Originally published on HowlRound on January 30, 2020.
Tonia Sina in rehearsal.
In case you haven’t noticed, we are experiencing a revolution in the way artists and entertainers rehearse and perform intimacy.
The seeds were planted at least ten years ago, when a few highly trained movement specialists started noticing that they were often called upon to handle scenes of sexual intimacy in rehearsal rooms. Working in isolation, they all realized that while many of their existing skills could be applied to that task, new techniques were necessary to choreograph intimacy in an ethical, efficient way. Today, Laura Rikard, Chelsea Pace, Tonia Sina, Siobhan Richardson, and Alicia Rodis …
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My #metoo theatre story is from high school. Our theatre department consisted of five women and whatever hapless guys we could convince to come play a part so that we weren’t limited to just doing Steel Magnolias over and over. The women referred to our teacher as the Dirty Old Man, or D.O.M. for short. He did everything guys like that do—touched us for too long, stood too close, talked about our bodies, stared at our breasts. But we liked making theatre, so we put up with it. None of us even thought to tell an adult what was going on, but years later I did hear he was fired when a student more woke than we were went to the principal.
Holly L. Derr 