 I mean we were looking into like what like music industry and like lyrics on how a lot of lyrics portray women through the different decades that was the original idea to see women through the decades through music but then we just got stuck on this one song and you started researching like the stats of domestic abuse that is happening right now. You know the funny thing was that we were looking at how incredibly misogynistic songs can be so hilarious and because we both love comedy so much like we were so kind of just like you know reading and laughing and crying and reading and laughing and crying over just like this massive list of songs and this particular one was the one that was the most I don't know it just hit in the right way so to say. Look at all these layers like looking at it like ah this is so funny you know but they really believe this and also like who pushed this motive why are you promoting this behavior. Since the beginning like since they released it it was so interpretable like you know it was aired for a bit and then they stopped and then later on like they you know they said I was it's a feminist anthem which is like even now when you look at it you can see like this song is great but no so not. Some people look at it saying oh my god this is terrible. Some people look at it saying of course of course imagine those women in the household they nagging at their husbands of course they get hit so I think you know that's why it's great because it's so interpretable and it's always like for everyone it's a different approach of course we all know one is the right one but um yeah I read comments on the actual song that's like uploaded to YouTube oh this song was so controversial but it's a really good song and I'm like it is I love it musically um but then another comment that got quite a lot of likes said people are interpreting this as domestic abuse but really it is a love story I'm like yeah like yeah it is I suppose from the woman who sings it because if she genuinely believes that this is why you love me this is why you do this that's totally valid that that's what she believes but it's just a shame. Yeah but that's the thing is like you know for the for victims you know violence is already like a sign of you know not all of them but for most of them they get used to this this is their life so it's very hard to break away from that and to just say now I'm leaving like I'm doing my own thing it's the only thing that you know so I do believe that a woman sings that song that we just sang um and means it you know in the right in the literal way of the of the song yeah it's kind of like a love that you crave of it something you're used to as well because um like the first ever relationship I was in um obviously being exposed to love for the first time was really abusive and then when I got out of that I kept asking my partners like new partners why don't you love me and they're like what do you mean and I'm like but why is there no passion why is there no fire I want you to shout at me I want us to fight why do you not want to shout why do you not want to and it's just crazy I believe that as well you know definitely um I think I don't know how it's Thailand but you know I presume similar but you know Romania where I grew up it's very like domestic violence is like something is normal for a man to hit a woman a bit you know so I think you know we grew up knowing that and kind of if something like this happens or you know not severe violence you still think it's kind of pseudo normal and then yeah and then there's that but what did she do to deserve it yeah yeah yeah yeah and it's like she could do anything she still doesn't deserve it and it's I mean we see it in the stats even you know to google domestic violence lockdown you found millions and trillions of articles everywhere in every newspaper um so yeah that's why we just kind of glued that in there you know the international women's day theme this year of like the the choose to challenge it comes in the right like you know in the right time so to say because it is a celebration but you know equally it's a raising awareness day when we are allowed to put all this out there and to make all this sarcastic videos and funny videos and sad videos so yeah otherwise would have gone out in the streets but this year is not possible so there you go hello everyone thank you so much for having me my name is Mireia Juarez I'm an actress and a theater maker from Barcelona Spain and since I've created theater I've created political theater well I think all theater is political I think the simple act of being an artist within a capitalist society is political because you're choosing to pay attention to your feelings you're choosing to slow down you're choosing to play by your own rules you're choosing to care about yourself to care about others to care about your surroundings and that in itself is a political act and so all my life has created political theater um that's something I talk about in The Edge which is a play I did in 2017 which is being revisited now and I talk about that need to slow down and and that ever-growing gap between the natural world and the material world and that we are so separated from from nature that we've kind of forgotten our own natural rhythms just for this need of constantly being productive at whatever cost so that's something I'm really passionate about that reconnection with nature with rhythms with your own rhythms with your own artistic rhythms this care I think caring for one another I think is a really strong revolutionary act and so that reflects in the way in which I create theater which is always very horizontal always very collaborative I'm always really playful I think play should be present in every step of the creative process because when you do multidisciplinary theater a lot of people have an activity for it so through play is a way to in which you can learn from them and you can bring your own things to the table as well it's a really good way to create material where everyone is equal everyone is playing and lots of things come out and then from all display and all this crazy creations just create loads and lots of materials and from that you pick and choose what works um so I think you can the starting point for dividing can literally anything you can have a very clear idea of what you want to say which is not often my case because I'm a bit more of a master creator or you can make theater the starting point can be anything it can be an object it can be a quote it can be a sentence it can be an image so for the edge it was this image I had of like this tree made out of plastic how we were destroying nature the very own thing that allows us to be alive uh and we were uh changing in for these plastic things um and with Porta Caos which is my theater company uh it was this text I I wrote uh when I was 18 years ago and I just always wanted to do something with it because it was really surrealist um and very raw and it really came from a very deep place inside me uh and I wanted to do something with it and I got together with this visual artist Mar and Marisa Safon and this opera singer whose name is Julia Piacchillo and we just always wanted to collaborate as well and we found in this text this opportunity to really break boundaries and I've realized that we working with artists from different backgrounds I've realized that really we all have we all encounter the same sort of problems so um we all encounter that our disciplines are very rigid of what theater is or what opera is or what visual artists tend to be and so we wanted to rake with all of that we wanted to play with our rules we wanted to create a new dialogue and as women as as creators who are uh as female creators we we face a very male based industry in the sense that we encounter that most of the roles and most of the opportunities available are for men when most of the artists are female so that is kind of weird and and the reason for that is because most of the people making the decisions the the producers the writers the directors they are male and so that lack of opportunity translates to into a lack a higher level of competitiveness and that translates to women being taught that other women are the enemy and and that toxic practice is starts in the institutions and goes on to all the industries uh and so we really wanted to stop that we wanted to collaborate uh this act of rebellion of being like no all arts are gonna are gonna be together and we're gonna go back to a more ancient sacred theater where there is no divides uh and we want to collaborate we're going to make something together and we want to tell our own stories you know we want to really indicate ourselves as artists with our own point of view and and we and the first play we've done which is called thoughts of an incoherent mind with these texts that we work on uh we are allowing ourselves to make these texts to not be perfect we're working with this idea of women needing to be as spotless and perfect and well spoken and well behaved and we're taking back the ideas that it's okay to fail it's okay to be messy it's okay to to love however you want to love uh without having to deal with this judgment and looks from everyone around you um so that's very important with my work uh with podcast and I'm really into it I'm really into working with them and it's going really well I'm gonna leave you a little bit of this work dear fellow humans for the purpose and good functioning of this performance it is highly recommended that you leave your brain outside the room please don't forget to collect them on your way out or if you prefer we would happily provide you with the latest 21st century updated brain with zero social awareness for a happy and easy life to share my work and my thoughts with you uh it's been a real pleasure thank you so much for listening thank you so much for having me how to make theater is very important for example I worked horizontally in the rehearsal room with my colleagues and we represent the author's theater on topics that are important for us this is actually a rehearsal for alternative ways of organization of life on the ground that are in the hierarchy that exist in our community what is corruption we define corruption as the abuse of entrusted power of private gains corruption can take many forms and can include behaviors like you can include behaviors like a public servant demanding or taking money or favors in exchange for services for decisions misusing public money or granting public jobs the contract to the sponsors friends and families corporations bribing officials to get lucrative deals project to catch you to go to see online and I hope that soon we will play the song in BG, in the UK and because it is not in other countries in the world, in the world and in us. So, until then, take care and see you again. The people from BG have been in BG for years, they have been studying with so much passion. They have been at this stage for years and so much time. The stories and their events that culture has written down for many years, because they know some men. So, for us, it is very political because we tried to bring some children to the plan and make them as loud as possible. Another element that is very political is the collective process, which has not existed in any kind of hierarchy. All the artists, professionals, they also had a training process. We had five artists on drama, music, dance, scenography and directing. They taught us how to use telepathy, but they didn't have the opportunity to do it. We are looking for a dialogue with these artists, not only in their hands, but also in their locations. We can change a lot of impressions about how we are growing in a world where we don't have a choice, where there are a lot of rules and a lot of rights, a lot of them and a lot of them. We are also looking for some daily practices to change the culture of Asia. The way we are, the way we do things, the