Storytelling PR

Theatre

Wonder Fools announce new summer season of work

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Announced this week: five new projects come from the young Glasgow Company as they, along with most of the country, rewrite their diary for 2020.  Stories to Connect Us is an entire season of digital work from Wonder Fools, with three completely new pieces of storytelling: Secret Private World, Home Made and The New Normal.

A reworked audio version of The Coolidge Effect will be available from July and the theatre company’s sold out Scottish touring show 549: Scots of the Civil War will be available for a limited time to watch online, with a new intro from the team explaining why they’ve decided to share the archive footage online. The online premiere with a Q&A will take place on June 30.

Wonder Fools co-founder, Jack Nurse commented:

“Wonder Fools were set for 2020 being the most productive, far reaching and artistically challenging yet. With the advent of COVID19, we have put our planned live shows on the backburner and turned our attention to creating digital work that directly speaks to today. At heart, we are a company that tells stories and have always experimented with different forms – Stories to Connect Us is no different.

“We can’t wait to be back in theatres again but for now we are excited for audiences to interact with some of our favourite old shows in new ways and to create brand new work for the first time in two years. We hope the season will utilise the possibilities of digital forms and through the stories we have chosen to tell offer audiences great entertainment and, above all, a sense of connection for these isolated times.”

Online from Tuesday July 28 a new audio version of Wonder Fools’ play, The Coolidge Effect, starring Robbie Gordon & Jamie Marie Leary, (written by Gordon and Nurse) will be available for download. Having toured extensively across the UK through 2016 – 2018 the show explores the impact of pornography addiction on people’s mental health. Devised from interviews with porn advocates, addicts, mental health experts and scientists The Coolidge Effect has become an even more relevant conversation as we sit at home behind our screens. 

At its core, The Coolidge Effect is a story about isolation and the importance of connection, the new audio version features a powerful and upbeat score written for the show by VanIves.

549: Scots of the Spanish Civil War will be shared through archive footage from one of the most joyous nights on the UK tour. Available to watch on Tuesday June 30. Filmed live in an Ayrshire town hall, the recording celebrates the raw power of rural touring and community, and tells the story of a moment in our history where international solidarity and hope stood up in the face of oppressive fascism. The need for this story to be retold regrettably continues today. Wonder Fools hope to reach more of the families of the 549 who were unable to see it on tour in 2019, inviting them to contact the team directly to share their stories contact@wonderfools.org. A huge archive of information gathered around the project of 549 men who traveled from Scotland to support the anti-facist movement in Spanish Civil War is continually being built at 549.scot.

The three projects that will be announced in more detail through the course of summer 2020 include, The New Normal, a collection of monologues created by the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland Young Company which tell the stories of those people most profoundly affected by the pandemic.

A co-production with MGA Academy, Home Made looks at how our relationship to home evolves as we move out into the world. Created on zoom with the final year acting students – what home means seems very poignant, especially right now.

Finally, Secret Private World is a new thriller by Wonder Fools to be serialised as a six-part podcast. Set in lockdown Glasgow, the familiar story of gazing out windows, staring at the same walls, watching the rubbish pile up, will come to life with fictional James, as our narrator. Whilst creating narratives in his head about the lives of his neighbours he notices something, a peculiar incident nobody else seems to notice.

Further information about this impressive season of work from the independent theatre company coming through summer 2020.

For images, interview requests and further info please contact Miriam at Storytelling PR miriam@storytellingpr.com 07825642225 (and hopefully the rest of the team soon!)

Listings Stories to Connect Us

The Coolidge Effect – available 28 June 2020

549: Scots of the Civil War – viewing on Tuesday 30 June, tickets available via the website on a ‘pay-what-you-can’ basis alongside a live Q&A with the creative team. Fundraising around the re-run of 549 Scots of the Civil War will see 50% of money raised going directly to the cast and creative team behind 549.

Home Made – to be announced

Secret Private World – to be announced

New Normal – to be announced

Wonder Fools Team

Robbie Gordon co-founder / co-writer/ performer

Jack Nurse co-founder / co-writer/ director

Steph Connell producer

549: Scots of the Civil War on tour was ‘in association with Citizens Theatre and the Brunton supported by Ayr Gaiety’. The Peggy Ramsey Foundation is supporting Secret Private World.

