in this story, has a personal impact on the transformation (self-impact) of not only the storyteller, but also all those present. Stories told in the playback performance give rise to the red thread of this performance, and their connectedness gives the feeling of a miracle.

M: Campbell also says that today art carries out the function of creating and disseminating mythology. That is, modern shamans and priests are artists, actors and directors. And I believe that one of the main playback functions is myth-making. Playback works with personal stories, turning them into mythical ones, that is, stories that are relevant not only to one person, but to the entire community, so that others can find their own questions and answers related to this myth.

R: For example, a personal story about breaking up with a girl turns into a Lost Love myth. The story told in the space of the Playback Theater performance ritual is a myth. Oral tradition in the flesh.

M: Yes. And in this way, we, like our ancestors, transmit knowledge about this world.

• Miracle and story

M: It seems to me that a miracle happens when a story is told and suddenly it comes to life on stage.

R: Campbell says that in every myth there is this sense of magic, of a miracle. And our thesis is that any story told in Playback Theater becomes a myth. Let’s say the storyteller shares: “I drank a delicious cup of coffee in the morning” – there seems to be nothing magical about it. But in fact, there is. When we reproduce this story on stage – in a song, or a dance, or any other figurative form, then the effect of miraculousness will just appear.

M: Well, yes. Miracle in playback is the transformation of the mundane into the magical. Another element of myth-making is that many people are involved in its creation. Here the actors are the conductors of the magic, and the audience witnesses the miracle.

R: Spectators thereby become participants in the action. Not only for the storyteller does it become magic, but the miracle manifests itself for everyone, for the entire community.

M: Yeah. First, the appearance of the storyteller on the stage and the story itself. Then the transformation of the story into a myth. And perhaps the spontaneity and improvisation of the actors on stage is the condition for the appearance of a miracle?

R: Spontaneity is magic in Playback Theater. Why is spontaneity magic? Because a miracle in itself is a life in uncertainty, beyond logic, beyond cause-and-effect relationships. It’s when we feel some kind of connection between events A and B, however our logic, our apparatus of reason cannot draw this line, this line is only in the sensory sphere.

M: Yes! We are looking for connections. Not logical connections, but, as you said, precisely at the sensory level, at the level of experiences and impulses. Or maybe something that connects strangely, but doesn’t feel like a miracle? For me, a miracle is also fascination, the perception of the divine, a miracle is something that delights, terrifies, evokes strong feelings.

R: In life we can reduce the intensity of experiences. The instinct of self-preservation works in the head. The mind tries to maintain the familiar perception of the world. But on stage, playback enhances the experience. It comes to life and turns out to be a real magic. Viewers often say, “How do you do this? This is really some kind of magic!”

M: Exactly. The playbacker operates on a territory where everything is magical. This is the space of the collective unconscious.

R: The viewer does not see a logical connection; he does not understand how we do it. Accordingly, he has a sensory response, and magic happens for him. So, this IS magic.

• What the spectator sees on the stage

R: When the viewer listens to the storyteller, he has two processes. Rational and sensual. I identify with both the story and the storyteller. The viewer perceives stories from their identities: gender, age, occupation, etc. And the second is sensual, he empathizes, and can share these feelings. While listening to the story, the viewer creates an internal architecture, a building in his head called “I understood the story”.

M: And when an actor plays a story on stage, this building can collapse. Surprise!

R: Yes, surprise. We want to be surprised. Often, we hear from the teller: “Oh, the performers saw something else in this story, something more that I didn’t pay attention to.”

M: Good. And the second thing?

R: Second, there is the main element of the story, which must necessarily manifest itself on the stage. That is, in playback, the viewer simultaneously wants two opposite things from the actors: to be surprised and to be shown the essence of the story.

M: The viewer craves for Miracle/Spontaneity and …

R: Yes. The viewer has just heard the story, he understood something about it, but when the actors, for example, start singing it, this is ‘wow’ for the viewer. On the other hand, if the actors do not reproduce the essence of the story, the viewer will be disappointed. That is, the Ego of the hero changes, but at the same time the Soul remains unchanged.

M: Yes. Singing is aesthetics. And through aesthetics we can get to the Miracle.

R: Yes, the practical task of aesthetics is to destroy the circumstances, the plot. For example, the story is about an office worker who is trying to submit an accounting report, and the actors can play it through the myth about Don Quixote and his struggle with windmills. Such an aesthetic filter brings pleasure to the viewer, because it surprises. This, by the way, is the essence of humor. Humor is about an unexpected decision that is not in everyday perception.

M: By the way, the game is built on the same principle. Some rules of the game are created, which are broken at some point. This is often the essence of humor.

R: Yes. We want to go beyond the cognitive perception of the world. As you said, we want a Miracle. Thus, there are two parts in story: the holy, sacred part – this is the heart of story – and the everyday world. On the altar stage the actors sacrifice a routine and remake it, preserving the essence, and then return the same story, only now completely sacred. And it is at this point that story finally becomes tribal and turns into a myth.

M: I agree, the essence of the story is preserved. At the same time, at the intuitive/archetypal level, the actors create an element of miracle/spontaneity. And for a miracle to happen, you need to create a sacred space.

• Sacred geometry of a performance

R: Stories unfold in a specific space. And if it were a different space, there would be different stories. In Odessa, one performance in winter, a storm began, a blizzard, everything was covered with snow, and only three spectators came. At the same time, the actors thought that no one would come at all. And now this is already a big story – the circumstances, this blizzard and storm, united all the participants in the performance and influenced its atmosphere/cosmogony.

M: I agree. And here the squaring of the circle turns up. Campbell mentions this in “The Hero with a Thousand Faces” (Campbell, 1949). The squaring of the circle is a kind of symbol of the transition from earthly to heavenly. And this appeals to me with playback and with a myth. So, a holy place, for example, a church, a building in the form of a square, denoting the four cardinal points, and in the middle of this building there is a round altar. And this is the place where the hero meditates, realizes himself in the Universe, his destiny.

R: Then it turns out that the essence of the ritual is the unification of a square and a circle, Earth and Heaven. What is impossible to do in an ordinary state of consciousness, but only in a ritual trance.

M: Yes, and let’s think about the playback process through this sacred geometry. The performance of Playback Theater is a sacred event, and it should take place in a sacred space. That is, we are building some kind of temple for sacred rites. And this is important. Jonathan Fox is talking about this, albeit in a different language.

R: The simple phrase “building up the stage” has a deep meaning and requires a lot of attention. Because what we do every time is we erect a temple and an altar and consecrate them. Playback architects.

M: That’s right. So how does it work? The room in which we play is usually square, and people, playbackers and spectators, very often sit in an oval.

R: Where is our playback circle? I don’t always have people sitting in a semicircle. Usually, the seats for the spectators are parallel to the stage.

M: Well, we definitely have a circle when we close the space with the audience. On one side there is the storyteller, the conductor, then the actors sit in a semicircle, even if the rows are parallel rather than in a semicircle. (See Figure 1.)

R: And inside there is the emptiness of the stage, this is the altar, the center of the temple, to which we all go, where the hero’s meditation takes place.

M: Yes. The spectator comes to the temple, and when he becomes the storyteller, he puts the story on the altar-stage, and then the actors meditate on this story, turning it into a myth.

R: Very powerful. I want to return to this moment of preparing the space for the performance – building a temple. Our spaces, where we conduct performances, are square. This is the manifested world in which we perform a physical action – we set up chairs, set up lights, set up music.

M: Yes. And there is also a circle, our “altar”. And here the question is, how do we sanctify it?

R: In my theater, there is a ritual when, just before going on stage, we stand in a circle and count to 21 so that only one playbacker speaks aloud at a time. And if we screw it, then we start counting from the beginning. This is how we tune in and create the initial seed of holiness-trance, with which we consecrate the scene when we open the performance.

M: Yes. All the playback groups I’ve worked with have a similar ritual. One way or another, before the performance, all of them stand in a circle! But I do not agree that we ourselves consecrate the scene – the storyteller does this, telling us a story. When the playback ritual occurs.

M: For me, the sacred temple and the squaring of the circle happens during the performance. The temple and the altar are just a building and an object, and only ritual and action, and a properly prepared atmosphere gives a lot of immersion. But I agree that preparation itself can also be called sacred. Okay, can you divide the concepts into Consecration (preparation) and Sacred action (performance itself)?

R: In my practice, it is important for me to define the value of preparation, this is “building the scene”, since in my opinion, the quality of attention of the playbackers to preparation is super important. “Good enough” Playback Theater is when the actors build a temple and consecrate it with their efforts and attention, their inner ritual, and then open up the space for the entire tribe. And the square of the circle during the performance, the altar of the temple, is open not only to the priest-actors, but also to the storyteller …

M: Exactly. This reminds me of “The Hero with a Thousand Faces” (Campbell, 1949) the part where the hero finds himself in “The Womb of the Whale.” He is swallowed up by some kind of power, a certain Whale, a cave, a garbage compartment on a star ship. The same thing happens during a performance in Playback Theater. The storyteller, who is leading the ritual, moves from his usual environment, the audience, to the stage. He separates from the tribe, rises on the stage and is “absorbed” by it, that is, our altar/Whale; and then the Whale (the stage) spits him out, and he comes out different.

