Lost In Trans by Dickie Beau - Toynbee Studios

Written for Exeunt Magazine.


Lost In Trans

Conceived and performed by Dickie Beau

Dramaturg – Julia Bardsley

Lighting Design – Marty Langthorne

Sound Design – Will Saunders

Producer – Sally Rose 

Toynbee Studios

The relationship between our internal sense of self and outward personality is a fascinating one. We align ourselves to a set of socially defined modes of being, dictated by our sex, class, occupation and many other intricate factors. But what we are screaming on the inside might not match the set of limbs and organs given to us at birth. Or, our society might not allow us to straddle separate modes of being. “Why can’t I be a woman with a penis?”, “Why can’t a human marry a horse?”

These are the kinds of questions that Dickie Beau – the persona created and performed by Richard Boyce – explores in his darkly humorous show, Lost In Trans. Combining found audio with stories from Greek Mythology and Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Dickie uses multimedia, drag and theatre to explore sexuality and identity in a unique, liberating and exciting way.

The show begins with a roaring sequence of images projected onto a mesh screen at the front of the stage, to a soundtrack of incredibly cool dance music (‘Breed’ by CRIM3S). We are shown shocking scenes of eyeballs, animals and the vocal chords in the human throat, while Dickie Beau stands on stage and slowly, serenely, hooks a flesh coloured all-in-one to the front of his body. In the video, the same flesh coloured all-in-one runs freely through the darkness, limbs swinging and dangling. On stage, Dickie pulls the legs of the all-in-one away from each other, like a woman might play with a dress, and suddenly his own skin looks like an outfit. The body he is in looks like an outfit.

And then, Tiresias: Dickie, wearing dark round glasses, unfolds a stick and waves it in front of him, like Tiresias poking at the two mating snakes. What happens next in the story of Tiresias is that he turns into a woman for the next 7 years, and in Lost In Trans, this is a perfect way to set up the precedent of gender fluidity. It is also a prime example of the way the show smartly interweaves Greek Mythology and the more contemporary stories, as Dickie Beau proceeds to be the vessel for both male and female voices.

Dickie Beau sits on top of a ladder and we hear a recording of a man declaring his love to a woman named Anne. He lip synchs the words of the recording perfectly, narrating with slick, evocative physical gestures. This section is inspired by the story of Narcissus, and a stunning reflection of Dickie Beau’s own face is projected in front of him, rippling soothingly. In combining these two stories, suddenly it becomes clear that although the recording is the declaration of love for someone else, it is primarily focused on the man’s own feelings. Dickie emphasises the speaker’s use of the word “I” with a pronounced flick of a hand to his chest. He repeats sections of the recording, and with each repeated outpouring, the recording takes on a darker, less earnest sentiment. It inspires us to question, how much can we trust the honesty of a person’s words and appearance? Or rather, how much can we trust that they are being honest to themselves? Dickie’s manipulation and performance of the recording brings its honesty to the fore.

We also meet two trans-women, portrayed in video form by Dickie who is transformed flawlessly into an imagined portrait of the speaker’s attire and characteristics. While the video plays, Dickie adorns a long blonde ponytail first in front of his penis, then on the top of his head, then on his bum, as a tail. He is man, woman, then beast, all by the simple placement of a ponytail. With two high heeled shoes on his hands, he is silhouetted in the dim light as a horse – as Pegasus. The woman on the recording talks of wanting fame, of wanting glamour and beauty, while another Pegasus moves across the back of the stage on crutches. Indeed, what’s stopping her?

The last story makes for a tremendous finale, and Dickie as a demure, modest lady leans into a microphone. She records an initially benign, bland message to her lover about the weather and the garden, before launching into a raunchy indulgence of her sexuality. “Darling”, the recipient of this recording, is treated to an account of all the things she wants him to do to her, before returning to talk of the weather, and saying “I love you darling, never forget that.” Safe in the love she shares with this man, it is clear that this seemingly innocent woman certainly has a naughty side. Through the contrast between Dickie Beau’s depiction of her attire and the recording itself, we celebrate her embracing it.

And that’s what the show is, it is a celebration of all of the voices, bodies and personas that the human form can take on. While this final recording is wrapping up, Dickie winds the microphone lead around his arm, around and around until we see that it is not connected to anything, and that it is not him speaking. It is made clear that he is the vessel for the stories, like that nude all-in-one that ran freely through the dark. Although his performance and command of the recordings is astonishingly clean cut, let us not be mistaken – he is performing an echo of these voices.

And so, he puts his dark round glasses back on, and returns to Tiresias. Following the original story, he gives another wave of the stick and – presumably – returns to the gender he was at the beginning of the show. That achieved, he leaves, while two dragonflies flit around, talking about having a sex change, much to our amusement.

After the show, I couldn’t help feeling that my own skin looked different, somehow. We are all of us wearing a flesh coloured all-in-one, running freely through the dark, free to embrace whatever character, gender or even species we wish to be. It is not just the many faces of man, it is the many faces that man can be. It sure is a bright and beautiful world that Dickie Beau has created.

Pheasant Plucker - Bush Theatre - RADAR Festival 2015

Pheasant Plucker, Lily Bevan’s debut solo show, is a comedic collage of the quirky characters her protagonist meets on a journey of self-realisation. She is a bird handler, and on the day that she gives up waiting for her bird to fly home, she decides to go on her own adventure to London. She wants to do the things that people in London do, like Time Out and Groupon. Because they’ve got their lives sorted, those people in London (cue rapturous pained laughter from the audience).

