Saturday 2nd October 2010 @ The Farm, St Werburghs, Bristol

www.myspace.com/circusofinvention

Saturday 25th and Sunday 26th September 2010 @ Portland Square, Bristol

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Wednesday 22nd until Saturday 25th September 2010 @ Redgrave Theatre, Bristol

One quirky truth of musical history is that the Western European audience recognises Italian as the standard language of opera. For the majority who do not venture to hear Berg, Glass or lesser-known writers of modern opera scores, opera sung in other tongues still comes as something of a surprise. This is not because there is not enough access to opera in the English access - the Royal Opera House’s Linbury Studio Theatre often presents contemporary works, right in the heart of London’s Covent Garden – but English is inevitably associated with stage drama and, when Americanised, with Musical Theatre. It was refreshing therefore, to hear that Eric Wetherell (who can add freelance BBC conductor, ROH repetiteur and biographer amongst to composer in his list of careers) adapted the book for his opera in both the English language and its idiom. The effect of this is that the audience experience is much more direct than a libretto presented in a foreign language.
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Friday 17th and Saturday 18th September 2010 @ Various Venues, Bristol

Igfest is Bristol’s very own interesting games festival - street games, outdoor spectacles, mass social interaction, the reclamation of public urban spaces for play and adventure.

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Tuesday 14th until Saturday 25th September 2010 @ Bristol Old Vic, Bristol

Cornish marvels Kneehigh, one of the country’s most exciting, innovative and altogether fantastic theatre companies, return to the Bristol Old Vic for a fifth stint. The Red Shoes, a show which they have resurrected from their long past, follows a nameless young girl as she breaks with convention and follows her impulses by wearing and dancing in bright red shoes around the house, in the street and even in church; a sin which results in her being cursed to dance in the shoes non-stop, forever.

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Saturday 25th and Sunday 26th September 2010 @ Portland Square, Bristol

Playfulness, oddity and spectacle are the buzz words of The Bristol Do, Bristol’s only street and circus festival, where scintillating circus performers, thrilling theatre acts and spellbinding street performers taking over St Pauls for the weekend.

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The Red Shoes: Tuesday 14th until Saturday 25th September 2010 @ Bristol Old Vic, Bristol

As we partake in a coalistic society, one in which conservatives undermine the importance of arts and culture, it is amazing to hear that one theatre company are keeping the industry very much alive and in the age of a recession as well! Kneehigh Theatre Company are consistent in their high standard performances. They have built a reputation for themselves from scratch and as a collective, they have pushed the barriers and utilised their space to create raw and emotional, exiting and unpredictable theatre. Now they have done it once more by opening The Asylum, a 20 ton dome structure which seats up to 1000 bottoms. Located in a remote part of Cornwall surrounded by rolling hills, it really is the perfect way to celebrate Kneehigh Theatre and their 30 years of excellence - and not just because it is the largest span in Europe without a pole.

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Saturday 11th until Sunday 26th September 2010 @ Across Bristol

For the first time, this September for two weeks Bristol will be awash with a cultural extravaganza with over 100 events all around cycling! There will be cycle theatre, cycle tours, cycle films, cycle street games, cycle fashion, cycle talks, cycle activism, and cycle-powered music: Cycle-riffic!

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Monday 16th until Saturday 21st August 2010 @ Alma Tavern Theatre, Bristol

Philip Ridley’s play, Leaves Of Glass, conjures a crisp and horrid texture inside our minds. One in which you can imagine these fragile yet free leaves swirling vulnerably around in the wind, something you tend to avoid when your crunching down the autumn path. Leaves of glass; what a fantastic image to enter a performance with.

However, the title is just a doormat to the poetry which is housed inside the text as the script is trickling like a bumbling spring with lyrical appreciation. Yet I feel the playwright has substituted plot as a result of this excessive imagery and the poetry is camouflaging a practicably weak plot. Although his script is a poignant portrait of a turbulent family who are a product of their own faults and destructions, the twist at the end didn’t feel like much of a twist.
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Bristol Old Vic, the stunningly beautiful theatre on Kings Street in the heart of the city centre, has had a very turbulent past few years. For those that need reminding, here’s a little recap of what happened: Having fist opened in 1776, it was one of the oldest continually working theatres in the country until it closed its doors in the summer of 2007 citing desperately needed structural refurbishments and huge debts. Reading between the lines, the theatre had been in a downward spiral for years; the shows they were putting on frankly weren’t very good so the public had just stopped coming and the second large problem was the insular nature of the entire Bristol Old Vic establishment. During these problem years they seemed to regard themselves as some sort of ivory tower, culturally superior to anything else going on in Bristol and so instead of working alongside Bristol’s other theatres, festivals and events, they excluded them and therefore themselves, loosing a lot of friends and support along the way. Their 2007 closure sparked an outcry though and the public came out in force to support the theatre’s future but also demanded changes.
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