Yo-EL Cassell’s performance in the play, “The Lifeboat,” at Harlem Stage in New York City. Photos by Todd Weinstein

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CREATIVES IN PRACTICE: YO-EL CASSELL

BU’s Head of Movement, Yo-EL Cassell, performs at Harlem Stage’s soldout show The Lifeboat, utilizing his Journey of Youth technique, which he also teaches to his theatre students.

One thing that gravitates the next generation of artists to Boston University College of Fine Arts? Knowing that their professors, advisors, and mentors are also working artists, gaining real-world experience and bringing that back into the classroom through their curriculum, lessons, and talks. In CFA’s Creatives in Practice series, your favorite CFA faculty and staff members share the work they’re doing off campus, locally, nationally, and globally.

“I feel personally that asking one ‘to be creative’ can sometimes invite unhelpful anxiety, but curiosity can invite suppleness, ease, and most essentially, movement,” explains Cassell, who continuously practices what it means to embody a J.O.Y. mindset through educating, performing, and creating. “When we embrace and embody the mindset of a child, we are unlocking a child-like ability to be curious, which invites creativity to unlock the portals of the imagination with great commitment.”

In this installment of CFA’s Creatives in Practice series, Cassell shares what he’s been up to during his most recent sabbatical leave. His journey has taken him abroad to Europe to teach, participate in a creative residency, and research the rise in popularity of physical theatre. Back in the States, Cassell curated a colloquium focusing on movement as medicine, finished his book proposal on the J.O.Y. technique, and, for the past year and a half, has been working with The American Physical Theatre (APT) in New York City.

“It’s been an honor to be involved with the development of The American Physical Theatre as one of the founding members and consultants, where we recently performed in March to sold-out capacity at Harlem Stage. The company realized that there is this real hunger for physical theatre where the body as a communicative channel becomes the expressive channel,” says Cassell. The play they performed was The Lifeboat, written and directed by APT’s Artistic Director, Arthur Yorinks. The play focused on what it means to be human, to find connection, and to be resilient in any “body of water.” For Cassell, it was a real treat to dive into this opportunity to fuse many of the approaches he teaches to his students at BU.

CFA: Tell us more about your J.O.Y. technique and how it applies to actors.

Cassell: I believe all actors/creative artists are elevated children. Actors in particular are curious about human nature, and it’s the commitment of being curious about human nature that invites us to embody the sensations of what it means to be human in a visceral, creative, imaginative, and transformative way.

The key is not to venture so much back to our childhood self, but rather to embrace once again the mindset of a child—fusing thought with action.

This led me to my personal commitment as a movement director, choreographer, movement coach, and educator to continuously practice what it means to embody a J.O.Y. mindset via the following areas: educating, performing, creating, leading, and reflecting. I wanted to embody this goal during my sabbatical.

What are some of your highlights or accomplishments during your sabbatical?

Since late December, I had the pleasure of observing, creating and teaching international movement directing and pedagogy graduate students from the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama in London. I curated and created a colloquium focusing on movement as medicine as Vice President for The Association of Theatre Movement Educators (ATME) in Arizona. I finished my book proposal on the J.O.Y. technique, and since this past August, I have been developing and rehearsing an evening length solo physical theater show in collaboration with Mark Stanley, Professor and Head of Lighting Design at BU, which premiered in Cambridge, MA, entitled humanINmotion at the Arrow Street Arts Theater. Over the summer, I was in Italy for a creative residency, developing the show and teaching physical theater artists and contemporary dance students.

Additionally, for the past year and a half, I have been involved with the development of The American Physical Theatre (APT) in NYC as one of the founding members and consultants, where we performed the play The Lifeboat to sold-out capacity at Harlem Stage.

What makes a physical theatre company distinct from other theatre companies? Do you see a rise in physical theatre?

APT utilizes movement to express inner sensations, intentions, thoughts and poetic dreams—very similar to how movement practice is taught and championed at BU. It has been dynamic translating what we teach in the studio to the wider platform beyond the terrains of BU. It’s a testament to the intensive and rigorous practice we embody at BU. Companies such as these are also trending upward in the United States, with similar companies debuting in Chicago, LA, Washington D.C., and in NYC, among other areas.

Through my research in Europe, similar companies are plentiful, but in the United States, companies with these approaches are beginning to build in momentum. The audience is craving for poetry within the idea that the body is a paintbrush. The misconception from some is that there is no translatable to the type of approach we teach at BU but this is further from the truth. In factuality, the research has confirmed, that what we teach is translatable to all forms of movement, including dance, musical theater, pure movement, physical theatre, film, stage, and Opera. The research has led me to confirm how versatile our training is and that without the body, there is no channel for the voice and the imagination.

