| April
2, 2001
While
growing up, Carol McIntyre endured a lot of "lickins" from the grandmother
who raised her. To hide her hurt, she grew a thick skin.
Today, as a member or Encore Theatre, a
senior performance group based in Eugene, she belts out feelings
about her youth in a bluesy number called "Tough Cookies Can't
Crumble."
"Tough cookies fight back,"
she sang at a recent performance. "When you're a tough cookie, you
better not fumble, 'cause no one's going to cut you any slack."
By the end of the song, though, she's no longer a tough cookie,
but "a smart cookie, with a soft center in it."
The song is a crowd-pleaser, espec-ially
with at-risk kids, says Eliza Roaring Springs, Encore Theatre's
artistic exec-utive director. "They relate to being tough, to shutting
down and not letting anyone know how they feel," she says.
A vibrant pastiche of vaudeville, auto-biography
and original music, Encore Theatre uses real-life stories from
its 16 members, spanning ages 60 to 81, to bring their experiences and
hard-won wisdom to those who most need to hear it: kids. In its
three-and a half-year existence, Encore has performed for more than 53,000 elementary,
middle and high school students throughout Western and Central Oregon.
REACHING
OUT, HEALING
Roaring Springs, 52, has acted and taught
theater for many years. The idea for the group, she says, sprang
from her conviction that, through theater, seniors can reach kids and in the
process feel useful and heal themselves of old hurts.
"Our rehearsals are very much therapy
groups," she says. "People express their fears, hard times, lost
dreams. This is not a generation that has sat in support groups.
Roaring Springs says from the begin-ning
she has been guided by two prin-ciples: that Encore's shows will
be free to kids and that the stories the performers tell will always be true.
Funding for the nonprofit group comes from
donations and grants. Honesty comes from the performers.
It was hard at first for some of the members
who were more used to doing schtick or putting on a persona," she
says. "But it's extremely important for kids to see that adults
respect them enough to be honest."
Wearing top hats and checkered vest with
colored linings, the performers begin their show by lining up across
the stage, their backs to the audience. Roaring Springs, standing to the side,
begins asking questions. After each one, any performers for whom the question
is true turn around, face the audience, then turn back.
"Who watches too much TV?" she asks. "Who
smoked when they were young?" "Who can belly dance?" "Who has ever
broken the law?" "Who feels like they still don't fit in sometimes?"
TRUE
STORIES
Some questions give rise to stories, such
as what it was like living on a ranch or during World War II or
before electric lights. Performers talk of iceboxes, radio shows, the terror
of having to use an outhouse full of scary spiders.
The oldest troupe member, Wayland Holmberg,
81, tells about her Native American grandmother, who lived during
the Civil War, married at 16, had 10 children, then lost seven of
them and her husband to typhoid fever. Her grand-mother combed cornmeal
into her long, silvery hair, chewed tobacco, chanted for the dead
and "was wise in the ways of plants and healing," Holmberg tells
the audience.
Encore suffered its own growing pains a
year ago when parents at a Eugene elementary school objected to
brief references in the production regarding sexual abuse and homosexuality.
The troupe immediately cut the offending lines, but the controversy led more
than 11 area schools to cancel appearances.
Although painful, "It was the best thing
that could have happened to us," Roaring Springs says. "It put
Encore on the map. People came forward to support us. We had to
pull together as a board and as a troupe."
This year, the elementary program is booked
solid for spring. References to homosexuality remain in the middle
and high school production, she says, because that's the truth of one performer's
life.
JUSTICE CENTER RUN
Encore holds a month long workshop in May
for youth at the Juvenile Justice Center in Eugene. It's also creating
a show aimed at at-risk kids that will travel around the state this fall.
David Mace, psychologist at the Lane County
Department of Youth Services, says Encore provides youth in detention
with acceptance and creative opportunities they haven't had access to.
For kids who grew up with accept-ance, that might not
be such a big deal, he says. But for many kids at the center, it's
unheard of. After participating in the workshop, "You should see
how they beam," he says. "You can see a difference."
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