London International Mime Festival          < go back to graphics version

35 Little Russell Street, London WC1A 2HH
Tel: +44 (0) 20 7637 5661
e-mail: mimefest@easynet.co.uk

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Help with choosing

Family-Friendly Shows 5+
Circus Klezmer
Collectif Petit Travers
Tomas Kubinek

Shows Recommended for Older Children 8+
Familie Floez
Les Apostrophés
Loup Pour L’Homme

Shows Using Circus skills
Circus Klezmer
Collectif Petit Travers
Les Apostrophés
Les Sept Planches de la Ruse
Mathurin Bolze & Hedi Thabet
Loup Pour L’Homme

Shows Using Masks/Puppetry/Animation
Akhe – both shows
Buchinger’s Boot Marionettes
Faulty Optic
Figurentheater Tübingen
Sharmanka

Shows for Adults Only (inc all Shunt Vaults shows)
Akhe – both shows
Faulty Optic
RedCape Theatre
Sharmanka
Theatre of Silence/Ex Machina Athens

Shows with Some Spoken Text
Akhe /Faust 2360 Words (with English sur-titles)
Buchinger’s Boot Marionettes
RedCape Theatre
Tomas Kubinek

Show Advice for People Who Are Deaf or Hearing-Impaired
Festival shows are without spoken text except:
Akhe / Faust 2360 Words (but with English sur-titles)
Buchinger’s Boot Marionettes (about 5 mins of spoken text)
RedCape Theatre (BSL interpreted perf Sat 24 Jan)
Tomas Kubinek (BSL interpreted perf Sun 25 Jan)

BSL Interpreted Performance
Sat 24 Jan @ 8pm RedCape Theatre at the ICA
Sun 25 Jan @ 4pm Tomas Kubinek TBC

If you would like to discuss the suitability of any festival shows for your needs, please email us at mimefest@easynet.co.uk and we’ll be very happy to help.

Venues

Barbican
Silk Street, London EC2Y 8DS
Tickets: 0845 121 6839
www.barbican.org.uk >
online booking link >

ICA
12 Carlton House Terrace, The Mall, London SW1Y 5AH
Tickets: 020 7930 3647
www.ica.org.uk >
online booking opens 10 Nov

Clore Studio Upstairs
Royal Opera House
Covent Garden, London WC2E 9DD
Tickets: 020 7304 4000
www.roh.org.uk >
online booking link >

Shunt Vaults
(entrance is a little door on Joiner Street in London Bridge tube station)
London SE1
Tickets: at the door
www.shunt.co.uk >

Southbank Centre
incorporating the Purcell Room and
Queen Elizabeth Hall
Belvedere Road London SE1 8XX
Tickets: 0871 663 2527
www.southbankcentre.co.uk >
online booking link >

Barbican Events
13-17 Jan:
Buchinger's Boot Marionettes
14-17 Jan:
Aurélien Bory
20-24 Jan:
Les Apostrophes

ICA Events
11-14 Jan:
Figurentheater
15 Jan:
Bolze + Thabet
17-21 Jan:
Akhe
22-25 Jan:
Redcape Theatre

Royal Opera House Events
24-25 Jan:
Loup Pour l'Homme

Shunt Vaults Events
24-25 Jan:
Akhe Plug'n'Play
14-31 Jan:
Sharmanka
16-24 Jan:
Faulty Optic

Southbank Centre Events
10-13 Jan:
Petit Travers
15-16 Jan:
Ex-Machina Athens
17-21 Jan:
Circus Klezmer
22-25 Jan:
Tomas Kubinek
23-25 Jan:
Familie Floez

Shows

Collectif Petit Travers France

Le Petit Travers UK Premiere

Purcell Room, Southbank Centre >
Sat 10 to Tue 13 Jan
Sat/Mon/Tue 8pm, Sun 4pm
Meet the Artists Sun 11 Jan