Bevan swoops on and off the stage with various additions and subtractions to her costume, and seamless alterations to her character. She moves between a yoga teacher, a therapist (including a hilarious walkthrough of her family via Sylvanian Families), a palm reader, a vegan nutritionist and a posh student studying for an MA. Each character is fully embodied, and as memorable and delightful as the last. They bear less of an impression on our protagonist however, and she woefully longs to return home to her bird.

It’s a funny, whirlwind of a show, supported by Luke Courtier on the guitar providing musical interludes akin in lyric, delivery and aesthetic to Flight of the Concords. The strength of their relationship is in being storytellers together, so a moment in which they find fleeting romance jars a little, primarily because they had stepped out as allies and do not proceed to explore the romance further.

The purpose of the show’s relation to the ‘Pheasant Plucker’ song (“I’m not a pheasant plucker I’m a pheasant plucker’s son” etc.) is a little unclear, however when the audience sing it altogether, the suspense in waiting for someone to say “Pleasant Fucker” is tantalising. The show defies too much analysis, really, and so much can be gained from simply enjoying Bevan’s bright, enigmatic performance.

Bevan does return home to her bird, and he returns home to her. It’s an odd little romance, with a sweet underlying message about being ready for a relationship when you are comfortable in yourself. But again, the joy of this show is not in thinking about it too much. It is in watching a female comedian who is comfortable in her craft lead us through some truly solid – if slightly bonkers – entertainment.

In A Vulnerable Place - Bush Theatre - RADAR Festival 2015

The fear with a piece of theatre about climate change is that it will largely be a lecture urging us to stop driving our cars, stop eating meat and look after our coastlines. These are valid points as lectures, and they are valid points as newspaper articles and factual documentaries. They are points that have been made in stunning photography exhibitions, displayed worldwide. Film has also tackled the topic consistently well. But as a piece of theatre?

Steve Waters is on stage already as the audience arrive. He is moving bricks between piles of bricks which look like wells in the ground. He begins to speak and presents a beautiful, simple insight into a character: he’s been feeling a bit low lately. But, he recognises his fortunes all the same. He feels low because of the state of the world today, and no doubt the gut reaction in the audience is to think on recent events, as well as climate change. There is a universal nod of agreement.

It starts with such promise. But after these opening lines, I’m afraid I largely tuned out and struggled to find a point at which to tune back in. Mumbled words pour forth. Words specific to a profession, hobbies and location follow. By the facts and figures about butterflies, bees and coast lines, I know that we are still talking about the environment. But members of the audience were finding opportunities to laugh which I had heard only as statistics. Was the piece just too intelligent for me? Should I have done some research before I came? I began feeling like the shy kid in the corner who hadn’t done their homework, and didn’t understand the class.

I fear that In A Vulnerable Place is indeed another piece of theatre that is trying to tackle a scientific idea, and instead comes off as a mind-numbing science lesson on a Friday afternoon. And the class stare out of the windows, too bored to even misbehave.

I picked out a few lines in the text that rang confident and true: “Avoid the unimaginable and imagine the unavoidable”. The message here is that if we confronted the state of water, food, global warming, the population increase and the preservation of our wildlife with this attitude, we would be in a more stable position. But we know this already, we don’t need more statistics in the form of theatre to understand. What theatre is good at is stories, and unfortunately Waters misses a golden opportunity here and falls into the lecture category. It is dry, it is unengaging, and I left with a more comprehensive image of the stage lights and fellow audience members than I did of the piece itself.

We Choose To Go To The Moon - Cape Theatre

Seen 7th Nov 2015 at Camden People's Theatre, London.

We Choose To Go To The Moon by Cape Theatre begins with a plea to the audience. We are asked to laugh in the right places, cry in the right places, to applaud, and most importantly, to love the performers. Like, really love them. Like, travel halfway round the world just to see them for two seconds kind of love. That love born from pure admiration, pure idolatry. And it is up to Cassie and Reena to help us get to that point.

It’s a charming beginning, and intriguing that already, we love the double act standing before us, but for none of the reasons they are striving for. Their aim is to reach a level of charisma akin to their own idol, John F Kennedy, with the aid of a self-help book - 'The Charisma Effect' by Andrew Leigh. Over the ensuing comedy of donning suits, changing their smiles, and putting a twinkle in their eyes via eyedrops and various sliced vegetables, we watch their personalities dissipate and their obsession increase.

It’s a journey that I’m sure most of us can recognise. I remember drawing a tattoo around the top of my arm and pulling two strands of hair around of my face to be just like Sporty Spice. I also had an odd fascination with Lara Croft (strong independent woman), and wore combat shorts accordingly. But, I remember the moment when I wasn’t sure where the obsession stopped and I began, and this blurring is what this show brings into interrogation.

Initially, what I found most interesting was that two girls were idolising a man, and it is a vibrant nod to feminism that they should strive to be the sort of person who ran a country, charmed an entire nation and could stand and speak before an audience of 35,000 people. As such, the show builds towards them both delivering John F Kennedy’s ‘We choose to go to the moon’ speech verbatim, and with precisely the same amount of charisma. But, it is more vibrant that they should come to learn that simply being themselves is the most charismatic they can be, and that they should wish to keep the suits.

