We have reached the mid point of the ‘100’ tour and are excited to be genuinely affecting our audiences. The immediate feedback at the post-show Q & A’s point to the love of the wonderful physical images that the company have created under the imaginative creative wing of our physical director, Jacqueline Avery. The rain-forest scene with its simple use of bamboo to create trees and vines, the boxes as canoes, and the ensembles accompanying vocalised sound-scape; the mesmerising bedroom-mirror scene created with actor’s physicality, bamboos and languid mirrored movement and dialogue; a deeply affecting scene where a character chooses to climb a tree and die for his principles. The lovers in bed, an opened window with birdsong and heart-beat all created on stage.
Our new graduate platform project AsCend Physical Theatre has visited some exciting new venues from an atmospheric, theatrically dark, performance space in a cellar bar, and an intimate school studio at 11 in the morning, to a more spacious, proscenium arch 30’s gem. The reaction from our audiences has been exciting, as has a shift in age range coming to see this show with more young people attracted as well as our more traditional theatre goer. We have enjoyed some great reaction and feed back to the play. It has proved as we planned a wonderful platform for our new graduate scheme; and our inaugural post-graduate pair – Maya Aitkin and Mainga Mayeya- have more than risen to the challenge provided; their talent, huge commitment and passion for performance there for all to see in their first professional touring production along with a strong cast of other more seasoned professionals. Maya and Mainga are a credit to the Arts University Bournemouth and the excellent training they received. http://aub.ac.uk/all/full-time/undergraduate/ba/ba-acting/
In a recent review, awarded four stars, by Natasha McGregor of Bristol Theatre Review of AsCend’s performance at the city’s Bierkeller “a moving and emotional piece about the power of memory and what we truly value in our lives” concluded with her only criticism of ‘100’ – ” It has to be the fact that it was only here for one night. Ideally I would love to tell my friends about it and get them down to enjoy it and join me in a hearty debate about our perfect memory”
For the full review click on: http://bristoltheatrereview.com/e/Uh3kDe-MRrGfl1DkXDx6yg
One of our favourite discoveries was to hear that a couple in their late 70’s – inspired by the show’s flyer description – had spent three hours prior to coming to see ‘100’ mulling over their lives deciding what their ‘memory for Eternity’ might be, and how the show had affected that again. Earlier in the tour, after 100’s premier, in Dorchester, asked what he thought of the play, a boy of around 10 years old said with such authority: ‘It made me think we should live our lives to the full, because life could be shorter than we think.’ We wonder what that young man will be when he grows up – someone of influence in his world hopefully!
If you have not yet seen this gripping, thought provoking play yet, then make sure you do not miss the chance by checking out the final THREE performances:
Thursday 7 November – The Arc Theatre, Trowbridge, Wiltshire
Tel: 01225 756 376 – www.arctheatre.org.uk
Wednesday 13 November – The Layard Theatre, Canford Magna, Dorset
Tel: 01256 418 318 www.canford.com
The final performance is:
Thursday 21 November – The Pavilion Theatre, Weymouth, Dorset
Tel: 01305 783 225 www.weymouthpavilion.com