Runs approx 70 mins/no interval

All seats £13.50 (limited concs)
Booking opens Mon 3 Nov >

‘Collectif Petit Travers gloriously explode circus stereotypes, providing an hour of acutely observed character play executed entirely through performances in juggling, trapeze and dance. An astonishing achievement.’
Total Theatre (Le Parti Prise des Choses at LIMF08)

'A heartwarming night in the theatre.’
Le Dauphine (Avignon Festival)

Following its success at LIMF08, French new circus/juggling ensemble, Collectif Petit Travers, returns to the Southbank Centre with another UK debut show. Nicolas Mathis and Denis Fargeton are two highly-strung musicians living in a basement room. Trying to get along together is proving tough, tensions are rising and so is the water pressure…

Recently acclaimed at Pina Bausch’s NRW Festival in Germany, Le Petit Travers features music, dark comedy and immaculately choreographed object manipulation. A magical seventy minutes for everyone and a definite must-see for contemporary circus and juggling fans.

Co-production: Le Lido, Centre des Arts de Toulouse, Theatre de la Digue, Toulouse

Presented in association with Southbank Centre

Part of Paris Calling

FigurenTheater Tübingen Germany

Salto.Lamento UK Premiere

With live music by rat‘n’X
(Johannes Frisch & Stefan Mertin)

ICA Theatre >
Sun 11 to Wed 14 Jan 8pm
After Show Discussion Mon 12 Jan

Runs approx 65 mins/no interval
All seats £13.50 (£11 concs)
Online booking opens 10 Nov >

‘Soehnle charms his expressively masked and costumed figures into appearing as if from nowhere. This surreal kaleidoscope is a wordless, weightless dance upon graves. The audience is spellbound, breathless, fascinated.' Reutlinger Nachtrichten

A drawer opens…secret messages escape, entrapping strange Centaur-like creatures, half man, half-beast. They force their way into the back rooms of memory where they meet a multi-faceted Death, effortlessly, dancing, almost skipping. Reflecting the artistic tradition of the Dance of the Dead from medieval iconography, a cycle of  poetic and bizarre metamorphoses unfolds.

Founded in 1991 by Frank Soehnle and Karin Ersching, Figurentheater Tübingen works at the intersection of puppetry, object theatre and live art. Far away from familiar theatre disciplines, both in their stage shows and many short films for TV culture channels 3sat and arteZDF they continually break new artistic ground.

Buchinger's Boot Marionettes International

The Armature of the Absolute
by Patrick Sims  
UK Premiere

Barbican, The Pit
Tue 13 to Sat 17 Jan 7.45pm
After Show Discussion Wed 14 Jan

Runs approx 70 mins/no interval
All seats £12
Online booking >

'Terrifying, surreal and droll, this is simply great art. Modern and rock'n'roll. A sacrosanct hommage to Jarry'. Corse Matin (Corsica)

‘Brilliant, lingering images…the show had the exquisite specific cruelty and beauty of what some extremely imaginative Edwardian children might dream up in a puppet theatre they got for Christmas’. Daily Telegraph (on The Vestibular Folds)

Think David Lynch’s Eraserhead, Goya’s hellish portraits or the world of the Brothers Quay. The Armature of the Absolute celebrates the ground-breaking ideas of French writer Alfred Jarry – creator of one of literature’s most outrageous characters, the murderous King Ubu. More than 100 years since his death in 1907, Jarry’s work still inspires and shocks.

Buchinger’s Boot Marionettes’ world is a chamber of wonders, a miniature fantasy land, distorting, disturbing, surreal and enthralling. They work with objects and figures made of recycled material, bone and wood, plants, insects and animals, all that enlightens, pleases and horrifies the eye. Anarchic and extraordinary, in the best traditions of puppet theatre. 

Buchinger’s Boot Marionettes is an international ensemble currently based in Marseille. It previously appeared at the Mime Festival in 2007 with Vestibular Folds. To make its next production The Old Man of the Mountain, the group has been awarded a residency at La Chartreuse in Villeneuve les Avignon, the French Ministry of Culture’s prestigious centre for new theatre writing.

