Theatre of the Oppressed and Rainbow of Desire (Boal)

1. Introduction

Version followed: Augusto Boal, The Rainbow of Desire: The Boal Method of Theatre and Therapy, translated by Adrian Jackson from the French Méthode Boal de théâtre et de thérapie (Routledge, 1st edition; Routledge dates it ©1994, released 14 December 1994; library catalogues and scholarly citations give 1995, xxvi + 188 pp.; cited here as Boal 1995). The Brazilian edition, O arco-íris do desejo: método Boal de teatro e terapia (Civilização Brasileira, 2002), is cited where Brazilian sources give its page numbers. The guide follows the book's technique names and order: theory (ch. 1–4), preliminaries (ch. 5), prospective (ch. 6), introspective (ch. 7) and extraversion techniques (ch. 8), set within the wider Theatre of the Oppressed (TO) framework of Boal's "Tree". Sourced: the chapter structure (Routledge page); the full list and order of the preliminaries, of the 15 prospective techniques and of the first two introspective techniques (Internet Archive and TUM records); the edition dates (Routledge, WorldCat, Internet Archive); and several page-referenced statements from the book quoted by Dwyer (2007) and Oliveira & Araújo (2012). Not sourced from Boal's text: the book's body text has no open authorised copy (the Internet Archive copy is loan-only), so the procedures for most techniques come from secondary accounts (Brazilian psychology and psychodrama literature, applied-theatre research, practitioner pages) and are tagged as such. Nine techniques are known only by name or outline and are given no steps. The rest of the introspective chapter, the contents of the extraversion chapter, Boal's eight stages of the Cops in the Head and his nine stages of the analytical image remain [uncertain]. [source: Routledge product page; WorldCat record; Internet Archive record; TUM library record; Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 342]

What it is. TO is not a single therapy. It is a system (Boal's "arsenal") of games, exercises and theatre forms developed by the Brazilian director Augusto Boal (1931–2009), first in Brazil and later in Europe, from the 1970s, building on earlier work and on Paulo Freire's Pedagogy of the Oppressed. In it, audience members become "spect-actors" who show, analyse and rehearse changes to their own reality. The Rainbow of Desire is the family of introspective techniques, grown out of Image Theatre, that Boal developed during his exile in France in the 1980s. He made it for European participants whose oppressions were mostly subjective (loneliness, fear of intimacy, inability to communicate) and had no obvious external oppressor. Boal framed it explicitly as both theatre and therapy. [source: Wikipedia, Theatre of the Oppressed; Oliveira & Araújo 2012, pp. 341–342; Bezerra et al. 2022, p. 25; Sullivan & Blatner 2006]

How change is thought to happen. Oppression is internalised as a "cop in the head". In a frequently quoted line of Boal's, "the cops are in our heads, but their headquarters are outside" [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017, quoting Boal]. Making these internal voices visible as bodies and images in an "aesthetic space" lets the protagonist and the group see them from outside. The protagonist observes themself in action, links the individual story to shared social patterns, and rehearses alternatives. Boal grounds this in three hypotheses: osmosis (social values absorbed without awareness), metaxis (belonging to the real world and the fictional image at once) and analogical induction (moving from one person's story to a collective analysis). For Boal, catharsis means removing the blocks on a person's desire to act, not purging that desire as in classical catharsis. [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, pp. 342–344; McLaverty-Robinson 2017]

2. Framework

2.1 The overall TO framework (the Tree)

Roots: the Aesthetics of the Oppressed, in three strands: sound, image and word. The ground the Tree stands in is ethics and solidarity, and the bird on it stands for the multipliers who pass the method on. The Tree was set out as a metaphor for the whole method by Boal and the Rio team around 2005. [source: Sarapeck 2016, pp. 14, 21, 24, 49]
Trunk: games (and exercises), Image Theatre and Forum Theatre. Every other form grows out of these. [source: Wikipedia; Bezerra et al. 2022 present the Tree as the metaphor for the whole method, §3.1, p. 41]
Branches: (the canopy) Newspaper Theatre, the Rainbow of Desire, Invisible Theatre and Legislative Theatre. Concrete social actions were once placed in the canopy as well. [source: Sarapeck 2016, pp. 14, 24; Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 341; Bezerra et al. 2022, pp. 23–26]
Facilitator: the Joker (Portuguese Curinga). The Joker explains the purpose of the work, leads the games that "de-mechanise" bodies, runs the forum or the technique, and returns questions to the group. [source: Bezerra et al. 2022, pp. 25, 38; Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 344]

2.2 Rainbow of Desire sequence (book structure)

Preliminaries: the modes (ways of replaying a scene), improvisation, identification, recognition and resonance, and the four catharses. [source: TOC, TUM / Illinois records]
Prospective techniques (15 named in the book, ending with Rashomon). These work on a scene and its relationships from several points of view. [source: TOC; Sullivan & Blatner 2006]
Introspective techniques (ch. 7). The book's contents list opens with the image of the antagonist and the analytical image. The publisher's description also names the Cops in the Head and their antibodies, the screen image and the image of the future we are afraid of, and Sullivan & Blatner place the Cops in the Head, the Rainbow of Desire technique and the screen image in this phase. These techniques explore the subtext and externalise the internal oppressors; the protagonist may accept or reject the group's interpretations. [source: Internet Archive and TUM records; Routledge description; Sullivan & Blatner 2006] [uncertain: the catalogue contents notes stop after the analytical image, so the full list and order of chapter 7 were not seen]
Extraversion techniques (ch. 8). The protagonist reruns the original scene with rehearsal variations the facilitator recommends, ending with a performance that includes strategies from the spect-actors' interventions. Breaking the oppression belongs here: it seeks closure by meeting the protagonist's desires and then reverses the protagonist and antagonist roles, borrowing from Moreno's psychodrama and sociodrama. [source: Routledge TOC (chapter 8); Sullivan & Blatner 2006] [uncertain: the techniques listed in chapter 8 were not seen]

