Class Overview

Course Experience Level: All 

Course Description: Balancing the many aspects of producing can already appear like a balancing act. From working with production staff and sponsors to working our way through logistics, every piece of a show brings its own life and spirit to the final show that leaves audiences inspired going "WOW!" How can producers inspire and care for their performers, audiences, and selves while deconstructing standard colonial practices that we often see in show production? By approaching burlesque with a decolonial lens, Cherry Cheeks breaks down colonial constructs in producing that often restrict the ability to create safer spaces, and instead look at relationship first. Participants should arrive ready to hear some hard truths and reflect on their own unconscious bias and privilege.


About the Instructor

Cherry Cheeks

Bringing her passion to the stage AND the classroom since 2014 is the Tāłtān Temptation, Cherry Cheeks! She regularly holds space for important conversations around equity and decolonization within burlesque and the performing arts. A proud indigiqueer, she works to create safer spaces, visibility, and *thriving* opportunities for performers of colour to be represented on stages and owning their space in the community. Always on the go, Cherry is the producer of House of Cheek Productions, co-producer and Diversity Coordinator of the Isle of Tease Burlesque Festival, Youtube sensation at Cheeky Burlesque, and a frequent community builder. With a fire in her heart she brings passion, humour, and cheek to everything she does.