Early this week, Actress Sandra Okuboyejo (Jocelyn Bioh’s Nollywood Dreams and the Chicago company of Hamilton) posted these 5 ways the industry can improve and we’re here for it!
- Sensitivity training
Many of the running shows explore racial tensions on stage. It is imperative these tensions are not transferred and felt off stage. Many POC are taught how to adapt to white spaces, while the reverse scenario is rarely (if ever) explored. Performers, and all individuals in power, should be taught how to respectfully exist in each others spaces. You should not have to leave your culture at the door.
2. Casting
The term “colorblind casting” is antiquated. It is important to question and shy away from calling POC in to audition and/or placing them in shows simply to fill a quota. POC should be trusted to tell a nuanced story. When married with sensitivity training and the further exploration and understanding areas such as colorism, micro-aggressions, LGBQTA inclusivity/exposure and actors with disabilities inclusivity/exposure, it will allow our stories to be more complete.
3. Mental health
There should be a mental health specialist at every show. In every theater. Pre-show, mid-show, and post-show breakdowns and panic attacks occur too often for actors. There should be a point person aside from HR whose sole purpose is to understand, navigate and assert themselves in matters pertaining to the mental health of their actors as they navigate their cast mates and authority figures, in a shared space.
4. Positions of leadership
A POC should never have to walk into a theatre where every authority figure they have to answer to is white. Stories exploring specific cultures should appoint these individuals to the creative teams. It’s not enough to have them as ‘insight’, they need to make compensated input. This extends to producers, and organizations receiving donations from proceeds. Diversity is not purely for the audience’s gaze. Diversity needs to extend to the people in power.
5. Hair and makeup
Hiring people who know how to do hair/makeup for POC (specifically black actors) is essential. Hair types vary and individuals should only carry out this responsibility if certified to do so. Too often, the lack of a correctly appointed professional, subjects blacks actors to doing their own hair and makeup, exhausting themselves emotionally and physically. Their priority should be their job: performing.
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