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Bristol Ferment turns 10 – line-up announced for January’s Ferment Fortnight

Bristol Ferment has  announced its line-up for January’s Ferment Fortnight, celebrating a decade of work-in-progress from artists and companies across the South West.

FERMENT FORTNIGHT (MON 27 JAN – SUN 9 FEB)
Marking its 10-year anniversary, bi-annual work-in-progress festival Ferment Fortnight is back in The Weston Studio and ready to showcase some of the finest innovation-seekers and theatre-makers the South West has to offer.

Ferment Fortnight highlights Bristol Old Vic’s 2020 Year of Artists pledge to champion creativity in everyone and stage work by the most outrageous talent Bristol has to offer. The 2-week festival will introduce the budding ideas of artists from across the South West, allowing audiences to engage with work that is still being made and feedback on scratch performances from emerging and established local theatre-makers.

This year’s line-up includes a welcome return to Bristol Ferment for the hugely popular Seamas Carey, Sharp Teeth, The Devil’s Violin and Sleepdogs alongside new friends like Florence Espeut-Nickless, Audrey Productions, Madeline Shann & Malaika Kegode, Jakabol and Jenny Davies – to name just a few.

Ferment’s mission is not only to support work at this initial stage but to help nurture these early sparks into a fully-fledged production. Over the last ten years, artists and companies have staged their work at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, the National Theatre, the Wardrobe and Tobacco Factory Theatres and toured across the UK and internationally.

In 2019, the Jan and Jul Ferment Fortnights supported 24 new works in progress, including:

FullRogue’s debut show Wild Swimming, subsequently programmed for a two week run in the Weston Studio after a sell-out Edinburgh run.

Ad Infinitum’s Extraordinary Wall of Silence, which was welcomed back with rave reviews for a full run in the Weston Studio.

Edson Burton and Ruth Ramsay’s Anansi and the Grand Prize, currently playing in the Weston Studio over Christmas.

The Wardrobe Ensemble’s The Last of the Pelican Daughters, scheduled to stop by the main house in April on a UK-wide tour.

As always at the Ferment Fortnight, the audience will play a crucial part of the process as they are invited to feedback on each work-in-progress to help the artists and companies develop and grow.

Ben Atterbury, Ferment Producer today said, “This programme represents the beginning of a decade of Bristol Ferment. Ten years of supporting brilliant South West artists and companies to develop and present brilliant work here in the region, around the country and around the world. The Fortnight has always been a crucial element of our programme of artist support, so we’ll start as we mean to go on; by asking our Supported Artists and Companies to invite the audience into their experiments and ask for their help to find a way forwards together. We hope this programme signals the beginning of another ten years of Ferment joy as we look over the coming year to make our support bigger, better and more meaningful than ever before; the South West is brimming with extraordinary artistic talent (those already discovered alongside those yet to be found). The artists and companies Ferment is working with are just getting started, and this is your chance to see where it all begins.”

Tickets to Ferment Fortnight are just £5 and are on sale to Priority Bookers from today (16 Dec) with general tickets going on sale at noon Tue 17 Dec.

MON 27 JAN
PAGAN PANDEMONIUM
Seamas Carey
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
Pagan Pandemonium is an interactive history lesson about British folkloric customs and traditions, told through the medium of a Japanese game show. Think Takeshi’s Castle meets Wicker Man.
Seamas Carey (Seamas Carey Meets His 4-Year Old Self) sets out to explore massive topics like sex and death, using copious amounts of audience participation, silly games and large inflatables.

Bristol Ferment announces line-up for January’s Ferment Fortnight, celebrating a decade of work-in-progress from artists and companies across the South West

FERMENT FORTNIGHT (MON 27 JAN – SUN 9 FEB)
Marking its 10-year anniversary, bi-annual work-in-progress festival Ferment Fortnight is back in The Weston Studio and ready to showcase some of the finest innovation-seekers and theatre-makers the South West has to offer.

Ferment Fortnight highlights Bristol Old Vic’s 2020 Year of Artists pledge to champion creativity in everyone and stage work by the most outrageous talent Bristol has to offer. The 2-week festival will introduce the budding ideas of artists from across the South West, allowing audiences to engage with work that is still being made and feedback on scratch performances from emerging and established local theatre-makers.

