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Swamp Motel are on The Search for New Creative Talent

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Off the back of a very difficult year for live theatre, Swamp Motel are looking to support creative talent in the live theatre and entertainment industries through a new paid commission programme, Room 21. Swamp Motel are opening their doors and asking for submissions – be that an original script or creative idea to adapt and produce into an online entertainment experience.

Room 21 is a virtual room in ‘Swamp Motel’ that the company are offering to a writer to then develop their original script / idea into a multi-platform narrative that can be told through an online, audience-led experience. Applicants could be amateur, professional or completely undiscovered writers. They could be university students, school leavers or 40 years into their career. Swamp Motel are welcoming creative applications from those who have not ventured into digital formats before.

The motivation behind Room 21 and welcoming new creatives into the fold at Swamp Motel to new talent is all about providing opportunity for people who have been affected by the government’s closure of the live theatre and entertainment experiences because of Covid-19.

Over 2020-21 Swamp Motel has diversified their creative offering. The Swamp Motel Trilogy began with ‘Plymouth Point’, in the autumn followed ‘The Mermaids’ Tongue’ and in March 2021 the final part in the trilogy ‘The Kindling Hour’. The success of the trilogy has enabled growth from 4 – 40 staff in the team, and extended capability to work with brands on tailor made experiences.

Taking theatrical storytelling to new audiences, the Swamp Motel Trilogy has been experienced by over 40,000 people. The Telegraph’s Dominic Cavendish commented how the experiences ‘feel very now.’ Firmly established as part of their work moving forward, when in-person performances resume, this sub-genre will continue to bring gamers towards theatre and vice-versa.

Comment from Swamp Motel:

“We’ve always had to innovate in how we deliver our storytelling. Working across many formats in our careers – from the stage, warehouses, basements, street corners, trains. Most recently, we’ve used the internet as our playground, which has allowed us to take our storytelling to new audiences who may never have been able to come to one of our live shows. Now, we’re so excited about collaborating with other talented storytellers to help bring their stories to life in new places that they may not have thought of before.”

Applications will be judged by Swamp Motel’s Directors, including Clem Garritty and Ollie Jones. The winning writer will receive a fee of £2,000, and a month working in collaboration with the Swamp Motel Creative Directors. Additional fees, royalties, administrative, production and marketing support will also be provided should the script move into production.

Applications for Room 21 are open now and close on 14th May 2021. For more information about Room 21 and how to enter, visit swampmotel.co.uk.

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For media enquiries, please contact Storytelling PR:

Miriam Attwood: miriam@storytellingpr.com

Emma Costello: emma@storytellingpr.com

Notes to editors

The commissioning programme will provide:

  • A writer’s fee of £2,000 (a non-returnable advance against royalties)
  • A month working in collaboration with Swamp Motel Creative Directors (Working virtually of course)
  • An additional writers fee of £2,000 should the script move into production (a non-returnable advance against royalties)
  • A ticket royalty of 10% on net box office profits
  • Administrative, producing, production and marketing support from the Swamp Motel team

Eligibility criteria:

  • You must be a UK resident.
  • You must be 18 years of age or over.
  • We cannot accept scripts or ideas that have been commissioned for another organisation.
  • Ideas must belong to the applicants
  • We’re open to applications submitted from more than one person.

Application Guidelines:

  • A cover sheet, detailing contact information, name, email, phone number, address, website (if you have one) and 150 words on your reasons for applying
  • An A4 one- page treatment OR an online link to one 3 minute video based treatment delivered by yourself. Treatment should include the following:
    • Outline the narrative premise
    • Highlight the key characters
    • Detail any other creative features of note that help to communicate your creative vision.
    • Why this piece is perfect for an online immersive format.
  • Your CV (or combined CV if more than one person)

Decision-making process:

  • There will be a collaborative shortlisting and decision-making process led by Swamp Motel’s Creative, Production and Marketing teams. Please note we will be unable to give feedback to unsuccessful applicants who are not shortlisted.
  • Shortlisted applicants will be contacted and invited to a 60 minute discussion with key decision makers from Swamp Motel via video conference. Further detail regarding the format and attendance of this discussion will be shared in advance to all shortlisted applicants.
  • The final decision will be at the discretion of the Directors at Swamp Motel, and may or may not require an additional meeting post the shortlist interviews.

Timings:

Deadline for applications:  14th May 2021

Successful awardee notified: By 30th June 2021

Writers residency: July 2021

London Performance Studios – an open call for 100 free space bursaries

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Seeding Space
Seeding Space

Lise Bell and Than Hussein Clark, of the newly founded London Performance Studios creative initiative announce Seeding Space – 100 free space bursaries for artists built within converted warehouse spaces, available through 2021 and onwards in South East London.

