I have extreme retroactive envy of a bunch of fourth graders. The 9-year-old me really wants to be part of their creative chaos, to emerge from shyness, to swim in imagination, to stop worrying about perfect grades, coloring within the lines, or my weird tendency to write “y” backward. What a relief it would have been to know that it was one activity to which my mother would not, could not say, “We can’t afford that!”
The Manton Avenue Project (MAP) is a free after-school program in the Olneyville section of Providence and the students chosen to participate are trained to become young Shakespeares. The playwriting and performance program runs year-round and is devoted to nurturing the creativity of students from the William D’Abate Elementary School. And it gets better: after several weeks of learning “The Bard’s” art, the work of the young playwrights is performed by professional actors in a real black box theater.
The actors approach the dialogue as if performing “Glengarry Glen Ross” on Broadway, and they never, ever change the children’s words. Keep in mind, the main character might be a deranged strawberry, a zombie robot, or a rocket-piloting monkey. The results are often brilliant, funny, joyous and surprisingly poignant.
During a recent performance night, a fourth grade playwright shared for the first time — in front of an audience — a play representing her family’s harrowing immigration to the United States. She told me she didn’t usually like to share personal stuff because it felt kind of weird, but in a play it was cool.
I feel privileged to share her story and MAP’s in the latest episode of “ART inc.” on Rhode Island PBS. Get ready for fourth grade antics and some inspiration, too. The Manton Avenue Project is a community program one volunteer calls a “win-win-win-win-win,” benefiting the playwrights, their families, the actors, their community and the next generation of Olneyville creatives.
Who gets to participate? A group of “feeder teachers” at D’Abate Elementary have the difficult job of choosing 10 playwrights to participate in the program from third through fifth grade. One teacher says they look for children who need to grow in language learning or creativity and also those who are shy, have trouble focusing, or simply need a safe place to simply be a kid and play. Teachers report that students who rarely uttered a word in class before participating in MAP become more outgoing, more confident and communicative.
Playwrights often maintain the connection to MAP into their college years and beyond, encouraged to return as mentors, stagehands, teachers, and directors. One of MAP’s three co-directors is a young woman who sat at the playwright’s desk on stage when she was 9. The folks at The Manton Avenue Project aren’t kidding when they say MAP students are the leaders of tomorrow.