Walk us through your time with APT developing, rehearsing, and performing for The Lifeboat. How did this experience in the field connect to your role as an educator at BU?

My character was a wonderful treat to embody as I was given the opportunity to fuse many of the approaches I teach to students at BU—from pure movement through transformational and character development work, among other forms of expressive physicality.

For over a year, the director, Arthur Yorinks—a tremendous human, artist and writer—and I have been in consistent dialogue dreaming up plans to potentially initiate internship and career development opportunities if there is indeed interest for BU students who train within the movement curriculum as the approach of the company is very much in alignment with the pedagogy journey offered within our very campus. Thus far, alums from our program have entered physical theater programs, theaters, and approaches, as well as other theatrical forms, which is exciting. Why not create a viable, practical bridge to continue the pathway of expressive physicality into the wider scale?

Thus, my personal dream as Head of Movement is to create a viable partnership between APT and BU School of Theatre, creating opportunities for our students to learn from guest artists from the company and supporting with locating translatable language from what we practice in the studio, making it accessible on a wider landscape. Arthur and APT are committed to being a viable professional bridge for career development and introduction after our students graduate.

From day one of rehearsals for APT, the process was about how do we communicate through stillness, through action, and through collective partnership? What if we take away the words and let our fingers speak? Sometimes there is so much emphasis on trying to put words to name things, but this process and the belief of the company is to let actions speak for themselves. This is something we also encourage at BU within the training of the embodied artist.

The company comprises tremendous artists from different approaches of movement—mime, Grotowski Technique, Laban, Viewpoints, Dance, Clowning, Physical Theater, Character, Contact Improvisation, and so on. For this particular set of performances, we rehearsed weekly in NYC, building community, creating language, and collaboratively answering curiosities via physicality.

Yo-EL, thank you for sharing your experiences with us. How did it feel for you to be back in a rehearsal space, back in the studio? What did you learn about yourself?

To be back in the studio after morning physical classes, training intensively brought me back full circle to when I was younger, my body feeling all of the sores and sensations of commitment with great curiosity and awakening.

Placing my body and mind back in a rehearsal space allowed me to feel the same feelings my students are feeling—creating greater understanding of what it means to be in their rhythm and shoes again. It’s riveting and I am so grateful to be able to not only embody that experience but, beginning this coming fall term, share that experience with my students—encouraging that their body, their voice, their imagination is indeed the solution. When we move, we reveal.

The performance was not only a celebration of the process taken but an illumination of how physicality can be moved to move others. The company is currently preparing a new work to be toured with more performances in the near and wider horizon. I look forward to continuing to perform and create with the company, traveling back and forth between Boston and NYC.

All of these experiences have confirmed the importance of what it means to wear different hats. Sometimes there is a tendency I hear from students to be set on one goal, one way of doing —this is the right way, but in actuality, there is actually a left turn as well. If we keep going to the right, we may miss the surprises and possibilities that a left turn may invite.

One exercise I love to share with students is to follow me in the hallway and keep making right turns. When I ask the student what they are feeling after doing so, the usual answers are that it feels comfortable, it feels structured. Then, when we do the exercise again, as we are walking, I mention to the student that we are going to take a left turn here and there, but when we do it, they will not know.  After doing this part of the exercise, I ask the student again what they are feeling—the responses are usually that it was surprising, a-rhythmical, not too structured.

And when we look at the movement of life, this is the same feeling. Life is not structured. We may structure how we live in life but in truth, life is not structured—life is filled with many movements, many approaches, many detours, many avenues, many hats, many left turns as well as right turns—and the more we can prepare ourselves to begin to embody what this may feel like in shape, form and rhythm, the better we can be equipped to not only move through but most essentially, move around and with. We are indeed born twice—we are born when we come into the world, and we are born when we are inspired. The body we came into the world with is the same one we have now—it has not disappeared. It has only changed. But the curiosity, commitment, and imaginative traits of child can very much be within, as if our body is a library.

Once again, to be able to personally open “books” to experience this myself, along with the commitment of students—especially these past few months has been a movement that has not only inspired but imprinted as well.

Connect with Yo-EL!

Yo-EL is an assistant professor at BU School of Theatre, teaching movement courses including The Expressive Human Instrument/The Expressive Human Instrumentalist, 360 Physical Storytelling, and The Creative Moving Artist. He also co-teaches The Moving Artist and: Choreography and Design: Light and Movement (with Professor Mark Stanley) and offers intimacy and consent based directed studies and workshops for SOT and its productions as well as movement direction and choreography.

Learn more about Cassell and the various hats he wears at yo-el.squarespace.com or send him an email at ycassell@bu.edu asking when Clown Day is taking place this fall (hint: theatre students walk up and down Commonwealth Avenue practicing clowning while wearing clown noses).

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