Performance
"Change will not come if we wait for some other person or...some other time. We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek."
—Barack Obama
Troubled by a racially polarized society, we wanted to invite others to listen in a new way. Not only to us but to each other. We wanted to "set the stage" for being curious, courageous, and vulnerable. Lesley Delmenico, specialized in community-engaged theatre work, adapted our manuscript and directed us ( Jan Gross and Heather Lobban-Viravong) in performance.
mtsd-trailer-v1 (Original).mp4
Jan, Heather, and Lesley
"More Than Skin Deep" began in Grinnell, Iowa (10/26/22) as a staged reading funded by an Andrew W. Mellon Foundation grant for "Connecting People through Humanities." Our 30-minute reading led to small-group conversations guided by facilitators. See reactions below.
"More Than Skin Deep: Live Conversations" was performed in Collegeville, Pennsylvania (05/01/23) in the Ursinus College Black Box theater. The animated and diverse audience brought campus and community together in discussion about what keeps us apart -- and what can bring us together.
Invite us to share our story and engage your community in candid conversation!
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"Whiteness" - A Poem
Viewing Emmett Till
Ursinus College Black Box Theater, Collegeville PA
05/01/23
Photos by Mark Garvin
Audience Reactions
"More than Skin Deep shows how trust can develop when we create space for difficult conversations. More than Skin Deep is a moving and inspiring experience that encourages us to embrace the richness in our differences."
-Audience member
“More Than Skin Deep" is a powerful meditation on race and friendship... intimate and deeply engaging. During the post-show discussion , we reflected on their experiences and reimagined what our college community could look like if we could demonstrate the bravery and compassion of Lobban-Viravong and Gross.
–Meghan B.
“More Than Skin Deep" is a testament to the power of performance to facilitate meaningful conversation. Students, especially white students, are often hesitant to talk about race. "More Than Skin Deep" opens a door for discussions about race and highlights the importance of listening and empathy. ..., this program is the liberal arts at its best ... asks us to reflect, share, and identify what we can do to make the future more just.
–Shannon Z.
Drake Community Library Grinnell, Iowa (10/26/22)
Audience Reactions
“So interesting and unique – to blend the personal, the performance, and the conversation.”
"I was surprised by how rarely we get to experience such honest, vulnerable, and compassionate discussions about interracial friendship (what an important event this was!) and I was challenged by helping others who don't know each other share their own reflections with the same raw openness in the small groups.”
"I think that simply asking people to react to the performance/presentation was very valuable and elicited a range of interesting comments. We might have conducted an entire discussion building off of those reactions, such as by asking people what they thought of specific lines in the play, for example when Heather says 'I just walk around being black.'"
"Having the opportunity to debrief with community/audience members after a piece as powerful and unique as this was incredibly valuable."
“Asking each other honest probing questions became the pinnacle of trust and closeness. So much to think about why friendship could seem out of reach, how well-meaning support programs like mentoring can become part of an already heavy burden but in this case could become the material from which the gift of your wonderful creative affirming project has emerged."
Actors' and Director's Reflections
Lesley Delmenico (Director and Scipt Adaptation)
One of the pleasures of participating in this collaborative project was transforming life-writing into stage performance. For years, I’ve created variations on the performance of orality from interviews, devising, and adapted documents like transcripts, both inside and outside of academia. Heather and Jan’s writing is important. In prose and poetry, it gently and fiercely exhibits the anthropological focus of the field of Performance Studies. Their personal, “micro” explorations reflect the “macro” realities of race in this time. Insider/outsider critique of their experiences makes it far more than personal. I’m also pleased that these two insistent “non-actors” ultimately recognized that they in fact are!
Jan Gross:
This project interweaves my personal and professional life in a profound way. My personal involvement began when I was asked/tasked to mentor a newly arrived minority fellow. The second came from my research on how theatre can influence the way we see the world and move us -- outside of ourselves. Effects may be slow but I hold out hope for the “slow burning fuse of efficacy" (Baz Kershaw). This is what public humanities is for me. I came to value the story that Heather and I chose to share and, with Lesley’s help, perform. At a time when the very word “diversity” is under attack, performing “More Than Skin Deep” feels relevant as a form of quiet activism.
Heather Lobban-Viravong:
My thinking about what constitutes research has changed because of this project. Even though I’ve always valued autoethnography, it took me a long time to see the value of my own lived experience/life story, as well as the value in sharing it. It’s interesting to write a personal narrative about racial difference, and then contemplate that story within the national landscape regarding race. What this project has reinforced for me is the power of the personal, and the importance of connection and relationship-building as avenues for combatting social and political forces that threaten to further entrench division.