MARIO DEANDRE BROOKS has lived and worked in the Chattanooga area for 13 years. Primarily a theatrical artist, he studied theater, musical theater, acting, dance, & music with the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga’s Theater department and graduated Summa Cum Laude from Chattanooga State Community College’s Professional Actor’s Training Program. He is completing an additional dual degree focusing on Theater and Communications with the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.
He currently serves as Director of Outreach for youth mentorship program Young, Gifted, & Black, which seeks to empower young artists between the ages of 14 through 25 who do not typically get the opportunity to perform in artistic disciplines of African and African-American origin.
Mario has also served as production manager for Ripple Theater’s run of Tony Kushner’s Caroline, Or Change in November of 2014. He also served as that production’s stage manager and coordinated the media and publicity campaign, conducting media interviews with The Tenesha Irvin show on WJTT and Around and About Chattanooga with Mike Miller at WUTC. The highlight of that media campaign was Charity Night, where low-income patrons were allowed admittance in exchange for a financial or good donation to The Partnership for Families, Children, and Adults’ shelter for battered women and children.
Mario has acted professional with Ensemble Theatre of Chattanooga’s productions including but not limited to nationally renowned musicals La Cage Aux Folles, Jekyll and Hyde, & Avenue Q as well as original and lesser known works such as Casting the Canvas, Around the World in 8 Plays, & its annual 24 Hour Play Festival. He was performed in Tim Hinck’s Work #152 as an actor and dancer as well as various community theater productions with the Chattanooga Theater Centre, such as Blues for Mister Charlie. He has appeared in dance performances with Ann Law for Cage Fest, Create 2012, & The Day of the Legs at Barking Legs Theater.
“When I look back on what I’ve learned professionally, I think, how much better would I be, had I have had access to training sooner? I want to reach back and lift up the kid like me, and help them be brilliant.”
Sample Programs Offered
Program Type: Arts Curriculum, Arts Integration
Program Description:
Learners will pair up and create a musical number with hand drums, and perform these songs for another set of students to interpret into dance and Gullah/Geechee inspired phrases.
The learner will (TLW):
Experiment with new sounds & rhythms and play in Creole-inspired dialects.
Create dances set to African drum circle playing created by the other students.
Experience the Gullah/Geechee language in the form of spoken word, music, & dance.
Essential Questions
How do we create new works in a world billions of years old?
What barriers do we face in experiencing something strange and foreign to us?
How does it feel to try something new?
Who has the right to speak? To sing?
Who has the right to speak? To sing?
Lesson Plan Example: Download File
Program Type: Arts Curriculum, Arts Integration
Program Description:
Learners will demonstrate perspective & interpretation by use of the improvisation game “Change of Emotion”: a simple scene that changes at the behest of the facilitator.
The learner will (TLW):
* Self-identify and share who she or he is.
* Discuss the clash of cultures be Rome and Egypt in William Shakespeare’s Antony and Cleopatra.
* Be able to empathize with and appreciate diverse backgrounds.
Essential Questions
1. What are you?
2. How does our culture influence how we view the world around us?
3. Would experiencing others’ POVs help you better relate to one another?
Lesson Plan Example: Download File
Program Type: Arts Curriculum, Arts Integration
Program Description:
Learners will create a narrative via the improvisation game “Running Story/Soap Opera”: a series of duet scenes set in a particular setting under a given set of circumstances.
The learner will (TLW):
Listen actively to his/her castmates as they engage one another in play.
Create a cohesive story, as a unit, via a series of duet improvisations
Discover Southern American oral folkloric traditions and their roots in African, Creole, African-American, & Native American cultures.
Learn to breath life into a character by creating a backstory for an original supporting player.
Essential Questions
What is collaboration, and how do we use it to create a community?
How does my partner make me perfect and vice-versa?
How do we achieve unity and equality when there are multiple perspectives that might conflict?
Lesson Plan Example: Download File
