Blood + Bandage Open Workshops

A series of Blood + Bandage workshops will run in the Granary during the Cork Midsummer Festival from June 13th to June 24th. All workshops will be open at various points to the public and in some cases there will be scope for critical responses. Some of the workshops are developing new plays, some are exploring music theatre, video imagery, verbatim-style theatre, etc. All will advance the core Blood + Bandage purpose of developing new work and new ways of working.

Schedule of workshops

CELEBRITY : Theatre SK By Jody O’Neill

13th/14th/15th June

"Celebrity" was presented as a work-in-progress in Project Brand New in January. We are now looking at extending the piece into an hour long piece for young audiences. We will use the three day workshop to develop the script and the characters and to map out how we can intertwine and develop the main themes: celebrity, the internet and relationships between captor and captive.

This is an experiment in narrative form, relationship between performers and audience, and how internet and live performance can intersect and influence each other.

This workshop will run 10am – 5pm daily with a public showing at 5pm on Monday 15th June to which all are welcome.

THE RITE OF SPRING: by Sarah Purcell / Meridian Theatre Company

16th/17th June

This workshop will use Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring as a basis for Sarah Purcell's music-theatre piece exploring the emotional worlds that sparked the excesses of Abu Ghraib and other American detention centres in Iraq and elsewhere. The bleak, bizarre imagery of torture with which we are so familiar is used by Sarah as a starting point for musical sequences built on Stravinsky's masterpiece and for dramatic scenes developed from the imagery.

As ever when confronted with such horrors, the questions are how and why ordinary people can act in bestial ways and while Stravinsky's astringent score and the brutal source images evoke the hellish world of the torture facilities the piece also touches on the mundane concerns, dreams, and fears of the soldiers who perpetrated this brutality.

The workshop will run 10am – 5pm daily with a public showing at 4pm on Wednesday 17th June.

BRILLIANT: by David Farrell / Bare Cheek & Granary

18th/19th June

Brilliant is a music-play, the story of Danny who grew up a working-class hero, who formed a very successful band, who toured the world, recorded top ten singles, was hyped and lauded in the music press and blew it all on heroin, crack and booze. Cast includes: David Farrell, Chris Schmidt-Martin, Frank Prendergast, James Brown and Karen Kelleher. Director and co-writer–Tony McCleane-Fay.

“Now I’m grown up and its all dark and weird and little Danny is asking me for a dig out and I keep telling him to hang on a sec I’m really having a hard time minding big Danny so hang on there little Danny just wait there another twenty years on your own in the Dark in your pyjamas and your curly hair and alone and waiting for fucking someone to give me a hug in the dark.”

There will be an open rehearsal at 6pm on 18 June and a public showing at 6pm on 19 June.

THE REPUBLIC OF IDEAS : Meridian Theatre Company
20th/21st June

The Republic of Ideas is multi-faceted project, a kind of intellectual cabaret on a grand scale which is focused on urgent, contemporary ideas, globally, nationally, locally. It will combine dramatic performances with discussions, debates, publications, interviews, webcasts, etc to create an ever-evolving and highly engaged festival of ideas with a theatrical heart.
On June 20th and 21st we are trying out a few elements of this. We are working with a theatre band which will be used as the primary means of creating a full theatrical narrative. We are looking too at non-fictional performances such as lectures and interviews to see how they can play a meaningful part in a theatrical exploration of ideas.
There will be a public viewing of this workshop on Sunday, June 21st at 4pm. All are welcome.

BEDSTAINS: By Nicola Depuis / Granary

23rd/24th June interactive open rehearsal/showings at 1:15 each day.

Biro. Chocolate. Mascara. Blood. Saliva. Urine. Sudocream. Breast-milk. Semen. Vomit. Tears. Curry. Tea. Egg. Drool. Ash. Red Wine. Excrement. Grease. Vaginal Secretions. How many stains would you find on your bed, and what stories do these stains tell?

In Bedstains, we follow the life of one bed and its various inhabitants, from newlyweds in the 50s whose relationship is marred by domestic violence,to a broken-hearted clown who hides behind her mask. Having been chosen for development by Blood & Bandage, Bedstains is currently being written by Nicola Depuis and developed through workshops with actors Cian Daly, George Hanover and Karen Kelleher, under the direction of Evelyn Quinlan.

At these interactive open rehearsals, audience members will have the opportunity to observe and take part in the process of creating theatre.

While all of these workshops will be of particular interest to those actively involved in making theatre themselves, interested people of all kinds will get a range of insights into the diversity of approaches that theatre-makers are now adding to the creative network. We hope to see you at some or all of them.

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Blood+Bandage:A Festival of New Theatre created in Cork

We are in 'talks' with local companies, venues, artists and interested parties about how best to build on the sucess of the recent Blood+Bandage Festival. We envisage B+B becoming an 'umbrella' organisation and not just a Festival, facilitating local, regional and national, theatre artists in the creation of new works. To kick off the creation of new work we are holding 8 three day research & development workshops from February to May 2009. More detail above.

September 2008 saw first of what will, hopefully, become an annual Cork Theatre Festival. In the past we have had many Festivals in Cork; Guinness Jazz, Midsummer, Cork Fringe etc. But what is different about Blood+Bandage is that it celebrates new theatre work specifically about Cork or work created by artists native to or based in Cork.

Working artists are crucial to the cultural life of our city – it’s lifeblood, so to speak. In response to what many have perceived as a weakening pulse or a certain sluggishness in this lifeblood, the Blood+Bandage festival seeks to acknowledge and support our local theatremakers and to capitalise on the breadth of available talent so as to work towards creating a thriving work environment for practitioners and home-produced, high-quality theatrical experiences for audiences.

The emphasis of Blood+Bandage is specifically on theatre; the creation of new theatre, the staging of new theatre and nurturing of established and emerging talent through the ancillary workshops and ongoing new works programme, which will support new ideas and ideally generate work for future festivals.

The three innovative productions featured this year were quite distinct; Kevin Barry’s There Are Little Kingdoms was so imaginatively staged by Meridian and director Brian Desmond. Ailís Ní Ríain’s Beaten was a sensory spectacle, which disturbed and enchanted equally, pairing sound artist Cormac O’Connor and visceral director Tony McCleane-Fay. Staged in the intimate Granary Studio, Thailand: What’s Love Got To Do With It? tackled serious issues but in a funny way.

Blood+Bandage is a bold new direction in theatre production and performance and we were lucky to have such exciting artists working in this years’ Festival.

In addition to the productions, the festival also included workshops and readings of works in progress. These continue after the festival with the intention of developing projects for future festivals.

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