This year’s line-up includes a welcome return to Bristol Ferment for the hugely popular Seamas Carey, Sharp Teeth, The Devil’s Violin and Sleepdogs alongside new friends like Florence Espeut-Nickless, Audrey Productions, Madeline Shann & Malaika Kegode, Jakabol and Jenny Davies – to name just a few.

Ferment’s mission is not only to support work at this initial stage but to help nurture these early sparks into a fully-fledged production. Over the last ten years, artists and companies have staged their work at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, the National Theatre, the Wardrobe and Tobacco Factory Theatres and toured across the UK and internationally.

In 2019, the Jan and Jul Ferment Fortnights supported 24 new works in progress, including:

FullRogue’s debut show Wild Swimming, subsequently programmed for a two week run in the Weston Studio after a sell-out Edinburgh run.

Ad Infinitum’s Extraordinary Wall of Silence, which was welcomed back with rave reviews for a full run in the Weston Studio.

Edson Burton and Ruth Ramsay’s Anansi and the Grand Prize, currently playing in the Weston Studio over Christmas.

The Wardrobe Ensemble’s The Last of the Pelican Daughters, scheduled to stop by the main house in April on a UK-wide tour.

As always at the Ferment Fortnight, the audience will play a crucial part of the process as they are invited to feedback on each work-in-progress to help the artists and companies develop and grow.

Ben Atterbury, Ferment Producer today said, “This programme represents the beginning of a decade of Bristol Ferment. Ten years of supporting brilliant South West artists and companies to develop and present brilliant work here in the region, around the country and around the world. The Fortnight has always been a crucial element of our programme of artist support, so we’ll start as we mean to go on; by asking our Supported Artists and Companies to invite the audience into their experiments and ask for their help to find a way forwards together. We hope this programme signals the beginning of another ten years of Ferment joy as we look over the coming year to make our support bigger, better and more meaningful than ever before; the South West is brimming with extraordinary artistic talent (those already discovered alongside those yet to be found). The artists and companies Ferment is working with are just getting started, and this is your chance to see where it all begins.”

Tickets to Ferment Fortnight are just £5 and are on sale to Priority Bookers from today (16 Dec) with general tickets going on sale at noon Tue 17 Dec.
MON 27 JAN
PAGAN PANDEMONIUM
Seamas Carey
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
Pagan Pandemonium is an interactive history lesson about British folkloric customs and traditions, told through the medium of a Japanese game show. Think Takeshi’s Castle meets Wicker Man.
Seamas Carey (Seamas Carey Meets His 4-Year Old Self) sets out to explore massive topics like sex and death, using copious amounts of audience participation, silly games and large inflatables.

TUE 28 JAN
D.E.S.T.I.N.Y
Florence Espeut-Nickless
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
Destiny dreams big. She dreams glamour. She’s gonna be an MTV Base backing dancer; you watch. If J-Lo can make it outta the Bronx then Destiny can make it off the scummy Hill Rise Estate in Chippenham. She’s fearless, ferocious and up for the fight (she’s had to be). Born below the breadline, she’s desperate to see beyond the neighbourhood and find hope in hopelessness.
D.E.S.T.I.N.Y gives an insight into the country’s most forgotten youth and the 4.5 million children currently living in poverty in the UK.

WED 29 JAN
POLLY (THE HEARTBREAK OPERA)
Sharp Teeth & Marie Hamilton
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
A riotous adaptation of Polly, John Gay’s banned sequel to The Beggar’s Opera, with techno, tracksuits and palm trees. Set in a tacky beach resort on a storm hit island, we meet jilted brides, pregnant murderers, pirates, politicians and power pop girl bands. Telling not just the story of Purest Polly Peachum but of the other wives of Mac the Knife as well, this is a viciously satirical, unashamedly sexy, fierce and very funny not-quite-musical. It is a battle cry for the broken hearted, a joyous dissection of love, loss and revenge, with songs inspired by Peaches, Britney and Nina Simone.

