Radical Mischief issue 4

RADICAL MISCHIEF www.rsc.org.uk

New work at the Royal Shakespeare Company

June 2015 | Issue 04

02 03 WELCOME TO THE UPDATE:

04 DAN HUTTON &

06 08 LOOKING BACK: RESEARCH &

09 10 WOLF HALL LIZZIE

12 NEW WORK

FOURTH EDITION

MARINA CARR ON HECUBA

BREAKFAST WITH MUGABE

ON BROADWAY

NEARBY

THE OTHER PLACE

EXPLORING THE CREATION OF NEW WORK

AT THE RSC

Original Photo by Stewart Hemley

AND BEYOND

Find out what's on at the RSC and buy tickets at www.rsc.org.uk

DEVELOPMENT: WORKSHOP DIARY

HOPLEY ON GIRL FIGHTS

RADICAL MISCHIEF | ISSUE 04 | JUNE 2015

COVER STORY

UPDATE BY ERICA WHYMAN ON

ERICA WHYMAN RSC DEPUTY ARTISTIC DIRECTOR & EDITOR

WELCOME TO THE FOURTH EDITION OF RADICAL MISCHIEF IN SEPTEMBER I AM DIRECTING A THRILLING NEW VERSION OF HECUBA

BY MARINA CARR WHICH PROMISES TO BE A SEARING VISION OF WAR, WOMANHOOD AND COURAGE

IN THIS EDITION we continue to explore new work at the RSC along with giving you an insight into our extensive research and development work.

Following on from the hugely successful West End transfer of Tom Morton-Smith’s Oppenheimer and Wolf Hall Parts One and Two becoming the most nominated plays on Broadway, we are excited to be opening two new plays this winter. In September I am directing a thrilling new version of Hecuba by Marina Carr which promises to be a searing vision of war, womanhood and courage. Later in the season we open Queen Anne by Helen Edmundson, a gripping new play chronicling the life of this little known monarch. We’re very grateful to RSC Board Member Miranda Curtis for her support of both plays.

With these new commissions and The Other Place set to re-open next year there has never been a more exciting time for new work at the RSC. JUNE 2015

See pages 4-5 for more on Hecuba 02

Can you describe the plans for The Other Place (TOP)?

We have begun construction works inside the box that used to house The Courtyard Theatre. There will be four new rooms; two rehearsal spaces, a permanent free exhibition of costumes with a costume store housing 30,000 costumes. The fourth space is the theatre. Where The Courtyard Theatre stage used to be there will be a 200 seat auditorium that will be highly flexible. It will be a black box but with a more distinctive character, we are reusing materials from The Courtyard and Midsummer Mischief Festival so there will be a sense of the ghosts of the other incarnations of the building.

What can audiences expect to see when they walk in?

41 years ago TOP lived for the first time in a tin hut. Our new Other Place will try to borrow all the good things of the past; a flexible, simple and intimate space with some small luxuries from the 21st Century.

Studio theatres are all about the work you make in them so people should expect something that feels a little bit like the Midsummer Mischief studio though a bit smaller, with more comfortable seats!

A dark space with red seats in which we will do some brilliant work.

Who will be using TOP day to day?

It’s really important that people share the space, you might have an RSC Designer and a terribly famous RSC Actor sharing a coffee table with a student and a corporate partner who might be hiring the space for a

THE OTHER PLACE

The Other Place under construction. Original photo by Stewart Hemley

meeting. Amateur and community theatre groups are also very welcome.

There's a special collaboration between us and Birmingham University, looking at the relationship between Shakespeare's spirit and contemporary theatre-making alongside the relationship between research and theatre practice. We want people from different walks of life sharing a creative space.

Why is putting on new work at TOP important to the RSC? Shakespeare was a daring, experimental writer. He wrote about the key issues of his day, sometimes concealing them by looking at the history of England or creating fantastical worlds. It's important that the RSC keeps making clear that the spirit of experimentation is at the heart of who we are and who he was. The Other Place in its 40 year history has always been the space we can explore

contentious issues and maybe divide opinion and we intend to continue in that spirit.

Conversations have begun about what kind of work might be performed at TOP. What ideas are coming out of these workshops?

