Grantees
and Partners

Target Margin Theater

Overview:

Target Margin Theater is an OBIE Award-winning company based in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. Over the past 30 years, it has produced more than 50 mainstage productions directed by founder David Herskovits and 130 individual lab productions by emerging artists. Significant artistic achievements include the OBIE Award-winning production of MAMBA’s DAUGHTERS (1998), marathon production of FAUST (2003-2006), acclaimed production of MOURNING BECOMES ELECTRA (2017), and New York Times Critic’s Pick production PAY NO ATTENTION TO THE GIRL (2018). In 2017, Target Margin moved into its first-ever performance home in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. Since then, connecting and collaborating with community partners has been a focus of its work. Target Margin Theater’s project partner, Raising Health, is a Sunset Park-based nonprofit organization that operates public health and wellness programs across communities, supporting and sustaining the well-being of immigrant communities through culturally-competent health, education, and community-building programs.

The immigrant populations of Sunset Park, particularly those who speak Arabic, Mandarin, and Spanish, experience stresses and anxieties from several different sources. Target Margin Theater’s partners at the Academy of Medical and Public Health Services (AMPHS, now named Raising Health) identified that the “concurrent and compounding stresses of ICE surveillance, public charge, family separation, economic instability, and xenophobia” all contribute to the diminished mental health of the community.

These challenges were exacerbated by the fear of contracting COVID-19 and the isolation resulting from the pandemic. The needs of immigrant communities can often remain invisible, as access to services and care reveal immigration status. “Fears of deportation and family separation contribute to aggravated mental health statuses for a population that is already victim to the trauma of violence and discrimination,” notes Raising Health, “making mental health risk factors more prevalent than ever.” In addition, the rise in anti-Asian hate and violence since the pandemic has been particularly detrimental for the Asian immigrant populations of Sunset Park. Raising Health highlights that “during the pandemic, anti-Asian hate crimes instilled constant fear in the Asian community, on top of anxieties of contracting COVID-19. The anxiety and depression are debilitating yet unspoken of because of stigma and invisibility. When left unattended, these mental health stressors place immigrants at risk for socialization barriers, severed relationships, and physical comorbidities.”

Grant:

Purpose: To support Target Margin’s Community storytelling project, serving Sunset Park community members including Muslim, Asian, and Latinx immigrant groups.

As part of their season-long theme of storytelling, and in response to the present mental health issues in Sunset Park’s immigrant communities, Target Margin Theater developed HERE AND NOW, an interactive storytelling project designed to foster community healing and build cross-cultural solidarity, providing a forum for personal experiences to be heard and engaging community members in the creative process.

Impact:

In 2022, adults from Sunset Park were invited to come together in small groups to share stories about their lives and experiences. Sessions were led by Artist Facilitators from Target Margin Theater along with wellness counselors from Raising Health. More than sixty members of the community participated in the sessions, which were offered in English, Mandarin, Spanish, and Arabic.

For some, attending and sharing their stories with the small group was the full extent of their participation. But participants who wanted to share their stories with a broader audience were invited to develop them into an artistic piece during additional sessions with the Artist Facilitators. Eighteen community members chose to develop their narratives further and record their stories as an artistic and therapeutic extension of their experiences. Their personal stories — documenting the experience of living in the community and what it means to be a newcomer – were recorded in the participant’s preferred language. The stories were read in live events in Sunset Park and were recorded for an exhibit at the Sunset Park branch of the Brooklyn Public Library and adapted as a podcast.