2.3 Format, duration, movement between phases

Group: Rainbow work is done as an internal workshop with a group that has built trust over time and shares a common background. It is not done with a public audience. [source: Scalar, Art and Healing]
Length: Sullivan & Blatner describe the Cops in the Head as a lengthy process of 8 basic stages, about 3 hours for the full structure. [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006] [uncertain: no available source lists the eight stages]
Course length: none is prescribed in the sources used. Short "informational" workshops (one-off exposure with no follow-up) differ from longer "formation" courses. Use the longer, continuous format whenever introspective techniques are used with clients. [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, pp. 351–352, citing Nunes] [synthesis: preference for the continuous format]
Clinical session template [synthesis, partly grounded in Sullivan & Blatner's check-in, warm-up, de-roling and debrief]: (a) check-in and re-statement of the contract; (b) warm-up games, graded from low to higher exposure; (c) group image work (prospective); (d) choice of a protagonist, if the group is ready; (e) one introspective technique; (f) an optional extraversion replay; (g) de-roling; (h) sharing from identification and resonance, not advice; (i) grounding and closure. Allow 2.5–3 hours, with at least 20–30 minutes for (g)–(i).
Criteria for moving on [synthesis]: from games to images once the group plays without visible self-consciousness and consents to being sculpted and touched. From prospective to introspective work only once a stable group exists (several sessions in), no member is in acute crisis, and the chosen story resonates with several members, which is the basis of analogical induction. To extraversion once the protagonist can name at least one internal oppressor and one "antibody" and wants to try a change. Stop or step down a level whenever arousal exceeds what the protagonist can stay present with (see §4.G and §5).

2.4 Who may use it

TO itself has no regulated profession. Jokers learn through TO centres and practitioner courses: the Centre of Theatre of the Oppressed in Rio, the international TO network, UK companies such as Cardboard Citizens, and week-long Rainbow-and-Joker trainings for people already grounded in TO. [source: Wikipedia; Ulex course page]
Using Rainbow techniques as therapy, with clients and a clinical aim, belongs to trained arts psychotherapists. Examples: an HCPC-registered dramatherapist (BADth) in the UK, where "Dramatherapist" is an HCPC protected title [source: UK Regulated Professions Register, Arts Therapist]; a Registered Drama Therapist (RDT) credentialed by NADTA in North America [source: NADTA RDT page]; or a certified psychodramatist (ABE/ASGPP) [uncertain: certification details unverified], ideally with specific TO and Joker training as well. A Joker without clinical training should not run introspective techniques with clinical populations unless a clinician co-facilitates. [synthesis] Practitioners in the field point the same way. Spry advises Jokers to say plainly that the setting is theatre, not therapy. Cecília Boal argues that mental-health work needs a team and continuity of care. Blatner notes that psychodrama demands far more expertise than running a Rainbow session. [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, pp. 350–351; Sullivan & Blatner 2006]
Physical safety [synthesis]: clear the floor of trip hazards, provide space for running and blind games, plan an accessible route for wheelchair users, and keep masks and props clean and non-toxic. Image work involves sculpting other people by touch (Image Theatre is described as forming statues by touch), so the consent steps in §4.G apply. [source for the touch element: Wikipedia]

3. Guiding principles

Spect-actor, not spectator. Everyone may step in and act. Practical meaning: build in invitations for any member to take a role or reshape an image, and never perform for the group. [source: Wikipedia]
Theatre as rehearsal for action. Practical meaning: end each piece of work with something the protagonist can try in life, not just an insight. [source: Wikipedia; McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
The cop is in the head, its headquarters outside. Practical meaning: as you externalise an inner critic, also ask where in family, institution or society it was learned, and do not pathologise the person. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
First-person plural. Boal contrasted TO's "we" with psychodrama's "I". Practical meaning: choose stories that resonate with several members, and use the group's images to show the shared pattern. [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 348]
Osmosis, metaxis, analogical induction. Practical meaning: look for absorbed values (osmosis); keep the image clearly a theatrical image so the protagonist can act on it (metaxis); always generalise from the one story to the many (induction). [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, pp. 342–343]
The aesthetic space. It brings past and hidden material close and lets images bypass habitual censorship. Practical meaning: let bodies speak before explanations, and look at an image before interpreting it. Meaning often emerges once the image is built and viewed from a step back. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017; Scalar]
Identification, recognition, resonance. Players need one of these links to a role. Practical meaning: before casting, ask whether the person identifies with the role, recognises someone in it, or feels it resonate, and cast accordingly. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Sympathy over empathic absorption. Practical meaning: keep the group able to see the situation from more than one viewpoint, and do not let the room sink into one person's feeling. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Catharsis removes blocks to desire. Practical meaning: the aim is unblocking the will to act, not emotional discharge for its own sake. Do not push for tears. [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 344; McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Desire has colours. Any desire is a mixture, usually with one colour dominant. Practical meaning: separate the strands of an ambivalent wish into distinct figures before working on them. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Surprise and admiration are the transformative emotions. Practical meaning: watch for, and name, the moment the protagonist is surprised by something they had normalised. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
The protagonist chooses. The protagonist usually picks the spect-actors for the roles. Practical meaning: give them casting and veto power. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017; Dwyer 2007, p. 3]
The Joker is not dogmatic. The Joker is a mediator who returns questions to the group, but holds real power and responsibility whatever the ideal says. Practical meaning: offer hypotheses as questions and own your influence on what the protagonist attends to. [source: Ulex course page; Oliveira & Araújo 2012, pp. 344, 348–349; Dwyer 2007, pp. 9–10]
Voluntary participation. For the analytical image, Boal warned facilitators to check whether the participant wants to take part. Practical meaning: consent is renewed at every escalation, not given once. [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 350, fn. 7]
Be clear about the frame. Practical meaning: state whether the session is theatre or therapy, that participants are responsible for what they bring, and that they should take on only what they feel ready for. [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 350, citing Spry]
Do no new oppression. Careless use can recreate the oppression the work opposes. Practical meaning: watch for the Joker, the group or the antagonist actor dominating, shaming or exposing a protagonist. [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 352, citing Bezerra]
Trauma-informed overlay [synthesis]: safety, choice, collaboration and pacing come before depth. Work in the present and future tense of the scene (Blatner notes the Rainbow's present and future focus, compared with psychodrama's attention to the past) [source for the focus: Sullivan & Blatner 2006], and do not enact the original traumatic event itself.
Techniques serve people. Boal ends the book by saying the techniques were "invented to be useful to people", not to make people fit the techniques. Practical meaning: adapt, shorten or drop any technique that does not suit this client or group. [source: Boal 1995, p. 188, quoted in Dwyer 2007]
The actor's process is the bridge to therapy. Boal grounds the analogy with therapy in the actor's movement between the "here and now" and the "then and there", and argues that if an actor can become a sick person, a sick person can in turn become a healthy actor. Practical meaning: keep the client in the actor's position, playing a role in the present, rather than reliving the past. [source: Boal 1995, pp. 23–27, 39, as summarised in Dwyer 2007] [synthesis: practical meaning]
Observe the protagonist observing. Practical meaning: while others play the scene, watch where the protagonist looks, for how long and how their body moves, and offer these observations back afterwards so they can recognise what they did. [source: Boal 1995, p. 98, quoted in Dwyer 2007]