R: Yes, on stage, on the storyteller’s chair, like in the belly of a whale, a person finds himself isolated from ordinary society and everyday life. This is a very important experience. People have forgotten how to live in isolation, weightlessness, inactivity, peace. The myths that they have consumed in recent decades were about active doing. For example Batman, Superman, Cat woman, Frodo, Anna and Elsa. Playback Theater teaches us not only to be active, but also to be passive.

M: I agree! After all, Buddha actively studied with many famous teachers for a long time, but he never found enlightenment. And, just sitting under Bo’s tree, he isolated himself and said, “until I reach enlightenment, I won’t get up from here.” And here I have a strong connection with the story of Jonathan Fox and his isolation in Nepal.

• Sacred rules 

R: Sacred rules are about the fact that the laws of morality and ethics came not from human relations, but from the divine. Moses received the tablets on Mount Sinai (Semitic myth), Vyasa wrote Mahabharata (Hindu myth), Odin taught people runes (Scandinavian myth). Relationships between people and morality are not a human invention, but divine laws that came from above.

M: Interesting. I haven’t thought about it yet. And does this have anything to do with Narrative Reticulation? (Fox, 2019)

R: Actually, the laws and regulations are the Ritual, which is voiced by the conductor. That is Guiding. The conductor talks about the playback rules: we raise our hand, we listen carefully to the story, we play it. The conductor, in this place, becomes some kind of actual conductor of the sacred rule. It was not people who came to the performance and agreed on the rules by which everything would happen. Someone came and said ‘this is how it goes’ from Jonathan Fox and Jo Salas; they are like the Prophets of the Supreme Being.

M: The Ritual plays the role of a moral code, which in our case was brought by Jonathan and Jo?

R: Well, they brought it from humanistic concepts that arise from Christian-Jewish morality. Plus, Jonathan’s reclusion in Nepal also falls on this idea.

M: Why is the Ritual important and what is its power?

R: The Ritual separates the individual profane (ordinary) space from the individual sacred (sacred). And similarly, the social profane – from the social sacred. But where is this border between social and individual myth?

M: And where, according to this border, is Playback Theater? For example, in the year of the pandemic, Jonathan started the Listening Hour (Fox, 2020) project (in the Russian-speaking environment you can find the name “Circle of Stories”), and he just listens to stories. Is this enough for a myth?

R: Listening Hour has its own ritual. There is a Guide, there are rules that organize the storytelling, and there is a creative act of the Guide at the end, when he collects all the stories (red thread) – called a “reprise”. Perhaps the very act of telling and listening creates the atmosphere and flow of the stories, thereby creating a myth.

M: Does the therapist create mythology in an individual session? How are we playbackers different from a psychotherapist? After all, it seems to us that it is precisely and especially playback that creates the myth in which the entire tribe is healed.

R: Psychotherapy also works with myths. After all, there is an idea in society about who psychotherapists are. It is with this view that the client comes into the session. As one of the representatives of this profession, I know that within a session there is even a shamanic experience, just like in playback.

M: The question is not in the idea of psychotherapy, but in what happens inside the process. And this is an individual experience. It reminds me of individual myths about how a child goes through his initialization and turns into an adult. Always, at the beginning and, especially, at the end, there is a connection to the tribe.

R: Well then, psychotherapy is a myth about isolation, where a transformation takes place in a small closed sacred space, after which the Hero returns to the world. And in playback …

M: … A social myth is created in which the entire tribe is involved, and in which there is a connection to both individual and universal human experience.

R: Yes. Playback Theater is in the middle, between big social myths and individual myths, this is our strength, the Power of Myth and Ritual!!!

• Ritual, cyclicity, game

M: If we say that myth is ritual, then one of its properties is repetitiveness and cyclicity. In this case, the improvisation itself can be of ritual character. That is, cyclical. We can come up with structures on the fly, creating some rules with which you can work on stage.

R: Improvisation is ritualized. We have a bunch of rules. Always say “yes”. Tuning in… and so on.

M: I mean how we play on stage. For example, a game is a rule/structure that appears right here and now. The actor begins to act somehow, and there are two options for the reaction of his partners. They either support, following this rule, or they act exactly the opposite.

R: That is, the Game, as a structure created during the game, is born on the altar/stage, and thus becomes a ritual. For me, what you say about repeatability is very important. Myths and rituals are characterized by repetition, this is an integral part of the tradition. No matter how many times we play a wedding, the ritual will be the same. Different people, different places, but the wedding is the same. For Pesach, for instance, twelve courses and so on.

M: No-no-no, I understand where you are taking me. You say that for all myths there is a form of ritual, and I say that within the myth there are elements of Game. For example, the famous tale about Tsar Saltan: he turned into a fly, flew, bit, returned. Then he turned into a mosquito. All the time he turns into something and bites. This is the element of constant repetition.

R: And so it happens in many tales and legends. For example, Cinderella has three tasks. And by the way, in J. Campbell’s monomyth (Campbell, Moyers & Flowers, 1988) – this happens before the battle with the dragon, here is such a cyclical nature.

M: Before, during and after.

R: And usually there are unbearable tasks that cannot be completed. This is not possible in everyday reality. But in a fairy tale (myth), the hero copes with this, relying on magical abilities. This creation of something on the stage, happens through some repetitive actions. These patterns carry energy, on the one hand, and on the other hand, the aesthetics brought by the actor. Perhaps this aesthetics is not in the story itself. But thanks to the combination of this repetition, support and so on, we can build some Cosmogony on the stage, some architectural work. The architecture is invisible, but it is present, and everyone is witnessing this building.

M: Plus. The structure is architectural in nature. We can, by word or action, create structure through cyclical, repetitive, and ritualistic. Just like architects and builders build a building floor by floor.

R: Then it turns out that at some point we need to destroy this building.

M: Yes. Break the Game, that is, change the already established rules. But, breaking Game, you do not ignore it, you base on it. Look, if this is a structure, then you can look at it as a kind of shell, a prison that holds the hero until he can break it and thereby change his world. And the fact that we are spinning in a circle in life, it is cyclical, as we cannot get out of it. The Wheel of Samsara. And to get out of it, we, as a Hero, must die, but we die in this action. We die and are reborn as others. We change ourself with the help of heaven. Perhaps our earthly cycle and circle limits us. We thereby reach a new level of ourselves, opening up new opportunities.

R: Yes. And here we are helped by the laws that Joseph Campbell formulated for us in “The Four Functions of Myth” (Campbell, 2004) and Jonathan Fox in “Narrative Reticulation.” (Fox, 2019) This connection will help us to consciously approach the sacred architecture that we build in game and Playback Theater in general.

• Afterword to Part 1

R: The story that is told and played back in Playback Theater becomes a myth.

M: To comprehend a story from the point of view of a myth is to dive deep. We connect not only to a specific story/storyteller/audience, but also to a common human experience.

 R: Playbackers prepare the space for the performance – they build a temple and an altar, connecting the square and the circle, the Earth and the Sky.

M: Myths are cyclical, like the existence itself. Then game is a microcosm that repeats the macrocosm of life.

 R: Playbackers are conductors of sacred rules. We teach these laws to spectators.

M: Miracles occur in our life all the time, but it is the temple / stage that allows us to realize / feel them in full.

R: Dear reader, that was the first part of our journey. Shall we go ahead?

Part 2. Playback through the myth-making prism

• Junction points between Functions of a Myth and Narrative Reticulation

R: I’m interested in understanding the general mechanism of Campbell’s myth and making a comparative analysis with Fox’s Narrative Reticulation.

M: Narrative reticulation. Why do we need this theory, if in practice we are already doing everything that it says? I understand that Fox means that we should improve the quality of our actions through awareness. And he creates a theory that helps to structure experience and look at the world through this prism. We may be doing the same with myth-making. That is, if we know the Functions of Myth (FM) and Narrative Reticulation (NR), then there can be direct practical benefits from a comparative analysis of these theories. And through this analysis, we can improve the quality of our creativity. Right?

R: I agree, and it is important that in the moment of theorizing, our thoughts about the Functions of Myth and the theory of Narrative Reticulation intersect and mutually complement each other. For me, this is like confirmation of both theories.

M: I agree. It seems to me that in this way the theory of NR receives an anthropological theoretical foundation. After all, when a theory meets other scientific theories (argues or agrees, elaborates on them), it becomes more grounded.

R: Let’s put everything in a table.

M: Sure. So, we present to your attention a table of concepts from NR and FM. Here, it is only important to say that we do not quote the authors, but voice our own understanding, and we bring attention to the articles and books in the bibliography for a more complete study of all aspects of these theories.

M: Let’s do it stage by stage, let’s talk about the Atmosphere and Cosmogony. For me, the Atmosphere is something primary. Of course, it will change in the process too, but its main function is manifested before the beginning, and what we, as performers, can influence, can actually create. Performance is based on a foundation; this is cosmogony. What was done “Before.”

R: Yes. And the important moment of the Atmosphere and Cosmogony is time. As a category of everything existent, as the points of beginning and end.

M: So, what can be done before the “manifestation of the world”? We can prepare space, light. And here I want to remind you about squaring the circle.

R: Yes. After all, the temple is a model or reflection of the universe. The space of performance in essence reflects all those stories and states which we can bring into it. That is why it is worth looking at the space-time of the performance through the eyes of a demiurge architect.

