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Dateline: 20th April, 2008
New Writing in Cardiff There's a buzz about Cardiff theatre. Innovative, high-energy new-writing projects are nurturing some impressive playwrights and directors, and well-produced, funky theatre events are gathering a ever-growing band of young devotees. There are two companies driving this. The newly launched Sherman Cymru, which merged Cardiff's producing theatre with the impressive new Welsh writing company, Sgript Cymru, has hit the ground running. But a small artists' co-operative called Dirty Protest, which launched last August, is attracting some of the best of Welsh talent and has already earned itself a cult following. Spring Board Festival at the Sherman CymruLast autumn, when the Sherman Cymru announced that it was committed to "finding and fostering challenging and incisive theatrical visions, both in Welsh and in English", it clearly meant every word. The standard was set by the Sherman's inaugural production, Kaite O' Reilly's The Almond and the Seahorse. Currently there are another twenty works under commission by the Sherman Cymru, including a verbatim play by Philip Ralph, A Deep Cut, to be premiered in July. This promises to be a searing and controversial investigation into the death of five young soldiers at the Deepcut Barracks. This month sees the launch of Spring Board, the Sherman's new writing festival spanning two weeks, designed to showcase works in progress of young, emerging and experienced writers from Wales. This is no low-key festival. Continuing the exemplary work of Sgript Cymru, Spring Board includes a series of innovative projects, all designed to get the best from their writers. These projects include the Lock In: six emerging writers are first treated to a weekend workshop with an experienced writer, and are then brought into the Sherman for two days and asked to write a short play. And then there's Muse On, which challenges two experienced playwrights to write a theatrical response to a classic play. Hearing Voices asks two established Welsh playwrights, Meredydd Barker (Acqua Nero) and Alan Harris (Orange), to go in search of a true story and write a verbatim piece about it. Dirty ProtestSpring Board also featured Three Dirty Plays, a hugely popular, one-night-only visit from the cult new Welsh writing company, Dirty Protest. A not-for-profit artists' co-operative, Dirty Protest describe their work as Guerrilla Theatre: this is in-yer-face, high energy, young and (crucially) accessible theatre with a thriving cult following. Dirty Protest targets the My Space generation and every month they perform a series of short plays (three to fifteen minutes), in a yurt in City Road, Cardiff. A regular feature is the monthly, Pop Your Cherry slot where theatrical virgins submit a short play and see it staged in the yurt. They advertise their events on the net, use top-notch Welsh actors, and challenge established Welsh playwrights as well as newcomers to write short pieces on a given topic in four weeks, for both English and Welsh language productions. The result has been something of a phenomenon. The Guardian has already commended their work as "cracking". The yurt in Milgi in Cardiff is packed to capacity at every event, with people being turned away each time. One Cherry-popper, Rhiannon Boyle, has received her first commission off the back of her Dirty Protest piece. And Kit Lambert's Dirty Protest play is already being turned into a short film. All this in less than a year. This is a company worth watching. Forthcoming Dirty ProtestsForthcoming Dirty events are Six Dirty Directors, in which one short play is performed six times, each with a different director. The company will also host a Welsh/English new writing event at the Millennium Centre later in the year. Writer and co-founder Tim Price (Café Cariad, Sherman Cymru; Y Pris, S4C's popular drama series, and contributing writer for the second series of Billie Piper's Secret Diary of A Call Girl ) staged Act One of his new play, The Whole Truth, at the Sherman Cymru's Spring Board festival this week. The 28-year-old Price from Aberdare said, "I've been one of the organisers of Dirty Protest since August last year and I've avoided writing for it for a number of reasons. Partly I didn't want to look like I'd created an event to parade myself like a delicate show pony. And partly out of fear: what if mine wasn't the best? Because, all of us, deep down want to be the best. Or at least, not the worst. Which is the same kind of thing, but more British." He now issues a Dirty Challenge to all writers and wannabe writers: write Acts 2 and 3 of The Whole Truth. "We see it as chapter one, and we are appealing for writers to come along, watch this play and then write chapter two or three of the story. Hopefully we'll have lots of different submissions." For any of who weren't lucky enough to have caught Act One of The Whole Truth at the Sherman Cymru this week, fear not. Tim Price's first act will be available to watch on You Tube in the next few days. The successful submission will be staged at the Latitude Festival in Southwold this July. Allison Vale
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