4. Intervention inventory

Key to depth. The available sources describe many Rainbow techniques only by purpose or in outline. Steps marked [synthesis] are the writer's operational sequence, consistent with the published description but not Boal's text. Techniques known only by name are listed as such and are not given invented procedures. Unless stated otherwise, all example wording is illustrative.

A. The wider TO framework

A1. Games and exercises ("de-mechanisation")

Purpose / when: opens every session. Games free bodies made rigid and alienated by everyday routine, and they are the first step in turning spectators into actors, starting with knowing one's own body. [source: Bezerra et al. 2022, pp. 36, 38] With clients, games also serve as a graded exposure ladder and as a way to read arousal before deeper work. [synthesis]
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Start with non-contact, low-exposure movement (walking the space, changing tempo). (2) Move on to games in pairs. (3) Add touch only once touch has been consented to (see G2). (4) Use eyes-closed or "blind" games only with a sighted guide, a clear stop signal and a cleared floor. (5) Debrief briefly on what each body noticed.
Example language (illustrative): "Notice which movements feel natural and which feel strange. The strange ones are the habits we're loosening."
Watch for: freezing, giggling that tips into distress, avoidance of eye contact, startle during blind games. Working well looks like looser posture, spontaneous laughter and people volunteering. [synthesis] Boal's game categories, as Sullivan & Blatner report them: feeling what we touch; listening to what we hear; dynamising several senses; seeing what we look at; and the memory of the senses. Their list of workshop warm-ups includes gravity and equilibrium, rhythmic movement, walks and massages, multi-sensory games, sound and beat routines, voice and breathing, mirroring, mask and ritual, and sensory or emotional memory. [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006] Use these categories to grade the ladder above: looking, listening and memory games need little contact, while touch and massage games need the consent steps in G2. [synthesis] [uncertain: the categories come from Boal's Games for Actors and Non-Actors; individual games are not described here]

A2. Image Theatre and Forum Theatre

These two trunk forms have their own implementation guide (item 119, Image Theatre and Forum Theatre), which covers the statue-building, dynamising and forum procedures in full. In brief, Image Theatre builds silent statues of a situation, sculpted by touch, while Forum Theatre plays a short scene of unresolved oppression and invites spect-actors to replace the protagonist and test alternatives, with the Joker running the forum. [source: Wikipedia; Bezerra et al. 2022, p. 25; Sullivan & Blatner 2006] The Rainbow of Desire is built on Image Theatre, so read that guide first. [source: Wikipedia; Ulex course page]

A3. Simultaneous dramaturgy

Purpose / when: the precursor of Forum Theatre. Boal developed it with peasant groups in Peru: professional actors staged a participant's story of oppression and performed the solutions the audience suggested. [source: Sarapeck 2016, p. 48] Use it when a group is not yet ready to come on stage but can propose solutions. [synthesis]
Steps: actors play the story; the audience proposes what the protagonist should do, and the actors perform each proposal. [source: Sarapeck 2016, p. 48] Playing the scene up to its crisis and stopping there before taking proposals is reported only in a secondary summary. [source: Wikipedia] [uncertain: secondary, unverified] Then process which proposals felt realistic and why. [synthesis]
Example language (illustrative): "Stop! What should she try? Tell the actors and they'll play it."
Watch for: proposals that are magical rather than realistic. Test each one in the improvisation instead of debating it. [synthesis]