M: How the ends of the world are connected the dome of heaven. So, the awareness of the atmosphere/cosmogony should be all encompassing. Like the myth, it is worth creating a sense of transition through all our chakras (from the base/animal to the sublime divine/heavenly).

R: Therefore, we need to realize, legalize and use the elements of space-time. For example, where is the entrance to the performance space, or how the light falls, or how to put chairs for the audience, or how to send a Zoom meeting link to the spectators. All this is sacred geometry, the walls of our temple.

M: Great. Now let’s talk about Guiding/Laws of Morality.

R: I have a feeling that both Guiding and the Laws of Morality are the glue that prevents this circus from falling apart. These are the principles of structure formation.

M: I agree. Guiding has to be ethical and fair. The main figure of the guiding is the conductor. And he brings in moral rules and goodness. He rounds the ends of the audience/community to the center, that is, he takes care of everyone. He dictates the rules of ethical and empathic treatment of storytellers and opinions of different parts of the audience/society.

R: And then who is a conductor through the prism of Joseph Campbell’s Functions of Mythology?

M: God! United and fair!! And also, a Guide giving the right advice (from the point of view of the Path of the Hero).

R: I completely agree with the Guide, but not with God.

R: Let’s agree that the Conductor is the Prophet.

M: Well, okay. After all, the Prophet, he is a part of God, His voice (the Voice of God).

R: Still, what is the practical application of Guiding/Morality?

M: Not to forget about the outcast. God loves everyone, and therefore everyone should be heard. It cannot be otherwise, else a community will not be created.

R: Thanks to laws/rituals, we do not question our innocence or legitimacy every time. Here’s a metaphor: we take on the “burden of the commandments” of the playbacker, entering a special performative state of service. The perception of Guiding at the level of feelings “makes the river flow, the banks direct the water, and the river does not turn into a swamp.” Therefore, it is not only about knowing the rules and rituals and telling the audience about them, but also about taking them as a vow, as a spiritual practice, and feeling them.

M: Yes, well said!!

R: Oh my, and yet what can we say about Story and Way of, God forbid, Transformations?

M: What do you want Roma, it’s the same thing, well, almost. In essence, in both there is a certain chronology, certain pattern of their unfolding.

R: And this is wonderful, I especially like what you said about chronology, it seems to me that this is the very practical side of the correspondence between story and transformation. Will you repeat?

M: The story has its own laws, and they cannot be violated, even if the narration is not linear, it is still logical.

R: And you can realize this with your mind, but more often with your own intuition. The playbacker learns to feel the hidden tempo-rhythm in history, to find the Heart of History – its true essence.

M: Yes. The story consists of ‘cubes-events’. The way the cubes are arranged, the transitions from one cube to another, and their overall totality is Story. Platform-Essence-Epilogue or Start-Mid-End. This logic of arranging cubes-events is exactly what guides us in the process of the story and builds the structure.

R: If we look at the logic of the change of events, the speed of their alternation (tempo-rhythm/chronotope), their intensity, then thanks to all the above we will be able to see the Heart of the Story. But, since there are often a lot of data, this is not even about “seeing”, but rather it’s about “feeling”. The heart of the Story opens rather through intuition.

M: Okay, now Miracle! And Spontaneity.

R: It turns out that Miracle is a kind of clarity or aesthetics that manifests itself from an ocean of possibilities. Thus, by adjusting the quality of contact between all participants in the performance, we create an ‘altar’ on which the hidden is manifested.

M: And the miracle is that it is impossible to cognize it with consciousness. Impossible to structure.

R: Yes, this is a kind of sensory experience that passes through our bodies and minds and is embodied on the stage. That is, the magic is not in the uncertainty itself, but in the fact that we combine our material nature (body, voice, consciousness) with the energy that came from the “Flow” (Csikszentmihályi, 1990).

M: Well, good. So, we’re done discussing the table. Important note. All these elements are not absolutely related and identical. They seem to be talking to each other. And sometimes they can be combined in a different way. For example, Jonathan Fox’s Story may well intertwine with Campbell’s Path of Transformation, as we suggested in the article, but also with Campbell’s Miracle.

I suggest finalizing this part. The most important practical application of our concept is healing. Campbell writes that by restoring the flow of symbols (myth), we connect the conscious and unconscious that are in a narrative dialogue, which is actually an integrity.

M: Yes! And it’s wonderful.

R: This is the conciliatory power of the Playback Theatre

M: And the myth.

R: And then it turns out that this stream of symbols is suspiciously like the Red Thread, what do you think?

M: YES! And also to the Path of the Hero.

Abstract:

In the fall of 2022, Mickie Marie, Associate Professor of Theatre and Lighting Designer at Ball State University Department of Theatre and Dance consulted with Spotlight Players, the local Playback Theatre troupe in Muncie, Idiana, to incorporate lighting elements into their repertoire. Over several rehearsals, the troupe learned fundamental aspects of lighting design, such as intensity, movement, visibility, and mood, and were able to integrate that knowledge into existing playback forms. The troupe finished the project with two invited rehearsals to solicit audience feedback on the work they had done.  The process has been summarized in this article. 

Introduction:

My aspirations for this exploratory project were to create a lighting design methodology for Playback Theatre performances; to develop a system incorporating lighting design techniques to support the playback forms with the community troupe Spotlight Players located in Muncie, Indiana (USA). Initially, I would create a system by which I would use specific lighting techniques to enhance specific short forms. For example, low-angle side lighting may be used during a short form (such as fluids) or use traditional front light during long form story. When I design lights for a traditional theatre performance, the story is contained within the script, and I analyze the story and apply my design aesthetic to the overall concept of the production. My goal is to enhance and support the story being told on stage. Lighting for Playback Theatre, the goal remains the same, but since the story is improvised, the lighting must be as flexible in its execution as the actors themselves.

The thought was to apply a lighting design aesthetic onto the troupe’s performance, but the more I learned about playback’s methodology, and engaged with Spotlight Players, it became clear my original approach needed to be modified. Instead, I focused on ways to integrate lighting into existing forms, and possibly create new forms that were lighting-centric, to further enhance the core purpose of Playback Theatre: validating an audience member’s story. My approach shifted from me creating a methodology to giving the actors the tools to create a methodology for themselves. I started by giving all the members of the troupe some fundamental lighting knowledge, such as what we can control within lighting, and then let them create techniques that used that knowledge to enhance the story being told. Much the way a playback actor uses a scarf, or a prop, or a musical instrument, they can also use a flashlight, or clip light, or a table lamp. This approach felt more in line with the spirit of Playback Theatre, where many performances exist in found spaces, with no traditional theatre technology available. It also places the power of design within the hands of the troupe and gives light an equal footing with music and props (Figure 1). Additionally, this approach does not require anyone in the troupe to have extensive training in lighting design techniques, nor does it require them to find someone who is trained to be a part of their process. Instead, it allows the troupe to use light to create the environment in the moment, based on how they feel the moment needs to look. Over the course of this project, I met with Spotlight Players (the local Playback Theatre Troupe) for seven rehearsals and explored fundamental aspects of lighting and playback. For the final two rehearsals we invited some audience members to observe the work and offer feedback on what they saw.  In this article, I have summarized much of the knowledge and techniques we explored throughout the rehearsal process in the Fall of 2022.

Parameters

As I planned the early stages of the project, I wanted to make it as accessible as possible to as many different playback troupes as I could. My goal now was to document the process we went through so that others could build on what we had done without needing extensive knowledge of lighting design or technology. My first parameter I placed on myself was that I would only use lighting devices that were easily obtained from local hardware stores. I didn’t want the technology to be controllable using computers or lighting consoles. I wanted the technology to be accessible to a variety of people regardless of their comfort with technology. All of our fixtures were purchased at the local hardware store, but with the advances in LED technology, we were able to get some remote-control color changing lights to add a bit of spectacle. 

The other parameter I set for myself was that I wanted to ensure all the devices were able to be controlled by various members of the troupe in the moment and were not reliant on one member to sit at a “control console” to operate the lights. The majority of the devices we used were flashlights, clip lights, and decorative lights that could easily be moved around and reset during the setup phase of a form. (Figure 1) With these parameters in place, the troupe and I began to explore light.

The Fundamentals of Light

In our first rehearsal, I broke down the very basic fundamentals of lighting design which are the controllable qualities of light and the functions of stage lighting. I used Richard Dunham’s text Stage Lighting: The Fundamentals (Dunham, 2019) as a reference point for all the information given to the troupe. When discussing the controllable qualities of light, I generally refer to these as the “what” of lighting. What am I doing with this light? What am I changing or manipulating? The qualities of light according to Dunham are: Intensity, Angle, Movement, and Color. When applying the qualities of light, we ask “what is that light doing?”, but we do not ask “why?” the light has been designed that way. I consider the functions of stage lighting to be the “why?”. The more prominent functions according to Dunham are Visibility, Focus, Modeling, and Mood.

Qualities of Light

The first controllable quality we discussed was intensity, which refers to how bright the light is. In a live environment (one in which the audience is seeing the performance with their own eyes as opposed to on a screen), the intensity is relative to the rest of the environment. A flashlight will appear very bright in a pitch-black room compared to outside in the bright sunlight. We discussed how moving a flashlight closer to your face will make the light appear brighter on your face and moving it further away will decrease the brightness. We played with changing intensity just by adjusting the proximity of the light to the subject (Figure 2).

