Created by UNESCO in 1949, the International Theatre Institute—of which TCG is the U.S. center—is an NGO that seeks to create peace and solidarity across borders and between people through the exchange and cooperation of artists. ITI began World Theatre Day in 1962, one year after TCG itself was established. The event continues to be celebrated annually on March 27 by more than 90 ITI Centers and the international theatre community. Information about World Theatre Day, including a map of global celebrations of its 50th anniversary this past March, can be found at www.tcg.org/international. This year, John Malkovich became the fourth U.S. artist to be invited by ITI to pen a message for World Theatre Day; his remarks follow.
2012 International Message
by John Malkovich
I’m honored to have been asked by the International Theatre Institute ITI at UNESCO to give this greeting commemorating the 50th anniversary of World Theatre Day. I will address my brief remarks to my fellow theatre workers, peers and comrades.
May your work be compelling and original. May it be profound, touching, contemplative and unique. May it help us to reflect on the question of what it means to be human, and may that reflection be blessed with heart, sincerity, candor and grace. May you overcome adversity, censorship, poverty and nihilism, as many of you will most certainly be obliged to do. May you be blessed with the talent and rigor to teach us about the beating of the human heart in all its complexity, and the humility and curiosity to make it your life’s work. And may the best of you—for it will only be the best of you, and even then only in the rarest and briefest moments—succeed in framing that most basic of questions, “How do we live?” Godspeed.
John Malkovich is a founding member of Steppenwolf Theatre Company, with which he has worked on 33 productions since 1976. He has acted in 70-plus movies internationally, receiving Academy Award nominations for Places in the Heart and In the Line of Fire. He was recently seen in the international tour of The Infernal Comedy: Confessions of a serial killer.
Generation Without Borders: Essay Contest Winners
Today’s young theatremakers are at a hinge point in history. The local is increasingly global, with the consequences of political, environmental and economic actions reverberating across state lines. The impulse of creative expression is finding new means of support and connection in the face of old systems of repression and control. TCG announced an essay contest: Could this next generation of theatremakers be a Generation Without Borders? What borders will this generation of artists transcend or transform, and what kind of work is necessary to create such change? Fifty years from now, when we look back at what this generation has accomplished, what will we say? Theatremakers younger than 30 or currently enrolled in an educational institution or training program were invited to submit an essay responding to these questions. Excerpts from the three winning submissions follow; the full text, plus additional submissions, can be read online at www.tcgcircle.org.
Fueling the Wave
By Will Kiley
Our borders and boundaries are thinning; I’ve felt them crumble in my hands. Last summer I left Cincinnati, Ohio, for Nairobi, Kenya, with aims to build and perform a brand-new play as part of World Refugee Day. The experience was life-changing and in one culminating instant revolutionized my understanding of theatre’s global potential.
The performance was hosted by the United Nations and the audience was packed with people from all parts of the world. As we recited our co-authored poem, Ojullu (my Ethiopian scene partner) and I were lifted high above the heads of our multinational ensemble. Separated by nearly 20 feet, our hands reached out pleadingly for one another and were slowly brought together. The audience erupted as we finally grasped hands. Perhaps some couldn’t hear or translate the poem, but no one mistook the connection. A connection that shattered boundaries of race, culture, religion and nationality. A connection built by 13 youth, from 4 different countries, with vastly different pasts. Symbolized with a sense of immediacy and honesty that only theatre can provide.
The bond was not fleeting. Just last Friday I woke up to a 12-digit phone call from Ojullu in Kenya. With a quick jump to Skype, we held a crystal-clear conversation across the globe. As technology grows, our world shrinks. Theatre will have to cross borders because the borders themselves are dissolving.
Too many problems exist because we don’t see each other. Nations are only able to war with one another by dehumanizing their enemies. Global crises are ignored because statistics are not faces. People can be pushed aside as long as they stay “the other.” As art crosses over borders it replaces this sense of “other” with faces, stories and relationships.