A4. Newspaper Theatre

Purpose / when: the first form Boal developed, while directing the Teatro de Arena in São Paulo. It is a set of techniques for staging news stories so as to expose what manipulative headlines hide; the same techniques can be applied to magazines, radio, television and the internet. [source: Sarapeck 2016, p. 48] Clinically it suits groups whose distress is tied to public events (e.g. racism, housing, migration). [synthesis: clinical indication]
The strategies as reported: simple reading, crossed reading, complementary reading, rhythmical reading, parallel action, improvisation, historical, reinforcement, concretion of the abstract, and text out of context. [source: Wikipedia] [uncertain: secondary, unverified; the Rio centre's account counts eleven techniques (Sarapeck 2016, p. 48), so this ten-item list may be incomplete, and the detailed procedure for each is not given here] A later practice manual uses its own names for comparable techniques (e.g. basic story, story out of context, story with missing information, parallel action, contradictory stories, historical approach) and says plainly that its terms differ from Boal's. [source: Tudorache 2021, pp. 10, 25–35]
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Pick a short, non-graphic news item. (2) Apply one strategy, e.g. read the item aloud while others act out what it leaves out ("parallel action"). (3) Discuss what changed in meaning.
Watch for: items that directly mirror a member's trauma. Screen content beforehand. [synthesis] Any facts added to an item must come from reliable sources, not guesses; everyone may decline to take part or simply watch; avoid humour on topics such as rape, murder or child abuse; check that the scene neither glorifies the oppression nor blames the oppressed. The same manual does not recommend the form for complete newcomers. [source: Tudorache 2021, pp. 23, 28–29, 70–72]

A5. Invisible Theatre

What it is: a scene played in a public place without revealing that it is theatre. It is controversial and often compared to pranks and happenings. [source: Bezerra et al. 2022, pp. 23–24]
Clinical use: not suitable for therapy groups. The bystanders involved cannot consent, and client-actors may face real confrontation. If a group wants it, refer them to an experienced TO company. [synthesis]

A6. Legislative Theatre

What it is: developed while Boal was a Rio de Janeiro city councillor (1992–1996); a form like Forum Theatre but aimed directly at the policies and laws that could solve the problems shown. [source: Britannica] In outline: a short play on an issue ends in a crisis; spect-actors replace characters and try solutions; the group then identifies policies or laws that would make those solutions possible, and in some versions a mock legislature debates bills drafted from the suggestions. During Boal's term, 19 permanent TO groups in Rio led to 30 pieces of proposed legislation, 13 of which became law. [source: Mitchell, Beautiful Trouble] "Legislative Theatre turned the citizen into a legislator." [source: Sarapeck 2016, p. 49, our translation]
Clinical use: a community and advocacy step beyond the therapy group. A clinician can link a service-user group to it, e.g. to influence service policy, but should not combine it with personal disclosure work in the same session. [synthesis]

A7. Aesthetics of the Oppressed (roots: sound, word, image)

What it is: Boal's late work, forming the roots of the Tree, in three strands (sound, image and word). Its premise is that everyone can make art: write poems, create melodies, paint. Its aim is to use these sensory languages against oppression. [source: Sarapeck 2016, p. 49] Boal set out the theory in The Aesthetics of the Oppressed (Routledge, 2006), a book of theory, essays and accounts of projects. [source: Hodson 2007] [uncertain: the exercises themselves are not described in the sources used, so they are not detailed here]

B. Rainbow preliminaries

B1. Improvisation with a protagonist

Purpose / when: the raw material for every Rainbow technique: a real, current scene from a protagonist's life. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017; Sullivan & Blatner 2006]
Steps: (1) The protagonist briefly describes a recent, specific scene in which they wanted something and were blocked. (2) The protagonist chooses spect-actors for the other roles. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017; Dwyer 2007, p. 3] (3) Brief the actors in a few sentences. (4) Improvise the scene once without stopping. [synthesis: steps 1, 3, 4]
Example language (illustrative): "Choose a moment from the last few months, not your worst memory. Who's in it? Pick someone here to play them."
Watch for: a protagonist choosing an old trauma scene, or a scene with a present-day abuser. Redirect to a more recent, lower-intensity scene (see G1, G3). [synthesis]

B2. Identification, recognition and resonance (casting and selection check)

Purpose: players relate to a role through identification ("this is me"), recognition ("I know someone like this") or resonance (vague feelings it awakens). [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Steps [synthesis]: after the story is told, ask the group to raise hands for each of the three. Cast actors who recognise or resonate with a role, and avoid casting someone who identifies too closely with an abusive antagonist. A strong group response suggests the story is a good choice for collective work (analogical induction).
Example language (illustrative): "Who recognises someone in this story? Who feels something stir, even if you can't say why?"

B3. The modes (ways of replaying a scene)

Use a mode after the first improvisation to bring out what the scene hides. Reported modes [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]:

Normal: played as lived. Two desires collide and reach a crisis, which is also an opportunity.
Breaking the oppression: replayed as it could have happened, with the protagonist changing it.
Stop and think: the Joker calls "stop" and the actors focus on what they are avoiding.
Softly, softly: slow and quiet, to invite reflection.
Lightning forum: a rapid burst of possible responses.
Agora: actors represent different desires or parts of the protagonist and debate them.
Fair: many improvisations at once around the room, which reduces the pressure of being watched. In one published account, pairs improvise while the protagonist watches. Boal tells the director to "observe the protagonist observing the couples": which pair she watches, for how long, and how her body moves, fed back afterwards so she can recognise what she did. [source also: Dwyer 2007, p. 9, quoting Boal 1995, p. 98] [uncertain: that the p. 98 instruction belongs to this mode is inferred from Dwyer's account]
Three wishes: the protagonist changes the situation by three wishes. This often shows a wish to escape rather than an affirmative desire.
Dissociation ("disassociation" in the source): actors voice inner thoughts all at once, then speak to each other, then act without words.
Playing to the deaf: the whole scene is performed without words.
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Name the mode and demonstrate it for ten seconds. (2) Replay the same scene in that mode. (3) Ask the protagonist what they noticed that the normal mode hid. Use at most two or three modes per scene.
Example language (illustrative): "Same scene, but in total silence. Let your bodies say what the words were covering."
Watch for: Stop and think and Dissociation bring hidden thoughts out quickly. With a fragile protagonist, prefer Fair, which lowers exposure, or Playing to the deaf, which needs no verbal disclosure. [synthesis]

