TRE EA G.UK H OR E. E TR TR T HEA HEA T lt A Y R A tot OR EMP 2008–09 | ONT R E G C in P WINT lo E 04 | V UE - DE E ISS TR 20 | HEA T L A tot VOLUME TOTAL MAGAZINE DAY OF THE DEAD – MEET THE YOUNG THEATRE COMPANIES TACKLING BEREAVEMENT SPECTRES A GO-GO AS WE HAVE WORDS WITH THE SPECTACULAR TIM ETCHELLS OF FORCED ENTERTAINMENT VENTURE INTO THE FOREST IN EdINBURGH AND GO ON A FABULOUS WALK IN DEVON TAKE A TRIP TO NEW LIFE BERLIN – WOOLOO! FIND OUT ABOUT THE TOTAL THEATRE AWARDS 2008 WITH REPORTS AND REVIEWS A-PLENTY READ ALL ABOUT IT – NEWS OF THE LONDON INTERNATIONAL MIME FESTIVAL, COMPANY UPDATES, AND MORE THEATRE MAGAZINE – TAKING YOU THROUGH THE DARK DAYS AND TOWARDS THE BRIGHT LIGHTS OF NEW PERFORMANCE TOTAL £5 totAltHEATRE.ORG.UK 3 TOTAL THEATRE MAGAZINE VOLUME 20 | ISSUE 04 | WINTER 2008–09 TOTAL THEATRE VOLUME 21 ISSUE 01 WILL BE PUBLISHED FEBRUARY 2009 EDITORIAL CONTENTS My first ‘job’ in ‘the arts’ was at the Institute of REGULARS TOTAL THEATRE MAGAZINE Contemporary Arts (ICA) in London. Those words are in quote marks because this was in the days Editor (mid 70s) when the talk was of art, not the arts, News & Previews P05 DOROTHY MAX PRIOR and making and presenting art was seen as a Performer & Company Updates P08 [email protected] vocation rather than a career. Divisions between Out & About P10 departments at the ICA were pretty loose then. Editorial Forum Pippa Bailey ROBERT AYERS In our view it was all art. In a typical week I ATES FRANC CHAMBERLAIN Absolute Beginners: P11 Y might well be programming an ethnographic film RICHARD CUMING festival, doing the get-in for The People Show, The Canny Granny gets specific about site ANTHONY DEAN running the bar at an informal late-night gig by Voices P14 BARRY EdWARDS The Clash, or setting up the opening party for the Rachel Clare of Crying Out Loud MARIGOLD HUGHES notorious Prostitution exhibition that earned us MIRIAM KING Being There P18 the Daily Mail headline ‘These People Are The HOTO DAVE LAURA LLOYD Wreckers of Civilization’. Of course it didn’t last, The Fabulous Walks P BECCY SMITH and we all got chucked out eventually. The ICA EdWARD TAYLOR TOT was dull and boring for a while, then a fresh crew MISCHA TWITCHIN FEATURES 2009. CASSIE WERBER A took over (including Lois Keidan, now of Live Art L TOM WILSON Development Agency) and a new era began. T LIMF HEA I Give You My Word P12 Listings Editor The ICA is currently in the spotlight because of Dorothy Max Prior interviews TR the decision made by its artistic director, Ekow JOHN ELLINGSWORTH E Eshun, to close the Live & Media Arts department Tim Etchells of Forced Entertainment [email protected] MAGAZ from the end of November 2008. This has Editorial Assistant understandably caused a furore – although, to Festival at the Crossroads P15 BECCY SMITH play Devil’s Advocate, Eshun is mostly concerned Pippa Bailey reflects on lift 2008 in about the redundancy of New Media as a distinct Advertising & E | artform and wants to rid the ICA of its Digital Subscriptions Manager vol Studio, and I’m with him on that. ‘New Media’ No Escape P16 SHARON ARMSTRONG- is a horribly old-fashioned notion – a pencil and Mary Kate Connolly takes a trip WILLIAMS HEATRE, APPEARING AT 20 | a computer are both just tools, after all. to New Life Berlin T [email protected] [email protected] iss There are plenty of theatre spaces in central ISUAL UE 04 | London, so if he wants to focus on visual arts Total Theatre Awards 2008 P21 V Design practice, so be it (and hopefully he knows that A special report on the winners STUDIO TONNE includes performance art). Outside of the London and the process by Pippa Bailey [email protected] FOR wint International Mime Festival – which will, as and Dorothy Max Prior D usual, be using the venue in January 2009 – the Printing E ICA theatre (one of many badly managed and ANDUS WAR R underused black-box London theatres) has not Into The Forest P24 [email protected] A 2008–09 been programming anything much of interest for Andy Field on the Forest Fringe years. It’s no great loss. Published by: UNIVERSITY OF WINCHESTER Death in the Afternoon P25 IN ASSOCIATION WITH And actually, London isn’t the epicentre of HEATRE experimental theatre/performance practice Claire Harvey of The River People, T TOTAL THEATRE currently (with notable exceptions including Cassie Werber of ChoppedLogic, and Total Theatre Magazine CPT, BAC, Toynbee Studios, Barbican BITE, OTAL T University of Winchester Shunt Lounge). Look a little further afield and Claire Beresford of Little Bulb Theatre tackle the subject of bereavement Faculty of Arts you’ll notice venues such as the Warwick Arts Winchester SO22 4NR Centre, The Basement in Brighton, greenroom in Manchester, Arnolfini in Bristol, The Phoenix