PART FIVE

On arriving in Warsaw I was greeted with snow and near arctic temperatures . After a brief attempt to do tourist stuff regardless of the weather, I returned to the hostel to drink tea, vowing never to go outside again. Once the snow (and my feet) had thawed out, I headed to the theatre.

My destination was the Palace of Culture and Science in the centre of Warsaw. The domineering Soviet style building reaches high into the Warsaw skyline, and unfortunately the show I had booked seemed to be in the loft.

I won’t spend long describing what turned out to be a piece of incomprehensible performance art, especially for those without a grasp of Polish. A man in silk pyjamas yelled at a CCTV camera, two mad women dressed as Marilyn Monroe scrawled lipstick drawings onto the floor, and a young guy dressed as a gladiator flexed his muscles and pranced around reciting poetry. The audience laughed a lot - it was difficult to tell whether they found it funny or just plain awful.

One highlight worth the ticket price was a short piece in which a group of three women performed a cabaret act with the most realistic-looking puppets I have ever seen. Their faces seemed to have been moulded with some form of latex material which looked convincingly like real skin. The control of the puppets was so precise and well rehearsed I often forgot they weren’t real. They were also incredibly funny. Some of the dialogue was in English and the scene in which a Sigmund Freud puppet counsels a character after a disturbing dream involving an Obama puppet was pure genius.

My second night in Warsaw was spent at the National Theatre watching a production of Twelfth Night by a Bulgarian director. The set was made up of half a dozen empty glass bookshelves which served as doors, windows, entrances, exits, dressing rooms and hiding places. The space was lit from stage left onto a wall of mirrors on stage right, filling the whole stage with brilliant light. An onstage pianist provided a continuous accompaniment which was relentlessly repetitive and gave both tragic and comic scenes a rather similar tone.

My main issue with the production was that it took itself too seriously. There was almost no laughter from the crowd and moments of comedy in the text, such as the unravelling of the final plot, were treated as tragedy. Most flawed of all was the casting. The Duke Orsino was played by a portly sixty something year old gent. Surely nobody in the audience believed that the beautiful young Viola was really passionately in love with the man who at one point got yogurt stuck in his beard…ummm no!

Heading west to my final destination I felt hugely optimistic about what lay ahead in Berlin. My first night took me to the wonderful old Deutches Theatre for an adaptation of Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. The stage was a white box, but there was a slim chance of it staying white for long. The design concept could be described in one word: mud! Bucket loads of it. The small ensemble took on all the parts, distinguishing each character with a layer of mud make-up. The savages smeared it over their bodies and in their hair; the ship’s officers wiped mud sideburns onto their faces. It went everywhere.

No pun intended, this was an earthy production. There was a phenomenal soundtrack, brought to life by a mixture of recorded sound and the cast clanging metal as the chain gangs passed, and quietly tapping microphones to create the noise of the tub boat engine.

Some of the stage imagery was outstanding. About half an hour in, as Marlowe’s boat reached the jungle, six gigantic stone figures looking like ancient tribal statues descended from the fly. They were puppets whose huge heads gently turned to follow the action on stage. Later, during the jungle ambush, cannons were simulated by large tubes filled with smoke which were thumped like drums, sending blasts of smoke into the audience. Simple, but very effective. I was hit by one of these blasts seven rows back and really felt it!

Second night in Berlin and a trip to the Schaubuehne in Western Berlin. Founded in 1962 by four theatre directors, it is still one of the most buzzing and contemporary theatres in the city. The building oozes cool with its young audience, bold brand design and very alternative décor (the toilets look part of a 1950’s hospital wing). The show was Hamlet, for the second time in three weeks, and turned out to be the best production of the tour.

Contemporary presentations of Shakespeare’s plays can easily go awry. Often something sticks out like a sore thumb: a modern soundtrack that doesn’t fit; a setting that defies credibility, or a shoddy projection that adds little value. This Hamlet dodged every one of these pitfalls. Every element of the show felt crucial to the telling of the story. It felt like Hamlet had been written last year.

