Shoreditch Town Hall has announced a programme that it claims is its most ambitious yet, including a new commission from dreamthinkspeak and the opening of its new 750-seat Assembly Hall.
The season kicks off with ABSENT from dreamthinkspeak, co-commissioned with LIFT and LeftCoast. This promenade production created by Tristan Sharps for the basement spaces of the building mixes film, installation and a haunting soundscape by Lapalux and is partly inspired by The Duchess of Argyll’s residence at a central London hotel from the 1970s until the 1980s, when she was finally evicted for running out of friends and credit.
Kneehigh will bring its reworking of John Gay's The Beggar's Opera, entitled Dead Dog in a Suitcase (and Other Love Songs), with a score by Charles Hazelwood for its London première.
There will be a new partnership with Penned in the Margins / Mercy to present The EVP Sessions, featuring spoken word, performance, music and technology.
Shoreditch Town Hall is supporting the launch of a new performance series, The Listening Party, and will also feature Gary McNair's Donald Robertson is not a Stand-up Comedian, Sophie Rose’s Quiet Violence, Hannah Sullivan's With Force and Noise, J Fergus Evans's ROVE, Hunt & Darton's Boredom plus work from Ira Brand, Hannah Ringham, Selina Nwulu, Jack Rooke, Gillie Kleiman, Will Dickie and The Ruby Dolls.
Shoreditch Town Hall Director Nick Giles said, "this is only the fourth artistic programme we have presented, and with each new season of work we have tried to take a step forward in ambition and in defining a distinctive place for the venue as a non-traditional space, growing audiences with longer runs, increasing our commissioning so that more work can be made for and of our spaces, and seeking out artistic collaborations with some of the most exciting and original emerging performance and theatre makers.
"Ultimately, this is with the aim of creating surprising and transformational experiences for audiences. It is exciting to now be able to take our work into new, grander territory with our magnificent Assembly Hall coming back into use fully as a performance space.
"I can’t imagine a better company than Kneehigh to launch this next phase, nor a better piece than the fantastically riotous Dead Dog In A Suitcase (And Other Love Songs) to put the space through its paces.”