We then discussed angle of light which refers to where the light is coming from relative to the actor and the audience. Is the light directly above the actor or is it below the face of the actor? Is the light coming from the left side of the actor or maybe directly behind them creating a halo effect? Movement was the third quality we discussed and that refers to the physical movement of the light in the space or on the actor as well as the change in intensity such as dimming. In our early explorations with flashlights, movement was one quality that was very prominent for the actors because the very act of turning the flashlight on and off is part of the quality of movement. The troupe also explored the idea of shaking the light to simulate fear and moving the light above them to simulate flickering lights. The last quality we discussed was color, which in this case refers both to saturated colors like blue and red, but also to tones of neutral white light such as warm white or cool white. We discussed how color is also relative and a cool white light might look very warm in comparison to a deep blue environment. 

The Functions of Stage Lighting

The first (and in my opinion, the most important) function of light is visibility. Can I adequately see the things I’m supposed to see? Visibility ties in directly to intensity. If something is not visible, it is highly likely we need to change the intensity of some lights to achieve that visibility. The reason I consider this one the most important is because if we cannot adequately see the thing we are supposed to look at, then we become distracted by that inability to clearly see the subject. The second function we discussed was focus. Simply put, focus refers to the attention of the audience. Are they looking at the things they are supposed to look at? Focus is also tied to intensity and frequently the brightest thing on stage will command the most attention of the audience. A really good way to draw focus to something in particular is to make that thing brighter when we want the audience to look at it. We can either increase the light on the subject to make it brighter, or we can decrease the light on everything else to make it brighter by comparison. Modeling was the third function of lighting we discussed. In this case, modeling refers to how three-dimensional objects appear in space. Do they have lots of shadows and highlights or do they appear flat and two dimensional? Modeling is most closely tied to angle of light, as the angle of the light has the most impact on shadows and highlights of a subject. Many examples of light in real-life have at least one bright source, such as the sun, with at least one other dimmer source to create some fill light on the subject. If you are outside in the middle of the day, and it is a clear day, the sun would be the bright source and the sky itself would be filling in some shadows. The last function we discussed was mood. In this case, mood refers to whether the lighting supports the overall feeling or emotion of whatever is happening on stage. Color can play a large part in the mood of a composition, but angle and intensity can also impact the mood. All of the qualities must work together to create a particular mood, and mood is frequently one of the more difficult functions to achieve simply based on how many variables of lighting make up a stage composition. In Dunham’s text, he elaborates on a few other functions such as establishing a scene, composition, style, rhythm, and staging the story. For the purposes of this project and for simplicity with the troupe, I emphasized the four functions of visibility, focus, modeling, and mood as the main ones to focus on. 

After discussing these ideas with the troupe, the rest of the first rehearsal was spent with each member of the troupe experimenting with a flashlight on themselves. Many of the experiments that evolved from that rehearsal explored direction and movement, and how the actor could dynamically shift the direction of the light to emphasize a point they were trying to make. Modeling and mood were frequently discussed as they tried to achieve particular emotions or evoke certain feelings. We also looked at a couple different light bulbs that were purchased from the local hardware store that had different colors of white light. We discussed how the varying shades of white can evoke certain feelings such as how warm white and cool white light can make someone feel differently. I then asked the troupe to pay attention to their surroundings over the next week before we met again and to see if they could identify different qualities of light and how they may have impacted certain things like visibility, focus, modeling, and mood. 

Exploration of Light

As the troupe continued to meet and consider the integration of lighting into their forms, the exploration we did in that first rehearsal formed the basis of the warm up that happened at each rehearsal, and ultimately would evolve into the audience warm up we performed at our two invited rehearsals. The conductor of the troupe would provide a prompt for the troupe, and they would spend a minute or two exploring with their own flashlight before playing that prompt back to the troupe. Some of the earliest prompts were more of titles that the actor would recite back to the troupe, after deciding on an emotion, or movement to convey their feelings, such as “I found ten dollars”, or “I got a bad grade on my test”. Some of the exploration that evolved from these prompts included using the flashlight to represent the ten dollars as it shined on the face of the actor, or using the flashlight to imitate a cell phone as the actor pretended to text their friend that they got a bad grade on the test. In these cases, the flashlight was not only a source of light for the actor, but also became a representation of important information, as well as imitated everyday objects. In later rehearsals, we prompted the actors with an emotion only, and let them decide how to use the flashlight to help convey that emotion. Having the actors understand some of the fundamentals of lighting such as angle and intensity became integral in their understanding of how the light was playing on themselves. One evolution of this exercise saw the actors moving the lights frantically around to simulate energized intensity, or light themselves from different angles to convey subtle emotional shifts.  One of the key ideas that evolved from this exercise was that a flashlight can be used to represent something, it can be used as a traditional light source to direct the audience’s attention, and it can also be used simply as a prop flashlight.  

The exercises then evolved from having one actor use the flashlight on themselves, to partnered work in which one actor would shine the flashlight on the other. The parameter for this exercise was that they were not allowed to discuss their intentions with their partner, but rather were trying to listen and react to what the actor of the pair was doing. We then evolved that exercise to be a trio, one actor and two people with flashlights. These early explorations added varying levels of complexity to the warm ups and forced the troupe to develop a vocabulary and method for these different parts. When the troupe was in pairs or trios, the people with the flashlights who were more supportive of the actor were referred to as “auxiliaries”. When working as pairs or trios, one of the recurring complexities of these exercises was how to start and end the moment. Does the actor begin, and the auxiliaries follow? How do the auxiliaries know when the actor is finished with the moment? What do the auxiliaries do when the moment is over? All these questions occurred numerous times, and eventually the troupe evolved a methodology and a consistent “language” for the lighting. The evolution of this particular methodology saw the auxiliaries get into place first, then when the actor saw they were set, the actor would step into the space to begin the scene. The auxiliaries would use their flashlights to either light the actor in a traditional sense, or sometimes they would use the light more representationally. The actor would progress through their scene, and when they were done, there would be a moment of stillness. At the moment of stillness, the auxiliaries would know the scene was ending and would also still themselves. Then, on the lead of the actor, everyone would shift to a neutral body position and place their hand on their heart to acknowledge the teller of the story.  This language formed the basis for how the troupe began and ended several different forms while integrating lighting.

Integrating Color and Scarves

After three rehearsals of exploration with just flashlights, we started to incorporate area lights, scarves, and color-changing lights. I used another section of Dunham’s text to elaborate on the psychological effects of color. We discussed the difference between warm light (which has more red, yellow, or orange in the mix) and cool light (which has more blue, green, or lavender in the mix). Dunham describes how warmer light tends to evoke feelings of excitement or energy, while cooler light tends to evoke feelings of peacefulness or tranquility. We then talked about a few of the more prominent colors and what kinds of emotions they might evoke. Many of these colors have both a positive and negative association, depending on context:

• Red – Passion, energy, excitement, lust, aggression, evil.
• Pink – Femininity, sexuality, pleasing on skin tones.
• Yellow – optimism, confidence, frustration, anger.
• Orange – Warmth, passion, safety, fun, assurance.
• Green – Balance, harmony, tranquility, boredom, stagnation, illness.
• Blue – Calmness, serenity, reflection, distance.

When thinking of color, in a traditional process, I would order gel filters to put into the lights to change the colors. For this project and the self-imposed limitations, we decided to use scarves to change the colors of lights. We had two clip lights with warm white LED light bulbs, and we draped the scarf over the light to simulate a gel filter and change the color of the light. This was an interesting process of exploration because we had a number of scarves in different colors, but also in different levels of translucency. Additionally, several of the scarves were multicolored, which added a different wrinkle into this exploration. When using the scarves that were more sheer, the color of the light was changed in a more subtle way, mimicking more neutral warm/cool white light. When using the thicker scarves, the color of the light was changed more dramatically, but also reduced the brightness of the light, so the troupe was able to play with color as well as intensity during this exercise. During our first invited rehearsal, one of the audience members commented how the more sheer scarves seemed more effective because it changed the color in a way that was noticeable but did not diminish the light and make it too dark. One note regarding safety: we constantly checked the temperature of both the lights and the scarves to ensure they were never getting too hot. Since we were using LED lights, the bulbs never got hot enough so we couldn’t touch them with our bare hands, even after being on for two hours. It is very important to understand that this may not work for all lights because of how hot some light bulbs can get. 

Evolution of Basic Short Forms

Throughout the rehearsal process of this project, the exploration of the flashlights became a prominent component for the troupe. There were several existing Playback Theatre forms that we explored and experimented with using the flashlights and the scarves. Of these different forms, we chose three that we felt were sufficiently rehearsed to be able to play for an audience. For our first rehearsal with an invited audience, we started with the audience warm-up, moved into Pairs, then Narrative V, then Fluids.

When setting up the room, we had two wooden coat trees that had all the scarves hanging on them. Mounted on top of the coat trees were the two clip lights providing some area light to the stage area.  (Figure 3) Draped on the back wall behind the actors was a string of color changing LED’s with the remote control sitting near the actors. We also had a string of Christmas lights laid out on the floor to act as front of the stage boundary. 

