 |
|
|
|||
|
Interviews
|
|||
|
|
Unlimited Philip Fisher interviews Jon Spooner and Liz Margree of Unlimited Theatre Company After many messages passed to and fro, Philip Fisher finally managed to fix an interview for the British Theatre Guide with Jon Spooner and Liz Margree at The Traverse Theatre where Unlimited are playing Safety, the second part of their war atrocity trilogy. Unlimited is one of the most exciting and adventurous young theatre companies working in Britain at the moment. They have already had great success in Edinburgh, winning awards in both 2000 and 2001. Apart from the awards, a measure of their success is that the Traverse Theatre read Safety and immediately gave the company a Festival slot. This puts them among the real élite. The company was formed on 1 January 1997 when six former Leeds University students reached a deadline that they had set themselves for taking the plunge into full time theatre. Previously they had been marking time doing an assortment of different jobs but hankering after careers in theatre. In 2001, one member left, reducing them to their current strength of five. The company runs as a co-operative with everybody mucking in as necessary but playing to strengths. They are all actors and this is their first love. Beyond that, their ethos means that, wherever possible, Liz Margree will run the commercial and business side of things, Chris Thorpe and Clare Duffy will write and Jon Spooner and Liz will direct. That leaves Louisa Ashley as the only person whose single first string is the acting. The company has a real family feel, possibly assisted by the fact that Jon and Liz are married to each other. Unlimited regularly collaborates with others, whether writers, actors or designers, and takes pride in the fact that the "outsiders" feel part of the team and will willingly work beyond their initial remit, where needed. The team spirit becomes obvious when the two members that have no major involvement in Safety pitch up in Edinburgh and roll up their sleeves to help behind the scenes. No thespian preciousness there! The company has a political agenda and believes strongly in working in the subsidised sector. They cannot currently imagine compromising their principles and doing commercially motivated work. None of the members of Unlimited does any work outside the group now. In addition, all finances, however generated, are shared equally. As an example, Liz does about 10 days per month helping commercial businesses to develop their staff using drama techniques. Her method is to try and create a cultural shif, promoting trust, autonomy and the value of play. In this way the workers will release creativity and increase motivation levels. The income goes into the pot to help the company to continue to develop its primary work. They also work within the local community in Leeds, where they are based. Liz cited a project to help teenage mothers and another working with 7-11 year olds to set up a photographic record of their local community. This can be seen at www.snapshots.me.co.uk. This seems particularly appropriate at the moment as the main subject of their latest play, Chris Thorpe's Safety, is the impact that photography can have on both the photographer and society. The way that the company works is to find an area of common interest (or perhaps passion) and to develop a work from it. This might be a newly written or a devised piece. They also believe in the development of their ideas through a number of different pieces. This means that every new piece is strengthened by what has gone before. The company works very hard to generate audience reaction, even if it is not entirely positive. This is one of their raisons d'être. It is not enough to satisfy themselves. They have to feel that they are breaking new ground and it seems impossible to imagine them sticking with a winning formula. They will always strive for the element of surprise. They have been remarkably successful for a relatively new, young company with no core funding - any funding is entirely on a project basis. As Liz Margree says, this means that they are not just actors. The company also has to be run as a business with positive cashflow, otherwise it will not survive. They have been touring Static, a piece that contrasts life in a war zone with that in England for over two years now. When they leave Edinburgh they will be flying the British Council flag in the Philippines and Papua New Guinea. The latter will be a real fact-finding mission as the British Council has no real presence there. The company publicly claim to love adventures and this could prove to be one of their strangest. At roughly the same time, their 2001 Fringe First Winner (following Static in 2000), Neutrino, will be travelling around the UK. It remains to be seen whether Safety will follow. This should keep the company on its toes because even with the almost perfected Static, 100 performances or more old, they are always looking at how to improve. The Neutrino story is even more amazing. After a year of development, it seemed to be complete a couple of weeks before travelling to Edinburgh, last year. At that point, they took a collective decision to scrap what they had and do a complete rewrite. A very brave and ultimately successful decision. The company has a really strong sense of where it is going. It has a mission statement, a concept more familiar in driven corporate organisations that in a theatrical partnership. This is simply to become a major British theatre company. Having said that, they are not completely sure what that implies but are adamant that they want to do work that is important. They seem to mean that in both an artistic and in a far more idealistic sense. It is interesting that they take some pleasure in achieving much as a theatrical company without formal drama training. As they say, "we are not Felicity Kendal or Simon Russell Beale". However, they are comfortable with their audiences and more often that not they are happy to listen to reviewers. Unlimited has always been an adventurous company with very different projects. For example, after Static played in Edinburgh in 2000 they set up a free follow up text messaging project. This was at least a year ahead of its time as they had prefigured the texting revolution. They have an active e-mail update and their latest project is Jon's daily Festival diary available on their website. This allows him to express collective views. It also means that when critics get too big for their boots he can also get his own back. The message that constantly comes through from both Jon and Liz is tha, although the main thrust is to produce work that has deep meanings that often take time to filter through, they all enjoy their work and realise how lucky they are to be able to work in theatre and present their ideas to the public. They also still have a true enthusiasm to continue developing new and old projects in order to get important messages across to increasing numbers of people. Their pick of Edinburgh 2002 to date - Kiss of Life by Chris Goode at Pleasance. If you want to find out more about Unlimited, go and see Safety in Edinburgh, or the other shows on tour or look at their website www.unlimited.org.uk
|
||
|
|