The play that we have been developing over the last 9 months will premiere as a reading with professional and community actors at RCHP on JULY 25th! Join us for food, storytelling, music and community!!
There will be vegan and gluten free options and games for the kids. PLEASE RSVP so we know how much food to make by clicking HERE or by emailing info@notchteatre.org.
AND FOR MORE INFO VISIT OUR WEBSITE!
Join us
for Reformed Church of Highland Park's World Refugee Day Prayer Service
June 17 @ 7:00 PM ET
Featuring: Portland Thomas & J. Richey Nash & members of the I-Rise staff!
We will be reading a preview of the play that Notch Theatre Company is creating with coLAB Arts and Interfaith-RISE a branch of RCHP-AHC, which helps resettle refugees from around the world in central New Jersey, provides home studies and post-release services to unaccompanied refugee minors, and assists people who have been subjected to human trafficking.
An in-person performance of the full play is in development and slated to present the evening of July 25th. Stay tuned for more details!
Also in celebration if World Refugee Day…
A first reading of the play will take place FRIDAY the 23rd at 2:00pm OUTSIDE at RCHP and you’re invited!
Read MoreI just finished reading Jhumpa Lahiri’s The Namesake, which tells the story of Gogol — a second generation Indian American. A major theme in the book is how Gogol’s identity is split between the country he was born and raised in (America) and his ancestral country of India. He is split between his parents’ teachings, culture, food, sense of home, dreams for him and his American ideals, goals and desires. So many of the interviews I have conducted bring up this same reality for immigrants, refugees, and asylees.
Read MoreCreative Connections is the brainchild of Parnika Celly, an intern with I-Rise getting her Masters in Social Work from Rutgers University. Creative Connections is designed to create virtual space for the I-Rise client community to engage in mutual mentorship, making and learning arts and crafts, and self expression through the arts.
Read MoreThe Biden administration has been making huge strides in demonstrating their commitment to refugees and immigrants. He signed three executive orders on immigration, including one that aims to reunite migrant families that the Trump administration separated.
Read MoreI have been having such a blast running workshops at RCHP. I’ve had the opportunity to run theater workshops with high schoolers and middle schoolers through Terry Stoke’s youth group on Wednesdays and Sundays (7pm - 8:15pm). I am getting to participate in Wendy Jager’s Book Club for English Language Learners on Tuesdays …
Read MoreThis month, coLAB, RCHP and I gathered to discuss measurables for the residency and my work with this community.
Historically, meant using impact in the arts sector has been illusive. which is why I want to give some time to it in this forum.
There are QUANTITATIVE metrics - number of events, number of attendees, number of bogs written, interviews conducted, participant and audience demographics. And these numerics are often requested by funders. But they hardly scratch the surface in measuring the true impact and power of the arts sector.
We know that audiences are changed through arts programming, and that this change is even greater when paired with community-engaged peer-to-peer storytelling. But, how are they different? What happens to people in their seats as they participate in theatre? What can audience feedback and impact data tell us about the experience of taking in art? How are people transformed by cultural experiences and exposure?
A project called the “Intrinsic Impact Study” developed a product to quantify the impact of theatre. The study states that you measure what you value. That statement cuts to the core of both policy and practice in the cultural sector. Indeed, collecting and understanding impact data is crucial. But what data?
The Intrinsic Impact Study is a consistent system for collecting and processing audience feedback, extending beyond the standard QUANTITATIVE data and attempting to collect and study the QUALITATIVE effects of our work with visible, concrete information.
Jim Collins, faculty member at Stanford’s school of business and founder of Management Laboratory (where he conducts research and works with leaders in the corporate and social sectors), discusses in his publication Good to Great and the Social Sectors: Why Business Thinking is not the Answer the importance of calibrating success in social sectors without business metrics. He believes that a great organization is one that delivers superior performance and makes a distinctive impact over a long period of time. He positions social sector thinking around the question: “How effectively do we deliver on our mission and make a distinctive impact, relative to our resources?”
My company, Notch Theatre Company, takes our cue from this thinking looking at indicators such as:
Emotional response of audience and participants
Wide technical range (are we able to work in a variety of modes to serve our mission)
Efficiency in delivering on the social mission
Increased demand for service
Is the work being copied and becoming more influential?
Is the work reaching across generations, gender, race, socioeconomics and continually expanding its reach?
Is the contribution to community unique enough to leave a hole should the work disappear
Are stakeholders invested in long term success?
