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Tricia Rose Burt

Speaker. Storyteller. Coach.

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theater

Sandra Bullock Gets Her Space Underwear Right

October 11, 2013 by Tricia Rose Burt

He can’t believe her underwear either

One summer night back in 1979, I went to see the movie “Alien” with my brother and some of his friends. More than 30 years later, I am still recovering. For me, there are three enduring images from the film: 1) the space critter bursting out of John Hurt’s chest; 2) the android with his head chopped off; and 3) Sigourney Weaver’s underwear in the final scene.

If you saw the movie, you may remember the scene. Sigourney Weaver’s character, Ripley, is the sole survivor of her crew. She has made it safely aboard the shuttle, although we all know she is anything but safe. As she prepares for her journey home, she takes off her flight suit, only to reveal skimpy little underwear. I distinctly remember saying out loud in the movie theater, “No one wears underwear like that in space.”

I said it again this summer when I saw “Star Trek Into Darkness.” For reasons that are anything but plot related, in one scene Alice Eve’s character Carol, a science officer, stands scantily clad in a black bra and matching panties. Now don’t get me wrong. There is a time and place for a black bra and matching panties, but I don’t think they’re necessary for the final frontier.

Appropriately dressed for space

I didn’t know what to expect when watching “Gravity” this week, the new space thriller starring Sandra Bullock. After surviving harrowing experiences outside the space craft, Bullock’s character Ryan makes her way onto a space shuttle for safety. She takes off her flight suit. I prepare myself.  Ryan reveals she not only has a brilliant mind and a broken heart but also sensible underwear — black briefs and an olive green tank top. Thank goodness.

Smart, yes; fashionable, no

But Sandra Bullock aside, women scientists depicted in entertainment — and most importantly, in REAL LIFE — still struggle to get a break. I just read an interesting article about the lack of women who pursue science. The author suggests that TV’s top comedy “The Big Bang Theory” does nothing to encourage women to pursue that field — the show’s brilliant neuroscientist Amy Farrah Fowler dresses like a grandmother and is socially inept, while the ditsy waitress Penny always looks adorable and gets all the guys. Personally, I love the character Amy Farrah Fowler as played by Mayim Bialik, who actually holds a PhD in neuroscience. But I have to admit, the author has a point.

 While Hollywood tries to get it right, I offer two antidotes from the worlds of theater and storytelling. First is The Story Collider, a storytelling collective based in NYC, founded by Ben Lillie. Ben is a former high energy particle physicist with a Phd from Stanford. At some point in his career, he decided that while he loved science, he didn’t much care for research and actually loved storytelling and theater. So he headed to NYC and started The Story Collider, where scientists and non-scientists alike come and tell stories about their everyday experiences with science. Lucky for me, I’ll be performing with them on Dec. 12 in Cambridge, MA.

Second, there’s The Ensemble Studio Theatre/Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Science & Technology Project — I attended a theater lab this summer with their amazing associate director, Linsay Firman. This is an initiative “designed to stimulate artists to create credible and compelling work exploring the worlds of science and technology and to challenge the existing stereotypes of scientists and engineers in the popular imagination.”

So, as always, there’s hope for change. Check these groups out and please give them — and budding women scientists — your support.

*****

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Filed Under: General Thoughts Tagged With: Alien, EST/Sloan Foundation Technology Project, Gravity, Hollywood, Sandra Bullock, Sigourney Weaver, storytelling, The Story Collider, theater

Here’s What Happened

September 20, 2013 by Tricia Rose Burt

Rachel Perry Welty and I, mid-performance

“You girls are missing out on your lives.” That was just one of the comments Rachel Perry Welty and I received during “WTF” (2013), our collaborative performance using cell phones at (con)TEXT, the current Sharon Arts Center exhibition curated by Tim Donovan. A quick description of the piece: we sat next to each other on a bench and for the two-hour duration of the opening reception we texted one another. We did not talk to each other or anyone else. Our “Hello, my name is…” name tags featured our cell phone numbers,  not our names. (Side note: I forgot to take my name tag off after the performance and went out for a glass of wine. The bartender couldn’t help but comment: “A lot of women communicate that they’re available, but you’re taking it to a whole new level.”) [Read more…] about Here’s What Happened

Filed Under: General Thoughts Tagged With: artists, creativity, theater

Opening Night on Broadway

March 8, 2013 by Tricia Rose Burt

Now on Broadway

Thanks to a dear friend’s generosity, I attended last night’s Broadway opening of “Ann,” the play about Ann Richards, the former Texas governor. Actress Holland Taylor is both the playwright and star of this one-woman show, and since I share those roles in “How to Draw a Nekkid Man” (formerly “I Will Be Good”), I was very eager to see her performance.

[Read more…] about Opening Night on Broadway

Filed Under: General Thoughts Tagged With: inspiration, one-woman shows, theater, women's issues

Going Through Stuff

June 15, 2012 by Tricia Rose Burt

My husband and I moved into our home nine years ago. Before we bought this house, I moved 16 times in 16 years. By the time I arrived to NH, I had boxes of my personal belongings — or as the great George Carlin would say, boxes of my “stuff” — stashed in attics and storage units all along the Eastern seaboard as well as overseas in Ireland. I was eager to have all of my things in one place, although at that point, I couldn’t really remember what most of those things were. [Read more…] about Going Through Stuff

Filed Under: General Thoughts Tagged With: creativity, home life, humor, theater, writing

The Importance of Being Vulnerable

April 13, 2012 by Tricia Rose Burt

In a recent video on storytelling seen on Carson Daly’s Last Call, The Moth founder George Dawes Green states great storytelling depends on vulnerability. I wanted to really understand that word, so I revisited several definitions including this one from The Oxford Dictionary: susceptible to physical or emotional attack or harm.  Sounds like a pretty scary place to be. [Read more…] about The Importance of Being Vulnerable

Filed Under: General Thoughts Tagged With: artists, creativity, storytelling, theater, writing

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