Side Roads

Side Roads - Documentary Performance

Tue 20th and 27th November; Sat 1st and 8th December 2018

A documentary Physical Theatre performance by Acting Now's group Drama Unlimited, in which participants with and without mental health challenges have devised "Side Roads", a play about different journeys we take: on the road, down memory lane and in our imagination. We explore the anxieties, fears, unexpected discoveries as well as the immense sense of freedom of travel. At its heart, this piece is about each participant, their life journey and the future hopes for this journey. This project is kindly supported by A14 Community Fund and Cambridgeshire Community Foundation.

The creative process:

Theatre practitioner Judita Vivas has been directing the group’s weekly sessions since February 2018, training the participants and coordinating the collaborative process of devising “Side Roads”. During the first two months the group spent the sessions meeting each other and creating a safe space, while working on different levels of communication, creativity and physicality, skills we need to communicate in a Physical Theatre language.

Prior to the devising process, participants took part in a research project in which they interviewed different people about their life experiences and memories about being on the road. With a selection of stories from the interviews and those collected during the group sessions, we put together a collage of personal experiences that served us as raw material and inspiration for the creation of “Side Roads”.

The performances:
Tue 20th Nov 7pm - Judith E Wilson Drama Studio Faculty of English CB3 9DP
Tue 27th Nov 7pm - Judith E Wilson Drama Studio Faculty of English CB3 9DP
Sat 1st Dec 6pm - Huntingdon Medway centre Medway Road, Huntingdon PE29 1SF
Sat 8th Dec 6 pm - Burleigh Hill Community Centre 6pm Constable Rd, Saint Ives PE27 3EQ

About Acting Now:
ACTING NOW es una compañía de teatro aplicado que nace de un proyecto personal de Marina Pallarès-Elias en Cambridge (Reino Unido) en 2013 y opera a día de hoy en todo el mundo. Se caracteriza por un fuerte compromiso social y la manera rigurosa, creativa y colaborativa con la que trabaja temas de profundo alcance social como la inmigración, la soledad o la exclusión social.

En Acting Now creemos que el teatro es una poderosa herramienta para explorar problemáticas cotidianas, trabajar estereotipos e impulsar el cambio social de manera significativa y a través de la creatividad.
Throughout the workshops, we also build social and emotional skills, self-expression and self-esteem and address the stigma attached to certain conditions. The projects culminate in original theatre performances based on the stories that emerge from the group. Volunteers and actors often join our groups as enablers and work alongside our participants, helping them to participate fully in the activities. To scale our impact, we work alongside community organisations, charities and local authorities to empower their service users to take action and transform their lives.

About the director:
Judita Vivas is a Lithuanian actress and physical theatre artist. She is a Physical Theatre Practitioner with Acting Now, Associate Artist of DUENDE, and Research Collaborator on Icarus Performance Project (Malta). She is also Founder and Co-Director of Foxtale Ensemble (international female theatre collective) as well as Double Trouble (female theatre-duo with Miriam Gould).

Polyphonic

Polyphonic at Cambridge Festival of Ideas

21st October 2018 2:30 pm & 7:30 pm

Tickets

Acting Now and Polygon Arts, in association with the MEITS Research project, present an original, devised theatre performance about language and identity. This is a story of fitting in and falling out, speaking up and not being heard, finding one voice and losing another. If who we are is connected to the language we speak, who are we when we speak more than one?

The Multilingualism: Empowering Individuals Transforming Societies (MEITS) research project is a major interdisciplinary research project funded under the AHRC Open World Research Initiative. Through six interlocking research strands we investigate how the insights gained from stepping outside a single language, culture and mode of thought are vital to individuals and societies. For more information visit www.meits.org

Alongside the various research programmes, MEITS has commissioned a community theatre production to bring stories of everyday multilingual lives to a wider audience. Acting Now and Polygon Arts have been working with community groups and individuals drawn from a dozen linguistic backgrounds to explore how speaking more than one language affects their lives. Through workshop and rehearsal, we have devised an intimate and interactive portrayal of the many identities the participants perform at home, at work, with friends and with family.

Acting Now and Polygon Arts are both Cambridge-based theatre companies that work with a wide variety of community groups and organisations. We put social, political and civic causes at the forefront of our work and devise creative drama projects that breathe life into the important social challenges facing participants and audiences alike. Please visit www.actingnow.co.uk and www.polygonarts.org.uk for more information.

This is me

Strength. Courage. Truth.
Wondrous things happen when we learn to love what makes us different.

This Is Me is a funny, tender exploration of what it means to be young and queer in Cambridge today. Devised by LGBT+ young people themselves and in collaboration with Acting Now and The Kite Trust, the play details the experience of coming out and the magic of celebrating difference.

Date and Time:
7pm, Tuesday 10th July 2018
7pm, Thursday 12th July 2018
Location:
Acting Now
47 – 51 Norfolk Street
Cambridge,
CB1 2LD
BOOKING REQUIRED (Free booking with donations on the day of the event) - Get your tickets through our Eventbrite page or emailing us at hello@actingnow.co.uk
Refreshments and drinks on sale from The Box Café.