Production: Buchinger’s Boot Marionettes, with support from Ville de Marseille

Presented in association with Barbican bite09

Akhe Engineering Theatre Russia

Plug'n'Play
London Premiere

Shunt Vaults >
Wed 14 to Thu 15 Jan 8.30pm

Entry to show is included in Shunt Lounge admission fee of £5 and is subject to availability:
Doors open from 6pm.
Advance booking not possible.

Akhe’s famous end-of-civilisation cabaret is a unique club night, with live DJ music.

‘Akhe blows the audience's mood sky-high with a series of explosive sub-scientific cookery experiments involving apples, bananas, lemons, onions, garlic, vodka, yoghurt, meths, burning fuses, exploding lightbulbs, blazing fireworks, strangely reimagined parts of their own bodies and a can of Red Bull; they also paint a giant primitive self-portrait on the wall behind the stage, to be auctioned later.

The point about all this is that every second of it is presented with such flair, irony and perfect timing - plus a fabulous junkyard look, with rusty props hanging on strings overhead - that it emerges as that rarest of theatrical events, a hilarious piece of slapstick and disco anarchy that also seems to mean something in poetic and political terms.’ The Scotsman

Aurélien Bory's

Les Sept Planches de la Ruse France/China  UK Premiere

Barbican
Wed 14 to Sat 17 Jan  7.45pm
After Show Discussion Fri 16 Jan
Compagnie 111 / Scènes de la Terre

Runs approx 75 mins with no interval
Tickets: £10, £12, £16, £21, £26
Online booking >

‘An amazing range of emotions come to life in this giant tangram’. Les Inrockuptibles

Aurélien Bory’s acclaimed trilogy for Compagnie 111, IJK, Plan B and More or Less Infinity, have all explored space and kinetics, using ingenious set design and circus arts. In this spectacular, dreamlike new work he goes one step further, proving that geometry is capable of producing exquisite visual poetry that speaks across cultures and generations. Les Sept Planches de la Ruse is based on an ancient Chinese game, Tangram, a mind-bender in which a set of seven different geometric shapes can be manipulated in almost infinite possible combinations. On stage these giant, interlocking forms are seamlessly assembled and manoeuvred with incredible agility, strength and cunning by a team of fourteen artists from Dalian, China. They evoke abstract landscapes, terrifying ravines and sky-high city towers; they conjure monochrome urban images from Fritz Lang films or themes from Kafka; they are vivid metaphors for human experience. As the performers climb, balance, vanish into voids and new images evolve, the play of scale and form contrasting men and objects is stunning and dramatic. Astonishing to see.

Production: Scènes de la Terre . Cie 111
Coproduction: Théâtre de la Ville – Paris; Department of Culture, City of Dalian; Equinoxe, Scène nationale – Chateauroux.
Cie 111 / Aurélien Bory is supported by Fondation BNP Paribas
Presented in association with Barbicanbite09
Part of Paris Calling

Sharmanka Russia/UK

Gothic Circus  London Premiere

Shunt Vaults
Wed 14 to Sat 31 Jan (not Sun-Tue) Wed-Fri: 6.30pm, 7.15pm, 8pm (not 22), 10pm (not 14)
Sat: 8.30pm, 10.30pm, 11.30pm
After Show Discussion Wed 21 Jan after the 7.15pm showing

Entry to show is included in Shunt Lounge admission fee and is subject to availability:
Wed-Thu £5; Fri-Sat £10.
Doors open from 6pm (8pm Sats).
Advance booking not possible.
Runs 30 mins/no interval

‘Is it theatre, visual art, puppetry or a séance in a scrapyard? Eduard Bersudsky is a mechanical genius’. The Scotsman

'Go see ’. The List

The product of Russian-born Eduard Bersudsky’s astonishing imagination, craftsmanship and engineering skills, Sharmanka’s kinetic sculptures and machines create dramatic sequences of movement, light and sound. Whirring and clanging, carved figures, junk-metal constructions and ancient household machinery are the protagonists in a thirty minute show about life and death, cruelty and beauty. Sharmanka’s previous London appearances have been at The National Theatre (LIMF02) and subsequently at the Theatre Museum.