Resilience (can the company deliver exceptional results over a long period of time, beyond any single leader, great idea, market cycle, or well-funded program?)
Collins believes that it doesn’t matter if you can quantify your results, as long as you are able to rigorously assemble evidence – quantitative or qualitative – to track progress. What matters is not finding the perfect indicator but developing a consistent and intelligent method of assessing output results, and then tracking trajectory with rigor.
The Civil Rights movement and Anti-Racism call of this past summer urged all of us to change the dominant cultural narrative, to interrupt the status-quo and dismantle the systemic obstacles preventing equity, diversity, accessibility and inclusion. Part of that work for us artists is to also subvert and expand our historic archives by centering culturally specific practices, by reframing what we remember about this country’s past. The erasure or justification of our racist past is what allows for the perpetuation and creation of racist policies. Our work as artists must strive to subvert and expand our historic archives by centering culturally specific practices of remembrance and by affirming, collecting, and organizing stories that are not currently remembered. Our archives are a way of organizing and centering these stories, and the ways we go about collecting them and performing them subvert traditional notions of what makes for “legitimate historic documentation.”
The true value this work doesn’t live in the non-profit industrial complex’s use of the word “impact,” nor in numbers and audience count and survey forms. Like the church I am partnered with for this residency (RCHP), it exists somewhere in a more spiritual realm. It lives in a belief in something larger than ourselves, in faith.
Much work is asked of artists to justify their existence. On a national level, our capitalist country does not share a belief in the intrinsic value of art. So we must constantly re-explain how our work contributes to and enriches our society. But how do you measure a movement of the soul? And is there a scale of achievement for healing? Have we ever officially “healed”?
This holiday season RCHP, I-RISE and Accompany Now case workers made sure that all the children in their community (not just the ones they provide direct service to but ALL children) had gifts. Teams worked tirelessly to get contact information for families, to purchase and wrap presents so that everyone felt seen and loved this lonely pandemic winter.
Additionally, Global Grace Market sold products (scarves, baskets, masks, jewelry, kitchenware, clothing, tchotchke, etc) made by refugees to the greater New Brunswick community. The products represent cultures and styles from all over the world. Likewise, Global Grace Café makes lunch each day for purchase. Everyday, the Café features cuisine by chefs who are cooking recipes from their culture. One day is Congolese, another might be Indonesian or Syrian. You can find what is being served on a given day on their facebook: https://www.facebook.com/globalgracecafe
Another innovative aspect of this process is that RCHP has established a farm (Global Grace Farms) so they can provide farm to fork produce for the Café. You can also order your own greens and seasonal produce boxes for direct delivery from them. So check it out - https://global-grace-marketplace-cafe.square.site
I have an idea for the plays. You want to hear it?
And obviously we are only one month in, so there is no doubt in my mind that the will change many times over before we get to the finish line, but right now, I am seeing three short plays emerge (roughly 10-15 min each / 30-45 minute of play total).
Play 1 is set in the café where we see the intersection of culture and food and language that happens here as we feed and nourish people. The actors will cook food live for the audience! Food sourced from the Global Grace Farm.
Play 2 would center around the Accompany Now Case Workers, one of whom arrived in Play 1 to pick up food for a delivery to the houseless community. We (the audience) move with her, from the moment of picking up food for delivery, to learning about her day, her work and the issues she is up against as she gives out food to her clients / the audience.
In Play 3 (now bear with me as this is a little bit of creative departure) the case workers land us in a refugee housing unit for their final food delivery of the evening. Here we meet refugees and asylum seekers making a home together under one roof, someone might be from Uganda, someone from Eritrea, someone else from Syria, someone from Turkey, someone from Guatemala and someone from central Jersey, all breaking bread together at the dinner table. And redefining ideas of home, or family and of community. Here we get to learn about the social and policy issues facing these unique refugee communities and the organizations that serve them. We learn first-hand what is working, what isn’t , and what change is so desperately needed to justly hold all our beloved communities.
The presentation would strive for simplicity, with a focus on our community members and actors at music stands reading the plays. It is all about the people and their stories. No fancy costumes or spectacle, no special effects or fog machines.
Moreover, I want the plays to be mobile and nimble, able to present outdoors and to adapt to our quickly shifting world. They are designed so that one of the plays could be picked up and used (for example) as testimony when a bill is being heard or for a policymaker event. If we want to move a section of the play to another venue, to put it up quickly at a rally, for instance, or at a march, or at another church or community event - it should operate in that way. The work should be flexible enough to do that, to be a tool of personal storytelling for RCHP’s overall work.
