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Company number: 3724349

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News

Call Out for our 2020 programme

Date published
Tuesday 10 March 2020

We're excited to be putting a call out for work to be programmed in 2020 and beyond at Blue Elephant Theatre.

Blue Elephant Theatre is located in South East London, off Camberwell Road. It is an intimate, friendly venue and our programming seeks to support emerging artists creating new work.
We work on a 50/50 box office split basis. We give fundraising, press, marketing and general support to our companies and artists, and rehearsal space where feasible

Edit: We are now unlikely to programme shows in April. There is obviously a lot of uncertainty about planning events in the next few months but we are looking to begin conversations anyway. We may also look to relax our programming guidelines for later in the year if shows start being cancelled now and cannot be rescheduled at their original theatre when the threat around Covid-19 has lessened.

Things to Note:

• We are particularly interested in work that reflects the London we live in – the communities here, issues we face, all the juxtapositions this large multicultural city throws at us.
• We are also particularly interested in working with artists who will really benefit from working with us – we want to help artists get to the next step, whatever that is for them at that time.
• We want everyone to feel welcome at the Blue Elephant – we work with artists from a wide range of backgrounds and experiences and want to continue to support emerging artists who may not feel altogether ‘welcomed’ into the arts industry for whatever reasons.
• If you consider yourself to still be an ‘emerging’ artist in some way, you are welcome to apply to us – it’s a tricky term to qualify! We do try to mostly support people at the start of their careers or the start of a new development in their careers but recognise that it is tough being an independent artist/company and you may feel that you are ‘emerging’ for a long time.
• We generally do not programme new productions of established scripts which have had runs in London previously or work which has been presented in London before and has not changed or developed significantly. We do, however, often programme work that we have seen as rehearsed readings, scratch pieces or works-in-progress as they go on to a further stage of their development.
• We usually programme theatre, dance (generally contemporary) and some comedy. Our stage is reasonable largely for a 50 seat venue (5.5m x 7.5m) and we have dance flooring although it has seen better days. There’s more information about our venue on our website under Info for Companies.
• We are looking to programme work at all stages of development, from scratch pieces looking for one night showings to three-week runs. We are happy to look ahead and work with a company as they develop a show and support them to secure funding.
• We cannot produce any scripts submitted to us as an in house show – our monthly Writers Group is the best way to work on a script with us. If you are submitting a script to us, please indicate that you intend to arrange for it to be produced if programmed (we will support with this!); otherwise we will be unable to read it.
• Our theatre space downstairs is wheelchair-accessible and there is an accessible bathroom but our bar/café area upstairs is not wheelchair accessible. We have one small dressing-room and it is unlikely that a wheelchair could fit through its doors easily but there may be workarounds.
• We currently have some space for performances in April, early May and June and from September into 2021.

To apply to put on a show at the Blue Elephant, please email Niamh and Jimmy at submissions@blueelephanttheatre.co.uk with:
• An outline of the proposed show and some background information on those involved
• Proposed dates
• A script if it exists yet
• Footage of past work
• We are based in Southwark and supported by Southwark Council so it is always useful to hear if you live or work in Southwark!

For more information about what we are looking for, please read our Blue Elephant Theatre 2020 Call.

If you have any questions, including about applying in a different or more accessible way, please email submissions@blueelephanttheatre.co.uk or call 020 7701 0100.

Unfortunately, we cannot accept applications from artists and companies based outside of the UK.