The Thanksgiving Play production photos.
Photos by Glenn Perry
Month: October 2019
Program Note: A Short History of Trigger Warnings
The debate over so-called “trigger warnings” continues to simmer, boiling over in the media every month or so. These warnings – statements alerting students, and other members of the public, if writing, video or other materials contain confronting images or ideas – have taken center stage in the campus culture wars in the US and beyond.
Proponents argue that trigger warnings protect vulnerable and traumatized students from harm. Warnings allow students to prepare themselves mentally for distressing experiences or to avoid exposure to them if they feel unable to cope.
Critics see things differently. Where trigger warning proponents see protection they see coddling. Where proponents see sensitivity, they see censorship and threats to fearless pedagogy.
The Concept of ‘Triggers’
Rather than enter this political minefield, we might consider the concept of “trigger warning” itself and ask where it comes from. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, a trigger can be something that acts like a mechanical trigger in initiating a process or reaction.
To trigger something is therefore not just to bring it about in some general sense, but to cause it in a way that is mechanical and automatic, like a reflex. Pollen is an asthma trigger because it sets off muscle contractions in the airways among people who are sensitive to it. The muscular reaction is involuntary and requires no conscious deliberation. It just happens.
The idea of trigger warnings originates in the psychiatric literature on post-traumatic reactions, where triggering had the same connotations. The primary features of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) include so-called “re-experiencing symptoms,” like intrusive thoughts and flashbacks.
These thoughts and images bring traumatic events vividly back to life, accompanied by the intense fear that the events originally evoked. Experiences that recall those early events trigger re-experiencing symptoms through a process that is rapid, unconscious, involuntary and automatic.
When trigger warnings were first introduced, they adhered closely to this post-traumatic sense of the term. Warnings were intended to alert traumatized people, who had experienced rape and sexual or physical assault, that soon-to-be presented material might spark their traumatic memories. Trigger warnings now commonly alert people not only to content that relates to sexual or physical trauma, but also to material that is potentially offensive, disgusting or politically questionable.
For example, one recent proposal urged trigger warnings for vomit, spiders and insects, slimy things, food, eye contact, pregnancy, classism, racism and transphobia (including, presumably, critiques thereof). Lists such as these indicate that trigger warnings have expanded their conceptual territory to encompass almost anything that could be a focus of strong emotion or conflict.
That expansion is revealed by statements that trigger warnings relate to material that is “emotionally confronting” or “distressing” rather than narrowly traumatic. Indeed, much of the content now subject to trigger warnings has no direct association with trauma in the psychiatric sense.
Over-Expansion?
The fact that a concept such as “trigger” has inflated far beyond its original meaning is not in itself a cause for concern. Concepts evolve all the time, and so they should. However, it is important to ask whether the expanding meaning of “trigger” has come at a cost.
Responding to Humpty Dumpty’s claim that a word “means just what I choose it to mean,” Alice [Through the Looking Glass] asked: “The question is … whether you can make words say so many different things.” Humpty Dumpty replied: “The question is … which is to be master,” he or the word.
Trigger warning advocates may be the masters when it comes to defining “triggers,” but they may be over-egging the definition.
The emotional signature of trauma is intense fear or horror. It is fear that dominates the reexperiencing symptoms of PTSD. However, the newer triggers often involve markedly different emotions: sadness or depression, social anxiety, disgust, or moral indignation at an offensive -ism. These diverse emotions can be rolled up with fear into an undifferentiated ball of “upset,” “distress” or feeling “confronted,” but crucial distinctions are
overlooked in the process.
Traumatic fear, for example, is intense, evoked by reminders in a largely automatic manner, difficult to override and related to a personal catastrophic experience. Mercifully only a small minority of the population suffers from PTSD at any point in time; 3.8% over a six-month period according to one recent study.
In contrast, most people experience some disgust at slimy things and vomit, but rarely to a pathological degree and not necessarily as a result of a traumatic personal history. To group together “triggers” for sexual trauma and for everyday disgust is to mix apples and rotten oranges.
The angry offence that people may take to undesirable social attitudes and political ideologies is even more different from traumatic fear, and even more questionably described by the language of “triggering.” Outrage or indignation is not as automatic as traumatic fear, involving a more complex moral assessment of the situation.
