Featured – Page 3

16 February, 201116 March, 2011

An open letter: World Theatre Day 2011

Dear Theatre Colleague,

World Theatre Day is March 27!

For 3 years now, I have been involved along with other facilitator-colleagues for World Theatre Day. Under the auspices of the International Theatre Institute (ITI), World Theatre Day (WTD) is celebrated annually on the 27th March by the international theatre community. Various national and international theatre events are organized to mark this occasion. We would like to invite you to join the party!

The World Theatre Day blog has been updated for 2011, and, as with the last two years, will become a virtual hub for sharing World Theatre Day celebrations from all over the world.

If you need ideas about how you can celebrate World Theatre Day in your community, please visit here, in the first instance, for ideas to get you started. Continue to follow along with the blog or via Facebook or on Twitter @WTD11 You’ll find more ideas there as the days roll by and news about how other theatre artists around the world will mark World Theatre Day 2011.

Prior to March 27, we’d love to hear how you are planning to celebrate. You can share your information easily by going to the WTD11 submissions page You can also use this same form to share your actual celebrations on March 27. Please include a photo or a link to a YouTube video so we can share your celebrations with the world! Here’s a sample of the kind of thing you can do – it’s a little video made at the after-show party for That Face a couple of years ago.

The meme in 2009 was to focus on the question ‘What does theatre mean to you?’

That night, 23rd productions did a backstage walkthrough and interval interviews around their then-playing production of The Pillowman.

This is that audience’s response to the meme.

Of course, it doesn’t have to be a video; you can upload pictures, audio files or just write and share what you did in words. The important thing is to celebrate along with the rest of the world. Get inspired!

For the past 3 years Queensland artists and companies have led off the global celebrations from midnight on March 27th. Perhaps this year New Zealand will get in first! There’s a challenge! The bonus for the first cabs off the rank is that the fun of World Theatre ‘Day’ actually goes on much longer!

We in Queensland look forward to sharing and celebrating with you!

Kate Foy (Editor Greenroom)

12 December, 201012 December, 2010

Gift suggestions for the theatre-lover geek on your list

: Image via Wikipedia

We had to weigh into this one. There are Christmas gift suggestions all over the place right now, but this one is just for you dear Greenroom habitués. You probably haven’t finished your shopping, and most of these can be bought online, some even emailed. Check for delivery times, but do it soon.

Here’s our list of suggestions:

Subscriptions or Tickets
Probably the most obvious. Contact your local theatre company and buy a ticket. Most single ticket sales should be open to catch the Christmas rush. Click the Greenroom poster wall on the home page to go directly to the company’s website. Include a promissory note with your ticket – ‘good for one drink at the bar’.

iPhone and iPad Applications:
You can gift all of these if you wish. Just make sure your lucky person has the right hardware first. Go to the iTunes store or just Google.

Shakespeare Pro
Good Reader (for storing your scripts and readings)

There are plenty of good, free apps like Rehearsal and Hollywood Helper/Broadway Buddy and the Shakespeare-lite version, all of which are free. You can’t gift these though … just tell a friend in the drop down menu beside each app in the iTunes Store.

Audible Books
audible.com is a terrific resource with plenty of plays, biographies, and interviews with actors, directors and other arty types (these are free) available for download. If you are feeling really, really generous, what about buying a cheap mp3 player and filling it with some goodies – a geek Christmas stocking. Alternatively give them an Audible gift card so they can select their own.

Theatre Videos
Always a favourite. There are lots available out there. But check this list for inspiration: 37 Flicks that Theatre Lovers Should Know put together by Howard Sherman of the American Theatre Wing recently. Greenroom favourites include: Slings and Arrows; Branagh’s Much Ado About Nothing; Shakespeare in Love; In the Bleak Mid Winter (Branagh again) and Vanya on 42nd Street. For theatre documentaries also check out Howard’s list of 13 Docos That Theatre Lovers Should Know. It doesn’t include In the Company of Actors which is based on the STC’s production of Hedda Gabler directed by Robin Nevin with Hugo Weaving and Cate Blanchett. The ABC Shop is a good place to browse, as is Dymocks for SBS screened arts-related videos.

Books
Where to begin? There are so many bios, autobios, playscripts, casebooks on productions and so on, that it’s hard to make any kind of recommendation. Can we just say that, if you want to browse in general or for something in particular, the admirable Book Depository based in the UK is the best online bookshop by far in our experience. They have an extensive catalogue, an easy-to-browse website, great customer service – they send you a little ‘Thank you ever so much for your order’ note when you place it – not kidding. Here’s the clincher though, the Book Depository provides free shipping worldwide. They discount their books too. How do they do it? Delivery time is round 10 days so you don’t have long.