We won't be making any decisions about what is going to be performed for another few months but in the meantime I'm really interested in power and who holds it. One artist has been doing interviews with serving soldiers

about how they feel about their role, exploring the notion that someone is serving their country but isn't necessarily serving the decisions behind sending an army into a conflict. We are also working with Mikel Murfi and Marina Carr who are exploring the darker side of fairies in Celtic culture; there are stories to tell about the metaphor of spirits and what they mean in terms of our emotions. All enormous ideas that we are trying to contain in a tiny little space.

Is there anything radical or mischievous that has come out of the project so far that you could share?

Capital projects are usually filled with lots of very tedious, but important questions. How many windows can you afford? How many toilets! We currently have toilets for 1,000 so I am unusual in that I am leading a capital project that needs fewer toilets.

We are also not deciding where the furniture goes.

It might be one way one day and then move the next!

There are a few examples like that through the building. For example, we talked about having a red floor backstage which seemed too 'loud' for the tech team and they were bound to mark out yellow lines on the floor. So I have done a deal, they can have a grey floor as long as the lines are red. Lines on the floor are apparently always yellow. Not here, they are going to be red!

The Other Place has been made possible thanks to the support of private and public funders, including very generous donations from The Gatsby Charitable Foundation and Backstage Trust, a £3 million Lottery grant from Arts Council England and a new creative partnership with the University of Birmingham, Founding Partner of The Other Place.

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RADICAL MISCHIEF | ISSUE 04 | JUNE 2015

www.rsc.org.uk

HECUBA

BY MARINA CARR

DAN HUTTON TALKS TO MARINA CARR THEATRE-MAKER & PLAYWRIGHT

“THE GREEKS” - as the playwrights working in ancient Greece are commonly known - are currently seeing a bit of a resurgence in British theatre. Even plays written in the last century are getting the Greek treatment, as theatre-makers look to ancient forms to better understand the questions facing us today. This is no less true for Marina Carr who returns to the RSC with her play Hecuba this autumn, and for whom the Greek canon tells us a lot about the world we experience.

According to the legend, Hecuba is driven by revenge, but Carr suggests her actions are less straightforward and come from a deep-seated sense of injustice.

“Her daughter Polyxena is taken from her to be sacrificed and she has to endure the death of her last son and husband. She has to endure being the mother of Cassandra, the prophetess... so she has quite a lot on her plate”.

© Tony Watson, Arcangel Images

Carr has always been drawn to these ancient myths,in a busy, often superficial world, it’s the depth of human “I think we're absolutely jaded with the rational” understanding that these plays demonstrate which draw Carr tells me when I ask why she believes this trend has her back time and time again. “I think we're all, to emerged. “We're jaded with being told A plus B equals C. ourselves, mythological. And we're all huge.

We're jaded with being told how to Unfortunately, everyone else on the , live.” In her opinion, the Greeks tap planet thinks exactly the same,” she I THINK WE RE ALL, TO OURSELVES, into a community trying to “invent” jokes. “The myths tackle the idea that , itself in the wake of sudden shocks.

MYTHOLOGICAL. AND WE RE ALL HUGE. our passions are huge. The investment “The last time there was such an immense UNFORTUNATELY, EVERYONE ELSE ON THE in living is huge. The consequences are shift was probably after World War Two; huge. And sometimes we forget that when PLANET THINKS EXACTLY THE SAME now, there's an absolute fragmentation it's all about the laundry and the of who we are and how we define ourselves. school run and the job.” Whilst those What we really are, are creatures of passion. Passions mundane aspects of life take over, the Greeks always are what we live by, despite what everyone tells us. have space to contemplate massive ideas which affect We’re not rational creatures.” all of us. “The purity of that world is what attracts me.”

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Carr, whose plays include Portia Coughlan and The Cordelia Dream, feels that Hecuba’s story has been misrepresented. “I've always disagreed with the legacy of Hecuba and the way she's been treated, so I wanted to argue a bit with how she's been handed down to us”. Hecuba, in Homer’s Iliad and later in Euripides’ play of the same name, was the wife of King Priam and bore eighteen children during a time of immense conflict. Carr, however, takes issue with a major plot-point in her narrative: “I fundamentally disagreed with the idea of her killing her two little grandsons in revenge. I just never bought that.

