Digital theatre production \u201cConnections\u201d brought together students from four different Atlantic universities to bring theatre to your living room.<\/p>\n
\u201cConnections\u201d explored the familiar pandemic themes of isolation, mental health, and racial injustice.<\/p>\n
The actors, all students from the Maple League of Universities, performed live over Zoom from their homes.<\/p>\n
Whether it was here in Sackville, Antigonish, or Barbados, the actors used their own laptops or cell phones to capture song, dance, painting, and their varying pandemic experiences.<\/p>\n
Director Neil Silcox, Toronto-based Mount Allison Crake Fellow, says he wanted to bring the theatre-going experience to those who miss it as much as he does.<\/p>\n
He says that \u201cpart of what is nice about theater is that it happens in a kind of dark, cramped room, [and] you can\u2019t get away from your neighbor. You have to acknowledge that we\u2019re in it together.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sitting in a theatre is not the only part of performance that has been dramatically interrupted.<\/p>\n
Silcox says that COVID-19 forced him, and all theatre teachers, to reevaluate their usual tried and true methods.<\/p>\n
Theatre classes usually consist of students and teachers \u201croll[ing] around on the floor and run[ning] around in circles,\u201d which is difficult to do online.<\/p>\n
Auditions and rehearsals took place exclusively over Zoom.<\/p>\n
\u201cConnections\u201d was built from the ground up collaboratively, with much of the inspiration coming from the actors themselves.<\/p>\n
Silcox\u2019s job as director is to then \u201cshape and guide\u201d their inspiration into what he calls a \u201ctheatrical pastiche.\u201d<\/p>\n
Actors shared dance, poetry, and song along with personal stories of loneliness and isolation experienced in their residence rooms.<\/p>\n
Mount Allison-based actor Aleyx Smith says that she shared some things for the first time ever in these performances.<\/p>\n
As for the dreaded Zoom hiccups, Silcox and Smith agree that flubs are an integral part of the theatre experience.<\/p>\n
\u201cTheatre is an art form that embraces imperfection. Movies are perfect, theatre embraces the liveness, the here and now, the fact that things are not quite polished to a high gloss all the time,\" says Silcox.<\/p>\n
\"I think there\u2019s beauty and power in that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hear this story as reported:<\/p>\n\n