BET mailing list

Submit your email

BET on Twitter

Loading feed...

Charity number: 1077161

Company number: 3724349

Blue Elephant Theatre Privacy policy.

We use cookies for Google Analytics, but these can be disabled via your browser configuration.

Past programme

Showcases an eclectic range of fresh and interesting contemporary work, largely by emerging artistslondondance.com
Theatre

Not Knowing Who We Are

by The Ugly Tree

Dates
Tuesday 12 June 2007 - Saturday 30 June 2007

A man sets out to learn the art of conversation. A girl sets out to find her father. A mother has a box with two keys. Kevin has a spare room and a photograph no-one wants to see…

Preoccupied with books and photographs and talking only to himself and his imaginary wife, a man sets out to learn the art of conversation. He stumbles upon relationships built on lies and deceit where his odd behaviour gives rise to prejudice and accusations. When his brother comes to the rescue, truths emerge and a claustrophobic world is broken apart.


Writer
Maggie Drury
Director
Toria Banks
Designer
Chris Gylee
Lighting Designer
Natalie Jones
Cast
Raymond Coker, Richard De Lisle, Mark Jeary, Richard Roberts, Nina Smith & Liv Spencer

Press

"An intriguing piece of theatre" Time Out
Dance

Everything Is Different

by Aranea

Dates
Thursday 31 May 2007 - Saturday 2 June 2007
Supported by
Camberwell Arts

In 1929, Hungarian author Frigyes Karinthy published a volume of short stories entitled Everything is Different. Inspired by the tale Chains or Chain-Links - where the characters believed that any two individuals could be connected through at most five acquaintances - this evening of music, dance & visual art looks at the simple connections we make in everyday life, magnifying these points to find beauty in the details.


Dance
Aranea (with music by Lucy Forde and choreography by Charlotte Spencer), green bean dance & MIKS
Music
Sekgura (Ghanaian percussion), Misirlou (contemporary Arabic) & Outhouse (jazz)
Fine art
Massie Kendal
Theatre

35 Cents

by Crying in the Wilderness Productions

A Political Satire Written & Directed by Paul Anthony Morris (Winner of the 2009 Offwestend.com Adopt a Playwright Award)

Dates
Tuesday 8 May 2007 - Saturday 26 May 2007
Supported by
Arts Council England

It's election time on the romantic Caribbean island of Jamaica. The campaign has, however, been completely overwhelmed by extreme apathy & disillusionment.

Fatigued by the ever increasing levels of poverty, debt & corruption, a new student organization called the 'No Confidence Movement' emerges in an attempt to lead the electorate on a national boycott of the general elections. With various bilateral and multinational interests now at stake, a US-led military invasion is initiated to neutralize growing support for the boycott. It is from within this cauldron that the students of the 'No Confidence Movement' take us on a frenetic journey that will ultimately determine the political future of their island .


Designer
Clary Salandy
Lighting Designer
Giuseppe di Iorio
Composer
Carol Mae Whittick
Cast
Julie Hewlett, Irma Inniss, Vinta Morgan, Anthony Ofoegbu & Mo Sesay

Press

‘Fluid, fast-and-loose theatre, that asks questions none of us can avoid: are power & principle mutually exclusive?’ Time Out
Dance

Springheeled Two

 

Dance & multi-media works that engage, entertain and inspire…

Dates
Thursday 3 May 2007 - Saturday 5 May 2007

Fish in a Bowl/Anthony Kurt:

AB sens 2

Iisa Ilona Jäntti

Ditto (interdisciplinary circus work)

Levantes Dance Theatre/Eleni Edipidi

(Winner of the Oxford Samuel Beckett Theatre Trust Award 2009)
Gin & Satsumas (a dance theatre piece)

Etta Ermini Dance Theatre:

Archetypical Encounter of the Third Kind (physical theatre)

Rosalind Noctor & Martha Moopette:

Hedgehogs & Honeybeads (dance film)

Cathy Seago & Dancers:

How We Know We Are Here: Part 1 Cupp for Three (multimedia work)


Theatre

The Inhabitants of the Moon are Noses & Diary of a Madman

by In Extremis & Stepping Out in association with Group Z

Dates
Tuesday 3 April 2007 - Sunday 29 April 2007

Do noses really live on the moon?

The Inhabitants of the Moon are Noses/Diary of a Madman explores the thin line between imagination & madness, with a double-bill of Nikolai Gogol’s dark, hilarious masterpiece & Steve Hennessy’s new play about Gogol’s life.


