MACT

Dear theatre enthusiasts,

I have been reflecting on the idea of collaboration. Theatre is a collaborative art, it lives and dies by a team of artists’ ability to offer, interpret, connect, compromise, relinquish, accept, adapt, challenge, and champion a myriad of ideas, perspectives, energy, and opinions. This work requires vulnerability and courage. It requires empathy, patience, and true listening.  

These skills are worth something.

Theatre gives us a space to both believe in and build these skills; to practice collaboration, to try on vulnerability, to awaken empathy. To accept the difference between vision and control. To understand that disagreement does not have to be disagreeable. To have faith that if you believe in something bigger than yourself; it is possible to build a world together.

Theatre is a proof of concept.

This work is not without conflict; not without disagreement; not without drama; not without imperfection, but the show goes on. And, I don’t know about you, but I am grateful to have evidence – every opening night – that it IS possible.

Larisa Netterlund

Executive Director, Theatre in the Round Players

(Reprinted from the TRP newsletter with permission.)