Paines Plough Blog

We’re super excited to announce our full Programme 2012 today.

We’re presenting 11 productions in 44 places across the country from Edinburgh to The Isle of Wight.

Some stuff you already know about, like Matt Hartley‘s SIXTY FIVE MILES which we co-produced earlier in the year with our friends at Hull Truck, and the two shows we have currently running in London – Mike Bartlett‘s LOVE, LOVE, LOVE at The Royal Court and Kate Tempest’s WASTED at The Roundhouse.

In addition we’ve lined up some real treats for you, wherever you live. WASTED continues its tour to festivals in Brighton and York. There’s a national tour of our Manchester International Festival smash hit soul opera THE 8TH by Paul Heaton & Che Walker culminating with a very special performance at The Latitude Festival. Simon Stephens’ LONDON opens its tour at Salisbury Playhouse in a co-production with both Salisbury and Live Theatre, Newcastle.

For the first time in three years, we’re presenting a season of work across London, all of which has premiered outside the capital. Love, Love, Love is currently running at the Royal Court. Wasted visits the Roundhouse. The 8th opens its tour at The Barbican. And we’re thrilled to be bringing our Roundabout Season to to town in the Autumn. Three new plays by Duncan Macmillan, Nick Payne and Penelope Skinner will be presented in our own purpose built portable in-the-round Roundabout auditorium at Shoreditch Town Hall.

Also we’re bringing back our 2009 hit GOOD WITH PEOPLE by David Harrower for The Edinburgh Festival. A new series of Come to Where I’m From will include playwrights from Brighton, Cheltenham, Chipping Norton and the Isle Of Wight; and we’re delighted to again be working with the students at Rose Bruford College on Sean Buckley’s SMITHEREENS.

Here’s a note from James & George:

“We’re hugely proud to announce our third annual programme of work as Paines Plough’s Artistic Directors.

“Our passion for new plays continues to grow thanks to the extraordinary playwrights that lie at the heart of our company. This year we’re presenting work by a huge range of writers, from Olivier Award winners to the stars of the future.writers who between them have won 2 Oliviers, 3 George Devine Awards, 2 Bruntwood Awards and a host of other accolades, whilst continuing to identify and support the stars of the future.

“We believe everyone should have the chance to see outstanding new plays, no matter where they live, so our commitment to national touring deepens this year with visits to over 40 different UK villages, towns and cities. We’re piloting new touring circuits The Local, Neighbourhood and Campus to make sure our unique brand of new plays reach every corner of the UK.

“After two years working outside the capital, we’ve been overwhelmed by the demand for our work to be seen in London. In response we’ve put together a London Season of productions, all of which have already been seen on tour. In typical Paines Plough style they’re spread right across the city so audiences can experience the work in their local theatre – whether that’s Shoreditch Town Hall, the Barbican, the Royal Court, the Roundhouse or the Albany, amongst others.

“As ever, we’re working in partnership across the programme, and are delighted to be working with old friends as well as new – including the National Theatre, Manchester International Festival, the Roundhouse, Birmingham Rep, Sheffield Theatres, Latitude Festival, National Student Drama Festival, Salisbury Playhouse and Live Theatre Newcastle.

“With these partners, we’re presenting astounding new plays by world class playwrights in places nationwide for people everywhere. We’re priveleged and excited to do so, and look forward to welcoming people to a Paines Plough show in their local theatre.”

So there you have it: Programme 2012. We hope you’re as excited by it as we are.

As the last one standing in the PP office at 5pm on the day before Christmas eve I thought I’d say one last goodbye to 2011 with a pictoral journey through Paines Plough’s Programme 2011.

Over the past 12 months more than 24,000 people saw one of 11 new plays by 15 different playwrights in one of 39 different places across the UK. Thank you to everyone who contributed, came, saw, enjoyed and supported – we hope to see you in your local theatre in 2012.

It’s nearly Christmas, and we’ve reached the end of another fabulous year at Paines Plough.

Programme 2011 is now complete and we’ve had a brilliant time over the year, working with 15 playwrights, and touring 11 productions to 39 places where 24,868 of you have come to see one of our shows. Thank you to everyone who joined us as we made our way around the UK, we hope you’ve enjoyed our shows.

