• Born 1931 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
• Influential theatre director, writer and
politician.
•Trained in Chemical Engineering at
Columbia University in the late 1940s
•Boal returned to Brazil after his degree
and worked in the Arend Theatre in Sao
Palo, when his theatre career took off.
Publications
• Theatre of the oppressed (1979)
• Games for Actors and Non-actors (1992)
•Rainbow of Desire (1995)
• Boal Theatre is known as:
“Theatre of the Oppressed.”
• Oppressed – weighted down
• The “Theatre of the Oppressed”
transformed the work of the theatre.
• So what is
“Theatre of the
Oppressed”?........
• Boal developed the idea of “Spect-actors”
not “Spectators.”
• This is where audiences were invited to
discuss a play at the end of the performance.
• This soon developed to the audience
stopping the performance half way through to
suggest different actions for a character.
Sometimes they even went onstage to
demonstrate to the actors what they wanted
them to do.
Street Theatre.......
• Augusto Boal also did types of street theatre, he was to bring
the scène that play did not have to be performed in a theatre like
Bertol Brecht.
• Brecht was a German theatre designer who believed that
the audience should see how the inside of the theatre
works. So he would remove the curtains and backing so
people could see back stage. Brecht most likely inspired
Boal in his work to bring the audiences and actors
together.
The Effects of Theatre of the Oppressed:
• At the time ` teachings were new, different and controversial.
• Boal was a rebel, and regarded as a threat - because of his
practices and beliefs he was arrested, tortured and exiled.
• Boal also worked for some time at a politician.
• Despite some people disagreeing with his theories he
worked tirelessly to make his processes available to as
many people as he could reach.
• He hopes that there are hundreds or even thousonds of
people carrying at his liberatory approach to comminity
arimation.
His Work Shops.........
• In the 1950’s and 1960’s Boal tried to transform theatre from the
“monologue” of traditional performance into a “dialogue” between
the auditorium and the stage, he experimented with many different
ways of doing this. His experiments were based on the assumption
that dialogue is common, healthy dynamic between all humans.
• Boal ran and created many different workshops which became a
training ground where action on the performances where practiced
but also action on life.
• A good book to look at for this is “Games for actors and non-actors”
and would be a good book for you all to look at. It has may interesting
games to build confidence and communication, which you may have
played before at high school etc.
Augusto Boal's main influences......
• His major influence was Paulo Freire, they were spoke at several conferences
and soon became great friends. Paulo Freire was a Brazilian educator, and a
highly influential theorist of education. He was the creator of 'pedagogy of the
oppressed'.
• Definition of pedagogy - the art or science of being a teacher.
• Paulo Freire was best known for what he called the 'banking' concept of education the student was viewed as an empty account to be filled by the teacher.
• Much of Boal's early work was also inspired by a Marxist philosophy - the idea that
capitalism will be displaced by communism - a classless society.
• But Boal hasn't let his career be restricted by this philosophy, and much of his
work and performing now falls within the boundaries of the 'centre left' ideology which is a political term - accepting a mixed economy with a significant public
sector and a thriving private sector, and tend to favour limited state intervention.
Images of Oppression