Our Work
The act of making theatre engages the body, heart, and mind. Theatre draws from both one’s emotional life as well as the intellect, imagination, and makes ideas and questions immediate. The process is collaborative, playful, experimental, courageous, and personal. We strive to bring the process of theatre-making into each Beyond Ensemble experience.
At its core, our work…
INVITES multiple perspectives and values the lived experience of each participant in the pursuit of making meaning together.
AWAKENS the artistry and creativity of each participant in the room. We believe everyone is an artist. When we cultivate our creative capacities, we hone the skills needed to solve complex problems, connect across our differences, and make meaningful change.
TRANSFORMS learning into an experiential process that is personal, immediate, playful, and collaborative.
A Message from Craig Maravich,
Founding Director & Theatre Artist
Thank you for coming to our site! I am Craig Maravich, Founder and Director of The Beyond Ensemble. For 25 years I have been making theatre as an actor, teaching artist, instructor, and director. My career in theatre started primarily as an actor. I worked in leading regional theatres, small theatres, and I taught acting. Then, I had the great fortune to become a member of the Bread Loaf Acting Ensemble at Middlebury College’s Bread Loaf School of English. It was here that I was introduced to the work of Teaching Artists. With this ensemble, I began to see the transformational impact that happens when we bring theatre into educational spaces that are not of the theatre. I experienced first hand how arts-integration, applied theatre, and embodiment in teaching can make a transformational shift in how we learn. This started me on a journey to pursue this work in K-12 schools and higher education. I noticed that each time teaching artists were in the room, classrooms became livelier. More voices and ideas and stories were valued in the space. I saw teachers get reinvigorated in their own practice. Students that often didn’t view themselves as creative were invited to play and learning looked like risk, experimentation, belonging, and joy.
This was a shift in my understanding of what theatre can hold and all the ways it can be a catalyst for individual and collective change. I have been doing this work in educational and community spaces for over 15 years. I have witnessed artists, leaders, youth, inter-generational communities, educators, and administrators find moments of meaningful connection in the process. Sometimes that connection is profound and at other times it’s quite simple.
Theatre is an artform with limitless possibilities, but more than anything, I believe it creates the possibility for connection. Theatre urges us to connect more deeply with stories, with one another, with the world around us, and with ourselves.
I started The Beyond Ensemble, to keep pursuing and creating these opportunities for connection. For many years I have been fortunate to collaborate with a passionate, committed, and talented group of professional theatre artists from across the country. Together, we have designed arts-integration workshops and residencies in schools across the US and on the other side of the globe in Singapore. We have worked with various communities to create connections and address local needs in our theatre projects. Countless partners and co-conspirators from all walks of life have helped shape our practice and reach. I’m excited to expand this network with people that believe in the transformative power of theatre and story. We at the Beyond Ensemble are curious to keep exploring what’s next and collaborating with you.
