Performing Communities

Grassroots Ensemble Theaters Deeply Rooted in Eight U.S. Communities

Robert H. Leonard and Anne Kilkelly

2006, 240 pages. New Village Press, P.O. Box 3049, Oakland, CA 94609, 510-420-1361, www.newvillagepress.net

Performing Communities documents the work of eight grassroots theater companies that have been working in close collaboration with their communities. The companies range from ten to thirty-five years old, and are spread out across the United States. Ensemble theatre is a fairly recent trend in American theater, and although there are as many types of ensemble theater as there are theaters in the country, all ensemble theater companies are based on a notion of community. They fill the full range of the spectrum in terms of size and production