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    KittensInBoxesKate Dries
    6/09/16 10:57am

    I did a lot of theater in my younger days. Hell, I’ve been billed (before they exploded) next to Chris Evans and his brother Scott.

    This dude is a douche.

    That said, the best director I ever had was someone who would throw chairs at me when I fucked up. Who didn’t make my stammering excuses and simply demanded excellence. As a result, I probably saved myself embarrassment because he always kicked my ass (sometimes literally) to get from me what he knew I was capable of doing. Not me and all my neuroses nor me and all my anxieties. But the person I was when someone stripped all that away and freed me from myself via... anger at me not being what I can be.

    He went on meds and apologized (to myself and likely fifty other students over the years he was physically nasty with) years later. I accepted the apology but also let him know that his constant pushing for me to be better was something that pushed me to be better, and which led to a lot of personal good-will when I was able to actually realize the promise he saw in me.

    The best directors take actor/artist issues and transform that energy from self-destructive to emotionally powerful. When you engage with art in such a way, you end up as an emotional rollercoaster regardless. And it is that insecurity and unbalanced state that makes you find something that provides hope and dream.

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      stonebiscuit is the queen in the northKittensInBoxes
      6/09/16 11:16am

      This sort of excuse-making is part of what’s wrong with our community. If someone has to throw chairs at people to do their job, fuck them. We deserve better.

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      KittensInBoxesstonebiscuit is the queen in the north
      6/09/16 11:20am

      Except that it was what jarred me from my excuses. I would have stayed in a bubble and fucked over other people by being self-absorbed.

      His violence was something that made me better. I was a better person for properly learning my lines. I was a better person because I could either do a role or quit. I played the roll and am thankful that someone knew what was best for me even when I did not.

      It taught me that the only person holding me back is myself with all my excuses. I don’t do that anymore. If it were about him throwing chairs I’d have merely retreated back into not trusting nor caring about anyone other than myself. It was a wakeup that this was his play as much as my own... and if it went bad he may be out of a job.

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    TheOriginalSangsterKate Dries
    6/09/16 10:59am

    I’ve been hearing about this shit for years, Thank god the truth finally came out

    #NotInOurHouse

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      SteakasaurusRexTheOriginalSangster
      6/09/16 11:18am

      Out of curiosity, do you think Chicago being more of an Equity-heavy city like New York would help?

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      TheOriginalSangsterSteakasaurusRex
      6/09/16 11:24am

      Maybe, but what makes Chicago theater great is that there are hundreds of small companies and storefronts that are working with young theater makers that need the freedom to experiment outside of the union. That not an excuse for abuse, but its how we produce relevant plays.

      Also I really don’t want to pay dues.

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    teenytinycornteethKate Dries
    6/09/16 11:45am

    Unfortunately I worked with Profiles when I was the Artistic Director of a very small theatre company about 15 years ago. It’s not even just the weird sexual power abuse but just general disrespect for people on a professional level. I know a handful of the people mentioned in the piece and it breaks my heart to know what they were going through. I hate that this smudge on Chicago theatre is being brought to the national spotlight (even though its entirely necessary) when there's so much other good, artistic, groundbreaking work going on here. Hopefully we'll be able to talk about that once we get through this bullshit.

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      goddessoftransitoryteenytinycornteeth
      6/09/16 12:37pm

      And how they try to make it some kind of sick “bonding” experience—we all went through the fire together and we’re STRONG! Horseshit. Abuse is abuse and no “creative” gloss changes that.

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      teenytinycornteethgoddessoftransitory
      6/09/16 2:26pm

      Right, they play off that ‘raw, gritty, realness’ that people associate with early Steppenwolf stuff and make people believe that they’re a part of some revolutionary envelope pushing.

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    HaHaYouFoolKate Dries
    6/09/16 11:20am

    Despite the progress we’ve made in the last few decades (for the most part, offices aren’t the outright sexist hellscape of Mad Men anymore), it’s important to keep hearing these stories. There are many industries where it is possible to push back against bad behavior and have a reasonable chance of keeping/getting work (a laborer, say, or paralegal can objectively demonstrate that they’ve done adequate work, and if that’s not enough they can usually find work at another factory or firm), but in industries like acting, modeling, academics, and to some extent journalism, all of your value in the market is wrapped up in your reputation. If a person with more reputation value than you tells everybody else in the industry that you’re full of shit because he’s butthurt that you declined to suck his cock, then that’s it. You don’t get work. So, we need to work really hard in these reputationally-focused industries to make changes. Also, it makes speaking out way harder, and major kudos to all those who do.

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      courtKate Dries
      6/09/16 10:57am

      The Internet has it’s unfathomable evils, such as allowing me to post inane, slightly drunken posts on jezebel, but what a godsend it has been during horrible situations such as this one. Women, and men, feel emboldened and safe to come forward in numbers, and the assholes, rapists, and abusers, often the most narcissistic social media users, find it impossible to hide.

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        recidiviciousKate Dries
        6/09/16 11:36am

        Ugh, this is like the next logical progression of the small college department I was in for awhile. I completely quit because I got tired of seeing boys behaving badly and never being called to account for it. People who did call them out on their shit (me, one or two others) were bullied and constantly relegated to the jobs no one else wanted to do.

        Seriously, fuck theatre boys’ clubs. And the boys in them, whether they’re college age actors or the middle-aged directors.

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          ChairmanoftheArearecidivicious
          6/09/16 12:31pm

          Agreed. I started college as a theatre major on a full scholarship (in, coincidentally, Chicago). I gave up the scholarship just so I could switch majors and escape the insanity (and inanity) of the theatre department. From instructors to students to visiting artists, it was full of abusive, egotistical and occasionally maniacal freaks who thought nothing of risking the physical and emotional safety of the people around them in the name of “art.”

          I know one of the women profiled in that article, and it makes me so sad to imagine what she’s gone through. No one deserves the pathetic torment of a theatre bro who thinks he’s the living embodiment of a Sam Shepard character.

          The cultish atmosphere of the theatre community described in the Reader article is completely familiar to me, and I’m afraid it’s not limited to Profiles.

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        EvanrudeJohnsonKate Dries
        6/09/16 11:23am

        I have noticed that certain people in the creative class like to minimize abusive behavior by saying it is due to “Artistic Temperament” or using Diva as a compliment.

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          goddessoftransitoryKate Dries
          6/09/16 12:31pm

          As a theater major who spent years trying to break in before deciding it wasn’t worth it,

          GIF
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            Covered in BeesKate Dries
            6/09/16 12:28pm

            Chicago theater folks - Rape Victim Advocates is doing a workshop this weekend called Trauma in the Spotlight. It hopes to address some of these issues, and registration is on a sliding scale so all who want to can participate: http://rva.ticketleap.com/trauma-in-the-…

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              XenophonKate Dries
              6/09/16 1:24pm

              I went to that show, Killer Joe. I left afterwards feeling more disturbed than I normally am after a play. Now I know why.

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