Seeding Space is the first in a series of exciting initiatives from the group created with artists at the centre, offering spaces across the next 18 months to support the creative freelance workforce to rebuild as we begin to navigate our way out of lockdown. The spaces can be accessed through an open call for applications that opens on April 6.

The stark numbers of freelancers that have fallen through the cracks over the past year and long before across different demographic groups remains an alarming issue that requires urgent attention within the creative industries. Seeding Space will meet some immediate requirements of artists by democratising this SE15 space in London.

The aim is to remove some of the current barriers to creative development for artists – identified through a queer, anti-racist, feminist, and equalist lens – through both the provision of free space and learning development opportunities.

Exploring new and risk free structures for the visual and performing arts, London Performance Studios’ bursaries will provide artists with one to three weeks of free space in its South Bermondsey rehearsal rooms for theatre companies, community groups, and independent artists working across the performing or visual arts fields, to develop new or existing works.

More than just the provision of free space, the successful applicants will have access to the London Performance Studios’ rehearsal space including kitchen, breakout space and rehearsal room; access to a fully-equipped workshop, industry advice and career support, fundraising advice, and an outside eye or dramaturgical support. There is also an opportunity to participate in the future of London Performance Studios wider vision and to become a part of the community with priority access to other upcoming initiatives.

Applications are open to all artistic and community ideas no matter how ‘out of the box’. Anyone is welcome to apply who can clearly demonstrate a need for the space be it for R+D rehearsals, full rehearsals, gallery exhibitions, creation of a large scale piece of art, a community gathering, a public sharing or long table event.

This project has been developed by Than Hussein Clark and Lise Bell. They began working together in September 2021, combining their extensive knowledge of the visual and performing arts, to develop this new artistic initiative.

As a visual artist, Than is currently participating in the British Art Show 9 and the upcoming Belgrade Biennale. For the Belgrade Biennale, Than is developing a 16 part radio drama In Alphabetic Gardens with The Director’s Theatre Writer’s Theatre ensemble.

Lise, a specialist in the performing arts most recently joint CEO and Executive Director at the Gate Theatre.

On bringing London Performance Studios’ Seeding Space to fruition they commented:

“Drawn from our collective experience of unlearning and confinement over the last eighteen months, London Performance Studios’ first initiative Seeding Space understands space as a vital and often finite resource which must be rethought and shared in order to urgently address and rebalance the needs of creative freelancers in both the visual and performing arts in the capital.

“In handing over the mic to artists over the next 2 years with this rolling programme of bursaries, London Performance Studios’ aim is not only to help kickstart the process of creative recovery for London’s freelancers but also to begin the process of a larger handover of creative control. Through a wide-ranging platform of opportunities in which the lessons of the past year, and before, might be made manifest, finally addressing the precarity faced by creative freelancers with new structures of resource and skill sharing. We aim to honour their essential and central role in the creative industries.”

The first round of applications for Seeding Space opens on April 6. For full details visit londonperformancestudios.com.

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For further information, images and interview requests please contact Storytelling PR:
Miriam Attwood: miriam@storytellingpr.com
Emma Costello: emma@storytellingpr.com

Follow @london_performance_studios for updates.

Notes to Editors.

About Than Hussein Clark (he/him)

Than is a visual artist, founding member of Villa Design Group, and co-founder of the London Performance Studios. He is also a member of the editorial board of Montez Press. After studying acting in Los Angeles and art history in Edinburgh and London, he completed a BA in art at Goldsmiths in London, and an MFA at the HFBK in Hamburg. Recent shows include A Little Night Music (And Reversals) at CRAC Occitanie in Sète, The Paintings of Selma Vaz Dias at Damien & The Love Guru, Meet Me At St. Louis, Lewis! at Centre Pompidou Paris, Stage for a Theatre on Mars at PLATO Ostrava, L’isola dei Baci (Disappearing Acts) at Kura Milan, School of Pain at Art in General, New York, and His Leftover Heart (Pauly et Cie) at Galerie Crèvecoeur Marseille.

About Lise Bell (they/them)

Lise is co-founder of the London Performance Studios. Before joining LPS, Lise was Executive Director and Joint CEO at the Gate Theatre, Notting Hill. Previous experience includes working as Producer at the Bush Theatre, supporting the development of their Studio Theatre, and Kiln Theatre, supporting their major capital redevelopment project.

Apply to be Storytelling PR’s Press Assistant with the Kickstart Scheme

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Storytelling PR Office

Storytelling PR is part of the UK Government’s Kickstart scheme, which is designed for young people aged 16-24 who claim Universal Credit and are at risk of unemployment.

The scheme has helped us create a new entry-level vacancy for someone to join the team for six months as Press Assistant.