Traces P28 in Exeter, and The Arches in Glasgow – vibrant artistic centres commissioning and programming Anna-Helena McLean, Persis-Jade exciting new work. Look through the Total Theatre Maravala, and Ian Morgan on © Total Theatre Magazine Magazine lens and you’ll realise that a lot of The Grotowski Project theatre laboratory WINNEROLONY, C All rights reserved. ISSN 0960-6106. theatre/performance we cover doesn’t even need a theatre building – to pick a few examples IOT The views expressed or opinions stated from current and recent issues: National Theatre REVIEWS P30 Id in Total Theatre Magazine are not of Scotland’s rural touring; the Without Walls necessarily the views of the editor or consortium of street arts festivals; NoFit State’s Includes: Edinburgh International Festival HE T publishers. Similarly, statements made circus-theatre; and the Fabulous Walks project and Fringe; CPT Sprint; Winchester Hatfair; or opinions expressed by the advertisers and numerous other site-responsive works are not necessarily shared by the editor documented in this issue. NTS Black Watch at BITE or publishers. Reasonable care has been taken to avoid error in the magazine Yes, I’m as sad as anyone at the thought of no MEDIA P39 HEATRe’s but no liability will be accepted for any theatre at the ICA. But mostly for reasons of T errors which may occur. No material in nostalgia. Times change, let’s leave Eshun to his this publication may be reproduced in yuppie restaurant-bar and get out into the railway New publications reviewed APE any way without the consent in writing arches and onto the streets. dC of the publisher. The publishers will not E accept responsibility for the safe return R of unsolicited material. We assume Dorothy Max Prior permission to publish any unsolicited Editor material unless otherwise stated in writing. OVER: C GET IN TOUCH! CONTACT DETAILS FOR ADMINISTRATION AND EDITORIAL: Administration: Editorial: Total Theatre Magazine Total Theatre Magazine University of Winchester The Basement Faculty of Arts 24 Kensington Street Winchester SO22 4NR Brighton BN1 4AJ [email protected] [email protected] Tel: 01962 827092 Tel: 07752 142526 www.totaltheatre.org.uk 4 totAL THEATRE - DEVEloPinG CONTEMPORARY THEATRE NEWS & PREVIEWS AREVA D ATALIA DU ATALIA N & HOTO HOTO P LAY. LAY. P LUG & P KHE A NEWS PREVIEWS NEWS FROM VENUES AND FESTIVALS BORy’s LES SEPT PLANCHES DE LA RUSE. PHOTO AGLAÉ 31ST LONDON International MIME Festival 10–25 January 2009 London’s celebrated showcase for contemporary visual theatre enters its fourth decade with a feast of UK premieres, featuring artists from the UK, France, Germany, Portugal, Russia, Spain, the USA, Greece, and China. Highlights of the 2009 festival include France’s Aurélien Bory, working with 14 Chinese NUTCRACKER AT EGG. PHOTO TOBY FARROW performers in Les Sept Planches de la Ruse at the Barbican Theatre (part of Paris Calling for bite09); and Germany’s mask theatre experts, Familie Floez, visiting Southbank Centre’s Queen THE EGG, THEATRE ROYAL BATH Elizabeth Hall and Newbury’s Corn Exchange with Hotel Paradiso, described as ‘an Alpine The egg theatre for children and young thriller-chiller with more than a hint of Fawlty Towers’. The season opens at the Purcell Room, people presents its first in-house Christmas Southbank Centre, with Le Petit Travers from France’s Collectif Petit Travers, taking object production with a new adaptation of ETA manipulation to new heights. Other highlights include: Circus Klezmer from Spain; American Hoffman’s The Nutcracker, written by vaudeville maestro Tomas Kubinek; the truly demented Buchinger’s Boot Marionettes; Hattie Naylor with music and lyrics by Russia’s cult avant-garde performance group Akhe whose Faust 2360 Words is a bizarre Paul Dodgson, directed by Lee Lyford and version of Faust in precisely 2360 words of text and a torrent of unforgettable images. designed by Hayley Grindle. A recent hit at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and winner of a 2008 Total Theatre This major Christmas production heralds Award for visual theatre, and a Fringe First, RedCape Theatre (UK) presents its debut the arrival of a permanent fixture in the show The Idiot Colony. egg’s annual calendar, building on recent critical acclaim for A Midsummer Night’s This year’s festival features a raft of Meet the Artist discussion dates, and an intensive Dream and His Dark Materials, previously workshop from Angela De Castro (see Training News, page 7). produced by the same team at the Theatre Royal Bath. For more information visit See the full programme online from 3 November at www.mimefest.co.uk www.theatreroyal.org.uk/the-egg A free festival brochure is available from 24 November – call 020 7637 5661.