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Image: Manpower (photo by Alma Haser)
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A very THEATRICAL October
October is very much theatre month as we welcome back our very own resident artists Two Destination Language and Hoodwink and some more of your favourite companies. Look out for the return of Forest Forge Theatre Company, Propeller and Idle Motion. You’ll find plenty to make you laugh with Mark Watson and Barnstormers Comedy and plenty to listen to as well. Find interviews, video trailers and more in this month’s Magalogue. Happy reading!
BIG NEWS We’re nearing our target for comfier seating and shiny new toilets! We’ve listened carefully to your feedback over the years and the one thing we hear more than anything is...
“... we love the Arts Centre but please do something about the loos!” With the generous support of Arts Council England, trusts, foundations and our wonderful audience members we have raised over 80% of the money needed to make that - and many other exciting improvements - a reality. With your help, by the end of next year we will have those shiny new toilets, comfier seating in the main space, more environmentally friendly lighting, new entry doors, a replacement lift and more.
Help us improve your Arts Centre experience by donating to the capital campaign today>>>
Open 2014 Exhibition open Tuesday - Sunday 10am - 3pm Thursday 2 October - Sunday 9 November
The latest exhibition is our annual Open submission exhibition, which this year is based on the theme of Print. More than 80 artists submitted works to the exhibition and 35 artists were selected by a panel of judges for the final show. The resulting exhibition is an eclectic showcase of contemporary printmaking exploring traditional hand techniques right through to cutting edge digital processes.
Enjoy a taste of the exhibition in our digital gallery>>>
Image: Rennie Pilgrem
Film
October films bring extraordinary stories, award-winners and delightful animation. Click on the images below to watch trailers of each of this month’s screenings.
Ilo Ilo (12A): Thursday 2 October 7.30pm Winner of the Camera d’Or Best Debut Feature, Ilo Ilo is a vivid portrait of family life. Gently weaving issues of class and immigration, it’s a domestic drama full of warmth, humour and compassion.
Tracks (12A): Sunday 12 October 7.30pm From the producers of The King’s Speech, Tracks is a remarkable true story of a young woman’s life-changing journey through the Australian desert. From Alice Springs to the Indian Ocean, you’ll be mesmerised by a wild landscape and an incredible story.
Ernest and Celestine (U) Thursday 30 October 11am This Cesar Award winning animation tells a beautiful and unlikely tale of friendship between bear and mouse. Bears live upstairs and mice live downstairs and never the twain shall meet. At least that was the case until grumpy bear Ernest met little orphan mouse Celestine.
View all Autumn Films and book your tickets now>>> Coming soon:
Image: Ilo Ilo, Tracks, Ernest and Celestine, The Wind Rises and Calvary
Manpower Friday 3 October 8pm
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ince they last performed here our talented resident artists have received rave reviews and scooped up a Total Theatre Award. They’re now working on a brand new show and are previewing it here before the official premiere in Bath. We caught up with Alister to find out more:
What can we expect from the preview? It’s exciting to place work in front of an audience for the first time, and discover which parts resonate. It’s not always what we expect, so the chance to hear from the audience about their experience is really important at this stage. The piece is a mix of silliness, cosiness, hope, disappointment, frustration and delight. It’s about the experience of the everyday, so it’s familiar things, given an unfamiliar form. Why explore themes of masculinity? I’m a man, and I’m interested in how little masculinity is celebrated. Feminism has made great strides in not just fighting to achieve equality, but in empowering women to be themselves. Men haven’t explored what it is to be a man so much. While there are political issues -- around paternity rights, for example -- we decided after much exploration that this shouldn’t be a polemic: it’s more of a recognition of what exists. And if people want to talk about change, we’re interested in having that discussion too.