The ire we experience when we take offence is not generated by an involuntary trigger-like mechanism but by a complex process of moral cognition.
The differences between traumatic fear and moral anger do not stop there. One motivates avoidance, the other motivates attack. People taking angry offence at classism or racism are unlikely to be responding reflexively to a personal trauma, and more likely to be responding in an, at least partially, reasoned way to injustices felt on behalf of (or as part of) a group, including groups to which they do not belong.
To argue trigger warnings are required for class content that refers to colonialism or Islamophobia is to stretch the meaning of “trigger” to breaking point, making it refer both to pathological fear and to normal moral disapproval.
As Alice said to Humpty Dumpty: “That’s a great deal to make one word mean.” To which Humpty replied: “When I make a word do a lot of work like that … I always pay it extra.”
About The Thanksgiving Play
Four well-intentioned white high school teachers scramble to create a pageant that somehow manages to celebrate both Turkey Day and Native American Heritage Month. What could possibly go wrong?
Perfecting a Poster
This is a guest post written by Digital Marketing Assistant Kate Casner in association with fellow intern Michael Rocco. She details the process of designing parody posters that imitate some famous and not-so-appropriate plays to incorporate into the set of The Thanksgiving Play.
One of the main characters in the The Thanksgiving Play is Logan, a high school drama teacher who is notorious for mounting very mature plays with casts of high schoolers (much to the anger of her student’s parents). When Stephanie Hettrick, our Production Manager, approached me and my fellow intern Michael about creating parody posters of iconic, mature plays that featured high school-aged stars to be used as set dressing, we were very excited to run a bit wild while making them.
Before we began, we asked ourselves, “just how far can we push the traditional boundaries of these shows?”. The answer, dear reader, is a lot.
Brainstorming
Michael and I were given a list of some plays that are wildly inappropriate for teens to put on such as Angels in America, The Motherf*cker with the Hat, and The Iceman Cometh. We researched the concept of each show for inspiration, then brainstormed how to create posters for them that both encompassed the main themes and looked like they were made by a high schooler who was really trying to show off their Photoshop skills.
“Just how far can we push the traditional boundaries of these shows?”
Execution
and Results
Our goal was to create shockingly funny juxtapositions between the teenagers featured on the posters and the adult content of the shows. We parodied some iconic posters, and even recreated the poster from our own production of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, directed by Scott Edmiston during our 2016-2017 season. We absolutely support non-traditional casting at the Lyric, but featuring an African American woman as Martha on the high school poster of Who’s Afraid not only contradicts the playwright’s intentions, it fundamentally changes the message of the play. That specific choice make Who’s Afraid even more shockingly inappropriate for a high school production!
Check out some side-by-side comparisons of these iconic posters and our parody creations for The Thanksgiving Play below!
About The Thanksgiving Play
Four well-intentioned white high school teachers scramble to create a pageant that somehow manages to celebrate both Turkey Day and Native American Heritage Month. What could possibly go wrong?
Spiro Veloudos Announces His Retirement as Producing Artistic Director of the Lyric Stage Company of Boston
Stepping away from the day-to-day operations of the theatre, he will focus on his greatest passion: directing.
Spiro Veloudos, legendary theatre director and Boston theatre icon, announced today that he is retiring from his role as Producing Artistic Director of the Lyric Stage Company of Boston.
“Ever since I started in this role in 1998, I promised to make the Lyric Stage ever more vibrant and to continually push my limits, producing shows that would challenge, entertain, and inspire our audiences. When I concluded my Sondheim Initiative with the production of Pacific Overtures this past spring, I took the summer off to contemplate what might be next, and I realized that it is time for me to focus solely on my work as a director and to let others manage the daily operations of the theatre and to guide it into the future. I am greatly looking forward to my productions of Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express this fall and A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder in the spring. And I hope that moving into this new chapter of my life will allow me more time to relax, enjoy being with friends and family, and focus more exclusively on my true love: directing.”
During Veloudos’ tenure, the Lyric Stage has won 40 Elliot Norton Awards, 69 Independent Reviewers of New England awards, and Veloudos himself has been the recipient of the StageSource Theatre Hero Award, the Elliot Norton Award for Sustained Excellence, and he was named Best Artistic Director by Boston Magazine. In 2017, Veloudos suffered a diabetes-related infection that caused him to lose his left leg below the knee.
