Teen sex, what it means to be Irish, fart jokes: it’s just another day in the life of a youth theatre. Seven groups recently came together at the Ignite Youth Theatre Festival in Trinity College Dublin to perform, showcase and offer feedback on each others’ work. It was the first festival of its kind run by the National Association of Youth Drama.
There are plenty of laughs as participants sit on the floor of the upstairs dance studio in the Samuel Beckett Theatre, as well as more than a few moments of philosophical thought as they talk about each performance.
“Do you think we’re a zombified youth?” asks one participant of the facilitators. Observes another: “For teens, life is ephemeral, it just passes us by . . . we think we’re immortal.”
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Questions are raised about relationships, politics, creative decisions, Instagram quotes. There’s no such thing as a stupid question. Youth theatre provides a space for young people not just to talk about issues that affect them, but to analyse them, perform them and, maybe, devise solutions for both personal and political concerns.
“Youth theatre is concerned with the artistic development of young people and their understanding of theatre, yes. But we do that while also consciously providing a space where we focus on their personal and social development,” says association director Michelle Carew.
“Within a youth theatre, young people will expect to participate in a series of weekly workshops that look at a variety of drama skills,” she says. “But within those workshops what they’re really doing is looking at life and sorting out life, and they’re trying things out and taking risks in a really safe space. They’re able to give voice to things in the context of a drama workshop. That’s of huge benefit to them.”
Past and future Their insights are not to be underestimated. Revolt, a piece devised by
County Wexford Youth Theatre, is set in 2116, when the world is run by a corporation, and discusses issues of equality and rights; Roscommon County Youth Theatre is performing If I was in the GPO we would have won, which takes a feminist slant on the Rising. It's certainly not the work of stereotypically apoliticaland apathetic teenagers.
Aside from working through political and social issues, youth theatre can also help young people work through personal ones. The cliche that some teenagers enter youth theatre as shy young people but grow to find their place within the community as performers, is entirely true, according to the participants.
“It’s somewhere you can really learn about yourself, learn about others, enjoy yourself, express yourself, don’t take things too seriously, learn confidence,” says Roscommon’s Molly Mew (17). “Confidence is a big thing. It’s amazing how much I’ve seen some people develop, starting off so quiet and at the end of the year they won’t shut up.
“That’s one of my favourite things in youth theatre,” she says. “I’ve been in it for four years and I’m well used to it. Now my favourite thing is seeing new people come in.”
Drama therapy as a form of treatment is a relatively minor player in the Irish mental health sector, but theatre workshops have elements that can help young people work through their issues. It’s not an alternative to regular treatment where that is necessary, but it does provide an outlet during what can often be a tumultuous time of young adulthood.
“I believe that a room with a youth theatre in it is a machine for generating happiness,” says Kildare Youth Theatre facilitator Peter Hussey. “It is a byproduct. In the past 10 years, a lot of our young people, mostly male, would have anxiety or depression or both.
“They have said very clearly as part of my research that when they’re coming into a rehearsal or a workshop or something that engages them quite well, that they leave the anxiety behind and there’s no room in their head for what’s worrying them.
“If they continue it over a period of weeks, they slowly rewire the brain to have those hours of freedom from worry, and it gradually replaces the pattern they’ve built up. And I have seen that firsthand. Sometimes it’s quicker, sometimes it takes longer. The key is aesthetic engagement.”
Such theatrical methods as improv and devising works teach young people skills that they don’t generally learn in school or anywhere else. These can be useful for self-care and mental health, as well as in everyday skills such as processing information, self-discipline and public speaking.
Through other eyes “If you’re working through things, you have to embody specific characters,” says Carew. “You have that safe ability to both distance yourself from an issue and embody it at the same time. You can see the world through other eyes. You can hypothetically be in different situations.
“You can go right into the heart of something, experience it there, and then leave it in the workshop.”
Even a technical workshop can bring up surprising life lessons. Carew describes visiting a vocal workshop at the Ignite festival. The facilitator was speaking about the benefits of self-awareness over self-consciousness. In the context of being aware of how you tense your body and how it affects vocal production, she discussed the differences between the two, and why one is much more useful than the other.
“That’s an example of how, through theatre, the young people are constantly exposed to different ways of seeing the world, which give them a means to deal with the business of growing up,” she says.
Louis Flanagan, from Droichead Youth Theatre in Drogheda, Co Louth, says theatre has provided a space to grow and develop throughout his teenage years.
“It’s unbelievable that five years ago I was a completely different person,” he says. “I joined when I was 13, so it’s that really challenging transition from primary to secondary, and I think that youth theatre was such a saving grace, such a platform.
“I learned stuff that I didn’t think I’d ever learn,” Flanagan says. “Everything was so diverse and open. Here was someone who was terrified of everything and just had no idea what lay ahead, and youth theatre was such a comfort. It’s so consoling; it’s that open space where you can be whoever you want to be.”
Group dynamics The key to a successful youth theatre – and one that truly benefits its members – is not focusing on the individual. Rather, it is simply the group atmosphere. Youth theatre groups are seen by their participants as an extended family, which feeds into the wider community of National Association of Youth Drama members.
Among the outcomes of youth theatre, a study by the association found that participants identified “a more developed sense of personal and group identity” and “a sense of personal and group achievement”.
“The most important thing about youth theatres is that they’re ensembles,” says Carew. “It’s not about shining lights on individuals. But through that ensemble, through the act of working with your community, you have your voice heard. There’s power in that because you’re sharing it with others.”
Is youth theatre for everyone? Well, everyone’s certainly invited, regardless of economic situation, ability or experience. One of the association’s affiliation rules is that the cost for a young person to join is small, often representing a token payment. No young person had to pay for attendance, accommodation or food during the three-day festival at Trinity College.
Participants say youth theatre puts them on a much more equal setting than stage and dance schools.
“I was in a stage school when I was 10, where all the good singers went to the front and everyone who was okay went to the back. Glitzy costumes, all staged, everyone left out except the good kids,” says Mew, who hopes to continue studying and working in theatre after her Leaving Cert next June. “Youth theatre is completely different to that. Everyone’s considered. Everyone has an important role.”
Equality in creativity is at the heart of the movement. Kildare Youth Theatre writes in an intro about itself: “It has equal numbers of boys and girls. It has no religion. It is open to all regardless of ability . . . It is for the deeply shy and for the proudly extrovert, the odd, the gorgeous, the brave and the weird.”
It is an apt description of the community of 100 diverse young people sitting around the floor at Ignite, laughing at each other’s jokes and discussing each other’s performances.