Near Gone won a Total Theatre Award for “Innovation, Experimentation & Playing with Form” at the Edinburgh Fringe this year. Will Manpower play with form and experiment in similar ways? Well, we can’t expect every work to win awards! Still, we do try to experiment, and the form of this piece is unusual. The lack of character, the style of text, the sound and the playfulness of the piece all combine to create something unlike our previous work, and unlike work we’ve seen. So there’s a real sense of risk, as there was with Near Gone, in not knowing how people will respond to the work. Tell us your best ‘Dad joke’. I remember when I first saw a universal remote control. I thought to myself: well, this changes everything.
Book your tickets for Manpower>>> Tickets: £12 | £10 concessions Members: Buy 1 Get 1 Free
Image:Manpower (photo by Alma Haser)
Woman of Flow
Tuesday 7 October 8pm
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orest Forge Theatre Company last visited us with Peeling back in 2011. Time has flown since then and we thought it was about time we invited this fantastic company back. We chatted to award-winning writer Kaite O’Reilly (KO’R) and Forest Forge Director Kirstie Davis (KD) about Woman of Flowers:
The story of your play is based in Welsh myth. What inspired that choice? Blodeuwedd, woman of flowers from the Mabinogion has fascinated me for many years as it invites constant reinterpretation, with resonance for our times: issues of duty, desire, freedom and the power of words in shaping world views... It feels both ancient and contemporary, with themes as relevant to us as humans now as they would have been when first written down in the Middle Ages. (K O’R) Was it a challenge to craft it into a contemporary play? We are still producing and enjoying work thousands of years old, like Ancient Greek plays, which still ‘speak’ to a modern audience.
I don’t think human beings must have changed that much - we still fall in love, commit crimes, are driven by intense emotions like anger and fear... The main challenge was to try and find an emotional angle the audience could connect to, and working closely with director Kirstie Davis ensured I had a strong sounding board and skilled collaborator to guide and encourage me. (K O’R) Tell us about “signed performance”. Woman of Flowers is predominantly made of everyday, edgy English dialogue, but it has sections when we go into the imagination, dreams, and private thoughts of the central character, Rose. These physical sections are lyrical and full of expressive movement, using a live musical score, some choreography and visual language - a mixture of theatricalised sign and gesture. It is not sign interpreted, where the spoken text is presented in British Sign Language - these sections are informed by sign language, but are more visual and poetic, the performer using her body and signs to communicate these private and inner thoughts. We use English Surtitles throughout. (K O’R)
wers Why did you choose to have live music on stage, and how does it influence the performance as a whole? It’s always exciting working with actor- musicians and the effect of live music on stage is palpable. But very early on when discussing this piece I said to Kaite that I really wanted to explore the feeling of a duet between a violin (which is a very visual instrument) and visual language. This ended up giving the monologues the feeling of imagination and possibility and dreams. The violin is also the representation of the character of Graham and all that he means to Rose. It has been so exciting working in this way - Sophie Stone doing the most extraordinary visual language and Pete Ashmore following her on the violin. The intensity and focus between them is amazing to watch. (KD) What would you like the audience to take away from the performance? I think the piece will challenge audiences with its multiple layers and ambiguities. Some people may come away with a completely different narrative and experience than someone sitting right next to them. That is what is so exciting about this piece and Kaite’s writing. It is deliberately left open to interpretation and allows you to enter the world of the play on your own terms and experience something very personal. (KD)
Book tickets for Woman of Flowers now>>> Image: Lost Exhibition
Our Friends the Enemy Wednesday 8 October 8pm
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art of our World War 1 theme of the season, Our Friends the Enemy takes us back to 1914 and an incredible moment of peace in a savage and desperate war. We chatted to playwright Alex Gwyther:
Of all the stories of WW1, why focus on this particular one? The Christmas Truce has always been a story which I’ve been fascinated by. The popular story of the football match held my attention and it wasn’t until I learnt more about the First World War as a child, I realised how bizarre and poignant the story was. After deciding to write a play based on the Christmas Truce, I began to research more. Everyone knows the story of the football match, but many people don’t know that the football match was one incident of many individual truces which happened across the Front Line during Christmas 1914. From German soldiers rolling barrels of beer across the firing lines, bicycle races, Cabaret shows to German and Allied soldiers coming together to chase a hare for their Christmas dinner. As I researched more, the story of the Christmas Truce became one which I wanted to tell to as many people as possible.