Mathurin Bolze + Hedi Thabet France

Ali  UK Premiere

ICA Theatre >
Thu 15 Jan 8pm

Runs approx 30 mins/no interval
All seats £10 (£8 concs)
Online booking opens 10 Nov >

‘They touch the public’s heart with laughter and emotion’. La Presse. France

Mathurin Bolze and Hedi Thabet both trained as circus artists from a very young age. Humorous and touching, their unique performance at the festival celebrates friendship and the power of creativity.  Ali runs just thirty minutes – perhaps the most inspiring half hour you will spend in the theatre this year. It’s dynamic acrobatics feature a memorable creation with two heads, four arms and three legs amongst many images that will stay with you a long time.

Hedi Thabet studied juggling and acrobatics and has worked in Belgium, France and Tunisia. Mathurin Bolze has worked with choreographers Josef Nadj and François Verret and has previously appeared at the Festival with Tangentes and with his solo show, Fenetres.

Part of Paris Calling

Production: Compagnie les mains, les pieds et la tete aussi

Theatre of Silence
Ex Machina Athens Greece

Seeking Oedipus  UK Premiere

Purcell Room, Southbank Centre >
Thu 15 to Fri 16 Jan 8pm
After Show Discussion Thu 15 Jan

Runs approx 65 mins/no interval

All seats £13.50 (limited concs)
Booking opens Mon 3 Nov >

‘A great and serious intellectual quest of this momentous myth...a must see!’
Ta Nea

From Greece, historic home of Mime, a gripping, wordless version of the Oedipus myth. 

Performing on a steeply inclined plane, a six-strong ensemble play the protagonists linked to the cursed house of the Labdacides. This powerful interpretation of the famous tale of passion, patricide and incest was acclaimed at the Athens Epidaurus Festival in summer 2008 and has most recently been seen at the Macao Festival. Aspasia Kralli who devised, directed and designed the production studied at the Marcel Marceau School of Mimodrama. She is one of Greece’s best-known actresses and featured in the movie, Captain Corelli’s Mandolin.

Presented in association with the Southbank Centre

Faulty Optic UK

Fish Clay Perspex
Incidences of a quirky kind   UK Premiere

Shunt Vaults >
Fri 16 to Sat 24 Jan (not Sun-Tue)
Wed > Fri 8.30pm , Sat 9.15pm
After Show Discussion Thu 22 Jan
Runs approx 80 mins/no interval

Entry to show is included in Shunt Lounge admission fee and is subject to availability:
Wed-Thu £5; Fri-Sat £10.
Doors open from 6pm (8pm Sats).
Advance booking not possible.

World renowned for its haunting tales, visual theatre, strange animated figures and dark humour, Faulty Optic presents the eccentric, droll and compassionate new production, Fish Clay Perspex.

In this simple, small-scale, low technology piece, Faulty Optic manipulates puppets, miniature and armless pointy-footed figures, clay, lagging, pens and plastic.

Fish Clay Perspex is a series of short character studies and incidences based upon chance, futility, expectation, doubt and the turmoil caused by the flailings and failings of the human mind.

Highlights include falling beasts, battered clay, bendy legs, bad drawing, frantic scribbling and the comic scrabbling of a guileless duo.

Akhe Engineering Theatre Russia

Faust.2360 Words UK Premiere

ICA Theatre >
Sat 17 to Wed 21 Jan 8pm
After Show Discussion Mon 19 Jan

Runs approx 60 mins/no interval
All seats £13.50 (£11 concs)
Online booking opens 10 Nov >

‘There is theatrical magic in this beguiling display of visual imagination’. The Independent (White Cabin)

Cult icons in Moscow and St. Petersburg independent art scenes and sought after at progressive festivals and across mainland Europe, Akhe creates a unique dream theatre of chaos. Filled with countless absurd and inspired events, its shows are packed with fantastic images and endlessly fascinating stage pictures.