This is Me is an original play devised LGBT+ young people in Cambridge in collaboration with LGBT+ charity The Kite Trust and directed by Acting Now theatre practitioners Marina Pallares and Rose Clark.

This is Me explores what it’s like to come out in several different ways. What is it like to come out about your gender? Your sexuality or your religion? Coming out about who we are is an ongoing process and one that is not always safe. This is Me imagines a world where we control the narration of our own stories. The play was devised over several months in busy, enjoyable weekly sessions. In each session the group focused on how difference can be expressed and celebrated in our community through dramatizing individual experiences.

The Kite Trust
The Kite Trust is Cambridgeshire’s leading organisation working with LGBT+ young people. For 25 years the charity has proudly promoted the health, well-being, and inclusion of LGBT+ young people across Cambridgeshire; raising awareness, supporting, and educating the local community.

Acting Now
At Acting Now we believe theatre is a catalyst for social change and should be for anyone and everyone, not limited by gender, sexuality, physical ability, condition, language or background. Our projects use the language of theatre with disadvantaged groups of varying abilities to enable them to find their voices in a safe and encouraging environment. Throughout the workshops, we also build social and emotional skills, self-expression and self-esteem and address the stigma attached to certain conditions. The projects culminate in original theatre performances based on the stories that emerge from the group.

Physical Theatre course for beginners starting in September 2018

Introductory course to Physical Theatre

(This course is now finished. Click here to check our upcoming course starting on January 2019)

A great opportunity to explore Physical Theatre Techniques. Our workshops are an alternative to conventional drama lessons and are based on body movement, freedom and creativity. Students are introduced to physical exercises, improvisation and movement, and will be encouraged to devise their own short solo and ensemble theatre pieces, developing self-awareness and discovering the expressive possibilities of their body, gestures and voice.

This acting course will focus on:

- The body, its sensitivity and expressiveness: the course will make the students highly conscious of how their own bodies can move. Students will be introduced to bodily and spatial awareness, exploration of truthful expression and personal creativity, the importance of observation of the world and its movements as well as ensemble and solo improvisation.
- The poetry of the movement: the body will be trained to transform life into poetry. By using the poetry of the body students develop creative possibilities. Stories go beyond realism into another stage of imagination. By the end of the course, the students will have acquired a broad palette of physical theatre techniques.
- Voice: in physical theatre, voice originates in the body and the two are inseparable. We will look at the expressiveness and possibilities of using voice in performance, vocal improvisation and using text in physical theatre.

Physical Theatre

Physical theatre is a genre of performance which makes use of the body (as opposed to the spoken word) as the primary means of performance and communication with an audience. Physical theatre can be distinguished from dance in that it tends to focus more on narrative, character and action. Acting Now uses the pedagogy of Jacques Lecoq, one of the finest teachers of acting in our time. As Lecoq’s puts it “the body knows things about which the mind is ignorant”.
This Introductory course to Physical Theatre will draw on various approaches and techniques, including plastiques and corporeal mime, Viewpoints, Duende ball work and others.

About Acting Now Physical Theatre School

Acting Now is an applied theatre company established by Artistic Director Marina Pallarès-Elias in Cambridge. We are committed to bringing about change in communities and participants from all walks of life, especially those who experience disadvantage.

We have developed our very own methodology through working with these communities by drawing on the ethics of applied theatre and the aesthetics and principles of physical theatre. We call this Raw Theatre (or Theatre of Yes). Alongside this, we run physical theatre courses and training programmes, which bring together theatre practitioners, educators, community organizers, charity representatives, social workers, activists and many others who are interested in exploring and developing their acting skills and using theatre as a tool for communication, empowerment and debate.

Meet the teacher

Judita Vivas is a Lithuanian actress and physical theatre artist. She is a Physical Theatre Practitioner with Acting Now, Associate Artist of DUENDE, and Research Collaborator on Icarus Performance Project (Malta). She is also Founder and Co-Director of Foxtale Ensemble (international female theatre collective) as well as Double Trouble (female theatre-duo with Miriam Gould).
Since 2008, Judita has trained with various international theatre practitioners, devised and performed in a large number of performance projects in Europe and the UK, and collaborated with theatre and multimedia artists. Her performances are physically and visually dynamic, drawing on real stories, mythologies and autobiographical narratives. Judita is passionate about socially engaged theatre projects and connecting with different communities. She regularly leads theatre classes and workshops where she combines somatic sensitivity with movement, ensemble work, storytelling and playfully experimentation with tangible materials.

DETAILS about the course:

WHEN: 8 sessions on Tuesdays 18.30 pm - 21.00 pm from 25th September 2018
WHERE: Ross Street Community Centre, Ross St, Cambridge CB1 3UZ
PRICES:
General Early Birds £118 (Before 31st July)
General £140
Concesions Early Birds £102 (Before 31st July)
Concesions £120
For more information contact us at hello@actingnow.co.uk or 07879913576

Check some of our videos to see what our students are capable of after training with us:

Complicité (Acting Now Physical Theatre School Summer 2017 at Corpus Playroom Theatre, Cambridge)