Challenging the role of the audience in Theatre

I think that one of the Practitioners that changed my perception of the audience, and, in general my perception of performance the most, is Augusto Boal. His work has inspired me to write a full essay on him and probably a big part of my dissertation will be based on him as well. Although he is a Brazilian practitioner, I had never really come across him and his work until this point. But I had a lecture in university which introduced me to his work. once I started reading about him I was fascinated by his work, I discovered he had been doing work in the district of Lima and Chiclayo (cities located on the coast of my Country-Peru) and in these he aimed to teach literacy to our illiterate population (at the time 28 % of it[1]), and to teach literacy in the artistic languages as well. In order to do this, he developed a system for Spect-Actors; in which the spectators not only witnessed but became the actors themselves. By doing this Boal wanted the audience to question their situation. He knew that these people did not have time to be metaphysical and philosophize, so, he always made them act on situations or tell stories that were relevant to the community. Boal developed a process through which he made the audience become actors but at the same time observers.

the spect-actor assumes the protagonist role, and solves the problem or situation that has been established, allowing and teaching them (those that belonged to the oppressed classes) how they could change their circumstances for the better- by changing themselves and their mentality without the need of changing the oppressor (something that they did not have control upon).

Therefore, Boal not only ‘breaks the 4th wall’ but also makes the audience become theactual actors. Ergo, the relationship between audience and actor is fused together and becomes much more symbiotic and rather organic.

Before I learned about Boal’s poetics Of the Oppressed I had never witnessed such a thing as spect-actor and this is why the Boal Lecture drastically changed my perception of a conventional audience as we know it because, although I had seen immersive pieces or one-to-one ones ( in which the line between actor- audience is not that strict) I had never witnessed one in which the audience genuinely became the actor and is allowed to freely speak and rationalize for themselves[2] what the answer or solution for the established problems were.

[1] Theatre of the oppressed, Pg. 119 by Augusto Boal, published on 1974 by Pluto Press, London.

[2] Theatre of the oppressed, Pg. 126 by Augusto Boal, published on 1974 by Pluto Press, London.

more on Boal:

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