Earlier this year The Chicago College of Performing Arts at Roosevelt University’s Associate Dean and Director of the Theatre Conservatory Sean Kelley was accused of repeatedly humiliating and sexually harassing his students.
Friday, September 20, 2019
Abuse Is Not Art: The Yard, CCPA, and Academic Atrocities
Earlier this year The Chicago College of Performing Arts at Roosevelt University’s Associate Dean and Director of the Theatre Conservatory Sean Kelley was accused of repeatedly humiliating and sexually harassing his students.
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This is such an important article. We really don’t talk enough about the inappropriate conduct that can occur, not only in the workplace, but at schools. One point I found really interesting in this article was the distinction between the relationships between theatre and non-theatre professors. I honestly didn’t realize, but it’s very true. There’s no instructors that I’ve seen be as close to their students as I’ve seen theatre instructors. It’s not that being close to students is inherently a bad thing, but boundaries are super important. In an industry where people are often expected to do whatever is asked of them, there’s a risk factor involved. I feel like there’s a common thought process in the theatre industry that actors should have to do every acting exercise and take every instruction if they want to “make it,” but anyone in any industry has the right to say “no” to any task they they’re uncomfortable with. The idea that any school has “fat letter” (except CMU’s acceptance letter, of course) is super disturbing. The student was right, that encourages eating disorders and all schools should embrace diversity in every way, including body type.
I completely agree with Elena above. It’s horrifying to see what happened at The Chicago College of Performing Arts at Roosevelt University. The toxicity and discrimination built up for a full thirteen years... Sometimes, we forget about boundaries in our community. The theatre community is very close and tight, we’re like family. While it’s vital in our theatre education to have a close relationship with our professors but we need to draw lines.
Thinking about our school, we’re lucky that administration is on top of this type of stuff and that as a student, I feel I have people to turn to if anything happens. However, I do feel like we have more work to do. I’ve heard professors say they will get us to be comfortable with things we’re not comfortable performing, like working with heights. While it’s not a problem for many people, and they can get used to it, there are just some people who aren’t able to stand tall heights. Should they be given bad grades because they naturally are frightened? For actors too, I’ve heard that the curriculum digs up memories/trauma from the past and that’s not healthy for many people. As a community, I think we need to work on establishing to what extent we should push the students. Of course, we only learn the best from pushing out of our boundaries but when is it too much?
This article hurts to read and angers me to no end. It was a joke in my undergrad that you knew if someone was a vocalist or an instrumentalist by whether or not they had come out of a private lesson crying. Not because the voice teachers were some kind of crazy tyrant, but because the nature of an instrument lesson focuses on the instrument and your use of it. The nature of a voice lesson focuses on your body and how you use it. I switched to a new voice teacher halfway through my time in undergrad because I felt wildly uncomfortable with the man who was teaching me. My new voice teacher was much better—but in retrospect, I think part of the reason she was better was because of the appropriate boundaries she insisted on instituting despite them not being required work. We work in a weird industry where some boundary lines that would be very clear cut in an office environment are a little fuzzy. And that’s ok. But what’s not ok is using that to your advantage, and deciding that fuzziness means there should be no boundaries at all. In fact, I think because of the business boundaries should be stronger, to protect students from abuse.
This was a painful article to read. It brought back a lot of memories of my undergrad, summer internships, and here at Carnegie Mellon University. For too long I and other students in theatre and drama have had relationship lines blurred with faculty and staff. I remember in undergrad drinking with my advisor. I was only 19 years old. This should not have been allowed, but it did. I remember summer internships hearing the actors, mainly the female identifying actors, talk about the diets they were on and how some of their own professors have suggested they do these diets. Then, only a few days ago, I was told how within Carnegie Mellon some faculty have straight up told their students they are ‘too fat’ and need to lose weight if they have any chance to make it. Too long this cycle of abuse and blurred lines has been going on, and it needs to stop. I am so proud of us as a student body for standing up against this and fighting back.
I have a few friends from high school that go to CCPA, and I remember hearing all about this last year. Studying theatre is just... so different from studying other fields. We spend so much time with one another and our faculty, and people often find it odd how close I can be with my theatre teachers. This quote in particular touched on this well:
"Theatre teachers have an unprecedented amount of access to and influence over their students. I never recall hugging my English teachers, but I hugged my theatre teachers. I never drank with my math teachers. I went out for drinks with theatre teachers after conservatory, usually rounds they bought for us. If boundaries are not properly set, teachers in theatre or performing arts have an unbelievable amount of access to a young person’s mind set, self image, and sometimes their physical person."
