Streaming
Last year, quite early in the pandemic, a number of actors, some ad-hoc groupings (The Coronavirus Theatre Club, for example) and others already existing (including Boyle Yer Stotts from South Shields and Durham-based Elysium Theatre Company) started to produce short films to be streamed via YouTube.
This continued in 2021 with, for example, Elysium producing the second volume, consisting of five new plays, of its Covid-19 Monologues. During the year, the company received an Olwyn Wymark Award from the Writers’ Guild of Great Britain for its support of new writing.
But the theatre which really embraced streaming was Alphabetti, Newcastle’s 80 seat Fringe venue. On 4 May onwards, it started streaming with Listen In, a guided video tour of the venue with specially written performances in the auditorium, the bar and an empty room, and when it was able to open to the public again, it socially distanced all performances, thus really reducing capacity. It insisted on masks being worn and streamed every production, including Newcastle Fringe Festival shows.
Northern Stage also began streaming and the streamed version of The Sorcerer’s Apprentice continued after COVID forced the show’s closure.
And Morpeth-based The November Club also joined in, streaming a number of their typical shows.