For our first invited rehearsal, we ran through each form a couple times to give the audience some different perspectives. For the second invited rehearsal, we performed all the forms under a neutral “work-light” environment and did not use any flashlights or clip lights. Then we did the forms again, incorporating the lighting elements we had been exploring. The second rehearsal was designed to give the audience a view of the forms with and without the added lighting so they could see and compare the two styles. 

Audience Warm Up

As each performance began, the conductor asked the audience some general questions about how they were feeling as the year was coming to an end. Several of the answers were things like “excited”, “nervous”, “anxious”, “hopeful”. Each time a feeling was shared, the conductor would indicate an actor in the troupe who would play that feeling back. Under the “worklight” setup, they did not use flashlights, but under the other setups, they did use a flashlight and maybe a scarf. This audience warm-up mimicked the warm-ups we did in the early explorations and helped to warm up the actors, the conductor, and the audience.

Pairs

After the audience warm-up, we continued in the spirit of using emotions as the basis for the forms as we moved into Pairs. During one of the rehearsals, one audience member was in town visiting her daughter, but her home was far away. She described how she felt lots of love being in town with her daughter, but she was much more comfortable at home. The troupe used the form to show the two different feelings of “love” and “comfort”. During the early exploration with flashlights and scarves, the troupe determined that this form was much more effective without the flashlights, as they felt the flashlights were more of a hindrance in this case. For each emotion described, one pair chose a scarf to change the color of the clip light to represent that emotion but did not use flashlights within the form. We also adapted the form a bit, and had each pair playing back the same emotion, rather than playing the different emotions, so that the color chosen on one side of the stage would represent the same emotion for both members of the pair. In this instance, the stage left pair chose a pink scarf and draped it over the clip light on stage left, and then they both played back “love”. The stage right pair chose an orange scarf to change the color of the light and played back “comfort”. (Figure 4)

This adaptation was highly effective because the color became the central lighting element that enhanced the emotion, and the pair was able to play into the color by shifting their proximity to the light. In another rehearsal, one audience described feelings of “excitement” but also “nervousness” about the new school year starting. In this moment, the actors chose an orange scarf to represent excitement, and a blue scarf to represent nervousness. The audience feedback of this was generally positive with several audience responses indicating they liked the use of the scarves to show the contrast of the emotions. As the troupe continues to explore lighting in the spring semester, they will continue to explore and discover which scarves are most effective in changing the color of the light. 

Narrative V

From Pairs we asked the audience to tell us a story about “one door closing and another opening”. One audience member described a situation in which she heard a noise under her porch. She went to investigate and found a kitten. The troupe used Narrative V to play this story back and the only adaptation we made to this form was that the troupe was able to use flashlights within the form if they felt it made sense. One actor used the flashlight to mimic a headlamp, while another used it as a flashlight pretending to look under the porch. The third actor batted the flashlight around on the ground pretending to be a kitten. This method of using the flashlight became a favorite of the troupe as it was highly effective seeing all the flashlights used in the same way, but then each time the actors rotated, they were able to come up with unique ways to use the flashlights and build off what the other had done before them. Another audience member told a story about growing in their relationship with their significant other and titled it “Unexpected Growth.” The troupe used the flashlight in a variety of ways to indicate growth. One actor shined the light on the ground and moved it up and down to literally make the circle of light grow. Another hid the light and slowly uncovered it to “grow” the illumination. Numerous symbolic and representational uses of the flashlights were discovered during Narrative V in the rehearsals.

Fluids

The last form we explored for the audience was Fluids. This form was jokingly referred to as our “free-for-all” form because we didn’t put any limitations or parameters on the actors. If they wanted to use a flashlight, they could, but were not required to. They could change the color of the background lights, they could drape a scarf to change the color of the area lights, they could do whatever felt right in the moment. In one rehearsal, an audience member told a story of how they write out clues for a scavenger hunt for their kids for Christmas. One actor used the flashlight to represent the kid searching for the clues, while another changed the background lights to red to represent Christmas time. One actor chose not to use a flashlight at all and an audience member commented that the variety was really effective with the different uses of the scarves and lights. 

Conclusion

This project was an excellent first step for the troupe in regard to true integration of light into the forms. In just a few short weeks, they were able to absorb a tremendous amount of lighting information and were able to integrate and execute lighting fundamentals, while also retaining the spirit of the forms themselves. When I asked the troupe how they felt about the work they did, one of them responded: “…lighting seemed a natural progression to utilizing props, cloths, and music as theatrical elements in storytelling. Light helped us create mood and enhance the space we performed in. It had the capacity to transform the environment and therefore stimulate our imagination to envision different scenarios for the stories we told.” (Veronica Santoyo, Faculty member Ball State University, Department of Theatre and Dance).

As a final wrap up with the troupe, I asked if they would like to continue exploring with light as they meet in the future. They were all adamant about continuing with that exploration, so I will consult with them as long as they want my assistance. My hope is that other troupes will see the value of incorporating lighting into their repertoire and that this article can be a resource for others to use as they begin to explore the artistic medium of light.

References

Dunham, Richard (2019) Stage Lighting: The Fundamentals (2e). New York, NY. Routledge

About the author

R. B. “Mickie” Marie is an Associate Professor of Theatre for Ball State University. Since 2009, Mickie has been designing professionally for various companies in the Midwest and the east coast, including several nationally recognized theatres in the Chicago area. Some recent credits include Always: Patsy Cline, The Addams Family, All Shook up, and Sylvia with Williams Street Rep and Dead Man Walking with the Piven Theatre Workshop. He is passionate about design and is always looking for ways that light can be incorporated into art in ways that haven’t been explored.

Introduction

In this brief article Deb Scott describes the development of a new response by the Centre for Playback Theatre, to the contract it shares with the 16 Affiliated Schools of Playback Theatre. This new Agreement will take the place of the traditional contract that has been in use since the early 2000s.

Setting the scene

This is the story of how this new Agreement was crafted by the Affiliated Schools Committee (Bea Somogyi, Élisabeth Couture, Shirly Legum, and Deb Scott) with input from the CPT Board and Schools personnel.

As of this moment in time, there are 16 Affiliated Schools of Playback Theatre^[1]. They are all listed in table below, with a general timeline of their original affiliation:

Timeline	Schools Affiliated
2001-2006	Scuola Italiana di Playback Theatre, Central European (now Hungarian) SPT, Israel SPT, Playback Theater Netzwerk/Playbacktheaterschule (German Speaking countries), SPT United Kingdom
2007-2012	SPT Hong Kong, Russian Central SPT, Skandinavisk Playbackteater Studio
2013-2018	Arab SPT, Drama for Life SPT (South Africa), Escuela Iberica de Teatro Playback, Korea SPT
2019 –	Greek SPT, École Affilié de Théatre Playback de Langue Francaise, Ukrainian SPT, New York SPT

The need for change

The world changes. Playbackers have always had a finger up in the air, noting how the direction of the wind is shifting. We are in place to hear how our communities experience life—as it is, or as it might be. On stage and in our lives, we practice saying “Yes” to the next moment, and move into a new space, with new demands and insights.

The original Affiliate Schools contract had begun to feel to many of us that it did not fully represent the desired relationship between the CPT and the Schools. On occasion, over the years, different Schools had asked that parts of the contract be reworded, to better describe their idea of affiliation. The language was full of legal terms that felt alienating.

In thinking about a new approach, we were inspired by the metaphor of the mycelium. The mycelium is the complex, sometimes invisible, network that mushrooms send out for great distances under the ground. These mycelia connect whole ecosystems, exchanging life giving nutrients, information and energy through resilient pathways. The network is a sharing economy: what benefits the mushrooms in turn benefits the trees, and other rooting plants. We understand that our playback community similarly thrives when the pathways of communication, resources and wisdom are freely shared.

Foundations of the New Agreement

The vital contributions from both the CPT and the Schools were our starting point. The Centre offers a consistent structure, a deep history of the theory and guidance on the practice of playback, and the capacity to coordinate global exchanges. The Schools are in touch with their local initiatives, with innovations and discoveries of a living art form, and with new generations of playbackers coming up. Meeting future changes and challenges together will happen through our strong and intentional collaborations.

An enhanced, mutually beneficial exchange between the CPT and its various programs is at the heart of our proposed new Agreement. We see all the partner programs (Affiliated Schools, Accredited Trainers of PT, Leadership and the volunteer committees that keep the work of the CPT moving) essential in this exchange, each offering insight, creative problem solving, respect and enthusiasm for the work we believe in. This is not a new concept, of course. But as we worked on the Agreement, we wanted to call attention to this collaboration, and in the case of the Affiliated Schools, spell it out clearly in our revisions—our Re-Visions. 

This is not a new concept, of course. But as we worked on the Agreement, we wanted to call attention to this collaboration, and in the case of the Affiliated Schools, spell it out clearly in our revisions-our Re-Visions.  

Each Affiliate School has autonomy within the relationship with the CPT. No School is exactly like the next, and accessibility to local students, in a familiar social context, and teaching in the students’ mother tongue, is valued. And, in the Agreement, strong communication between Schools, and with the CPT, is encouraged.

