On The Case

I was packing the flight case in which The Spurting Man show, props and costumes etc. has travelled the world for twenty odd years when it struck me how many performers must have similar cases packed with similar tat. When sending this stuff by freight I have to fill in the value and its always a tough call, as the real value, what its worth on E.bay, would be about £50 (mainly for the case) but the value to me on the gig is huge, I mean how could I replace a plastic water spurting crown at short notice its not exactly a B&Q item! Here are three such other cases from a recent dressing room. Traps cases from  SticklebackPlasticus,  MC Fois and Avanti.

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The Britannia Music Hall

I visited the Panopticon otherwise known as The Britannia Music Hall in Glasgow last week. It is in what might best be described as ‘atmospheric decay’. I loved the playbills and that one can walk on stage to experience how it must have felt performing there. During my visit some of the staff were in the back cracking jokes one of which had them it fits of laughter. This sound, uncontrolled laughter, must have echoed round this building over many years perhaps even Bob Hartley ‘King of the Corn Beef Tin’ stormed it! (See below) News just in – Bob Hartley apparently danced on a corn beef tin and the difficulty of this was where the comedy came from – genius! Being the king of something does rather imply that there were other corn beef tin dancers to be king of imagine that.

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Drippers & Clickers

Here is a short video of the little remote control electronic clickers Dave Southall made for the Full Circle show. These neat little devices, still in the prototype phase, note the LX tape, create a ticking (Clock/Dripping) sound that accompanies the performance. They have been much commented on and are surprisingly effective even in the great outdoors. More Dave stuff Here.

Full Circle

Just back from Bath where we were doing development work on this new show then presenting it at Bedlam Fair in various versions. Lots of interesting feedback from friends and fellow professionals and helpful input from Neil Fowler who joined the team. Looking forward to presenting this performanceas a work in progress at Greenwich & Docklands on the 24th & 25th of June.

Stoke Capital of Culture 2021

We helped launch Stokes-On Trent’s bid to be UK capital of culture last month with our site responsive show Hydromania, slightly re-titled, ‘There’s Something In The Water Duck’, for the purposes of this event. Our guests The World Beaters joined us again and the whole thing went off very well. It’s unusual for us to make two Hydromania shows in the same month and it started to feel like a tour. A real hi-light was Seaming singing from the top, the very top, of the Hanley town Halls flag tower. The next one is in Bournemouth in October.