Live theatre: Revelstoke youth collaborate with world renowned theatre director David Glass

Revelstoke Youth will showcase their skills not only as performers, but as theatre devisers, when Shoe Tree: A Play is presented on stage for the first time this weekend.

For the past 14 months youth involved with local drama group Flying Arrow Productions have been hard at work to develop the piece as part of world renowned theatre deviser and director David Glass’s AB Project. The three-year international youth arts participation project is based on journalist Asne Seirstad’s book One of Us, an account and reflection of the July 22, 2011 terrorist attack when Anders Breivik detonated a bomb in the government complex in Oslo, Norway before he proceeded to the Islana ol Utoya and lethally shot 69 participant at a Workers Youth League Summer Camp.

Glass made a visit to Revelstoke in April, 2017 to begin working with youth involved in the project. A total of nine countries are taking part in the project and Revelstoke is the only Canadian community involved.

Flying Arrow Productions artistic director Anita Hallewas said while exploring the themes behind Seirstad’s book Revelstoke youth kept coming back to a topic all too familiar with many North American high school students – high school shootings.

“Every time we met it seemed as if there was another attack we could talk about. The conversation kept going back to what scares them,” Hallewas said in a phone interview with the Mountaineer online.

The script for Shoe Tree: A Play was still being finalized on Thursday afternoon when youth involved with Flying Arrow Productions presentation of Shoe Tree: A Play rehearsed. Photo: Melissa Jameson/Revelstoke Mountaineer.

Drama enthusiasts will know that often actors explore themes by “playing,” acting out what different ideas to experience what those moments might feel like. At one point the shoe protest that took place in Washington, D.C. to memorialize children killed by gun violence came up. That memorial included 7,000 pairs of shoes laid out in front of Capitol Hill. Hallewas couldn’t bring in 7,000 pairs of shoes but she did the best she could recreating the experience with 50 pairs of shoes.

“We imagined we knew the people in those shoes,” she said.

Glass arrived in Revelstoke on June 7 to see the progress the youth had made and to collaborate with them on the project. As of Thursday the play was still being devised and the first script only printed on Friday afternoon. Hallewas said the final product the audience will see is a culmination of the youth’s ideas and Glass’s larger, artistic ideas.

“It’s unique. It’s very physical, very visceral. There’s a lot of sound, a lot of movement,” said Hallewas.

Shoe Tree: A Play the Revelstoke youth’s of the events of the 2011 terrorist attack in Norway but Hallewas says the performance has a focus on metaphor and feeling.

“It tells the story but it also leaves the audience with a feeling of hope,” said Hallewas.

Hallewas says she encourages people to not only come and see the performance but to stay afterwards and chat with the youth involved.

“It’s really a social piece of theatre,” she said.

Shoe Tree: A Play runs Saturday, June 16 and Sunday, June 17 at the Revelstoke Peforming Arts Centre. Shows begin at 7:30 p.m., and doors open at 7 p.m. Tickets are $10 and available at the Revelstoke Community Centre or at the door.