The show is a unique execution of a familiar concept, full of charm and light-heartedness. The double act itself is ready for more growth, and there is space for them to be more daring in their relationship. The moments of potential conflict between them are the most delicious, because we know that their friendship will be ever-stronger by the end of the show. The text itself lags in places, and the overall pace would benefit from more verve and agility. But, it’s an early glimpse at an exciting company. All the ingredients are there for a sparkling, dynamic, hilarious show, ripe with schadenfreude and silly dancing.

We Choose To Go To The Moon was performed at Camden People's Theatre, programmed as part of the Fitter, Happier, More Productive season.

Four Minutes Twelve Seconds - Trafalgar Studios 2

What's the biggest lesson you can learn from your time in education? What’s really the stuff that’s going to propel you into the big wide world as a brilliant, honest, successful human being? In what context will your parents smile proudly and say “Yes, yes she/he did really well”?

So goes the predicament that Jack’s parents face at the heart of Four Minutes Twelve Seconds, written by James Fritz. As it gradually transpires that their son has made a video of him having sex with his girlfriend Cara, and that the sex was not consensual, and that the video is plastered across the internet, the morality of the ensuing action spirals out of control. Do they protect their son until he has completed his exams ahead of going to university? Or do they report him to the police and teach him the error of his ways?

The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, and the play brings up gleefully horrifying revelations that hurtle Di and David’s marriage into disarray. The pace and manner in which we are fed the information is delicious, until we are an audience aghast with wide eyes and hands over our mouths.

Fritz’ play is structurally satisfying and topically provocative, and the liveness of watching the action unfold makes for a very short 90 minutes. Anna Ledwich’s direction is sharp, and the performances are consistently bright, focused and engaging. While Kate Maravan and Jonathan McGuiness as Di and David thrive in the darkness of the comedy, Ria Zmitrowicz’ feisty performance as Cara is the grounding voice of reason. Meanwhile, Anyebe Godwin’s charming performance as Jack’s friend Nick brings warmth to what looks like a sorry state of affairs for the next generation.

It's just so solidly realised, with astute things to say about class, sexual consent and the internet. It is an intriguing choice that we should never meet or hear from Jack: all we get is heresy - a version of events - much like the internet itself. The play highlights the terrifying capacity for news to spread widely, quickly and permanently across the internet, to the point where the original author need not even grace the stage.

The play and its production are both provocative and clever, and are as inclined to moments of comedy as they are to pertinent questions. Will Jack glide through higher education and a sterling career without a whisper or repeat of his past misdemeanours? We can only hope so.
http://www.hampsteadtheatre.com/whats-on/2015/four-minutes-twelve-seconds/

The Session - Soho Theatre

Originally written for Exeunt.

The Session, written by Andrew Muir, is the story of a British man and a Polish woman meeting, falling in love, and experiencing the breakdown of their marriage. The audience play their marriage counsellor for the evening, and are privy to the re-enactment of their lightest and darkest moments together in a bid to move forwards.

The play covers some big topics, from language, to love, to home and belonging. But most broadly, it is about communication, and when Robbie (Tom Shepherd) and Lena (Izabella Urbanowicz) first meet, they can barely say two words to each other. They speak charmingly in physical gestures and simple English, and their relationship is born of a pure love and appreciation of the other person’s energy and physicality.

It raises interesting questions, particularly at a time when immigration is such a ripe topic for discussion. When Lena threatens to leave Robbie and move back home to Poland, we are willing her to stay as much out of repairing their marriage as for her to feel like she belongs here. But will that be possible while her husband won’t even bother to learn Polish, and takes no interest in Polish traditions? After all, now she’s in Britain, what possible use could those things have?

The depth of their love onstage is, however, not totally convincing. This might be due to the fact that the majority of the text is addressed to the audience, and the confusion created by the characters talking individually about different things. Nonetheless, it is interesting to observe how we as an audience oscillate between willing them to succeed in healing their marriage, and thinking they’re better off apart. Indeed, if only they spoke about the same thing, at the same time, in the same language, maybe we would expect them to stand chance.

Whereas a lot can be said for the play, less can be said for the production. It’s nice to see the text up on its feet: the dynamics of the story are approached delicately and sensitively, the comedic moments land well enough, and Debbie Hannan’s direction ensures the journey between the highs and lows moves elegantly. The set is simple and practical, and props lay covered in fabric, waiting to be unveiled and spark a memory. But I’m not sure we learn anything more about the characters as a result of them standing before us. It is a beautiful depiction of the story, but it is a safe one, nuzzled behind the beats of the text itself. Perhaps it speaks too plainly.

The Notebook - Forced Entertainment - Battersea Arts Centre

Written for Exeunt.

This production of The Notebook - a translation and adaptation of a novel by Hungarian writer Ágosta Kristóf - is conceived and devised by Forced Entertainment, and performed at the Battersea Arts Centre.

I’m going to launch right in here, to what I believe to be the heart of the matter, and talk about the translation of the book to the stage. I’m not doing so necessarily to discuss form, nor to discuss it in any kind of zeitgeisty context, but because I think the process of that adaptation is the very reason that this is a stunning piece of theatre.

I’m not saying that the book should have been made into a piece of theatre, nor that the production is in any way superior to the book. They are separate entities, and I spent most of my journey home wondering why - why this adaptation had to happen.