Why did you stage this performance as a one man show? It was something which took a while to decide. The option was to stage a play with many actors, but due to financial restrictions and the way I had written the script, it wouldn’t have been right. After having seen many other friends perform one man shows, I was able to see that it is possible for one person to tell a story and capture a moment. I decided that I wanted to tell the story of the truce through the eyes and experiences of one soldier as it allowed me to use poetry and prose in the script with dramatic storytelling. I found it far more interesting to see how the truce impacted upon the individual. I also felt it would have given a far more intriguing and unique performance through one character. Do you think these kind of stories still resonate with a contemporary audience? Definitely. The story of the truce is not dated. Its fundamental message can still teach us something today, and I believe that with current global events, the truce is more relevant to a contemporary audience than ever.
Book for Our Friends the Enemy>>>
Image: Our Friends the Enemy
Mark Watson ‘Flaws’
Saturday 11 October 8pm
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e’re full of admiration for comedians who brave the stand-up circuit. Mark Watson took that bravery to a new level when he set his ‘flaws’ on the line, confessing his dependence on alcohol and some of his lowest moments live on stage. Flaws is comedian and novelist Mark Watson’s darkest, most personal and funniest show yet. The multi award winning comic is the host of BBC’s We Need Answers and a regular on Never Mind the Buzzcocks and Mock the Week. He’s also the star of Radio 4’s Mark Watson Makes the World Substantially Better. Though a familiar face to many, Mark Watson is full of surprises in this latest show described by Time Out as “joyously human”.
What the media had to say about Flaws: “This might not be a perfect show, but it’s a joyously human one. It helps that the human in question happens to be the wittiest bloke on the Fringe, but it’s even more important that it feels universal in its inadequacy.” TimeOut “As Watson charts his road back to relative health and contentment, there are excellent passages on his relationship with his son (and nonrelationship with Madonna), his fondness for making drunken donations to charities and his contempt for tapas. Moreover, for all the gnawing existential uncertainty that permeates Flaws, it corkscrews in a typically craftsmanlike way down to a note of tentative optimism.” The Telegraph
Book your tickets now>>>
Image: Mark Watson
Image: Pocket Dream
Pocket Dream All male Shakespeare stars return Kindly sponsored by Fletcher & Partners Friday 19 September 8pm
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fter two sold out performances of Pocket Merchant of Venice last year, Propeller returns this month with its lively Midsummer Night’s Dream kindly sponsored by Fletcher & Partners. Under the direction of Edward Hall, Propeller is an international theatre company that is best known for its ability to bring Shakespeare’s texts to vivid life with productions full of clarity, poetry, speed and imagination. We’re delighted to welcome the company back with both a matinee performance for schools and an evening performance for you to enjoy. Combining an enchanting story and a world-class company: it’s a pocket-sized dream come true! Both performances are kindly supported by local accountants Fletcher & Partners.
Book your tickets now>>>
We chatted to our sponsors:
Tell us a bit about Fletcher & Partners... Fletcher & Partners are an independent firm of chartered accountants. We have an enviable reputation for providing first class accountancy, taxation and business advice and are committed to developing close business relationships with our clients. Why did you choose to become Salisbury Arts Centre’s Education sponsor? At Fletcher & Partners we are keen to sponsor events that involve and entertain the local community. These performances by Propeller and Stopgap are a perfect example of this; as well as evening performances Propeller includes a schools performance and Stopgap offers a masterclass for Jigsaw, Salisbury Youth Dance Company. What’s your favourite Shakespeare play? Macbeth Find out about Fletcher & Partners>>>
LĂşnasa
Thursday 16 October 8pm
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eltic music stars Lunasa bring their famous Irish instrumental music to our stage this month. Known for steering acoustic music into surprising new territory, the group brings inventive arrangements and bass-driven grooves. Click the image below for a taste of Lunasa live.
