Vol. 38, No. 18

2-1-2006
By: Susan Wittstock Dalzell

Drama illuminates domestic violence dilemmas

MFA acting student Chris Roche is used to taking a script and learning a role for a play, doing his best to interpret and portray a fictional character.

But for an upcoming Department of Theatre production, Hidden Voices, his character is a composite of real people, based on insights he and other MFA students gathered from residents of Turning Point, a domestic violence shelter and counseling center in Marion.

"What makes this so different from working on a normal show is that at the end of the day, these are real people in real situations," Roche said.

Hidden Voices is Ohio State's first Community Outreach and Engagement production. The show will be performed Feb. 9-12 and 16-19 in the Drake Center's Roy Bowen Theatre, with additional performances planned in Marion on Feb. 24 and Mansfield on Feb. 25.

The finished play is the culmination of almost three quarters of work. The first quarter, in spring 2005, 10 MFA acting students researched and visited potential community partners and picked one as a collaborating partner. Turning Point was selected, so for fall 2005, the students traveled regularly to Marion with Valerie Kaneko Lucas, assistant professor of theatre and OSU Extension state specialist in the arts. They met with the women and men, learning their stories, and conducted creative workshops with the residents and their children in areas such as acting, creative writing, movement and art.

"The thinking behind this was that a partnership between theater and a community organization has to be a two-way street," Lucas said. "The MFAs wanted to give something back to the women and families who were undergoing tough times. It gave the women and children a chance to have fun, even if only for an hour."

Victims of domestic violence typically stay three weeks at Turning Point, which serves Crawford, Delaware, Marion, Morrow, Union and Wyandot counties. The shelter provides food and clothing to those who need it as well as guidance and information on how to handle the emotional, legal and financial aspects of their situations.

A key issue Turning Point's administrators wanted the actors to grasp is that domestic violence comes in many shapes and sizes. "Turning Point said we'd like you to help raise people's awareness about domestic violence and encourage working toward a violence-free society. It's not just beatings and physical violence - the things we often think of as domestic violence. Domestic abuse can be emotional, verbal and economic abuse as well, and abusers exist across the socio-economic spectrum."

Hidden Voices has four storylines. One follows a professional married couple; the second focuses on a same-sex female partnership with a child; the third is a same-sex male partnership where the characters are Spanish speakers; and the fourth plot follows a woman with a young child who has left an abusive relationship and is working her way through a bureaucratic maze.

The experience is intended to prepare the actors for careers after Ohio State. "Outreach has become a huge part of university settings as well as for regional theaters," Roche said. "This is gearing us up for saying that we have a working portfolio - we don't just act but can do something for the community as well. We're learning how to create work for ourselves."

The 10 students are the first class to enter the MFA acting program since the curriculum was revised to emphasize the creation of new work. They entered in the fall of 2003 and will graduate together in spring 2006. The second class of 10 will enter in the fall of 2006.

Audiences may have strong reactions to Hidden Voices' content, so after each show, specialists from the Columbus Coalition Against Family Violence and other organizations will help facilitate discussions. The theatre lobby will have booths hosted by area agencies that offer services to victims. T-shirts from Turning Point's segment of the Clothesline Project - a national effort to have victims and/or their loved ones express their emotions through decorating shirts - also will be on display.
Information also will be available about Ohio State's "Campaign Against Family Violence and Relationship Abuse - Recognize It. Refer It." The campaign kicks off in February and is targeted toward university employees, with a student component planned for fall.

"The timing of our production and Ohio State's new effort is a little uncanny," Lucas said. "We share the goal of helping faculty, staff and students become better informed about domestic violence and the toll it takes on so many."

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