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Company number: 3724349
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Past programme
Showcases an eclectic range of fresh and interesting contemporary work, largely by emerging artists
The Cave [WORLD PREMIERE]
by Mervyn Peake
In one cave, thousands of years of history are played out. A history marked by conformity and the persecution of anyone who dares to speak out. One family struggles to live their day-to-day lives. Then one day a young girl enters the cave and throws their belief system into question.
This unsettling and powerful play by Mervyn Peake - author of Gormenghast - is a dark, inquisitive look at the nature of authority and its effect on the human condition.
There will be a post-show discussion with the writer's son, Sebastian Peake chaired by writer Neil Norman on Tuesday 26 October.
Reviews
It has streaks of the angry postwar nihilism of Anouilh and Sartre: the hopeful theme of rejecting fear and social coercion leads only to amoral fragmentation in the last act. But it is extraordinary: a howl, an imperfect and painful philosophical struggle, part of a remarkable artist's testament. Honour to the little theatre." –Libby Purves, The Times
Review by Caroline Jowett from Express.co.uk
Review by Paul Vale from The STAGE
Interviews
Interview by BehindTheFringe.com
Londonist Out Loud 2: Aaron Paterson from Londonist on Vimeo.
Rehearsal
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The three artists involved in the exhibition to accompany the play 'The Cave' have spent a number of days watching and making drawings of the rehearsals. They have all responded in ways particular to their own working methods. Collecting images and ideas during rehearsals has been enormously inspiring for all three artists.
Florence Peake has concentrated on 'one to one' contact with the director and cast of the play and produced a set of drawings showing the dynamic nature of the rehearsals. By a mixture of quick observations and more 'worked' drawings she echoes her own practice in choreography and performance.
Lewis Peake, with his experience in film and television, has used a combination of photography and drawings as starting points for his work in the exhibition.
Fabian Peake has used the drawings and watercolours produced during the rehearsals to develop ideas and visual themes in his studio. The work produced displays a linear path which often diverges greatly from the original subject. The initial drawings 'on set' were the basis for a more cerebral interpretation of events encountered in the rehearsals.
Jukai 樹海
At the base of Mount Fuji lies a stretch of forest known locally as 'The Sea of Trees'. Centuries of secrets lie hidden under the mossy earth, where rivers of lava have hardened over to form the cavernous forest floor. Thousands of people who have entered these woods have never been seen again. Some simply got lost. Others went in intending to disappear…
Theatre Témoin collaborates with Taiko drummers to devise a new piece which incorporates half-mask, contemporary theatre and Japanese traditional music to tell a story about straying from the path.
FAQs: "Jukai" @ Blue Elephant Theatre, London [BehindTheFringe.com]
Featured article: JUKAI Review 28 Sept -16 Oct [JapaneseLondon.com]
★★★★★Review of Jukai 樹海, by Theatre Temoin [Remotegoat.co.uk]
Review by Amy Yorston [The British Theatre Guide]
Borough Faces etc.
A member of The Camera Club at Kennington, Philip Ratciff is a local portrait photographer.
Most of the pictures were taken in and around the Borough Market with enthusiastic co-operation of members of Trinity College of Music.
Stairway To Heaven
Cheops’ Pyramid. Egypt. 2,700 B.C.
The biggest, most terrifying and dangerous construction site the world has ever known.
A hundred thousand men will haul two and a half million limestone blocks weighing a total of six million tons up a building the size of a skyscraper using nothing but human muscle.
On his first day working on the pyramid, one young man has to adapt quickly to a new life in a work gang where intense friendships and hatreds are forged in a feverish furnace of desert heat, brutal humour, backbreaking work, horrific accidents, drink, sex and death.
And as the ghosts of dead workmates and visions of Amun Ra the Sun God elbow their way into Makhthon’s dreams, something strange is happening just out of sight, on the higher ledges of the pyramid, where the workers are never allowed.
Where does the stairway really lead?
Press
We see the World through the Prism of our Understanding
An exhibition of work by Jessica Davies.
Spark: London
Everyone has a story in them. Extraordinary true stories of life in this fine city told by a specially-selected group of Londoners.
Recordings
Click to play
- A story told by Martin Cullingford
Press
The Book of Disquiet
Listed as one of The Guardian’s top 100 books of all time, Fernando Pessoa’s The Book of Disquiet was discovered in a trunk in his apartment in Lisbon after his death in 1935. Part novel, part memoir, part philosophical meditation on the futility of living, Pessoa’s Livro defies definition and endures as a testament to modernist writing.
Have you ever thought how invisible we really are to one another?
How little we really know about each other?
We look but do we really see?
We listen but what we hear is our own voice inside.
The Book of Disquiet
Naughty!
Modern Romance
Sebastian Rex Dance Group
A full-length contemporary dance piece examining gender politics and the effect of the re-definition of identity on our modern interpretations of love and romance. With a soundtrack buzzing with songs from the Noughties.
$ellebrity
Acting Like Mad A very short play about commodities. This dark comedy asks a very simple question – if celebrities sell themselves to the public – who owns them?Press
Othello
WINNER: 'Best Fringe or Regional Play' Broadway World UK Awards 2010
A sweeping and dramatic production of Shakespeare's classic story of love, betrayal and jealousy - using text, movement and music with an ensemble cast of fourteen.
Press
More of Venice
Photographs of Venice by Tina Engström
Watercolours of Venice by Bianca Marsden
Nobody's Home
Turbulent storms and fantastical monsters stalk Ulysses at every port; what should be a joyous voyage — his homecoming — becomes a nightmare more torturous than the war he is returning from.
A modern and highly physical retelling of The Odyssey,painting a dreamscape of post-war trauma through the story of a combat veteran fighting a psychological battle to get “home.”
Nobodies Home’ had a run at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in August 2011.
Press
The Stage
Fringe Report
Writers at Work
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74a Station Road
by Andy Brunskill
Tough Theatre Company
Frank, Pete, Amy and Aidan share a flat. Aidan rules the house with bullying and macho bravura. What starts out as a practical joke on Frank escalates into something a lot worse, taking a violent turn. Frank begins to lose his grip on reality. Aidan feels his power slipping. Things get messy.
A dark new play exploring the violence underneath how people relate in a close environment.