Completely Ridiculous Productions is:

a training center/performance laboratory dedicated to professional actor training and the development of new works of theatrical comedy.

Mission and Anti-Racist Theatre Statements

The following statements are both living documents, being edited and updated as often as is necessary.  Last Edited in May, 2021.

Mission Statement

Completely Ridiculous Productions 

is founded on empathic vulnerability 
This guiding principle - created by Completely Ridiculous Artistic Director and Founder, Gabriel Levey - is the willingness to fully see an other while being fully seen by an other, all while staying open to the possibility of transformation. This work requires safety and trust. To allow your self - your strengths, weaknesses, triumphs, failures, hopes, dreams and humanity - to be seen is not an easy task. Knowing this, we are aware that we can only fully embody these principles when we are upholding individual boundaries, access needs, and a developing state of agency in each individual.

is dedicated to justice, diversity, equity, inclusivity, accessibility and accountability.
At CRP, our conservatory students are required to take courses focused on Anti-Racist theater practices, and playwrights who identify as Black, Indigenous, People of Color / members of the Global Majority. We are an affinity space for all artists. We are dedicated to uplifting these voices and supporting the work of both international and local artists of all ethnicities and religious affiliations. 

is devoted to comprehensive and globally minded actor training.
We offer actor training rooted in the Eurocentric teachings of the Yale School of Drama and Christopher Bayes’ The Pandemonium Studio, a school based in physical acting and Clown. Our goal is to support the development of professional artists from around the world strengthening their ability to make and hold space, in their lives and in their work, for empathic vulnerability, whole heartedness and fun.

is committed to enlivening the individual artist’s community by:

• Continuing to work towards our aspirational goal of being an anti-racist institution.
• Creating and presenting work that celebrates our failures, encourages us to befriend our fears, and makes us fall in love with the complete ridiculousness of life.
• Producing a full season of work created by international and local guest artists.
• Providing funding  for performing artists to develop new works of comedy.
• Providing residency space for new work to be created and performed locally in Northampton, Massachusetts before touring nationally and internationally.

 
is focused primarily on comedy because:
The comic performer has a unique responsibility: to make the audience laugh. And, in order to get a true laugh the comic performer must be brave and vulnerable enough to allow themselves to be fully seen.

For the comedy audience that arrives ready to laugh, vulnerability is inevitable because laughter is inherently vulnerable. Through laughter then, the actor and audience make way for each other to experience empathic vulnerability together in real time.

In this way Completely Ridiculous Productions hopes to create a brave space where community members, alongside local and international artists, can walk together into the unknown, leading with generosity and hope while being fully aware of the inevitable struggles to come.

“Vulnerability is not weakness…Vulnerability is our most accurate measure of courage. [It] is the birthplace of innovation, creativity and change. [And] to create is to make something that has never existed before. There’s nothing more vulnerable than that.”
-Brene Brown, 2012 TedX Talk “Listening to Shame”.

Anti-Racist Theatre Statement

As a fledgling online training center offering ongoing acting classes, master classes, workshops and conservatory style training, Completely Ridiculous Productions (CRP) explicitly commits to strive towards greater justice, equity, diversity, inclusion, accessibility and accountability in its faculty, staff, services, practices and student body.  

CRP recognizes that to play and make art have always been inherent acts of revolution. As an organization of working performing artists, our aim is to train the next generation of working performing artists to tune into their own feelings, to acknowledge, celebrate and respect each other’s unique experiences and backgrounds, allow themselves to see and be seen, open their hearts to the experience of others, lean into their wonder, listen, find comfort in the discomfort of not always having the right answer, and use their voices to speak their truth. 

At CRP, we believe that the theatre should be a place of action and justice, and that theatre practitioners at every level must continue to be agents of change. CRP is committed to continuing to educate ourselves and our students about anti-racist practices in the theatre and in the world. In this way we hope to contribute to the changing systemic landscape of the theatre industry in the U.S., staying actively in dialogue and accountability with the many individuals and organizations leading the charge.
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Actions taken in pursuit of these goals include:

• In May of 2020, a week before we announced our first conservatory program, George Floyd was murdered. In response, and in conversation with the movement for racial justice sweeping the country, we gave out 4 full scholarships to students of color, who would not otherwise have been able to work with us. We then donated 10% of all our earnings to Black Lives Matter, FairFight, and the Okra Project.
• In August of 2020, after our first program was complete, it was clear that the diversity of the students was not matching that of the faculty. In order to address this issue, the faculty was reorganized centering Black, Indigenous, People of Color (or, members of the Global Majority), gender expansive and sexually inclusive individuals, and cisgendered women. Now, in April of 2021 our faculty and staff consists of 7 members of the Global Majority, 5 gender expansive and sexually inclusive individuals, 5 cisgendered white women, and 1 cisgendered white man.
• In September of 2020 we added a class focused on the work of playwrights of the Global Majority.
• In February of 2021 we brought in a member of The Encompass Collective to run an optional anti-racist theatre workshop for our conservatory students.
• In March of 2021 we took three big actions. First, we established a studio wide community agreement to share with our faculty and students - a living document built to change and evolve. One of the primary agreements is to name and acknowledge perfectionism as a tool of white supremacy, and center ourselves around care and well-being as a means whereby the growing pains of an artist stepping in to their whole self can be embraced, celebrated and supported. Second, we hired a consultant, Rad Pereira, to help align our business practices and culture with our stated values. Third, we brought in a new faculty member, Storm Thomas, to teach a mandatory anti-racist theatre course inside of the conservatory program.
• In April of 2021 we partnered with the Classic Theatre of Harlem to produce a dynamic fundraising event, creating a template for future fundraising events to support other Black owned businesses and arts organizations.
• Now, in May of 2021, we are building both a scholarship fund to help more students in financial need, and an advisory board that reflects, supports and amplifies our values.

 
And this is just the beginning. We are currently in active dialogue, setting ongoing aspirational goals and actions as we continue our work towards becoming an Anti-Racist instituion. Please check back to see what we are doing next and to hold us accountable.

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