Hot Brown Honey

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WORD POLLINATION TOUR | DECOLONISE AND MOISTURISE | ROCK THE BOAT

Hot Brown Honey. Image by Dylan Evans.

It’s 2020, and Hot Brown Honey are back. Touring to the UK and Canada, leading a charge for a matriarchal future with their smash-hit, world-wide, sell-out blend of theatre and activism. 

Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner Mother Lovers? A theatrical explosion of colour, culture and controversy, Hot Brown Honey is returning to the UK and Canada after taking the world by storm.  

Equal parts theatrical masterpiece and social activism, a stellar posse of phenomenal women smash stereotypes in an unapologetic celebration of our similarities and differences. Steeped in the Word of the Mother and packing a potent punch of Hip Hop politics, Hot Brown Honey will make you laugh until you cry, clap until your hands bleed and shake every part of what your mama gave you. With lighting, music and costume set to ignite the change we want to be, Hot Brown Honey is an extraordinary production that spins tradition on its head, going above and beyond to challenge boundaries and embrace resilience. 

Hot Brown Honey features a bevy of powerful and talented First Nations women from the Global South from Aboriginal, Samoan, Tongan, Maori, Indonesian and South African backgrounds who are dead set on calling out the patriarchy, shattering preconceptions of colour and having a riotous time doing it. 

Starring Lisa Fa’alafi as the Game Changer, Kalala Sione as The Love Liberator, Hope Haami as Hope One the Beatboxer, Cody Raymond as The Shape Shifter, Crystal Stacey as The Peace Maker and Busty Beatz as The Queen Bee. 

Co-creator and Director Lisa Fa’alafi says: “We’re telling our own stories and putting them into a big theatrical explosion. We are going, you know what, it’s our time to shine. We’re all from these amazing heritages and we all live in Australia and we want to show the world what we’re made of. We really do believe ‘You cannot be what you cannot see’, so we are just doing it; we are putting more brown faces on stage.”

Recipients of the 2017 Three Weeks Editor’s Award at Edinburgh Fringe Festival, 2016 UK’s Total Theatre Award for Innovation, Experimentation and Playing With Form, Helpmann Award for Best Cabaret Performer and Green Room Awards for Best Production and Best Design and a 2018 UK Theatre nomination for Best Touring Production, Hot Brown Honey have lit centre stage at the most prestigious venues and festivals across the globe including Sydney Opera House, Queen Elizabeth’s Hall, National Arts Centre Ottawa, Brighton Festival, Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras, Auckland Pride Festival and Hull Freedom Festival, to name a few. 

Co-Creator/MD Busty Beatz: “The Arts has the capacity to shift culture and we are living in a time where the paradigm is shifting enormously. We live in a culture that needs change urgently.Not tomorrow. Right Here. Right Now. We stand in the Creative Revolution.At the forefront we give Love and Respect to First Nations People. We give Love and Respect to those who have come before us. To the Game Changers Myth SlayersPoets, MoversMusic MakersGround Breakers, Truth Sayers, Shake em up Women Queens, Queers and Risk Takers. We are the Change Creators – This is our world Mother Lovers and we are here to MAKE NOISE!”

In 2020 Hot Brown Honey are ready to Rock The Boat, unapologetically fierce, defiantly shattering preconceptions in an explosion of colour, culture and controversy. Fighting the Power never tasted so sweet. 

Media Contact: Miriam (+44) 7825642225 miriam@storytellingpr.com and Eleanor eleanor@storytellingpr.com at Storytelling PR LTD.

Within Sight

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By Ellen Renton
Presented by In The Works

Spring UK Tour March – June 2020 

Ellen Renton, Within Sight. Image by Bibi Schwithal.

Scottish Spoken Word artist Ellen Renton has lived with albinism her whole life. An estimated 1 in 17,000 people in the UK do. But what if there was only one achievement that would deem that life successful? Within Sight dismantles ableism, inspiration porn, and the myth of the Paralympics. 