Akhe returns to the Festival for the first time since its memorable White Cabin (LIMF04). Told in 2360 carefully chosen words, bizarre happenings, chemical experiments and trademark visual ingenuity, this explosive version of the Faust story is Akhe’s latest show.

Performed in Russian, with English surtitles

Please be aware that smoking forms an integral part of this performance.

Akhe also performs its post-industrial cabaret Plug‘n’Play at Shunt Vaults 14-15 Jan

Co-production: Akhe Engineering Theatre; Kampnagel, Hamburg; NET Festival, Moscow

Circus Klezmer Spain     UK Premiere

Purcell Room, Southbank Centre >
Sat 17 to Wed 21 Jan
Sat/Mon/Tue/Wed 8pm, Sun 4pm
After Show Discussion Tue 20 Jan

Runs approx 70 mins/no interval

All seats £13.50 (limited concs)
Booking opens Mon 3 Nov >

‘Full of humour, poetry and virtuosity. Don’t miss it!’ El Periodico

The guests are assembled, the band is ready, there’s food and drink galore. A nice Jewish village wedding, somewhere in Eastern Europe, but it’s all going wrong as the rings are mislaid and the arguments start.

Circus Klezmer conjures up the bustling, noisy world of Emir Kusturica’s Time of the Gypsies and Chagall’s dreamlike paintings in this rollicking, circus-theatre entertainment. It’s good-humoured, warm and atmospheric with a gallery of outrageous characters and irresistible live klezmer music. Never cried at a wedding? You will at this one!

Argentine-born director Adrian Schvartzstein previously appeared at LIMF03 as a member of Circus Ronaldo.

Presented in association with Southbank Centre

Les Apostrophés France    

L'Ecume de l'Air  UK Premiere

Barbican, The Pit
Tue 20 to Sat 27 Jan
Tue-Fri 7.45pm, Sat 4pm
After Show Discussion Wed 21 Jan

Runs approx 65 mins/no interval
All seats £12
Online booking >

'A sensational concert piece for juggler and double bass.' Midi Libre, France

Six years since his LIMF/bite03 appearance with juggling partner Jérôme Thomas, Martin Schwietzke returns with a  brand new show, this time with musician, Michel Bismut. Full of mystery, joy and sensuality L’Ecume de l’Air combines object manipulation artistry with Bismut’s beautifully played original score – a mix of modern classical, jazz and warm Mediterranean sounds.

Creating an exquisite harmony of objects, space and music these two performers explore the intriguing relationship between sound and movement. It will engulf and enchant you. Martin Schwietzke is from Germany and a founder member of  Les Apostrophés, a French-based company of circus-inspired artists. Tunisian-born Michel Bismut has played and recorded with many leading French and Spanish musicians.

Production: Compagnie Les Apostrophés

Presented in association with Barbican bite09

Tomas Kubinek     

Certified Lunatic and Master of the Impossible USA

Purcell Room, Southbank Centre >
Thu 22 to Sun 25 Jan
Thu-Fri 8pm, Sat 6pm, Sun 4pm

Runs approx 90 mins/no interval

All seats £13.50 (limited concs)
Booking opens Mon 3 Nov >

‘Absolutely expert’. New York Times

‘Artful dodges and poetic bamboozlements performed with feline virtuosity and devilish wit.’ Louisville Courier-Journal

‘Dazzling and amazing’. Theatrescope USA

Virtuosic vaudeville and irresistible charm in equal parts, Tomas Kubinek’s exuberant show features mind-boggling magic, surreally eccentric acrobatics, water-burbling and much more. He was born in Prague, grew up in Canada, learned his skills in Europe from mentors such as Pierre Byland and Bolek Polivka and featured in one of The Right Size’s early hits, Moose. Self-styled ‘doctor of dramatic diversions and curer of melancholia’, this multi-talented entertainer will leave you with a comically altered view of life’s creative possibilities. He’s toured this unique collision of theatre and music-hall around the world, delighting audiences of all ages.

Please be aware that smoking forms an integral part of this performance.