Finally, I think the short plays will be interspersed with facilitated dialogue. So that the audience can be in conversation with one another about the issues and stories being presented on stage. The plays want to be be multilingual, which means dreaming into creative offerings for translation and captioning.
And, like I said, this idea is just a jumping off point and will continue to evolve as I share it with the community and get their feedback.
The places. People. And words keeping me company.
Congo
Indonesia
“What is the change you want to see for your community?”
Eritrea
“It is a story of moments. It is a story of small stories.”
Ethiopia
Syria
“Compassionate assessment means listening for strengths and resources.”
“We have clients who are dealing with issues of sexual orientation and gender identity, disability, mental health issues, trauma, and a myriad of other physical health issues. We don’t just deal with immigration. We deal with the whole person.”
Rwanda
“Defining ‘trafficking,’ in the eyes of the law is complicated. Commercial sex vs sexual assault vs labor trafficking. They make it both nebulous and nuanced in what feels like an effort to continually prevent deserving individuals from receiving the benefits and services and resources they need to succeed here. ”
Turkey
“How do you burn out and then work through burn out? Because the work has a high burn out rate, but that’s not the end of the story. We have to keep going.”
China
“What I love about this work is that while there is a lot of need, it is not only crisis that brings our client to us, it is also the stories of joy. Stories of successes and reunification.”
Guatemala
Not just fleeing, but also liberation. Not a moving away from, but a moving toward.
The Distance Between Us By Reyna Grande
Exit West By Mohsin Hamid
Uganda
“The first time I met him, he is 4 years old mind you, his mother said - ‘ok, get ready, you are going to meet your case worker.’ So before the Zoom call he rushed to the bathroom, combed his hair and put on perfume.”
“It is the small victories. Not just the huge advocacy moments. It is the personal and direct advocacy. That is the story.”
Following the election, Interfaith-Rise (a program of RCHP) held a march for refugees. The day was sunny and the crowed was uplifted by the potential positive impact a new administration could have on the issues facing immigration policy. Unfortunately, no one told the Pandemic that things were finally looking up and so with health concerns still very much present, the crowd was small ... but mighty.
There is a cultural deficit in this country. When the civil liberties of historically underrepresented groups continue to face serious threat and our nation is stalled in an ever-polarizing inability to engage in productive dialogue, we artists and cultural workers must engage communities to which we might not normally find ourselves in proximity, to excavate the barriers standing between us, to address community concerns with artistic ferocity, with bold questions and daring choices, and to provoke audiences with questions (old and new) about who is given access to our nation’s promise of opportunity and who is being systematically shut out.
By collaborating with communities across the nation to tell their real stories on stage, my work (and my work with Notch Theatre Company) engages folks that brick and mortar theaters are not reaching, personalizes important social issues for people on all sides of a conversation, raises awareness in a compelling way, drives change on a national scale, and prompts meaningful, lasting engagement at a grassroots level.
I believe that theater is able to connect with an audience in a deeply personal way, and strive to push the boundaries of what that connection can achieve.
As I embark on my 9-month residency and work with RCHP I divide my process into 5 stages.
Stage 1: Community Engagement and Trust Building, which will take place during the months of October and November.
December begins Stage 2: Story Collection.
Then Stage 3: Playwriting (February - April) when we create the collaborative plays/art piece with community (and continue testimony collection).
Stage 4: Pre-Production. This will include a first reading of the plays with community for feedback around the of end April.
Stage 5: Production. Rehearsal and a final Presentation will begin mid-May and run into June with public presentations slated to happen summer 2021 when it is warm enough to gather outside.
October of 2020, Notch Theatre Company joined coLAB Arts and the Reformed Church of Highlands Park's Affordable Housing Corporation (RCHP-AHC) to create original theater pieces with the diverse refugee community served by RCHP-AHC, in an effort to share the story of how their mutual aid service work transforms lives.
In November of 2020, more than 2200 individuals were given humanitarian release from New Jersey ICE detention centers -- a prison system that has recorded the highest coronavirus rate in the nation. I have been honored to collaborate with coLAB and RCHP to document and use the arts to share forward the crucial testimonies of these refugee communities and the organization and individuals supporting them.
Check out this Broadway World article about the collaboration.