way we get involved, the way we listen to them and the way we speak to them. I am Diana and I am very proud of the fact that all the Raganli have a name for themselves. I am Adolescent, I am from Tervunia and I was so proud of the fact that there was this opportunity to film the drama and every time I found myself in other situations like mine. During the summer I listened to the stories, I asked myself how I should understand you, why I should do some things, what I should do, what I shouldn't do. And, once again, I am so happy that I was able to express myself in a certain way and in this context, that is, in a theater piece. What I have learned is that you shouldn't live according to certain concepts, the society that needs to understand and have the courage to do what is best. This theater piece marked me in the summer and once again I am very happy that I had the opportunity to talk about these concepts. I am Diana and I am very proud of something. I was present and I participated in the charity of other women about feminism, which resulted in the possibility of the Raganli have a name for themselves. Personally I think this is very much for me. In the XTS plan, I think it's going to be even more. Because the fact is that I had an amalgam of statements from the press, from stories, children, you were on the street, all sorts of things. I participated in the same show, it seems, and I wanted to make a story about a woman and clearly a story about her and she is the most important thing. At the end of the day, I seem to be in the character of the woman and our story, at the moment, is a story. I think it was a piece that was disturbing sometimes, but it was a piece that attacked courage and other thoughts, because at the end of the day, it was not our family, we received a lot of feedback from everyone, but also positive feedback, and I think that this is what matters the most. I think it's the people that changed our lives. There was a woman who came to me and said, I think this is what happened to me and it was not a secret. I mean, I was at school, I was on the street, I was on the street, I was on the street, and I said, yes, yes, oh my god, I'm very happy that I found this woman. The fact is that she helped us, she helped us to get rid of this idea of our new city, and in another city, I don't understand. What else can I say? We are friends, we are beautiful, we are super, super mega cool, and I think that today we can be more vocalized and more out of the space. Hi, my name is Nisha Abdullah. I live and work out of Bangalore in India. I began my theatre practice as a performer. I did playback theatre and theatre of the oppressed, and after the shot stint with scripted plays, I quickly moved on to play writing and directing. Of late, I've also began working as a dramaturg, and through all of this, I've always been an educator. I work on rights-based modules using the theatre, and all of my work is really anti-oppression at its core. I'm also a founder of Kabila. It is a collective that I founded in 2018, and Kabila's work has always been about questioning the inequities of the time and to build an artistic resistance of sorts to the things that cause these inequities. Yeah, and my work or Kabila's work, I hope would sit in a continuum because India's political theatre history is very rich. There's always been anti-caste struggles. There's anti-colonial struggle. There's anti-class struggle. All of these have been realised partly through political theatre, using the epics to talk to these power structures, art forms that are native to India, that are fully indigenous, whether it's theatre or dance or music, which has constantly questioned the power structures. There's a rich history of this in India, and I would really like for Kabila's work and my work to sit in that continuum. Political theatre for me is really about imagining a more equal, a more nurturing future, and political theatre enables the questioning, the impossible questions that we can ask in order to get there, in order to get to that more equal future. I believe very few groups of people have the credibility in society today to be able to do this. Artists are some of them. Largely society trusts us to be able to ask some of these questions, to kind of nudge or kick them into questioning and realising. But in order for us to be able to do that as political theatre makers, I think it's important that our own questioning and our own imagining, it must start from the rehearsal room itself. So often my question as a director to myself is, what am I doing in the rehearsal space that is enabling an imagining of a more equal future? So, you know, how am I dealing with differences in the room, with dissent in the room, with the hierarchy that is present in the role of the director? So what are those best practices that come into my practice, that must come into my practice? For me, I feel that it's impossible for me to not do political theatre at this moment in time. I am a woman, I am Muslim, I come from relative privilege of an English education and I live in an urbanised context. How can I not do political theatre at this moment in time? There is extreme polarisation in India. There is a supremacist dominant culture against which any kind of marginalised community is constantly trying to survive, trying to assert whether it's legally, whether it's culturally, whether it's politically. So, yeah, so I think it's obvious to me that I would be making political theatre. Hello, I'm Shanali Bhattacharya. I'm a playwright and activist from the East Midlands in the UK currently based in London. I've been asked to answer two questions. The first one is, how do you define political theatre? So I define it in three ways. Firstly, in terms of representation. Very early on in my career, I realised I had to deal with being treated as a more of an anthropologist than a storyteller because of my British Asian background. So there's always going to be a constant struggle about our right to tell our stories full stop and that hasn't gone away. Seeing ourselves on stage is definitely important, but superficially ticking boxes in terms of diversity can be a smokescreen for ongoing injustice and inequality. So yes, I write about Bengali factory workers, lesbian resistance fighters who organised against Nazi occupation, British Asian teenagers standing up against gentrification and cultural appropriation in their neighbourhoods. But the political nature of those stories doesn't end just with the casting. As storytellers, we have the opportunity to tell the people's history. This is what representation really means to me. The struggle of ordinary people against capitalism, racism and colonialism. And more importantly, what effective resistance to those things looks like. There are solid reasons why these stories are not widely told in a British mainstream media landscape that still props up the monarchy and the class system and actually thrives on it. So here, state sponsored racism is ramping up and has been for over a decade. Colonialist legacy is woven into the fabric of our society and neoliberalism is eroding any gains that we've made in terms of workers' rights, equality and social justice. This is all facilitated by a client media who parrot the government line and also work to instill fear and division in our communities. As a country, we're increasingly isolated from the rest of the world. Our mainstream culture is extremely myopic and also liberal politics often makes for very boring stories and very boring work. So I don't think we can create a better world without being able to imagine one first. That means everything we write is political. Also, the status quo is shit, so I always want to subvert rather than reinforce it. It's easy to succumb to the temptation to just be court gestures as storytellers and as writers, but we must resist that because stories express an alternative. They can be radically optimistic. They can critique the right-wing narrative that we're forced to consume on a daily basis. That's inherently political and incredibly important. Thirdly, as theatre makers, our process is as political as a finished production. We are almost always freelancers and the nature of the industry pushes us into individualism and atomisation. We are the product. We exploit our own labour. Our work is precarious. We are made to feel grateful for simply being in the creative industries and we are made to compete with one another. The hierarchy of our industry skews our approach to our work and our idea of what a career, ladder or otherwise should look like. But this hierarchy impacts on who is able to participate and also how our work is treated and regarded depending on our backgrounds and our status. This is very boring and repetitive and reductive and helps prop up an increasingly reactionary and more rebund mainstream culture in the UK. So for me, my activism is a social duty and my writing and my theatre making is a chance to play. But as David Graber taught us, play is the ultimate form of liberation and liberation is inherently political. So that brings me onto the second question I've been asked to answer, the way in which I make political theatre. So for me, theatre making offers us the ability to organise collectively and the ability to imagine the future we can build if we do. After the defeat of the first chance to break from thatcherism in my lifetime in the 2019 UK general election, I realised I wanted to bring together my work as an activist and my work as a theatre maker and playwright more intentionally. More than ever, I think we all need to reflect on what our role is as cultural and arts workers in this era of pandemic and hard-right nightmare. How can we find ways to make the process of making our work political? How do we make our protests liberating and playful and so easier and more accessible to participating? It's become really clear that we can't look to leaders. There is no one behind the curtain. We are the people who have to save us. So how can we use our work and our organising to put into practice the movement building that we need now? For me, the skills and collaboration required to stage a production are similar to those needed to organise a demonstration and we must do both. The skills required to publicise our work are similar to those required to publicise our campaigning and we must do both. We must make sure we remove as many barriers to participating in theatre making as we can ourselves. The practical, challenging work of radical inclusivity, horizontal decision making, seeking consensus that many of us strive for in our political activism and agree it's necessary for movement building can be practised in making theatre. Hi, my name is Kyla Davis. I'm from Johannesburg in South Africa. I'm the founder and director of WellWorn Theatre Company. We are an ecological justice theatre company. We are a non-profit. We've been running for about 10 years. We make a touring theatre for predominantly young South African audiences, but also for audiences of all ages. We tour a lot to schools. We started our journey with a particular focus on climate change and then quickly realised that there is no ecological justice without social justice. So we broadened our topics of investigation to include social justice issues as well. Because we feel the two are very closely interlinked. I guess I want to talk specifically about our most recent programme, which was a three-year touring play programme in which we made three different plays over a period of three years and toured those plays also for a range of age groups. The first one was about the social justice programme. The first one was called Plastocracy, which was for teenagers. That was about plastic pollution and kind of convenience culture and single-use culture. The second one was called Galela, which was a play about water for younger audiences. Water in South Africa all over the world, but in South Africa it is extremely political. So it