Finances

Another change to the traditional contract: We propose a new financial relationship between CPT and SPTs. Schools are asked to pay an annual membership fee, at a level they choose; if this is not possible, they are invited to design a project or initiative that will benefit the community in place of the fee. And the CPT will be financially transparent to the Affiliates, sharing general income and expenses. Also, the CPT will share an estimation of the volunteer hours that are “paid into” the Centre, to keep it operational. The organizational design is horizontal, like the network of mycelium, with the CPT and each SPT offering the other energy and resources.

We are not changing the three-year renewal cycle carried over from the old contract. However the new financial/service exchange is a pilot program, and will be reviewed after a year, to be sure it meets everyone’s needs. In the course of this first year, if a School projects it will not be in a position to cover the membership payment by the end of the year, they are asked to propose a plan for their service project or initiative early in the contract year.

Review and reflection

As we worked on the new Agreement, we also began to think about our Committee. We are expanding our membership and our capacity to serve the network. And we realized it would be good to take time every year reflecting on our work together. Is there balance in our process? What new initiatives are appearing? What continues to work well? How do we best serve the needs of the wider community?Are we caring for the relationships at the heart of our work? And realistically what do we have the capacity to attempt? Regular times for reflection seem a good place to keep us active and grounded.

The world landscape changes, and our playback community grows, encountering challenges and finding new ways to support the sharing economy. Through these pandemic years, through unrest and war, we see the playback community’s networks of support and connection are already in place, creative, resourceful, loving. May we continue to tend these networks and deepen our work together…. and like the forest, grow and thrive.

The New Agreement is still being finalised at the time of going to print.

Notes

[1] In addition, there is the Japan School of Playback Theatre, which has the designated status of a sister School.

About the author

Deb Scott worked in more or less traditional theater in NYC for twenty years before encountering Playback Theatre in 1995. It was love at first sight. She co-directed Asheville Playback Theatre from 1997-2015, and continues to offer playback to the community in monthly workshops. She

Abstract

This article by Karen McClain Kiefer summarises her experience of facilitating Playback Theatre workshops as part of an event for artists who are refugees now living in Scotland (New Scots). Karen introduces the overall programme and its participants and describes the demands (and potential risks) of being engaged to provide “optional workshops” to a group that has no previous experience of playback. The importance of trusting the process, however tricky that can sometimes be, and the resulting sense of joyful achievement and connectivity, will be familiar to many trainers and practitioners.

Prologue

Oleksandra is a watercolour artist. She fled Ukraine last year with her teenage daughter, Anna, a dancer, and they found refuge in Scotland after driving 4000 km across Europe. They are two of the ten participants Steve Nash and I were fortunate to work with in February during a week long workshop in Central Scotland funded through the Scottish Refugee Council (SRC). This was the first residential component of a year-long programme to enable refugee artists to pursue their creative ambitions and build community here. The programme includes residential multi-disciplinary workshops, mentoring, and a culminating showcase exhibition in October. Intentionally forward-looking, the SRC refers to this as a “New Scots” programme – preferring this moniker over “refugee” – to foster a sense of belonging in their new home environment, however permanent or temporary.

We came together as people with different backgrounds, art forms, and lengths of residency in Scotland (or the wider UK) in a beautiful place just west of Perth, UK called the Bield, an arts and spirituality retreat centre that nurtures creativity through engagement with nature and the arts. An old Scottish word, “Bield” is rich and resonant in meaning, from shelter and refuge to welcome and strength – a perfect setting for an SRC programme. The project originated through the Bield by Liz Crichton, their Art Facilitator, who serves as the project’s Programme Manager.

Liz and I are arts-focused colleagues who have collaborated on numerous exhibitions and projects (at the Bield and in other unconventional venues) and we both especially delight in exploring culturally-relevant and timely issues through the integration of multidisciplinary artforms – her focus being primarily visual and installation art and mine primarily incorporating Playback Theatre along with installation art.

Given that a primary aim of the SRC’s arts and culture work is “creating new stories to tell about ourselves” (About Our Arts and Culture Work, 2023), playback was a natural fit for the programme among other, predominantly visual, artforms. Steve and I were there to help everyone tell their stories and experience the artform of Playback Theatre. During this first residential week in February, participants were offered a visual art workshop, materials and art space to work on their own projects, and two afternoon Playback workshops.

To build trust and a cohesive programme style, Steve and I co- coordinated with Liz the flow of the week and facilitated some of the large group icebreakers and activities. From the first evening’s bonfire, it was clear how important and meaningful bringing these artists together in a relaxed and creative environment is. And we were able to integrate another art form – music – within the overall experience, thanks to Steve, invited artist and arts facilitator Alina, and the myriad of percussion instruments we brought. Most of the group, including Alina, were from Ukraine, and one artist was from Syria, and another from Iran. Steve and Liz are both from the UK and I have been a resident here from the US for the past six years. Around the fire, our different cultures emerged freely and we enjoyed learning more about each other through them. The stories shared through music helped to break the ice for later sharing.

Beautiful People

What we have encountered in these “New Scots” are incredibly talented artists seeking new lives, community, and new opportunities for creative expression. They are beautiful people with beautiful dreams who have been forced to take very difficult, life-interrupting journeys requiring great risk and courage. And for many, like Oleksandra, this is reflected in their artwork.

“I couldn’t paint flowers“

As a displaced artist (now, a New Scot) mourning her homeland, Oleksandra’s creative expression is more important than ever, and she notices how it has changed since the invasion. In this time of turmoil, Oleksandra has turned from painting botanicals to a subject more precious to her – her daughter Anna:

“My passion is watercolors. [B]efore the full invasion [of] Ukraine I painted flowers, held watercolor workshops for adults, experimented with watercolor. When I came to Scotland, I tried to paint the same as before the war, but instead I got completely different works. I started with graffiti and charcoal, and then watercolors were added, because I felt the need for color. The theme of the works also changed – since I didn’t have joyful emotions to share […] with people, I couldn’t paint flowers. I lost everything I loved because of the war, but the most precious thing I have is my child, whom I brought here in search of safety. And she was my basis, my inspiration and my model for artworks.“

Beautiful Risks

One of the most inspiring aspects I found in Oleksandra’s character and among the other participants was their resiliency in taking risks and improvising amid the turmoil into which their lives had been suddenly thrust. These artists have been displaced not only from their homes, but from their studios, their supplies, their models and other forms of inspiration, their venues, and from creative spaces. Many are living in hotel rooms. Yet, they are finding a way for creative expression. Their art is finding a way too, and we were thrilled to be able to see some of it in progress during the week. The depth beneath the haunting beauty of their work silently spoke of navigating difficult territory on an inner journey as much as their harrowing physical one.

Beautiful Stories

Every participant revealed parts of themselves and their stories throughout the week – through their art, through informal evenings of music and games, and through conversation.

And then there was playback.

None of the participants knew about Playback Theatre, and because all the activities were optional, we were uncertain how many, if any, would show up to our two brief workshops. And so the plan to have some sort of performance on the last evening was also held necessarily fluid – Steve and I discussed Plans A through E to try to anticipate whatever we could think of, including the option of a Duet style performance with just him and me if it came to that. Steve insightfully mused that most playback workshops are planned for people who have chosen to be there, and so there are certain expectations trainers can have that makes planning easier. Put more plainly, he summarised the experience as: “Beautiful people, beautiful place, funny gig“. But just as the New Scots artists have had to improvise on their journeys and in their artforms, so did we – we did not know how many would come and our Playback workshops competed with precious time in the art room with the coveted materials there.

As it happened, six out of ten participants attended the first workshop and five were present at the second. . .but not all the same people. So there was some re-working of our already fluid agenda required, and a very focused second session on the two forms we would use for a performance that evening. Our flexibility and thinking-on-our-feet were met with a delightful willingness by the five present to take risks. And the 90-minutes within which we had to work were both productive and extremely enjoyable. We were struck by the willingness of the participants to share of themselves, tell their stories, and demonstrate their deep listening by beautifully portraying others’ stories via playback. We discovered in the moments of that second workshop that as important as flexible facilitation skills are for having a successful outcome for participants, the courage and perseverance of the participants are vital for the facilitators. As I think back on it now, it was as though we all helped each other across uncertain territory to a mutually desired finish line – feeling ready to perform the stories that wanted to be heard among the whole group. They did it. We did it.

That evening – the evening of the Playback performance – was our last evening together for this residency. All were in attendance, including Liz and the owners of the Bield, in the comfy lounge-turned theatre, and there was a poignancy mixed with playfulness in the room. We heard stories representing both of those energetic elements, and during the first half of the performance our new New Scots Playback actors beautifully and artistically portrayed the moments and the stories back for the group, accompanied by Steve, our musician. For the second half, Anna’s dancing talents were highlighted in a “Poetry in Motion” Playback form in which Steve began with music and singing; Anna joined in with dance movements, wearing on her head her art piece from the week: a wreath which she crafted from natural elements around the property; and I moved from conductor to poet. Finally, Steve and I did end up doing a “Duets” form, a back-and-forth between singing bard and poet. Immense gratitude filled the room from all present throughout the performance and afterwards – gratitude for each other, for being able to be together in the ways we had been.

