Royal Shakespeare Company will tackle privilege and microaggressions from audiences
The Royal Shakespeare Company has pledged to examine “white privilege” and tackle “microaggressions” minority actors experience from audiences on stage.
In the wake of Black Lives Matter protests the thespian institution dedicated to the Bard’s work will “educate ourselves” and “educate our audience” about racial inequality.
Show programmes could be used to spread a message of inclusion to theatregoers to prevent stars from minority backgrounds feeling like outcasts in a self-described establishment organisation.
The company’s leadership is also taking counsel from its Youth Advisory Board, whose members range from 10-year-old primary school pupils to those in their early 20’s, on using their stated privilege to lobby for changes to the English curriculum.
It is hoped by placing the “brilliant dead white man” Shakespeare in the context of increased black history and authors at school, a new generation will be conscious of “white privilege” and minority communities will not feel alienated by the playwright.
Deputy artistic director Erica Whyman believes it is harder for young people from minority backgrounds to be part of organizations associated with the establishment, and performers can feel subtle prejudices from audiences.
She told the Daily Telegraph that while the company is diverse, board members are now "thinking deeply about our privilege" and how to get more minority talents in leadership roles.
The board is also keen to develop a culture of “anti-racism” as well as equality for staff, with My Whyman believing work done to ensure 45% of performers were BAME in the past year is not enough.
“The challenge is genuinely making that experience equal for them,” she said.
“Understanding the level of microaggressions that they receive, just from the audiences, whether that’s when they’re on stage or afterwards in post-show discussions.”
Ms Whyman said that microaggressions may not be overt tuts and murmurs from the auditorium at the sight of a diverse cast, but a feeling of judgment and being out of place due to skin colour.
To ensure current and future staff feel at home in the company, based in Stratford-upon-Avon, it has pledged a programme of “self-education and unlearning” to understand the situation for minority employees in the wake of Black Lives Matter protests.
Ms Whyman said: “We really need to educated our audience and educate ourselves. Go beyond a parity of respect.”
Articles and programmes could be used to reach audiences, and familiarise them with the diversity of the RSC and issues of privilege.
In the long-term the company is also taking advice from its Youth Advisory panel, with children and young adults urging the theatre group to use its influence to lobby for a more diverse literary curriculum.
Plays about slavery, including The Whip by Juliet Gilkes Romero, are among those the RSC could push to be taught alongside the Bard’s work in order to keep his plays universally relevant and accessible.
Ms Whyman said: “If we really could shift how our education works we would find ourselves with a generation that understands the existence of white privilege and where it comes from in our history.”
While the company's "house writer" is a long-dead white figure, the work of commissioning future work will focus on sourcing the work of writers from more diverse backgrounds.
