Walt Whitman. Leaves of Grass. Metro teenagers. Collision course.
These phrases are more connected than you might think. All are part of the Alliance Theatre’s annual Palefsky Collision Project, in which selected students get up close and personal with a poem, book or play and turn their impressions into original theater.
This year’s project began July 11 and concludes July 29-30 with free public performances (free tickets HERE or at 404.733.5000).
This year, the project’s 15th, some 20 teens are using Leaves of Grass with an eye toward themes of sustainability and the environment. In part, the 1855 poetry collection praises nature and the individual’s role in it.
Each year’s Collision ensemble includes actors, singers, dancers, writers, directors and techies. Any high school student, regardless of experience, is invited to interview for the project. Open auditions are held each year for those “who have something to say and the desire to say it.” The project is free to all participants. Details HERE.
Past Collision Projects have used Thornton Wilder’s Our Town, Shakespeare’s King Lear and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech as jumping-off points, often with the guidance of Pearl Cleage, the Alliance’s playwright in residence, and director Patrick McColery. Both return this year.
They’re joined by speakers and artists who work with the students on writing and performance exercises, a lineup that includes the Rev. Gerald Durley; Danyé Evonne, an actor, vocalist and teaching artist; actor Tinashe Kajese; actor/composer Bryan Mercer; Alliance director Rosemary Newcott; singer-songwriter Doria Roberts; dance-maker Lauri Stallings; and Mama Yeye, a West African dance, culture and sekere specialist.
“I am always inspired by their optimism and their willingness to tackle the problems their generation will be called upon to solve in just a few years,” says Cleage, now into her sixth Collision Project.
The 2016 participants are Patrick Aspinall, Elise Jackson and Joseph Swift of Campbell High School in Cobb County; Susannah Atkinson and Bautista Botto Barilli of the Atlanta International School; Laughton Berry, Mariyom Muhammad and Perah Rutledge of Tri-Cities High School; Matthew Brown of South Atlanta High School; Masai Brimm of Georgia Virtual School; Anthony Campbell and Michaela Toles of New Manchester High School in Douglas County; Sydney Emerson of North Springs Charter High School; Nicole Falco of Woodstock High School in Cherokee County; Jatiyah Goodin of Westlake High School; Tieler Gray of Creekside High Schooll; Kyla Hunder of Pebblebrook High School in Cobb County; Ryan Kerul of Flowery Branch High School in Hall County; Julienne Macamu of the Global Village Project (charter middle school for refugee girls); and Jamaya Tookes of The Paideia School.
The project is named for Vicki and Howard Palefsky, Alliance patrons who help fund it.
