The Black Rep Presents: The Strong Men

Here’s a free videoconfernce opportunity from HEC-TV Live! and RoundTrips:

The Black Rep Presents:  The Strong Men
Date:  April 21, 2009
Time:  10:00 a.m. and 1:00 p.m. Central Daylight Time
Grade Level:  Grades 7-12

About the Videoconference
Join us live from the rehearsal space of the St. Louis Black Repertory Company to enjoy excerpts from their touring performance of The Strong Men, a choreo-poem adapted by Ron Himes from Sterling A. Brown’s poem and other poems by African-American authors.  Meet the actors and director who bring the story to life. View a performance of scenes from the show.  Ask your questions of what it means to “act a part.”  How do the actors prepare?  How do they create a character?  What does the director do?  What’s it like to stage a touring production in a variety of different places?  Participants will meet actors, director, and designers to discuss how the show came to life from the first phase of design to the final phase of implementation.  Ask your questions of actors, directors and designers who are part of America’s largest professional African-American theatre company.

About the Production
This choreo-poem displays the powerful voices and delicate humor of African-Americans who have made major contributions to American history.  The Black Rep brings to vivid life some of the verses, which show how poetry can be spoken, sung and danced, and how poetry can be a window to the self and to our world.  Selected poems include “The Creation,” “We Wear the Mask,” “Dedication to Fathers,” “A Cry from a Black Man,”  “I, Too, Sing America,” and “Strong Men.”

Inside the Artist’s Studio 2008 Theatre Programs

Inside the Artist’s Studio is a free, standards-based, distance-learning education project designed to connect artists from Missouri to students. Funded through support provide by Missouri Arts Council, the School District of Clayton, Missouri, and the St. Louis County Cable Commission, the project is structured to provide student learning across the artistic disciplines of dance, music, theatre and visual arts.  

This February, join Inside the Artist’s Studio as it goes behind the scenes of the St. Louis Black Repertory Company– connect via interactive videoconference, the Internet, and broadcast television to link your students to professional actors, directors and technicians of the St. Louis Black Repertory Company.  See how a production comes to life; meet the people involved in bring a playwright’s tale to life; increase your understanding of what it takes to create a theatre company.  Additional preparatory materials, including a detailed agenda, related curriculum standards, and pre-program and post-program learning activities, are available for each program.  Please e-mail us at live@hectv.org to request the materials or view them online at http://www.hectv.org.  For more details about the St. Louis Black Repertory Company, go to http://www.theblackrep.org.

Program 1:  The Black Rep and August Wilson: Being True to the Text

Date:  Tuesday, February 5, 2008; please register by Thursday, January 31 for videoconference

Time:  10 a.m. CST

Grade Level:  7-12

Live from the rehearsal space at The Black Rep, program participants will interact with Director Lorna Littleway and members of the cast of from The Black Rep’s upcoming production of Radio Golf by August Wilson.  Audience members will explore the power of Wilson’s language, his development of character, and his voice as a playwright.  Viewers will participate as cast members rehearse a scene from the play and discuss casting, staging plot and character development.  What do you want to know about August Wilson?  About bringing a character to life?  About rehearsing a scene?  About being true to the text?  Join us from America’s largest professional African-American theatre company to find out.

 

Program 2:  The Black Rep and August Wilson: Staging Radio Golf

Date:  Thursday, February 14, 2008; please register by Monday, February 11 for videoconference

Time:  10a.m. CST

Grade Level:  7-12

Join us live from the stage of the Grandel Theatre, performance home of St. Louis Black Repertory Company, to view a scene from The Black Reps’ current production of August Wilson’s Radio Golf.  Participants will see the same scene discussed and rehearsed in our previous program, but this time view it as it comes to life on the stage and in costume. Participants meet Producing Director Ron Himes and members of the design team to discuss how the show came to life from the first phase of design to the final phase of implementation.  View the lights, the costumes, and the scenery.  Ask your questions of actors, directors and designers who are part of America’s largest professional African-American theatre company.

 

To participate in this videoconference, contact Rebecca Morrison at Cooperating School Districts of St. Louis by registration dates. MOREnet will bridge videoconferences.