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A Brief Introduction to Augusto Boal
Excerpted with permission from “Playing Boal”, edited by Mady
Schutzman and Jan Cohen-Cruz (Routledge,1994)
Brazilian theatre director, Augusto Boal, developed the Theatre of the Oppressed
(TO) during the 1950s and 1960s. In an effort to transform the theatre from the
“monologue” of traditional performance into the “dialogue” between audience and the
stage. Boal experimented with many kinds of interactive theatre. His explorations
were based on the assumption that dialogue is the common healthy dynamic between
all humans, that all human beings desire and are capable of dialogue, and that when
dialogue becomes a monologue oppression ensues. Theatre then becomes an
extraordinary tool for transforming monologue into dialogue. “While some people
make theatre,” says Boal, “we are all theatre.”
From his work, Boal evolved various forms of theatre workshops and performances
that aimed to meet the needs of all people for interaction, dialogue, critical thinking,
action and fun. While the performance modes of Forum Theatre, Image Theatre, CopIn-The-Head and the vast array of the Rainbow of Desire [see Glossary] are designed
to bring the audience into active relationship with the performed event, the workshops
are virtually a training ground for action not only in these performance forms, but for
action in life.
The “typical” theatre of the Oppressed workshop comprises three kinds of activity.
The first is background information on TO and the various exercises provided by the
workshop facilitator (or “difficultator”, as Boal prefers to describe it). Such
information begins the workshop but is also interspersed throughout the games and
exercises. Moreover, the group is brought together periodically to discuss responses to
games and to ask questions of the various processes.
The second kind of activity is the games. These are invariably highly physical
interactions designed to challenge us and to truly listen to what we are hearing, feel
what we are touching, and see what we are looking at. The “arsenal” of the Theatre of
the Oppressed is extensive with more than 200 games and exercises listed in Boal’s
Games for Actors and Non-Actors alone. Several years ago, Boal’s Centre for the
Theatre of the Oppressed in Paris (CTO – Paris) proceeded methodically through all
the TO activities; the inventory took two years to cover. Ultimately, these games
serve to heighten our senses and demechanize the body, to get us out of habitual
behaviour, as a prelude to moving beyond habitual thinking and interacting. We also
become actively engaged with other participants, developing relationships and trust,
and having a very good time.
Finally, the third area of activity involves the structured exercises. Although there is a
kind of gray area at times when might one might call an activity a game or an
exercise, the exercises are formulated so as to infuse a given structure with genuine
content.
These activities are designed to highlight a particular area of TO practice such as
Image Theatre, Forum Theatre, Rainbow of Desire, etc. Thus, we are invited not only
to imagine new possibilities and solutions, but to actively participate in them, Forum
style. Group problem solving, highly interactive imagining, physical involvement,
trust and fun combine to create vigorous interpersonal dynamics. As a result, we learn
that we are, if not the source of our difficulties, at least the reason for their
maintenance. More importantly, we are clearly the source of our mutual liberations.
A Glossary of Terms from
Augusto Boal’s Theatre of the Oppressed
Cop-in-the-Head is a specific exercise amongst Boal’s therapeutic techniques. It is
also the term Boal originally used to designate the entire series of TO exercises that
address internalised oppressions. Boal explains that some people stopped themselves
from taking political actions because they had “cops in their heads”--fears that
persisted after the oppressor no longer had “real” power over them. Boal believes that
all the cops in our identities and headquarters in the external world that need to be
located. He sees this work as bordering on psychology but still firmly rooted in the
realm of theatre.
Dynamization, a fundamental goal of TO, is the term for the activation of the
spectator, whether to bring a still image to life or to intervene in a forum scene. For
Boal, dynamization is also connected to catharsis--but it refers to the purging of the
fear that keeps the spectator from fighting oppression rather than to purging of the
spectator’s desire to act (due to vicarious identification with the actors).
Forum Theatre is a TO technique that begins with the enactment of a scene (or antimodel) in which a protagonist tries, unsuccessfully, to overcome an oppression
relevant to that particular audience. The joker then invites the spectators to replace the
protagonist at any point in the scene that they can imagine an alternative action that
could lead to a solution. The scene is replayed numerous times with different
interventions. This results in a dialogue about the oppression, an examination of
alternatives and a “rehearsal” for real situations.
Image Theatre is a series of wordless exercises in which participants create
embodiments of their feelings and experiences. Beginning with a selected theme,
participants “sculpt” images onto their own and others’ bodies. These frozen images
are then “dynamized”, or brought to life, through a sequence of movement-based and
interactive exercises.
Invisible Theatre is a rehearsed sequence of events that is enacted in a public, nontheatrical space, capturing the attention of people who do not know they are watching
a planned performance. It is at once theatre and real life, for, although rehearsed, it
happens in real time and space and the “actors” must take responsibility for the
consequences of the “show”. The goal is to bring attention to a social problem for the
purpose of stimulating public dialogue.
The joker is the director/master of ceremonies of a TO workshop or performance. In
Forum Theatre, the Joker sets up the rules of the event for the audience, facilitates the
spectators’ replacement of the protagonist, and sums up the essence of each solution
proposed in the interventions. (Refer to “Theatre of the Oppressed for examples of
scenarios). The term derives from the joker (or wild card) in a deck of playing cards:
just as the wild card is not tied down to a specific suit or value, neither is the TO Joker
tied down to an allegiance to a performer, spectator, or any one interpretation of
events. Also used as a verb “to joke”. The joker is related to, but not the same as the
“Joker System”
The Joker System is a theatrical form developed by Boal and his collaborators at the
Arena Stage in Sao Paolo between 168 and 1971. The genre is characterized by the
mixing of fact and fiction, the shifting of roles during the play so that all actors play
all characters, separation of actor and character through Brechtian techniques, and the
introduction of the “joker” figure, both a narrator who addresses the audience directly
and a “wild card” actor able to jump in and out of any role in the play.
Rainbow of Desire” is the name of a specific TO exercise in Boal’s therapeutic
repertoire and, for a while, referred to his whole body of therapeutic techniques. Boal
recently stated that neither Cop-in-the-Head nor Rainbow of Desire was the right
name for that series but he had not yet determined a name that he found more suitable.
Spect-actor refers to the activated spectator, the audience member who takes part in
the action. In TO there are meant to be no passive spectators; Boal emphasises the
potential involvement of even those who do not physically participate, and the fact
that they have at least the choice.
Note: The Theatre Arts Forum and Resources includes information on literature
outlining Boal’s techniques and information on workshops that are held regularly in
various parts of the world. P.W.