Director/Lighting Designer
Andy Burden
Designer
Peter Liddiard
Costume
Penn O'Gara
Cast
Martin Aukland & Julia Gwynne (The Inhabitants of the Moon are Noses), Sebastian Steiger (Diary of a Madman)

Press

‘Hennessy’s use of madcap farce and the poetic quality of his language makes for an intriguing piece, as riveting and baffling as its subject matter’ The Stage

Weights

by Merco Productions

Dates
Tuesday 13 March 2007 - Saturday 31 March 2007
Post-show discussion
Led by Professor Jean Stubbs [Director - Caribbean Studies Centre/ London Metropolitan University]

An island nobody ever leaves, the Bermuda Triangle, something like that.

Cuban-American writer Jesse Quinones charts a day in the life of a slum estate in Havana .

Cuba: a tropical idyll where the sun never sets, or a stifling prison where the days never end?


Director
David Mercatali
Designer
Wendy Uren
Lighting design
Jason Kirk
Cast
Geoff Aymer, George Couyas, Olayinka Giwa, Scarlett Perdereau & Vineeta Rishi

Press

"An affecting snapshot of life in the final days of Castro's Cuba" Time Out
Theatre

Tales from Mumbai

 

Dates
Tuesday 5 December 2006 - Saturday 23 December 2006

An acrobatic production with an all-male cast with tales exploring metro-sexuality & the need for spirituality and hope in the harsh tough world of Mumbai.


Director
Serena B. Robins
Designer
Elves n Elements
Lighting designer
Jason Kirk
Cast
Cristian Cardenas, Jatinder Chera, Christopher Gutmann, Shazad Iqbal & Imran Mirza

Press

"A truly original evening" Catalyst
Theatre

22 Death Scenes

by Jumbled

An exploration of how popular culture invades our real life stories.

Dates
Tuesday 7 November 2006 - Saturday 11 November 2006

Jumbled look to harness the power of autobiographical material and direct address, and explore placing this in the context of richer visual and theatrical worlds. Through ongoing collaboration with sound-maker Nick Gill, Jumbled closely links live sound with action, to create a multi-layered experience.

We don't want to die but we know people who have. We'd fight for you, we'd lie for you, you know it's true, everything we do we do it for you. Before your very eyes, Jumbled will die not once, not twice, but 22 times. Watch us as we meet our ends simply, quietly, loudly, gloriously, haltingly, beautifully.

Listen as we tell you about the scenes we wished we had seen, and play you the music we wished we had heard. Sob as we breathe our last breath, scream as we are mercilessly butchered, gasp as we escape unscathed only to be gunned down at the last minute.


Performed and devised by
Lucy Foster, Nick Gill, Kirsty Lothian & Mike Tweddle
Lighting & sound by
Robert Wells
Theatre

Angels Don't Dance

by NEFELI productions

Dates
Tuesday 17 October 2006 - Saturday 4 November 2006

In the psychiatric unit of a large urban hospital, Dr Jones conducts a first interview with Jamie:

"Am I broken?"
"I think you are"
"You see the cracks?"
"Some"

But things are not so straightforward. Unseen to Jones, Jamie is shadowed by Angella, a second personality you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy…

A practising psychiatrist, Brockman’s play is based on true accounts. His work was included in the Samuel French Best Short Plays of 2001 & 2005.


Director
Mirra Bank
Set Designer
Jamie Warner
Lighting Designer
Giuliano Bocca
Sound Designer
Timothy Gill
Costume Designer
Natasha Ward
Cast
Lucy Aitken, Will Chitty, Juliet Oldfield, Christian Olliver & Iris Veneti

Press

"Richard Brockman's play contains moments of sheer brilliance, insight and imagination when dealing with Jamie's story. There are episodes of self-discovery that quite rightly deserve him the title of psychopoetic writer, with beautifully crafted denouement and well chosen metaphors" The Stage
Theatre

Hazmat & Me

by Demonstrate

Dates
Tuesday 3 October 2006 - Saturday 14 October 2006

Just after the end of the world, a lonely survivor clings on to better times with a bicycle-powered reading lamp and a dusty old gramophone. He's fed up, he's had enough and he's ready to die.

So it's a shame that his friend Hazmat, an eight-foot radiation suit with a penchant for mischief, is having none of it. Hazmat has a different take on the man's past and won't let him go before he's made to face the truth…


Original score performed live by
Anton Maiof
Devised by
Richard Kingdom, Matt Hill & Ged Matthews
Cast
Matt Hill & Ed Birch

Press

"A charmingly quirky (and heart-warming) platonic love story. Both actors are adept at balancing humour with pathos, and succeed in communication a huge amount with a very minimalist script" www.fringereport.com
Dance

Plasmas

Manipur is in north eastern India and its remoteness has ensured that Manipuri Dance has, until now, remained relatively untouched by Western influences and other traditional Indian forms.