Here’s a quick round-up of Programme 2011:

LOVE, LOVE, LOVE

We started the year with our co-producers Drum Theatre, Plymouth on our spring tour of Mike Bartlett’s LOVE, LOVE, LOVE, which we are delighted won the award for Best New Play at the 2011 Theatre Awards UK last month, and has been shortlisted for Best Regional Production in the upcoming Whatsonstage Awards.

Here are some of the reviews from the tour:

“Bang-on-the-money new play… required viewing.”
★★★★★ The Telegraph

“Devastating precision… peppered with terrific lines and big laughs”
★★★★ The Guardian

LOVE, LOVE, LOVE will return in Programme 2012 in a brand new production at the Royal Court in April. You can book tickets here.

Read the LOVE, LOVE, LOVE blog here.

TINY VOLCANOES

We then returned to the Liverpool Everyman with our co-production of Laurence Wilson’s TINY VOLCANOES, before taking the show on the road for its second national tour.

Here’s what some of you said about the show:

“Wild and exciting, terribly funny”
Audience member, Trowbridge

“Excellent, thoughtful, great performance, please come back to Folkestone”
Audience member, Folkestone

“Very engaging, challenging and entertaining”
Audience member, Harrogate

Read the TINY VOLCANOES blog here.

THE 8TH

In July we hit festival season, and collaborated with Manchester International Festival on THE 8TH by Paul Heaton and Ché Walker, which played for three nights at The Pavilion Theatre and starred Reg E Cathey.

Have a look at some production shots from the show.

Read THE 8TH blog here.

WASTED

Later in July we braved the rain and took to the muddy fields of the Latitude Festival in Suffolk, where we premiered WASTED by Kate Tempest alongside our co-producers Birmingham Repertory Theatre and The Roundhouse, and our friends at NSDF.

We’re touring WASTED in spring 2012 and will be announcing dates in the new year. Keep an eye on our website for updates, and in the mean time check out our production shots from Latitude here, and watch our online trailer here.

Read the WASTED blog here.

A PLAY, A PIE AND A PINT

The second half of the year saw us tour three new plays in co-production with Òran Mór in Glasgow, in our A Play, A Pie and A Pint season. We opened the season with DIG by Katie Douglas, which was followed by YOU CANNOT GO FORWARD FROM WHERE YOU ARE RIGHT NOW by David Watson, and JUICY FRUITS by Leo Butler.

Here are some reviews on each of the plays:

DIG
“Devastatingly effective”
★★★★ Edinburgh Evening News

YOU CANNOT GO FORWARD FROM WHERE YOU ARE RIGHT NOW
“Funny, intelligent, observant”
★★★★ Edinburgh Guide

JUICY FRUITS
“Brilliantly witty, acerbic and dark…”
★★★★ The Public Reviews

Read the A PLAY, A PIE AND A PINT blog here.

THE ROUNDABOUT SEASON

In October, we opened the first ever Roundabout Season in partnership with Sheffield Theatres. The season consisted of three new plays, performed by an ensemble cast in our prototype Roundabout Auditorium which lived in the Crucible Studio for two months. We opened the season with ONE DAY WHEN WE WERE YOUNG by Nick Payne, followed by LUNGS by Duncan Macmillan and THE SOUND OF HEAVY RAIN by Penelope Skinner.

Here are some Tweets about each of the plays:

@MatthewDPlant: @painesplough @crucibletheatre #OneDayWhenWeWereYoung: stunningly emotive/engaging. Original/ innovative scene changes with costume. BRILL.

@lyngardner: Duncan Macmillan’s Lungs at Sheffield Crucible is fab. Edgy, anxious, very funny, horribly honest and completely now. #stage

@Cory_face: Enjoyed ‘The Sound of Heavy Rain’ by @painesplough + @crucibletheatre brave but silly, consciously stylised and dramatically justified. See!

You can watch a film about The Roundabout Auditorium here, or read more here.

Read the Roundabout blog here.

COME TO WHERE I’M FROM

To close Programme 2011, we staged COME TO WHERE I’M FROM : JERSEY with playwrights Ben Evans, Leon Fleming, Martha MacDonald, Hannah Patterson and Colin Scott performing their own 15 minute pieces inspired by the place they grew up. The event took place at the Jersey Opera House and was part of The Big Room, and organised by the Jersey Arts Trust.

You will soon be able to hear podcasts of the plays on our website. In the mean time, have a listen to some of the podcasts from COME TO WHERE I’M FROM 2010 here.

Read the COME TO WHERE I’M FROM blog here.

