article by Sianna Ephrem Zewdie (Y10)
There is a moment in every theater class when the teacher announces the rules of a game that is particularly embarrassing to play, in which a range of reactions can be seen on 20 different faces. You have the brave few who are ready to throw themselves into the work, while the rest look around, side-eyeing their friends with expressions varying between mild skepticism and full-blown incredulity. Now imagine that…but with a hundred different students.
That was the situation I found myself in on Friday morning. I was standing in the La Grande Boissière auditorium, spine aligned with that of a Belgian stranger, wondering what the teacher meant by ‘conveying a sense of yearning [to my partner] through the movement of my back’. The vaguely sexual sounding direction gave rise to a wave of titters and nervous laughter as we looked around, trying to figure out if he was actually serious or not. The activity was designed for us to get to know each other better, and perhaps it did…not through rubbing our backs together, but through a sense of wondering what we had gotten ourselves into for the next few days.
And ultimately, that is the main point of ISTA, I find: the collaboration. As an association that organizes workshops and ensemble sessions for secondary students, it is built on a foundation of cooperation. Nothing would be possible if there was no sense of team spirit between artists, teachers, and students, and usually that camaraderie is what people take from the experience. In the words of Anastasia Burnley, a La Chat student who also attended the festival, “the best thing isn’t really the theater work: it’s meeting new people that we never would have interacted with otherwise.” This sentiment was echoed by other students when I asked them for their opinions—statements that were strongly enhanced by the frantic sharing of socials that I saw at the end of the festival.
The ensemble leaders had very different approaches to running their companies. Wencong “Michael” Chen used his many specializations, particularly in the realm of immersive theater, to bring creative ideas to his group. Desta, with her field of expertise being music and dance, brought a sense of community to her group, and as for Cheryl, she made use of her fine wit to complement her history with commedia dell’arte, an Italian theater form. But ultimately, since this was an Inter Arts festival (meaning that it was not just theater, but art and music related as well), all the artists managed to stage performances that blended so well with each other, that it was hard to tell when one ensemble ended and the next one began.
Having said that, the “Inter Arts”-ness of this festival could be contested, and many students were disappointed with the fact that it was still largely theater based. Due to the marketing in the months prior, many students had signed up, assuming there would be options for music and art students as well as performers. However, once they turned it up, it was clear that this was still heavily theater focused, and there were little to no opportunities for people who didn’t want to do that, leaving many feeling like it was a waste. Hopefully, in later festivals, they will make more of an effort to be more broad—or at least not mislead students through advertisement.
Despite this initial disappointment, many people came away from the festival with positive memories. At the end, many people were exchanging tearful goodbyes with people they hadn’t even known three days prior, which goes to show the strength of the bonds that were created during this experience. This should be regarded as a success on the side of the ISTA foundation, as the artistic director Julia Roberts (not the actress, to my disappointment, but still a quite remarkable woman) said: “I just want everyone to go away feeling the magic of theater.”
And as I walked away from the ISTA festival, wondering if I’ll ever look at a back rub the same way again, I couldn’t help but think: “Well, at least I got a good story out of it…and maybe a slightly awkward memory to laugh about in the future. And maybe… Julia was right. I did feel the magic of the theater.”