"Synchronicity": How the Power and Role of Theatre Has Changed During the Pandemic

“No one ever just breaks into song randomly like that in real life, that’s just stupid.”

I’m sure that at some point, every musical theatre enthusiast I know has heard some naysayer say something akin to this. We hear this from people who believe that musical theatre is inherently dumb, the reasoning behind this opinion usually being that musical theatre is not realistic. I’m not here to disagree with the notion that people don’t just simultaneously start belting in five-part harmony and performing choreography that they all miraculously know in the middle of a grocery store.

When people want to convey the melancholia they feel concerning the fact that the store has run out of, say, toilet paper, they usually, well, don’t convey it. They just bottle up their feelings and find the manager. I myself am a musical theatre lover and performer, and trust me, I am very much aware of the fact that a spontaneous musical number is not a commonplace occurrence. 

However, you know what is not only realistic, but fundamentally human? The sensation of frustration one feels upon lacking the means to express something that feels so complex, so extreme, so layered, so larger than life, and yet so, well, human, that it is impossible to convey the experience in mere words. Like due to a betrayal. Or a divorce. Or a global pandemic.

It is also fundamentally human to gather. We are social creatures, and we rely on our communities at large for support, especially when the emotions that we are experiencing are so indescribably intense and multi-faceted that solitude feels like too much. Like due to a betrayal. Or a divorce. Or a global pandemic. 

In pre-pandemic times, I would have said it is realistic and fundamentally human to gather. However, in the case of the global pandemic we have faced for over a year now, even though our bodies are craving physical touch, the preservation of our mental health requires togetherness, and our souls are arguably calling upon us to gather more than ever before, for safety’s sake, we physically cannot.

Musical theatre, and theatre in general, connect us to our shared humanity. ​Wouldn’t it be great if language could fully convey exactly what it’s like to share a collective experience (i.e. a global pandemic) and, simultaneously, experience it individualistically?

Well, when you think about it, there are experiences that transcend language, and thus language is imperfect and could not possibly convey the human condition entirely. Human beings think in imagery in addition to language; words are mere symbols for meaning, so language can limit us. Victor Hugo infamously said, “Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent.” 

Plus, without the collective social ether we know as art/culture, none of us could possibly attempt to make sense of or connect to the greater human condition. Particularly not without theatre. Theatre is humanity’s great social ritual, church, and zeitgeist. It is a part of human nature, spanning from the amphitheaters of ancient Greece to the bright lights of Broadway. We gather. We express, and witness the expression of others. The moment passes. On to the next. 

Acclaimed stage actress Sherie Renee Scott once said, “That’s the scary thing about theatre--it doesn’t live on. But that’s actually the most beautiful thing about it, too...It doesn’t last--only in people’s memories and in their hearts. That’s the beauty and sadness of it. But that’s life--beauty and the sadness. And that is why theatre is life.”

We gather at the theatre, and we feel with, for, and against those whose triumphs and tribulations are unfolding right in front of us. We witness life and the human condition in all its beauty and complexity reflected back at us. We use said reflection of life to attempt to better understand ourselves as a species and the complexity of the human experience. To empathize. To think. To have something stirred within our souls, something that often provokes subsequent change within ourselves and within society and culture at large. To leave the theater motivated anew.

There is nothing quite like the exhilaration of a live theatrical performance, the electric energy exchange that occurs between actors and audience inside a theater after the stage manager has made the “places” call and the house lights have been dimmed. As musical theatre pit musicians tune up, we feel so attuned, so deeply alive. In fact, there have actually been studies that have shown that theatregoers’ heartbeats sync up when they are attending the same performance. 

However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we have been prevented from gathering and partaking in the great social ritual and zeitgeist we know as theatre. In our pandemic-plagued world, large gatherings, in general, are unsafe, and singing publicly/in large groups has been deemed particularly dangerous due to the ease with which it can spread a respiratory virus. Broadway has been shut down for over a year, leaving entertainment professionals jobless and despondent. Stage actors, used to congregating to perform for live audiences, have been prevented from pursuing our passion in its purest form. Many have given up and changed career paths. We have felt lost, purposeless, hopeless, adrift. 

Avid theatergoers, used to congregating to spectate live-action, have been robbed of their ritual. Gathering in such a way was their filter and palette cleanser. Theatre lovers that are working from home in light of the pandemic are having a difficult time both focusing during the day and sleeping at night with nothing to break up the monotony. They struggle to “turn work off” with no way to give their minds and bodies a reprieve from routine. The red cushioned seats they so zealously looked forward to sitting in have been collecting dust. 

Those red cushioned seats have been empty for over a year now, and as a result, the theatre artists that have decided to continue pursuing the craft amidst the pandemic have been forced to adapt. As has everyone else, theatre artists have turned to technology. In order to create remote theatre, we have turned to self-tape equipment and to Zoom, our bedrooms and living rooms becoming our rehearsal and performance spaces. We were previously embracing and stage-slapping in-person scene partners, and could hear gasps, applause, reactions coming from live audiences. Neurotransmitters flashed bright as starlight in the minds of audiences and artists as we shared a collective theatrical electricity.