The Forced Entertainment production, directed by Tim Etchells, presents us with two grown men on a stage populated by two wooden chairs, atmospheric lighting and a couple of bottles of water. the men are dressed identically, they move identically, and they speak either in unison or take turns. The story is of two young boys - identical twins - who are evacuated to their Grandmother’s farm in a Europe impoverished by World War II. The men on stage, Robin Arthur and Richard Lowdon, take on the character of one twin each, and read the story from identical yellow notebooks.

The notebook is something that the twins bought together with the intention of compiling within its pages accounts of their days and adventures. One of the rules of the notebook is that the stories in it are written as truths, devoid of opinion and emotional bias. The result is an emotionally cold retelling of the darkest corners of their young years - the death of family members, visions of bestiality, perversion, the burning of children and the horrors of the war. 

Salient point number one: due to the poker-faced reading - the events told as plain fact - the audience’s imagination runs clear and sharp with images that I - personally - will struggle to forget. As such, it is when the performers stop to move their chairs, to take a sip of water, or to begin the next chapter, that there is a chilling collective recognition of the fragile humanity of it all. 

The next crucial element is the delivery of the story. Our performers are two grown men, they are two grown men playing twins, they are men playing young boys. This disjunct brings to life the very sentiment that is instrumental to a lot of the discomfort of the piece: that the two boys are experiencing horrors beyond their young years. The difference in age creates a sorrowful image of the maturity the boys have been forced to ascend to. Moreover (without giving away any spoilers), to see the twins lifted off the page of the book, physicalised as separate people who move, think and speak as one, makes the idea of any kind of separation all the more heartbreaking. 

Still, I'm not intending to say that this production is an enhancement of the book. It is just a different way of telling the tale, and in this regard, all of my wondering “why” has come back as controversially superfluous. The production harks at the golden notion of theatre as storytelling, stripped of spectacle and complication. Nonetheless, it is a testament to the book itself and Forced Entertainment’s adaptation that we should have the will to stay until the end, for over two hours. The students who were sat next to me couldn’t quite believe how long they were going to have to sit without an interval, and indeed, many may consider it a feat of endurance. Makers of theatre are told never to put a clock in the set because the audience will only be focused on how long they have been there, and how much longer is left. Unfortunately the notebooks from which Arthur and Lowden read have a similar effect, and it may well be personal to me that I found it excruciating to watch how few pages were turned and how many remained. 

Yet, there’s something in the endurance that makes the ending all the richer. The content of what we have sat through has been undeniably moving, evocative, beautiful and devastating. And as the boys become real to us, the passing pages of their lives until the end of the notebook are, on reflection, something quite special. We watch the passing minutes of youth, we will a war to end. This stark piece of theatre reminds us that it is the moments in between the chapters that are most poignant. 

First Love Is The Revolution - Soho Theatre

Originally written for Exeunt.

I tried to approach my viewing of First Love is the Revolution with no preconceptions. I expected nothing and everything, and was ready to be hit with whatever nonsense and brilliance the Soho Theatre main stage had to offer.

Even still, I was knocked sideways. This play by Rita Kalnejais follows the story of two star-crossed lovers forbidden from being with each other because of their warring families, surrounded by brutal murder and prejudice. But the emotional rawness of this Romeo and Juliet tale, coupled with the darkness of a depressed mother and murdered father between them, is framed with ridiculous comedy and joyful absurdity. The catalyst for this combination is the very thing that took me aback: this is no simple boy-meets-girl story, it is boy-meets-fox, complete with hunting, romping, and banter with other animals.

In this respect, it is the movement direction that deserves significant praise, and the performances therein. Aline David’s work successfully puts paws on foxes, a slink in a cat, and a doddering peck in the chickens. Hayley Carmichael’s performance as the caring, over-protective mother fox is particularly moving, embodying the wise hungry eyes that counter the innocent, bright ones of her cubs. Likewise, Emily Burnett as Rdeča is a delight to watch, and her relationship with Basti, intelligently played by James Tarpey, is directed beautifully and with delicacy by Steve Marmion.

The play itself is well paced, neatly structured and has just the right amount of bonkers to carry forward a poignant message: the revolution will begin when love between humans and foxes is accepted. It will begin when the barriers between species, race, nationality and gender are broken. This is something we can recognise and sympathise with, and the comedy in the play allows this to be a celebration. The only concern one might have is with the casting of this production: is it potentially problematic to cast the black girl as the fox, the white boy as the human? The female as the animal? The black boy as the dog?

Perhaps the casting is this way to make that exact controversial point, and make it crystal clear for the audience. Perhaps it was the clearest way of appealing to historical preconceptions and thwarting them. The ending, in which the revolution begins with the murder of their parents, may well be designed to mark the murder of a poisonous, stereotypical approach to casting. But are we still not ready for a production that marks a revolution beyond that point?

Either way, the production is a lot of fun, and the energy that oozes from its youthful, urban bounce is infectious. There are possibilities and alternative meanings within its layers and subtext that are rich and provocative: is it real? Is it actually all happening inside Basti’s head as a response to the trauma of his mentally unstable mother and philandering father? Are they all in fact human, and this is simply how Basti views the world?

It is a unique play with a lot to offer, both in thought and entertainment. A laudable contribution to the Soho Theatre’s Love Against The Odds season.


http://www.sohotheatre.com/whats-on/first-love-is-the-revolution/

Should Journalists Work For Free?

