A group of teenagers are sword fighting in an otherwise empty room.
The swords are large and heavy, something you’d see in live-action role playing. Some of the teens are wearing masks. By the end of the fight, only one is left standing.
Here at OFC Creations on Winton Road, they are rehearsing the play “She Kills Monsters.”
It may sound like a typical high school play, but this performance is different. It’s produced by Golisano Children’s Hospital Pediatric Behavioral Health and Wellness center. The teenage cast and crew have all received mental health care at URMC, and this theater production is another part of that care.
The play, “She Kills Monsters,” is about a girl who discovers a world built by her late sister, Tilly. The tragic and comedic story confronts themes of grief and loss, while remaining playful.
“As she's playing through this storyline, and she's meeting these like demonic fairies and evil Jell-O molds that she has to battle, she also starts to learn that Tilly was exploring her sexuality and her gender and trying to figure out things about that,” said Maggie Powell, a drama therapist at URMC. “She learns that Tilly was experiencing bullying, and the bullies are represented in the story as these evil cheerleaders succubae with these huge bat wings.”
Drama therapy is an unorthodox mental health treatment. Research on its effectiveness is limited. But according to a study published last year in the National Library of Medicine, it can decrease depressive symptoms, anxiety, posttraumatic stress, and aggressive behavior. It can also improve social skills like assertiveness and have a positive if indirect effect on academics.
“It's a way of exploring some of these challenges in a way that is kind of more distanced and is kind of more playful and creative,” Powell said, “which I think can help us feel a little bit more empowered and a little bit less overwhelmed by some of the difficult things that we can encounter in life.”
But the authors of the study say there needs to be more research on the different aspects of drama therapy in order to understand what makes it effective in these ways.
Since the URMC project started in July, assistant director Robyn Broomfield said what stands out to her is the moment when the cast began learning fight scene choreography.
“That's intimidating, and I think a lot of them didn't know that they even could physically maybe do those things,” said Broomfield, who is also a mental health therapist. “To see them now on stage with their weapons getting ready to fight these monsters and these dragons, which in some ways may signify something more to them … has just been probably one of the coolest pieces for me.”
Broomfield said this production takes on a different approach than what might be typical. As themes come up in the story, they take time to process what that brings up for teens who may have a personal connection to them. So in a way, it’s like group therapy.
“You can see their confidence grow in those situations, and now they can really see that they are capable of, of hard things,” she said. “I think the biggest thing is, we want to walk away from this and let them know that they're more than the struggles that they go through. They're not defined by those things.”
When the curtains rise this weekend, the teens will be performing to a public audience, so there’s an aspect of community that wouldn’t be possible if they were to perform only for other patients and family members.
“There's such a stigma around mental health,” Broomfield said, adding that it's important for the larger community to recognize that it's OK for people to seek support.
The play “She Kills Monsters” is being performed at OFC Creations theater center Friday through Sunday.