The show was set on the burial ground of Hamlet’s father; the entire stage was covered in a thick layer of soil. It was going to be another muddy production. The play opened with the funeral. Rain poured on stage as Laertes awkwardly pushed the coffin into the ground, many times slipping into the grave in a darkly slapstick routine. At the back of the stage there was a long table set for a feast, a party that had been and gone; the wake and the wedding. Characters tucked into microwave meals and chugged cheap beer.

Hamlet himself was a sad and dishevelled young man. Overweight and unattractive, he was rude, obnoxious and socially awkward. By the end of the play we wanted him to die. With a handheld camera Hamlet filmed the other characters on stage, projecting ghostly images onto the wall of chain-metal at the back of the set. In the moment Ophelia (who interestingly doubled as Gertrude) drowned, we saw her projection trapped behind a wall of cellophane, breathing heavily into a microphone. Music played a huge part in the show and extracts from Beirut and God Speed You Black Emperor provided a haunting soundtrack to the action on stage.

Most brilliant of all was the dark humour and witty self-awareness of the show. Hamlet and Horatio performed the play within the play as a take-off of avant-garde performance art; wrapping each other in cling-film and pouring milk and wine over their bodies as Claudius and Gertrude looked on in bemusement. Hamlet’s madness was played to the extreme as he tormented Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. There was also cheeky treatment of the play’s text; at one point Hamlet asked Horatio to leave the stage as it was time for him to do another long monologue!

My last two nights in Berlin (and of my tour) were spent at the Berliner Ensemble. Probably Germany’s most famous theatre, the Berliner Ensemble was established by Brecht in 1949 following his much aclaimed production of Mother Courage.

The first night was Brecht’s own Threepenny Opera directed by the great American theatre designer, Robert Wilson. When I spoke to the theatre’s press officer she told me that very few theatres in Germany could afford to work with Wilson because of the time, freedom and money that he required. From the moment the curtain rose I could understand what she meant. The set was a gigantic piece of modern art. Long clean lines ran the length of the stage creating interesting angles and perspectives. Beautiful interlocking circles of light lit up the front wall during the show’s infamous opening song. In the second act a clever trick of the eye made six horizontal red strips look like a giant staircase, giving the stage an incredible depth and height.

My only problem with Wilson’s design was the difficulty it presented for the actors. How does a character move naturally when they’re standing on a piece of modern art? Stylised actors with white faces and large expressions looked like pawns on Wilson’s epic set. The alienating effect of over-stylised action (even the mimed doors had creeking sound effects), meant that I started to feel a bit detached from the action. But it may not have helped that I was right up in the gods!

My second night at the Ensemble was Frank Wedekind’s Spring Awakening. Unlike the previous evening, the set was completely bare. This might have had something to do with the theatre’s rigid policy which requires the set from the previous night to be struck immediately after the show. A rehearsal set is then erected for use on the following day until three o’clock when they begin rigging the set for the evening’s performance. Three sets in the space of 24 hours – madness!

The cast had put a lot of work into capturing the physicality of the young characters. This was really interesting to watch and made the play’s more shocking scenes even more disturbing. However the best bit for me was the section in the second act when the school teachers meet to discuss the suicide of one of the pupils. The Dickensian school masters stood in a ring on top of small white blocks which meant that they towered over the young Melchior as they interrogated him. As the masters left the scene we realised their feet were attached to the blocks as they strode into the distance like gruesome creatures!

So, the trip is over, I'm back in the UK. It's been a fantastic experience and I've learnt a great deal. From the highs of Pinocchio in Brussels and Richard III in Prague to the lows of Alls Well That Ends Well in Vienna and English theatre in Frankfurt, every night was a treat in its own way. I've returned with a bag bursting with notes and programmes and a head buzzing with ideas. I think my tolerance and patience has developed and I've learnt to appreciate even the smallest details of stage performance. I can't wait to start making my own work and to put what I've learnt into practice.

Thanks to everyone who's been reading. If you have any questions or would like to know more about any of the places I visited then don't hesitate to get in touch. Thanks also to Ideastap who allowed me to share this blog with so many people.