So that was the year that was. We’ve had a ball. Bring on 2012.

If you saw any of our shows this year, please post a comment and let us know what you thought.

It’s been a busy Autumn for Paines Plough, with shows on in Sheffield, Glasgow, Manchester and Coventry simultaneously but despite our team being split all over the country we’ve still managed to catch plenty of theatre all over the shop and the festive period is looking pretty good for our culture calendar too…

James and I caught Tom Wells’ brilliant new play The Kitchen Sink at the Bush on press night.  It’s selling out but the run has been extended til 23^rd Dec, so there’s still chance to catch this extraordinary new play.

Claire and Hanna loved April de Angelis’ JUMPY at the Royal Court, Tara caught Polar Bear’s OLD ME at the Roundhouse and we all went on a PP office social to see OFFICE PARTY at the Pleasance which was an absolute hoot!

We were big fans of Michael Sheen’s HAMLET at the Young Vic, Jez Butterworth’s JERUSALEM (it just gets better…) at the Apollo, BLACKBERRY TROUT FACE by the superb Laurence Wilson (who wrote TINY VOLCANOES which we toured earlier this year), and ONE MAN TWO GUVNORS by Richard Bean at the Adelphi.

We’re very excited about seeing COMEDY OF ERRORS with Lenny Henry and directed by Dominic Cooke at the National, I’m off to see Michael Grandage’s last show at the helm of the Donmar- RICHARD II with Eddie Redmayne at the weekend and James saw Dennis Kelly and Tim Minchin’s hit adaptation of MATILDA at the Cambridge Theatre and can still be found humming the songs around the office…

Last week Claire and Tara headed up to Sheffield (quickly becoming our second home) to see the Crucible’s revival of Sondheim’s COMPANY with Daniel Evans and Samantha Spiro which was brilliantly entertaining! And speaking of Sheffield we had a great time there two weeks ago when the whole team got together to see our ROUNDABOUT season; Nick Payne’s ONE DAY WHEN WE WERE YOUNG, Duncan Macmillan’s LUNGS and THE SOUND OF HEAVY RAIN by Penelope Skinner.

So what are we seeing over Christmas? Our panto withdrawal from last year will be soothed by trips to ALADDIN at the Lyric Hammersmith and SLEEPING BEAUTY at Sheffield’s Lyceum. We’ll be at the National next week for Daniel Kitson’s IT’S ALWAYS RIGHT NOW, UNTIL IT’S LATER which I’ve been dying to see since it debuted at the Edinburgh Fringe back in 2010. Claire’s off to see Matthew Bourne’s NUTCRACKER at Sadler’s Wells on Tuesday and Tara will be going to Kurt Weill’s MAGICAL NIGHT at the Royal Opera House later this week. Other treats in store are Reuben Johnson’s THE PROPOSAL produced by exciting young company Fiddy West Productions at Theatre 503, Joe Penhall’s HAUNTED CHILD at the Royal Court and Dawn King’s FOXFINDER at The Finborough.

Wowzer, there’s a whole lot of theatre for you.

What have you been seeing? Any top tips for theatre trips over Christmas?

We’re shutting up shop at PP HQ today and heading north en masse to Sheffield for the first of our Roundabout Season three-show days.

Our season in Sheffield culminates with Nick Payne’s ONE DAY WHEN WE WERE YOUNG and Duncan Macmillan’s LUNGS re-entering the fray alongside Penelope Skinner’s currently running THE SOUND OF HEAVY RAIN.

You can catch all three shows today and on Saturday at 3pm, 5:30pm and 8pm with enough time in between for a pint and a bite to eat in Crucible Corner.

We’re very excited about seeing our immensely talented acting ensemble pushing themselves to the limit as they play an array of different characters with barely time to draw breath in between. Maia Alexander and Andrew Sheridan star in ONE DAY WHEN WE WERE YOUNG, Alistair Cope and Kate O’Flynn star in LUNGS, and then all four are embroiled in the search for missing Foxie O’Hara in the finale – THE SOUND OF HEAVY RAIN.

We’re delighted to welcome lots of friends of PP to Sheffield today and on Saturday to see the season out with the whole shebang on show inside seven hours.

Bring. It. On.

Penelope Skinner. Photo: The Evening Standard

Much cheering at PP HQ at the news that Penelope Skinner scooped the prestigious Evening Standard Award for Most Promising Playwright at yesterday’s awards.