was our attempt to make that political sort of accessible for younger audiences. The third production we made, which is our most recent production, was called Burning Rebellion, which was a protest poem, a choral work about climate justice, which was inspired by the School Strike for Climate Movement. That was very big in 2019 and some of 2020. And we toured that around South Africa to basically to audiences that were 16 up, along with a rigorous kind of talk-back session after the poem. Yeah, that poem in particular, I think is our most political work to date. We wrote it together. Well, we write all of our work together. We devise it and we workshop it on the floor. We're a physical theatre company. We make use of masks and movement and puppet in our works. But Burning Rebellion was quite a stark contrast to our usual aesthetic in that it was really bare bones, no costume, no set, no lighting, just the text and the performance, the ensemble performance of the text. And I say it's almost political because I guess it's, we're the most direct we've ever been. We usually really use story and character and narrative and metaphor to get our message across. But with Burning Rebellion, we're quite on the nose. And I think it came from, it stemmed from us being quite tired of saying the same things over and over again and feeling like this particular issue of climate justice was reaching a little bit more of a fever pitch in the global conversation as well as in the South African conversation. So, yeah, that is a, this project has been slightly curtailed by the pandemic and it is our hope to continue to tour it and also to publish it alongside performance so that the text is available as a resource for people who might want to perform the poem themselves or to interrogate what is in the poem. I think that's all. I'm looking forward to, yeah, to engaging with other women globally who are engaged in this kind of work. We are one of the few kind of deliberately or, not deliberately, but proudly theater activists, theater companies in South Africa. And it is very much a passion of ours to perform live. We have been struggling in the digital age. We do believe that it is the liveness of theater, of the theatrical experience that is the most impactful when it comes to this kind of work. Yeah. I think I'll leave it there and I'll send a clip of Burning Rebellion so we can start the discussion from there. Thank you. And it's a pleasure to be part of this group and to make new friends in this network. Ports are coming in a roadsmountain in Australia with temperatures reaching a record high of 49 degrees centigrade. World leaders claim that these soaring temperatures are not necessarily linked to climate change. Activists, however, disagree and say that we are to expect even more extreme temperatures in the near future. We are going to need another planet, guys. You can run, run, run, but you can't hide forever. Run, run, run, but you can't hide forever. Run, run, run, but you can't hide forever. Run, run, run, but you can't hide forever. The software trains that condition us and imprison us in the red race of the consumer machine. The hamster wheel chasing price tag greens. For only two million trees per day. Hypnotised by the pipe pipe of two. We are slow dancing in a burning room while they disembowel our home, our earth. Can you hear her howl? Guts seeming as a rip and tear, her flesh and bone. Gouging out her core, searching for more and more and more. More gold, more coal, more gas, more oil. More oil, foreign countries mining on African soil. Neocolonialism. Rotting red turmoil. Death from the inside. It's the genocide. Destructive extraction devastates communities. Colombia. They have a right to say no to these mine dunes, to these mass raids. They have a right to choose not to be enslaved. But we are afraid, guys. We are very, very afraid. Hello and welcome to GLOD Political Theatre as a women's right. This is a special International Women's Day event. And today we are joined by four theatre makers from around the world who make incredibly inspiring work. Kyla Davis is here. Jobre Lescu, Nisha Abdullah and Sean Ali Batacharia. I'll say that again. Sean Ali Batacharia, sorry. First, I would like to ask all of you a couple of questions about how you actually make theatre, your process. And I'd like to start with you, Joe. Listening to the two girls that you invited as part of this project, Diana and Elena, it seemed that the actual process of making Uragane was incredibly empowering and that they became very attached to each other and they found some sort of sisterhood and solidarity. And I wanted to ask you whether that is something to do with the non-hierarchical way that you rehearsed or worked together? It might as well be. The main area that we work with at Ceva Performative Arts Centre is pedagogical. And we do stress the importance of the process more than that of the result. So yes, I think from the beginning what we had was a very safe space in which the ten teenagers, who are also the performers and the writers and co-directors of the play, I think from the beginning they understood that what is most important is the way in which they feel and what they get out of this. So yes, there was a safe space from the beginning and the artists that they worked with were also going through a learning process because they had never worked with the teenagers or with unprofessional artists and they were also very open to getting feedback. So what I noticed was that the girls themselves, the teenagers, they started to know what they want and what the course of the work that they desire is and they were really setting boundaries even with the residents. So they were saying, we don't like this, we don't want to be talked to that way and we want this process to go in a certain way. And they were really active in determining how that goes and I think that is seen. Actually the end song of the performance is one in which they say we have the courage to be vulnerable because we have our sisters with us. That is beautiful. Thank you. Thank you so much. That's incredible. And you can really tell that they're very confident, the two girls who sent videos. You can tell that they're very secure in who they are and that they're not afraid to speak up and be themselves and that's incredibly encouraging. Were they like that when you met them or do you feel that the process of working with you on this project has heightened that confidence? Well, they are definitely as teenagers and I have been working for years with teenagers. They're just waiting for a chance in which to be taken seriously and given a platform for their voice. So maybe that's partly the default that teenagers are very open to action and to experiment. But definitely having a context like this, I think it might help them in the long run, whatever they decide to do, whether it's artistic or not. Thank you. Because we're talking about process, I wanted to ask Kyla about your process of making because collaboration and devising is also at the core of your work. Yes, absolutely. And before I start, I just want to say I was struck also in engaging with everybody's work, how much process is at the core of everybody's work. And I mean, I think I'll start by saying that we really believe that theatre is a social project. It's inherently collaborative, the way in which we make theatre. We devise everything. So we start with an image or a poem or a picture. We've already decided are we making a play about water or climate change or plastic or whatever the theme is, but then we need to find a way in. So what we do is we engage in the kind of research period where we bring a whole bunch of stuff into the room, film clips or whatever it is that we find inspiring and is a way for us to hook into the material. And after this, then we spend some time playing with that material. So we'll put things on the floor with improvisations, with movement, with puppetry, masks, music. We do also use a lot of songs that we write in our pieces. And then we basically just keep playing until we've found a chunk of material, really. And then we start to slowly, and this I think is also a hugely democratic process, you know, to start to cut away and say, OK, what serves the story best? Even though we really love this piece and we love this song that we made that actually isn't serving the overall story or it's not age appropriate or we'll save it for another piece at a later stage. And then slowly but surely together we kind of chip away at the material until we have the core of something. And then we practice, then we rehearse, you know, we start to fine tune it. And yeah, someone recently described this process as maybe taking a chunk of clay and then, you know, slowly carving your, which is very much like mask making as well, which we do a lot of, you know, allowing the rather than looking for the thing to come out of the clay, allowing the shapes to emerge from the clay, which is very much how we work, you know, seeing what can emerge from the people in the room in this exact moment. So absolutely we, so I'm just looking at my notes here. Yeah, collaborative inquiry. We play, we improvise, we experiment and we search also for style together, according to the strengths in the room as well. So it's inherently democratic, our process, even though, and we might talk about this later, but yeah, sometimes democratic theater making doesn't always make for the best theater, but certainly we make for a democratic and also a non hierarchical process in the room. Thank you, Kyla. And I wanted to ask you, do you have a permanent company that you work with a group of actors or does it change from project to project? Yeah, for the, I mean, this is always been our dream to have a repertoire company and for the last three years we had project funding that allowed us to do so. So I was working with the same actors over this period of three years on three different productions, which was a gift, really, because then you really start to know each other, where your weak points are, where your strong points are, and it becomes very much like a family and a safe space, as Jo was saying. Fantastic. How about you, Jo, just to bring it back with Cheva, are you striving to work with the same group of teenagers again after this project? Well, with teenagers is always very difficult, because you only have them for a couple of years and then they go away. So right now we're really under pressure a bit. We want to make a dialogue performance about the experience of being a boy or a man in this area, generally in Romania and particularly in the city, which is quite patriarchal, I would say, and a rather conservative environment. And yeah, our goal from the beginning was to work with teenagers and we've been active for three years here, and we've only started to realize what the needs are, because of course teenagers are one group which are not taken into account so much, but they're not the only one. And what we would like to do is kind of unite these marginal voices and make them work for one another. Thank you. Shona Lee, I wanted to ask you something about you mentioned in your video. You talk about representation and how important that is. And I wanted to ask you, especially in the UK as a playwright, how do you make sure that your work is made by the right people? Yeah, it's a really good question actually, because also there's enormous barriers to participating in the theatre industry. And Britain is, you know, we have extremely, you know, we're really riddled by class dynamics and the theatre industry very much so is it's quite rare to meet, you know, to meet people who are working in a sustainable way, you know, they can persist in the industry who aren't from quite privileged backgrounds actually and that's not at all to dismiss a lot of those very privileged people who are some of, who are very talented, but it's still, it's undeniable that there are, you know, there are many barriers. So