Liz commented on the importance of playback in this New Scots programme, especially in helping artists confront their inner journeys and as a tool for them to process their experiences and facilitate reflective insights. Particularly moved by the Syrian artist’s sharing, she observed:

”Playback opened up a space that enabled people to share things that they may not have shared with anyone before, certainly not new acquaintances. The power of him sharing in that forum was tremendous. Now that he has given voice to it, he is able to own it, and work with it.“

She will be accompanying the artists over the next several months on Zoom to see how they are getting on and to help provide resources to enable their art-making. Steve and I and our Mosaic Playback colleagues may get the privilege to see some of them on Zoom over the summer as well, to stay connected and to share a different kind of playback forum. And we are thrilled that our full Mosaic company is planning to join the group again on site at the Bield during their final residency in October for the culminating art exhibition – to hear more stories and perform with and for them.

A Beautiful Spark

Near the end of our first evening together at the bonfire, the group was fascinated by the dancing fire, in which we could each see so many elements of beauty and inspiration – different colours, different intensity, different shapes. In the darkness, there were many sparks of light.

The next morning when I ventured past the remnants of the fire and of our time together from that previous evening, I noticed something.

Something glowing. . .

This was a powerful metaphor for the group as well – their spark remained glowing all week.

As New Scots artists and playback practitioners, we faced real moments in our shared process together, and we looked behind and beneath them. Sometimes we discovered an ember of hope.

References

‘About Our Arts and Culture Work,’ Scottish Refugee Council (blog), accessed March 9, 2023 //scottishrefugeecouncil.org.uk/working-for-change/arts-culture/about-our-arts-and-culture-work/.

About the author

Karen has enjoyed working with corporate and community charitable organisations, facilitating personal, professional and spiritual development programmes over the past two decades. She is currently completing her PhD at the Institute for Theology, Imagination and the Arts (ITIA) at the University of St Andrews in Scotland, in which she explores various contexts of ‘empty space’ with emphasis on playback and improvisational theatre and the challenges we face in encountering the unknown. Karen is a community theatre co-founder, director, improvisor, a certified Advanced Playback Theatre Practitioner, and a member of Playback Edinburgh, Mosaic Playback and True Heart Theatre.

Abstract

This is a review of the 10^th International Playback Camp in Turkey in 2022, compiled from personal accounts from three of the participants: Raz Balian offers his perspective as a relative newcomer to playback; whilst Joke Rood shares her thoughts as a “seasoned campaigner“. IPTN Journal co-editor and camp regular Steve Nash summarises work that was done at this event, looking at ways that organisers can help everyone to feel safe, especially those from minoritised groups – despite the challenging social and political dynamics and conflicts that can and do impact on our gatherings.

Account from Raz Balian, Australia:

To mark the 10-year anniversary of the Playback Theatre Camp taking place, the incredible management and staff of Tiyatro Medresesi (see Figure 1) warmly opened their arms and four walls to cater for 61 attendees who came from far flung corners of the globe: a total of nineteen countries. (See Figure 2)

Of course, this resulted in a significant melting pot of various cultures and personalities mingling and integrating for the week-long event. Moreover, all individuals regardless of age and Playback Theatre experience levels came together in unison where deep and meaningful, if not powerful and emotionally charged, stories were shared, acts were carried out, and healthy relationships were harnessed.

When an event of this magnitude takes place there are always grey areas at play and sometimes not every person feels as included as everyone else. One participant departed early, leaving a heartfelt letter to the Camp’s “Orga“, management team. This letter had the potential to cause significant upheaval within the camp; however, the Orga team handled it with sensitivity and respect and as a community we did some constructive work on the issues and feelings that were raised. Again, to utter words already mentioned in this piece, this particular exercise was indeed deep and meaningful, if not powerful and emotionally charged.

Special praise is to be heaped on the Orga team which consisted of Anastasia Vorobyeva, Olga Sanachina, Nina Garbuzova and Olga Koltzova. Their tireless efforts, added on with cheery enthusiasm and the determination, to make this camp the best it possibly could be was no mean feat. As this was the 10^th anniversary, they pulled out all the stops to make the event as extravagant and momentous as they possibly could. This is additionally considering that due to the worldwide pandemic there was no camp in 2020 and only a small event in 2021, in Ukraine. They were always available to listen to every participant and make each person’s experience as positive, joyous, and inclusive as they could. On a personal note, as this was my initial occasion of attending, I could see, from an “outsider’s lens”, how hard they were working both behind the scenes and on the coalface. In relation to the latter, debriefing the entire cohort of participants every morning as well as prescribing and overseeing the activities everybody undertook at all other times was carried out by them. On my end, I would personally like to thank them for this again.

As I just noted how it was the first camp I attended, I was not alone in this space. There was a mix of newbies as well as seasoned campaigners. In fact, various dynamics were at play. There was a father who attended with his two children, who stated in a Playback exercise on the final day of the camp that he attended to forge a healthier bond with his children. The father said, with great pride, that the healthier bond within the family had indeed materialised. This was by feeding off other people’s ideas and positive energy, a common theme echoed by other participants within the camp.

Now that a family story has been disclosed, let me shift my attention to the secret friend story. Of course, orchestrated by the Orga team, at the beginning of the camp each participant was randomly drawn a secret friend. On a regular basis across the seven days, it was requested that whichever person you were drawn you had to “pamper” and provide care for them in a secretive manner. Practical examples included getting another person to provide a hug to your secret friend. Another, for you to make tea and coffee and get somebody to deliver it to your friend. In essence, the rule of this exercise was for your secret friend to not know it is you who is “sharing the love” to them. I was spoilt by the beautiful human who drew my name for this activity: hugs by others on average twice per day every day, pleasing notices to read left behind in my accommodation room, and the list goes on. I think vanilla ice cream was provided once as well… Anyway, during the final evening of the camp, it was instructed that we approach our secret friend and spill the beans of who it was. As one could imagine, laughs, tears, shocked faces, hugs and stories were shared amongst respective pairs.

The underlining tone set by Anastasia for this camp was, “Only Care can change the future”. Care was provided across the various exercises and activities undertaken. These ranged from the countries’ speed-dating evening, performances from the international trainers’ team, and by a combined team of playbackers from Russia, Ukraine, and the occupied territories of Ukraine (Donetsk & Lugansk), the immersive white costume performance evening (organised predominantly via Zoom prior to the camp – see figures 3 and 4), and the various workshops conducted by the trainers. I would be remiss to not mention the trainers as valuable time and energy were put in by them to make their workshops as effective as possible. Thank you to them. In addition, thank you to the camp volunteers for being always on hand to ensure the smooth day to day flow of proceedings. Equally, many thanks to the Tiyatro Medresesi management and staff. They were additionally of tremendous help across the entire time of the camp taking place. Breakfast, lunch and dinner were prepared on a daily basis by them for us all to enjoy.

In closing, every morning the entire group of us would sing the camp song. The first two words were, “Come together”. Indeed, we all came together where profound healing, nurturing and care came to light and shone across the entire week. May long this continue.

Account from Joke Rood, The Netherlands:

As one of the “seasoned campaigners” that Raz mentions in his description of the Playback Camp in Turkey, I’d like to add some words. All of his nice words are more than true and recognizable as a newcomer in playback. We all may remember the thrills we had (and have) in telling stories, playing them back in the most respectful and creative way. Playback Theater as a gift to ourselves and the world!

But … what we face nowadays is that we must deal with difficulties, like politics, and very different opinions about what’s right and wrong. We have big elephants in the room! “Every story is worth sharing” is not always true (anymore?); and feeling safe is not always the case, even not in our holy moly community. We have secret friends as a nice ritual, as Raz mentioned, but do we also have secret enemies without telling? No gifts, no singing, no words? 

In the camp there was a great collaboration between the Russian and Ukrainian participants: in the moment, they overcame (and much more than that) the “enemy” question. Unfortunately, that didn’t happen in another conflict that arose. A member of our Arabic Playback Theater community left the camp because she did not feel safe – no need to go into details here. We might all know the delicacy of this. The leaders of the Camp had a hard time with this issue, and they did a great job handling it at that.

But …

Long story short … 

Maybe our goal in future is to find out, (not if) but how … we in our Playback Theater community are capable of being (non)aware and honest to each other about secret friends … and enemies – and how to deal with them?

We have great tools, that’s for sure. So, I’m sure we can! We only have to have the guts to face that there is more we can bear and be aware of sometimes. To face and name the elephant is a step towards this goal. Let’s watch.

Epilogue from Steve Nash, UK:

I want to say more about the work that the Orga Team did to try and make the Camp a safe space, despite the painful realities of the external world. One example was that before the gathering, the impact of the Russian invasion of Ukraine was considered, and efforts were made to try and make those affected feel welcomed. But another distressing issue arose in the here and now, and out of respect for the person who was not able to stay, and care for those who remained, a community intervention was put in place.

This took the form of a World Café session. Different topics were suggested by participants for consideration at different tables. At one table, Jutta Heppekausen facilitated a conversation about issues of inclusion, and the political and power dynamics that can exist at international playback events. There was a focus on trying to come up with practical steps that might make everyone, especially playbackers from minoritised groups, feel safer and better supported in the future. In the notes below I have summarised these ideas (including those that might not be so easy to implement).

Before the event:

• Reach out to actively create more diversity – and not just amongst participants but also:
  • Organising team
  • Trainers’ team
  • Performers
• Use registration forms for individuals to identify concerns or fears that they might want to share.
• Organisers and trainers to be more proactive about identifying potential issues and conflicts and doing preparatory work about to how to respond.
• Transparency about the makeup of the trainer team as early as possible.
• Let participants know, as early as possible, who will be at the event.