THU 30 JAN
UTILITY FUNCTION
Tremolo Theatre
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
Eli XO have been told by their record label that they need to step up their game for their next album. They decide to take action & go to a remote location to record with an AI; the latest state of the art intelligent recording studio. As time progresses the band begin to suspect the AI is going above and beyond the call of duty. Is it friend or foe? Is it helping or hindering? Each member of Eli XO interprets the AI differently. But who is right?

FRI 31 JAN
BODY & SOUL
Audrey Productions
3.30pm
Coopers’ Loft
£5
Body and Soul is a new British musical-in-progress inspired by a true story. In a tiny Cotswold hamlet a small group of elderly, female congregationalist Christians rented their Sunday school out to a pole dancing class to raise funds for their crumbling buildings. Body and Soul is inspired by the two communities of women who gathered at this old chapel in the Cotswolds; some to sing hymns and worship and others to pole dance. This early sharing of ideas for a new musical brings these unlikely worlds together, as three generations of characters unearth ancestors, awaken goddesses and laugh their t*ts off.

SAT 1 FEB
BOB (Ages 5+)
Tessa Bide
5pm
Weston Studio
£5
Two friends play alone in an undescribed, unnamed place. They have their own private games and play together in silence or using limited language. One day, Bob – a blob of light – comes bursting into their world, and their world becomes brighter with him inside of it. With him they play games, make adventures and explore. They are happy. But one day Bob’s light fades away, and then they are left to come to terms with his unexpected disappearance from their lives, helping each other to understand the process of letting Bob go, and moving forward.

TUE 4 FEB
SOMETHING IN YOUR VOICE
Emergency Chorus
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
In this ambitious new performance, Emergency Chorus pick up the phone and plunge into a vast cityscape of moving bodies, dense information and traffic, eavesdropping on bleary arguments, late-night gossip and whispered confessions.Taking inspiration from the everyday dance of switchboard operators and the poetry of the Yellow Pages, Something in Your Voice maps out a tangled web of crossed lines and broken signals, asking what connects us in a world where everyone is in touch.

WED 5 FEB
THE BEAST IN ME
The Devil’s Violin
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
Who is the stranger who waits at the crossroads? Why does the filthy stranger wear a bear’s skin, and why do his pockets overflow with gold? Shot through with mysterious imagery, The Beast in Me is an unforgettable tale of the calamitous impact of chance and the redemptive power of love. The Devil’s Violin return; since their inception in 2006, they have developed a huge following for their gripping and powerful storytelling. The Beast in Me will feature their trademark fusion of timeless story and beautiful live music, as well as a few surprises!

THU 6 FEB
BABEL’S CUPID
Sleepdogs
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
Babel’s Cupid is a play about sex and translation. It’s about how words hold immense power, but how language as communication isn’t merely contained in the words spoken. It’s about how bodies change words. It features talk of a big-ass telescope (not a euphemism) and dancing at the end of the world (also not a euphemism). It might get loud. It might get sweaty. Or maybe it’ll just be the quickening of a pulse, the flicker of an eye, and the impossibility of turning away.

FRI 7 FEB
OUTLIER
Malaika Kegode, Jenny Davies & Jakabol
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
Devon. A party. A funeral. A tortoise smuggled in a box. Ama, Lewis and Oskar have grown up together. In each other’s pockets in some ways, isolated in others; they smoke, drink and charge through life together. They are railing against the stories they feel have been written for them. This is their opportunity to show you who they are and who they could be. Based on lived experience, Outlier will become a gig-theatre piece combining spoken word storytelling, animation and loud music to explore themes of addiction, mental health and belonging in the rural reaches of Britain today.

SAT 8 FEB
THE GRAVITY
Madeline Shann
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
Sam is trying to hang on in a world that doesn’t care and that feels like it’s falling apart. As Sam disappears further down the rabbit hole, she finds reality bending around her as she tries to find a way back to what is real and true about the world that she is in. The Gravity is a new piece exploring suicide and despair with influences from the world of satire, black comedy, cinema and sci-fi. This work-in-progress is the culmination of a two week R&D, the first workshop phase of the project.

