I've been practicing and teaching Playback Theatre for 15 years - and got my start training at the Centre for Playback Theatre in NY. Check out their summer courses:
The Centre for Playback Theatre (CPT) offers comprehensive training in Playback Theatre, a form of personal improvisational theatre, valuing story, ritual, and community. Courses range from one day to three weeks and are sequential. Summer residential trainings held in New Paltz, NY, the home of Playback Theatre, at the beautiful Lifebridge Sanctuary.
June 10th - 13th
Using Playback Theatre in Trauma Work
Traumatic stories affect us deeply as they most clearly expose our vulnerabilities and resilience, our weaknesses and courage. Trauma stories are challenging gifts. At times we could become overwhelmed and freeze. What do we do? How do we play these stories back? What are our boundaries? How far can we go? Do we need to be therapists to play back difficult stories? In this training we look at different situations where trauma stories may come up, what special considerations we need to make and how companies can become ‘trauma ready’ to perform these kinds of stories. Instructor: Shirley Legum, APTT.
Get a strong start in Playback Theatre means taking enough time to immerse yourself in the rich atmosphere and dynamics of the Playback experience. In this four-day intensive, you’ll learn all the basics, with lots of opportunities to practice. Playback forms will be taught—scenes, fluid sculptures, pairs, tableau stories, and more. Each student will have a chance to try the roles of conductor and musician, as well as actor. And, of course, everyone will tell and enact stories together, in the spirit of fun and fellowship. Designed for new and relatively new students. Instructors: Jennie Kristel, APTT with Elisabeth Couture.
This course will support deeper understanding and practice: Learning how to manage transitions over the course of a whole event; Moving from conductor/actor introductions to audience moments and linking from one moment to the next; Inviting stories from teller to teller, story to story, and on to ending a performance. How do you bring your full self into the many roles of a conductor, developing presence, managing rhythm, context & content? Instructor: Hannah Fox, APTT.
June 28th (beginning at 1:00 pm) – June 30, 2016 (ending at 12:30 pm)
Bring Playback Theatre to youth in your community. Build the next generation of actors, musicians, and conductors as well as learn the history behind the Playback experience at Sidwell Friends School (SFS) in Washington, DC, where for the last 13 years more than 1,300 students have emerged into caring storytellers and story listeners. Learn how to infuse Playback into the culture of your school or community organization. Didactic and experiential, theoretical and practical, this workshop will meet the needs and interest of teachers, artists, community organizers, advocates, and teens interested in playing it forward with Playback. Instructor: Tim Reagan, PhD, APTT, RDT.
Bring your practical skills to the advanced level while paying careful attention to conducting and acting, including reviewing the main forms and when to use them. Conducting practice will include warming up any audience; assessing how much (or how little) you need to repeat for the actors; and embracing stories that may not be easy to tell. Explor recruiting and training company members, and the practical issues that come up in running a group. This course is a precursor to the final level of advanced training – the 3-week Leadership program – which ends with graduation from the Centre for Playback Theatre. Instructor: Jo Salas, APTT.
A comprehensive introduction to Playback Theatre training, this course includes a review of curriculum, student competencies, group process and pedagogical principles. Participants will discuss ethical concerns and special issues, such as performances versus workshops and the place of self-reflection and feedback. Each student will receive a handbook of materials. Instructor: Jonathan Fox, APTT.
Explore what clowning and a child-like state of being can bring to your Playback work. Through play, paradoxically we can learn and grow stronger by exploring our vulnerability. This kind of clowning is not a technique but a personal journey of listening and being receptive. Showing up as we are, embracing the unknown and being truly present to our tellers and each other, we will stretch ourselves as Playback performers and find fresh ways of bringing stories to life. Instructors: Angie Foster and Sarah Halley, APTT.
July 19th – August 6, 2016 - Leadership in Playback Theatre with Jonathan Fox, co-founder of Playback Theatre
Location: Taipei National University of the Arts, Taiwan
This course offers students a chance for an extended training with Jonathan Fox, Playback theatre’s co-founder. We will work in the substantial workspaces of the Performing Arts Department. Accommodation will be in the guest building of the Taipei National University of the Arts, with views of grasslands and forests – the spectacular plain of Kuandu. Instructor: Jonathan Fox, APTT.
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Tim Reagan, PhD, RDT, APTT
Silver Spring MD
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