British Theatre Guide podcast – Détails, épisodes et analyse

Fierce Festival is a “youthful and joy-filled festival of international theatre, performance and experiences” which takes place in and around Birmingham every two years.
 
Midlands editor Steve Orme spoke to Fierce’s artistic director Clayton Lee and Adam Kinner whose one-to-one show Manual will be presented daily in the Library of Birmingham.
 
Fierce Festival will run from Tuesday 15 until Saturday 19 October.
 
(Photo: Clayton Lee and Adam Kinner, credit Steve Orme)

In 2009, TV writers Trevor Suthers and John Chambers put together a night of short, brand new plays written by established TV writers which took its name from its original venue, the Joshua Brooks pub on Princess Street in Manchester.

Fifteen years on, and now at fringe venue 53two, JB Shorts is an established biannual event on the Manchester theatre calendar with its two-week runs of six 15-minute plays.

With the 25th JB Shorts about to open, BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Trevor together with actor James Quinn, who wrote for the very first JB and has written, directed and performed in many since, about what JB is all about and what this next run will offer, as well as how the whole thing began.

JB Shorts 25 runs at 53two, Arch 19, Watson Street, Manchester from Wednesday 9 to Saturday 19 October 2024.

Actor, writer, choreographer and film-maker Lanre Malaolu’s play Samskara had a sell-out run at London’s Yard Theatre in 2022 and was subsequently published by Nick Hern Books.

Now, I See is the second play of what has become a trilogy which, like the first part, examines family relationships through a modern black, British lens.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Lanre about the play, his writing process, how his work comes from his own experiences and observations and his introduction to creating theatre through Anna Scher drama classes and a transformational experience through Jonzi D’s Breakin’ Convention at Sadler’s Wells.

Now, I See runs at Theatre Royal, Stratford East in London from 10 May to 1 June 2024.

Braham Murray OBE arrived in Manchester in the 1960s as the youngest artistic director in the country, of the travelling Century Theatre, remaining in the city to co-found the 69 Theatre Company which went on to become the Royal Exchange Theatre, still one of the UK’s leading regional theatres.

Murray died in 2018 at the age of 75, but BTG editor David Chadderton spoke to him in 2011 when he had just announced that he would leave the theatre he co-founded 35 years earlier. He spoke about working with Century Theatre's travelling auditorium, forming the 69 Theatre Company at the University Theatre (now Contact) and the process of designing the unique Royal Exchange Theatre module, as well as the rebuilding of the theatre after the 1996 IRA bomb.

This interview was originally recorded for TheatreVoice in 2011, but we are reissuing it as a tribute to a man who was very influential in helping to turn Manchester into a major theatrical centre.

For more information about the Royal Exchange Theatre, see www.royalexchange.co.uk.

(Photo of Braham Murray, credit: Mia Rose)

The 2019 Manchester International Festival will take place at various venues around the city in July. An edited version of the main presentation at the MIF launch on 7 March can be heard in a previous British Theatre Guide podcast episode, but we also spoke directly to some of the artists involved.

We asked MIF Artistic Director John McGrath for his highlights of the theatre programme and how Manchester has changed since he was head of the city's Contact Theatre.

We also spoke to Leo Warner of 59 Productions about his collaboration with choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, writer Lolita Chakrabarti and Rambert Dance on an adaptation of Italo Calvino's novel Invisible Cities.

Finally, we asked director Phelim McDermott about Tao of Glass, his collaboration with composer Philip Glass on a new stage performance featuring ten brand new pieces of music composed by Glass.

Invisible Cities will be performed at Mayfield beside Piccadilly Station in Manchester from 4 to 14 July. Tao of Glass will be at the Royal Exchange Theatre in Manchester from 11 to 20 July.

The Manchester International Festival 2019 will take place at various venues from 4 to 21 July.

Photos:

• John McGrath, MIF Artistic Director and Chief Executive introduces the MIF19 programme. Image credit Tarnish Vision.
• Leo Warner, Lolita Chakrabarti, Benoit Swan Pouffer—Invisible Cities. Image credit Joel Chester Fildes.
• Philip Glass and Phelim McDermott. Image credit Rod Morata.

Derby Theatre is preparing for a new adaptation of Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book, in an adaptation by Neil Duffield, which will be the theatre’s first ever production to full integrate BSL signing into the production.