So I've written my own version of what might possibly have happened on that beach.”

Carr’s version of Hecuba brings to life private thoughts, making the play resonate for a modern audience. Above that, the story also helps us understand what it means to live within a society, in much the same way the Greek playwrights themselves were trying to invent an idea of the world. “In a way we've come full circle as we're also trying to define a series of narratives and powerful codes by which we live.” These huge plays, Carr believes, are about “powerful emotion that we all carry around, even though we try to sift through it because our passions are so huge. But I think they were onto something trying to define and contain the immensity of what it is to be alive.”

Presented with the generous support of RSC Board Member Miranda Curtis

Hecuba plays in the Swan Theatre from 17 September 2015 05

BEFORE WRITING BREAKFAST WITH MUGABE I was a newbie playwright from Derbyshire, with questions about power and spirituality and a fascination with African politics. My lucky break was to meet Chartwell Dutiro, a fabulous Zimbabwean musician.

Over a pint or three of Guinness he talked about

BREAKFAST WITH MUGABE PLAYWRIGHT

FRASER GRACE

LOOKING BACK

2015 RADICAL MISCHIEF | ISSUE 04 | JUNE

his homeland, and from that point on, the ancestors were with me. Soon I stumbled across a newspaper article that supplied the bones of a plot, in which Mugabe is treated by a white psychiatrist. I arrived for a meeting with Paul Sirett, then RSC Literary Manager, with my pants on fire; Paul doused the flames and offered me a commission.

Writing a new play with the RSC was gruelling but fantastic! A real struggle went into transforming my idea into a four-hander fit to hold the Swan Theatre. I was under pressure, what would happen if Mugabe was swept from the scene? But the original production (like the

president) just kept rolling.

I was lucky enough to have a fantastic cast, Antony Sher directing and Chartwell Dutiro – the very same – supplying the music. The play premiered as part of the New Writing Festival in Stratford in 2005 before transferring first to Soho, then into the West End and broadcast on radio.

The play has since been revived in the UK and elsewhere, most recently in 2014 – first Off-Broadway, and then in Berkeley, California. Audiences often see shades of Macbeth in the play’s mixture of power and paranoia. I always say it reflects the Company it was written for – by which I mean its appetite for Shakespearean themes, obviously.

www.rsc.org.uk

RADICAL MISCHIEF | ISSUE 04 | JUNE 2015

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Workshop photos by Réjane Collard-Walker

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RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT:

WORKSHOP DIARY COLLETTE MCCARTHY

RSC LITERARY ASSISTANT

www.rsc.org.uk

THE MOST NOMINATED PLAY ON

BROADWAY CATHERINE MALLYON

RSC EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

Collette McCarthy takes us through a week in the life of an RSC Workshop.

We start with the Meet & Greet, which always involves tea, coffee and biscuits. It’s a bit like the first day of school – some people know each other and are busily chatting away – others don’t and are pretending serious interest in their coffee. Everyone has a little bit of nervous tension excitement for the week ahead.

We then form a big circle and everyone introduces themselves and which part they’re playing, or what they’re here to do that week.

Then the actors read the play – hearing the play out loud is absolutely key for the playwright but also for the other creatives. New plays at the RSC tend to have a lot of characters so it can be really hard for a writer to keep all of their voices in her/his head!

After lunch we all have a chat about the play – usually a work in progress. Everyone has a unique perspective – for example an actor will be seeing the story through their character’s eyes. This discussion about the play will continue throughout the week.

TUESDAY

If the play features a particular setting or subject, we’ll often arrange a talk from an expert – we have had all sorts, from nuclear physicists to cricketers, or specialists of the salacious clubs of 18th Century London. It’s always amazing fascinating to see the world of the play through a new lens.

In the afternoon we start to get the play on its feet – The RSC Literary Department is generously supported by THE DRUE HEINZ TRUST

the director takes the play scene by scene and works with the actors, script in hand.

WEDNESDAY

Often the designer will have a moment in the workshop to test out some ideas on how to create the visual world of the play. This is the time for trying out ideas, not all of which are successful! Having room to fail is a very important part of the creative process.

We often get a selection of items from the RSC costume and props stores. They are a real treasure trove – everything from guns and crowns to fur coats and rubber severed heads.