Undaunted, Veloudos celebrated his 20th season as Producing Artistic Director and directed Camelot that spring. He is now energetically following his passion for directing, and will be at the helm of two productions at the Lyric Stage this season.
The Lyric Stage Board of Directors has also announced that former Managing Director Matt Chapuran returned to the company on October 1 in the newly created position of Executive Director. Associate Artistic Director Courtney O’Connor will be serving as Acting Artistic Director.
Jo-An Heileman, Lyric Stage Board president, said, “We thank Spiro for his years of dedication and artistic achievements with the Lyric Stage. Over the last two decades, he has made the Lyric Stage into one of the most important and vibrant artistic institutions in Boston, providing intimate world-class theatre to nearly 40,000 audience members each season. We wish Spiro the absolute best on his continuing artistic journey. During Matt Chapuran’s five seasons as Managing Director, the Lyric Stage staff and board were energized with ambitious ideas and a desire to more deeply serve the city of Boston and to collaborate with other Boston artistic institutions. We believe in this new expanded role of Executive Director, Matt will take the Lyric Stage to the next level.”
Chapuran said, “Back in the mid-90s, I was an intern for an improvisational after-school program that Ron Ritchell and Polly Hogan had running at the Lyric Stage. It was my pleasure to be in Boston for the entirety of Spiro’s run at the Lyric Stage, where he really transformed the Boston theatre scene for the better. He staunched the flood of theatrical talent from Boston to New York, and took on impressive musicals that no one else would have had the daring or wit to stage in our intimate theatre. Working at the Lyric Stage was a joyful experience for me, and I’m so happy to be able to give back to a company that has given me so much.”
Spiro Veloudos’ Major Achievements as Lyric Stage Producing Artistic Director
Served 21 years as Producing Artistic Director of the Lyric Stage.
Directed more than 65 productions over 35 years.
The Spiro Veloudos Sondheim Initiative: directing 10 Sondheim productions in 20 seasons.
Lifetime Achievement in the Arts Award, Salem State University, 2011
Elliot Norton Award, Sustained Excellence, 2006
StageSource Theatre Hero Award, 2003
Spiro Veloudos has served 21 seasons as Producing Artistic Director of the Lyric Stage. During the last two seasons he directed The Roommate, Pacific Overtures, Souvenir, and Road Show. In previous seasons, he directed Company, Camelot, Sondheim on Sondheim, Peter and the Starcatcher, Sweeney Todd, City of Angels, Into the Woods (Independent Reviewers of New England (IRNE) Awards for Best Director, Best Musical, and Best Ensemble), One Man, Two Guvnors, Death of a Salesman (IRNE Award for Best Play),The Mikado, 33 Variations, On the Town, Avenue Q (Elliot Norton Awards for Outstanding Musical and Outstanding Ensemble, five IRNE Awards including Best Musical and Best Director), The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby (Elliot Norton Award for Best Production and Best Director, five IRNE Awards including Best Director), Big River, Superior Donuts, Animal Crackers, Blithe Spirit, Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar & Grill, and Kiss Me, Kate. Spiro received the Lifetime Achievement in the Arts Award from Salem State College. He was the recipient of the 2006 Elliot Norton Prize for Sustained Excellence. During his tenure, the Lyric Stage has earned numerous awards and honors including Elliot Norton Awards for Outstanding Production (Nicholas Nickleby, Speech & Debate, Miss Witherspoon, The Old Settler), and Outstanding Musical Production (Sunday in the Park with George); IRNE Awards for Outstanding Production (Nicholas Nickleby, The Old Settler, Glengarry Glen Ross), and Outstanding Musical Production (Grey Gardens, Urinetown: The Musical, A Little Night Music, Sunday in the Park with George). His numerous directing credits at the Lyric Stage include A Little Night Music (IRNE Award for Direction), Glengarry Glen Ross (IRNE Award), Sunday in the Park with George (Best of the Year in Boston’s Globe, Herald, and Phoenix; Elliot Norton and IRNE Award for direction), Assassins (Best Production of 1998: The Boston Globe), Lost in Yonkers, Never the Sinner: The Leopold and Loeb Story (Elliot Norton Award, along with Assassins), and Speed-the-Plow (Elliot Norton for Outstanding Production). Mr. Veloudos received StageSource’s Theatre Hero Award (2003) and was named Best Artistic Director by Boston Magazine in 1999. He served as the president for the Producers’ Association of New England Area Theatres from 2008 to 2018, and is adjunct faculty in Performing Arts at Emerson College.