BTG’s Midlands Editor Steve Orme speaks to director Sarah Brigham about the production, followed by Ivan Stott, who wrote the songs and will play Baloo, and Caroline Parker MBE, who will play Tabaqui and be signing for other characters in the play.

The Jungle Book runs from Friday 5 to Saturday 20 April 2019.

Photo: Caroline Parker (Tabaqui), Ivan Stott (Baloo and composer) and Sarah Brigham (director).

Highlights of the launch event for the Manchester International Festival 2019, held in Manchester on 7 March 2019.

Introduced by MIF artistic director John McGrath, this episode also features announcements from festival participants including Phelim McDermott of Improbable Theatre, Kwame Kwei-Armah of Young Vic Theatre, actors Maxine Peake and Juliet Stevenson, Leo Warner of 59 Productions, writer Lolita Chakrabarti, choreographer Claire Cunningham, Mary Anne Hobbs of BBC 6 Music and grime artist Skepta.

Other artists appearing at the festival include Philip Glass, Yoko Ono, Laurie Anderson and David Lynch.

Image from MIF launch:
Michael Symmons Roberts, Emily Howard, John McGrath, Maxine Peake, Grainne Flynn, Wesley Thistlewaite, Adam Ali, Kirsty Housley, Claire Cunningham, Leo Warner, Kwame Kwei-Armah, Isaiah Hull, Young identity poet, Reggie Gray, Animals of Manchester child-curators, Sibylle Peters, Karl Hyde, Lois Keidan, Adam Thirlwell, Danny Collins, Adania Shibli, Juliet Stevenson, Lolita Chakrabarti, Benoit Swan Pouffer, Christine Cort, Mark Ball

From Shore to Shore is a play written by British playwright Mary Cooper in collaboration with M W Sun based on real migration stories from Chinese communities throughout the UK that will tour nationally to Chinese restaurants and Chinese community centres rather than theatres.

For this episode, BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to the play’s director, David Tse, and veteran British Chinese actor Ozzie Yue, who leads the cast, about the play, the process of collecting stories, their own family connections with Chinese migrant stories and also how opportunities have changed for British Chinese actors over the last few decades.

From Shore to Shore, directed by David K S Tse for On the Wire and starring Ozzie Yue, will open at the Yang Sing Restaurant in Manchester from 9 to 16 March and will then tour until 6 April, with performances in Liverpool, Lancaster, Morecambe, Newcastle upon Tyne and Birmingham.

The latest production from Manchester-based new writing theatre company Box of Tricks is SparkPlug, written and performed by David Judge based on his own experiences being brought up as a mixed race child by a white stepfather in 1980s Manchester.

The production is directed by Box of Tricks Joint Artistic Director and co-founder Hannah Tyrrell-Pinder and begins its 9-week tour at HOME in Manchester, where BTG editor David Chadderton spoke to David and Hannah in a dressing room during a break from technical rehearsals.

SparkPlug runs at HOME in Manchester from 13 to 23 February 2019 before touring to Unity Theatre in Liverpool, Theatre Severn in Shrewsbury, Cheltenham Everyman Studio, Harrogate Theatre Studio, Live Theatre in Newcastle, York Theatre Royal, Hull Truck Theatre, Theatr Clwyd in Mold, Crewe Lyceum Studio, Spring Arts Centre in Havant, The Lighthouse in Poole, Marlowe Studio in Canterbury, Old Town Hall in Hemel Hempstead, The North Wall Arts Centre in Oxford, Square Chapel in Halifax, The Met in Bury and Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough, before finishing at Birmingham Rep from 10 to 13 April.

Conrad Nelson’s production of Shakespeare’s comedy Much Ado About Nothing for Northern Broadsides Theatre Company had a cast change on the first day of rehearsals when Reece Dinsdale had to drop out of the key role of Benedick due to a family illness and Robin Simpson took over the role.

BTG Editor David Chadderton spoke to Robin during the second week of rehearsals about the additional pressure that may have put on him and also about the production as a whole, playing Shakespeare, performing comedy and even a bit of panto.

The Northern Broadsides production of Much Ado About Nothing runs at the New Vic Theatre in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire from 8 February to 2 March 2019, before embarking on a national tour until the end of May to The Dukes Lancaster, Stephen Joseph Theatre in Scarborough, Salisbury Playhouse, Derby Theatre, Theatre Royal Bury St Edmunds, Lawrence Batley Theatre in Huddersfield, Viaduct Theatre in Halifax, The Lowry in Salford, York Theatre Royal and Harrogate Theatre.