This may land controversially, but it’s something that has been on my mind for a little while now. It is this: should theatre journalists - critics, reviewers and feature writers - really have to work for free? 

Of course, we do it for the love of theatre, we do it because we enjoy engaging with a piece on a critical level and being part of the dialogue that occurs after the event. We get to see shows for free, and sometimes even get a little press drink. The payment is plentiful in terms of our own emotional, intellectual and social enjoyment, and we receive it gratefully. But it is not plentiful in the ways that pay the rent, or the hours it takes to form an entertaining and intelligent piece of writing.

I feel righteous in bringing this up because I work on both sides of the coin. Between marketing, playwriting and journalism, it’s a confusing mix, but it does mean that I see the truth. Over the past year, consistently, I have seen the cold harsh light of statistical evidence revealing the effect reviews have on ticket sales for a show. Negate me, please do, but my evidence comes from the box office reports of a variety of external companies performing a variety of work at different times of the year. The variables are plenty, the trend remains firm: the highest sales dates come from previews, ticket offers and press publications. 

It comes as very little surprise that when a well known and highly respected critic’s review is published, there is a spike in sales. The theatres know this, and no doubt it is the reason why at a recent press night I attended, a critic for the Times had four seats reserved for them under their name. I didn’t even have one, and she was getting paid for the gig. I’m not saying I want celebrity treatment, I’m saying that there shouldn’t be special treatment for anyone, but the argument against the gap between artists and critics is one for another time.

I sort of feel I might lose my rights to review for this, but it’s a situation that rubs my arm hairs the wrong way. Why shouldn’t we be paid for doing what we love, when we work so hard at it? Across the board, online publications and journalists are doing incredible things for the dialogue around theatre purely off their own back. A lot of people assume that these people are getting paid, which is why I wanted to write this. When a friend asked me to travel to Hampshire to review his show and I said I couldn’t afford to, he asked, “Won’t the newspaper cover it?” Friend, I wouldn’t even be paid for the review. The only reason I occasionally venture to Hampshire to review work there is that incredibly exciting things are happening and it is high on my personal agenda to ensure regional theatre receives the coverage and the acclaim it deserves. Otherwise, it is a hardy slog down the M3 through the roadworks and a day I have to book off work in advance.

Okay, alright, then who is going to pay the wage? The truth is, I don’t know. The theatre isn’t going to pay it, the company isn’t going to pay it, the not-for-profit publication with lots of contributors to cover the sheer wealth of work isn’t going to pay for it. Megan Vaughan of Synonyms For Churlish has taken the Patreon route, and I have been delighted to see friends rise to write for editorials who have the capital to pay for a review. Being paid for an interview is a rare luxury, but again, the compensation for this comes in the form of receiving the uncut version of the conversation, and having the chance to ask the questions you have been burning to ask (Nick Payne, I’m ready when you are.) But - for me, at least - it’s five days of stress and self-loathing, beating an article into submission in all of the hours around paid employment. It’s hard. I love it unconditionally, and it is like food to me, and I don’t do nearly enough of it, but it’s hard.

Of course there is an order to things, and of course you work your way up through the appropriate channels in the appropriate amount of good time. That’s just the way it is. But why does it have to be that way? What if you simply don’t have the time to go through all the channels, stuck in a catch-22? That’s why initiatives like The Stage’s critic search is brilliant, as is the IdeasTap/Hiive paid columnist gig. Otherwise, we gladly volunteer our time, but I would gladly volunteer more if it could directly supplement my rent and travel expenses. 

There is no one to blame here, and I’m not saying that anyone is in the wrong. It’s simply a situation that has risen out of the brilliant furore of bloggers and voices proclaiming their love for theatre in the form of well-written, inspiring reviews and features. We haven’t prepared for it, but I believe it is in tandem with all the brilliant new work that deserves funding and support. That is, only if we as a culture and society truly value it. If not, then let’s have that conversation, and find a way to talk about theatre in a way that does appeal to the majority. But either way, I’m inclined to suggest that in this case, the best things in life should not be free.

I won’t stop writing, but I will continue to ask this question, and hope others will, too. I don’t have any solutions or answers, and have a sneaking suspicion that under our current government, this will remain the case. But if anyone does have any ideas, please give me a shout. 

Mouthful by Metta Theatre at Trafalgar Studios

Interview with Inua Ellams, Suzanne Filteau and Poppy Burton-Morgan - originally published on Exeunt.

On a global scale, our approach to food cultivation and consumption is at a crisis point. Obesity walks beside starvation due to environmental factors, due to consumer choices, due to money and politics. And for better or worse, we’re getting clever with it: chicken meat is cloned to meet overwhelming demand, while allotments are built on the rooftops of city buildings because we’re running out of space. I’m not intending to preach about vegetarianism, or home gardening, or inspiring the next generation of farmers or paying more for your milk. But what Mouthful will do, presented by Metta Theatre at the Trafalgar Studios and supported by the Wellcome Trust, is to explore these questions alongside unquestionable scientific fact.

Directed by Poppy Burton-Morgan, the production’s response to the global food crisis comprises a collection of six short plays by an exciting bunch of six writers, Lydia Adetunji, Bola Agbaje, Clare Bayley, Inua Ellams, Neil LaBute and Pedro Miguel Rozo, each working in collaboration with six scientists. To discuss the project, I meet with Burton-Morgan and one of the playwrights, award-winning poet Inua Ellams, as well as the scientist he has been working with, Suzanne Filteau, who is Professor of International Nutrition at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. I’m mainly curious as to how the collaboration with science has worked: ironic, then, that we should consistently sidetrack the conversation to discuss media stories and anecdotes about food, with interjections of scientific fact from Filteau. I see exactly how this has worked.