Nowadays, we argue with our noisy cohabitants (our only company) as we stare at our computer screens and try to concentrate on connecting with virtual scene partners and audiences, sitting on the same couches on which we ate Cheez-Its mere hours before. The most palpable electrical charge involved now comes from the wires plugged into the walls, providing our laptops and ringlights with power.

However, it is often said that great art comes from great pain. These times of immense suffering and isolation have birthed a multitude of original work. I myself have made art that I never would have dreamed of if I hadn’t been forced to stop and reflect amidst seclusion. My desire to bare my soul and to remain connected to others, to my own purpose and passion for storytelling, and to my own humanity, became so overwhelming that I took matters into my own hands.

In order to remain hopeful, keep musical theatre alive, and provide ourselves and others with laughter, my good friend Bryelle Burgus and I co-created a musical theatre webshow called Tunesday: A Virtual Cabaret (@tunes_day on Instagram, Tunesday on Facebook). Each and every episode (we release one every other week) includes two musical theatre song covers, and is written, shot, and edited, completely remotely, solely by the two of us. I have performed in and organized a plethora of virtual productions, play readings, cabarets, and remote duets with  artists all over the globe, and even made my debut on Turkish late-night TV from within my own house. Due to my newfound active involvement with an independent film company (First Fire Studios, LLC; first_fire_studios on Instagram, First Fire Studios LLC on Facebook), I am currently collaborating with three other actors/writers on the script of an original short film that we are fundraising for and planning to start shooting later this year. The short film is about four individuals that reexamine their authentic selves, interpersonal relationships, and priorities in a myriad of ways as they cope with the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The theatre industry has evolved in other ways that have turned out to be beneficial as well. Auditions have become much more accessible, as they are now primarily virtual. Theatre artists have been able to perform with companies all over the country and world without needing to pay for travel or uproot our lives. For instance, Chilean actor and singer Chris Browne Valenzuela, who graduated from the musical theatre conservatory program at Circle in the Square Theatre School in 2020, has stayed incredibly busy as an actor without ever having left his apartment to do so! He has, from within his own apartment, performed in virtual theatre projects mounted by companies all across the country: Hacienda (a play that premiered at the “Selma Originals” Festival at the Selma Arts Center in California), Safe and Sound (an original musical that premiered on Saturday, March 13th, 2021 at the “Front Row Fringe Festival” and took home ten awards, and will soon be making its European premiere), and Sueño Americano (produced with the company Telatúlsa in Oklahoma), just to name a few. 

Additionally, Chris has turned to the film and television industries for employment (as many stage actors have). He acted in two soon-to-be-released short films (Bathroom Universe by Momo Kirimichi and Shadowed by Olivia Lenius), is in pre-production for the mystery series Lark & ​​Spur, which will air on Amazon Prime, and starred in a commercial for Giant Supermarkets. “My specialty is theatre, and specifically musical theatre. But in a pandemic, having a live audience is impossible. It is much more feasible to make film and television, where staff can be limited, masks can be used 90% of the time, and the people involved can be tracked,” Chris says.

Despite some silver linings brought about by the newly adapted theatre industry, we’re still lacking the synchronicity of our collective human heartbeat that occurs at the theater and feeling its absence. However, ironically, amidst this pandemic, the heartbeat has synced up in a different way. This time, we are not sitting next to each other in red cushioned seats within an air-conditioned theater, though. We are in the middle of reality. 

Due to the impact of COVID-19, each and every individual is experiencing different types and intensities of emotion, and words don’t even begin to cover their scope. Some are experiencing anxiety. Some depression. Some anger. Some denial. Some loss and the many multilayered emotions that come with it. Some are experiencing all of the above. But we have all, ironically, been experiencing the same thing: the spread and influence of COVID-19. No matter your background, your field of work, your perspective on life, or your ethnicity, to some degree, you have been experiencing the effects of COVID-19 on your life and on your physical/emotional well-being. It is important to note that people of lower socioeconomic status and people of color have been suffering at significantly higher rates than people of higher socioeconomic status and white people, but that’s a whole other article to write.

These effects are so complex that they cannot be conveyed by words alone. The circumstances we face are literally unprecedented territory for this lifetime. Except we can’t break into song and dance side by side this time. We can’t gather at the theater to express and process this time. This time, we are standing at least six feet away from each other, creating purposeful separation from other human beings. And some of us are wearing running shoes and jogging in the park to pass the time while others cannot afford a pair. But our hearts still beat in time, no matter how isolated we are from each other. Even though they cannot synchronize within the same room, our hearts are still moving as one.

This experience is, in fact, a shared one. Let’s do our best with the tools we currently have to emphasize its shared nature and thus our shared humanity. Let’s do our best to continue to be the theatre artists we always wanted to be...or didn’t want to be. To be the theatre artists we now need to be, to adapt the zeitgeist, to attune to the synchronicity. This is our opportunity to embrace our artistic voices and autonomy like never before. Maybe we’ll even be one step closer to, once this pandemic is over and we can all gather again (in theaters and in general), breaking out into a spontaneous musical number in the grocery store. And maybe when we do, there will be enough toilet paper rolls for each and every person to get to hold one as a prop. Maybe by then, hoarding it will be a thing of zeitgeists past.