Presented in association with Southbank Centre

RedCape Theatre UK  

The Idiot Colony London Premiere

ICA Theatre >
Thu 22 to Sun 25 Jan 8pm
After Show Discussion Fri 23 Jan
BSL interpreted performance Sat 24 Jan

Runs approx 65 mins/no interval
All seats £13.50 (£11 concs)
Online booking opens 10 Nov >

‘A delicate work of damaged poetry and slow-moving grace. Beautifully accomplished…a remarkable debut.' The Herald

‘Endlessly inventive…thoroughly disquieting. It’s stunning, you can’t help but catch your breath.' Metro

Forgotten for decades inside a mental hospital three women escape their present by remembering their past. In the asylum’s hair salon, to the strains of Rick Astley and Glenn Miller they relive wartime affairs, illicit trysts and childhood secrets. Total Theatre Award and Fring first winner at the 2008 Edinburgh Fringe, The Idiot Colony is inspired by true accounts of the treatment and incarceration of ‘moral defectives’ in 1940’s Britain. 

RedCape Theatre is a new company comprising three performers, Cassie Friend, Claire Coache and Rebecca Loukes and writer Lisle Turner. The production's director is Andrew Dawson.

Familie Floez Germany

Hotel Paradiso UK Premiere

Queen Elizabeth Hall,
Southbank Centre >
Fri 23 to Sun 25 Jan
Fri-Sat 7.30pm, Sun 6pm
Meet the Artists Sat 24 Jan

Runs approx 70 mins/no interval
£13.50/£15.50/£17.50 (limited concs)
Booking opens Mon 3 Nov >

'Familie Floez draws us in to make us roar with laughter and shed a tear with their delightful blend of physical humour and pathos. Familie Floez's brand of physical comedy is endearing and galvanising.' British Theatre Guide

After its sell-out successes with Teatro Delusio (LIMF05) and Ristorante Immortale (LIMF06), Germany's mask theatre experts Familie Floez return to the Festival with their latest silent comedy, an alpine thriller-chiller!
Strange things are happening at the Hotel Paradiso, a mountain spa resort whose staff – from kleptomaniac maid to cannibal cook – would not be out of place at Fawlty Towers, or even Psycho’s Bates Motel. As the mysteries multiply, events spiral out of control. 
Based in Berlin, the multi-award winning Familie Floez has generated huge interest in European mask theatre. Touring worldwide with its inimitable brand of visual comedy and repertoire of hit shows it has captured the hearts of old and young alike.

Suitable for 7 years +

Presented in association with Southbank Centre

Compagnie Un Loup Pour l'Homme France

Appris Par Corps UK Premiere

Clore Studio Upstairs,
Royal Opera House >
Sat 24 to Sun 25 Jan
Sat 7.45pm, Sun 4pm

Runs approx 55 mins/no interval
£13.50 (£10 concs)
Online booking >

‘Virtuoso acrobatics serving a powerful artistic vision. Totally compelling’. Telerama

Two young men explore their relationship through the language of acrobatics. There’s tenderness and violence, attraction, loneliness and fear. The company’s name plays with an ancient Roman proverb, ‘man is a wolf to man’, always preying on one another yet complicit and dependent. This powerful duet goes straight to the heart of the matter as it explores a web of complex emotions.

Co-production: Les Migrateurs / Le Maillon / associes pour les Arts du Cirque – Alsace; Equinoxe, Scene nationale de Chateauroux; Culture Commune, Scene national du basin minier du Pas de Calais.

Part of Paris Calling

Workshops

How To Be A Stupid
or The Clown's Intelligence

with Angela de Castro

BAC - Battersea Arts Centre, Lavender Hill, London SW11 5TF
Thu 8 to Sun 18 Jan 9.30am-6.30pm
Bookings:
Email whynotinstitute@aol.com
Phone: 44 (20) 7739 8363

‘How To Be A Stupid’ is a unique workshop, a full time full-on course exploring the state of clown - an intense, inspiring, challenging and transformatory journey, with laughs and play along the way.