Matt Chapuran (Executive Director) was the Managing Director of the Lyric Stage from 2014 to 2018. He was previously Managing Director of Stoneham Theatre, where he co-produced over 70 plays, musicals, concerts, and educational productions for an annual audience that grew to over 50,000. During his tenure, Matt ran the 2010 Boston Marathon with Producing Artistic Director Weylin Symes in support of Stoneham Theatre’s educational mission. At the Nora Theatre Company, Matt was Managing Director during the inception of a capital campaign that ultimately led to the construction of the Central Square Theater. Matt also managed institutional giving for the Huntington Theatre Company, and was most recently the Director of Development for Conservatory Lab Charter School Foundation in Dorchester. A graduate of Boston College with an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Emerson College, Matt has performed, taught, and directed improvisation for over two decades, most recently as a part of Babson College’s M.B.A. program, as one half of the improv team The Angriest Show in the World, and as the director of Improvised History. He lives in Roslindale with his wife and their three daughters.
Production photos from Spiro Veloudos’ Sondheim Initiative: https://tinyurl.com/SpiroSondheim
Below is a complete list of productions Spiro Veloudos has directed at the Lyric Stage, along with awards won for those productions.
| SEASON | DIRECTOR/PRODUCTION AWARDS | |
| 1985-86 | Cat on a Hot Tin Roof | |
| 1986-87 | Quartermaine’s Terms | |
| 1987-88 | The Common Pursuit | |
| 1988-89 | Not about Heroes | |
| 1989-90 | Otherwise Engaged A Shaina Maidel | |
| 1990-91 | Misalliance Butley | |
| 1992-93 | American Buffalo | |
| 1993-94 | The Substance of Fire | |
| 1996-97 | Speed-the-Plow | Elliot Norton, Best Production |
| 1998-99 | Lost in Yonkers Assassins Never the Sinner | Elliot Norton, Best Director Elliot Norton, Best Director Elliot Norton, Best Director |
| 1999-00 | She Loves Me The Comedy of Errors The Judas Kiss | |
| 2000-01 | No Way to Treat a Lady Curse of the Bambino | |
| 2001-02 | Sunday In the Park with George Glengarry Glen Ross | Elliot Norton, Best Director, Best Musical IRNE, Best Musical, Best Director IRNE, Best Production, Best Director |
| 2002-03 | Dirty Blonde It’s All True Side Show | |
| 2003-04 | Book of Days The Spitfire Grill Noises Off | |
| 2004-05 | A Little Night Music Fully Committed Shakespeare in Hollywood | IRNE, Best Musical, Best Director |
| 2005-06 | Urinetown A Number THE GOAT, or Who Is Sylvia? Kong’s Night Out | IRNE, Best Musical, Best Director |
| 2006-07 | 1776 Souvenir Arms and the Man | |
| 2007-08 | Man of La Mancha Three Tall Women The Importance of Being Earnest | IRNE, Best Musical |
| 2008-09 | Follies The Mystery of Irma Vep Grey Gardens | IRNE, Best Musical, Best Director |
| 2009-10 | Kiss Me, Kate Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar & Grill Blithe Spirit | |
| 2010-11 | The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby Animal Crackers | Elliot Norton, Best Production, IRNE, Best Director, Best Production, Best Ensemble |
| 2011-12 | Big River Superior Donuts Avenue Q | Elliot Norton, Best Musical, Best Ensemble, IRNE, Best Musical, Best Director |
| 2012-13 | The Mikado 33 Variations On the Town | |
| 2013-14 | One Man, Two Guvnors Death of a Salesman Into the Woods | IRNE, Best Play Elliot Norton, Best Director, Best Production, IRNE, Best Director, Best Musical, Best Ensemble |
| 2014-15 | Sweeney Todd City of Angels | |
| 2015-16 | Sondheim on Sondheim Peter and the Starcatcher | |
| 2016-17 | Company Camelot | |
| 2017-18 | Souvenir Road Show | |
| 2018-19 | The Roommate Pacific Overtures |