Ellams says of his approach to the brief, “I knew what I wanted to write, but I didn’t know how to make it real enough in terms of the academic side of things, the science side of things. All of that really informs the characters and just populates the reality of the finished piece”. For him, Filteau has been a direct source of information and offers fact checking at the other end of an email. But Filteau’s also keen that Ellams’s focus on character means that the piece resists being a fact heavy, lecture style piece of theatre. Burton-Morgan agrees that “There’s quite a vogue for a kind of ‘science theatre’, but quite often it takes the form of a character who is a scientist giving a lecture and actually, that’s quite a lazy way through it.”

Poppy Burton Morgan and Alisha Bailey 

She might well have the Royal Court’s 2071 in mind: a climate change piece that’s one of the more high profile recent examples of didactic science theatre. But even if some audience members found its approach mind-numbingly boring, its scientific message was well worth communicating – so how do you find the balance? Mouthful will weave video projections designed by William Reynolds between each play that provide factual information, enriching the context of the stories. The benefit of programming six short plays is that the evening can feature six separate insights into a different issue, or different angles. “It’s a ten minute punch of an idea”, says Burton-Morgan. With 12 voices (the writers and the scientists, if we don’t also include actors, director and technical aspects), the net is cast wide to reach a varied audience. Burton-Morgan continues: “The food crisis is such a rich and diverse and contested and conflicted thing that you want as many voices as possible.”

The aim at the heart of the production is to inspire audiences to question consumer behaviour. A small change to our habits may indeed be small, but potentially significant. Burton-Morgan offers that if you buy less meat, you can afford to buy the organic vegetables which, Filteau adds, is both the most ethical and the healthiest way of doing things. Ellams expresses his irritation at those who throw good food away just because the packaging says it’s passed its sell-by date, while I’ve started buying milk from independent farmers. When you break things down like that, it seems quite simple. But, as Ellams’ play will show, there are always external contributory factors to consider, and far-reaching knock-on effects. “We can’t present the answers to a global food crisis in a play”, says Burton-Morgan, “But what we can do is go: there is a problem and there is a need for change.”

In rehearsal: Doña Croll, Robert Hands, Harry Lister Smith and Alisha Bailey

Playing devil’s advocate while we sit in the rehearsal room, I have to ask, “Why theatre?” Filteau responds with the fun answer, of “Why theatre? Why not?”.  It’s a strong vessel for communicating big ideas. She elaborates to say that there are different ways of getting things across to different people, and as Burton-Morgan observes, theatre is “A human way in”. With regards to the issues presented in Mouthful, she says that, “When you see all those infographics it doesn’t quite enter into you. And then you see a play that has a lot of intricately detailed, truthfully drawn characters that go through some heartbreaking stuff, you can’t not be emotionally affected by that, and that stays with you, in a way that a fact doesn’t.” It is in this sense that Ellams’ work alongside Filteau has proved most effective, as he has been able to draw characters that are as real and believable as possible.

Theatre’s key asset is its variety of communication channels, be that via the building a play is housed in, the audiences it attracts, the creative team behind it or the part of the world it plays in.  Filteau notes that the Trafalgar Studios, being a West End theatre, will receive a different audience to – for example – The Tricycle. We discuss how it is a way of connecting with an audience by a method that is not policed under the same scrutiny as television or newspapers may be. It follows as no accident that our discussion verges into politics and power, and fearful speculations on the altruism of thinking of the future and the corrupt hierarchy of leadership. Unintentionally, each play in Mouthful is presented with a family story, and the theme of what we pass on to the next generation is a common one. Again, this is no accident – the food crisis is a real fear for our future, so it’s little wonder that each writer was inspired to put a family at the centre.

With that, Poppy Burton-Morgan leaves us to contemplate further, and heads home to her own children. Mouths to feed indeed.

MOUTHFUL plays at the Trafalgar Studios from 8th September to 3rd October, and is supported by Arts Council England and the Wellcome Trust. You can buy tickets here, and visit Metta Theatre’s website here.

Artists Need Holidays Too

It came as a shock, sometime mid-August, to realise that I had not taken a holiday in four years. Sure, I had been away: I had gone to theatre festivals, taken weeks off work for R&D projects and writing courses, usually in lovely relaxing locations. I had spent the months post-university and pre-London in the comfort of my parents’ home with sunshine and farmland to walk through, but even this was in a perpetual state of unemployment panic and artistic angst.

The life of an artist, stereotypically and characteristically, affords no holidays. No weekends, only occasional evenings off and lunch breaks staring mindlessly into space, usually only provoked out of necessity because our brains are so damn fried.  Why? Why do we do this to ourselves? Ideas and urges strike at incalculable times, and it is first and foremost a passion, hobbie, identity and way of being. It is the lens through which we see the world. Also, it is a competitive field, and for a new artist in particular, work is driven by impatience: the harder you work, the quicker you produce something that might get noticed, the quicker you can start running with your career.