This is a poetic exploration of living with albinism – an inherited life-long condition that means people produce little or no melanin, affecting the eyes, skin and hair and resulting in various levels of visual impairment.

One of society’s most misunderstood conditions wildly shrouded in myths and misconceptions, Ellen will tour the UK this Spring with her debut solo work urging audiences to reconsider representation.

Through softly spoken but hard-hitting words and an impressive cardio display, we follow the journey of a young athlete who goes out for a run in an attempt to clear her head after receiving news that she has narrowly missed out on being picked for the GB Paralympics team. 

As she runs, she recalls the events that have led to this pivotal moment, reflecting on relationships between her body, her senses, and her sport. She contemplates what her future will hold in a society that has forced her life into a binary: to succeed and be an inspiration, or to fail and be pitied.

Hot-tempered with passion and fanatic in her strong work ethic, the protagonist’s complex character defies the one-note depiction of disabled people in popular media. 

Spoken word and poetry is fast becoming one of the world’s most popular mediums for marginalised artists to address societal prejudice and discrimination. Ellen set out to create a work that is personal in its topic but universal in its narrative of how society fails disabled people.

Confrontational, complex and emotional, the show is a display of the power of spoken word theatre.

The team for Within Sight is disability-led, and the show has been designed to flip accessibility on its head. With minimal staging and text-based performance, the show has been created for all to enjoy without relying on sight. Ellen enlisted filmmaker Kiana Kalantar-Hormozi to create a visual backdrop aimed at providing a glimpse of what the world looks like through the eyes of someone living with partial sight and a musical score by Jack Hinks. 

On creating Within Sight, Ellen Renton said, “I wanted to challenge people to think about the role that they themselves play in perpetuating ableism, and specifically, to talk about the poor representation of disabled people in today’s society. The show mixes a fictional narrative with the reality of living with albinism, confronting the audience with their expectations of what a disabled life looks like.”

Event information: 

5-6 March, 8pm – Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh 
19-21st March, 8pm – Tron Theatre, Glasgow 
15 May, 7.30pm – Dunoon Burgh Hall
21 May, 8pm – Canada Waters, London
30 May, 2pm – Platform, London
4-5 June, 7.30pm – Byre Theatre, St Andrews 

Every venue will host BSL interpreted shows with an adapted ‘touch tour’ pre show available for visually impaired audience members. All performances are captioned and relaxed. 

Tickets available from In The Works.

MAIM

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WORLD PREMIERE
Presented by Theatre Gu Leòr in collaboration with WHɎTE

“Dar a thig an t-uisge gu grad, dè chailleas sinn?

/ When the water comes suddenly, what do we lose?”

A raw howl of grief and an act of protest for what has already been lost and what could follow. MAIM is a love song to the land and language of Mull, a burst of panic in the face of extinction, because the time to take action is running out.

This unique collaboration between Scotland’s award-winning Gaelic theatre company Theatre Gu Leòr and the hugely successful contemporary Gaelic band WHYTE was inspired by their latest album Tairm. MAIM will also include newly composed work by Ross Whyte and Gaelic lyrics and text by Alasdair C. Whyte, in collaboration with the cast. 

MAIM is a departure for Theatre Gu Leòr from their Gaelic text-based work. Collaborating with award-winning Irish choreographer Jessica Kennedy of Junk Ensemble, the piece will combine movement, live music, spoken word, and video designed by Lewis Den Hertog, with integrated BSL throughout.

MAIM is a call to action, giving voice to the frustrations of the next generation who care deeply about the crisis facing ar tìr agus ar teanga – our land and language.

Across the length and breadth of Scotland, place names created and used in Gaelic-speaking communities are being forgotten and their meanings lost, as land mismanagement, non-native tree planting and the effects of climate change threaten to drown the land and language. Even as the success of Gaelic Medium Education grows and numbers of learners rise in the Central belt, the language is vanishing from the rural heartlands, in danger of becoming extinct.

MAIM /mʌɪm/: panic; terror; consternation; alarm; an outburst.

Raised on Mull, Alasdair C. Whyte of WHYTE was inspired by his post-doctoral research in the Celtic and Gaelic Department of the University of Glasgow into the place names of the Torsay region of Mull, and what is causing their disappearance. 

