Out Of Hand Theater Announces 20th Anniversary Season

Out of Hand Theater, working at the intersection of art, social justice, and civic engagement, has used the tools of theater to help build a more just world for 20 years. This year the theatre celebrates its 20th anniversary.

The theatre will return to in-person performances for Calf, continue its successful virtual programming such as Equitable Dinners and The Institute for Equity Activism, present new digital programming in the form of See You and Say Their Names, and transition back to in-person Creative Kids.

"What an amazing moment for us to celebrate our 20th anniversary when we just won The New York Times Best Theater of 2020 and doubled our annual income! We are so honored to work with all these brilliant community partners to promote racial and economic justice and help make Atlanta a better place for us all. Thank you for an incredible 20 years!" - Ariel Fristoe, Artistic Director

Calf by Levi Jelks follows Eli "Bull" Willis in the months after he's released from incarceration, as he attempts to overcome obstacles to building a new life and connecting with his son. In Calf, we address the prison industrial complex and recidivism in Atlanta through performances coupled with community conversations in living rooms across our city, all in partnership with the Urban League and the Georgia Justice Project. Directed by associate artistic director Marlon Andrew Burnley, this play will be presented from January 28th to March 27th in living rooms across Metro Atlanta, coupled with cocktail parties and conversations with our partners.

Equitable Dinners is a free, monthly, online series featuring art, experts, and conversation. Every month, we address a different racial equity topic-including health, food, poverty, education, housing, voting, immigration & criminal justice-with a guest speaker, the performance of a new 10-minute play written in consultation with the speaker, and facilitated, small-group conversations in Zoom. Equitable Dinners has already served 5000 attendees since 2020. We will continue to virtually gather every third Sunday of the month from October 17th until June 2022.

To build a more just and racially equitable world, we need leaders able to identify and dismantle systems of white supremacy and oppression in our daily lives, our communities, and our country. The Institute for Equity Activism is for the person who wants to make a positive difference in their community or organization but does not currently have the knowledge, skills, and confidence to know-how. We are currently supporting an August 2021 cohort and will be supporting a second in January 2022.

See You, created by Lee Osorio and Gabrielle Fulton Ponder, provides sex trafficking awareness and prevention for middle and high school students. Trapped inside a mysterious maze of mirrors, three kids find the following spell written in golden letters on the walls: "To escape this maze of mirrors, You must learn to see you clearer. Tell your story to unearth, The true value of your worth." As they begin to tell their stories, the Wise Warrior, the Princess, and the Strongest Boy recognize what connects them and start to realize what it will take to get out of the maze. Using the framework of fairy tales and metaphor, each kid begins the long process of healing after the trauma of exploitation. See You was commissioned by the Georgia Council for the Arts, the Georgia Attorney General's Office, the Georgia Department of Education, Wellspring Living, and Street Grace. The program will pilot at five middle schools in Georgia in spring 2022.

The Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women human-rights crisis disproportionately affect Indigenous peoples in Canada and the United States, notably those in Native American communities. Marcie Rendon's Say Their Names, directed by associate artistic director Marlon Andrew Burnley, sheds light on this issue on November 14th, 2021.

Out of Hand Theater will return to providing in-person Creative Kids theater training for free to elementary school students at Barack and Michelle Obama Academy of the Arts (2 sessions), Peyton Forest Elementary, and Kimberly Elementary, and to middle school students at Agape Community Center (2 sessions). Through our 12-class after-school programs, we provide lessons on storytelling, script analysis, staging, character development, and performing for an audience, and rehearse and perform short musical theater shows. All Creative Kids programs are completely free for students and schools. Creative Kids serves Atlanta schools with the highest percentages of students living in poverty and helps close the opportunity gap for our students.

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