THURSDAY

We might get a movement practitioner to join to help the team explore the physicality of the characters –– for instance looking at things that might seem impossible on the page, such as a character transitioning from a child to a man in fro before the audience's’ very eyes.

FRIDAY

We go over the work we have done that week, and think of a way to present it, whether in a partially staged read through of the whole play, or the staging of some scenes. In the afternoon the RSC Artistic Team will come to see some of the work we have done and discuss the piece so far, all over tea and biscuits of course!

Production photo from Wolf Hall. Photo by Keith Pattison

ON 11 DECEMBER, 2013 Wolf Hall opened in the Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon shortly followed by Bring Up the Bodies. Based on the novels by Hilary Mantel and adapted by Mike Poulton, these exhilarating stories of power and persuasion transported audiences to the volatile court of Henry VIII. After much critical acclaim, both plays transferred to the Aldwych Theatre, London where they received 5 Olivier award nominations and 2 Olivier Awards.

Designer Christopher Oram picked up an award for his Tudor costume designs, which helped bring our adaptations of Hilary Mantel's novels so wonderfully to life and Nathaniel Parker won Best Actor in a Supporting Role for his portrayal of Henry VIII. Now playing in New York at the Winter Garden Theater, Wolf Hall Parts One and Two are currently the most nominated plays on Broadway with 8 Tony nominations, including Best Play, 7 Outer Critics Circle nominations, 5 Drama Desk nominations and 3 Drama League nominations.

We are thrilled that these productions that were made in Stratford-upon-Avon have gone on to achieve such fantastic success both in the UK and abroad.

WOLF HALL TONY NOMINATIONS BEST PLAY BEST PERFORMANCE BY AN ACTOR IN A LEADING ROLE IN A PLAY BEST PERFORMANCE BY AN ACTOR IN A FEATURED ROLE IN A PLAY BEST PERFORMANCE BY AN ACTRESS IN A FEATURED ROLE IN A PLAY

Photo courtesy of www.imgkid.com

MONDAY

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BEST SCENIC DESIGN OF A PLAY BEST COSTUME DESIGN OF A PLAY BEST LIGHTING DESIGN OF A PLAY BEST DIRECTION OF A PLAY

www.wolfhallbroadway.com 09

RADICAL MISCHIEF | ISSUE 04 | JUNE 2015

Can you tell us how Girl Fights came about?

Girl Fights was inspired by a stint I had at a temping agency during a prolonged ‘resting period’.

There seemed to be a terrible rage amongst women of my age (mid to late 30s), trapped in unwanted jobs in an uncaring, competitive metropolis. This was also reflected in the city around me. London seemed full of small but unmistakable incidents of aggression coming, not from men or gangs outside my own culture, but from women my own age.

Fascinated by this phenomenon of Girl on Girl Crime, I delved further and discovered Female Chauvinist Pigs by Ariel Levy and Odd Girl Out by Rachel Simmons, newly published studies of female aggression trapped in competitive urban modernity. Women rooted in dissatisfaction and the pressure to succeed on every level. Women who had been taught to compete with men but manipulated by society to compete with each other. And more importantly, women who have no outlet for their natural aggression. Unlike men. In short - women just like me.

I spoke to female fighters, boxers mainly. I followed leads to underground fight clubs, spoke to people who knew someone who knew someone but never found one. I wondered what would happen if this aggression

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THE FIRST RULE OF FIGHT CLUB IS...

LIZZIE HOPLEY ACTRESS/PLAYWRIGHT

Lizzie was part of the Acting Company for the 2014 Roaring Girls season. During this time she developed a new play called Girl Fights.

was given a proper, organised outlet. If violence could be harnessed and used by women, on women, to effectively heal itself. Girl Fights was the very dark result.

Can you tell us what was unique about being able to research and develop a piece of new work at the RSC? I knew there was an interest in radical new writing reflected in the excellent Midsummer Mischief Programme.

That, together with my experiences exploring prominent strong women during the Roaring Girls Season had brought Girl Fights to mind. It seemed a timely project to develop, particularly with so many talented actresses trapped on site. It also gave me access to the excellent Lucy Bailey, a director who had seen my work in the Season and who I was hugely keen to work with.

What kind of support did you get from the RSC and how did it help?