Say Thanks!
And if you enjoyed yourself this year at the theatre, why not send a thank you Christmas email wish – even a hand-written card – to the companies that brought you pleasure. It’s that time of year!

Got any further suggestions to add? Please put them in the comments below. Seasonal cheers!

22 July, 20105 May, 2014

Fractal Theatre is Back! Brenna-Lee Cooney (Interview 9)

Brenna-Lee Cooney is telling me about the plans she has for the revivified Fractal Theatre, now based in Ipswich. After some years of child-raising, teaching, a self-imposed break from theatre-creation and urged, she tells me with a snort, by her now grown-up children to ‘do something with your life,’ she’s energised and ready to tackle afresh one of the most challenging tasks any theatre maker has – that of producing and directing (and choreographing) a show from the ground up. I sense Brenna-Lee is not one to do things at half-pace and, as she speaks, my pen rushes to keep up.

Like most who’ve not done a day’s study of physics in their lives I’m interested to hear why ‘Fractal’ for a theatre company? I do know a bit about the relationship between physics and fractals, having read Gary Zukav’s wonderful ‘The Dancing Wu Li Masters‘ many years ago; it’s still one of my favourite science books. But why ‘fractal’ for theatre, I ask? It turns out that it’s all about patterns. ‘I’m interested in the ever-repeating patterns of nature and history and pattern repetition in movement and music and, of course, in the poetry of text,’ Brenna-Lee explains.

She and Fractal have always been interested in creating theatre that blurs the boundaries between the forms, and Steven Berkoff‘s The Secret Love Life of Ophelia, which opens next month in its Australian premiere, continues the tradition begun when Fractal started in 1989. At the time Brenna-Lee was studying at UQ; ‘Richard Fotheringham, then my lecturer, threw me the keys to the Avalon (theatre) and told me to do something over the Christmas break,’ she recalls. She did, and a production of Lysistrata emerged. A series of productions – some epic, some small, and all innovative followed over the years. There were classical Greek works, including a Butoh-inspired Oresteia led by Lynn Bradley, Ibsen’s Peer Gynt supported by the Norwegian Community, Wedekind’s Lulu, all with enormous casts. Continue reading “Fractal Theatre is Back! Brenna-Lee Cooney (Interview 9)”

26 March, 20101 April, 2011

What theatre means to Greenroom: World Theatre Day 2010

In case you don’t know, World Theatre Day (that’s #wtd10 if you want to follow all the conversation on Twitter) is tomorrow, March 27.

You can read all about what’s happening on the blog here and, better still, add to it what you and your group are doing. You can also catch all the action via Twitter tomorrow through Sunday, as the rest of the world catches up with NZ and Australia who kick it all off at midnight tonight. Follow @wtd10 on Twitter and keep the theatre convo going from front of house, backstage, the foyer, after-parties … wherever.

By the way, you don’t have to do anything special, but be sure to share what you’re doing via a video, stills, audio or a tweet or two from the coalface. Here’s where they will end up … on the WTD Tumblr ‘scrapbook’ … and here’s how to add your stuff.

Meanwhile, the image above is what theatre means to this blog … at least this is the Wordle that shows the most-used words on the blog since we started last year.

Happy World Theatre Day wherever you are!

Image: http://www.wordle.net/

10 March, 20105 May, 2014

Conversation with the audience: Sven Swenson (Interview 4)

I’ve known Sven Swenson and admired his work since 1996, the year his first play Vertigo and the Virginia workshopped for Queensland Theatre Company. Since then Sven’s completed 15 plays, but he notes there are 33 others “in various stages of disrepair.” His latest work, The Bitterling premieres next week as the opening production of the inaugural La Boite Indie program; ‘opening’ and ‘inaugural’ – a lot of firsts, and a lot of expectations. He’s writer and director.

He tells me, “We know we are the indie guinea-pigs, we’re all keenly aware of this. There is constant dialogue between the participants and La Boite, who are extremely supportive and available. They have a genuine and profound desire to see good indie theatre develop.” He goes on, “There’s a real air of excitement right now, and it’s helping us to create at our best.”

I’m glad to catch up with Sven, one of Brisbane’s most prolific and also proudly parochial writers. I want to know more about the inaugural winner (2002) for Road to the She Devil’s Salon and then finalist (2008) of the prestigious Queensland Premier’s Drama Award. His play Beautiful Souls was produced Off-Broadway (2007) and also in Los Angeles. Among other things we talk about beginnings, influences, how he works, and the local theatre scene. He has a few surprises for me along the way. Continue reading “Conversation with the audience: Sven Swenson (Interview 4)”