Practices Workshops

Monday Workshops again.  Joe Hill-Gibbins ran one of them. Along with all of the other perspectives on the work that we're exploring on these Monday mornings - we wanted a director's perspective too.  By director we probably mean more a potential function or role within the group - rather than necessarily a particular person. Interestingly, Joe and I immediately fell into fairly traditional roles with regard to this workshop - that is, I wrote it (with his encouragement - we needed something for participants to sign-up for in advance) whereupon he took it to the group and I imagine did exactly what he felt like doing on the day.
Joined in at the end of the morning and found them all sitting around a good many sheets of paper on the floor.

Looking at these, it appears they'd been making lists of the properties they all felt a good piece of work needs. Joe's energy was quite high at this point, and the point he was emphasising was the importance of reaching agreement early in the process with all collaborators, so that differences aren't even on the agenda later on.

Practices Workshops

Our idea is to start every monday morning with two workshops - running in parallel. On the first day Karen run one, I run the other  - improvisation.  Here we are in the Top Floor Performance Studio.

Practices Unit

A year's gone by since my last entry. Time to resume this blog, this time as Co-Convenor - with Karen Christopher - of the MA Advanced Theatre Practice Practices Unit 2010. This kind of picks up where the last entry left off - with the next Unit  ...  the next Unit now being undertaken a year later by a new group of students.
My first task is to try to get across to the group what we're asking them to do.  It's a fairly simple task I suppose. We're asking them to form companies - in quite a deliberate and methodical way ... and to measure out the experience of forming companies, and learn something about that process, instead of rushing on too quickly to make a new piece of work. They can and probably will make a new piece of work. But that's only a part of what they're being asked to do.
It's a very bright and receptive yeargroup. My sense is the whole exercise has been quite well understood and received.

One of the company tasks they're being asked to consider is documentation, and our first speaker Nicki Polykarpou addresses this subject - in what appears to be an extremely thorough and well-researched way. Maybe someone who was there could add something about this - as I couldn't stay.
Towards the end of the morning, Gregg Fisher - the Sound Tutor at Central and a graduate of the course - called in to say something about a workshop he'll be running later in the term.  And finally the producer Kyu Choi - another graduate of the course, briefly in London - called by and talked about his work as a producer/dramaturg since leaving Central several years ago.
Kyu and  I have lunch in the Hampstead Theatre and he tells me about his work  around the world - especially with new and innovative companies.  Did you know that Stoke Newington International Airport had recently undertaken a residency in South Korea for example? That was something Kyu had organised. The great thing, he thinks, is to understand what's going on, responding to the environment, and understanding his artists and how they fit in. Some of this he learned at Central and some through Central at the BAC - where he acknowledges David Jubb as his Mentor.
What a delightful person Kyu is - who's made research, and his quest to understand what's going on around the world, a whole way of life. And he's mainly interested in small innovative companies - fortunately - just the kind of companies we're hoping to coax into life in this Unit (if everything goes to plan).