I think that there's, I mean, there's a few things I think representation is key, but as I mentioned in my video, I think that's only the first, that's really just the most superficial thing. For me that seems quite a natural thing. I write about, I write about the world I see around me, I write about my own experience, but also write about the experience of my community and of the experience of people who I, you know, fill an affinity with and that's, that's now war in history. But those people usually it's not just because they happen to look like me or they happen to be women, it's usually about something which deeper about that. It's often about a commitment to a cause, it's often about the resistance and the resilience that they either they've demonstrated as characters or people in real life who have demonstrated that whose voices and whose stories have not been sort of honoured or recognised. So I think that I think the nature of my work, the approach to my work, inherently attracts a certain kind of collaborator. So I've been really lucky in that, you know, I've sort of over the years have, you know, established really fantastic working relationships with collaborators who, who, who, who feel who find that kind of work appealing basically. So it's, it's, it's something like for me, I think it's, I think there's a couple of things. It's not just about subject matter as well. It's about the rigor that you approach that subject matter with. So you can always have to make sure that you don't just have a suit. So for instance, I don't think you can have a superficial commitment to someone's politics like a character's politics, you have to be quite rigorous about that. And the more rigorous you are, the more likely you are to be, you know, end up working with collaborators who also have that same attitude and that same rigor, because the level of understanding is, you know, is, they want, they want to sort of dig deep into that. And then I also think it's about starting to shrug off your self-censorship as a theatre maker as well. So when I first came into writing, I've been writing for a long time now, like I was quite young when I started writing. And the level of self-censorship that I look back, I used to have was quite, was quite profound actually, which is understandable, you know, there's a level of fear, there's a level of like you feel very lucky and very grateful to be in the industry, which you're obviously encouraged to feel as well because that encourages self-censorship. I think over the years I've shrugged that off. I've sort of got to a point where I happily just don't give as much of a shit anymore. And that in itself, you know, brings people into like my sort of working sphere who have a similar lack of giving a shit, I guess. And I feel like that's the door into being able to grapple with things in a more serious way, but also in a more playful way, like feeling confident enough to be able to dig down deep into more sort of political and more sort of provocative ideas and themes. I wanted to ask you a little bit about how present you are in the rehearsal room when your plays are being produced, but first I noticed that everyone was smiling when Shona Lee said that she doesn't give a shit anymore about how the work is seen. So I wonder if any of you wanted to add to that because I felt like a vibe. I'm certainly getting there and listening to Shona Lee speak so emphatically about it is good. It's good. I'm still not in the space where I can say I've fully shrugged it off. I haven't, but I know I'll get there. I can see the journey. Fantastic. And I hope that all the female theater makers out there who are watching this right now know that that is the path to go on. Just stop giving a shit about how your work is perceived when you know that you're doing the right thing. I noticed that Kyla, you've unmuted yourself, so I wonder whether you want to add anything. Yeah, just to answer that question, maybe not, I wouldn't describe it as not giving a shit, but I only recently really embraced what it is that I do, that I actually do. And shrugged off this idea of, oh, I'm not this kind of theater maker or I'm not in this particular place that I wanted to be in my career. And it happened at a performance actually in the rural areas of South Africa in the mountains and we were at this very small school. And we were performing for quite a small audience and like, I guess in the theater landscape, it doesn't register, you know, it's not, it's not really an event. But it was real, it really was very meaningful right there. And in that moment I had this profound realization that this was happening and this is what we do. And I felt in that moment that I fully embraced the style of theater that I do. That's fantastic. So back to Shona Lee now to ask you that question about how involved you are in the rehearsal process as a playwright. And whether you prefer to be in the room or you like to be surprised when you come to the opening night. No, thanks. I mean, I always prefer to be in the room. It's very different depending on the project though, like I like, you know, like a lot of, a lot of writers. My work like spans sort of, I guess, like commissioned work and then sort of work that's more through participatory and community theater, and then also work the straddles both, I guess. So I always like to be engaged as possible, and as much as, you know, I'm able to and I also continue to write through. I've got two young children and I've continued to write through both of their infancies and stuff and so I've also always been like really keen to take babies into the rehearsal rooms, take toddlers into the rehearsal room. And I've also really actually to go back to your previous question actually that in itself also has really thrown up some of the best collaborators. You know when you start to really challenge some of these like extremely sort of restrictive ideas about what the artistic space is like and you know what the you know the sanctity of the creative sphere and actually it just means that some people can't participate. And I've just been like well I've got a baby so if you want me to participate the baby is coming and people are cool with that are usually cool in lots of other ways as well. So yeah so I like to be as engaged in possible as possible I like to collaborate as closely as possible. So it's always a little bit of a, I feel I don't I think, I think the British theatre culture is particularly, maybe has slightly more designated roles and maybe some of the, some of the countries in terms of the director and the writer and there is a certain there is a certain hierarchy. But I feel like increasingly like younger directors I work with and not just younger directors but directors who are interested in working on more I guess more more provocative work, want to try and overcome that I want to try and collapse some of those boundaries. So yeah I'm always really interested in being part of that and but equally I'm also quite happy that there's usually a point in every project where I'm happy to sort of step away and say this is the director and the actors now and I just feel like I'm meddling really. But yeah. I'd like to go back to Nisha now and ask you about the way that you make work. And in your video, you mentioned that the identities that you hold compel you to make political theater and not any other kind of theater and I wanted to ask you. How does that change type of way that you make or how you work. I think when when I first started writing and directing. It was really because I felt there weren't a lot of stories or pieces out there that I felt spoke to me. I was still sort of discovering who I am and what are these identities that I'm comfortable holding, but I also saw quite clearly that a lot of it did not speak to me and I don't mean in just the texts that were done but also in the manners in which that they were done. Yeah, it's also that but also I think one thing to understand is that a lot of theater in urban India comes from not everybody is a trained theater practitioner I'm not a lot of my learning has come on the job has been on the rehearsal floor, you know, in other directors rooms. I've done semi structured programs with mentors all of that is there but it's not the same as a two year three or five year program and things like that. So we're also, you know, negotiating a lot of that. There are a lot of untrained bodies are a lot of semi trained bodies. There's all kinds of skills and hats that people are wearing just to be able to make this work. Right. So, as, and so there's also probably some shortcuts that are taken. So when I started making work I realized fairly early on that all of the provocations that I wanted to toy with directly play into this identity that I hold so you know in the beginning I remember with my first play I wanted to imagine some myths that were Islamic in in its idea. How do I imagine that on stage and I was writing of course but but I didn't have an imagery for it and I was stuck there for like a week or two because I found it very difficult to find that. So, you know, that's that's an example of an early struggle. Today, it's a bit different. And today I find it, you know, I find it. I find that my process involves a lot of research a lot of talking to people who whose experiences I want to bring into these pieces. I also am, you know, a very privileged Muslim in India. So I live in an urban center I don't live in in a ghettoized area I don't have the markers of being Muslim apart from my last name. So I can get away with a lot of things and they may not be there won't be the kind of blatant discrimination on my body is on the line or bodies that threat in ways that a lot of others a majority of the my community would be in. So, increasingly my work is involved a lot of research a lot of talking just spending time with people really understanding, you know, in terms of the themes that I want to work with either writing or devising really look at what it is that we're talking about like I don't live those lives but I want to responsibly speak about them and use them as means to provoke a conversation in other bubbles, you know. Yeah, so, so there's a lot of research I think I think 60 70% of my work really is just research just talking and meeting people. After that a lot of it is so if there is if it's a play that I'm writing of course it's a more loan journey until you know it's ready to be workshop by a group of actors, but if it's a devised process then definitely a lot of bringing everybody on to the same page or a similar page. Because just the various identities that are there in the room. Make it difficult to assume a common starting point. So there's a lot of that in the beginning of just sharing research material discussing talking about how you're feeling about this what are your thoughts about this. So there's a lot of that and some of it is processed in the form of conversation some of it is through play through improv prompts. We're bringing in also working with with memory bringing in prompts from personal lives there's a lot of that and I think through that is is when the distance from the source material begins to come. And then I'm able to as someone who's facilitating the devising process or as someone who's writing the play the distance then begins to come then. This is what I've discovered so far, but I'm only four productions old as a maker so you know I'm interested in what more this could be. Yeah. That's fantastic. It's such an incredible making process that you have. And I wanted to ask you more about your process of research so you say that you start by interviewing and talking to people. And then you take the material to the rehearsal room. Do you ever feedback to the people that you were talked to or do you try to bring the shows in that community. How exactly does it work. Yes, with the devised pieces I've been able to do that. But with the with the other, you know the