Charity gig turned Inside Out
Youth scheme gets new mentors and technical boost
They lit up Auckland for 2011’s Rugby World Cup after touring the world with a giant inflatable rugby ball; created a multimedia extravaganza for luxury brand Louis Vuitton; produced eye-popping shows for David Jones and designer Collete Dinnigan and once flooded Aotea Square to launch Auckland’s art festival.
Now the powerhouse New Zealand events company Inside Out Productions is lending its talents to a small but growing charity making its annual show at the Basement Theatre.
Inside Out, founded by Michael Mizrahi and Marie Adams, joins actor Chris Graham and singer-songwriter Laughton Kora as mentors to help produce Manawa Ora for Nga¯ Rangatahi Toa. With the catchphrase “Before you teach me, you have to reach me”, NRT uses creative arts to get young people once labelled as “troublemakers” back into mainstream education or work. As well as creative arts mentoring, it offers wraparound whanau support.
Manawa Ora comprises performances devised by the youth themselves in an intensive two-week series of workshops that draw on their personal experiences. Mizrahi says his daughter, Ella, recommended they see an NRT show because they would find it powerful.
“We went to the show last year at The Basement and were very moved. We bought the T-shirts and sweatshirts as a gesture of support but knew we could do more, so we got in touch and offered to help.”
Huia O’Sullivan, executive director of NRT, suggested they help with the production which is in its seventh year. Mizrahi acknowledges it is very different to the sort of work he and Adams have done most recently.
“One is painting with broad strokes to mass audiences often televised, the other is intimate and soulful,” he says. “But that is where Marie and I began, in small scale intimate theatre. Creating our self-devised work through improvisation, connecting to a live audience up close and personal. It will always be our first love.”
Mizrahi says they will add technical touches and enhance the show-going experience. “But to be fair, we are very much in a support role this year. Chris [Graham] is directing and guiding the process. We worked with Chris on an Opera/Happening we staged called So Far, when we flooded Aotea Square to launch the idea of an Auckland Arts Festival.”