{"id":38663,"date":"2022-04-27T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-04-27T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cws.charlotte.edu\/backup-coaa\/theatre-professor-choreographs-intimacy-for-broadway-and-tv\/"},"modified":"2024-06-03T10:35:31","modified_gmt":"2024-06-03T14:35:31","slug":"theatre-professor-choreographs-intimacy-for-broadway-and-tv","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cws.charlotte.edu\/backup-coaa\/news\/2022-04-27\/theatre-professor-choreographs-intimacy-broadway-and-tv\/","title":{"rendered":"Theatre Professor Choreographs Intimacy for Broadway and TV"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the past three years, Assistant Professor of Theatre Kaja Dunn<\/a> has developed a national career in the new field of intimacy choreography.<\/p>\n

Dunn, who teaches acting at UNC Charlotte, is associate intimacy director for the Broadway production of A Strange Loop<\/em><\/a>, a Pulitzer prize-winning musical that opened on Broadway this week (April 26). She is also the intimacy choreographer and fight director for the Denver Center for the Performing Arts regional production of Choir Boy<\/em> \u2013 running April 22-May 29 \u2013 and a lead intimacy coordinator on the set of the NBC series Best Man<\/em>, which will begin airing on Peacock in September.<\/p>\n

While fight choreography \u2013 staging combat scenes \u2013 has been practiced since antiquity, intimacy choreography \u2013 choreographing sex scenes and other physically intimate actions on stage and screen \u2013 has become more common only in the past few years, since the #MeToo movement started. <\/p>\n

Dunn works with writers, directors, lawyers, actors, costumers, and stage managers to help create a safe space and set appropriate boundaries for actors in intimacy scenes. That involves, among other things, developing non-sexualized language for directors to use, ensuring that costuming provides protection when necessary, and putting practices into place that create consistency in actions throughout each iteration of a scene – whether across filming or across the run of a show.<\/p>\n

In Choir Boy<\/em>, for example, there is a scene in which two characters kiss in a shower.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s about creating protocols,\u201d she says. \u201cKnowing who people are and respecting their boundaries.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dunn\u2019s particular expertise is in race and intimacy, and she is one of only a few people in the world with that specific research and practice. All three of the current projects \u2013 A Strange Loop<\/em>, Choir Boy<\/em>, and Best Man<\/em> \u2013 deal with Black intimacy. That expertise allows her to help writers and directors avoid negative cultural tropes in scripts and characterizations and offer advice on cultural nuances.<\/p>\n

And not only does Dunn work on multiple sets, but as the Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Specialist for Theatrical Intimacy Education, a consulting group specializing in researching, developing, and teaching best practices for staging theatrical intimacy, she leads trainings and workshops in the U.S. and abroad.<\/p>\n

Dunn\u2019s work in the field is rooted both in her own past experiences on stage and in the classroom, where, she says, she has worked for years to create safe spaces for students \u2013 especially students of color.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have had a consent clause in my acting classes since 2011. Students don\u2019t have to engage in any physical behavior or language that violates their boundaries.\u201d<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In the past three years, Assistant Professor of Theatre Kaja Dunn has developed a national career in the new field of intimacy choreography. Dunn, who teaches acting at UNC Charlotte, is associate intimacy director for the Broadway production of A Strange Loop, a Pulitzer prize-winning musical that opened on Broadway this week (April 26). She […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":38665,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"_clt_a11y_last_scan":"1778693144","_clt_a11y_has_violations":"0","_clt_a11y_violations":"[]","_clt_a11y_suppressions":"","_clt_a11y_needs_validation":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[59],"class_list":["post-38663","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-theatre"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nTheatre Professor Choreographs Intimacy for Broadway and TV - College of Arts + Architecture<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Theatre Professor Choreographs Intimacy for Broadway and TV - College of Arts + Architecture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In the past three years, Assistant Professor of Theatre Kaja Dunn has developed a national career in the new field of intimacy choreography. 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