Edward

PART FOUR

First night in Vienna and a trip to the Akademie Theatre (One of the three theatres associated with the National Theatre). Having been rather spoilt for choice over the last two weeks, the interior of this theatre did not impress. Everything looked pretty drab and tired and on my balcony seat I had about four inches of leg room.

Unfortunately the show was just as drab as the surroundings. The Burgtheatre company's production of All's Well That Ends Well was a masterclass in what not to do with Shakespeare (or in fact any play...ever).

There was a weak opening as we were vaguely introduced to the characters and their situation. Sloppy casting made it incredibly difficult to work out who was who. The king looked no more than a month older than his son. Scene changes happened during the action in an attempt at fluidity. As the action was so dull I found myself watching the rather chaotic and clumsy way the set was being dragged around the stage.

The actors needed to be told whether they were somewhere or nowhere; is it a bar where the characters hang out, or is it a creative space where the story comes to life. It's wasn't really either and while some actors performed, others stood around trying to look cool like members of a jazz band tapping their toes while listening to a fellow instrumentalist improvising...it all looked awkward. Worst of all, most of the small cast looked miserable and bored. Even in the curtain call the actress playing Helena looked glum. I felt like shouting 'Cheer up, at least it's all over!'

Second night in Vienna found me at the more historic and hugely more charming Burgtheatre itself. Having taken a guided tour around the theatre during the day I was able to recognise the beautiful Klimt paintings that adorn the cielings of the entrance halls (one that Klimt painted of himself at the Globe Theatre watching Romeo and Juliet although the guide was pretty convinced he was never actually there!). The show was the second part of the Faust saga, directed by Matthias Hartmann. For those that don't know the story I'm not going to attempt telling it, it's far too long and you wouldn't believe me anyway...it's bizarre!

The stage was a cube with projection screens for each wall. For anyone that's seen a Katie Mitchell multimedia-based production, the style was very similar. The cast ran about on stage setting up complex film shots that were then recorded live and projected onto the four side walls of the cube. Actors could stand inside or outside the cube, thereby creating a multi-layered effect. Complicated....yes! One example: Faust stood at stage left, talking to a projection of the king on the front wall. Behind the semi transparent projection we could see actors playing council members who were also addressing the king. On the back and side walls were images of castle walls, recorded from a story book open at the front of the stage. The result was moments of genius amid a lot of rather messy, complicated images. Much like staring at a magic eye puzzle: if you see the image it's great, if you don't it's pretty annoying and you end up with a headache.

Little stood out in the acting. Because of the complicated nature of the story a lot of the actors' time was spent story-telling rather than in character. However the actor playing Mephisto captured the demon-in-a-suit physicality perfectly as he crept around the stage.

Being two of the closest capital cities in Europe, it only took me a couple of hours travel from Vienna to Bratislava. On my first day in Bratislava I treated myself to some mindless fun at the Bratislava puppet theatre. The average age of the audience was four and a half and I was given a ticket at the end of the row so as not to block the sightlines of any little people in the audience. I'd love to say it was an eye-opening experience which taught me a great deal about simple creativity. It was not...but it was great fun. The puppets looked truly gruesome, there were some catchy Slovak songs which I'm still whistling and they served chocolate croissants in the interval. What more could you ask for?

A step up the cultural scale took me to the old building of the Slovak National Theatre for a performance of Amadeus by Peter Shaffer. Set in a beautifully lit hospital wing, where the aging Salieri is recovering from his attempted suicide, the piece began as a chorus of around thirty patients in white gowns silently swept the stage.

Salieri spent a lot of time directly addressing the audience as images from his memory appeared before us, all watched over by the two Venticelli cleverly positioned in two of the theatre's old boxes. My first impression was that Amadeus didn't need a chorus and that the crowd of pale patients was unnecessary. But their presence acted as a constant reminder of the show's framing: Salieri's mental health and deteriorating condition. They drove the show, pushing characters onto stage on hospital beds, dragging the emperor in on top of an old carpet and performing the show's music in a haunting tone.