play the play writing the text. No, I haven't. There's also the problem of language in some cases. So sometimes I also have access to a couple of different languages. You know, English being of course the most urban and universal in the urban context, but there's also some other native languages that I can either make work in or at least direct translations off because I understand it very well. So there's all of these complications when it comes to taking work into the community but I have to say that the one time that I said you know I'm going to chuck language because I want to be able to go beyond the politics of language and that became like a form decision right up front. In that case we you know we decided we took a call very early that it's going to be a nonverbal play at max there might be words or maybe some you know gibberish if at all. So every word you know that was remotely text had to earn its place you know and that really helped because that allowed me to take it to spaces. This is the theater for young audience one. It allowed me to take it to spaces that otherwise would not have opened up for me and that was a, it was a mind blowing experience to be able to take it back into the community because a lot of the prompts that we were working with and a lot of the incidences you know the inciting incidences on the on the rehearsal floor came from the community. So to take it back and then for you know for teenagers to say ah you know that's me how did you know you know was brilliant and it came back it came back into the play and it and it helped the play you know shape itself. Yeah. I think that's that's excellent how where you want to take the show and who you want to speak to has actually influenced what the play will be and we will we will get to the audience. Category of questions in a bit I just want to ask one final question which is directed to all of you so anyone feel free to answer. It's something that I often think about that if it's a piece of work is political in its nature, but then it doesn't respect its own ideology and politics in the making so it's maybe not hierarchical, it's hierarchical, or the wrong people are making it. Is that truly political theater. I would say no. And I would say that although the production is always important the process is just as important and like I think that can be it. I think that I think one of the worst things is to go and see show you feel like there's a lot of grandstanding. And it's really about a sort of I guess a sort of a superficial posing where whereas you know actually the the politics being represented on stage a sort of superficial. That to me, I'd rather go and see a show that has has no political subject matter at all but was made in a really sort of, you know, non hierarchical collective way that in lots of ways that would be more exciting if those are the options for me. I think this is also a process in itself, developing the working method and a group within which everything is more horizontal. I mean I have learned a lot from my earlier projects where, let's say, the intentions were good. But then, somehow we ended up being a bit exploitative or a bit representational of other people instead of giving a voice to them and I really I really did learn a lot and reflected a lot with my peers from these projects. And I think we all had to so many things to learn about how we want to do things in the future. And yeah I think even criticism to such projects should be brought kindly. Because we are, yeah we all do have good intentions but we also live in the context in which so many of these stories are instrumentalized to do all sorts of art washing. And we're only learning how to do it better by doing it. Yeah, I love this learning by doing and that's certainly what happened for us and we've been touring for 10 years now. And this is one of the things that we learned early on. So we cannot be an ecological justice theater company talking about environmental issues and not be walking that talk ourselves. And so it's now part of our ethos that the way in which we make the shows is aligned with the theme of the shows as well. So for example, with our show Plastocracy, nothing new was bought, we're talking about like throwaway culture. So nothing new was bought, everything was reclaimed, repurposed, reused. And that's just obviously a very practical example, but something that we also learned that goes along with this topic is that for us the show begins as soon as the company arrives in the space. From the moment that you speak to the security guards, there's a lot of security guards in South Africa, usually blocking access to places but from the moment you engage with that first person, you know, the show has begun, the company has arrived. And I think a lot can be said for a company that doesn't treat those steps towards the stage with respect and with humanity. Because yeah, for us it's like what happens on the stage is merely the culmination. It's not the whole thing. So I absolutely agree. Thank you. Nisha, I think you wanted to add something. That's just a really great way of putting it across, Kyla, so much resonance. This thing of, you know, what are the ideologies or what is the politics in the room is something that I've been thinking about a lot more in the last, I think, one and a half or years. In fact, the pandemic and that, you know, forced break also made me really think about this. There is a lot of polarization even within the theater community in the city I work in and even otherwise in other urban centers in India. And I think I've really clearly sort of drawn a boundary for myself, but also as the director in the room to make sure that the others whether they hold these identities that are marginalized or not. They are allying, or they're collaborating to to, you know, in service of this play. And so they also as allies need to feel safe. It's getting very clear for me what those boundaries are. As a dramaturg, I've had to negotiate this a bit because I'm not the director in the room and I'm not taking calls on collaborators and things like that but but then I'm the dramaturg in the room so you know what are my lines there. What what is it that where is it that I'm saying that no I'm not going to be part of this project for these reasons, just to be able to say it out loud itself seems, you know, very liberating to say that this is a concern and I will foreground this is itself feeling like quite a liberation. Absolutely. I wanted to ask you a bit more about what you mentioned about creating boundaries. Can you give us an example of how you create boundaries. So one that one that specifically I've put in place in my rehearsal room is after the me to movement happened. My, my, you know, floorworked I mean my rehearsals typically have more non male members, but I also wanted to break the hierarchical nature of working in Indian rehearsal rooms a lot of them are, you know, are led by males. I've seen in rooms that are led by older men, you know, who have cast privilege and therefore there is a certain politics that come with that so to not have to not know what the other the alternative is but to keep kind of wrestling with what it is to speak to other women. Because we're leading rooms and look at what have you done here, what have I done here. So after the me to happen. I decided that it was time to do something in the rehearsal room where as an as an as a director I am held accountable. Someone that is always associated with the with each production where this person's this person would be a therapist or someone who can who they can approach in case of any issue related to abuse or harassment in the room. Me included. And this person's details are shared in our chat rooms before we begin rehearsals. And this person becomes the go to point. Of course the option remains with, you know, every member of the team to come to me first if they'd like but what happens if I am the abuser in the room. So, so then needed to have, you know, to have that there needs to be that I don't know if this was as foolproof because I've not faced the other side no one's actually reported anything. So I think the strength of it really I'll know only when or we'll all will know only if you know if you have to deal with it, but it seemed like a step in the right direction. And I know that it made a difference for, for example, the queer members in the in the rehearsal room. You know, and I know that we started off on the right note. We started off on the note where everyone is aware that, you know, all kinds of safeties are being thought off and if it isn't then you know you can bring it up was a good note to start on. The other is of course is political alignment. I mean, if I'm going to be creating a play that is about asserting a non dominant identity on stage, then who you know who's in my crew who's in my tech. I'm, I'm, I'm, you know, vetoing out people because I know the kinds of values they hold will not fit in this rehearsal room so they might be fabulous at their work. My first choice if it was only skill base but you're not going to be in my room. I'm not going to legitimize your political views against Muslims against queers against whoever it is that is not going to happen. So yeah, so again, like I said, it took me time to to know that it's okay to do this, that it's not some kind of, you know, relegation from my role as an artist, you know, it took me time to discover that I wish I had discovered it earlier. Absolutely, I think it takes a lot of strength to do that and to choose the person who is right for the project rather than the best person for the job, and to, first of all, put the psychological well being of your collaborators, you know, that's the highest priority. Thank you. Thank you for sharing that that's very inspiring. I'd like to now shift a little bit towards the audience and your relationship with the audience and how your work has been received. And I wanted to ask Joe, first of all, to start with you. Elena, one of the teenagers, she mentions that actually there have been some negative reactions to your shows when you've been touring and I was wondering if you could tell us more about that. Sure. The tours were mostly in rural areas around the Hunan, and as I mentioned before, it's quite a conservative area. And one of the scenes, I suppose that one of the teenagers is traveling back in time, meeting her mom when she was trying to decide whether to give birth to her. And it's this very touching scene in which the daughter goes back into the past and tells her that she is free to do whatever she wants. And for us, this was a very liberatory thing, including, yeah, for our relationships with our mother and vice versa. And that was letting go of control and ownership over somebody else's life and body, and encouraging a woman to choose for herself. And of course, that was criticized at the end. Because yeah, it just goes completely against many of the values here. So maybe we also included this layer of provocation unconsciously to make it more strong. So yeah, if something is really important for us, then it's also okay to go, yes, the current and make the audience uncomfortable. Absolutely. And for it to come from the child as well, I think it's even more powerful. The child coming from a completely different point of view and saying, yeah, you can choose not to have me. Because it will be better for your life. I think that is so powerful. And actually, I think that even negative reactions are important for this type of work. Because even though that person may say that they disagree, I feel like something has been touched, and at least it started a conversation. I'd like to ask you, how did the teenagers react to that? How do they feel about the negative reaction they've received as artists? Because we're all artists and we all feel really, really deeply when we're criticized. So how did they take it? Because we had a quite compact group and they were trustful of each