Preview: Directors’ Cuts, Wardrobe Theatre

Every spring, the tyro directors learning their craft at Bristol Old Vic Theatre School get a moment in the sun. The four final-year directors each choose a contemporary play to stage for a week before paying audiences, with the cast and creative team also taken from the Theatre School’s current graduating class. Here’s a quick rundown of the 2017 season (this month at the Wardrobe Theatre), as introduced by the four rising directors.

Sex With a Stranger (pictured top), by Stefan Golaszewski
Alexandra Moxon, director: I think everyone at some point has been let down by someone, whether a trusted friend or a partner. Whilst the play presents a more obvious scenario about infidelity, at its core Sex with a Stranger is more about a person having a lack of responsibility and empathy for someone they are supposed to care for.
In this current time of internet dating, Tinder and broken relationships it seems to echo the immediacy of modern, failing relationships. The writer, BAFTA winner Stefan Golaszewski, creates a wonderfully comic yet bleak and honest world.
Adam, Grace and Ruth are all lost in their lives and relationships. Three people, all in their mid-twenties, searching for a happy ending but harming themselves and each other in the process.
The Wardrobe Theatre is such an exciting space to work: its shape is very interesting when staging scenes. The play’s non-chronological structure means that we are constantly transported through time and location, and I think the unconventional space will only enhance this distinct plot structure.
May 2-6
www.thewardrobetheatre.com/livetheatre/sex-with-a-stranger

Iceland

Iceland, by Nicolas Billon
Geoffrey Brumlik, director: Billon is one of the hottest writers in Canada, and this play in particular has made a stunning impact wherever it has been performed. As a Canadian myself, I felt it was important to represent some of the truly remarkable new writing emerging from my home country – in particular Iceland, given the entirely unique experience it offers an audience. It is smart, dark and very funny – and unravels a really remarkable story in a quite riveting, compact 60 minutes of theatre.
Iceland examines the dark ironies of how the global financial system can infect the paths of our lives. It bravely tackles some very large issues – but does so on a really engaging human level. Above all, it connects intimately with audiences – ideal for the Wardrobe Theatre. The wonderfully quirky thrust stage creates terrific theatrical opportunities, allowing us to draw audiences into the play’s world in a powerful way.
May 9-13
www.thewardrobetheatre.com/livetheatre/iceland

I Am The Wind

I Am the Wind by Jon Fosse
Two men on a fragile boat. A trip to sea, a few drinks, a bite to eat. The One decides to sail further out in the threatening fog on the open ocean, bound with The Other on a journey into the unknown among the distant islands, looking for a place to exist.
Charlotte Marigot, director: I chose this piece because I was looking for one that would be close to how I was feeling at the time. I don’t want to give any spoilers so I won’t expand on that, but for me, it was important to chose something that I can somehow relate to or express through the author’s words what I can’t express myself yet. And that is still very true today.
It is a challenging piece in its form. We are not following a linear story – and that challenge kept bringing me back closer to it. The storyline – reliving an important moment of two men’s friendship, through the brain of one of the characters – is fascinating. How often are we able to venture inside people’s minds to understand them and read how they feel?
May 16-20
www.thewardrobetheatre.com/livetheatre/i-am-the-wind

Crave

Crave by Sarah Kane
Jessica Rose Mcvay, director: I am excited by how challenging Crave is. Up to this point, I have worked on linear, story-driven, naturalistic work. Crave has no story to speak of, no delineated scenes, no definition of space and time, and it isn’t naturalistic; it allows for me, designer Eleanor Bull and the company to create the world of the play completely.
One of the things I am most excited about in all my work is exploring the marriage between movement and language. Sarah Kane gives the four characters musical, poetic language to speak of their longing and loss of love – and I am excited to create a physical language that matches the style and poetry of that verbal language.
I love this piece because it makes me a braver director and person. I had never read a piece which spoke to so much of my own life experience. Crave allows its characters to reclaim their own stories, to speak both the good and the bad of their lives with honesty. While it can be bleak and horrific in the world of Crave, there is hope.
May 23-27
www.thewardrobetheatre.com/livetheatre/crave