Arts in Health Award Recipient: New Hampshire Theatre Project - Elephant-in-the-Room Series®, Portsmouth
New Hampshire Theatre Project (NHTP), founded in 1988, uses the art of theatre-making to spark conversations, connect individuals, and strengthen communities. Based at its 50-seat black box theatre in Portsmouth’s West End, NHTP programs are delivered across the region in schools, businesses, healthcare institutions, and community organizations. NHTP is known around the state as an applied theatre company, using the craft of theatre to help solve real world problems.
Created in 2017, NHTP’s Elephant-in-the-Room Series® (EITR) presents play readings by professional theatre artists about stigmatizing topics that we as a society often feel uncomfortable discussing in public. Following the reading, a facilitated audience conversation focuses on attitudes about ethical issues involved in the subject over time and today, and our responsibility as a society to bring these issues into the cultural mainstream. These events use live theatre to create a safe and nurturing environment that encourages transformational communication.
From 2017-2020, NHTP toured the EITR program throughout the state, partnering with over 40 different health care, social service and educational institutions. Public health issues addressed by the EITR Series included substance misuse disorder, suicide and self-harm, human trafficking, mental health, school violence, eating disorders, and attitudes around death and dying.
In 2020-21, NHTP re-envisioned the EITR program due to the pandemic. Final Thoughts, a play by Tim Barretto about suicide, was presented online to Portsmouth residents following the death by suicide of a prominent city employee. Participants could attend the webinar or watch through the city’s community access television channel. A Wider Circle, Mary Ellen Hedrick’s play about a family struggling with opioid misuse, was presented in the same format in collaboration with Network4Health in Manchester, and later streamed for a month through Derry Community Access Media. Final Thoughts is currently being filmed and will become the centerpiece of a new video version of the EITR Series.
Created in 2017, NHTP’s Elephant-in-the-Room Series® (EITR) presents play readings by professional theatre artists about stigmatizing topics that we as a society often feel uncomfortable discussing in public. Following the reading, a facilitated audience conversation focuses on attitudes about ethical issues involved in the subject over time and today, and our responsibility as a society to bring these issues into the cultural mainstream. These events use live theatre to create a safe and nurturing environment that encourages transformational communication.