Twenty-Six
It costs me to share what happened in my time at Circle in the Square — both in the summer program and then the two-year program. I share it to make sure this side of the systemic power abuse is heard, acknowledged, and addressed and specifically that Ken Schatz is permanently removed from faculty and not allowed to set foot in the school again, particularly for the protection of the underaged women there. I also share it so those who have also been abused by him know they are not alone.
I share the experience of my rape at Circle in the Square because the occurrence of my rape is part of the culture at Circle in the Square where violence, assault, sexual assault and rape are too common of occurrences during rehearsals on and off campus. My letter is not the first to address this and I am sure will not be the last. Again, I share so that those who also survived violence while at Circle in the Square know they are not alone. It wasn't our fault. This is the culture that was embraced, enforced, hidden and that faculty and administration actively practiced gaslighting around.
This is my story:
I was a teenager my entire time at Circle in the Square.
I was raped my first year by a fellow student during a rehearsal for a rape scene.
I was 18.
My rapist's excuse was: he was doing what the school taught us what acting was and that he had gotten lost in the role.
It took Circle in the Square a month to kick my rapist out.
During that month I was expected to continue to attend class and be around my rapist.
I had PTSD.
I was neither provided with nor steered toward any mental health support.
I was told to “use” what I was feeling in my acting work.
When I had flashbacks and panic attacks I was asked to leave class and was left alone to deal with them.
I was penalized for the amount of class I was missing and my “lack of participation” [my inability due to my PTSD]
In my second year final project I was cast with my rapist's at-that-time girlfriend who had turned half the school against me when I reported him. I was told we were cast together because the teacher thought it would add some exciting conflict and energy to the play. It was re-traumatizing and caused major setbacks in my healing.
The teacher I first confided the rape to was Ken Schatz — the physical acting teacher — 20 years my senior.
I confided in Ken Schatz first because Ken Schatz had been grooming me since he first met me in the Circle in the Square summer program when I was 16.
Ken Schatz began to pursue a sexual relationship with me in my second year of school stating it was “okay” since he was technically no longer my teacher for the second year.
Ken Schatz told me to tell no one because he had many student accusations against him already, particularly from underaged women, and it would tarnish his reputation further.
Circle in the Square was aware of these accusations before and after my time. They stayed silent, kept him employed, and enabled his abuse.
It took me over 10 years and someone else offering me the word “grooming” — a word I didn’t know — as a potential label for my experience, for me to finally understand what happened to me with Ken Schatz.
It took me this long because of the nature of grooming and the long-term impact it has.
I offer this definition from the NSPCC in case it helps someone else understand what happened to them: "Grooming is when someone builds a relationship, trust and emotional connection with a child or young person so they can manipulate, exploit and abuse them. Children and young people who are groomed can be sexually abused, exploited or trafficked.”— NSPCC
Ken Schatz reminded me often during the time I knew him that my brain wouldn’t fully develop till I was 25.
After I left Circle in the Square I dealt with ongoing PTSD, depression, panic attacks, flashbacks, anxiety, cutting, anorexia/bulimia, binge drinking, and suicidal ideation. I almost quit acting 5 years after graduating, despite some success. I was wildly frustrated that I still could not put the Circle in the Square acting techniques to use and often wound up re-traumatized when trying to use them. I continued to not be able to feel safe enough to do my work in any kind of power dynamic with white men — which in the current state of the business is almost always the power dynamic of a rehearsal/shoot/production/audition. I blamed myself.
Luckily, I had enough resilience to try to teach myself how to act all over again using a healthy acting technique. This took many years, a lot of money and a lot of grit. I was fortunate enough to have been able to stick with it. I am now finally confident in my craft, over a decade after graduating from the school that was supposed to give me these tools. I still have a deep distrust of white men in power in acting spaces and continue to struggle to be vulnerable — which is a huge part of our job as actors. After over a decade of therapy, healing, and relearning how to act, I still have panic attacks during auditions and I still lose jobs because of what happened to me at Circle in the Square Theatre School.