Dates
Thursday 21 September 2006 - Saturday 23 September 2006

Anwesha Ahmed Company’s project to redefine Manipuri dance in the light of the contemporary world began what was to become a radical process. The title of the piece, Plasmas, is inspired by the notion of the stripping of electrons from atoms to create free-flowing Plasmas –the fourth state of matter.

Five dancers present this journey accompanied by a specially commissioned score, which combines live and improvised music. The instrumentation includes the sarangi, the kartal (played by one of the dancers) as well as the violin and congas.


Dancers
Catriona Johnson, Rachel Landers, Miia Laiho & Anwesha Ahmed
Musicians
Kirit Singh (sarangi), Olmo Cassibba (Conga) & Will Street (Violin)
Choreography & Artistic Direction
Anwesha Ahmed
Music Direction
Will Street
Costume Design
Hannah Lenim & Anwesha Ahmed

Press

"The performers are all impressively accomplished and focused, as Anwesha Ahmed's choreography tosses them through aggression, playfulness and contemplation. Anwesha Ahmed steals the show with her seemingly effortless, delicately-controlled movements - demonstrating how expressive and graceful her dance-form can be" www.fringereport.com
Theatre

The Highway Crossing (or A Tale of a Golden Fish)

by Stagespell Productions

1st UK production of an Estonian play

Dates
Tuesday 13 June 2006 - Saturday 1 July 2006

Three people. One night. Four billion dollars.

How far would you go for four billion dollars?
Would you give up the love of your life?

The Highway Crossing follows a young couple as they embark on an evening they will never forget. A witty and dark piece about human nature and the choices we are forced to make at a moment's notice.


Written by
Jaan Tätte
Directed by
Liisa Smith
Designed by
James Perkins
Music by
Jaanus Putting
Cast
Faye Hunter, Gary Mackay, Cal Saville & Archie Whyld

Press

"Catch it while you can" The Observer
Theatre

Actor

by Rogério Nuno Costar

Welcome Goodbye is Portuguese Festival of Performance & Visual Art

Bringing together Portuguese visual artists and companies that share references to tourism, migration and new geographies.

Dates
Wednesday 31 May 2006 - Saturday 3 June 2006
Supported by
Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation

A performance reflecting on the realities of being an actor and a dancer: the ‘actor’ is the essence of a show, equipped with a body to move and act according tothe script, but he is also a person in his own right with his own emotions, experiences and thoughts.


Devised and performed by
Rogério Nuno Costa
Lighting
José Álvaro Correia
Set design
F. Ribeiro
Video
Rui Ribeiro
Movement
Marina Nabais
Theatre

Welcome Goodbye/Adeus Obrigada - Drama: Five Shipwrecks & a Twilight (Cinco Naufrágios e um Crepúsculo)

by Cão Solteiro

Bringing together Portuguese visual artists and companies that share references to tourism, migration and new geographies.

Dates
Wednesday 24 May 2006 - Saturday 27 May 2006
Supported by
the Calouste Gulbenkian

Based on texts by Austro-Hungarian dramatist Odon Von Horvath, Eugene O’Neill & others, Drama by Cão Solteiro weaves together people and places - both disparate and linked - like pieces of a jigsaw: the drowned, the hanged, the Devil, spectres, unborn children, old English songs and sharks… All come together under the black veil of night, at twilight…


Director
Miguel Loureiro
Set design
Nuno Carinhas
Costumes
Mariana Sá Nogueira
Cast
Paula Sá Nogueira & Paulo Lages
Theatre

Welcome Goodbye/Adeus Obrigada - Singularity

by Beatriz Cantinho

Bringing together Portuguese visual artists and companies that share references to tourism, migration and new geographies.

Dates
Wednesday 17 May 2006 - Saturday 20 May 2006
Supported by
the Calouste Gulbenkian

Built through a set of images alternating between memories of times past and present, Singularity questions the philosophical concept of a ‘body without organs’: a body longing for desire and thriving in chaos and absurdity, refusing to conform to normality.

A physical theatre piece using the language of dance and movement.


Dramaturgy
Valério Romão
Performers
Ana Gouveia & Beatriz Cantinho
Scenery & costumes
ñaki Zoilo
Props
Tiago Neves
Lighting
José Manuel Rodrigues