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THE Roots OF LIVING THROUGH DRAMA — HEATHCOTE AND MAN IN A MESS through the fictional situation. Heathcote says in the film that it will take some time for the boys to realise and say to themselves ‘that was me talking’.*’ The relationship of fiction and reality, the role and the participant is a crucial element in creating a productive crisis. The situation here clearly brings into play the tension between the fictional crisis — prisoners of a war camp — and the real situation of the participants — having to stay at an approved school. O’Toole calls this metaxis, the tension created by the interaction “between the fictional context and the real context". A third example is based on Bolton’s account of a Heathcote drama lesson from the ‘60s. The Death of the President was also filmed in an approved school and the participants here chose to shoot the president, but their decision was that one person should shoot. Bolton refers to the original lesson, not only what can be seen of it in the film. The gang listen to the radio as their associate shoots the president, who is caught and the drama continues in the prison. Bolton describes” the extreme tension created by playing the moments where the consequences of their joint decision to shoot the president goes wrong, generating questions of personal responsibility. One such moment is listening to the live broadcast on the radio, in which space is created for participants to realise what the implications of their plans are. A dialogue between the prison guard — Heathcote in role — and the shooter is also a moment which opens space for understanding the consequence of the action, not by moralising about it, but by talking about the prisoner’s breakfast. Bolton also analyses how Heathcote wins back the group after they reach a ‘low point’?! The next day she starts by creating the prison cells and the sound of someone mopping the prison floor. This game re-engaged the participants, and Bolton argues that it is the connection between the drama and their lives that re-energised the boys’ participation in the fiction.” These examples show that Heathcote relied on the urgency of the crisis for the fictional roles and the problem’s connection to the participants’ real lives in her LTD. Comparing Man in a Mess with the Mantle of the Expert approach developed by Heathcote in the late seventies, we see that the distance from the crisis grows. David Allen” cites an example from # At 15:30 in the film https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owKiUO99qrw, (accessed 26 April 2020). O’Toole: Process of Drama, 30. Gavin Bolton: Dorothy Heathcote’s story: biography of a remarkable drama teacher, Stoke on Trent, Trentham Books, 2003. 99 Ibid., 74. 9 Ibid., 75. 72 Ibid. % David Allen: Citizens and Stewards: Dorothy Heathcote’s ‘Mantle of the Expert’ System, The Journal for Drama in Education, 28(2), 2012, 41-50. +29»
