Category: New Science-in-Theatre Production

Posted on

Henrietta Lacks Show in Edinburgh

As the Edinburgh Festival Fringe enters its final few days there is still a chance to see HeLa, Adura Onashile’s one woman show about the life and legacy of Henrietta Lacks.

When Lacks attended the Johns Hopkins Memorial Hospital for treatment in 1951, a sample of tissue was taken without her knowledge. The now famous HeLa cell-line has played a role in many medical breakthroughs in the decades since.

The evocative wooden-panelled setting of the Old Anatomy Lecture Theatre in Edinburgh’s Summerhall provides a backdrop for this new piece of physical theatre. Adura Onashile’s powerful and versatile performance captivates for the whole hour as the play examines some of the ethical questions surrounding the treatment of the Lacks family and the scientific significance of the HeLa cell-line.

Meanwhile, at the same venue Jack Klaff stars in a 75 minute show about the life of Isaac Newton, first performed the the Gravity Fields Festival in Grantham in 2012.

HeLa, produced by Iron-Oxide, is on daily at 6.45pm at Summerhall, Edinburgh until 25th August 2013. Newton plays at the same venue at 5pm.

Posted on

Bletchley Park Gets the Theatrical Treatment in Edinburgh

Alan Turing and the Bletchley Park story get the theatrical treatment at the Edinburgh Fringe this year in Idle Motion‘s new play That is All You Need to Know. This piece of physical theatre uses brilliantly imaginative stagecraft to tell the stories of some of the people who tried to save the wartime code-breaking site from the brink of destruction. It also tells the tales of some of the people who worked at Bletchley Park during the Second World War and who weren’t allowed to talk openly about what they did for decades afterwards.

Music, movement, drama, stunningly simple visual effects and commanding performances combined to make this a captivating experience when StageScite caught That is All You Need to Know at the Greenwich Theatre in June.

That is All You Need to Know is at the Zoo Southside, Edinburgh at 17:05 on 2nd-24th August 2013 (not 11th and 18th).

The production will also be at the Oxford Playhouse on 5th September 2013.

Posted on

Stella: History is written in the stars

The three night run of Stella at the Greenwich Theatre begins on Thursday 11th July. The first night performance will be followed by a Q&A session with the play’s writer Siobhán Nicholas and astronomer Radmila Topalovic.

StageScite caught this new play about Caroline and William Herschel when it premiered at the Old Market Theatre in Brighton in May 2013.  Actors Chris Barnes and Kathryn Pogson joined Nicholas on stage to play the four roles, with Barnes doubling up to play the both the husband of present-day astronomer Jessica and William Herschel in the 18th Century. Nicholas herself took on the role of William’s sister Caroline who was his sometime assistant and an accomplished astronomer in her own right.

When musician Bill is offered a job with an orchestra in Germany, the chance to relocate raises a conflict with his wife Jessica whose own successful career as an astronomer is rooted in England. Jessica is also following her historical  interest in the Herschels, which takes her on a research trip to Bath to study Caroline Herschel’s private diaries. As Jessica’s investigations progress and her relationship with Bill becomes increasing strained, we are presented with interleaved scenes from the lives of the Herschels, whose own individual aspirations and careers are also pulling them in different directions.

Stella received special mention in the judging for the New Writing South Best New Play Award 2013. It runs at the Greenwich Theatre in London on 11th, 12th and 13th July 2013.

Posted on

New Writing Festivals are a Hotbed of Science

Cambridge, London, Colchester and Bury will all play host to new writing this month as Managerie Theatre Company’s annual Hotbed Festival expands into new locations.

Specially commissioned one act plays, workshops and works-in-progress will feature at venues including the Cambridge Junction and London’s Soho Theatre.

A new project this year – ‘What’s Up Doc?‘  – pairs playwrights with expert thought leaders to produce new writing for the festival. Of particular note is Somniloquy by Craig Baxter, who has written a 20 minute monologue about sleep and its disorders with expert advice from Professor Richard Horner of the University of Toronto. The monologue will be performed by Jasmine Hyde and explores the function of different sleep cycles in the light of latest ideas on the dynamic nature of sleep.