Penelope’s play THE SOUND OF HEAVY RAIN is currently playing as part of our Roundabout Season in Sheffield, and she was formerly part of our Future Perfect playwright’s group.

We loved her play THE VILLAGE BIKE at The Royal Court earlier this year, for which she was honoured.

Huge congratulations to Penelope. We’re dead proud.

You can read more about the awards here.

There’s a feature about Penny and similarly brilliant fellow nominees EV Crowe and Vivienne Franzman here.

Having spent three years at uni in Sheffield, and being born and bred in Manchester, I understand that up North is gets cold. However, this week Sheffield is COLD. Arriving into the train station on Friday evening, it was seriously chilly. So when I came to spend the day in the rehearsal room for The Sound of Heavy Rain, the last play in our Roundabout Season, co produced with Sheffield Theatres, I was glad to be armed with a big, woolly coat.

Now, if you’re anywhere even remotely close to Sheffield at the moment you’ll know that it is ALL going on at the Crucible for their 40^th Birthday celebrations. This week the cast of Company moved up to carry on their rehearsals in the steel city, alongside the casts of the first Sheffield People’s Theatre production- Lives In Art, Invisible Flock’s interactive performance Fanfared and Rationale’s In My Shoes. So, with all of this happening, Paines Plough have migrated for a couple of days, across the road to the rather beautiful rehearsal space of Channing Hall.

Andy, James and Maia in rehearsals...apologies for the poor photography!

The room we were rehearsing in was opened in MDCCCLXXXI  (1881- Turns out James is pretty hot on his Roman Numerals…) and is a HUGE room with carved wooden beams, mosaics, chandelier light fittings and plaques galore. It’s a lovely space to rehearse in, but as the weather had taken a turn for the worse and this big old room was unused over the weekend the radiators took a little while to kick in. However, soon enough, everyone had warmed up and were on form for a packed day of rehearsals.

The Sound of Heavy Rain is a pastiche of the usual detective story and is jam packed with chuckle inducing moments meaning that rehearsals were filled with plenty of giggles on and off the stage. Highlights included a discussion on the merits of acting opposite an old school wooden mop rather than your new fangled plastic Vileda, and an impromptu break in rehearsals while Andy (playing P.I Dabrowski) climbed into a wheelie hold-all (one of the props, not just something PP have lying around the rehearsal room) to see if he could fit- (he could, with plenty of room to spare- the bag is THAT big). Another welcome impromptu break came when Maia (playing Maggie Brown) produced Chocolate and Pecan Pie- a seriously delicious dessert giving us all the sugar rush to push through to the end of the day.

Andy, Maia and Channing Hall in all its glory

The show opens next Wednesday (15^th) for the Public Dress (tickets are a total bargain at £1 from the Crucible Box Office on the day) and is really coming together now; it was fascinating to see the actors putting the final touches to their characters, whilst Louise (our ASM) was out sourcing props and organising costume fittings before doing a run through in front of the writer, Penny Skinner, later in the week. What made Monday even more exciting for the company was that Penny was shortlisted for the Evening Standard Award for Most Promising Playwright, something which everyone at Paines Plough is very happy about!

So what can you expect from our last instalment in the Roundabout trilogy? Some super new writing, singing, dancing, body bags, mops and so much more…Sheffield, you’re in for a treat!

Penelope Skinner

We were thrilled to be at this morning’s George Devine Award ceremony at the Royal Court Theatre where Penelope Skinner was announced as the winner of this year’s George Devine Award for her upcoming play at the Royal Court Upstairs, The Village Bike.

The Award, recognised as one of the most prestigious for new writing, was set up in 1966 as a memorial to the life and talent of George Devine, Artistic Director of the Royal Court 1956-65.

Previous winners of the George Devine Award include: Edward Bond (1968), Mike Leigh (1973), Hanif Kureishi (1980), Martin McDonagh (1996), Conor McPherson, Enda Walsh (1997), Rebecca Gilman, Mark O’Rowe (1999), Gary Owen (2002), Lucy Prebble (2004), Alexandra Wood (2007), Hassan Abdulrazzak (2008), Nick Payne (2009) and Vivienne Franzmann (2010).

Penelope was part of Paines Plough and Channel 4′s Future Perfect project and is writing a play for our upcoming Roundabout season, a collaboration with Sheffield Theatres.

Huge congratulations to Penelope from all at PP.