It feels, as a playwright and critic and all-round theatre lover, like a travesty to have not made it to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival this year. It’s a rite of passage, I know, and there was plenty going on that I was desperate to see and do, and that would have been useful for my career. I watched tweets scroll, reviews get published, friends’ shows receive critical acclaim. The article that really rubbed salt into the wound was Lyn Gardner proclaiming that a theatre company basically won’t make it unless they go to Edinburgh. Which of course is absolute bollocks and I hope I have simply misread the article, because A) it depends what you want to achieve with your work, and B) if this is true, we clearly need to do something about a culture that excludes anyone who can’t afford to take a show to Edinburgh, and take five weeks out of paid employment. (On this, Lyn has since somewhat redeemed the argument.) 

Amidst that anger, amidst that frustration, instead of throwing my money at a trip to Edinburgh, I flew away to Stockholm. I hung out with my sister and brother-in-law, I watched boats float in and out of a harbour. I spent an entire Sunday thinking of nothing and walking in whatever direction my gut told me to. My mind was so quiet of thought that my brain couldn’t handle it, and I was bombarded with ABBA-based earworms ranging from Voulez-Vous to Nina, Pretty Ballerina. Above all, I watched this civilisation of calm and peaceful people go about their envious work/life balance with style and effortless cool, and remembered that it’s okay to wait at a pedestrian crossing for the green man to show, whether a car is coming or not. 

Upon my return, plunging straight back into work has been unappealing. This is mainly because of the state my work was in before I left, and of course, no plays or ideas have written themselves out of discombobulation in my absence. But also, I have returned with a healthier attitude to 14 hour days and 7 day weeks. If my career takes longer, or if I fall behind my contemporaries for taking my foot off the gas, is that really such a terrible thing? If I spend more time with friends, family, and watching a full moon glisten over Scandinavia while flying 30,000 feet in the air, am I really missing out? 

I just think we’re getting ahead of ourselves. We’re churning out theatre and reviews as if we’re responding to our society before an event has even happened. We’re pre-empting a dialogue, desperate to be ahead of the curve. Quite simply, we’re J-walking, and I’m nervous that it means our theatre and our art is as quickly consumed as a cappuccino with cold milk and burnt espresso.

Undoubtedly, Britain’s work receives international acclaim, and people travel from far and wide to indulge in its colourful scene of arts and culture. But we have such variety and such quantity that we teeter on saturation point. I agree that everyone should have the opportunity to realise their creativity, have access to arts and be provided with a voice through which to communicate and express themselves. But would be so awful to do it a little more leisurely?

Time is expensive, rehearsal time is short, and this ends up being an article begging for the upkeep and proliferation of the Arts Council. I might go so far as to suggest that a lack of financial investment in the arts is what perpetuates an artist’s lack of holiday time. If you work in the arts and get paid time and a half for working a bank holiday, my God, congratulations. If you’re freelance, just forget it. But as individuals, we can look after ourselves a little better. If we want to accurately portray our city, our country and our world, we need to get out of it and achieve a bird’s eye view. Otherwise, the echo chamber prevails, and art is only for those who don’t take the time to sit on a sun lounger with a mojito. It risks becoming solely an artist’s view, rather than a human view.

That image of the moon over Scandinavia seen from a Boeing 737-300 is an experience I will never forget. From that height, I could see the moon entirely reflected in the waters of the baltic sea. We were flying fast, and flying high, but with enough distance to see our world as it really is. Now, I’m sure winter will fall, and my addiction to my work will absorb me once more with all the anti-social apologies to my long suffering friends. But I’ll try to remember that image, and that a holiday or a day off is not going to end my career. No matter how many times you push the button at a pedestrian crossing, the green man will not come any faster. It’s fine to wait, it’s fine to be patient. It is healthy to be calm and we will invariably produce better work as a result, probably with happier dispositions.

On that note, anyone for fika?

The Sick of the Fringe - Brian Lobel - Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2015

Originally written for Exeunt.

In recent years, the conversation on how art and science can support each other in both the telling of stories and development of research has been slowly but confidently coming to the fore. It’s taken the form of plays such as The Effect by Lucy Prebble in 2012, the work of Curious Directive, and the Wellcome Trust’s collaboration with choreographer Wayne McGregor (Thinking With The Body – 2013). It’s been found in festivals, regional theatres and arts centres, and celebrated in installations, aural experiences and solo shows battling everything from mental health to astrophysics. And it’s been embodied by Joan Littlewood and the Fun Palaces, with their tagline ‘everyone an artist, everyone a scientist.’

The latest instalment in this conversation is The Sick of The Fringe, a festival celebrating science, health and art at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. It’s been conceived by artist and Wellcome Trust engagement fellow Brian Lobel around the question: “How can we use the Fringe to put people in dialogue with each other?”

“Each other” is the operative phrase here, because it’s not just art that benefits from the influence of science. The exchange goes both ways, and when I speak to Brian the night before he goes to Edinburgh, he observes that “Everyone’s realising the benefits of working outside of their own bubble.” And realising, too, how similar the creative processes in art and science are: “Sometimes you have to micro-pippette something for a year to find out if it works.” It can be fun, it can be interesting, it can be incredibly boring. You’d be forgiven for thinking there’s a lot of painstaking work that artists and scientists can laugh about together, but despite these similarities Lobel has noticed that “Actually they’re not drinking in the same places, they’re not chatting in the same places”. Whether it’s over coffee or whisky, the goal of the festival is to get this dialogue happening.