Other new works at this year’s festival include What Did It Feel Like To Go To The Moon? by poet Lucy Sheerman (written in collaboration with Al Worden, command pilot on the 1971 Apllo 15 lunar mission) and an initial glimpse of A Broken Replicate: Altered Skin which looks at processes in genetics through theatre and dance.

The Hotbed Festival will be visiting three new locations during July after opening at its usual home in Cambridge.

Somniloquy will be performed in Cambridge on 12th and 14th July, in Colchester on 19th and 21st July and in London on the 23rd and 26th July.

Posted on

The Effect of Success

Lucy Prebble’s 2012 play set in a clinical trials facility has been shortlisted for another writing prize. The Effect, which has already won a Critics Circle Award is one of five plays nominated for the James Tait Black Prize, coordinated by Edinburgh University. James Tait Black Memorial Prizes for fiction and biography were established in 1919 but this is the first time a prize has been offered for drama. A panel of judges representing Edinburgh University, The National Theatre of Scotland and The Traverse Theatre will decide on the winning play which will be read in Edinburgh on the 5th August 2013.

The Effect was staged at The National Theatre from November 2012 to February 2013 and was a co-production with Headlong. Bille Piper and Jonjo O’Neill starred as a couple who apparently fall in love during a neuropharmacology drug trial.

(Update: The winning play has been announced as The Radicalisation of Bradley Manning by Tim Price.)

Posted on

London Tour Dates for Stella

Last month StageScite posted preliminary tour dates for the new science history play Stella, which features astronomers Caroline and William Herschel among its characters. Take the Space Theatre Company will also be be taking Stella to Maidenhead on 11 June and to the Greenwich Theatre in London between 11-13 July, details below.

Stella is in the running for the New Writing South Best New Play award at this year’s Brighton Fringe Festival, where it premieres on 29th May. Writing for the Old Market Theatre, playwright Siobhán Nicholas says that this is the first time Take the Space will open a new production in their home town.

Full Tour Dates for Stella

Posted on

Proof Proliferates in the States

On the 5th May 2013 theatregoers in the USA will be able to choose from no less than five different productions of David Auburn’s Proof.

The Hershey Area Playhouse in Pennsylvania is putting on Proof between 25th April and 5th May. Meanwhile, Proof will also be performed at the Bishop Connolly Black Box Theatre in Fall River, Massachusetts on 3rd-5th May and at the the Hoogland Center for the Arts in Springfield, Illinois on the same dates.

For those on the West Coast of the US, Humbolt State University are performing Proof in Arcata, California from 2nd-5th May and it’s also on at The Hayworth Theatre in Los Angeles until 12th May.

In the UK, the recent Menier Chocolate Factory production of Proof will be at Bath’s Theatre Royal from 29th April to 4th May 2103.

Is this cluster of Proofs a statistical fluke or is there method behind the mathematics?

Posted on

Herschel Play to Premiere in May

Performance dates have been announced for the new play about astronomer Caroline Herschel. Stella, by Siobhán Nicholas will have its first performances at the Old Market Theatre in Brighton on 29 and 30 May 2013 as part of the Brighton Fringe Festival. StageScite is also aware of touring performances in Kingston on 4th June, Scarborough on 21st June and Oxford on 27th and 28th June.

Described by Take the Space Theatre Company as a ‘story about women and astronomy’, Stella features Caroline and William Herschel in a drama set across two Photo Take the Space Theatrecenturies.

Future Performances of Stella

Posted on

The United States of Arcadia

Two productions of Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia will open in the USA in the coming wehttp://www.act-sf.org/press/photos/theater_2_web.jpgeks. There will be six performances of Arcadia at the Crossroads Theatre in Denver, Colorado between the 12th and 27th April 2013. The American Conservatory Theater in San Fransisco will be staging Arcadia between 16th May and 9th June 2013 with a series of acompanying events that includes a pre-show discussion with director Carey Perloff on 21st May.