This has the potential to be either incredibly inspirational to a student's work or incredibly, incredibly harmful, as we see here regarding CCPA's problems. Theatre, especially for performers, is a very vulnerable subject to study. It requires coming face-to-face with your inner-self, mind, and physical appearance. For someone to have the power to build up your confidence and skill and instead use it to tear you down and exploit you is so heartbreaking to hear. I'm grateful that CCPA took the action to fire this abuser, but disappointed that it took so long. I'm proud that my generation is making sure these allegations are being taken more seriously, but upset that people ever did this to begin with. We have a lot of work to do in this industry to make sure performers feel comfortable and safe in the spaces they will ultimately have to be so exposed in.
It is heartbreaking to know all these, but in the same time it is also a courageous response for all people suffered in the scene around us. I totally agree the argument that brought up in the article that theater teachers have more access to students life than other teachers in other trades. The reason behind this is that we are trying to form a learning environment that is very artistic and personal. And through the building of that environment, we lean heavily on instructors' own opinions and experiences. Personally I feel the part of intimacy is necessary toward our work, but the boundaries are just like what the article, too hard to define. The only way out of this is very clear,also rely on all people in the theatrical educational system. We have to look after each other, try to spot anything that is unusual and support those who speak out loud. By forming a safety net around us, we can guide our young generation into a better theater world.
Place value "on student growth rather than student survival." For me, that is by far the most important sentiment voiced in this piece. There are so many hardships that students in theatrical academia face including all the ones expressed by Regina Victor. Discrimination overhangs so many fields in society today but none quite so dynamically and long-standing as in the theater. From the early days where women were barred from being performers, there has always been an idea of how an actor is supposed to "look." This focus, while necessary for casting in a way which no other field can claim, can create an unhealthy atmosphere that leads to burn out, hopelessness, eating disorders, and so many other issues. If a person went into computer science and didn't get the job due to their race they could yell discrimination but because of the work we do it's so much more difficult to identify where the line between accurate character casting and prejudice resides. What's even worse is that there is no easy solution to many of the problems. The intimacy between theatre teachers and students is one which everyone has observed. This closeness which forms so easily due to the way we interact with our instructors can both be so necessarily beneficial and raise so many red flags for those that either don't understand it or identify real issues that need to be addressed. While I wish there were an easy way to address the discrepancies between the atmosphere we claim to foster and what actually comes from our efforts the only true reform we can easily push through is to be cognizant of what is going on and try as individuals to change each small issue we see that contributes to the larger problem.
This article simply states the facts and reports what has happened, and it makes me feel physically ill. Echoing what others have said above, it is true that in this industry we become physically and emotionally closer to one another than in any other industry out there. We are vulnerable in front of one another, and this often cannot be helped, as it is part of the nature of the work. That being said, there are numerous ways in which boundaries can be set, and instead of taking advantage of one another's vulnerability, we should be expected to be there as a support system for each other. There should never NOT be rules in place for how professors, directors, choreographers, and other actors are allowed to interact with one another. No one should ever be made to do, perform, or believe something simply because someone with more power than they have is giving the order and they are afraid of the repercussions of saying no. The industry has made huge strides in Intimacy Direction, and I think there is much to be learned from their tactics. Always ask before you initiate touch. Never sexualize or make insinuations about the work going on, and always treat it clinically. Maintain the boundaries set in the room, and make it clear that you expect everyone to adhere to these boundaries as well. Most importantly, respect everyone's ability to say "no" and ensure that there will be no repercussions from them saying so. This culture of secret abuse is not okay, especially when we are supposed to be an industry that helps people heal and grow. It takes all of us to acknowledge this, however, and a commitment to be better.
One of my future goals is to spread Theatre in Education among a compulsory education system in Japan. While I do believe that theatre teachers can change one’s life in a glorious way, like how they changed my life, this article makes me re-recognize how delicate theatre education is. Although professional works do require judgements and criticisms, it is not always the case in the educational field, where students are allowed to freely express and develop their ideas.
Ironically, the sensible side if often ignored because most of the people who enter this industry to actually get involved in theatre programs are the ones who experienced the positive effects of it. Since the introduction of theatre in an academic field is a relatively new, one of the causes of these abuses could simply be the undeveloped training for theatre teachers. At this point, Carnegie Mellon University plays a significant role by holding the Excellence in Theatre Education Award every year.
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