Not just Food for Thought, but Food for Action

LightBox Theatre’s Gull, directed by Ellen Beckerman. Photo by Benjamin Heller.

Starting in October, New York City-based LightBox Theatre will be serving up a new dish: The Food Theatre Project.

The non-profit theatre company is creating a cutting-edge, “kinetic” production to address the food system. No stranger to social issues, LightBox's mission is to create new performances relevant to key issues of our time.

We recently caught up with Ellen Beckerman, artistic director of LightBox, and Nicole Betancourt, producer and video designer, to talk about the development of The Food Theater Project and the role it can play in the larger movement around food.

Update: LightBox has worked on a wide array of projects since its inception in 1999. What made you pick food as a topic?

Beckerman and Betancourt: We originally started thinking about the project in 2003 while we were discussing the Iraq war and democracy, and specifically the way we as Americans do or don't engage in our democracy. As the discussion progressed, people started to talk about how numb and out of control they felt about these huge, towering kinds of issues. At the time, some of us were reading Fast Food Nation and we started trying to make connections and examine how people make choices about what foods they purchased. It became clear how overwhelmed people were by the food system and how disconnection from others interested in or working on this issue was only breeding that feeling. We wanted to create a production that helped people connect with each other and form community, because that's when people stop feeling overwhelmed and start feeling empowered.

Update: Tell us about The Food Theater Project . What is it?

B & B: TFTP is truly cutting edge, multimedia theater. The live performances will begin in Manhattan in October 2007 and will then tour nationally. The performance is followed by an After Show Café, where audience members will talk with guest speakers, eat locally produced food, browse through books, and have the opportunity to take action and get engaged with the food organizations we're partnering with. In addition to the live performances, LightBox will also conduct youth workshops in schools that will train teachers and students to research, write, produce, and present their own food-based theater for their communities.

It's more than a play. One of our other performances was about soldiers' experiences during war and what it's like to come home to a society that asks young men and women to fight, but into which it is so difficult to reintegrate. That was produced as a classic play. TFTP is dealing with the food issue head on. We're using our expertise in theatre to leverage action and foster connection. The arts open people up and engage them emotionally. But we don't want to leave people fired up with nowhere to go. That's the reason for the After Show Café and discussions afterward.

Update: Who are you trying to reach with TFTP ?

B & B: We want to bring people to the play who have a wide range of opinions. We also want to bring the communities that our partner organizations are working with—teachers, journalists, farmers, etc. What we are not doing, first of all, is preaching. And second, we are not communicating to the choir; this project is about dialogue. There are a number of great organizations who are working on the food system right now and we don't want to recreate the wheel. What we can do is help connect the audience to the organizations.

This idea of audience is one of the things we need to keep being mindful about as we work on the play. We want to make sure that we include diverse points of view. When artists have their opinions about a subject and don't include other voices, it becomes propaganda and people shut down because they don't want to be lectured. This project is not a one-way conversation or a call for judgment; it is truly a dialogue.

Update: Do you see this theater project fitting in with the larger movement around food?

B & B: Absolutely. It will play a very important role. There needs to be a voice that connects people to the issue and to the advocates already doing the work. What we can do is bring curious, creative, energized newcomers to the movement. We are raising awareness about the issues, and the After Show Cafés and guest speaker discussions will be the places where the audience can connect with the organizations working in the frontlines of the movement. These organizations are “the choir” that we were talking about—they know the food system needs reform and are working on it. What we're doing is connecting the choir to those that are not in the choir, and helping them to talk to each other and exchange ideas. We believe that dialogue is essential to the food movement.

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