Florence Espeut-Nickless
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
Destiny dreams big. She dreams glamour. She’s gonna be an MTV Base backing dancer; you watch. If J-Lo can make it outta the Bronx then Destiny can make it off the scummy Hill Rise Estate in Chippenham. She’s fearless, ferocious and up for the fight (she’s had to be). Born below the breadline, she’s desperate to see beyond the neighbourhood and find hope in hopelessness.
D.E.S.T.I.N.Y gives an insight into the country’s most forgotten youth and the 4.5 million children currently living in poverty in the UK.

WED 29 JAN
POLLY (THE HEARTBREAK OPERA)
Sharp Teeth & Marie Hamilton
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
A riotous adaptation of Polly, John Gay’s banned sequel to The Beggar’s Opera, with techno, tracksuits and palm trees. Set in a tacky beach resort on a storm hit island, we meet jilted brides, pregnant murderers, pirates, politicians and power pop girl bands. Telling not just the story of Purest Polly Peachum but of the other wives of Mac the Knife as well, this is a viciously satirical, unashamedly sexy, fierce and very funny not-quite-musical. It is a battle cry for the broken hearted, a joyous dissection of love, loss and revenge, with songs inspired by Peaches, Britney and Nina Simone.

THU 30 JAN
UTILITY FUNCTION
Tremolo Theatre
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
Eli XO have been told by their record label that they need to step up their game for their next album. They decide to take action & go to a remote location to record with an AI; the latest state of the art intelligent recording studio. As time progresses the band begin to suspect the AI is going above and beyond the call of duty. Is it friend or foe? Is it helping or hindering? Each member of Eli XO interprets the AI differently. But who is right?

FRI 31 JAN
BODY & SOUL
Audrey Productions
3.30pm
Coopers’ Loft
£5
Body and Soul is a new British musical-in-progress inspired by a true story. In a tiny Cotswold hamlet a small group of elderly, female congregationalist Christians rented their Sunday school out to a pole dancing class to raise funds for their crumbling buildings. Body and Soul is inspired by the two communities of women who gathered at this old chapel in the Cotswolds; some to sing hymns and worship and others to pole dance. This early sharing of ideas for a new musical brings these unlikely worlds together, as three generations of characters unearth ancestors, awaken goddesses and laugh their t*ts off.

SAT 1 FEB
BOB (Ages 5+)
Tessa Bide
5pm
Weston Studio
£5
Two friends play alone in an undescribed, unnamed place. They have their own private games and play together in silence or using limited language. One day, Bob – a blob of light – comes bursting into their world, and their world becomes brighter with him inside of it. With him they play games, make adventures and explore. They are happy. But one day Bob’s light fades away, and then they are left to come to terms with his unexpected disappearance from their lives, helping each other to understand the process of letting Bob go, and moving forward.

TUE 4 FEB
SOMETHING IN YOUR VOICE
Emergency Chorus
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
In this ambitious new performance, Emergency Chorus pick up the phone and plunge into a vast cityscape of moving bodies, dense information and traffic, eavesdropping on bleary arguments, late-night gossip and whispered confessions.Taking inspiration from the everyday dance of switchboard operators and the poetry of the Yellow Pages, Something in Your Voice maps out a tangled web of crossed lines and broken signals, asking what connects us in a world where everyone is in touch.

WED 5 FEB
THE BEAST IN ME
The Devil’s Violin
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
Who is the stranger who waits at the crossroads? Why does the filthy stranger wear a bear’s skin, and why do his pockets overflow with gold? Shot through with mysterious imagery, The Beast in Me is an unforgettable tale of the calamitous impact of chance and the redemptive power of love. The Devil’s Violin return; since their inception in 2006, they have developed a huge following for their gripping and powerful storytelling. The Beast in Me will feature their trademark fusion of timeless story and beautiful live music, as well as a few surprises!

THU 6 FEB
BABEL’S CUPID
Sleepdogs
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
Babel’s Cupid is a play about sex and translation. It’s about how words hold immense power, but how language as communication isn’t merely contained in the words spoken. It’s about how bodies change words. It features talk of a big-ass telescope (not a euphemism) and dancing at the end of the world (also not a euphemism). It might get loud. It might get sweaty. Or maybe it’ll just be the quickening of a pulse, the flicker of an eye, and the impossibility of turning away.