The production was propelled into excellence by two brilliant performances from Mozart and Salieri, the latter whose understated delivery and brilliantly paced slow decline to madness was fascinating to watch.

My last night in Bratislava took me to Slovakian National Theatre's new building. It could not have been more different in style from its older brother. Built in 2007 it feels more conference centre than theatre and the auditorium itself was particularly characterless.

The production was Hamlet and I had come prepared. Over a beer with a Bratislavan the night before I had been phonetically taught Slovak for 'To be or not to be' which I spent much of the show listening out for. The show began with a slightly self-indulgent scene as the casually dressed company engaged in some Bratislavan banter about who would play each part. If it had a point it drifted firmly over my head. Once they'd got through all of that we were treated to an incredibly dramatic opening as the coffin of Hamlet's father rose up out of the stage to the accompaniment of pounding drums and full orchestral backing. Very very exciting.

By far my favourite aspect of the show was its striking design. The huge curtain that hid Polonius from Gertrudes bedroom fell with a crash as he was murdered. An army marched across the stage in their hundreds. The end of an elegant red banquet table poked out onto the stage suggesting a luxurious court celebration. Although there was very little set on stage, this wasn't the dull bare bones of Munich's Romeo and Juliet, it was striking, elegant and epic!

Ophelia gave a very impressive performance avoiding the usual crazy-woman stereotype and instead delivering a very searing and vulnerable decline to madness. Hamlet only really impressed in the scene with his mother. As she left the stage at the end of the scene with her back to her son, we saw him release a silent scream of 'Mama!'.

I'm nearing the end of my travels now. But before heading home it's Twelfth Night in Warsaw and five nights of brilliant theatre in Berlin (including Robert Wilson's Threepenny Opera with the Berliner Ensemble!!). I hope you will watch out for my last blog at the end of my final week.

PART THREE

Now travelling solo, I left Brussels and headed across the border to Germany. First stop, Frankfurt.

Just down the street from the hostel I found The Frankfurt English Theatre, a semi-swanky joint which only produces shows in English, in fact operates entirely in English (even the toilet signs are in English!). Unfortunately the show, Streetcar Named Desire, was not recognisable in English, or even in German, but instead a weird hybrid of English-German-deep-South accent that only the actors could understand and wouldn't have been out of place in a Python sketch. It was either this accent, or the fact that the actor playing Stanley repeatedly ripped off his shirt and grunted like a mating panda, that kept the audience giggling throughout the show. Either way I left my first ever production of Streetcar under the impression that its about ridiculous Americans, which I'm sure was not quite the point..

After a day walking around Frankfurt, including a flying visit to Goethe's house and a quick photo of the desk where he may/may not have written Faust, I headed to my next venue. The Bockenheimer Depot is a refurbished train shed that sits just outside the city centre in the student district. I seemed to be the only student about as I made my way into the giant building for the opening night of Schauspiel's Cabaret. Inside you can really sense the enormity of the space as you queue up for the theatre temporarily housed within (similar to Manchester's Royal Exchange). As I entered I was disappointed to find that the ceiling had been lowered using curtains to hide the tech rigging. It seemed bizarre to me to build a black box inside such a beautiful building concealing its inherent character.

The show was no less bizarre, with dialogue translated into German and songs left in English, the actors switched between the two almost in the same breath. Apart from some pretty dodgy singing, it was a bold production from a company who clearly specialise in drama more than musical theatre (the rest of their season includes a lot of Ibsen and Chekhov). The design was minimal but striking and the director had avoided glamorising the Cabaret world, so that when a dishevelled Sally delivered the title song in the closing scene it was truly gutwrenching. I got the impression (somewhat from the crowd), that it was a reasonably avant-garde production, an idea confirmed when the band came on stage for the curtain call wearing matching space-age pyjamas

On to Munich where my first night was spent at the Staatstheatre in one of the city’s many impressive squares. The marble white building felt uncomfortably exclusive. Champagne bars and glass doors lined the corridors and a rather snooty team of ushers reluctantly showed me to my seat. As I was buying my program a small dog, having broken free from the office, ran across the marble floors, skidding to freedom with a look of enormous glee on its face. The usher, snatched the program out of my hand and dived for the dog, followed by a team of six waistcoated colleagues. A chase ensued and by the time the dog had been cornered it was time to go into the auditorium.