The festival itself includes a series of Open Meetings with the likes of Bryony Kimmings & Tim Grayburn (Fake It ’Til You Make It), Brigitte Aphrodite (My Beautiful Black Dog) and Simon McBurney (Complicite), which will be platforms to hear and talk about making work that tackles health issues. On 27th and 28th August, the festival culminates in keynote speeches from neuroscientist Sir Colin Blakemore and actor, comedian and disability rights activist Liz Carr. While seeing seven shows a day, Brian and a team including the festival producer, two assistants and a guest artist curator are on the lookout for work that will be presented as an Opening Act for each keynote talk. Shows can be submitted for consideration, and what they’re mainly looking for is work that draws an interesting – not necessarily direct – link to the questions posed by the keynote speeches, which are published on the website.

Lobel asserts that this isn’t a competition, it’s an opportunity to contribute to the conversation. But think your show won’t fit? Perhaps think again. When I pose the possibility of seeing references to health in every show at the Fringe, Lobel counters that “I see health in everything I see anyway.” A feminist may always see gender inequality, a Marxist may always see class struggles. “Everyone has their own radar – that’s just my lens.” It follows, then, that Lobel will be keeping a blog – a blog of Diagnoses – charting how the work he’s seeing is relevant to the wider discourse around health. I offer that perhaps as a result of the festival, audiences and artists will come away having adopted this new lens through which to view theatre. Brian says that he hopes so.

What the festival is also offering is an opportunity for inspiration beyond the Fringe. Brian is crying out for artists, performers and creators to come forward, and wants to “encourage the people who are new to making work to make it, to not be afraid of stigma, to not be afraid to talk about their body.” Just because artists such as Bryony Kimmings and personalities such as Ruby Wax seem confident in speaking about themselves and their bodies, it doesn’t mean that it’s easy: “I love Bryony, and I’m so excited she’s speaking, but who knows if she felt empowered to make that show and talk about that topic had she not already been quite a successful performer?”

Ball, a quirky, hilarious exploration of his own diagnosis of testicular cancer at the age of 20. But he explains that when he first made the show, he struggled for audience and support partially because he was a new artist, but also because he found audiences were resistant to autobiographical work about someone’s body. There’s the danger of expecting it to be a ‘Woe is me!’ outpouring of inner pain and experience. But to see – for example – the joyous musical My Beautiful Black Dog by Brigitte Aphrodite, is to realise that it can be entirely the opposite.

It is in this sense that the festival is, above all, a forum for discussion. Against the backdrop of frantic flyering and marketing campaigns, what The Sick of the Fringe is hoping to offer is a sense of community and a place for critical engagement. Brian acknowledges that “of course the festival is a hotspot for seeing a lot of things, but that’s not the only thing that needs to happen there.” He’s interested in creating an environment where we have time to reflect. A space to pause between art and science, the fields that most furtively question what it is to be human.

As the keynote speeches will demonstrate, this synergy between art, health and science presents a platform that’s just as personal as it is political: Brian tells me that while Liz Carr will be discussing social perceptions of ourselves and being the person “that no one wants to be” in terms of disability, Colin Blakemore will be talking about synaesthesia, and how the brain perceives things via illusion and conditioning. The social and the biological are two sides of the same question, and ripe for debate.

Sir Colin Blakemore

Liz Carr

And if theatre is a medium by which we can understand ourselves better, there’s scope here for collaboration that incorporates cutting edge research and important questions and transfers it into the public consciousness. As it is, Lobel remarks that theatre lags behind science: “Although the world is having so many conversations about health, and access to healthcare, and the rights of healthcare, and the impacts of science and the ethics of science, we don’t have the breadth of art to support it.”

This is why The Sick of the Fringe is happening, and this is why Lobel is keen to “embolden” artists to make work that shares big experiences and asks the big questions. It’s the first time a festival like this has happened. Certainly in Edinburgh, if not nationally. And Lobel’s hopes for the future after The Sick of the Fringe are to develop a year long programme that reaches artists beyond Edinburgh – beyond the UK – and audiences beyond theatre. He says that the Wellcome Trust is more open to new work than we think, “or than anyone thinks”, and hopefully, the Surgeries that artists can sign up for to discuss their work and funding options with a member of the Wellcome team will be a platform to prove that.

Brian laments that “artists have been taught not to ask for anything”, but what this festival presents is a chance to bring the Wellcome to Edinburgh and open the floodgates between artists, audiences, funding and researchers. It’s got all the excitement of conducting an experiment in a test tube: let’s see what happens.

Brian Lobel

The Sick of the Fringe programme of events

Monday 10 August | 12.00-13.00 | Summerhall

Open Meeting with Bryony Kimmings and Tim Grayburn

Monday 17 August | 12.00-13.00 | Summerhall

Open Meeting with Simon McBurney

Monday 24 August | 10.30-11.30 | Forest Fringe

Open Meeting - the Sick of the Forest Fringe 

Tuesday 25 August | 09.00-11:00 | Summerhall

Wellcome Trust surgery

Wednesday 26 August | 09.00-11.00 | Summerhall

Wellcome Trust surgery

Thursday 27 August | 10.30-11.30 | theSpace @ Symposium Hall

Main Event feat. Sir Colin Blakemore

Friday 28 August | 10.30-11.30 | theSpace @ Symposium Hall

Main Event feat. Liz Carr