Publisher Description

Jacques Lecoq and the British Theatre brings together the first collection of essays in English to focus on Lecoq's school of mime and physical theatre. For four decades, at his school in Paris, Jacques Lecoq trained performers from all over the world and effected a quiet evolution in the theatre. The work of such highly successful Lecoq graduates as Theatre de Complicite (The Winter's Tale with the Royal Shakespeare Company and The Visit, The Street of Crocodiles and The Causcasian Chalk Circle with the Royal National Theatre) has brought Lecoq's work to the attention of mainstream critics and audiences in Britain. Yet Complicte is just the tip of the Iceberg. The contributors to this volume, most of them engaged in applying Lecoq's work, chart some of the diverse ways in which it has had an impact on our conceptions of mime, physical theatre, actor training, devising street theatre and interculturalism. This lively - even provocative - collection of essays focuses academic debate and raises awareness of the impact of Lecoq's work in Britain today.

With more than 300 photographs showcasing the work of over 130 designers -- each image accompanied by the artist's own notes -- this collection presents the best, most comprehensive overview of modern English theatrical style. These magnificent sketches, stage sets, and costumes come from drama, musicals, ballet, and opera. They include Alison Chitty's suspended, golden representation of the heavens for several Shakespeare plays; Patrick Robertson's and Rosemary Vercoe's modern-day conception of Rigoletto, and John Napier's elaborate, futuristic creation for Starlight Express.

This book explores the various manifestations of affects in British theatre of the 21st century. The introduction gives a concise survey of existing and emerging theoretical and research trends and argues in favour of a capacious understanding of affects that mediates between more autonomous and more social approaches. The twelve chapters in the collection investigate major works in Britain by playwrights and theatre makers including Mojisola Adebayo, Mike Bartlett, Alice Birch, Caryl Churchill, Tim Crouch and Andy Smith, Rachel De-lahay, Reginald Edmund, James Fritz, David Greig, Idris Goodwin, Zinnie Harris, Kieran Hurley, Lucy Kirkwood, Anders Lustgarten, Yolanda Mercy, Anthony Neilson, Lucy Prebble, Sh!t Theatre, Penelope Skinner, Stef Smith, Kae Tempest and debbie tucker green. The interpretations identify significant areas of tension as they relate affects to the fields of cognition, politics and hope. In this, the chapters uncover interrelations of thought, intention and empathy; they reveal the nexus between identities, institutions and ideology; and, finally, they explore how theatre can accomplish the transition from a sense of crisis to utopian visions.

This book considers the representation of madness in contemporary British theatre, examining the rich relationship between performance and mental health, and questioning how theatre can potentially challenge dominant understandings of mental health. Carefully, it suggests what it means to represent madness in theatre, and the avenues through which such representations can become radical, whereby theatre can act as a site of resistance. Engaging with the heterogeneity of madness, each chapter covers different attributes and logics, including: the constitution and institutional structures of the contemporary asylum; the cultural idioms behind hallucination; the means by which suicide is apprehended and approached; how testimony of the mad person is interpreted and encountered. As a study that interrogates a wide range of British theatre across the past 30 years, and includes a theoretical interrogation of the politics of madness, this is a crucial work for any student or researcher, across disciplines, considering the politics of madness and its relationship to performance.

Since the Second World War, we have witnessed exciting, often confusing developments in the British theatre. This book, first published in 1976, presents an enlightening, objective history of the many facets of post-war British theatre and a fresh interpretation of theatre itself. The remarkable and profound changes which have taken place during this period range from the style and content of plays, through methods of acting, to shapes of theatres and the organisational habits of managers. Two national theatres have been brought almost simultaneously into existence; while at the other end of the financial scale, the fringe and pub theatres have kicked their way into vigorous life. The theatre in Britain has been one of the post-war success stories, to judge by its international renown and its mixture of experimental vitality and polished experience. In this book Elsom presents an approach to the problems of criticism and appreciation which range beyond those of literary analysis.

“As finely worked as a Swiss watch and as funny as the human condition permits ... the zigzag brilliance of the text as the clunky lines of the farce-within-a-farce rub against the sharp dialogue of reality.” The Guardian A play-within-a-play following a touring theatre company who are rehearsing and performing a comedy called Nothing On, results in a riotous double-bill of comedic craft and dramatic skill. Hurtling along at breakneck speed it shows the backstage antics as they stumble through the dress-rehearsal at Weston-super-Mare, then on to a disastrous matinee at Ashton-under-Lyne, followed by a total meltdown in Stockton-on-Tees. Michael Frayn's irresistible, multi-award-winning backstage farce has been enjoyed by millions of people worldwide since it premiered in 1982 and has been hailed as one of the greatest British comedies ever written. Winner of both Olivier and Evening Standard Awards for Best Comedy. This edition features a new introduction by Michael Blakemore.

This is an essential guide for anyone interested in the best new British stage plays to emerge in the new millennium. For students of theatre studies and theatre-goers Rewriting the Nation: British Theatre Today is a perfect companion to Britain's burgeoning theatre writing scene. It explores the context from which new plays have emerged and charts the way that playwrights have responded to the key concerns of the decade and helped shape our sense of who we are. In recent years British theatre has seen a renaissance in playwriting accompanied by a proliferation of writing awards and new writing groups. The book provides an in-depth exploration of the industry and of the key plays and playwrights. It opens by defining what is meant by 'new writing' and providing a study of the leading theatres, such as the Royal Court, the Traverse, the Bush, the Hampstead and the National theatres, together with the London fringe and the work of touring companies. In the second part, Sierz provides a fascinating survey of the main issues that have characterised new plays in the first decade of the new century, such as foreign policy and war overseas, economic boom and bust, divided communities and questions of identity and race. It considers too how playwrights have re-examined domestic issues of family, of love, of growing up, and the fantasies and nightmares of the mind. Against the backdrop of economic, political and social change under New Labour, Sierz shows how British theatre responded to these changes and in doing so has been and remains deeply involved in the project of rewriting the nation.

Between 1960 and 2010, a new generation of British avant-garde theater companies, directors, designers, and performers emerged. Some of these companies and individuals have endured to become part of theater history while others have disappeared from the scene, mutated into new forms, or become part of the establishment. Reverberations across Small-Scale British Theatre at long last puts these small-scale British theater companies and personalities in the scholarly spotlight. By questioning what "Britishness" meant in relation to the small-scale work of these practitioners, contributors articulate how it is reflected in the goals, manifestos, and aesthetics of these companies.