About the Role

This job will involve everything from writing press releases, speaking directly with creatives, logging coverage and planning in endless spreadsheets and generating great ideas. You will be expected to listen, learn and engage with the arts.

You will be supported to train and look for your own opportunities to grow – which storytelling will support with time or finance. We are looking for someone who engages with culture, loves to hear, and tell stories and is ready to take this opportunity and run with it. Storytelling is a small company meaning the opportunity for growth is very real and could happen really quickly with the right person and commitment!

The press assistant will work across all projects in the entire team, copywriting, fact-checking, researching and prepping press releases and supporting the team with admin tasks.

The role will last six months and will be 30 hours each week, over four days, and it can be flexible.

The successful applicant will be paid the Living Wage.

Skills and Experience

Desirable

· A Higher / A Level equivalent in Drama, English, History, Politics, Culture

· Experience working in a fast paced environment

· An active interest in pop culture

· Comfortable with social media, be that one favourite platform or an awareness of many

· An active interest in the news, how the news is made and what’s happening in the world

· Experience making videos, editing and playing around with tech

· Fun loving and curious

Essential

· An interest in culture, be that books, live music,

· An awareness of what press relations and publicity are

· Excellent writing skills

· Experience using Excel, Word, Google drive and Google docs,

· A willingness to learn, think quickly

· Good communication skills

· Open-minded, caring and thoughtful

About Storytelling PR

Storytelling PR Ltd works with theatre makers, musicians, artists and change-makers to get their stories told to the world via press, media and digital marketing. We are one of the leading small publicity companies in Scotland and are very well known, within industry, at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

We pride ourselves on working opening within an equalist, feminist, anti-racist code of conduct and we appreciate as a small company we have perhaps more capability to support change makers, and make change ourselves, than some big industry powers.

How to Apply

To apply, contact your local job centre and ask to be referred to us.

A Space to Bless, live from St Mary’s Cathedral to lead a month of queer connectivity from Queen Jesus Productions

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Jo Clifford in The Gospel According To Jesus Queen of Heaven at Traverse Theatre Dec 2018, credit Aly Wight

One year on since the pandemic took hold, Queen Jesus Productions have continued their pioneering support of trans and LGBTQI+ theatre by sustaining two interlinked, evolving strands of work; the development of Scotland’s first all trans, non-binary and gender non-conforming performance ensemble and a programme of interactive digital art works inspired by Jo Clifford’s revolutionary play, ​The Gospel According to Jesus, Queen of Heaven.

Looking to the future this April, audiences are invited to immerse themselves in the stunning surrounds of St Mary’s Episcopal Cathedral in Edinburgh for a series of blessings. A Space to Bless is the centrepiece in a programme of events and gatherings next month – a space within Clifford’s queer utopia to gather and commune online for up to 15 minutes every day Monday 12 – Monday 26 April.

A follow on from a series of Sunday blessings released online in 2020, these brand new works will be livestreamed at noon from the Cathedral, with each daily chapter offering a gathering, a text, space for meditation and a blessing.

The five chapters will incorporate elements of The Gospel According to Jesus, Queen of Heaven, reimagined in this unique setting – inspired by and respecting the building’s use, stunning physical features and fascinating history. There will be live BSL interpretation by Yvonne Waddell each day and all five chapters will be available with Closed Captions at the end of performance week.

The week will close with a screening of The Gospel According to Jesus, Queen of Heaven, recorded as live and streamed from Augustine United Church in Edinburgh on Saturday 19 December and Sunday 20 December 2020.

The livestream performances will coincide with “Gender & Liturgy in conversation” – an online conference taking place over six days to discuss various themes and issues around gender and liturgy in the Scottish Episcopal Church and the wider Anglican tradition.

Revd Canon Marion Chatterley, Vice Provost, St Mary’s Cathedral, said: “We’re delighted to welcome Queen Jesus Productions into St Mary’s Cathedral for their week of live-streamed ’A Space to Bless’ events. Our Cathedral seeks to celebrate diversity, to welcome everyone into our prayerful space and to be a place where we are reminded that we are all loved equally and completely by the God who knows us and made us.”

Jo Clifford, writer and performer and founding director of Queen Jesus Productions said: “It is a real joy to be able to create something for Queen Jesus to livestream from the very beautiful St Mary’s Cathedral. It’s a great privilege and a great responsibility.

I was brought up in the Anglican tradition and it still remains very precious to me. I’ve been very moved to rediscover its beauty as I’ve been attending Evening Prayer every day there as part of my preparation for this event; and a real honour to be asked to contribute some thoughts to the “Gender and Liturgy in Conversation” event that the Catedral is hosting in the same week.