other that they could easily say, like use this common voice and say, no, we believe in these things. And we had throughout the process, of course, we had all sorts of discussions and deconstructions of ways in which we perceive things. So they were really ready, I think, to respond to all sorts of criticism. But of course, they also got really positive feedback and encouragement. Of course. I wanted to open up to everyone else. Maybe start with you, Nisha, if you faced any sort of black backlash or negative feedback in your work? Sure. I mean, for sure. But if you're asking specifically, because of the content of, okay, so with the written text, of course, there was feedback to the tune of, do you have to be so specific? Do you have to be so, do you have to shout so much about some of this? So tone policing is something that I have dealt with as the writer. But I think if there's a backlash, it's been more in the school space, I think, there has definitely been an impact on some of the spaces that I used to work with before. When, you know, when, for example, they can access a very public social media profile, and they see some of the things that have either been involved in or I'm putting out there, there has been some backlash about things like that. You know, some, some policing about, okay, I don't want you to talk about this or I don't want you to deal with this in the classroom, but you can do that and it's disturbing and a lot of it has to do with fear that my, you know, the identity that I hold will be used to, you know, to push an agenda of some kind. And so I have spent, in cases where I feel like I'm okay to do so, I have spent time explaining that that is not what my work with youth is about. But in other cases, I've just let it go because in some spaces it comes with a top down history of not wanting to engage with these themes or with these topics, especially in a school or a community center kind of a kind of a context. You know, either school principals or teachers or community space managers are worried about how to explain this to parents. And I'll try once I'll say look that's exactly why you need to do this. And a lot of it will come from the children themselves you've got to trust the process, right. I'm not, I'm not putting anything on them a lot it's all going to come from this from the kids and if, and if the teenagers are open to so much that's out there in the world you can, you can how long can you police them. But in some cases I just let it go it's just not worth. I know that it's not going to make a difference. But yeah mostly in these in these cases there has been backlash of this kind. So it's difficult to really pinpoint and say that hey, you know I see what you're doing. But I know it's present it reaches you, you know it reaches you through others in the community and yeah. I'd like to open it up to you, Shona Lee and Kyla. How do you resist backlash publicly so have you ever been attacked for the things that you've written or or made. And also how do you deal with it personally as a human being. Yeah I can jump in. I don't know. I don't think I've ever been directly attacked for the content of anything I've written, excuse me. But particularly actually, particularly only on in my career, something about being a bit younger I guess I felt I was attacked just for simply being an Asian woman writing. And that's just the very like very knee jerk just racist sort of patriarchal response basically and actually I probably was more noticeable. If I was so I remember I had so there's two things particularly that stand out that I had a radio commission on the BBC so of course the BBC is very you know is quite a mainstream platform and so I think that the, the, you know, some really this is pre social media though so it would have been much worse if it was on Twitter but you know you can leave comments and they're just some just some openly just sort of racist and socialistic comments about and the essentially was like how dare you be on this platform. And then I guess also, I had a round probably around the same time had a play on that was also went to Edinburgh and it's on, you know, it was sort of, I think it's more. So it's not so much about content is actually just about trying to which I'm sure we've all experienced like just trying to suppress your voice like, you know, even sort of like having a platform to say anything is seen as transgressive and seen as threatening. But I mean, but probably come from very reactionary sections of British society so I don't know if I don't know how reflective they are but this is just I think something we probably are really aware of now as social media is so part of our lives we have a feeling that we are, you know, much more. Well, I guess our experience in real life is sort of, you know, has a parallel in social media and so. But not so much for the content. I feel like the content is more about being able to get your work made in more. It's more about that, you know, that process is probably harder. I like you want to add anything to that. I guess I have a slightly different experience in that with kind of ecological issues them quite science heavy and and also I think can feel quite distant like nobody really wants to place themselves at the center of these enormous interconnected problems that feel too big to even tackle by on mass nevermind individually which is true. And so I feel like a lot of how our work has been less about trying to kind of push back and more about trying to draw in and trying to help audiences to see themselves as part of the picture. So, so when you talk about like what is the audience backlash you've experienced. The biggest thing is we've experienced this thing of like, it's not me, it's not me. I, this is not my problem there's nothing I can do it's somebody else's thing. And so it's been that has been very much part of our journey is how do we pull people in. So, in an empathetic and compassionate way. So that we can start to see ourselves as part of the story, without this kind of defensiveness that happens around environmental issues where, because they can also obviously the environmental movements can be and our plays have also been quite preachy. This is also something that we are very cognizant of and working on you know this kind of high horse. You must do this you shall do that, according to the book of the green or whatever. So it's like, you know, trying to get rid of that and be like well what is the, what is the, the story that we can tell ourselves in order to approach this. It's these issues from a collective rather than the government has to do something about it my neighbor has to do something about it. It's my parents fault. It's the next generation's problem. So, yeah, I would say that's been our major challenge with audiences over the years. Yeah. And that actually moves me on to the next question I wanted to ask you, which is how in this in this subject of climate justice. I could, I could guess that there's a lot of resistance to the subject matter. And also, I found that there's a lot of fatigue relation to this subject. And I wonder whether it's the same in South Africa and if you've had to deal with that with people like oh not the polar bears again. In South Africa is less about the polar bears and more about energy. We're a mining country, you know, we're a country that's built its wealth on pulling things out of the ground and burning them for for cheap, for cheap energy that has served the elite few read white, the white population historically. So the fatigue, I think is probably more around that than climate justice as a as a theme and now what's happening. Oh sorry is a dog barking out there. I think that what's what's happening is climate justice is now being inserted into those issues in a way that it hasn't previously been. So, I mean I did live in the UK for for 10 years and it does have a very different I understand the idea of fatigue there because it does feel like quite an individual problem like you alone are responsible for climate change and your solution your your actions alone are going to fix this whereas in South Africa it's it seems like it's a bit more of a collective people understand that it's a little bit more dispersed the problem. So, yeah this this question of fatigue when it's not only climate justice it's also environmental issues in general, and you absolutely right there is the sense of what can I do you know where can I start. It's too much. It's too much and and in South Africa in particular it's very low down on the agenda underneath rightly so underneath genocide and crime and poverty and jobs and employment it's very low down on the list and is seen traditionally as a sort of white liberal issue. So that is that is a challenge like how to how to, I don't want to say convinced because we've done with that now we don't do that anymore, but gently suggest that it is not low down on the list and is in fact, as you say intersects with with all of the above. And to try and do that in a way that does not provoke this defensiveness that I spoke about and this like I actually can't deal, you know, I can't deal right now. Can't think about the environment I'm too busy thinking about me and my family and how we're going to survive the month basically. And that's the best way we've found to do that is with humor, honestly speaking, humor and satire and poking fun at things and I mean for me this is the heart opens wide then right and there's the sense immediately of humanity of okay you're not blaming me great but we can talk about it. So this is very much a weapon of ours is humor and imagery you know physical imagery and things that are not so cerebral or intellectual but more embodied and work in on the heart rather than the head. Let me stop there. No thank you thank you and that actually will connect a lot with the next, the next subject which is intersectionality and how we try to connect the issues that we speak about to other issues in society. Before we move to that I have one last question about audience and that's personally, and I wanted to ask you as as a playwright, I'm asking you this question because I'm more familiar with the work in the UK and I'm curious how you do it how do you decide who your work is for and who your audiences, and when you make political theater do you decide to talk to the majority to the people in power to change their minds or, or do you want more to empower individual communities. This is such a good question and after I recorded my piece which you asked us to do before this process is something I was thinking about actually I didn't talk about audience I was thinking I hope they asked me about audience because actually that is probably the fourth element of political theater which I think is so important. So, I think it's really important not to write for an assumed audience. I cannot stand it when I go to the theater and I know that the audience the intended audience is not me and it's hardly ever me, actually, it's almost always seems like you know, quite a sort of reactionary pale male stale sort of audience member and it's like what is the point of this like, you know, like, I don't need you to tell me, you know, we, oh my god this person experienced racism and it's like and everyone's supposed to go. And it's like well no person of color in the audience is going to go because that's just not a doesn't relate to our lives in any way is it goes back again to the boring work that I mentioned. So, no, I never assume I don't tend to assume a majority audience. I often think this is unfortunately increasingly relevant here, much more relevant for some of you than probably in the UK as well I mean like Nisha you're really on the front line in this, but increasingly we have an increasingly authoritarian hard right society about the government really mascot. And I think a lot about how I've heard sort of like comrades and artists and writers from other countries who've sort of been been