Nonprofit Leader: Rebecca Noon, Director of Community Engagement, Guthrie Theater

Article by Becky Fillinger, photo provided

Rebecca NoonGet to know Rebecca Noon, Director of Community Engagement for the Guthrie Theater. We talked to her about how she goes about building collaborations with community - individuals and groups - to support the Guthrie’s mission. Her authentic approach to work and building relationships is effective and inspiring - we predict she will lead the Guthrie to even greater levels of community engagement.  

Q:  What’s a typical day for you?  

A:  One thing I love is that there is no typical day. On a “full and productive” day, I may catch up on emails, research prospective community partners, read a play that the Guthrie is considering for a future season, attend meetings with community members, attend internal committee meetings, interview a show’s director or attend a rehearsal. I also connect with young professionals seeking advice on the field or other community engagement practitioners looking for Thought Partnership. When I am having difficulty figuring out who to reach out to for a given collaboration, I may take a walk and listen to a podcast or the radio. More than once, this has helped me find my next contact for collaboration.  

Q:  You’ve done similar community engagement work for other theaters. In a prior position at Trinity Repertory Company, you described your duties as “moving beyond the transactional, to a place where you could envision investment in community members as audience co-conspirators.” Is that how you approach your position at the Guthrie, too?  

A:  When I began the work at Trinity Rep, I was a working artist who had experience producing. I naturally gravitated toward people and experiences outside of commercial norms. Trinity was just starting to think about integrating a Community Engagement plan into their work and invited me to make a proposal. I was able to research the field and think about Trinity Rep and Providence, RI, in a thoughtful way, and I like to think what we did together the following four years was impactful.  

When I said “yes” to the Guthrie, I was not sure how much of my approach would be applicable to a new theater and a new city, but in the end, I realized that my approach is mine. My approach is so relationship-based and personal. At the end of the day, if I can’t be authentic in the work, then I'm lost. 

I don’t think about transactional relationships. We are working on transformation together — I am changed, the partner is changed, the Guthrie is changed and the community is changed — in ways that give all of us greater access to each other and the gifts we cultivate and want to share. I don’t know how to engage community any other way. 

Q:  Can you please share with us the communities – local or national – you’ve targeted for engagement?

A:  Inside every community are other communities and then individuals. While I often start with a big idea, as soon as I start talking to people, I discover how the individuals representing those communities want to be considered, and where they see themselves in this proposition. At the Guthrie, we have built strong commitments with members of the Native community in the Twin Cities, which holds the second largest urban Native population in the country and is where the American Indian Movement was born. In general, I want to get to know people from a specific community because we are producing a play somehow connected to them and believe they should have access to the storytelling from as close to the beginning as I can get. In the past, this has led me to build relationships with people coming out of incarceration, hairdressers who work with multiple textures of hair, women from Iraq living in the Twin Cities, labor organizers, African American history keepers, people who work for housing justice, and people who immigrated here from Vietnam, among others. In every partnership, I meet people who want to keep being in relationship with me and the Guthrie, and I endeavor to keep the relationship alive with them by showing up to things they invite me to and inviting them into more projects and conversations, no matter the subject. Because that is what happens when we develop mutual relationships.  

Q:  Is part of your mission to also drive engagement around certain topics the theater may tackle – climate change, mass incarceration, Indigenous rights, etc.?   

A:  I sit on a team that supports the play selection process at the Guthrie. The themes surrounding our shows guide the work of the theater. I also have the agency to propose events or initiatives that might illuminate work we want to collectively invest in as an organization. When I initiate collaboration with any community, it means having a real conversation about our shared values. By saying yes and giving pieces of our platform to people fighting for all kinds of causes, I am driving that kind of engagement. 

Q:  Do you have an advisory committee?  

A:  Currently, I work closely with the Community Engagement committee of the Guthrie board and our Native Advisory Council. As I’ve worked to maintain and build open relationships with community members who would like to be involved, the idea of a community-based advisory committee has also come to mind. This “Community Advisory Network” is not an unfamiliar concept to the Guthrie, and an opportunity may present itself again for this type of collaborative forum to live within Community Engagement.  

Q:  How may we, as community members, stay engaged with your team and the Guthrie?  

A:  My dream is for people to know each other, and know the Guthrie is part of the fabric of how and where people find each other in our community. If Community Engagement connects someone to the Guthrie, I hope their relationship will expand to other areas of our organization. Community Engagement helps people meet our staff in Education, where they take classes; Production, where they tour our shops; or Guest Services, for involvement with our access programs. I love nothing more than to see someone I introduced to the Guthrie in the building for reasons other than Community Engagement.

I’m always open to a good dream session. I love meeting people who might have an idea about how the Guthrie could be useful to them and then take it from there. We’re an organization full of highly skilled, passionate people. I’m happy to make connections when I can. 

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