For Angela de Castro, clowning is not a technique but a ‘state’.  Through practical exercises and games, this energetic workshop helps  you find your clown persona and experience it in this ‘state’. It  gives truthfulness and depth to your clowning, embracing the tragic as  much as the comic. For actors and other performers, it helps make performance more real, individual and joyful. For beginners, it is a journey of discovery.

Angela de Castro is one of the most loved women clowns. She has been awarded fellowships with Nesta Dreamtime, the Arts Foundation and the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. She is well known for creating the Green Clown in Slava’s Snowshow.

www.thewhynotinstitute.com

Viva La Commedia -
The Pillars of Physical Theatre

with Didi Hopkins and
Ninian Kinnear-Wilson

The Blue Room, Spirit Level,
Southbank Centre
Sat 17 to Sun 18 Jan 10am-6pm
£85 for the 2 days
Bookings: 0871 663 2527
Further information:
didi@dell-arte.co.uk

Explore the DNA and nuts and bolts of physical theatre with director Didi Hopkins and mask-maker Ninian Kinnear-Wilson. Discover the actor's role as author/ editor/ performer, how to play an audience, and what makes theatre work. Open to all who are interested in serious fun and need their energy and spirit ignited, this two day workshop goes deep into the world of commedia. It looks at masks, characters, archetypes and comic scenarios – the roots and routes that make commedia a vital and important foundation of contemporary theatre. Suitable for all levels of experience. Participants must be over 18.

2009 LIMF Lecture:
Dick McCaw
The actor - a reluctant mover
ICA theatre Sat 24 Jan, 2.30pm
All seats £5
tickets: 020 7930 3647

Dick McCaw’s talk for LIMF09 examines the importance of movement to the actor’s art. With reference to the work of Lecoq, Decroux and other 20th century masters it focuses on the work of Geraldine Stephenson, his own movement mentor (and coach to such well-known actors as Leonard Rossiter and Maureen Lipman) and in turn on her teacher – the legendary pioneer of movement and dance – Rudolf Laban. Dick McCaw co-founded Actor’s touring Company with John Retallack in 1978, and the Medieval Players with Carl Heap in 1981. From 1993-2001 he was artistic director of the International Workshop Festival, programming an annual series of practical workshops with leading figures in the performing arts including Jacques Lecoq, Lev Dodin, Keith Johnstone, Katie Mitchell and Phelim McDermott. He is currently Senior Lecturer in Drama at Royal Holloway, University of London, a qualified Feldenkrais practitioner and is working on the Routledge Companion to Laban as well as the Complete Laban toolkit for Nick Hern Books. Dick McCaw will also chair most of this year's after show discussions - see below.

After-show Discussions

Usually the first performances to sell-out, this is your chance to chat to the artists about their work and ask them any questions. We try to keep these discussions as informal as possible - they will be led by Dr. Dick McCaw, Senior Lecturer in Performing Arts at Royal Holloway, University of London (except RedCape Theatre on 24 Jan, which will be led by Andrew Dawson).

Post-show Meet the Artist Dates:
Sun 11 Jan  Collectif Petit Travers, Purcell Room
Mon 12 Jan Figurentheater Tübingen, ICA Theatre
Wed 14 Jan Buchinger’s Boot Marionettes, The Pit, Barbican Centre
Thu 15 Jan  Theatre of Silence/Ex-Machina Athens, Purcell Room
Fri 16 Jan Aurélien Bory, Barbican Theatre
Mon 19 Jan Akhe, ICA Theatre
Tue 20 Jan Circus Klezmer, Purcell Room
Wed 21 Jan Les Apostrophés, The Pit, Barbican Centre
Wed 21 Jan  Familie Floez, Corn Exchange, Newbury
Thu 22 Jan Sharmanka (after 7.15pm performance), Shunt Vaults
Thu 22 Jan  Faulty Optic, Shunt Vaults
Fri 23 Jan  Tomas Kubinek, Purcell Room
Sat 24 Jan  RedCape Theatre, ICA Theatre
Sat 24 Jan  Familie Floez, Queen Elizabeth Hall