The RSC works as a massive support system that adopts you utterly while you’re there. Not only that, it is a centre of excellence with huge resources. I was given two weeks of research and development under the guidance of an in-house producer, excellent stage management support, space to rehearse and perform in, a professional female

www.rsc.org.uk

Stage Combat team (RC-Annie) and chocolate biscuits.

Do you have any plans to create other new work or continue to explore Girl Fights you would like to share?

The follow-up feedback from the RSC Literary Department and personally from Erica Whyman has been invaluable during rewrite hell. But most heartening was the audience response.

Girl Fights is an edgy play and incites passionate debate and I certainly got one, including advice to write in more mud and jelly. I’m proud to say I have resisted this. Lucy Bailey remains attached and committed to the future of the project and we are currently seeking its urban home.

How did it feel presenting Girls Fights to an audience of RSC Staff?

Briefly, terrifying. I sat at the back with every muscle clenched. However, the event was safer than I’d imagined. I was nearing the end of the Roaring Girls Season and felt part of a big family.

I just didn’t expect so many of the extended family to come! I was chuffed to see front of house, technical staff and security take a seat.

But that might have been the draw of the title.

There may have been the expectation of mud and jelly…

I WONDERED WHAT WOULD HAPPEN IF THIS AGGRESSION WAS GIVEN A PROPER, ORGANISED OUTLET, IF VIOLENCE COULD BE HARNESSED AND USED BY WOMEN, ON WOMEN...

The fight call that inspired Lizzie to create Girl Fights. Photos by Lizzie Hopley

The RSC Ensemble is generously supported by THE GATSBY CHARITABLE FOUNDATION and THE KOVNER FOUNDATION

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NEW WORK NEARBY

We are always on the lookout for new work taking place throughout the region. Here are just a few of the shows that you can catch on stage near you.

BELGRADE THEATRE UNPLUGGED

FIERCE FESTIVAL 2015

BIRMINGHAM REPERTORY THEATRE 4 – 6 JUNE 2015

BELGRADE THEATRE COVENTRY & WARWICKSHIRE 20 – 27 JUNE 2015

VARIOUS VENUES ACROSS BIRMINGHAM 7 – 11 OCTOBER 2015

May 2002. Spring in Bethlehem. A group of armed men seek sanctuary in one of the world’s holiest sites as the Israeli army closes in with helicopters, tanks and snipers. The Siege is inspired by real life testimonies from a group of fighters, now exiled across Europe.

Stripped back, rehearsed readings of plays the Belgrade will be producing in the Autumn.

With no sets or costumes, their cast of professional actors allow you to witness the very start of the process that turns amazing scripts into amazing stage plays.

Fierce is an international festival of live art centered in Birmingham. The festival embraces theatre, dance, music, installations, activism, digital practices and parties. Fierce reimagines the city with performances in out-of-the-ordinary spaces including a mechanic’s garage and former metal factory.

www.birmingham-rep.co.uk

www.belgrade.co.uk/unplugged

www.wearefierce.org

WORTH A TRIP CARRIE

BY STEPHEN KING

ADAPTED BY PAUL TAYLOR-MILLS LTD

SOUTHWARK PLAYHOUSE SOUTH LONDON 1 – 30 MAY 2015

Pray for your Salvation… Carrie is back like you've never seen her before.

Produced originally by the Royal Shakespeare Company in 1988, this modern musical retelling of Stephen King’s novel is an unlikely Cinderella story. Seventeen year-old misfit schoolgirl Carrie White has a burning secret. A tale of music, insanity and gore, with the talented Evelyn Hoskins, this revitalised musical will thrill to the very end. www.southwarkplayhouse.co.uk

We would love your feedback on our newspaper, please drop us an email with your thoughts

EDITORIAL TEAM: Graham Rolfe, Laura McMillan, Erica Whyman and The RSC Literary and Marketing Departments.

CONTRIBUTORS: Marina Carr, Fraser Grace, Lizzie Hopley, Dan Hutton, Catherine Mallyon, Collette McCarthy and Erica Whyman.

The RSC Literary Department is generously supported by THE DRUE HEINZ TRUST.

radical.mischief@rsc.org.uk

THE SIEGE

BY THE FREEDOM THEATRE