Theatre / mayfest
Mayfest 2018 programme announced
Mayfest is back, celebrating its 15th year of adventurous, thought-provoking theatre.
Spilling out across the city, Mayfest playfully – and sometimes provocatively – champions extraordinary new work from artists with distinct voices, for audiences, whoever they are. From the classical architecture of St George’s to the nightclubs of Old Market, Mayfest invites audiences to come together, play along and take a moment to reflect.
Artists from Canada, Japan and Australia offer opportunities for participation and exchange: Town Choir, Contact Gonzo and We Are Lightning! will all collaborate with talented performers and musicians from Bristol.
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Festival highlights include the world premiere of The British Paraorchestra’s new work The Nature of Why, commissioned by Unlimited, who celebrate and support the work of disabled artists. Taking inspiration from the unconventional curiosity of Nobel prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman, and his search for meaning in the world around us, The Nature of Why brings together dance and live music into an epic and beautiful performance.
Featuring a cinematic live-score from Goldfrapp’s Will Gregory, an ensemble of musicians from the acclaimed British Paraorchestra and four extraordinary dancers, The Nature of Why promises to be an up-close-and-personal dance experience like no other.
With an explosion of work from around the world, some of the highlights from overseas this year include the UK debut of Japanese company Contact Gonzo, whose jaw-dropping physical style will thrill audiences at Jacob’s Wells Baths on May 12 and 13.
Contact Gonzo. Pic: Anja Beutler
Elsewhere, direct from an acclaimed off-Broadway run, Halifax, Nova Scotia’s 2b theatre company bring Old Stock: A Refugee Love Story, a deliciously dark folk tale woven together with a blistering Klezmer-folk gig. Also from Halifax, The Accidental Mechanics Group’s Let’s Not Beat Each Other To Death lands at The Loco Klub – a genre-defying play/memorial/electro-pop dance party and a celebration of LGBTQ people around the world.
And cult musician Doug Hream Blunt flies in from San Francisco for a collaborative performance with The Cube Workforce at The Cube Microplex. And the UK premiere of We Are Lightning! by Sam Halmarack & Joseph O’Farrell takes over Trinity with a cast of nearly 100, including a huge choir, a brass band and a teen band.
‘Old Stock: A Refugee Love Story’. Pic: J Kronick
Bristol’s rich artistic landscape plays out in rude health: Sabrina Shirazi’s Choral Cuisine is a sonorous dining experience in a coffee roastery where a two-course meal becomes an opportunity to create music while you dine; in Draw to Look, Hannah Sullivan invites you to join her in the simple and deliberate act of looking and noticing through drawing; and there’s a world premiere of a major new work by Verity Standen, Undersong.
The ever-innovative Ridiculusmus make a welcome return to Mayfest, with a rare opportunity to see the full trilogy of their work focusing on mental health, Give Me Your Love (pictured top), The Eradication of Schizophrenia in Western Lapland and Complicated Grief, taking place at Tobacco Factory Theatres and the Southville Centre between 16–19 May.
We Are Lightning! Pic: Pia Johnson
Also returning to the festival is Scottee with Bravado, his blistering memoir of working-class masculinity, performed at Jack of Diamonds on Old Market. Younger audiences, meanwhile, should make a beeline for Snigel and Friends by Caroline Bowditch and Bristol’s very own Drag Queen Story Time.
Mayfest is curated and directed by MAYK, the Bristol producing organisation led by Kate Yedigaroff and Matthew Austin. They said of this year’s programme: “We are living in a particularly big political, cultural and social moment. The work in this year’s festival speaks loudly and subtly about where and who we are, right now. It’s so good to be back after a year away, and we can’t wait to share this year’s programme with audiences from all over the UK.”
Mayfest 2018 takes place from May 10-20. For more information and to book tickets, visit www.mayfestbristol.co.uk
Pictured top: Ridiculusmus’ Give Me Your Love
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