At the start of the event:

• Social mapping that emphasises countries and nationalities can reinforce existing and historical differences and conflicts. Consider different categories for connection, for example “who likes?”, or zodiac signs, or other ways for people see and share what they have in common.
• Be open about the fact that some participants may be in large cultural or national groups – but others do not have this support. Encourage participants to be sensitive to their needs.
• Reach out for ideas from the participants about how to create safety for everyone who is present.

During the event:

• Enable free choice or movement between workshops/home groups.
• Make separate, safe, spaces possible – e.g. for those in minoritised groups (perhaps time limited, as a step to hopeful encounters later on).
• Be sensitive to power dynamics that can be created when trainers and organisers take the teller’s chair.
• Offer an “awareness team” (perhaps with external experts) offering consultancy or supervision.
• Provide well promoted access to therapeutic support – could be a dedicated room with staff presence – could be peer to peer.

More generally:

• Create more opportunities in the Playback Theatre community (and at events) to look at theory and practice of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion work (looking at labelling, stereotypes, racism, gender, class and body issues etc).
• CPT to consider reviewing our Ethics statement.

This is a very initial piece of work, and it is included here in the hope that it will be of interest to others, and perhaps stimulate further development of the ideas that are suggested.

About the authors

Raz Balian

Raz is a social worker from Australia. He commenced participating in Playback Theatre towards the end of 2021, and sees the benefit of applying its various forms to the workplace as well as the outer world. These transferrable skills have been applied in other performing art realms he is involved in. Raz is always curious to “learn and train further”.

Joke Rood

Joke is co-founder of Wordt Vervolgd Playbacktheater group, existing almost 30 years, and an Accredited Trainer from the Centre for Playback Theatre. She has taught Playback Theater in Holland, India, Belgium, Nepal, Finland, Germany, Ukraine, Cuba, and she was organizer of EPTG in Amsterdam in 2014. Joke has led homegroups and workshops in several gatherings. Joke has now moved to Spain. From there she organized Zoom PBT with the international group ACT, which performed during COVID time.

Steve Nash

Steve has worked in mental health services in the North of England since 1980, in a variety of settings and roles. He has been active in Playback Theatre since 1991 when he became a founder member of Playback Theatre York. He has offered numerous workshops on playback and music, and has been part of the trainers’ team at the International Playback Camp on many occasions. He became co- editor of the Journal of the International Playback Theatre Network in 2021.

It’s a book for experienced playbackers and newcomers as well. For the beginners to tell them what Playback Theatre is, how it works, about its basics and what it possibly can be, about its power, about cultural and social awareness and what difference it could make in the world. For long term-playbackers to remind them of exactly the same. The book shares basics, in the best sense: the foundation of Playback Theatre and what it means, if we take it seriously.

I started playbacking twenty-five years ago and joined “Blickwechsel” in Freiburg, Germany for about twelve years. And I liked it. But then I discovered my very vivid love for dance and I decided to quit Playback Theatre and focus on dance. Mareike, since years leader of “Blickwechsel”, persuaded me three years ago to join the International Playback Theatre camp. She fished me with telling me that Nastya (the organizer of the Camp) and her group Vozdukh are combining Playback Theatre and dance. And that I must take a look on that.

Once in the camp I discovered the magic of Playback Theatre again, and I met Nastya, believing so firmly in the power of Playback Theatre to make a difference, to change the world a tiny bit into a better place, “not solving problems but helping to understand them”. Not only, I came back to playback but also back to my group. Thanks to Nastya.

I find the same persuading power in this book.

It is simple and complex at the same time. Written in plain English and talking about very complex stuff: feelings, conflicts, longings, home, differences, hope, pain, war, suppression, love, guilt, shame, forgiveness, needs… All about being human and leading one’s real simple daily life: as simple as complex.

In the Introduction, Nastya tells about her childhood and her time as a teenager, struggling with limiting narratives, prejudices and violence against queer people in the Russian society. She talks about fighting for her real self, discovering and exploring it and finally choosing her own path despite all this; last but not least through Playback Theatre and playbackers she met.

“There are no broken hearts“, she says. “When our heart cracks open, we can see wider and dig deeper into the empathy we need more than ever.“

How can we train and cultivate this empathy and awareness through playback and at the same time train and cultivate it for playback and performances?

The chapters of the book are dedicated to several questions in Playback Theatre and are to be read as some kind of guidelines. They are fed by a lot of stories, Nastya put in her pockets while travelling around the globe, working with playback, meeting so many different people from different backgrounds, cultures and histories. Playback Theatre taught her a lot about life, she writes, but actually I think Nastya allows also life to teach her a lot about playback.

The themes in the chapters are not to be understood as guidelines in the sense of recipes, more in the sense of questioning our attitudes, to the teller, to the stories, to the audience, to the social dimension. So, chapter by chapter she shares her experiences with us.

How to go beyond dualistic thinking, not thinking of others in us and them, accepting our own and others’ truths at the same time. How this can be the start of a healing process. How a story emerges while we are cultivating the here and now. How important it is to be aware of the tellers’ identity and the social context in which a story is told. How important the training of social awareness and the understanding of intersectionality is to make this happen.

How Playback Theatre, in being aware of social dimensions and human rights is extremely political. ‘From knowing comes care and from care comes change!’

How we can take care that the silent voices in the audience, the unspoken perspectives, are heard. How we can give space to stories about trauma and not let the audience or the teller drown in it.

How we sometimes have to admit the limits of Playback Theatre’s ability to face the nightmares of war, and how despite this they kept trying to work with separate groups of Russian and Ukrainian people because it was the only way not to provoke more trauma, pain and conflict.

Some months after I read Nastya’s book I joined the German Playback Theatre gathering. There the question came up, how can playback in Germany become younger and more diverse. We talked, discussed and playbacked around it. With Nastya’s book in my pocket I think: becoming more diverse in playback means leaving our comfort zone, being really decided and curious to know and learn. It’s not about “finding diverse people”. It’s more about being willing to change our attitudes, to allow being shaken by others. To open up for the reality of those minorities which I am not a part of. To be willing to change our habits, speech, thinking and actions. Not because it is ‘politically correct’. But because we can be sure that this makes our community a better and safer place for everybody, where no one has to ignore discrimination to be able to be part of it.

Nastya shares very honestly failures and mistakes while trying this. But she dedicates her book to her firm belief in the power of Playback Theatre and in the trust that we can make it, if we really, really listen and honestly try to understand our fellow humans.

This book is a treasure box of pocket stories you can carry with you. It’s a heartening book full of courage and hope, of knowledge and visions and of tenderness.

(The book is available from the author at avorobyova6@gmail.com)

About the author

Cornelia (Conny) Hartmann is a member of the playback group “Blickwechsel” in Freiburg/ Germany. She is a dancer, educated at TIP Freiburg (School for Contemporary Dance, Improvisation and Performance). To be able to follow both of her passions, she is exploring and teaching how to combine dance and physical movement with playback. To earn her living she works as a social worker in a school for not privileged kids. And she also loves that.

1. The use of the BASIC Ph model as an additional listening tool for Playback Theater performers and conductors: An exploratory study, Hila Haban Ashkenazi, Atar Dahan,Susana Pendzik, The Arts in Psychotherapy, Volume 83, 102019 April 2023
2. Use of Playback Theatre with Assistive Technology for Inclusion and Community Building for People with Disabilities, Uma Shankar Veeravalli, Radhika Jain, International Journal of Management and Applied Science (IJMAS) , pp. 98-100, Volume-8, Issue-9, 23^rd December 2022
3. Social role development in Playback Theater groups in light of the Mackenzie and Livesley Model, Oshrat Mizrahi Shapira, Naphtaly Shem-Tov, Shoshi Keisari, The Arts in Psychotherapy, Volume 80, 101942, September 2022
4. Playback Theatre, social justice and empathy: A diffractive review, Kathy Barolsky, Applied Theatre Research, Volume 9, Issue 2, p. 117 – 132, 1^st November 2021
5. Playback Theatre: Group, stories, and stage as elements of change, António-José Gonzalez, Tiago Xavier, Nuno Amarante, Rita Barros, Beatriz Amaral, Miriam Bernardino, Margarida Lima, The Arts in Psychotherapy, Volume 81, 101968, November 2022

Playback Theatre Reflects (Jo Salas)

Playback Theatre Talks (Noa Leibu)

Canada

In Response to Racialized Attacks, Muslim Women Practice the Art of Healing​ Through Theatre, Rukhsar Ali, 12^th June 2022, The Globe and Mail (updated 13^th June 2022)

India

Life Unscripted: Diversifying the Application of Theatre in the Corporate Sector, SiliconIndia, July 2022

USA

Katherine Bielawa Stamper: In Ukraine, Nata creates theater in a war zone, VTDigger, 23rd February 2023

War as theatre, at a private home in Kharkiv, Masha Gessen, The New Yorker, 22^nd February 2023

Tell Me a Bedtime Story: Playback Theater comes to Anacostia, Gregory Ford, DC Arts, 3^rd December 2022

The Performing Arts at UCF Empowers Community Members Living with Aphasia. University of Central Florida, Zenaida Gonzalez Kotala, 28^th June 2022