Image: Lunasa
Live Lunches with a Salisbury twist and a familiar face
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ffering free live music from 12 - 2pm on selected Saturdays and Sundays, Live Lunches have long been a popular part of our programme. Music Programmer Thomas Brooman CBE selects some of the finest up and coming musicians from across the South West and further afield but this month you might just see a familiar face or two:
On Saturday 25 October, we’re presenting a special Live Lunch as part of Salisbury Music Awards.
On Saturday 18 October we’re welcoming back our ex-Outreach and Engagement Manager Beck Goldsmith to perform a special Live Lunch set.
Also coming up in Live Lunches this month:
Since leaving Salisbury Arts Centre, Beck has been signed to a record label and is soon to release a new album. Her cover of I Vow to Thee My Country for the BBC’s The Village trailer has been selected by Clare Balding as her Desert Island Disc. Her haunting track The Watchers has found its way into a horror film. All that and she’s really rather lovely too! To say we’re excited is a bit of an understatement. We can’t wait to welcome her back and we hope you’ll join us to listen to her beautiful music.
Have a listen to I Vow to Thee My Country>>>
In a lunchtime addition to the annual awards event, you’ll have the chance to see a showcase of Salisbury’s finest Acoustic acts. Come along and celebrate our local talent.
Sunday 12 October - Quiescent A Bristol duo with outstanding vocals and distinctive guitar arrangements inspired by Fink and John Martyn. Sunday 26 October - The FB Pocket Orchestra Hot Jazz, Ragtime and popular dance tunes of the 1920s and 1930s.
View all this season’s Live Lunches>>>
Composer Portrait:
Sarah Collins Sunday 19 October 7.30pm
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e say a very special Happy Birthday to Wiltshire-based composer Sarah Collins this month with a relaxed evening of music celebrating her 50th birthday. We chatted to Sarah about what to expect, her career highlights to date and why she loves living in Wiltshire:
What can we expect from your birthday celebration concert? I hope that my birthday celebration concert will give people a little insight into me, my music and some of my musical tastes. Also introduce them to some wonderful performers, such as Alison Blunt, the violinist, who has put together a string quartet for me, and Neville Moody, who is a fantastic brass player, as well as great Salisbury based players like Olu Taiwo and Rob Priestley. It should be relaxed and entertaining! You’ve had a very varied and exciting musical career. Can you name some highlights? Working with Jude Kelly and Patrick Stewart at The West Yorkshire Playhouse on a huge production of Johnson Over Jordan by J.B.Priestley. I sampled Patrick’s breathing to make the sound for the beginning of the play, and wrote a score for two pianos, one of which I played. Nearer to home, I have loved all my work with Hoodwink Theatre Company and setting up Downton Community Choir and my new choir.
What have you got planned for the future? On the day after my concert (my actual birthday) I’m flying up to Inverness to work with Ian Spink again. Really looking forward to that. I am the music leader for a mixed group of dancers, musicians, actors, writers etc. Expect madness! I hope that my long-term project based on a completely mad Japanese Manga novel called HellBaby will keep gathering momentum… I keep the faith for her. I also need to keep composing, and as my children spread their wings into the world I think I can too. If anyone wants a composer, let me know. What’s your favourite thing about Wiltshire? I think, (dear friends aside) it has to be the landscape. I am sitting here at my desk writing this, looking out at The Downs… I love the expression ‘up the downs’ (wrote a piece called that in fact). It is beautiful and I feel very lucky to live here.
