Arts Reporting: Digital Theatre Offers New Arabic Theatre for Free

Excerpts from The Guardian newspaper by Lyn Gardner, via ArtsJournal.com:

Theatre needs windows on the world

Gulf Stage gives theatre an invaluable opportunity to look outwards

posted by Lyn Gardner at Guardian.uk, January 31

As we know, nowadays all the world's a stage. [. . . ] Today it's being broadened further, as the British Council launches Gulf Stage, a new project made in association with Digital Theatre, who have previously worked with the Almeida and Young Vic among others. For those of us unable to hop on a plane to research Arab theatre, Gulf Stage allows audiences around the world to access filmed recordings of six productions from young companies hailing from Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. All the productions have English subtitles and, unlike Digital Theatre's other productions, will be free to download for the first year.

This project is useful for several reasons. We often talk about the world becoming a smaller place, but too often companies visiting from abroad here find themselves up against restrictive visa rules, and with the British Council sending so much UK theatre abroad, it's good to see them building two-way relationships. Although the UK, and particularly London, now sees a wide range of work from abroad, there are still entire areas of the globe about whose theatre we're ignorant, and which – if it does manage to find its way here – is presented like a piece of cultural exotica. In the past, the only way to get a taste of Arab theatre would be to travel. While these downloads are no substitute for experiencing a live performance, they offer a chance for artists, audiences and producers to make cultural links across geographical borders. In the longer term this online project may have an offline life through many different social media platforms. A Younger Theatre is involved with the project, to try and encourage engagement by young artists and audiences across the world. Maybe, as a result of Gulf Stage, we may see some of this work on our stages or UK companies will forge relationships that lead to collaboration.

Click to read full text of Lyn Gardner's article. . . .

Click 'to view posters for the six Gulf Theatre project productions

Opinion: Alexis Soloski on Actors Breaking Up on Stage

Found on-line:

The joy of corpsing: why giggling fits the theatre

The Guardian, UK October 21, 2010

by Alexis Soloski

When laughter erupted on stage in a US production starring Patrick Stewart, the audience lapped it up. Why?

We Yanks have no convenient piece of slang that approximates your lovely term "corpsing". But that doesn't mean our actors don't succumb. I saw the best – or perhaps the worst – example in recent memory the other night at David Mamet's A Life in the Theatre, a 90-minute play in 26 scenes revived for a rather snoozy Broadway run. Patrick Stewart plays the older of two thesps, TR Knight playing the younger. In scene 14, the two men must chomp away at Chinese food as they recite their lines. Some prop designer had unwisely provided Stewart with a noodle dish. As he spoke, he stuffed his mouth, but one piece of noodle went awry and seemed to smack him in the face. After a moment's pause for reflection, he slurped it up.

This proved too much for Knight. Convulsive laughter overtook him. First he dropped his head to the table, shoulders shaking, then he attempted to hide himself behind his chair. Then he put a hand in front of his face and attempted to go on with the scene. Bad idea. Stewart's next line: "There are things we can control and those things which we cannot." This set Knight off again. Even Stewart had to stifle a chuckle. Finally Stewart – amused, annoyed, not precisely in character – asked his scene-mate, "Are you all right?" Receiving something approximating a nod, they managed to finish the scene.

Read more at Guardian (UK) on-line . . . .

Reviews from Elsewhere: Dixie's Tupperware Party, Edinburgh Fringe and other venues

A Guardian newspaper review by Jackie Hunter, August 19, passed along by @artfulmanager via Twitter:

Dixie's land of Tupperware bowls over Edinburgh

An outrageous show with an acid-tongued drag queen flogging colanders is a hoot on the fringe. But there's more to this party than meets the eye

Jackie Hunter, guardian.co.uk, Monday 17 August 2009

At the only other Tupperware party I've ever attended – reluctantly, with my mum, in 1983 – I'm pretty sure the demonstrator didn't address the assembled guests as "hookers". Nor did she dwell on unfortunate episodes of drunken sex behind restaurant dustbins, or make gags about "rimming" (the practice of working round the lid of a plastic bowl with both thumbs to seal it properly, at least in this context). How things have changed in the world of kitchenware.

Read more at AustinLiveTheatre.com . . . .