The night's performance was Romeo and Juliet in a translation by Thomas Brasch. Again the height of the space had been lowered to give a stylistic rectangular shape to the stage. Unfortunately this meant that anyone on the second or third balconies like myself, could not see any action taking place upstage.

The production lacked pace and felt unbearably long, I'm sure scenes had been added to the original and having spoken to a German family in the interval I learnt that the dialect was somewhat dodgy too. One lady remarked that Shakespeare would have never written some of the text!

The main issue with the production was its relentlessly bare design. When the cut off ceiling finally receded in Act Two it revealed a stage of grey stone slabs and metallic grates. Shakespeare on a blank canvas is all very well, but the acting lacked the pace to keep the audience engaged. On leaving, the lady I had been chatting to in the seat next to me commented that while Romeo and Juliet had died, the audience were thankfully still alive...just.

Second night in Munich I headed round the corner from the Staatstheatre to the Kammerspiel for Troilus and Cressida. A much more relaxed environment from the previous night, the Kammerspiel is brightly decorated, looking more like an eccentric Spanish villa than an inner-city theatre. The theatre produces a season of their own work, led by a resident artistic director, alongside a wide variety of touring shows (GobSquad and Forced Entertainment are two UK-based companies I recognised in the program).

As the curtain rose we were faced by a large, dark, smoke-filled space, possibly the cellar of an abandoned theatre, maybe the remnants of a crumbling office block. Drips from a leaky roof fell with satisfying sound into fifty or so metal basins and bowls positioned across the stage . The cast, with the exception of the two protagonists, were a group of aging men wearing equally aging suits, loosened ties, and in some case, no shoes.

What followed was an incredibly simple and indefinably beautiful re-telling of the story. The script was abandoned and instead the cast took it in turns to tell the tale directly to the audience: characters were adopted and dropped in a moment; lines were forgotten or repeated, and there were disagreements over the plot.

It really is impossible to describe what made this production so touching. My notes became an illegible scrawl as I was increasingly drawn in by the show. There was always something happening on stage: Troilus and Cressida's first embrace under the jumper Cressida pulls over their heads; two elderly gents playing football in the rain with a deflated ball; all accompanied by the mellow wails of one member of the cast, strumming on a ukulele.

A longer than expected six and a half hour train journey from Munich brought me to the beautiful city of Prague. My first night at the ancient Estates Theatre (where they filmed Amadeus), started with a rather pleasant surprise as I was shown to my box! Never mind that it was one of over forty private boxes and had about fifty percent visibility of the stage, it was a box!

The show, The Government Inspector by Gogol, was very funny (in Czech). Fortunately there was a great deal of physical comedy to keep me amused. The show's forte was also its weakness as a full cast of physically trained comedians made for a very busy stage. The doctor, who clearly felt his part not to be big enough for his talent, spent most of his time on stage clowning around, getting his leg trapped in doors and dropping things. Very funny, but it did draw focus from the dialogue going on around him.

The second night at the Estates Theatre and the last show of the week was Richard III, this time in a more sensible seat in the stalls. If the purpose of this trip is to fill my theatrical swagbag with inventive concepts and clever stagecraft, it is now full. The show quite unashamedly and incredibly skillfully employed every trick in the book.. Every element of the show hung perfectly together and nothing seemed superfluous or contrived (even down to the choir of angels at the end of the show!). The set, which was simple, revealed its nooks and crannies as the show unfolded, including the Tower of London's prison underneath the floor of the stage. The costume was elaborate and bizarre. Richard's two hitmen changed into workmens’ overalls to do their horrible deeds, and when they were sent to kill the two young princes they dressed as clowns. St George's Cross was used repeatedly and ironically, the best moment when Buckingham handed out flags to the front row of the audience to wave as Richard entered. The pacy music drove the show forwards, never allowing the energy to lull. The icing on the cake was the final battle scene. A choir of angels and a chorus of drummers scored the battle between Richmond and Richard. It was witty and clever without losing a drop of integrity. Brill!