Book your tickets for Composer Portrait: Sarah Collins now>>>
Idle Motion leads the way to
Bletchley Park Wednesday 22 October 8pm
Kindly supported by Salisbury Arts Centre Business Members
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f you saw Idle Motion’s last show, The Seagull Effect, you probably still remember the beautiful use of video projection. We took a little look at the production shots for their new show, That is All You Need to Know, and it looks like we’re in for another treat. The company told us more about the new production, which is based on Bletchley Park: Tell us a bit about the history behind your story… This devised piece of visual theatre tells the story of Bletchley Park and the untold secrets of the remarkable men and women who cracked the seemingly unbreakable German Enigma code. Among these were the visionary ‘Godfather of Computing’ Alan Turing, the exceptional Gordon Welchman and the thousands of dynamic women whose work was the hidden heroism of the war. We also tell the story of the Bletchley Park Committee, a group of local volunteers who, against all the odds, saved the site from redevelopment in the 1990s. This play is a celebration of humanity’s ability to solve the impossible and of the extraordinary people whose quiet work changed the course of our history. What inspired you to create a play about Bletchley Park? There is so much about Bletchley Park that is remarkable – the community of chess champions, scholars and young debutants working together to crack the German codes, the genius of Alan Turing and his colleagues, how close it came to being luxury commuter flats.
What we found particularly inspiring however was that it was kept a complete secret by the 10,000 people who worked there for 30 years. Having signed the Official Secrets Act they couldn’t tell their friends, family – even each other – about the work that they were doing. In the modern world, where people broadcast their lives at the click of a button this was simply fascinating for us to explore in the play. The show uses “personal testimony”. Whose experiences did you draw on? What other research did you do? We worked closely with Bletchley Park throughout the process and were fortunate to be granted exclusive access to their archives interviews with veterans who worked at the park. These were invaluable to help re-create the atmosphere and look of the Park in the 1940s and we feature some in the show. As with all our work we approached the show with a real sense that we had to do the story justice and this therefore involved endless research to ensure we did not take too much dramatic license! What can the audience expect to see on stage? So we tell all these stories using filing cabinets, desks and a whole host of props which give the staging a very playful element. In one scene a character emerges through a cabinet and in another a chess board emerges out of a desk. We also use a lot of multimedia in our work to help tell the story which gives the production a very filmic quality. At the heart of all of this production lies a brilliant story which we’re thrilled to share with audiences in a very inventive way.
Delve into Tibetan Culture with the
Tashi Lhunpo M Sunday 26 October
Monks T
his October we welcome a group of monks from the Tashi Lhunpo Monastery for a very special Tibetan Culture Day. Join us throughout the day for workshops, film and performance:
10am - 2pm Drop in Family Workshop This activity is FREE ● Ages 5 and over The monks invite you to try the unique artistic traditions of Tibetan Buddhist monastic art: butter sculpture and sand mandala making, printing a prayer flag and making a dukar protection wheel, as well as learning some Tibetan language. 3 - 4pm Family Performance workshop Tickets: £5 ● Ages 7 and over In an interactive workshop during the afternoon find answers to your questions about the Tibetan monastic tradition: why do so many young Tibetans choose to enter the monastic life? What do the magnificent costumes used in the masked dances represent? You will discover the answers to these and other questions, as well as learning some of the dance steps and intricate hand gestures from a Tantric prayer.
7 - 9pm Film and Performance Tickets: £7 ● Age 12+ FILM: Chenrezig In December 2011 Tashi Lhunpo monks visited Glastonbury and created a beautiful sand mandala. Film makers Tim Knock and Kevin Redpath recorded the impact of their five-day visit on the Glastonbury community and the step-by-step creation and dissolution of this beautiful mandala. With stunning photography and a soundtrack of monks’ chanting, this beautiful film will touch your heart. PERFORMANCE .‘ ..a psychedelic whirl of chanting, dancing, drums and cymbals...’ The Times The monks from Tashi Lhunpo Monastery present a mesmerising programme of their Buddhist tradition. From the shattering sound of the dungchen - the great long horns - to the contemplative chant of Tantric prayer, and the majestic brocade costumed dances, this provides a colourful climax to a day of Tibetan culture.
