Therapy-as-Theatre

This article examines how theatre works as a form of therapy using Duncan Macmillan’s Every Brilliant Thing and Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’s An Octoroon . Both depict fictional representations of psychotherapy but also use concepts from narrative therapy as developed by White and Epston (1990), such as the audience as witnesses and creators of their own story. We argue that therapy-as-theatre exerts a pull on the audience, which invites them to empathize, identify and understand, and draws them into the “affective arrangement” of the plays as defined by Slaby, Mühlhoff, and Wüschner (2019). The two plays bring together the therapeutic and the theatrical both in terms of content and form: in Every Brilliant Thing , the performer explicitly re-enacts conversations with a counsellor and mimics the therapy setting by sharing with the audience their feelings concerning the suicide of their mother. Similarly, in An Octoroon , the playwright’s alter ego BJJ makes himself vulnerable to the audience. However, the play also confronts spectators with hard truths about the history and topicality of racism that they may not be prepared to hear. Within the specific time frame of the shows, similar to the frame of a psychotherapy session, the two plays create self-contained affective spaces where feelings and emotions circulate between performers, spectators and among audience members

Aesthetics · Art · Feeling · Id, ego and super-ego · Literature · Narrative · Psychoanalysis · Art Therapy and Mental Health · Diversity and Impact of Dance · Psychology · Social Psychology · Theatre and Performance Studies

• Affective Arrangements

  Open Access•Jan Slaby, Rainer Mühlhoff et al.•Emotion Review•2019

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• Hissing, Bidding, and Lynching

  Carrie J Preston•TDR/The Drama Review•2018

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• Theatre, Sacrifice, Ritual

  Erika Fischer-Lichte•Theatre, Sacrifice, Ritual•2007

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