FRI 7 FEB
OUTLIER
Malaika Kegode, Jenny Davies & Jakabol
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
Devon. A party. A funeral. A tortoise smuggled in a box. Ama, Lewis and Oskar have grown up together. In each other’s pockets in some ways, isolated in others; they smoke, drink and charge through life together. They are railing against the stories they feel have been written for them. This is their opportunity to show you who they are and who they could be. Based on lived experience, Outlier will become a gig-theatre piece combining spoken word storytelling, animation and loud music to explore themes of addiction, mental health and belonging in the rural reaches of Britain today.

SAT 8 FEB
THE GRAVITY
Madeline Shann
8pm
Weston Studio
£5
Sam is trying to hang on in a world that doesn’t care and that feels like it’s falling apart. As Sam disappears further down the rabbit hole, she finds reality bending around her as she tries to find a way back to what is real and true about the world that she is in. The Gravity is a new piece exploring suicide and despair with influences from the world of satire, black comedy, cinema and sci-fi. This work-in-progress is the culmination of a two week R&D, the first workshop phase of the project.

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Bristol Old Vic’s Writers Department launches unique partnership with Bristol Old Vic Theatre School

Bristol Old Vic

In a bid to harness the writing, acting and technical talents of the South West’s most exciting emerging artists, Bristol Old Vic’s Writers Department has partnered with Bristol Old Vic Theatre School to present 5 plays and a musical born from The Open Session. New Plays in Rep will include two fully staged productions and four workshop performances. The season of work will take place in The Weston Studio in repertory style and will be performed entirely be Bristol Old Vic Theatre School actors-in-training. Also involved are students on other BA and MA courses, including Design, Production Arts, Costume, Directing and Scenic Art.

Bristol Old Vic’s Writers Department introduced its new writing initiative The Open Session in 2014, inviting West Country writers to submit drafts of their projects with the aim of being supported further. Since then, the department has received over 600 scripts, of which 28 were picked up for further development.

NEW PLAYS IN REP | THU 28 FEB – SAT 16 MAR | THE WESTON

 The Dissociation of Shirley Mason
The first fully staged play as part of New Plays in Rep is The Dissociation of Shirley Masonby Isabella Culver.

Isabella Culver is an actress and writer, who is also currently studying Site-Specific Theatre Practice at Mountview. This is her debut play, selected by Bristol Old Vic from its Open Session call-out to West Country writers in 2017.

The play will be directed by Peter Leslie Wild, who directed The Wizard of Oz for Bristol Old Vic Theatre School at the Redgrave Theatre in 2017. Peter’s recent production of Wind in the Willows at the New Vic Theatre received 4 Star Reviews from The Guardian and The Stage.

The Dissociation of Shirley Mason charts the life of Shirley Mason, a young woman of uncertain identity – buffeted by the expectations of family and church in the American town of her childhood. Later, as an art student in New York she feels her personality disintegrating, and a psychiatrist takes a keen interest. Dr Cornelia B Wilbur may have stumbled upon a landmark case to make her reputation.

As the two women’s lives become entwined, lines blur between psychiatry and art, case studies and tall stories, real hurt and false memory.

Inspired by the real-life case of a woman diagnosed as having 16 personalities. This premiere production is an American tale spanning decades up to the 1970s, with questions for us all about where our true selves reside.

Orca
The second fully staged play is Matt Grinter’s debut play Orca.

Matt is a Bristol-based writer and director. He is currently on attachment at Bristol Old Vic through The Open Session. His work has appeared in several venues across Britain and beyond, including The Finborough, New York Metropolitan, Trafalgar 2, Glastonbury and Bristol Old Vic. His second play, The Dog and the Elephant was produced in conjunction with Bristol Ferment in 2015 and subsequently turned into a short film. Orca was the winner of the 2016 Papatango New Writing Prize and was first performed at Southwark Playhouse in November 2016.

