list.co.uk/festival Festival Theatre
BUNNY New writing exploring race and class tensions in modern Britain THE VANISHING HORIZON Idle Motion takes you on a journey . . . to Croyden Airport
O V E R E D ©
HARLEKIN Fringe favourites return – and this time it’s war
‘We just enjoy being in a city where there are more street artists than pedestrians,’ says Anton Adasinskiy, director, performer and founder member of Derevo, one of the most lauded companies to come to the Fringe in the last decade, on his decision to return. ‘When I mentioned “Maybe we should go to Edinburgh again?” everyone started screaming “YEEEEEE!”’
It’s perhaps a slightly less dignified response than one would expect from a pack of Butoh-inspired Russian performance artists with a reputation for creating taxing, beautiful and unique theatre, but early signs from camp Derevo are that Harlekin may be a very different type of show. It’s their first Fringe since 2006’s multi award-winning Ketzal (although they’ve become regular visitors to Glasgow’s Arches in that time), and they’ve pared back the cast to just three founder members of the company: Adasinskiy, Tanya Khabarova and Elena Yarovaya. ‘The process has been very different this time,’ says Adasinskiy. ‘It’s easy
to work when your partners understand you from the first sigh or move, and Harlequin came into being inexplicably. No one anticipated that this romantic story involving the Lute, the Monkey, the Princess and the foxy Harlequin himself would appear after the mythical and carneous Ketzal.’ Derevo’s Harlequin is not the diamond-patterned mute of the Commedia d’ell arte, but an earlier incarnation inspired by Dante’s demon Arlechinno. Adasinskiy describes it as ‘the role I have waited all my life for.’ However, when asked to explain further, he just states that ‘Harlekin is dedicated to Real Theatre. It comes out of our desire to go to war against those who pull sex, politics, violence or plain newspaper leads onto the stage, wasting other people’s time and money.’
To summarise, then: Derevo, back, and declaring war on at least half of the Fringe programme. Perhaps they haven’t changed that much after all. (Kirstin Innes) ■ Pleasance Courtyard, 556 6550, 7–30 Aug (not 9, 16, 23), 1pm, £12–£14. Previews until 6 Aug, £9.
We hear a lot about the violence and tensions of inner city life, yet in many respects a nation’s temperature is taken through its small and medium- sized towns. Dramatist Jack Thorne certainly thinks so, and his new play uses his hometown of Luton to make the point. In the monologue, a young white woman relives a violent incident involving her black boyfriend and an Asian youth. A quest for revenge becomes an anatomy of modern Britain’s ills. ‘I love Luton, but I’ve never heard
any more casual racism than I have in the last five years here,’ says Thorne. ‘In a way, the town is fascinating because of its racism.’ A lot of the play is about racism inside the Asian community, but it’s also about class, which muddies the waters as well. ‘Behind the girl who tells the story is an animation where you see the things that she sees in her journey through the town, and in a sense Luton is one of the characters.’ (Steve Cramer) ■ Underbelly, 0844 545 8252, 7–25 Aug (not 18), 2.10pm, £9–£10 (£8–£9). Previews 5 & 6 Aug, £6.
Online Booking Fringe www.edfringe.com International Festival www.eif.co.uk Book Festival www.edbookfest.co.uk Art Festival www.edinburghartfestival.org
On the face of it, a show by some recent Oxford graduates, about . . . some recent Oxford graduates who attend a book group doesn’t sound like particularly special or unusual Fringe fare. However, Borges and I, by young physical theatre company Idle Motion and featuring a set which unfolded as paper-carvings from the inside of 150 books, turned out to be one of those tiny, surprising, beautiful shows that makes the whole of August worthwhile.
This year they’re back with The Vanishing Horizon, about travel, flight, and the days when Croydon Airport was, apparently, ‘the gateway to the globe’. Accordingly, they’ve replaced the books with baggage. ‘We started with the ideas of travel and flight and were very keen to make a show using lots of suitcases, maps and paper airplanes,’ says company member Grace Chapman. ‘As old, battered suitcases began to arrive from generous neighbours with so much character in them we began to look at early aviation and the heyday of flight, particularly the pioneering female aviators. So this production really began with a pile of old suitcases!’ (Kirstin Innes) ■ The Zoo, 662 6892, 8–27 Aug (not 17, 24), 6pm, £8 (£6). Previews 6 & 7 Aug, £6.
CaLARTS festival theater
On Lochend Close Off the Royal Mile £8 Gen | £5 Con tix: 07074 20 13 13 www.venue13.com
CaLARTS FESTIVAL THEATER At Sundown Aug 07 - 13 @13:20 Aug 14 - 21 @18:30
The Bacchae Aug 07 - 13 @15:30 Aug 14 - 17 @20:30 Aug 18 - 21 @22:30 Floozy Aug 07 - 13 @12:00 Aug 14 - 21 @17:00
Silken Veils Aug 07 - 13 @14:20 Aug 14 - 21 @19:30
NO PERFS AUG 16TH
at sundown The story of the end of our lives told in our youth. A collectively imagined autobiography about the unraveling of memory. A joyous physical theater collage about clinging to the past and letting it go.
www.atsundown.net www.allmalebacchae.com
By Amy Tofte Directed by Pacho Velez
www.silkenveils.net
Run through the MicePace Sonic Maze while you wait!
5–12 Aug 2010 THE LIST 71