through periods of authoritarianism and fascism and they've talked about how that has impacted on them in a very formal level and what something that's really stuck with me was an Italian writer speaking at the beginning of the pandemic actually last year and he was talking about how that through like the years of Mussolini he felt like people thought that their neighbors had very scary fascist views so they kept their actually considerably more progressive and collective and humanist you know human views to themselves because they didn't want to be but actually as that regime sort of sort of ended and people increasingly realized that they were not alone in their communities but the atomizing effects of authoritarianism and the fear and the division had separated them. And so I think about that a lot that you know I never, you know I don't want to write for that the assumed audience I want to write as if people, you know need to feel have that feeling unlocked I guess. So yeah I essentially I mean selfish I guess always right for me, but always right for an audience a bit like me. And also, I think ultimately, I'm always very wary of not of trying not to like educate or explain anything of just trying to meet people as if they, they understand so just assume that people understand or assume if people don't understand they'll very quickly be able to understand. And above all, my responsibility as a theater maker and as an artist is just to write a bloody brilliant play. And that actually supersedes everything and once it goes a bit to what Kyla was saying about, you know, pulling people in with humor and the satire and I think that that's that's absolutely right it's about you know you welcome people in and you write a fantastic you write you write as good a play as you're able to write, and that you know that that people appreciate that and then they will follow you on whatever journey you take them on hopefully. Thank you. Yes. Do you think you could respond to that a little I just wanted to absolutely absolutely please please. Um, you know it's, it's something that a lot of us here, especially in urban centers in Bangalore we think about often because spaces where we can perform our plays at our limited and there is a lot of, you know, the specific cast and of people who can come into those spaces who feel like they can enter these spaces. And there's also my, you know, intersectional identity. Because of the kind of spaces that I can access. I'm also able to directly ask questions of silences of complicity and negotiating this is sometimes can be a bit debilitating in the in the writing process also. And I have to kind of consciously work wrestle with that because of course you want to make the, you know, you want to write the best kind of play that you can write and you want to make on the devising floor you want to make the best kind of work that you can. But this question is always present and I don't know if it's a bad thing or a good thing that who is going to be coming and watching right because I know the spaces that that I will have to necessarily apply to to to to reach an audience. There is also the other way of looking at it which is I'm not going to go down that route. I'm going to create my own spaces, right. Yes, but even then there is gatekeeping that happens. So if I'm going to talk about, you know, what, you know, anti anti Muslim sentiment or anti caste sentiment, then I want to be speaking to the people who belong to the communities that have the most privilege and can be quiet about it. You know, and yet that's where there is, you know, the most amount of gatekeeping so so negotiating all of this is itself quite something simply because spaces, you know, are political the space that you that you create your peace and that you showcase your peace and they're all political choices the language especially in in India, the language is deeply political the minute I make a play in English. I know that this is open to a certain audience and so with it comes a certain audience that you're creating for as well it's kind of in build in So it's interesting to to hear Chanel is perspective. Yeah, I just I just wanted to think out loud. Absolutely, I think I think it's important to for all of us to understand that individual contexts are different in each country. And for example, in the UK. I definitely feel what she really is saying because work seems to be, and I say this as a woman and as a migrant I say about us, you know, kind of like as an object, rather than work that is truly for us. And I say this as a migrant as a woman. But at the same time, yes, certain spaces will be completely white or, you know, completely middle class. And that is, that is true and that is one, one, one thing I wonder about how do we change these spaces. And it's actually a question that I want to address to everyone that, at least in the UK and I'm sure everywhere, some large spaces are trying to change their image by by programming work that may be very representative, for example, but actually it won't really rock the boat their politics won't be very hard hitting. And I wonder as women, some of us as migrants some of us as holding other identities that make us more marginalized. How do we fight for representation and without allowing our identities to be objectified for art washing. Sorry, that was a very long winded question. Feel free anyone to to jump in or if you'd rather not answer week I can skip. It's a great question and I think the only I have a very short answer the, the only ways in which that I can, you know, make sense of this is to just continue working independently. And a lot of us in in India work independently because there is no institutional support to speak off. And in doing that, we find our own ways of keeping this alive, you know, funding through patrons finding your own spaces, literally, knowing that the constraints you're working with, formally speaking as well, could be, you know, little black boxes made out of non performing spaces, therefore, with it comes certain choices. And that's the only way that I think a lot of us here have found to deal with some of this, just make your own spaces and, you know, find your own patrons and it's hard as hell. Definitely slows things down for a lot of us. But in some ways, it seems more acceptable to me than having to spend energies convincing, I don't know, other other spaces people that this is worth it. I, I don't know, it sounds a bit, sounds a bit arrogant, I think, but it just comes from the need to put work out there and do it at on your own terms. Yeah. I think it sounds very reasonable and not arrogant at all. I think this is kind of a connector question that it leads us to the subject of the place of political theater but because some so many of us cannot literally get a seat at the table in this industry that is so male and so middle class and so white. How do we actually reform it. If we can't reach those spaces that is a question for everyone and more of a reflection really I know we can't find the solution. I don't necessarily have an answer but I'm really really keen for us as a, as a, as a group of like a sector to start organising and to start seeing ourselves as workers more than we do at the moment. I mean, certainly British theater culture is like, like so many I guess all the entire creative sector is built on a sense of individualism and a sense of, you know, I've talked about how grateful we're supposed to feel to be here, especially if we're not from very privileged backgrounds, but really erodes the fact that we put in our time and our effort and our work and that we're workers and that we wouldn't you know that I've got a good friend who's an actor and his union are fighting for a five day week. You know, like the rest of us is trying to start to talk about four day week is we just want a five day week and it's like yes exactly that's the issue. So I'm really keen to sort of start thinking about that and you know I'm really excited like for instance that the unions like UVW have got like a design and culture sector workers sort of section now and I'm really interested in sort of exploring how we both organise as sort of theatre workers but also how we all see recognise that we are precarious workers and that we have, you know, we can be organising in solidarity with other precarious workers and there is massive overlap there and and the part and parcel of that has to be breaking down that hierarchy about who gets to, you know, who gets to participate in theatre and culture and who gets to make this work, you know. And I certainly don't have the answers but I'm really, I feel like we need to fast forward on some of this organising and some of these discussions in order to start doing sort of this this sort of collective thinking. Thank you. Does anyone else want to add anything to that? Joe. Yeah, for me it's a lot about decentralising not just methods and voices and so on but also the places where we choose to do our work for instance for me it was quite a big step to move from Bucharest to the Gunams, Bucharest where there is a local scene and there is some formed public already including the political theatre and moving here where there's almost nothing happening and implicitly there's the people don't have any expectations from theatre in general. So maybe many of the people that we reached it was their first performance. So then we're dealing with a blank page which can be, I mean, yeah, of course it requires so much more work and effort, but that kind of work it's not deconstructive, it's more constructive. You can start from something and then they don't have a term of comparison so they're not going to say classical theatre is better. You can take it as it is and then consider it for what it is and I'm sure that this area is not the only one where, you know, the public hasn't had the chance to see a performance and to be asked what do you think about this given subject. Exactly and actually that's something I wanted to discuss with all of you this idea of art with a capital A and how sometimes that is seen as antithetic to political theatre and as political artists we have to really dance around that line and I wonder how how you do that in your work this is towards all of you. If I can say something about that and it is does definitely relate back to what we were just talking about. So many resonances there in terms of what Sean Ali said about making a good play, first and foremost. And also what Nisha said about making your own spaces or sidestepping some of the bureaucracy of theatre, which is what it feels like sometimes and also the idea of decentralising I mean I resonate with all of these I think they are really great points and certainly something that we've come to as well. We think that's a way to carve out space for this kind of work in our industry is to keep making it, to keep making it and for every play to be better than the last and more popular than the last and to go to places that haven't seen work like this. And just to keep like pushing those to pioneer basically to keep pushing pushing outwards rather than trying to beg for a seat at this table, where everyone's clamouring. And that is definitely the man the men at the gate certainly in South Africa it's like the gatekeepers are these big powerful very patriarchal people and systems that that are definitely don't want you and this kind of work at the table. So then, you know, we, we don't expend energy on knocking on those doors anymore we just turn around and go the other direction, and we keep making the work, and we keep making the work as entertaining and interesting and provocative and inspiring and unusual and unique and different as possible. And we keep performing it for more new and new and new audiences so that. Yeah, we, we, we, we therefore going outwards rather than inwards I guess we're not trying to repeat what happened in the past but we're trying to make new because that is also what we're