B4. The four catharses

Named as the fourth preliminary in the book (ch. 5). Boal's catharsis aims to remove the blocks on a person's desire to act, not the desire itself. Oliveira & Araújo contrast Aristotelian catharsis (relief and emotional discharge in spectators), Morenian catharsis (a therapeutic effect in the actors as well as the spectators) and Boal's catharsis (removing the blocks to liberating action), and discuss Moreno's integration catharsis separately. [source: Internet Archive TOC; Oliveira & Araújo 2012, pp. 344–345, 347; McLaverty-Robinson 2017] [uncertain: this is the article's comparison, not Boal's list; the four catharses as the book names them were not seen]

C. Prospective techniques (book order)

These work outward from a scene and its relationships. They suit groups early in the Rainbow process because exposure is shared across the group. [source: TOC order; Sullivan & Blatner 2006] [synthesis: the exposure rationale]

C1. The image of the images

Purpose / when: links the individual image to the collective level. Use it after several people have imaged the same theme, or after Rashomon, to combine the perspectives. The links can show characters following separate storylines. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017; Sullivan & Blatner 2006]
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Several participants each sculpt their own image of the theme or scene. (2) The Joker asks the group to merge or connect these images into one composite. (3) Everyone walks round the composite. (4) Ask what the whole shows that no single image did.
Example language (illustrative): "We have five separate pictures of 'being ignored'. Make them into one picture without losing any of them."
Watch for: the protagonist recognising their image inside a common pattern. A relaxing of shame ("it's not just me") suggests the technique is working. [synthesis]

C2. The image of the word

Purpose / when: a quick way into a theme. Participants make an image of a word. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Steps [synthesis]: the Joker says a word (e.g. "family", "work", "respect"). Everyone instantly makes a body image of it, without thinking. Look at a few, then ask which images recur.
Example language (illustrative): "On three, your body's first answer to the word 'home'. Don't plan it."
Watch for: words that are trauma cues for members, such as "father" in a group of abuse survivors. Choose words with the group or screen them in advance. [synthesis]

C3. Image and counter-image

Purpose / when: named by the publisher among the book's key exercises. McLaverty-Robinson describes pairs of images in which the protagonist exchanges places with another actor. [source: Routledge description; McLaverty-Robinson 2017] [uncertain: whether that description refers to this technique]
Steps [synthesis]: (1) The protagonist sculpts an image of the relationship. (2) The other party, through their actor, sculpts a counter-image of the same relationship. (3) The protagonist steps into the other's place in each image. (4) Process the contrast.
Watch for: distress when the protagonist stands in a hostile figure's position. Offer to watch from outside instead (see G5). [synthesis]

C4. The kaleidoscopic image

Purpose / when: the protagonist sees many perspectives on their own scene. After a scene, participants each image their own response to it, and the protagonist views these images. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Steps [synthesis]: (1) The protagonist's scene is shown. (2) Each member makes an image of what they felt or saw. (3) The protagonist walks among the images in silence. (4) The protagonist names one that surprised them.
Example language (illustrative): "Don't explain. Just walk around and let these pictures tell you how your story landed."
Watch for: images that judge rather than respond. Ask makers to image their response, not a verdict on the protagonist. [synthesis]

C5. The images of the image

Purpose / when: several images are made from a single scene, each from a different participant's point of view. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Steps [synthesis]: as in C4, but each participant re-sculpts the protagonist's own image as they perceive it, using the actors, rather than imaging their own reaction.

C6. The projected image

Purpose / when: participants project their own feelings onto an image. It builds group resonance and lets members work on their own material at one remove. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017] [synthesis: the clinical rationale]
Steps [synthesis]: (1) One image is shown, often the protagonist's. (2) Members say aloud, or show in a body, what they project into it from their own lives. (3) The protagonist hears which projections fit and which do not.
Watch for: members disclosing more than they intended. Keep projections brief and in the present tense. [synthesis]

C7. The image of the hour

Named in the book as the seventh prospective technique. [source: Internet Archive and TUM contents records] [uncertain: no available source describes the procedure, so no steps are given]

C8. The ritual gesture

Purpose / when: shows the oppression built into everyday rituals. An everyday ritual is enacted and stopped at a vital point, and others take it up or reinterpret it. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Steps [synthesis]: (1) The protagonist chooses a daily ritual (e.g. arriving home, a family meal). (2) Actors play it. (3) The Joker freezes it at the key gesture. (4) Other members step in and continue or reinterpret the gesture. (5) The protagonist chooses which version to keep exploring.
Example language (illustrative): "Freeze. That small gesture: what is it really saying? Who wants to take it somewhere else?"

C9. Rituals and masks

Purpose / when: social roles are magnified as exaggerated masks to reveal the role a person is trapped in. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Steps [synthesis]: actors take the mask (face, posture, voice) of a social role in the ritual and exaggerate it step by step. The group names the role. The protagonist tries the ritual without the mask.
Materials: if physical masks are used, give each person their own or clean them between users, and let anyone decline to wear one. [synthesis]

C10–C14. The multiple image of oppression; Multiple images of happiness; The rotating image; The image of transition; The image of the group

Named in the book as prospective techniques 10–14, in this order. [source: Internet Archive and TUM contents records] The secondary sources add two points. Images can be used to create multiple views of oppression, of solutions to it, or of happiness, which matches the two "multiple image" techniques in outline only [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]. The outcome of Rashomon can be used for an Image of Transition between the Real and the Ideal images, the same Real / Transitional / Ideal frame used to process the Cops in the Head (D1) [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006]. [uncertain: Boal's procedures for all five are not described in any available source, so no steps are given; do not improvise them and present them as Boal's]