Book your tickets for Tashi Lhunpo Monks now>>>
Beneath the Trees
Tuesday 28 & Wednesday 29 October
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fter another successful Family Fiesta in September, resident theatre company Hoodwink are back and preparing to take you beneath the trees in an interactive theatrical experience. We caught up with Stephanie from Hoodwink to find out more about the show. Where did the inspiration for Beneath the Trees stem? Following on from Hoodwink’s Frozen Forest at Salisbury Playhouse, the egg at Theatre Royal Bath asked me to create the Forest of Arden where many Shakespeare plays are set, a magical forest for 3-7 year olds to have their first encounter with Shakespeare. I wanted to create a playful interactive environment which touches on the themes of misrule and magic that exist in the Forest of Arden. What makes Beneath the Trees different from other theatre shows? This is not just a show but a time to play and the audience make the magic happen. A simple but beautiful environment where we listen to nature, create the wind, move the rocks, wish on acorns and sleep in a bed of leaves after dancing Beneath the Trees! Children are delighted to play with performers and feel they are a part of the story. If families have enjoyed Hoodwink’s Winter Wonderland and Family Fiesta activities, then Beneath the Trees allows them to become part of a magical world and fires their imagination.
What characters can the audience expect to meet ‘beneath the trees’? Families - as accompanying adults join in too rather than sit and watch - meet fairy Peaseblossom, Bottom and of course naughty Puck but also hear the voices of many characters from Shakespeare from talking trees and rocks! The children themselves conjure up a Tempest as they shout lines from King Lear and create magic with words from A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Is there anything else we need to know about the performance? We try to limit the number of accompanying adults per child to one as the audience numbers are limited and although big folk love the show, they do take up a lot of space!
What audiences have said so far: “The children were so full of beans when they returned and I have been told stories all day about naughty Puck and how he turned Bottom into a donkey!” “We took part in the ‘Beneath the Trees’ performance at Basing House today and it was magical. Both children (8 and 5) loved it and enjoyed taking part - particularly the conga with Bottom! Thanks for a fab end to our afternoon. “
Book your tickets for Beneath the Trees now>>>
Bridget Christie: ‘A Bic For Her’
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ith three major comedy awards already secured for 2014, Bridget Christie is very much the comedian of the moment. We took a look at what the media have to say about what makes her so incredibly successful:
“Announces her as one of the finest comedians around.” Independent *****
About ‘A Bic For Her’ Bridget Christie’s show A Bic for Her was inspired by the hilarious Amazon reviews of a new pen for women. Why does Bic think women need special biros to write with? Who decided Thatcher and Beyonce were feminist icons? What did Sir Stirling Moss say about women’s brains?
“She may have stomped on rape jokes for ever, so successful is this, her finest hour.” Sunday Times *****
Bridget Christie tackles all these questions and more in this hilarious show.
“Inspired.” Independent on Sunday *****
2013 FOSTER’S EDINBURGH COMEDY AWARD WINNER – BEST SHOW
“Piles derision and tomfoolery upon everyday sexism, while never pretending that jokes alone will solve the problem.” Guardian ****
2014 SOUTH BANK SKY ARTS AWARD WINNER – BEST COMEDY
“A beautiful balance between the personal, the public and the parodic.” Times **** “Sublimely deft.” Evening Standard *****
2014 CHORTLE AWARDS – BEST SHOW 2014 CHORTLE AWARDS – BEST RADIO (FOR BRIDGET CHRISTIE MINDS THE GAP)
“A superb stand-up with a powerful voice and something to say. It’s nothing short of a revelation.” Observer
TOP SELLING COMEDY AT SOHO THEATRE EVER
“Bold, passionate, thought-provoking, cheery, and at times hectoring.” Telegraph
Book your tickets for Bridget Christie now>>>
“A triumphant show that scores on every measure.” Chortle ****