With our hands linked, Ojullu and I transcended our contrasting pasts and became united in our shared future. We looked openly into one another, championed our differences and became global citizens striving forward. This is what theatre can do. Must do. In the next 50 years, the dam of borders both local and international will continue to break apart. As theatre artists we can either fuel the wave or be washed over. But have no fear; you can’t get held up for carrying a story through customs.
Ohio native Will Kiley is a BFA candidate in drama at the University of Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music (CCM). The collaboration in Kenya between CCM and students and African refugees was part of the Great Globe Foundation’s Dadaab Theater Project.
On Borders, Old and New
By Amanda Quaid
Compared with generations past, theatre artists today are more likely to commute to rehearsal with earphones on, listening to the soundtracks of our lives instead of the voices around us. We send quick, pithy texts instead of calling even our best friends.
Many of us actors keep our cell phones in our dressing rooms and text throughout the play, unable to relinquish “connectedness” for a two-hour stretch even while we act—the one thing that purportedly makes us feel the most connected.
This isn’t to point a finger. Our generation is accustomed to communicating with multiple people simultaneously. We experience it as being hyperconnected to a world community, part of the buzz we get from being a Generation Without Borders. And it is wildly attractive. To be connected across state lines, time zones, and continents is an achievement we should make use of.
But there is a flip-side. As connected as we are globally, we are increasingly cut off from our own communities. Our iPod drowns out the person sitting next to us on our commute. We don’t know the name of our neighbor on the other side of the wall. We text with our friend across the country rather than notice the distinctive way the stranger in front of us holds his cane. While some borders have dissolved, new, perhaps subtler, borders have emerged all around us. My call to action for the artists of Generation Without Borders is to strengthen our communities.
To be present. To take the buds out of our ears and listen. To witness and relate to the plights of strangers we see in the street. To be moved by a play and share our thoughts with our fellow audience members before immediately posting a status update. To look out. To offer up. To volunteer in our communities and know who our neighbors are. Let’s embrace what’s best about our new connectedness and reject what threatens to make us self-absorbed, distracted and myopic.
Actor Amanda Quaid is from New York City. A graduate of Vassar College, she teaches at HB Studio.
Where I Stand on History’s Timeline
By Nina Yarbrough
I am a black woman living in the United States in the 21st century. My privileges and state-sanctioned rights far exceed those of my mother, grandmother and great-grandmother at least twentyfold. Fifty years ago they lacked basic protection under the United States Constitution. Fifty years prior to that, no woman—black or otherwise—had voting rights. In order to answer the question, “What does Generation Without Borders mean to me as a theatremaker,” I have to look at where I stand on history’s timeline. To be a theatre practitioner in this day and age is to be a living anachronism of the philosophical and revolutionary variety.
Oftentimes we “children of the pear garden” (as my college advisor would often refer to us) are out of sync with the world around us. Our industry has always been one of forward momentum. We build, create and destroy so that we may build and create again the next day. Technologies and processes employed in our craft are by their design meant to evolve. If theatre seeks to take a mirror and hold it up to society and reflect back to its audience what it sees, the way in which we reflect must continuously transcend what came before. An anachronism is by definition out of place with the events around it. Good theatre, when it is truly spectacular, will challenge the status quo by ripping it from its place in time and freezing it for further study and scrutiny.
I genuinely believe that theatremakers are creatures of perception and understanding. We are scientists; always observing, experimenting and asking questions—testing out different theories. As a result, our world has gotten smaller and smaller. We do not exist in a vacuum, and as the timeline progresses the influence of others has manifested itself in more tangible ways. What we choose to create, how we build it, and the methods for destruction can no longer be done in the privacy of our backyards. It will be on YouTube before the day is out. This is a truth that crosses all disciplines. The imposed borders placed on us as artists and citizens have been steadily pushed outward until they seem almost to disappear.
For a borderless generation, the responsibility is daunting but equally exhilarating, because when we finally get it right, the possibilities will be endless.
Cincinnati native Nina Yarbrough received her B.A. in theatre in 2009 from Kentucky’s Berea College.