C15. Rashomon

Purpose / when: shows one situation from several characters' viewpoints. It is the culminating prospective technique. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017; Sullivan & Blatner 2006]
Steps (1–5 per Sullivan & Blatner; detail and step 6 [synthesis]): (1) Improvise the scene. (2) The protagonist makes a relational image of each character as they experience them, based on power, e.g. the boss as a towering figure. (3) Re-improvise the scene with each actor staying inside that physical "mask". (4) Each other character, through their actor, repeats the process from their own point of view, and the scene is replayed from it. (5) The group builds an image of the images (C1) combining elements of every viewpoint; this can lead into an image of transition between the Real and the Ideal (C10–C14). (6) Share.
Example language (illustrative): "Show us your mother as you felt her in that moment. Not as she is, as she felt. Now play the scene from inside that shape."
Watch for: the protagonist feeling ganged up on when other viewpoints are shown. Frame the other images as information, not verdicts. It is working when the protagonist sees a new option, or sees the other person's constraint. [synthesis]

D. Introspective techniques

These carry the highest exposure in the Rainbow. Use them only after the readiness criteria in §2.3, with one protagonist per session and renewed consent at each stage. [synthesis]

D1. The Cops in the Head and their antibodies

Purpose / when: to externalise the internalised oppressors ("cops", or "ghosts") that stop the protagonist acting in a specific scene, and to find allies against them. It is the central Rainbow technique. [source: Bezerra et al. 2022, p. 25; Routledge description; McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Steps (elements per the sources; order and detail [synthesis]):
1. The protagonist tells and briefly improvises a scene in which they wanted to act but did not. [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006; McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
2. The protagonist names the inner voices that stopped them and sculpts each as a body image, a "speaking sculpture", using group members. [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006]
3. The protagonist testifies to the images about the past each one comes from (who said it, where it was learned). [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
4. The images come to life: each cop speaks its line and moves, and the cops interact with the protagonist and with each other. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017; Sullivan & Blatner 2006]
5. Group members who recognise further cops may add them, with the protagonist's agreement. [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006; McLaverty-Robinson 2017] [synthesis: the agreement requirement]
6. Others step in as antibodies, allies who try to subvert a particular cop. The protagonist tries strategies against each cop. [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006; McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
7. Process the work as Real, Transitional and Ideal sculptures: how it is, how it could move, how it would be. [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006]
8. De-role every cop and antibody and share (G4–G6). [synthesis] Sullivan & Blatner call the full form "a lengthy process involving 8 basic stages", about three hours in all. [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006] [uncertain: no available source lists Boal's eight stages, so the sequence above assembles the reported elements and is not Boal's numbering]
Example language (illustrative): "Who was in your head at the moment you went quiet? Give that voice a body. Put them where you feel them, close or far, above or behind." "Who in the room knows this cop? Will someone come in as an antibody?"
Watch for: the cop being a literal abuser rather than an internalised voice. In that case keep the cop at a distance, as a symbolic posture with no touching, or stop (see §5). [synthesis] Cops should reveal ideological influences, not personal quirks: aim at the ideology behind each cop rather than at a particular individual. [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006; Steedman 2012] The technique can also be used to analyse passive "silent witnesses" in the scene. [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006] Surprise and admiration are the emotions Boal links to transformation [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]. Signs it is working: the protagonist voluntarily moves closer to the action, laughs at a cop, or chooses an antibody. [synthesis]

D2. The Rainbow of Desire (the technique)

Purpose / when: for a protagonist with mixed or contradictory desires towards one person or situation. The desire is "split into its colours": separate images, each a different strand of the desire. They dialogue with one another and are then recombined, usually with one colour dominant. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Improvise the scene. (2) The protagonist sculpts, using different members, a separate image for each feeling or desire present (e.g. love, fear, anger, duty). (3) The protagonist arranges the images according to how strongly they are present. (4) The images dialogue with one another. (5) The protagonist rearranges the colours as they would like them. (6) Replay the scene with the antagonist facing the new arrangement.
Example language (illustrative): "If your wish to leave were a rainbow, what colours would be in it? Give each colour its own body."
Watch for: a protagonist trying to delete a "bad" colour. Work on proportion and relationship instead of elimination. [synthesis]

D3. The screen image

Purpose / when: named by the publisher among the key exercises. It examines the projections two people hold of each other: the images each "screens" onto the other. [source: Routledge description; McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Steps [synthesis]: (1) The protagonist makes an image of how they see the other person. (2) The protagonist makes an image of how they believe the other sees them. (3) The actors interact as these projected images, not as the real people. (4) Process the gap between person and projection.
Example language (illustrative): "This isn't your partner. It's the picture of your partner you carry. Let's see how the picture behaves."

D4. The image of the antagonist

Listed as the first introspective technique. [source: TOC] [uncertain: procedure not described in the available sources, so no steps are given]

D5. The analytical image

Purpose / when: for a protagonist who does not understand what is happening to them. Oliveira & Araújo call it one of the most complex techniques in the TO arsenal, with nine stages, built on improvisations to which all participants contribute so that the protagonist can see and hear more clearly what stays hidden in the story. [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 350, fn. 7, citing Boal 2002, pp. 161–169] Boal advised the facilitator to consider whether the participant wants to take part. [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 350, citing Bezerra] The oppressive situation is caricatured and then shown being transformed towards liberation, and observers discourage the protagonist from sliding back. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017] [uncertain: the nine stages themselves were not seen]
Published example: in a workshop described by Dwyer, participants modelled images of an antagonist's "strong points" and the protagonist's "weak points". The protagonist settled into a face-down pose and played the scene from it in a "dynamisation". When the director said "You can change the image if you want to!", he stayed still. Dwyer notes that the technique assumes the protagonist will find what he sees intolerable and want to change. [source: Dwyer 2007, pp. 3, 7]
Steps [synthesis; not Boal's nine stages]: (1) Get explicit consent for an analysis-heavy technique. (2) Group members make images of different aspects of each party (e.g. the antagonist's strengths, the protagonist's weaknesses). (3) Dynamise the images in the scene. (4) Invite change. (5) If the protagonist does not change, stop dynamising and explore the not-changing (see §5).
Watch for: collapse postures (prone, curled up) held for long periods. They signal shame or dissociation, not resistance. Bring the protagonist out of the image to witness position. [synthesis]

