Speak Up

Speak Up (a Tube Theatre Organization)

We come to you, in your training room, hall, or community centre. Or even in your office or yard.

You the audience, large or small, tell us your problems, and we act them out, so that they can be seen for what they are. Sometimes the person with the problem plays her or himself; sometimes she joins in after she has seen what the actors make of what she has told them.

Roles are changed, or exchanged. People from the audience take part, while the person with the problem sees what the audience make of it. After the first problem has been discussed to everyone’s satisfaction, someone from the audience describes her problem if she has one, and the process starts again. The acting is easy for the inexperienced or shy, because each routine is usually a minute or less.

People are quick to come forward, because no names are mentioned. Everything is generalised. For instance, a person claiming benefit might have difficulty at the counter with a clerk, and acts that out, with one of the actors playing the clerk. Another person wants to know how to speak up to a bullying chairperson of her organization. And another, how to deal with an aggressive phone-saleswoman.