Acting Out

– Performance, Saturday 14th November 2009

ACTING OUT
The performance

“Releasing the beast”: a pack of animals caged from society roll the dice in the game of chance, aiming to obtain freedom and inclusion in the other side…

This is an interactive, site-specific, macabre game show style event that gives the audience an insight into what’s involved with being homeless and the luck you need to get out of a situation of homelessness if you find yourself on the street.  Animals start in a cage begging to be “sponsored” by an audience member. If they are sponsored they are given a number of rolls of a dice (4) to progress through a snakes and ladders style board game. The dice has a combination of good and bad options that can either advance the characters along the path or set them back. The game will be over for a character when they either reach the highest level, are thrown back in the cage or run out of dice rolls. A ringmaster will run the board game and a number of “Move on Poleez” will move the audience around the stages of the board game.

The Artists: Acting Out team
The “Acting Out” theatre program is aimed at bringing quality theatre processes to Brisbane’s most marginalised young people. Acting Out is a theatre development program in which young people who are homeless or at risk of homelessness learn drama and then develop a public performance outcome to legitimise their use of public space which has been compromised.

Participants of the project bring their unique experience in living and surviving with homelessness, which has been used as material to develop the final performance. There have been many young people who have contributed to the development of the performance, including Irish, Adrian, Telysha, Jamie, Tar, Chris, Tiara, Sonom, Dougie, Andrew and Shelly.  The facilitation and project management team are: Liminal Performance Group Ashley Slader, Amy Bradney-George, Megan Jensen in partnership with Brisbane Youth Service (Lani Pereira, Thomas, Jodi, Laura, Ben) Visible Ink: Valley (James Douglas, Kerry O’Connor and Deanna Borland-Sentinella)