Legislative theater

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Augusto Boal

Legislative theater serves to democratize politics through theater and was developed from the " theater of the oppressed " by Augusto Boal in his time as Vereador (city councilor or senator) of the city of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil from 1991 to 1996. The topics were: the environment, geriatric medicine, disability rights, discrimination against homosexuals, the landless movement, women's issues, domestic violence, AIDS prevention.

As a theater director Augusto Boal transformed the audience into actors, as a city councilor or senator he transformed the voters into legislators. His theater group worked with the citizens' initiatives in the city to present the problems. In small festivals they exchanged and improved them, then presented the scenes to the population for change. The suggestions were noted and processed for legislative proposals.

The project not only brings the problems of the residents' groups to the town hall, but also the events in the “chamber” to the outside world: actors and actresses bring scenes and texts from meetings into public space.

The starting and basic form is the forum theater . In his plays, the central figure is an oppressed person who cannot realize his wishes because he is prevented from doing so by a figure of oppression. In the first run, the audience should just watch, then the scene starts all over again and the joker or the game leader encourages the audience to go into the scene and replace the central figure in order to try a different outcome to the situation and as many possible alternatives try out.

The reports from Rio de Janeiro were so well received at the 1997 International Festival of the Theater of the Oppressed in Toronto that a European conference in Munich brought together the concerns and attempts at transmission in the various countries. A first series of performances in Munich City Hall brought symbolic scenes and themes into play in the auditorium, which Boal then included as the last chapter in his book under Symbolism in Munich .

In the meantime, further long-term projects have been carried out in Vienna and Berlin, in Vienna with the judiciary, in Berlin with initiatives and associations. Against a broader testing in Germany stands the mood to deal with the legislation in the party discourse instead of seeking broad democratic participation.

literature

  • Augusto Boal: Legislative Theater: Using Performance to Make Politics. Routledge, London / New York 1998, ISBN 0415182417 .
  • Daniela Panfy: Com Coragem de ser feliz. Augusto Boal's Legislative Theater. Vienna 1998.

See also

Web links