February - May 2005

LIVE 05
Challenging - Contemporary - Controversial
3 weeks - 17 companies - 56 performances - 1 venue

Tired of the old texts? Sick of stories staged in staid old ways? LIVE 05 is the solution - an electric and equally eclectic programme bringing the most brilliantly innovative and ground-breaking companies together under one roof between February and May.

BILL AITCHISON - Zones 2-6
Like Sherlock Holmes meets don Quixote in Palmer's Green.
In Zones 2-6 bill assumes the part of his doppelganger searching for his 'real' self who lives somewhere on the other side of London. Zones 2-6 follows this search for his elusive self through ever decreasing circles, gyratory systems, dodgy boozers and traffic islands without end. By turns poetic, questioning, comic and austere, Zones 2-6 stands, walks and sits somewhere between physically charged experimental theatre and site-specific performance.
Bill Aitchison is a performance artist most known for his lucid and risk-taking outdoor performances. In his double life as an experimental theatre actor he has performed widely across Europe and in New York. For Zones 2-6 he has been enticed to take the stage for himself where these two Bills may just meet.

SIDELONG - Omnibus 3
Do you always do as you're told? Sidelong performance group turns the Chelsea Theatre inside out in a multi-room performance event exploring the slippery nature of identity. Omnibus 3 twists the audience-performer relationship in a site-sensitive exploration of what it means to watch or be watched, to do as you're told or to do as you want. With audience and performers roaming the building, everywhere is onstage and everyone waits for something to happen... Who you are depends on who you ask.

THIRD ANGEL - Hurrysickness
Do you never have quite enough time in the day? Do you change lanes in traffic queues in the hope you will get home that bit faster? do you get irrationally irritated by the cashier who just too slow? Do you find yourself trying to do more and more in less and less time?
If the answer to any of the above is yes, you may be suffering form Hurrysickness. Third Angel has been exploring the science and history of time and time pressure, and invites you to take time out to share and enjoy some of their findings in this engaging performance lecture. You can even contribute to their research by participating in a couple of experiments - multitasking at its most entertaining.
Third Angel has developed a direct, intimate and playful audience relationship through innovative performance installations and film work in diverse settings since 1995.

MELANIE WILSON - Simple Girl
A simple girl shares some erratic and sordid recollections.
Flitting between macabre tales, unseemly confessions and a perversely executed Marilyn Monroe cover, our girl accompanies herself with an insouciant soundtrack of pertinent noise and low-level cheek.
Manners however, become increasingly unpredictable; sounds wilfully disobedient and stories pleasingly audacious before an audience that are at once adjudicators, confidantes, play mates and quarry.
This is Melanie's first attempt to marry together her two occupations of performer and sound designer.

GLASSEYED - Place Me Elsewhere
Glimpse into a noxious future through the bleary eyes of present day prophets as multimedia company GlassEyed presents a fresh concoction of filmic soothsaying, sound and live entertainment.
Escaping from behind closed doors creep The Clones. Superior, stupendous or downright stupid, the future lies in the clammy palms of these technological crossbreeds.
On sreeen, urban disarray mushrooms into catastrophe, and the rise of an all too likely uberpower means the countdown for a miracle discovery is on. On stage, fatigues and incomplete human clones take you on the final stretch of their journey. The ominous stage dwellers keep their intentions under wraps, because desperate survivors accept the shadiest of salvations.
When all else fails could you rely on a replica?

STRANGE NAMES COLLECTIVE - Testimonial
We like you, we like all of you, we like ourselves and everyone else.
In Testimonial, The Strange Names Collective will be exceedingly nice about everyone, whether they deserve it or not.
Testimonial will explore the best things that can be said about people, and the things best left unsaid. We will pay compliments honestly and sincerely, and if we can't say anything nice we will say nothing at all.