Learning and Teaching

Ideas in Focus: Interactive Theatre




Moving its educational message off the podium and onto the stage, CLEARCorps/USA, the national program to reduce childhood lead poisoning, based at UMBC's Shriver Center, has developed an exciting new traveling interactive theatre presentation that's wowing audiences.

Jimmy's Getting Better is a full-length play depicting the everyday reality--and larger sociopolitical concerns--of lead poisoning, using the powerful story of two mothers grappling with their sons' medical problems due to lead.

Created by CLEARCorps's Minneapolis/St. Paul affiliate, the play has been touring community centers in several cities, helping to raise awareness and stimulate community dialogue. The play also has been getting rave reviews. Jimmy was selected as a finalist for production at Harvard University's Institute for the Arts and Civic Dialogue and was featured in the University of Minnesota's "Designing Research for Change" conference. The St. Louis Black Repertory Theatre will be producing Jimmy, and parents there will be able to have their children tested for lead poisoning after the show. A dramatic scene can move an audience to tears--and to action.

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