People of all ages, backgrounds and communities are being encouraged to experience new and innovative theatrical work as part of the Scottish Arts Council’s 2005/06 drama touring programme.

The programme features 16 Scottish productions that vary broadly in style and format, including street theatre, circus, work involving poetry, site-specific theatre using flowers as well as more traditional stage-based theatre.  The productions will tour to high profile venues as well as more remote locations the length and breadth of Scotland between April 2005 and March 2006, ensuring that everyone has an opportunity to experience high quality theatre over the coming year.

The successful projects, which have all received Scottish Arts Council funding, reflect the commitment of Scottish companies to develop new writing and audience development.   Many of the productions will also be complemented by extensive outreach and education work with schools and community groups.

David Taylor, Head of Drama at the Scottish Arts Council, says: ‘By encouraging and supporting Scottish theatre companies to develop high quality drama and enabling them to take these productions beyond the big cities to smaller communities, we hope to encourage far more people to enjoy the experience of going to the theatre.  The wide range of productions supported and the issues and themes tackled means there really is something available for everyone.’

Some of the highlights of this year’s programme include Grid Iron’s adaptation of the book Devil’s Larder by Jim Crace, which will be premiered as part of the Cork European City of Culture festival before touring in Scotland and internationally.  Also Vanishing Point will revive its critically successful production, Lost Ones - a surreal adventure story about curiosity and how a man’s past comes back to haunt him, resulting in a dark, chilling and funny production featuring live music. 

The 2005/06 programme, however, starts with Rapture’s Scottish premiere of the award-winning play about mental illness and racism, Blue/Orange by Joe Pernhall at Paisley Arts Centre on 29 April, before touring to 26 different locations across Scotland.  Also in April, boilerhouse will stage its new street theatre production 3600 as part of the Big in Falkirk festival on 30 April and 1 May. 3600 has been developed in collaboration with French company Metalovoice and features performance, text, video images and live original music and will also be performed at this year’s Merchant City Festival and the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Other Scottish productions that will be performed during the 05/06 schedule are:

• Cartoon-theatre The Perfect Spot for young children, by Arts In Motion directed by David Smith.  The production will blend live performance with animation and is ideally suited for small scale rural touring.
• Clyde Unity’s new circus, Breakfast at Audrey’s, featuring aerialism on a metal hoop and examining issues of thinness, beauty, self-esteem, parenthood and the Hollywood icon, Audrey Hepburn.
• Communicado’s production of The Memorandum by Vaclav Havel.
• Plain Speaking from ek, examining representation and language.  The performance will take place around, on and over a very large table at which the actors and audience are seated together. 
• Fragrant – a highly visual multi-disciplinary drama using flowers based on the winter rituals that are celebrated by different religions.  This site-specific work will take place at the Hidden Gardens, Glasgow.
• The revival of Licketyspit’s children’s production of Molly Whuppie with live music and film and a series of workshops for children with special needs and resource-packs for schools.
• A new play from Magnetic North entitled My Old Man by Tom McGrath about confronting old age and the past and the effects of Alzheimer’s.  My Old Man will be premiered at the Tron in September 2005.
• Prime Productions’ extensive Scottish tour of Further Than The Furthest Thing by Zinnie Harris, which focuses on a remote island community displaced by a natural disaster.
• A new piece of work entitled Good Reason from Reeling and Writhing which will involve collaboration with poet Elspeth Murray and explore themes of deceit and loss while dealing with issues of domestic violence.
• Sounds of Progress’ new disability awareness musical theatre, Inside Outside, aimed at children and families and presented by professional disabled musicians and actors.
• A new physical comedy by Theatre Obkektiv entitled How to Kill Your Lover, about passion and destruction inspired by the work of poet Pablo Neruda and visual artist Bruce Nauman.
• The Working Party’s new one-man show, Adventures of the Baron, based on poems about Baron Von Munchausen, written for performance by renowned poet Edwin Morgan.
   

Also supported as part of this year’s touring programme are two English-based theatre companies, whose productions will complement those of the indigenous work.  Kali Theatre Company, will present a double-bill of Bells by Yasmin Khan and Chaos by Azma Khan as part of the Arches theatre festival while Theatre Sans Frontieres will perform Around the World in 80 Minutes, a French language production with songs, film and audience participation aimed at 7-11 year-olds.

David Taylor adds: ‘Our drama touring initiative is well established, and once again demand for funding has been extremely competitive.  The projects we are announcing today represent only a fraction of the high quality applications we received and would have liked to have supported.  However, we do feel that these represent a wide range of projects that will appeal to a wide spectrum of people across the country.’

Further information on each production, including details of the tours, will be available on our website as and when they are announced by the individual company.  Keep up-to-date with developments by visiting our what’s on guide at www.scottisharts.org.uk.