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Dateline: 1st September, 2010

News from the RSC

The Royal Shakespeare Company today announced its plans to reopen the Royal Shakespeare and Swan Theatres on time and on budget in November 2010, following a four year redevelopment as part of the £112.8m Transformation project designed to bring actors and audiences closer together.

The Company will reopen its doors to the Royal Shakespeare and Swan Theatres from 24th November 2010, inviting people in to rediscover and explore the building, which will have a new 1,000 seat thrust stage auditorium, 36 metre high tower, new exhibition spaces, new places to eat and drink, including the Rooftop Restaurant and the Riverside Café and terrace, restored 1930s features and improved public areas, including the new Weston Square. Visitors will be able to take part in a series of preview events and activities which will help test the spaces, while throughout the opening period Matilda, A Musical plays at The Courtyard Theatre.

In February 2011, the current RSC ensemble will perform the first productions on the new Royal Shakespeare Theatre stage when they return from London’s Roundhouse to revive King Lear and Romeo and Juliet, directed by RSC Associate Directors, David Farr and Rupert Goold. The company will also perform Artistic Director Michael Boyd’s production of Antony and Cleopatra in the Swan Theatre and both Young People’s Shakespeare productions of Hamlet and The Comedy of Errors, before going back to London to premiere three new plays at Hampstead Theatre which run from April to June 2011.

The RSC will celebrate its 50th birthday and formally reopen the theatres with new companies and a new season from April 2011. Further details will be announced in November 2010.

The opening programme of events is directed and devised by RSC Chief Associate Director, Gregory Doran, and Director of Events and Exhibitions, Geraldine Collinge, and includes tours, exhibitions and activities designed to encourage people to explore the transformed building and participate in our work. Full details are listed in the appendices and in the reopening leaflet. They include:

Ghosts in the Walls – an auditory and sensory tour which evokes people’s memories of the old theatre and celebrates this new chapter in the Company’s life.
My RSC Gallery – tiny boxes of art hidden around the building waiting to be discovered when the theatres reopen. These are the culmination of a nationwide public competition, created by artist Luke Jerram, who asked people to submit miniature artworks inspired by Shakespeare, the RSC and the theatre.
Transformations – an exhibition which explores how the architects, Bennetts Associates, theatre designers, Charcoalblue, and construction managers, Mace, approached some of the major aspects of the transformation of the Royal Shakespeare and Swan Theatres, incorporating the best of the existing 1932 Elisabeth Scott Art Deco building with bold new architectural features.
‘Why?’ by Squidsoup – a digital sculpture in the new exhibition space, the PACCAR Room, which creates a web of words from the comments, questions and thoughts of RSC audiences on the relevance of Shakespeare today, sent by text message to a dedicated number.
Love is my Sin – distinguished RSC alumnus Peter Brook directs his own adaptations of Shakespeare’s sonnets, performed by Natasha Parry and Michael Pennington, alongside music by Frank Krawcyk in the Swan Theatre.
Local amateur groups will be trying out the RSC stages with specially created pieces. The Bear Pit, Stratford’s amateur arts umbrella organisation hosts Open House, a special variety evening on 12th December, curated by RSC Chief Associate Director Gregory Doran, which celebrates local creativity through songs, plays and dance. Over 200 singers from Stratford-upon-Avon and Huddersfield Choral Societies perform Handel’s Messiah on 8th January to mark their joint 175th anniversaries, and Stratford Operatic Society presents Return to the Forbidden Planet on 9th January.
Young people will play a key role in the reopening period. School children from Stratford and some of the RSC’s local Learning and Performance Network schools will work with the Company during the opening week to help other children to navigate round the building.
Over 300 young writers from the Black Country, inspired by the ghosts and spirits in Shakespeare, are collaborating with the RSC’s artistic team to create ten new plays. Writing on Your Feet will be directed by RSC directors and performed on the Royal Shakespeare Theatre stage on 7th and 9th December by young actors from three acting colleges. Leading hip-hop artists and UK lyricists, including the cutting-edge wordsmith Polarbear are also working with RSC Voice Director, Cicely Berry, and the RSC’s education team on Sound and Fury, a site-specific performance around the building, culminating on the Swan Theatre stage on 8th December.

Throughout the winter, a series of one-off events, family activities, workshops for teachers and schools groups, alternative comedy, music, poetry, and one-man Shakespeare shows, including artists as diverse as Roger Rees, Barrie Rutter, Camille O’Sullivan and our poet in residence, Malika Booker, will start to bring the building back to life ready for the first full productions on the Royal Shakespeare and Swan Theatre stages in February 2011.

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