about right we are about making a new way you know I love this this idea of like if you if you don't like me taking my baby into the rehearsal room well then you also don't know me and you don't know me as an artist because I'm inseparable my the fact that I'm a mother is inseparable from the fact that I'm also a theater maker. We come together and this is how we do things now, and this is the normal way. Not your way, this is the normal way. So, yeah, that that's what I have to say about those two things you know like how do we make art we, we make it. We make it like this now. And, and also the idea of how do we. Yeah fight fight back against this thing that hopes to exclude us. Unfortunately, I have to start wrapping up I have so many questions for all of you. I have learned so much in this in this discussion and I'm so in awe and I have so much respect for everything that all of you do. But before we end I wanted, first of all to offer you the opportunity to ask each other questions if you want to talk more to each other. And then towards the end I would like you to tell our audience what you're working on at the moment, what your future plans are and how our audience can help you support you spread the word about your work. So, feel free, whichever one of you wants to start. I have a question for Kyla. And actually and Joe, both of you. Do you, what do you do, you know, before and after the actual show to kind of prep the people that are going to be doing it. Especially because of some of the work that you discussed Joe and Kyla because you spoke about some amount of fatigue or some amount of this isn't my problem. Is there, how do you do that how do you prep an audience to receive some of what you're going to be telling them, especially if it's provocative if it's, if it's dark if it's if it requires them to really wrestle with themselves. Because that's something I think about a lot and yeah. We always do have an introduction and we can talk about the working process so we don't just throw the audience into the experience, especially since, as I mentioned, many of them maybe haven't seen the theater performance. And we also have a discussion afterwards, which is moderated and which, yeah, again we come back to the working process and to be as transparent as possible about that. And I think it's part of, it's an integral part of what we present. Sorry, sorry. This is a great question and something that I also think about a lot. Especially because we do visit a lot of schools certainly the last three years we've been working with various age groups at schools, and what we have been trying to do is for the educators to do that prep beforehand. For example, if we're talking about water issues that they talk about that in class, and then say that there is a play coming. It's about this and then usually what happens is we also have a talk back session after the play where we try to steer the conversation away from how old are you. But how did you become an actor and more towards the actual meat of the of the performance, which is again an interesting conversation about, especially if you are going to places that haven't seen a lot of theater before. How do you hold those two things the art and the experience the theatrical experience, and the novelty of that with the subject matter there's a lot going on for audience members sometimes, especially young audience members. But I will say that I'm dissatisfied with this and I'm looking for new ways in which to allow the production to sit and to land and I'm yeah I'm dissatisfied with the sort of like bookmarking, you know, and I'm wondering what else what else is possible. Yeah, yeah we should we should continue the conversation because I've been thinking about what else is possible to it just seems like there should be other ways, and I feel like I haven't or we haven't cracked it yet. One more thing that I'd like to add to this is that I think, especially when we talk about more marginal public. I think it's important to come back and to return and if once they've seen one performance and yeah maybe it's not enough to make up your mind or to take some action, but coming back also I think kind of gives the message that you matter. Even if it does take some extra work from the company to go that extra mile, we do it because you're also, yeah concerned about these things that happen and you can also make an impact even if you live in rural, you name it. This has worked for the Theatre for Youth production that we were touring with before the pandemic hit. It did work for us, yes. Going back and also volunteering sessions with the government school kids, the government school is like the public school equivalent except it's specifically for, well not specifically for but typically the kids that go there are off marginalized identities. Schooling is very segregated in India. It's a legacy of the caste system, it's a legacy of the colonial reality, so all of that. And going back, it did do something and we volunteered sessions with the group and it opened up both what Kyla was talking about both the spaces, you know the questions around the artistry and questions around what the content was. I think it's really important what Joe said as well about coming back and especially if you go to a community or if you collect research from that specific community for you to come back to it and not just use them as a source. And this and actually shownly in your video you speak so beautifully about art and activism and how our work is fused, but there's also the conflict with us being seen as workers. And I know we won't have time to debate this, I think feel like there should be a conversation just about like an hour on this subject about how, how do we protect ourselves as workers but also when our work is actually activism. How do we get, you know, getting paid for activism and things like that so it's, I just, it's just made me ask myself a lot of questions and I hope that it would have sparked questions and thoughts for our audiences as well. And now we, I really have to wrap up so please tell me what what are you working on at the moment shownly what what are we looking forward to. Yeah, I'm working on some some really awesome projects I'm really enjoying at the moment. So one that people can actually book for and see because it will be live streamed in the next few weeks. There's a commission for the orange tree who are commissions, I think six of us to mark the reopening of their doors, who knows what's going to happen. I mean, they thought they'd be reopening their doors. I think they will. I think they will be. But they'll be live streamed so I think that there's, you know, they've been quite sensible about that. I've got another couple of commissions coming up. I'm working for the armade at the moment. I'm writing a play for Torah Arts. And there's been some exciting developments with a play called Chasing Heads I wrote as well which is set in Kolkata in about 20 years ago and in Britain like now. So yeah, but no sort of announcements around that yet. But if people are interested in, yeah, bookings, it's called Inside Out for the Orange Tree. I'll post a link in the chat here to share. Thank you. I'm sure the link is now here for our audiences to click on through some sort of tech magic that I do not fully understand. I've just muted myself. Nisha, what are you working on? So I'm right now on the floor with two others. And we were all sort of imagining, devising, performing together. I go back on the floor as a performer after five years and it's nerve wrecking as hell. But we're there. We're doing it. All three of us hold intersectional identities that have been marginalized and we're bringing personal history, family history, community history. And kind of weaving what we hope would be deeply unsettling experience. It's not going to be live streamed. We took the call to not do that. We wanted to work with Shell Space. And we have sort of taken a call to actively look at what are those spaces that we can perform in that is going to break, at least try to break some of these bubbles that exist. That's the attempt. You wish us luck. I hope you get there. But the piece itself is something that looks at what does it take for in a supremacist dominant culture? What does assertion look like? And how does one move beyond mere questions of survival really? And that's really what we're looking at. Yeah. Thank you. Joe, what are you working on? Well, there's one short variant of the answer, which is corresponding applications. And then there's the creative and exciting part in which we're working on a musical performance about future. Because Ceva, which means something also stands for community education, future and art. And we thought that every edition we're going to dedicate one of these subjects, which of course is treated quite intersectionally. So yeah, future as dystopia, utopia, imagined spaces and so on is like, yeah, we're doing a performance on this. And we're also preparing a festival for other teenager theater groups, which is also very exciting and also a lot of work because we're doing it with a bunch of teenagers who have never been to a theater festival. But are going to organize one for other teenagers. So it's really a very fertile ground to imagine and create experiences for one another. That's fantastic. Kyla, what are you working on? I love a dystopian political theater piece. I wish I could see it. Yes. I'm actually working on a school with some colleagues. It's called the Johannesburg School of Mask and Movement Theater. We all have similar training in devised theater. And I guess I'm mentioning it because we have had specific conversations around how do we train theater makers, not only actors, but also the theater makers, those who make theater, which is also writers, directors, designers. So we've been working on that throughout the pandemic. We've been working on a curriculum and we've just got our first workshops coming up in the next couple of weeks, some weekend workshops. As I said in my video, we really have a struggle with the digital, the kind of imposed digital age. We are very much a live company and we've just coming out of a lockdown now here in South Africa. So I guess we also, I'm trying to reimagine how we can get back to the liveness of things without putting people in danger, putting ourselves in danger. And other than that, we want to revisit our Peace Burning Rebellion, which is a climate justice protest poem, the choral work that I mentioned. So slow steps towards that, I guess, but I guess the biggest thing is the school. And I mean, I think what would be helpful for us is for people to follow us on all the places, a well-worn theater company. We're on all the feeds and then, yeah, and there we're quite active on there, letting people know what we're up to. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I'm sure that everyone's Instagrams and Facebooks and things are now on the screen somewhere for people to follow. So please do follow Kyla, Joe, Nisha and Shona Lee. And thank you so much for joining this very special International Women's Day event to everyone at home. And I want to especially thank you HowlRound, who are making this technically possible, and AppSide Cinema Club, who is a feminist cinema club in Romania, who are supporting us. And to invite you to our next event in two weeks' time, March 22, with an incredible company called Jubilee Penn. They are the first Roma feminist theater company in Romania. And they make some incredible work. We'll be streaming their show Cor Purvan. And then we'll be having a conversation with Mihaila Dragan and Zita Moldovan, who are actors and also run the company. And Aldeza, who is an activist for Roma women's rights with the Association Eiromunia. So thank you so much again, everyone. I'm very grateful for this conversation. And I look forward to keeping in touch with all of you and learning more from you and your incredible work. Bye.