As teachers and students everywhere scramble to reinvent education under the constraints of social distancing, new developments in remote learning take place daily. Nowhere is this process more crucial than among students of the performing arts, whose core activities — concerts, plays, and recitals — have been disrupted and are likely to remain so.
At UCSB, where the Theater and Dance program offers a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree, and where the curriculum follows a conservatory model, the double-barreled loss of face-to-face instruction and live audiences is having a radical impact. Fortunately, the leaders of the school’s new play development program, Launch Pad, have already begun finding ways not only to circumvent delays in providing instruction, but to turn the evolving crisis to some new advantage. Beginning on Thursday, April 2, at 7 p.m., Launch Pad takes to the Internet via Zoom for the first installment in what promises to be an exciting and innovative series of online performances of new plays and other works in progress.
Launch Pad online kicks off with a new comedy called Fortunes that was written by Dan Castellaneta and Deb Lacusta before COVID-19 forced Californians to shelter in place. Risa Brainin, UCSB professor of theater and founder/artistic director of Launch Pad, said that students and the writers were ready to go into conventional rehearsals on March 10, the night that Chancellor Yang announced that winter quarter would go to online teaching.