RESIDENT ENSEMBLE
Free Street’s Resident Ensemble creates opportunities for 100 youth artists from across Chicago.
The youth engage in a rigorous two-year training and production process. The youth artists are teamed with four professional artists who mentor and collaborate with the young artists during the training process. As part of their training, the youths develop three original productions that are performed each year at Free Street Theater and in public spaces throughout Chicago.
The creation of each production is the culmination of numerous workshop acting and writing exercises. As a group, the topic is arrived upon through thematic exploration and fleshed out through comprehensive research. The acting and writing exercises then evolve to advanced material creation that forms the ensemble play: character development, scene development, dialogue, and monologue.
Continuing Free Street’s history, the youth focus their explorations on universal topics regarding the human condition and social change. Past productions delved into the U.S. economic collapse and rise in home foreclosures and the inefficiencies of the U.S. educational system.