Orca will be directed by Chloe Masterton, a recent MA Theatre Directing graduate from Bristol Old Vic Theatre School.

The play takes place on Midsummer’s Day. The village must choose a new Daughter to sail with the fishing boats and bless the waters, keeping the threat of the orcas that roam the sea at bay for another year.

Fan hopes with all her heart to be the one chosen, but her older sister Maggie is adamant she must never, never, go with the boats. Because something happened to Maggie out there. Because no one will admit it. Because sometimes the most beautiful places harbour the darkest secrets.

Orca is an incisive, unflinching insight into what makes a community tolerate the unthinkable.

 Mr Maglump
Bristol Old Vic’s Writers Department will also be re-introducing the musical Mr Maglump, following its first outing during The Weston Studio’s Opening Weekend in October. The ‘musical for all ages’ is written by Brook Tate, based on a book he originally wrote and illustrated for his nieces. It has been workshopped with the help of the Writers Department.

On a street where everybody knows their neighbour, one man stands apart – Mr Maglump. Behind his door lies a rather marvellous secret which could turn the town upside down, and quite possibly the right way up. Just one brave child has the courage to find out what it was, or who it was, that put the glum in Maglump.

Brook is a painter, writer and musician based in Bristol. He has been painting since 2011 and has written and illustrated two children’s books, Theresa the Tree and Little Bobby Maddison. Mr Maglump is his first musical.

 

Wonder Boy
The second workshop performance will be Wonder Boy by Ross Willis.

Ross is a member of the Orange Tree Writers’ Collective, BBC Writers Room and a playwright on attachment at Bristol Old Vic. He was the writer-in-residence at Theatre Clwyd and is an alumnus of Tamasha Playwrights and Soho Theatre Writers Lab, where he developed Wonder Boy. Ross is currently one of the 503Five, a group of resident playwrights at Theatre503, where his debut play Wolfie, a surreal telling of life in and after the care system, will open in March. Ross has recently been announced as one of three writers awarded the inaugural Royal Court & Kudos Writing Fellowship.

Wonder Boy tells the story of a schoolboy struggling with a severe stammer, who finds help in a teacher who champions him; but he also has the attention of his comic book creation Captain Chatter, and taunting supervillain William Shakespeare. A dynamic and tender new play that explores the failings of language and grief.

 Invalid
The New Plays In Rep season will also feature Nell Leyshon’s new play, Invalid, which will be performed in Bristol Old Vic’s new studio space, Coopers’ Loft.

Performed entirely in the dark, this evocative new play centres on a woman who is confined to a darkened room. Her young children seem far away but her partner is by her side; however his ability to negotiate the darkness is a strange kind of reassurance. This thrilling and immersive performance takes place with the audience seated.

Nell is a writer of plays, novels, radio drama, and a libretto. Awards in theatre include the Evening Standard Award, and an Olivier nomination (Comfort Me With Apples); for BBC radio drama the Richard Imison Award (Milk); and for internationally published novels the Prix de l’Union Interalliee. Bedlam was the first play written by a woman to be performed at Shakespeare’s Globe.

Nell has written plays for Hampstead Theatre, National Theatre Connections, Theatre Newfoundland and Labrador, Theatre Royal Plymouth, and RADA.

 

Kingdom or The Anthropocene
The final piece will be Kingdom or The Anthropocene by Skot Wilson.

Skot is a multi-disciplinary writer from Devon. In 2016, he became one of 6 writers on attachment at Bristol Old Vic following his Open Session submission Footsteps. His play Stallions was amongst the eight plays shortlisted from 1,160 for the international Nick Darke Award 2018. He was awarded the 2018 Benjamin Franklin Literary Prize. He also works at the Natural History Museum and has been published in the Journal of Natural History.

Kingdom is Skot’s first staged work.

The tussle for the planet is evoked in this set of surprising short plays looking at the indelible mark human beings have made on animal life – an age named The Anthropocene. Kangaroo boxing, sea wall erosion, earth grubs hiding a murder, and whales thrown off course by a sea full of digital noise, all combine to ask “Whose Kingdom is this?”

 

 

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