D6. The image of the future we are afraid of

Purpose / when: named by the publisher among the book's key exercises. McLaverty-Robinson reports a related "fear images" technique, in which participants image their social fears and the group selects images that synthesise shared fears. [source: Routledge description; McLaverty-Robinson 2017] [uncertain: whether these are the same technique]
Steps [synthesis]: each member images a feared future; the group selects or combines images expressing a shared fear; the group then works on the composite rather than on one person's fear.
Watch for: suicidal or catastrophic content. Assess this outside the image (see §5). [synthesis]

D7. Contradictory images

Purpose / when: multiple images of the same person or character, to hold contradictions without forcing a single view. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017] [synthesis: steps as for C5, using one character]

E. Extraversion techniques

E1. Breaking the oppression (replay)

Purpose / when: the closing phase. The protagonist reruns the original scene using what the prospective and introspective work revealed, recreating it as it could have happened. Sullivan & Blatner describe it as seeking closure by meeting the protagonist's desires, followed by a reversal of the protagonist and antagonist roles (E2). [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006; McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Steps [synthesis]: (1) Recap the antibodies and insights. (2) Replay the scene with the same antagonist actor, who is told to resist realistically but not overwhelmingly. (3) Stop after the first real change and anchor it in the body. (4) The protagonist names one action to try in life.
Example language (illustrative): "Same room, same boss. What's the first thing you'll do differently? Show us, don't tell us."

E2. Role reversal with the antagonist

Purpose / when: part of Breaking the oppression in the extraversion phase, which Sullivan & Blatner say borrows from Moreno's psychodrama and sociodrama. The protagonist plays the antagonist to grasp that person's logic. [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006]
Steps [synthesis]: swap places physically. The protagonist speaks one or two lines as the antagonist, then swaps back. Keep it brief, and do not reverse with an abuser in trauma work.

F. Rainbow games

F1. Improvising the opposite of one's own personality

Purpose: loosens fixed self-images. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Steps [synthesis]: in pairs, each person plays briefly in the manner opposite to their usual one (e.g. a shy person plays a domineering one), then reflects on what felt available.

F2. The childhood-idol game

Purpose: participants act the role they wanted to be as a child, and spectators guess the desire behind it. [source: McLaverty-Robinson 2017]
Watch for: grief about lost childhood. Keep it playful and offer a light, short form. [synthesis]

G. Group-enactment safety procedures for clinical use [synthesis throughout unless stated]

The Rainbow sources describe a check-in and warm-up, role protection, de-roling of antagonists and a debrief [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006], but no formal screening or safeguards against retraumatisation [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006; Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 350]. The procedures below are offered for clinical practice.

G1. Screening and contracting

Steps: individual pre-group interview covering: current mental state and risk (suicidality, self-harm, psychosis, mania, dissociative disorder, active substance misuse); recent or ongoing trauma; current abusive relationships or court proceedings; physical limitations; consent to touch; goals; support outside the group. Postpone introspective work for anyone in acute crisis, with unstable PTSD or a dissociative disorder, in active psychosis, or currently living with violence; offer prospective and game work or individual therapy instead. Agree a written contract: confidentiality and its limits, the right to pass, the stop signal, what happens if someone is distressed, the frame ("this is therapy" or "this is theatre", per Spry's advice to make the frame explicit [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 350]), and access to follow-up.
Example language (illustrative): "You can say 'pass' to any exercise, and you never need to explain why."

G2. Touch consent in image work

Steps: before any sculpting, demonstrate touch as a request ("May I move your arm?"), allowing verbal or gestural moulding as an alternative. Agree no-touch zones, with genital and breast areas always off-limits. Let people opt out of being touched or sculpted at any time. Pay attention to cultural and gender norms. Offer "mirror sculpting", where the sculptor shows the shape and the statue copies it, as a no-touch default.

G3. Pacing and titration

Steps: use present-day scenes over past trauma scenes; use symbolic rather than literal antagonists; keep distance between cop images and the protagonist; prefer group-exposure modes (Fair, Kaleidoscopic) before single-protagonist modes; agree a 0–10 distress check, pausing at the protagonist's agreed threshold; spend no more than one introspective technique per session; leave time for closure.

G4. De-roling

Steps: at the end of every enactment, each actor steps out of the image, physically shakes off the posture, says their own name and one true thing about themself that differs from the role, and returns any prop or position. The protagonist looks at each actor and names them as themselves. Give special care to whoever played the antagonist or a cop, so the group sees the actor is not the oppressor and appreciates the difficult role. [source for antagonist de-roling: Sullivan & Blatner 2006]
Example language (illustrative): "I'm not your father. I'm Sam, and I'm hungry and want my tea."

G5. Sharing

Steps: after de-roling, members share what resonated from their own lives (identification, recognition, resonance), not interpretation or advice. Actors share what it was like to hold the role. The Joker asks how participants felt and what worked. [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006 (debrief); framing synthesis]

G6. Closure and grounding

Steps: a closing circle with a one-word check-out, a grounding exercise (feet, breath, naming objects in the room), a check that the protagonist has a plan for the next 24 hours, and, after heavy sessions, a brief individual check-in before people leave or within 48 hours. Note who needs follow-up. Workshops can "shake certain structures" and need follow-up support. [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 351, citing Nunes]

5. Handling problems

The available sources offer few explicit responses to clinical problems. Unless a source is cited, the guidance below is [synthesis].

