{"id":1514,"date":"2016-06-01T21:46:42","date_gmt":"2016-06-01T09:46:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/?p=1514"},"modified":"2016-06-01T21:46:42","modified_gmt":"2016-06-01T09:46:42","slug":"justus-takes-justice-to-the-stage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/2016\/06\/01\/justus-takes-justice-to-the-stage\/","title":{"rendered":"JustUs takes justice to the stage"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Andrew<\/a>

Andrew Broadley as Michael, in JustUs. Photo: Meredith Johnson<\/p><\/div>\n

Audience members have described the premiere of JustUs, a new verbatim theatre work created by Massey University\u00a0Creativity in the Community students as “powerful” and “fantastic”.<\/p>\n

The original work, which was developed in collaboration with JustSpeak, a youth-led justice advocacy charity, was staged for the first time in Wellington today (June 1), and\u00a0will return for two more performances, on June 3 and June 9.<\/p>\n

The 40 minute one-act production combines film and live theatre to trace the journeys of two brothers through the NZ criminal justice system. \u00a0It resulted from the Massey expressive arts students’ work with JustSpeak to understand the differences in life\u00a0outcome for 16-year-olds, who can access Youth Court processes, and 17-year-olds, who are tried in the adult court system. From a series of guest lectures, the students workshopped creative concepts then developed an original script.<\/p>\n

The staging of the work is timely, with the government currently considering whether to raise the youth court age. \u00a0Principal Youth Court Judge\u00a0Andrew Becroft has recently described<\/a>\u00a0New Zealand’s youth justice age of\u00a017 as “an enduring stain on New Zealand’s otherwise<\/p>\n

\"Fusi<\/a>

Fusi Mesui and Hamish Boyle in JustUs. Photo: Meredith Johnson<\/p><\/div>\n

good youth justice record.”<\/p>\n

While New Zealand’s youth justice system was considered internationally to be “pioneering in its approach”, it had a long way to go, Judge Becroft said<\/a>.<\/p>\n

JustUs aimed to present that ‘long way to go’ concept through theatre, to reach out to an audience beyond those directly connected with the justice system and, through creativity, engage more people in considering the impact on \u00a0broader society of our justice approach to youth offending.<\/p>\n

The dialogue in the piece is predominately\u00a0taken from direct interviews the class were able to have, through working via JustSpeak, with youth offenders and the community workers who support them. \u00a0While the speech and context are real, the students then created a fictional dramatic structure around that \u00a0dialogue featuring two brothers whose only difference is age, with their upbringing, culture and crime identical.<\/p>\n

Course coordinator, Associate Professor Elspeth Tilley, also invited established creative artists who have worked in prisons and on justice issues to talk to the class about how to apply creativity to challenging and sensitive topics. \u00a0Playwrights William Brandt and Jo Randerson, and author Pip Adam, all of whom have extensive experience\u00a0teaching creative writing in prisons, were among those who helped the students by providing specialist creative guidance.<\/p>\n

\"JustUs<\/a>

JustUs poster – design by Fusi Mesui.<\/p><\/div>\n

Audience members’ written feedback\u00a0after the first performance included “Fantastic performance, really powerful and wonderfully performed. Thank you so much, and well done to all the cast and crew,” and “T<\/span>hat was truly awesome – had tears in my eyes.” \u00a0Another said “What a great performance.\u00a0I was so impressed. It was fantastic.”<\/p>\n

JustUs returns to the stage on June 3, 2016 at 7pm as part of the Wellington Expressive Arts Students’ End of Semester Showcase<\/a>\u00a0and on June 9<\/a>, when it will begin at 6.30pm, be held at a larger venue in downtown Wellington and followed by a speaker panel and community forum. \u00a0All welcome. Entry at the final performance will be by koha to support the advocacy work of JustSpeak.<\/p>\n

To receive updates join the Facebook event for the June 9 event at\u00a0https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/events\/604959266344766\/<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Audience members have described the premiere of JustUs, a new verbatim theatre work created by Massey University\u00a0Creativity in the Community students as “powerful” and “fantastic”. The original work, which was developed in collaboration with JustSpeak, a youth-led justice advocacy charity, was staged for the first time in Wellington today (June 1), and\u00a0will return for two […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,100,13,66],"tags":[85,102,161,71],"class_list":["post-1514","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-expressive-arts-subject","category-news","category-theatre","category-wellington-campus-campus","tag-creative-activism","tag-creativity-in-the-community","tag-theatre-for-social-justice","tag-wellington"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1514","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1514"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1514\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1534,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1514\/revisions\/1534"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1514"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1514"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.massey.ac.nz\/expressivearts\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1514"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}