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We have a Winner!

Congratulations to ‘Tessa Newby’ for winning two tickets to Reunion & Dark Pony. We asked people to sign up to our newsletter over the summer and during our last production ‘Cosi Fan Tutte‘ and Tessa was the lucky name out of the hat!

Reunion & Dark Pony is on between 9th – 15th Oct. Reunion tells a story about an ex-alcoholic father, reconciling with his daughter for the first time in 20 years. In Dark Pony a father tells his child a magical fairy tale about the friendship between an Indian Brave and his Dark Pony.

 

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Aged 16-25 & based in South London?

This event was in 2017

Do you want a sneak peek into rehearsals?

Do you want to be involved in a professional theatre production?

Are you interested in learning about acting, directing, theatre design, stage management or box office? Then come join our fun team! We are looking for reliable, enthusiastic volunteers with an interest in theatre and libraries to help us create Reunion and Dark Pony for site-specific performances in six different libraries across South London.

No experience is necessary as all training will be provided. We’d ask you to help us at least one performance during 9th – 15th October when we’d cover your travel expenses. And you’d be invited to come to rehearsals during the week commencing 2nd October to see how our actors, director and designer bring the plays to life and to meet for a chat with our Artistic Director to discuss how we can advise you on your future goals.

Travel expenses will be covered. Read more

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Announcing the cast of Reunion & Dark Pony

Find out more…

We are excited to announce our cast for Reunion & Dark Pony by David Mamet. These two short plays of David Mamet’s early work are about father and daughter relationships. Reunion realistically observes a meeting between an estranged father and daughter who have not seen each other in years, while Dark Pony playfully explores a father telling his child a magical story. Performing these plays in beautiful library spaces across South London. 

David Schaal’s many TV credits include The Inbetweeners and The Office, while theatre credits include Rabbits (Park Theatre) and A Steady Rain (Arcola Theatre). Siu-see Hung rejoins Baseless Fabric following her involvement in their production of A First Class Death for VAULT Festival. Other recent credits include Chinglish (Park Theatre) and I Wish To Die Singing (Finborough).

Find out more…

Read more

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Designing a production for six libraries across South London

Clapham Library

Clapham Library

So our design process for Reunion and Dark Pony is well underway! Our exciting Set & Costume designer Bex Kemp and I have started the process of thinking about how you design these plays for six different libraries! Read more about Bex’s previous work here.

We’ve been reading and discussing the plays, pulling out things we think are interesting and possibly useful to think about as well as visiting all of the libraries together. Each library is quite different so the plays will be a different experience in each library, each with its own problems to be solved and exciting, beautiful or unique elements to make the most of. We need to work out how the plays can work best in each of the six libraries to make the most of each individual space as well as telling the stories of these two plays as best as we can. Read more

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Transforming sleek city bankers to grungey surfers…

Wig used in the show – pre-transformation

-So, this is for you? 

The man in the wig shop was gesturing for me to try on the brunette wig he was holding in his hands.

-Oh no, it’s actually for a man, the director Joanna pitched in.

-For a man? Is he dressing up as a lady? Said the bemused wig vendor.

Joanna smiled and explained that she is putting on a new adaptation of Cosi Fan Tutte and in this version, our two suitors, Ferrando and Guglielmo –are city bankers dressing up as grungey surfers to seduce their unsuspecting girlfriends to win a bet. The wigs are a part of the costume our bankers don to deceive their supposedly faithful girlfriends. Of course, our bankers are betting that they will fail and their girlfriends will remain as faithful as they believe them to be, but who can resist a rough but charming surfer? Especially with that hair! Read more

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For the love of libraries….

As Mamet plays in libraries is a bit different to opera on the high street, we thought perhaps you might be interested to hear a bit more about our forthcoming production of Reunion and Dark Pony and why it’s taking place in libraries across South London.

Firstly, we aim to present one opera and one theatre production a year. Last year it was street opera Drifting Dragons and digital promenade theatre piece A Secret Life, which took the audience on a journey round the streets and ended up for a scene in the wonderful Mason’s Arms pub. Both of those projects were new pieces based on local people’s stories and inspired by the many local people across Merton and Wandsworth we spoke to about their memories.

This year we have left new stories to re-discover old ones and present them in unusual public places. You don’t often hear Mozart’s Cosi Fan Tutte in the pub or the supermarket do you? But you do with us! So we wanted this year’s theatre production to also be a classic in an unexpected place.

Read more

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5 Star Review & OffWestEnd Award Nomination

We have been overwhelmed and delighted by everyone’s super positive responses to our Cosi Fan Tutte Street Opera!

Firstly, we are so excited to have been nominated for the Offies Best Opera Production award by OffWestEnd.com after one of their assessors saw our Morden performance. The nominations continue over the year with the 2017 winners announced early 2018 – so keep your fingers crossed and watch this space!!

And we couldn’t be more thrilled by our 5 and 4 star reviews from Operissima and LondonTheatre1 respectively. You can read the full reviews at the links below or check out the Cosi Fan Tutte page for some of the quotations we’ve picked out. Read more

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Chatting to Wandsworth Radio about Street Opera

Last Saturday Artistic Director Joanna Turner headed to Wandsworth Radio to talk about our Cosi Fan Tutte Production. To listen to the broadcast just click the play button above. She also talks a little about our next production by David Mamet as part of National Libraries Week, Reunion & Dark Pony.

We still have a few remaining Cosi Fan Tutte performances in Mitcham, Wimbledon Village and Wimbledon Town Centre. Check out the Cosi Fan Tutte production page for details.

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Cosi Fan Tutte performances in full swing!

Raynes Park Tavern, Raynes Park

Our Cosi Fan Tutte performances are now well underway and we’re getting fantastic reactions both from audiences who’ve come along especially to see us and people who we’ve surprised while they’ve been doing the shopping or having a pint in the pub! So far we’ve had scenes popping up in Tooting, Pollards Hill, Raynes Park and Colliers Wood.

Tooting High Street

Who’d have thought you’d hear the Cosi opening trio of the boys making the bet to test their girlfriends whilst playing pool in the Raynes Park Tavern, or the girls deciding which disguised boy to flirt with in the jewellery section in Colliers Wood M&S? I think my personal favourite though was the boys singing their conversation about whether their girlfriends have cheated whilst coming down the escalator in the Qube shopping centre!

The hugest thanks to all the amazing businesses who’ve given us permission for performing in their stores – we really appreciate your help in bringing opera to everyone in Merton!  Read more

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Excited about singing in the supermarket? We ask our Cosi cast….

Cosi Fan Tutte Rehearsal

James, our Stage Manager, interviewed our singers and instrumentalists of the Cosi Fan Tutte Street opera in rehearsals this week…

What is your favourite opera or composer?

Tom Stoddart (Guglielmo):  “Favourite composer, Mahler, who never wrote any operas or Tchaikovsky. And my favourite opera is Eugene Onegin by Tchaikovsky.”

Simon Gfeller (Ferrando): “Favourite composer I think Mozart. But it’s generally the opera I’m doing at the moment as I fall in love really quickly with what I’m doing.”

Philip Smith (Don Alfonso): “La Bohème by Puccini would be my favourite opera quickly followed by quite a lot of Britten”

Claire Wild (Fiordiligi): “One of my favourite operas is Don Giovanni actually, Mozart. But I love La Bohème as well.” Read more

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