Its been a great week with even more to come.. . including Faust in Vienna and Amadeus in Bratislava.

Thanks for reading my ramblings so far.

Some photos...

Outside the Comedie Francaise

Inside the Comedie Francaise

Theatre Festival on bank of the Seine

The box-office at Circus Space St Antony

On the way to Children of Saturn at Ateliers Berthier

PART TWO

Now in Europe, the tour begins! My first week was spent in Paris and Brussels, accompanied by my girlfriend, for six days of French theatre. Here's what we saw:

First stop was Moliere's The Miser at the Comedie Francaise, the national theatre of France. The theatre sits in a quiet square, just a stone's throw from the Louvre. Busts of famous actors and writers line the walls and a regal red carpet leads the way to your rather luxurious velvet seat. I began to feel slightly conscious of the less than ironed shirt I had pulled out of my rucksack.

The show itself was what you might expect from a French farce. A highly energetic and expressive cast supported the real star of the show, the miser himself, Harpagon. Playing the role, Denis Podalydes was a spitting image of Blackadder as he frollicked across the stage, whalloping servants with his cane and haranging the world in Basil Faulty-esque tones. His performance was brilliantly crafted and he looked completely exhausted at the end when the curtain calls lasted for the good part of ten minutes. In France, if the actors have done their job well they are greeted not by raptuous applause, but by a regimented slow clap from the audience akin to that of an angry crowd of X-Factor fans.

Watching Moliere at the Comedie Francaise felt like watching Shakespeare at the Globe. The audience knew what they had come for and they loved it. You get the feeling that the experience of being at the theatre makes up for any flaws in the production.

Next up, the circus! After a half hour Metro ride and a fifteen minute walk into the outer suburbs of Paris we found two brightly coloured circus tents tucked away amidst the tower blocks and multistorey car parks.

The box office was in a rather tired looking caravan which also sold rather tired looking baguettes. When we entered the performance tent the Companie Rasposo (the majority of whom belong to the same family) were finishing up their dinner, tuning instruments, taking photos of the audience and squabbling over bits of set. There was no big opening, stuff just began! Two lads practiced gravity defying acrobatics on a couple of wooden chairs, the musicians started teaching each other some tunes and a clown played tricks on the audience.

The show was raw and dangerous: no safety nets, little choreography and in place of traditional circus animals, a mouse, a dog and a turkey. A high point of the night came when the large, elegant chandeleir that dominated the stage split with a great crash into eight seperate chandeleirs to gasps and screams from the audience below. For the rest of the show they hung in the air at different heights like jelly fish floating in the sea. Beautiful! There were no concessions for the children in the audience; the show was dark and dangerous, but nevertheless full of relentless charm and magical creativity.

On Sunday afternoon we ventured to Ateliers Berthier (a sister theatre to the famous Paris Theatre de L'Odeon) for a matinee of artistic director Oliver Py's Les Enfants de Saturnes. As it was a play I didn't really know, and was to run for two and a half hours without interval, I was not massively optmistic. As we sat down in front of a small rather simple set, I started to panic. About ten minutes in, just as I was resigning myself to a political drama in incomprehensible French, there was a huge jolt and the audience block (in which around 200 people were seated) slowly began to rotate! We were in fact in a huge warehouse space and surrounded by four incredible sets: a full size motel room, a funeral parlour in the woods, and a gigantic stately home. From scene to scene the audience was rotated following the action, with accompanying music from a grand piano. The final and most impressive scene featured a whale, ridden by two members of the cast, complete with a fully functioning blow spout! I still didn't understand a word…..

