This is a great competition idea from the RSC - write your own love poem or even Love Tweet!
Great start to the day as Metro have included our production of Talking to Terrorists in their weekly “Critic’s Choice: Stage Shows Worth Seeing”. Of the show it says:
“Starting out at The Royal Court, this affecting piece came about from interviews with people directly affected by terrorism as hostages, journalists or victims. Spoken verbatim by the actors of The Crescent Theatre the result is a hugely powerful piece of theatre.”
The heat of activity at the theatre is rising ahead of this weekend’s LTG (Little Theatre Guild of Great Britain) Conference. Badges are being made up, delegate packs are being stuffed, displays are being refreshed and the exterior of our wonderful ‘little’ theatre even received a lick of paint yesterday.
Come Friday evening some 140 delegates from across the UK will start arriving in Birmingham for a weekend packed with theatre related excitement. In addition to the formal elements of the conference (including the LTG’s AGM) delegates will be watching TERRORISM on the Friday night and THE BUS on Saturday evening.
They’ll also be attending four lively workshops exploring the creative process of taking a play ‘From Page to Stage’. This will culminate with a presentation on Sunday morning of practical – yet fun – examples based on what delegates have learned. Our speakers, who will look at directing, design and acting, are all joining us from the RSC and are bringing a wealth of knowledge and experience with them to share.
Crescent members may attend the workshops for FREE and you’ll be receiving an e-mail with details of how to sign up and join in the fun. I hope to see you there. And, don’t forget we need lots of volunteers to help make the conference run smoothly, so put your name down to help without delay.
More than 50 people gathered in The Crescent’s bar on Saturday night to celebrate St Valentine’s Day by listening to a vibrant selection of music, songs and readings all on the theme of love and exploring the emotion’s many facets.
It was a great event and love really was in the air that night. Apologies for the poor photo, but if gives you a good idea of the event.
Birmingham Theatre School in association with The Crescent Theatre has announced two new shows for February…
Full details will be published on our main website soon.
Yes, it’s my final evening here before travelling back tomorrow afternoon, and straight back into all things Crescent with a meeting in the evening.
Today started with a little shopping (not much with the exchange rate being what it is) then a gentle wander around the Museum Ludwig which houses the most superb collection of modern art. I drooled over the Mondrian, scoffed at the Warhol and mused about where it was that Picasso lost his way. Ooooo controversy!
Then I had a meeting with Rainer Hoffman, kurator of the theatre festival. Over a couple of coffees we chatted about organising events, attracting visiting companies and the issues that inevitably arise in these situations.
Then I took in a video installation which - for once - was actually worth sitting and looking at. Then I met up with Rainer again and we paid a visit to LAUTER KÖLNER WÜNSCHE which was a shop where wishes were being received from the good people of Köln. The wishes were being processed, and there were wish ‘rituals’ and a large white rabbit. I thought at first it might be Harvey, but I don’t think he was quite 6′ 1.5″. Pity that.
Tonight it was the final show on my programme which Rainer had put together for me before I came over: performed with puppets, in Korean (but with German surtitles) it was called DER BERLINER GAETTONG and was based on a Korean myth but reflected the shared fate of Germans and Koreans of living in a divided country. It was a wonderful piece of theatre - funny and moving and a beautifully told story.
So as I wind up here in Köln, there’s just time for a final G&T at the bar. I hope you’ve found travel diary interesting on some level or other.
Is this part four? I’ve lost track of time and the days here; I even sent Andrew Lowrie a text yesterday thinking it was Tuesday and therefore the day of this month’s board meeting.
So here I am, still at Köln and about to set off to take in some modern art before meeting with the kurator of the theatre festival.
Yesterday was another busy day: first I met with the director of the ‘walkabout’ show I’d seen (been a part of?) on Sunday. Lukas talked enthusiastically about his theatre work which often involves site specific story telling of this kind. I suggested that we might try something similar in Birmingham and his response was very supportive. We talked about how he researched the lives of ordinary people who have lived thru extraordinary times and how to translate these into theatre. I really feel there are some stories to be told about Birmingham and that this would be an excellent project for The Crescent to lead in the future. Watch this space!
Then , last night, I joined a coach load of other people on a journey out to forest to watch DER BÜS. Even if your German is as bad as mine, you can probably guess that this is THE BUS - the play we are giving a UK premiere to in March. Well, it was great experience; the play works superbly in the great outdoors, even when the great outdoors are below minus degrees celcius. I’m not going to write an essay here now on the play, but needless to say the production, whilst very different to the one we’ll be doing, gave me lots of ideas.
Following the coach trip back into Köln I attended the after show talk which the director (Samuel Schwartz) and members of the cast kindly conducted in English for my benefit and the local radio station - yes the radio guy preferred it all in English! Following a couple of drinks I came back to the hotel to get som much needed sleep.
Today is the last full day in the city, so I’m off now to make the most of it.
Today I have had two of the most amazing theatrical experiences of my life!
The first was a three hour marathon walk around Köln visiting a school gym, several apartments, a shop, an office and, finally, a boat. At each location we met characters telling their story, all of which were interlinked and related the story of Kölners in the 20th Century. Called KURZ NACHDEM ICH TOT WAR it was a superb piece of theatre that - literally - could not be told anywhere else. Tomorrow I’m meeting its director (Jörg Lukas Matthaei) to find out how they pieced it all together and see whether we could do something similar in Birmingham. I was so caught up in the work that at one moment I found myself being interviewed for the Hitler Youth (and being accepted which was worrying) and then discussing Communist propaganda in a shadowy back street with a man in a trenchcoat. During the latter experience I’m sure I could hear the theme from The Third Man playing somewhere. The iPod audio in German was somewhat lost on me, but the actors all worked so well in English once they knew language-poor me was there.
Then tonight I trudged across town for KAMP. With no words, but the most amazing sound track, three talented Dutch folk use puppets and models to tell tales from Auschwitz. It’s the first time I’ve ever experienced that rarest of beasts - an audience that just sat in silence for a few minutes at the end totally absorbed, totally affected. Experiencing this piece with a mostly German audience was one of the most profound experiences I can think of and the chance to chat to some of them afterwards was especially poignant.
Well, I think I deserve tonight’s large G&T at the hotel bar. After that off to bed.
Guten Morgen!
It’s Sunday Morning here in Köln and I think this is the first time I’ve ever used a German keyboard; letters are in different places which will be a handy excuse for any typos! I’m using the hotel’s PC as it’s E8 an hour to use my laptop in my room, so piccies will have to wait.
Travel plans yesterday went well and the flight was lovely, just 24 passengers on the plane: either Dusseldorf is not a popular destination or the credit crunch thing is really kicking in.
Anyway…. (getting really annoyed now that the ‘y’ key is in the wrong place) I hit the road running once I arrived by seeing two shows here at the ECHT! Politik im Freien Theater festival. The first was fairly traditional, called MONTANA and dealt with poltical crises and the loss (sic) of utopia. Second up was NOTHING COMPANY, that was more avant garde and featured cardboard boxes and headphone commentary; very entertaining but with a good message - and in part in English!
Today holds two more shows and some sight seeing, so, now I’ve stocked up on a good brekkie, I’m off out exploring.
More news tomorrow.
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