Theatre B in Moorhead, Minnesota, is staging a production of "What the Constitution Means to Me" — a thought-provoking play that delves into themes of politics, identity, and personal rights. Listen above as Prairie Public's Tay Calloway takes us to the theatre to hear from artistic director Jon Micheels Leiseth and managing director Monika Browne-Ecker.
Theatre B's production wraps up this weekend, with performances running through Sunday, October 20. For more information, visit theatreb.org.
—
Transcript
Tay Calloway: Radio is often called the theatre of the mind. All the elements in a radio story set the stage. The music, the environment, and the voice can take you on a trip. We could go back to listen to the 1940’s, the 70’s, and… nowhere.
[Sound: Roosevelt speeches; 70’s music]
Tay: We could just sit here and talk–think, and ask larger questions like do dogs know they drink their own backwash and if aliens saw that we put pineapples on pizza, would they destroy us? Or, we could ask questions about ourselves and the world around us which is what the theatre does. And it has me wondering, what draws us to the stage? Besides the big name actors, the musicals, the costumes, and the ticket price, what keeps us in our seats after the intermission?
Jon Micheels Leiseth: I have always been fascinated by and drawn towards how do we play well with others? How do we play well with others?
Tay: But first, what keeps us in our seats begins with those who are on and behind the stage. The voice you just heard was Jon Micheels Leiseth’s, the artistic director at Theatre B. He’s currently running a production for What the Constitution Means to Me by Heidi Schreck. If you haven’t heard of What the Constitution Means to Me, then it is important to know that this play speaks about politics and to some of the issues that are affecting us now - like abortion, rights and whose rights are protected, election, and what might we do to go about creating the constitution of tomorrow. It’s heavy and it’s a conversation in recent years many of us have been shying away from.
Monika Browne-Ecker: ...our mission is to ignite transformative conversations in the community. Basically, we ask big questions, and we invite our audience to ask themselves and engage in those questions in our intimate black box space.
Tay: That’s Monika Browne-Ecker, she’s the new managing director of Theatre B. Her and Jon are working together to produce this play.
Jon: ...when you see a production that's made it onto Theatre B's season, it's the result of those kind of community conversations that have been already happening...
Monika: And so conversation is really important. And hopefully it's a beginning to something. Not just the thinking, but also maybe some doing.
Tay: In What the Constitution Means to Me, there’s a lot of talking. I mean, it’s a debate afterall. And a good one. It’s a discussion on a subject that has somehow become taboo in this country built on conversations. We don’t really have conversations anymore. It’s you’re right or you’re wrong, nitpicking, and everything other than talking to understand one another.
Monika: ...because theatre is live, you, you feel it differently than watching a movie. You’re experiencing the same thing the characters are experiencing and that really affected me. I loved it as a child, I love it now. Being an audience member was the beginning for me.
Tay: When we’re in front of the stage and we're an audience to the story and to all those around us, taking in everyone’s laughter, cries, gasps, cheers, and subtle movements, we realize the difference between us–the space that lies before us and beside us that separates the us from the next person is really just at arm’s length.
Monika: And from that comes the feeling that we are not alone, and that is the most valuable umm… experience that theatre can bring us. That relief that we are not alone in the world. There are other people that feel, think, do similar things that other humans do.
Jon: So while, yes, you can come to a Theater B performance, and you can be amused, and you can laugh, and you can even escape into another world, at the end of the day, we choose our art so that all of us, audience members, artists, everybody who's involved in the production will return to our own lives. The goal is to be transformed, to see our own lives differently...
Jon: ...go about our daily same old, same old in a new way because we've been changed by this theater experience…That's beautiful.
Tay: And that’s because it is. It’s beautiful to have a space where we can all come together, share an experience, feeling different emotions and make different faces and still be together. So, when Jon says…
Jon: I have always been fascinated by and drawn towards how do we play well with others? How do we play well with others?
Tay: What he is saying is…
Jon: ...I am fascinated with watching people and listening to people and looking at what they do and finding their particular strengths and their hunger and their passions, what drives them, and then finding processes and environments where we can get that at the same table in order to collaborate together.
Tay: Theatre is all about collaboration and bringing different artists and talents together to ask a lot of questions. Sometimes we are given an answer and sometimes we are left to think on it ourselves. With everything that is happening in our lives. Politics, work, relationships, and friendships–how do we play well with others? How do we find and take those strengths, differences, and passions and place them in a sandbox to create a better future? And if that’s too forward thinking, then, at least a better tomorrow.
