Disability Arts History Australia

"Bree Hadley, Clark Crystal (2017) Style, stage presence, and the poetic subversion of stereotypes: A case study of Blue Roo Theatre Company. Social Alternatives, 36(4), pp. 15-21."

Item

Title

"Bree Hadley, Clark Crystal (2017) Style, stage presence, and the poetic subversion of stereotypes: A case study of Blue Roo Theatre Company. Social Alternatives, 36(4), pp. 15-21."

Description

"In this article, we consider the work of Blue Roo Theatre Company (http://www.bluerootheatre.org.au/), a Brisbane-based theatre company which “creates contemporary performances lead by the artistry, experiences and imaginations of an ensemble of artists with diverse ability and impairment” (http://www.bluerootheatre.org.au/). Writing from a dual insider-outsider perspective – as a scholar of disability theatre and a creator of disability theatre in conversation – we discuss the work done in the training and rehearsal room in the lead up to Blue Roo Theatre Company’s performances, such as the company’s recent sell-out performance of Orpheus and Eurydice in collaboration with Opera Queensland at the Judith Wright Centre for Contemporary Arts, and the way it creates a distinctive performance style, poetics, stage presence, pleasure for the spectators who come along to witness the results of the work, and sense of community. We document moments in which facilitators, collaborators, co-creating artists, audiences and the media alike feel the physical, psychological, and aesthetic focus and force of voice, movement and character work by people with disabilities. We identify ways in which this stage presence can subvert dominant depictions of people with disabilities as innocent, childlike, or inspirational as significantly as the content of a show. In doing so, we provide insights into Blue Roo Theatre Company’s processes, and the aesthetic results it produces, and contribute to a growing body of commentary around disability theatre and performance, which – though increasingly well understood by those working in the form – clearly can still provide surprises for audiences and commentators anticipating conventional representations of people with disabilities onstage."

Identifier

BK00045

Publisher

Social Alternatives

datePublished

2017

sourceOrganization

Opera Queensland

Blue Roo Theatre Company

creator

Bree Hadley

Clark Crystal

category

abstract

Type

Article<ScholarlyArticle

Format

URL

inLanguage

English

keywords

Theatre and Performance

Music

Community arts

Access

Participation in cultural life

copyrightNotice

Except as permitted by copyright law, you may not reproduce or communicate any of the content on this website, including files downloadable from this website, without the permission of the copyright owner. The Australian Copyright Act allows certain uses of content from the internet without the copyright owner’s permission. This includes uses by educational institutions and by Commonwealth and State governments, provided fair compensation is paid to the copyright owner. For more information, see www.copyright.com.au and www.copyright.org.au.

url

https://search.informit.org/doi/10.3316/INFORMIT.473885116045263

Item sets

Article