The Episcopalian church in Brazil has been incredibly courageous in its support for Queen Jesus during her persecution there, and it makes me really happy to be working their sister church here in Scotland on a programme of liberation for everyone.”

Meanwhile behind the scenes at Queen Jesus Productions, the ensemble; Sadie Godiva, Bibi June, Adam Kashmiry, Goose Masondo, Saerlaith Robyn McQuaid O’Dwyer, Kirsty Biff Nicolson, Bel Pye  and EM Williams, with Stage Manager Fin Dickins and Director David Wood continue a bespoke programme of development and training. Members were first brought together as part of Queen Jesus’ 10th anniversary festival in 2019 – responding to an open call to take part in a new verbatim theatre piece called Untitled 2009, written by trans non-binary writer Nelly Kelly.

External expert sessions led by inspiring trans creatives at the top of their fields, including SHaySHay, Rebecca Root and Malik Nashad Sharpe aka Marikiscrycrycry will take place in tandem with writer Nelly Kelly’s further development of the ideas underpinning ‘Untitled 2009’ into a new play, written for the ensemble, which is supported by Playwright’s Studio Scotland’s New Playwright’s Award. The programme is being delivered online while restrictions are in place with an invited public reading of the work in progress play planned for spring.

Over the last 11 years The Gospel According to Jesus, Queen of Heaven​ has had a profound impact on trans representation in theatre and on the thousands of people all over the world who have interacted with it. Queen Jesus will continue to grow its international reputation as the play makes its Australasian debut next month with Kristen Smyth in the iconic role, to be performed live as part of a new production for Melbourne’s Theatre Works and Midsumma Festival.

With the theatre industry under enormous pressures Queen Jesus Productions believes it is vitally important, now more than ever, to continue to represent, support and lift trans and LGBTQI+ voices onto our stages as we look forward to the theatrical gatherings that so many cannot wait to return to, when the time is safe and right.

The world is living through a continued time of widespread social distance, isolation, turbulent physical and mental health – but with some hope on the horizon. Queen Jesus Productions will continue to gather a community no matter where they are in the world,  with April’s programme of events just the beginning for them in 2021.  

For more information visit queenjesusproductions.com.

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Listings

A Space to Bless, live from St Mary’s Cathedral – 12:00 BST daily on Monday 12 – Monday 26 April

The Gospel According to Jesus, Queen of Heaven – 18:00 (BST) on Friday 16 April

One ticket grants access to all five chapters and the screening of The Gospel.

Tickets are on a sliding scale of free, £2, £4, £6, £8 or £10.

Booking: https://www.queenjesusproductions.com/a-space-to-bless-st-marys

Media Contacts

For further information, images and interview requests please contact Storytelling PR:

Miriam Attwood: miriam@storytellingpr.com

Emma Costello: emma@storytellingpr.com

Notes to Editors

About Queen Jesus Productions

Queen Jesus Productions is an award-winning theatre company based in Scotland on a mission to end trans and LGBTQIA+ discrimination, created originally to support Jo Clifford’s ground-breaking play ‘The Gospel According to Jesus, Queen of Heaven’.

Formed in 2015 by founding directors Jo Clifford (writer and performer), Susan Worsfold (director and designer) and Annabel Cooper (producer), the company has toured internationally to a broad and diverse range of venues, from Belo Horizonte in Brazil to Belfast in Northern Ireland.

Our sister company, Queen Jesus Plays BR, has overcome censorship and violence to perform the play over 200 times in Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina and Capo Verde, inspiring thousands and changing the face of Brazilian theatre for ever.

The company has continued to work throughout the pandemic, collaborating with Nelly Kelly, NTS and the BBC on 68 Months in Waiting,  creating lockdown-responsive digital artworks under the banner of A Space to Bless, presenting a live-streamed performance for Christmas and supporting the evolution of Scotland’s first all trans, gender non-conforming and non-binary performance ensemble.

Fringe Funding Workshop

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Storytelling PR are going to host a free online Fringe Funding Workshop on Wednesday 17 March at 2pm. Why? Well in the absence of the Fringe and because we’re missing the kinds of conversations that we’d normally have about the Fringe (and how to support the growth of the entire industry) we want to create a space for those conversations where anyone can join. We’ll even offer a perspective on what Fringe 2021 could look like.

Hosted by producer powerhouses, Daisy Hale (They/Them) and Robyn Jancovich-Brown (She/Her) this workshop is for anyone who wants to attend and discuss how to get funding to take work to the Fringe in the simplest terms; no bumf, no industry speak, no problems. Whether you’re an artist, an emerging producer, a PR or just interested, we want this event to be as laid back and welcoming as possible.

Please RSVP to the workshop by the morning of 17 March and you can also submit questions to Daisy and Robyn ahead of time by emailing Amy: admin@storytellingpr.com