Overwhelm or retraumatisation mid-enactment (flooding, freezing, dissociation, panic, flashback). (1) Stop the scene with the agreed signal: "Freeze, everyone step back." (2) Remove the cop or antagonist images from the protagonist's space first. (3) Ground the protagonist in the present: name the date, the room and the people as themselves, press feet into the floor, slow the breath. (4) Move them to witness position beside you, looking at the scene from outside. (5) De-role every actor at once (G4). (6) Do not resume the same scene that session; offer a stabilising image, such as an image of an ally or a safe place. (7) Follow up individually the same day and review the plan for the next 24 hours. (8) Reassess at the next screening whether introspective work suits this person now.
Group members triggered by someone else's work. Before starting, agree that anyone may step out and that a co-facilitator will follow them. Hold a brief check-in during sharing, and offer one-to-one contact afterwards. Use resonance in the sharing as material, but not as a second enactment that same night.
Disclosure of current abuse, a risk to others, or safeguarding concerns. Leave the theatrical frame, speak privately and follow your service's safeguarding procedure and duty-to-report. Images and scenes are never evidence of abuse in themselves, but a verbal disclosure is acted on as a disclosure.
Suicidal or self-harm content in images (e.g. in the feared-future image, D6). Pause, and assess risk afterwards in person using standard practice: ideation, intent, plan, history, protective factors and a safety plan. Do not explore method in the image. Agree on follow-up.
Protagonist does not change the image (e.g. stays prone, as in Dwyer's example). Dwyer notes that the technique assumes the protagonist will find the image intolerable and want to change [source: Dwyer 2007, p. 7]. Treat staying still as communication. Bring the protagonist out to witness position, ask what keeping the image still protects, invite an antibody to come to them rather than demanding they move, or close with the Real image accepted as "for now".
Stuck or flat scenes. Change mode (B3): Playing to the deaf when words are defended, Stop and think when the action is avoided, Fair when being watched inhibits the protagonist. Or switch from introspective work back to a prospective technique (Rashomon, kaleidoscopic image) so the group carries the work.
Resistance to games or to being looked at. Initial resistance to warm-ups is common, so introduce warm-ups gradually [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006]. Offer witness roles, such as sculptor, observer or person who names images, as full participation. Never coerce anyone onto the stage.
Protagonist wants to enact an original trauma or a present abuser literally. Redirect to a present-day scene that has a similar "cop", use a symbolic posture for the abuser without voice or touch, keep distance, or refer for individual trauma-focused therapy first.
The actor playing the antagonist or a cop is overwhelmed or over-identifies. Avoid casting novices and spect-actors in roles that attract strong hostility, and use experienced, grounded actors for antagonists [source: Sullivan & Blatner 2006]. If it happens, stop, de-role thoroughly and give that actor time in sharing.
Group turns on the antagonist actor, or shames the protagonist ("new oppression"). Careless use can create new oppressions [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 352]. Restate the frame, reflect the dynamic aloud as a group image if that is useful, and re-establish the right to pass.
Joker over-directing, interpretation drift and transference. The director works from hypotheses and shapes what the protagonist attends to, and Boal's text does not discuss this asymmetry or transference [source: Dwyer 2007, pp. 9–10]. Offer hypotheses as questions, check them with the protagonist, take supervision, and note transference to the Joker in your clinical notes.
Psychologising social problems. Forum scenes tend to psychologise social problems, and the Rainbow openly takes the therapeutic route [source: Bezerra et al. 2022, pp. 25–26]. To keep both levels, ask "where are the cop's headquarters?" and offer Forum or Legislative routes (A2, A6) for structural problems such as racism, poverty or workplace abuse.
Ruptures with the protagonist (felt exposed, misread or pushed). Name the rupture, apologise for your part, ask what they needed instead, and agree changes to pacing or consent. Offer a one-to-one session.
Non-attendance or dropping out after a heavy session. Contact the person directly. Check whether the last session left something unprocessed, and offer an individual session or a lower-exposure role on return.
One-off workshops with no follow-up. One-off workshops can expose participants without follow-up, and participants may lack the knowledge to judge their own risk [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, pp. 350–352]. In one-off formats, do not use introspective techniques; restrict the session to games, prospective images and Forum work.
Mental health inpatient or community settings. Work as a team with continuity of care [source: Oliveira & Araújo 2012, p. 351, citing Cecília Boal]. Coordinate with the treating team, agree on contraindications, and record each session.
Children and young people. Get parental or carer consent and the child's own assent, renewed at each activity. Know local safeguarding and mandatory-reporting duties. Use prospective and game work with fictional or third-person scenes rather than the child's own family conflict. Use no cop images of carers. Sessions should be shorter and include more play. Two adults should always be present, and touch should be minimal and always invited.
Physical injury or touch complaints. Stop the activity, attend to the person, document it, and review your consent procedure (G2). Offer the complainant a route to raise it with the service.

Sources

Pages used

Books cited

Boal, A. (1995). The Rainbow of Desire: The Boal Method of Theatre and Therapy (A. Jackson, Trans.). London and New York: Routledge. Routledge's page gives 1st edition, ©1994, released 14 December 1994, 216 pp.; the TUM, WorldCat and Internet Archive records give 1995, xxvi + 188 pp. Cited through its contents lists, the publisher description and passages quoted by Dwyer (2007) [uncertain for body text].
Boal, A. (1993). Theater of the Oppressed. New York: Theatre Communications Group. Cited via Wikipedia's references. [uncertain]
Boal, A. (2002). O arco-íris do desejo: método Boal de teatro e terapia. Rio de Janeiro: Civilização Brasileira. Cited via Oliveira & Araújo (2012).
Boal, A. Games for Actors and Non-Actors (A. Jackson, Trans.). London: Routledge. Game categories cited via Sullivan & Blatner (2006). [uncertain: edition]

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