.jpg "light night at the workshop theatre")
This year, for the first time on Light Night, the Workshop Theatre (School of English) is opening its doors to present a varying collection of events to challenge and intrigue… The schedule is hectic (not unlike that which you might find scrawled outside an Edinburgh fringe venue) but I’ll try to explain it as best I can.
Dealing with the ground floor first then, we have another chance to see the results of the Level 3 collaboration with IOU theatre.
Small groups of spectators will enter the building at regular intervals, to be led on a weird and wonderful performance tour of parts of the Workshop Theatre building that other shows do not reach into… Solve the mystery of the entrance hall; listen at keyholes down an eerie corridor; hang out in “The Waiting Room”; gasp for breath in Studio 2…
This performance installation will run from 6.30 with a total of five showings. You can stroll up at 6.30, 7.20, 7.30, 8.20 or 8.30 and we’ll let you in. Provided we like the look of you.
Alternatively, you can wander upstairs, on the hour, every hour from 7.00pm to 11.00 and see a selection of short performances in our main theatre space, Studio 1, selected from recent work by students and staff, and temporarily retitled according to the “Light Night” theme. These include:
Blackout – a.k.a. The View from Down Here, by Max Dorey. Puppetry and nostalgia come together to create a unique view of a bygone era. A little girl views the world around her with curiosity and wonder. But her idyllic world is peppered with signs of harder times ahead…a world of Anderson shelters, rationing, and terrifying gas masks. How will her imagination be able to cope with these new, strange images?
Projections – a.k.a. [Sub]conscious Filtering and Mental Parenthesis devised by Rachel Ashwanden, Sophie Carr, Jennie Eggleton, Phoebe Sparrow and Helen Wood. Lit only by an overhead projector, an ensemble of women set about exploring — with wit, humour, and some painful home truths — the ways in which we develop our first impressions of other people.
‘A first year examine piece looking at first impressions and perceptions – focusing on the way we judge ourselves and the way others judge us.’
Slideshow – a.k.a. Snowflake, Arizona, by Steve Bottoms, in collaboration with Illinois-based artist Julie Laffin. After touring Light Night spectators down the University’s Red Route corridor last year, Steve Bottoms invites you on a virtual, visual tour to the back of the American beyond, to encounter a woman you will never get to meet. A story about the struggle for friendship amidst ecological crisis.
That’s the line-up folks… and it’s an awful lot of theatre for very little money. In fact, it’s free! So that’s an awful lot of theatre for absolutely no money whatsoever. By my calculations, this means you have no good reason not to come along. But you know… it’s your call… No pressure.
How to find us:
Workshop Theatre is housed in the Emmanuel Institute building, directly opposite the new Ziff building. (i.e. it’s the second building on your left after you enter the main gates of the University on Woodhouse Lane)