Joanne McQuarrie, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter | [email protected]
2020 Vision, a play written and performed by the Geeky Street Theatre ensemble is a reflection of how the kids are sitting with the state of the world.
The six-member group entertained a small crowd on August 14 at the CN Stage, the finale to a week-long accumulative program, led by Elena Kellis and Rahat Saini.
In the play, Houdini breaks into a helmet museum and opens a box he was not supposed to. He lets out a number of horrors: violence, pestilence, hatred and death. But among these terrible things is hope, joy and happiness.聽
The audience saw how each of the creatures released from the box affects Houdini as he desperately tries to escape from the museum. They overwhelm him and start to drag him away as Little Miss Rainbow runs in to help.
The actors included Alice Wannop as Little Miss Rainbow, representing hope, joy and happiness; Elijah Mwaniki as Skull Hunter: bringer of death, who also has fun making people pass out; Piper Davis as The Plague Doctor: god of plagues who brings pestilence and illness wherever they go and takes the form of a bird.
Theo Kellis played Ishida, a Samurai turned demon who brings fear and violence wherever he goes; Emerson Gibbons was Houdini: a hippie from the 60s who loves peace, protesting and his funky spectacles; and Mackenzie Byatt, Hater, who hates everything, especially love, and has the power to make you hate everything too.
The theatre program started with ensemble-building exercises, Elena Kellis said. "Improvising games, trust games."
"As well as spatial awareness exercises, especially now when we're doing a camp in COVID-19 times," added Saini.
The idea, they said, was to make sure the group of kids was comfortable working with each other, comfortable with sharing their ideas and working on a show together, that they could be proud of.
The young folks learned about the history of masks in theatre around the world and how they have been used in performance.
Saini said: "This year we started by giving them plain masks to decorate and craft supplies. They used cardboard, pompoms, feathers, yarn.
鈥淲e asked them to journal and ask questions about the characters to have three dimensional characters that [were] in the final production.
Kellis continued, "After that we had them sit in a circle and everyone shared their characters with the group.
鈥淎fter the sharing it was clear there was a connection between the characters."
The character descriptions reminded Kellis and Saini of the Greek myth of Pandora's Box. They offered the kids that idea and they ran with it.
Saini added, "We did the work of piecing together a story that was theirs. The kids did the work."
In the play, when Little Miss Rainbow ran in to intervene, the negative beings were no match for her on their own, but together they started to overwhelm her.
With a soft spot for unicorns, Skull Hunter, stood up to the others, which gave Little Miss Rainbow a chance to escape.
But he soon realized that darkness cannot defeat darkness and his powers were useless against Violence, Hatred and Plague.
Enter Little Miss Rainbow who came back this time with a magic feather, which she gave to Skull Hunter to freeze the others and put them into a deep sleep.
After freezing them the Skull Hunter gave the feather back, which allowed Little Miss Rainbow to put him to sleep as well.
Houdini came out of his hiding place and thanked Little Miss Rainbow with a cupcake.
She warned him not to touch the frozen creatures but impulse took over and Houdini leaned in to get a selfie with them.
He lost his balance, which woke up the sleeping horrors - and they all took after him again. Little Miss Rainbow ran after them yelling 鈥淣ot again!鈥�, and the cycle continued...
What they wrote, Saini said, reflects a lot of dark realities.
"These are difficult times. I confirm they're alright but they are not okay," she said.
In an email later, she and Kellis said, "They are processing a lot and there is so much changing right now. Because of this it is more important than ever that young people have opportunities and space to express themselves.
鈥淲e put a heavy emphasis in our week鈥檚 curriculum on listening to what the kids want to learn and connect to.
鈥淲e feel thankful and lucky to have the ability to hold space for young people to create together, especially since just months ago we didn鈥檛 know when that would be possible again."
