Playing to Type: Industry and Invisible Training in the National Youth Theatre’s ‘Playing Up 2’

Alongside its core actor and stage technician training activities, the National Youth Theatre of Great Britain runs training programmes targeting specific ‘socially excluded’ groups. This article examines the 2009/10 iteration of the social inclusion actor training programme ‘Playing Up 2’ (subsequently suspended and reinstated as ‘Playing Up’), drawing on a period of rehearsal observation and interviews carried out during and after the final showcase performance The Block. This play was set on a fictional London housing estate and included several stereotypical archetypes of inner-city, working class characters (the black drug dealer, the mentally ill young racist, the benefit claiming single mother). This article begins by considering the politics of casting in The Block project; it then focuses on how the notion of ‘social inclusion’ mediated participants’ understanding of the relationship between their personal and professional identities. It demonstrates how asking young people to embody stereotypes closely related to their ‘real’ identities caused significant tensions within the training process, exacerbated by the ‘socially excluded’ label. It reveals how the organisation of the programme and interactions with tutors operated as ‘invisible’ elements of the training process, reinforcing the ideas about ‘industry’ that participants were exposed to in the curriculum.