Here's our history...
These days we tend to think of theater as Broadway. We
forget that from ancient times theater has been a communal event that
brings
people together in a shared experience.
For 35 years, since the first Earth Day in April 1970, Mass
Transit has been bringing people together to enjoy a play or video and then
discuss what they have experienced after the show. This is the role we
play, and we have reasons to believe we do it well. Our success is
evidenced by the many groups that make the latest Mass Transit play a yearly
event. And . . . another kind of recognition . . . our work continues
to be generously supported by the New York State Council on the Arts, The
Bronx Council on the Arts, The NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, the
Puffin Foundation, and the North Star Fund.
LAST SEASON . . .
Provocative theater group celebrates 35th anniversary
By Alisa Opar
Before 1973, when abortion was still illegal, members of Mass Transit Street
Theater gathered near a Bronx church to perform a piece about a woman’s
right to choose. In the audience watching the show were several Roman
Catholics who stayed to have a thoughtful conversation with the actors about
the controversial topic. “There’s
something about theater,” said Jerry Cofta, co-founder of the Bronx-based
community theater group, which is celebrating its 35th anniversary.
“It allows people to talk because we don’t throw these subjects into
people’s faces in an antagonistic way — the plays are usually entertaining,
often funny.”
Since its inception in 1970, Mass Transit has used song,
storytelling and dance to create progressive, socially-conscious works. Over
the years, the troupe has tackled issues such as war, feminism, education
and housing. Mass Transit outlived similar performance groups scattered
throughout the borough in the 1970s. The troupe moved from parks and street
corners into community centers and theaters and, more recently, has
incorporated video in its performances. For its anniversary, Mass Transit
revived Home Free, a 15-year-old production it considers a landmark. Mr.
Cofta did little rewriting to bring the play up to date. Set on a platform
in the lower reaches of Grand Central Terminal, Home Free addresses the
elusiveness of the American dream. A man undergoing a mid-life crisis —
disillusioned and yearning for a simpler time — spends a night in the
company of three homeless people. “The homeless issue and the protagonist’s
search for meaning are still relevant,” Mr. Cofta said. The play, which had
its final performance on Saturday, got people talking on June 3 at the Puffin
Room in Manhattan. As always, Mr. Cofta invited the audience to share their
thoughts after the show. “Our plays really grow out of stories people tell
us after the performances and in interviews,” said Lyn Pyle, the troupe’s
co-founder and a well-known community activist in nearby Norwood, who has
been a leading opponent of building the water filtration plant in Van
Cortlandt Park.
For the last decade, Ms. Pyle has been using video, often in
conjunction with live performance. She called her adoption of multi-media
performance an “accident,” explaining that she offered to carry the video
camera while attending the Fourth World Conference on Women in 1995 in
China. “I knew nothing about video, but I came back with 18 hours of
incredible footage of women from all over the world,” she said. “So I had to
learn how to make a video.” Ms. Pyle transformed the footage into We Are the
Leaders, which sold about 300 copies. She’s been hooked on video ever since
and changed the group’s name to Mass Transit Street Theater & Video. Her
recent work, What Does War Cost the Bronx?, examines a woman who is torn
because she wants to support a son who is serving in Iraq, but who believes
the administration lied to justify sending the troops in. “We’re taking a
contemporary situation and exploring it from all the different points of
view from the people involved,” Ms. Pyle said. She’ll continue working in
this vein on her next film, about the daily violence Bronx teenagers
experience. Though Mr. Cofta has not yet settled on a topic for his next
play, he is not concerned about Mass Transit’s future. “There’s been a
rebirth of interest by much younger people in this type of theater,” he
said.
2003-2004 WHAT DOES WAR COST? Thirty
community-based performances of the play, and 71 showings of the video
on public access TV in Manhattan, the Bronx, Brooklyn, and
Westchester.
Emma Gay
Eric Vetter
Jodi Young
Raybblin Vargas
as Aunt Sam
as Arnie as Yvette as Truth Fairy
WHAT DOES WAR COST? is now available as a 30-minute video.
Use the video version to provoke discussion, expand vision, inspire
storytelling and writing for your class, church group, friends or
co-workers.
In a brighty-lit car of the # 4 train, as they return to the
Bronx from work, John & Yvette meet a homeless Aunt Sam (recently kicked out
of government in Washington) and the Truth Fairy who strangely enough
changes subway ads for the MTA. At the heart of the play
is Yvette's struggle to support her soldier son and face the truth of a war
that puts his life at risk. The encounter of the four characters is heated
and generates many questions for the audience discussion that follows each
performance. What is patriotism? Who's telling the truth?
What is the impact of war on the people and things we care about in New York
City -- like our schools, health care, and the security of our
families and communities? And what do we truly value in our
relationships with one another and with others in our global village?
scene from What Does War Cost?
LESSONS explored
central conflicts in today’s society through the prism of a South Bronx
classroom. Jerry Cofta (writer and actor) and Ted Hannan director, have spent
much of their careers with a dual focus -- theater and education. Jerry is a
language arts teacher in a South Bronx alternative high school and Ted is a
professor at the Tisch School of Arts, NYU. They begin this new theatrical
piece using their shared knowledge from their hands on work within the field
of Education.
It is their expectation that much of what we are about as a society, our
dreams, our disappointments, our anger and our fears, will be revealed in a
playing our\t of how we learned – then and now.
Lessons, set in an urban high school, presents a teacher and a
student, old and young, white and black, locked (metaphorically) in a
classroom, each wanting to get out, each desperately needing to stay. The
play, through the prism of education continues our exploration with our
audience of where we have been, of our commonalties and differences, and
where we need to go, as a community.
[VIDEOCLIP]
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