THEATRE PREVIEW
unau- Fallbaok Hump soup
‘our shows are full oi surprises, iull oi things people don’t expect,’ says Ada Plinck ol Dutch theatre group, Dogtroep. ‘In one show we had a man who was just walking along normally, then blew up.’ Inilated rather than exploded, I hope, but with this troupe nothing should be taken verbatim. Its new show, Camel Gossip is. . .well, actually nobody seems to know what it is yet.
Working with live artists from Glasgow, the group is enjoying a six-week rehearsal/workshop period and has been given the luxury oi a space at Tramway to create a specially conceived show which will be
“a”.
After a painfully quiet month in Glasgow and a , ferociously busy one in Edinburgh, Scottish theatre companies have unanimously declared the start of autumn. As well as the usual scattering of post-Fringe tours, Glasgow is swinging back into action with nearly all the main theatres up and running, and even Edinburgh is showing signs of quick recovery from its summer overkill. Dance fans are relatively well catered for over the next fortnight: as well as the Siobhan Davies premiere at Tramway (see ’ panel), there‘s a short run
l periormed in iront oi an audience oi
' 120 people iorten nights. But Dogtroep are no theatrical pansies. This Is the group which, when commissioned by the Winter Olympics, endured minus 20 degree temperatures on ireezing hillsides. Fitting the production to the event meant snow, hills and severe cold.
At Tramway, there are no such constrictions oi climate or decor. ‘We are playing around with the possibilities,’ says Plinck, oi the show which is still at an experimental stage. ‘Music is diiiicult here as there is a heavy echo and we have found that spitting is loud enough. But the place we have chosen is beside the street and you can see and hear cars too. Maybe we’ll use them.’
The artists are in tor an interesting time, taking part In the show’s conception and its periorrnance. ‘There are seven women in the show and we iound that they are all really small - that’s a visual thing —what can you do with seven small women? We like working with the lorces oi gravity.’
Yes, yes the millions doth protest, but what about the story? Where's the plot? ‘We don’t work with a story. We make it here,’ says Plinck. ‘lt's like making a soup. In summer there are more tomatoes than in winter so we mix the ingredients we have and make a show. We make theatre out oi visual art.’
Camels, spitting, little women and traitic. Expect the spectacular. (Beatrice Colin)
Camel Gossip, Tramway, Glasgow, Mon 14—Sun 27 Sept.
by Scott Clark and Russell
full-time Centre for
Contemporary Arts, I ' -
while over at Paisley Arts ’ I e Centre, Steve Slater has secured the short-term survival of innovative young company Life Dance by commissioning
i ‘Fruit was a luxury in the 18th century, . so to give it was as glamorous as giving
a new piece from them
(see photo), I impress someone you gave them a On the touring circuit, pineapple.’ Siobhan Davies, one oi
Dave Anderson and Britain’s most famous and
David MacLennan are reviving the self-seeking media-man character from their entertaining
sophisticated choreographers, é explains why pineapples and pears play an important part in her latest dance White Breath Featherless. ’A lot h 4 t : oi the work is to do with having called The Home made], something taken away Irom you and
Boughtperformed by the ' something given.
ever-industrious Wildcat. ‘The title comes lrom an 18th century They’ll be racing round . riddle tor the way the sun melts snow,’ the country after ? she continues. “Riddles start oii being
Communicado, Gallus Stage Productions, Cacciatore Fabbro and Borderline which have all have completed runs in
one thing and end up being something
else and that idea gave me the energy
to produce work and iocused me on making an unusual conclusion.’
Edinburgh. The dance is set to parts oi an opera . And finally, there is an by Gerald Barry Whose ‘score is Intngumg range of wonderiuliy energising' as Davies
well-made dramas just about to open, from 505 classicA Taste of Honey at the Arches, and Raindog's Scottish reworking of One Flew over the Cuckoo 's Nest at the RSAMD, to Pam Gems’s tribute to Piaf at the Brunton and Neil Bartlett’s translation of Moliere’s School For
; explains. ‘What interested me was that
his work has a danger to it which I iound
incredibly invigorating, so I tried to Iind my own version oi danger in terms oi
how to speed up movement. The
singers accelerate through a line oi
music nearly to the point that they can’t
sing it and the dancers have to deal
with this.
; ‘I gave myself an 8 x 6 metre space
‘ which is very clearly delined,’ says
Wives at the R0 al Lyceum, (Markypisher)_ Davies outlining the second work on See listings for details. “'3 company’s ngtamme.
an extraordinary present nowadays.To vi '
4.
Make-Make, ‘an isolated space where movement has to be made small because oi a real dilemma. With six dancers and up to twelve people singing in a restricted space a very strong sensation is produced.’
The polyphonic sound score has been collected Irom all over the world, with Alrican and Irish keening together with layers at story-based songs. ‘You don't just hear one voice,’ she says, “there might be a pygmy song with Bundhi women singing and an Alghanistani man droning in the background, but I can’t say more as I’m right in the mesh oI making it.’ (Tamsin Grainger)
White Bird Featherless and L Make-Make, Tramway, Glasgow,
Thurs 244m 26 Sept.
V NEW PLAY
Celtic
How do you get six youth groups to work on the same project but to produce significantly different pieces of theatre? That was the challenge the Royal Shakespeare Company‘s Education Department posed itself and one which it solved in a novel way. ’The brief for the writers was that you had to take the play Antigone and, along with the cast and directors. work out what themes you wanted to explore in it and devise a new piece of work from that,’ explains playwright Lara-Jane Bunting who has collaborated with Scottish Youth Theatre on The Grave ovaery Hope, the Scottish contribution to the nationwide event
Meanwhile, youth groups across Britain are working through a similar process. In Cornwall they‘re devising a futuristic drama that raises issues about Cornish independence, in Cheshire they’ve gone for a modern-day setting — the root is always Antigone but, when all the plays come together in Stratford in November, the results will be very different. ‘As a group we chose pre-destination and the gods, and created a play that was based on Celtic times,‘ says Bunting, who wrote the play based on improvisation workshops with the 29-strong cast that in turn were based on her own research. ‘We felt that if we set it in Celtic times we could use high tragedy and high drama in a more comfortable way than if it was set in the present.’
Directed by Mary McCluskey, the play is an hour-long drama with echoes ofAntigone, making much use of tribal-influenced music and three choruses rather than lead actors. ‘It‘s a new process for me to work with,’ says Bunting, ‘but it’s also really exciting, especially because the cast are so able. Because the workshops went so well , I had loads of material to work with rather than too little. I feel there’s a lot ofit that is mine, a lot I’m pleased with and that I feel quite precious about, but it is a communal effort.’ (Mark Fisher)
The Grave of E very Hope, 01d Athenaeum Theatre, Glasgow, Thurs 24—50! 26 Sept.
40 The List 11 - 24 September 1992