Theatre
Introduction
Theatres and theatre companies/managements abound in all kinds of different forms, and paid opportunities for live performance are not restricted to putting on productions. The days of the permanent repertory company are almost gone, but there is a much wider diversity of work available. The larger companies/managements often use casting directors (see page 106), who should usually be your first port of call with your letter, CV and photograph. However, it can be worth exploiting any personal contacts that you may have.
For all approaches, it is important to send your submissions to the person named â unless you have a personal contact.
Active listening in a community of nomads
Cherrelle Skeete, co-founder and Artistic Director of Blacktress UK Interview by Joan Iyiola
Cherrelle Skeete is an actress, writer, cultural curator and consultant. She is co-founder and Artistic Director of Blacktress UK, a network and support group for Black womxn actors and creatives providing a platform to grow and connect through community. Cherrelle works across theatre, television and film and was on the 2019/2020 Soho Theatre Writers Lab. Cherrelle believes storytelling is a necessary tool to activate understanding, build bridges and heal ourselves so we can all move towards our own freedom.
How have you used community practices in your work as an artist?
I think community is the ultimate dialogue, a dialogue of active listening in the hope that no one gets left behind. I have to mention âcommunityâ because no person is an island and I didnât just turn up here. It took a group of people to make various decisions and who said different things to support me and remind me who I am. To me, community is liberation, strength, a place to really learn. Iâve found a lot of solace in different communities. Your community is your chosen family, itâs the place where you learnt your craft at different points. It might be the place where you learnt that you were actually good at something or where you felt seen for the first time when other parts of society werenât seeing you. Itâs a space thatâs about everybody whoâs responsible for taking care of it, a space thatâs cultivated, with a sense of community, similarities based on what that community is setting out to do. Thereâll be a certain demographic within that community, with similar cultural interests. I think itâs something we as artists do. Weâre always looking for our tribe. When youâre auditioning for something, youâre looking for your tribe. Everyone involved is involved in a sense of community, itâs everywhere.
Off the back of that, can you give us an overview about Blacktress, your reasons for setting it up and the work that you have created with this wonderful group?
Blacktress has been going for four years. Iâm a co-founder and I run it alongside my partner, Shiloh Coke. Itâs a network, support group, and weâre curators. The work is Black women and femme-centered. We do Spark workshops, we ran a festival of Black women-led work early in its formation called the Blacktress Season. Weâve curated specific events, which again are Black-women-centred, but theyâre open to all. We have socials where weâre celebrating women who may not necessarily be recognised within the mainstream and weâll see them first and celebrate them. This was a space cultivated out of many conversations Iâd heard, women saying they felt alone, isolated, didnât feel seen or heard. So, we create a safe space which is often about healing. I believe those whoâve suffered most deserve the greatest victories and I think weâre so victorious. Yes, Iâm the founder but Iâm not the sole custodian of that space. Every single person holds everybodyâs story, everybodyâs physical and spiritual beingâs space with a sense of care and thoughtfulness, consideration, compassion, curiosity and the ability to just listen.
What might you want to say to the graduating actors and performers of this year about the importance of this act of self-care?
Firstly, itâs really important to spend some time on your own to get to know who you are â who you are without the noise, the industry stuff. Just strip back and learn so you can identify when youâre feeling low and also identify what you need to get back to a place where you feel balance. Because the word self-care has been thrown around a lot, itâs become this almost overused buzzword. I think what Iâm going to start using is âbalanceâ. To get back to a place of balance. The first thing I say to graduates is find your tribe, you were put together with other people within your year group by circumstance. They may be your tribe, but you may also need to reconnect with yourself and find your people. Speak about your experiences, theyâre valid. Use this wonderful thing the internet and reach out to people. Weâre all in it together, literally. Thereâs no wrong way of doing it, theyâre all just experiences. Affirm your experiences for yourself by writing them out. I encourage everyone to journal, but if you donât like to write, maybe scrapbook. Do it for self first and then everything else will come from that in terms of connecting with people and youâll attract the right people who might be your future collaborators. Thatâs the whole point: you want to be making art with people who respect you, respect the dignity of life, and you can be on the same page in terms of how you want to make art.
Weâre seeing a lot of anti-racism pledges from theatres and companies at the moment. What does leadership in this space look like to you?
If you look at your team of people who you work with and the building that you might work in and you see that there are opportunities being opened up, maybe think about what you would usually do and then challenge yourself to do something slightly different. Bring in someone who wouldnât necessarily be within that environment that youâve created. If youâre actively wanting change, as an artist, a venue, an organisation, then bring in people to do that. I think what weâre asking for post-lockdown is actually human kindness and itâs not passive. Itâs a loving action. Create that space, even give up space. A lot of what weâre doing is about the dismantling of the powers that be, speaking truth to power, which is not always easy.
In order for us to sit in this space where we can all sit together, itâs âI do something for you, you do something for meâ and weâre constantly going, making offerings of kindness in the space to find out what our collaborative power is.
The relationship is reciprocal. Thatâs why I said community is for me the biggest dialogue, not one-sided. When you have community leaders, the pyramid is upside down and you as the leader are at the bottom. Because youâre answering to people at the top and thatâs your community and itâs actually about being of service. I want to create more spaces where weâre doing more reimagining, talking about what we need, what are the active measures that we need to do. Do we need to ringfence tickets to make sure that weâve got audience members? We canât be using the same tactics as before. Weâve got to up our game. If that wasnât working, letâs try something else. Weâre very fortunate in the arts to lead on that because we are the people literally creating with our tools, our hands, our talent, the people that we come across. So, every kind of process that weâre going into with our storytelling, you literally get to reset and restart again how you want this ship to run. I think thatâs amazing. You know, in theatre you build this incredible relationship with people over the course of five months and then thatâs it! Then you start again with these nomadic people, but I think thereâs something so beautiful about that.
Thatâs beautiful, our imagination is our superpower.
I think the most powerful thing that we have as a people, as Black people, as human beings, as creatives, whoever you are, is our imagination. In terms of culture, culture is a collection of concepts. There has to be a dialogue, we canât just have one concept all the time. The exchange has to be happening back and forth constantly and the concept grows, then we all agree and eventually that becomes a culture. Thereâs a repetition of concepts that everybody agrees on. So, if weâre saying that we want to keep reimagining, weâve got to keep talking to each other, listening â actively listening â and, from that, take action.
You incorporate activism in your artistry. How would you encourage others to do the same?
Everyone is res...