“It’s time for us as Gaelic speakers to realise once and for all that our language and culture are in no way inferior to English language and culture. The way to leave this toxic way of thinking in the past is to celebrate and honour the people who came before us and create new things in our language. I am hugely grateful to Theatre Gu Leòr for giving me a chance to do this in MAIM.” – Alasdair C. Whyte

MAIM is fully accessible to non-Gaelic speakers and has integrated BSL in every performance #MAIM

Cinn-latha Cuairt / Tour Dates

Am Màirt / March 2020

6 – 7th March – previews, Tron Theatre, Glasgow

10th March – 14th March, Tron Theatre, Glasgow

17th – 18th March – Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh

19th March – Eden Court, Inverness

20th March – Lemon Tree, Aberdeen

21st March – SEALL, Sleat, Isle of Skye

24th March – An Lanntair, Stornoway

25th March – Sgoil Lìonacleit, Benbecula

26th March – Sgoil Bàgh a’ Chasteil, Barra

27th March – Corran Halls Studio Theatre, Oban

28th March – Mull Theatre, Tobermory

CLEASAICHEAN / CAST

Elspeth Turner

Alasdair C Whyte

Evie Waddell

Ross Whyte

SGIOBA CRUTHACHAIL / CREATIVE TEAM

Stiùiriche / Director – Muireann Kelly

Sgrìobhadairean / Writers  –  Alasdair C.Whyte & Cast

Ceòl & Dealbhadh-Fuaim / Music & Sound Design – Ross Whyte

Coireògrafaiche / Choreographer – Jessica Kennedy

Dealbhadh / Designer –  Jen McGinley

Dealbhadh AV/ AV Designer – Lewis Den Hertog

Dealbhadh Solais / Lighting Designer – Benny Goodman

Eadar-Theangaiche Cànan Balbhanachd Bhreatainn /Integrated BSL – Evie Waddell & Cast

Gobby by Jodie Irvine

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A biting and heartfelt comedic odyssey about what it really means to be loud.

Gobby by Jodie Irvine. Image by Ben Fogg.

Gobby is the story of one woman’s search to accept and process the myriad ways she’s been put down. Using party paraphernalia to tell the story, Bri (Irvine) toots her horn through a series of house parties that may well allow her to escape a multifaceted emotional trap.

Newcomer Jodie Irvine had one of the buzziest plays at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, taking on the Big Belly; the space which saw Millie Thomas’s Dust, Monica Dolan’s The B*EASTS, Maddie Rice’s Pickle Jar, and of course the little known Fleabag by Phoebe Waller-Bridge introduce new female writer-performers to the world. Gobby followed up gaining word-of-mouth momentum with audiences for its smart and dark take down of coercive control. Following sold out performances in Edinburgh and as part of Pleasance Theatre’s “Best of Edinburgh” Season Autumn 2019, Gobby comes to VAULT festival for seven performances this February. 

Five parties. One big mouth. Bri is not who she used to be, so she’s revisiting the five parties that changed her. Gobby is a one-person playlist of awkward encounters, starting over and growing up, staged amongst hoards of party memorabilia and a whole host of anarchic festivities. 

As we increasingly train ourselves to question if disconcerting behavior masks trauma or an uncomfortable truth Jodie Irvine’s first full length play deals with the old analogy of the swan gliding over the surface, as the feet spin beneath the water. Delving into gaslighting and emotional abuse – which so many people suffer at the hands of controlling partners – Gobby is a roar for a return to real life. 

A darkly comic telling of survival, and a lesson in how to throw a really good party.

This new play is written and performed by Jodie Irvine (Soho Young Company, The Second City) astonishing audiences at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe having premiered in London at The Lion & Unicorn Theatre, and performances in Manchester, Bedford and Exeter supported by Arts Council England. 

“Unforgettable” ★★★★★ Broadway Baby

“A raw, triumphant and soaring one-woman odyssey” ★★★★★ Stage Whispers

“Pure genius” ★★★★ North West End

★★★★ Remote Goat

★★★★ Feminist Fringe Review

Gobby is directed by Rosie Snell and produced in Edinburgh and at VAULT Festival by Jodie Irvine.