Next to Brussels where we attended the opening night of Joel Pommerat's Pinnochio at the Theatre National. This was no panto or Disney adaptation, and it certainly wasn't for young children. Adapted from the original, much darker story by Carlo Collodi, Pommerat's Pinnochio is a spoilt young brat who betrays his father, plays truant, and sells his school books to run away with criminals. A deadpan narrator, with microphone in hand, led us through a series of cinematic images each laced with dark wit and simple beauty. Image after image appeared out of the darkness: Pinnochio surrounded by puppets in school room, a boat stranded at sea on a sheet of crystal blue light, a child turning into a donkey. The lighting, the stage craft and the haunting refrains from a solitary musician were perfectly melded to create a stunning piece of theatre.

Had I understood the subtleties of the spoken text this could have been a perfect piece of theatre (must get a copy of the script!). I left feeling somewhat overwhelmed!

Finally, the wildcard of the week. On our last night in Brussels we ventured out to a Theatre de la Balsamine in the suburbs of the city. The evening's performance was L'Ecole des Ventriloques by Point Zero. The company specialised in full body puppets, attached to the controller at waist height. The characters were straight from a Dickensian underworld with macabre faces and terrifying voices. The real joy of this show was the masterful control of the puppeteers in bringing the characters to life. My favourite were a group of OAPs who hobbled onto the stage, shouting insults at the audience and cursing the world! The story seemed to be surplus to requirement, as did the bizarre video interludes of flickering images of the cast in the nude...

Coming up next week: Cabaret in Frankfurt, Romeo and Juliet in Munich and lots more!

PART ONE

“Good artists borrow, great artists steal” is a bastardised quote from the great poet, T.S. Eliot. I’ve bought a rail-pass, packed my rucksack and tomorrow I set off for a month of theatrical thieving and inspirational productions in twenty venues across nine European cities.

As a theatre-grad, hanging in unemployed limbo between university and a career in the arts, I’ve decided to spend four weeks drawing inspiration from the current theatre climate. But what kind of thespian-thief would I be to steal from home ground? No; the month will be spent investigating the state of theatre on the other side of the Channel.

My route begins in Paris at the home of Molière, the state run, Comédie-Française. From there I will travel East in a speedy zigzag through Brussels, Frankfurt, Munich, Prague, Vienna, Bratislava and Warsaw before taking a u-turn back in the direction of Berlin where my travels will end. Along the way I will see an avant-garde Hamlet, an epic Pinnochio, the Berlin Ensemble’s Threepenny Opera and a rather strange looking Polish piece with shot-gun wielding child puppets.

I’ll drink beer at the Munich Oktoberfest before/after seeing Troilus and Cressida. I’ll take a 12 hour train from Bratislava to Warsaw to catch a production of Twelfth Night. In Paris I’ll be paying top dollar to sit in the worst seats in the house, in Prague for a tenner I’ll sit in what is either the royal box or the tech box (lost in translation?), and in Frankfurt I’ll be heading for the Cabaret.

With shows booked every night, I’m taking in a mix of national theatres and fringe. At the national theatres I hope to experience some of the best examples of what these countries have to offer. On the fringe, a taste of the alternative: the wild, adventurous and sometimes bizarre. From both I want ideas, images, techniques, inspiration and motivation.

“This guy must be some sort of multi-lingual genius!” I hear you cry. Well I’m not. I passed French GCSE a long time ago, and will struggle to ask directions to the bathroom. Language, I have decided, will not be a problem. I’ve chosen well known plays, so I should be able to grasp what’s happening on stage. Beyond that I will set out to enjoy the way stories are told visually and sensually.

In the national theatres I’ve searched for big stages, big lighting, big costumes and big budgets in the hope that the visual impact, direction and stage craft will be a treat in itself. At the fringe I expect to experience something different: mind bending physical theatre; twisted adaptations of classic texts; and some electrifying site-specific work. If all else fails I’ll just watch the audience!

I’ll be blogging once a week from internet cafes across the continent, sharing my theatrical swag-bag with the Ideastap community. Please get in touch if you have any recommendations for theatre gems around Europe…or indeed any drinking spots!



[These blogs will also be published on Ideas Tap, it's a brilliant site and if you're not already a member I recommend you join. It's free!]