Our Creative Development Officer talks about a recent project...

Hello,

My name’s Amy and I work as the Creative Development Officer in our Education and Outreach department.  I have been working with our Outreach Officer, Carly, on a creative project for a group of young people who do not usually have the opportunity to attend the theatre.

We worked in partnership with Nacro, a crime reduction charity, to arrange for a group of young people to get involved in theatre, many of whom are homeless and not in formal education, employment or training.

It’s rare that we get to bring groups like this into the Coliseum, but with support from the Big Lottery’s Young People’s Fund, we have been able to offer an access fund to cover the cost of lunch, transport and resources. This is so important.  For this type of group, if support isn't available, these aspects can become real barriers to taking part.  The support from the Big Lottery and from Nacro staff meant the group could come to the theatre each session to work in our studio space, where professional actors are usually in rehearsal.  This made the project feel really special for participants and staff alike.

We began the project with a fun series of creative games and exercises, to help participants relax and get to know each other, before moving on to develop characters and storylines.  It’s really important at the start of this type of project for group members to have fun and feel like they are achieving something straight away.  They grew in confidence during these first few sessions, learning that they could take part, create, and have fun doing it!

We then started to explore possible themes for the project.  The group decided that homelessness was the common topic that united them all and chose to focus on this.  They wanted to challenge stereotypes of homelessness through the project, and were given the chance to perform their work as part of the Coliseum Open Day on Saturday 2nd July 2011.  This opportunity, although daunting for some members of the group, gave us a positive goal to aim towards and the motivation to produce something that would both entertain and challenge the audience.

With this in mind, participants set about making comedy sketches and writing rap music about their experiences of homelessness.  They wanted to challenge negative ideas of homeless people by demonstrating their own creativity and sense of fun.  Group members also worked in partnership with Square 1 Recording Studio and Training Academy to create a track to accompany their performance.

Participants had a lot to deal with on the day of the performance at the Coliseum’s Open Day and generally coped really well under pressure.  They performed their piece to 60 people, many of whom made the point of congratulating them afterwards.  We were so proud of what they achieved, as were Nacro staff.  The group went on to enjoy the rest of the Open Day, getting their faces painted and having a go at learning circus skills!

We are so pleased with the impact that this project has had for members of the group.  Although it has been very demanding, they have been really engaged and positive about their experiences.  Each individual feels that they have developed transferable skills to take away from the project and many have been surprised by how much they’ve enjoyed doing drama!  We’ve learned a lot from them as well.

We are now working with participants to develop their CVs and to complete their Bronze Arts Award portfolios, so they can hopefully top off their achievements with a nationally-recognised level 1 qualification at the end of it all. 

Here are a few quotes from the participants:
“The production was aimed to relieve the negative stigma attached to youth and homelessness. Even if the audience didn’t understand what we were trying to get across, we all still had fun.”

“I’ve learned that I can take part in things.”

“Thank you so much for putting up with our antics!”

“I would love to do performance art again.”

More than meets the eye...

Did you know that on top of the eight main house shows we produce at the Coliseum we also host a variety of other community events during the year? Opportunities are available to everyone, from children to the over 60s, to showcase their work on our stage. A majority of these happen during the summer once our season has come to a close. We have supported this type of work for many years and will continue to do so for years to come.

Last week the theatre was awash with nearly 300 children from local primary schools who had been working on a Shakespeare for Schools project over the last term. The name Shakespeare can be a little daunting – especially at school – but this was a fantastic way to introduce young people to his work. Nine schools were involved altogether and the children performed extracts from the Bard’s best known plays on the main stage to an audience of family and friends. The corridors were echoing with the sounds of “Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou Romeo?”

On Monday we hosted A Celebration of Dance where secondary schools showcased their work that they have been rehearsing all term. The show was a mix of different dance styles; tap, jazz and street led by Laura Mulholland who choreographed the spectacular dance sequence in Totally Over You  - the youth show that kicked off our spring/summer season. Many of the kids involved would never have thought they’d get the chance to perform on the main stage at a professional theatre.

Dance sequence from Totally Over You

Tuesday saw the return of the totally unique over 60s Silver Stars talent show organised by Age Concern. I was on the judging panel again trying to pick a winner from the singers, dancers and musicians. I really look forward to it because there’s always such a great atmosphere in the auditorium and our staff love popping in and seeing who’s on stage.

Tonight we have Judith Barker’s Imagination – a showcase of the fantastic work being produced at her self-named drama school. Judith has a long history with the Coliseum and is a friend of the theatre; she appeared on stage for several years when we had a resident company of actors alongside her husband Kenneth Alan Taylor. We’re always delighted to welcome her back and support her talented pupils one of whom did a brilliant turn in Brassed Off in 2008.  

Next week sees the return of Oldham Theatre Workshop in their annual summer slot. We have a long association with OTW and I always look forward to seeing their show. This year it’s Prom! The Musical set on the night of a school prom (surprisingly enough) where things don’t run smoothly…

As you can see, there is a vast range of activity that goes on at the Coliseum besides the plays we produce. We regularly welcome amateur companies to perform during our season and also have a wide range of drama groups that also get the chance to perform their work here. It’s really important element of what we offer the local community.

See you at the theatre,

Kevin Shaw

Artistic Director

Sizing Up Saucy Sarah

The lovely ladies in our wardrobe department are putting together the first stages to one of the pantomime dame costumes for Dick Whittington. Saucy Sarah (that’s the pantomime dame not one of the wardrobe ladies) is to be dressed as a portion of fish and chips. The cast don’t start with us for some time yet so they were on the lookout for a stand-in (a victim basically).

I’m roughly the same size and height as Fine Time Fontayne so got roped in for a basic try on of the costume. What could be more normal for a slightly overcast Wednesday afternoon at work? On goes the padding to bulk me up to resemble Saucy Sarah’s voluptuous dimensions, that in its self is quite a weird experience and although on a diet I was pleased that I still needed the padding.

Then we add the prop costume - it’s going to look amazing. Celia, our designer, was there to oversee proceedings even at this early stage and it’s looking like we are going to have yet another visual feast ahead of us. The prop chips have been made, they're huge and covered in sparkly gold lamé. Already I can predict jokes, maybe something like “people round here have a real chip on their shoulder” etc etc. Oh the joy of panto and its only 18 weeks till it opens.

As it turns out I quite like dressing up anyways… happy days.

Jonno

Deputy Stage Manager

This week's news from the Coliseum...

This week has all been about casting. We’ve held two sets of auditions, for two very different productions.

First up was Deathrap – Ira Levin’s chilling comedy. We have five characters to cast and it’s an interesting challenge to find actors that can work together creating entirely truthful characters. It is essential that the audience believe in the situation for the thrills to work. We’ve seen about 6 or 7 people for each part from hundreds of suggestions. They read extracts of the play and it’s nothing like what you see on X-Factor of Britain’s Got Talent; I try and get the best out of each auditionee by making them feel calm and confident. I want them to leave thinking “that’s the best I could have done”.

So far we’ve managed to cast the terrific Stephen Pinder as playwright Sidney Bruhl. You may remember Stephen from his appearance in the 2010 production of Absent Friends as well as his time in Brookside as Max Farnham. Helen Kay, who appeared in both One for the Road and Absurd Person Singular here, will play his wife Myra Bruhl.

We also held auditions for Dick Whittington. We’ve already cast a couple of parts; Fine Time Fontayne and Richard J Fletcher are returning to the Coliseum reuniting a fantastic double act. Their comic timing is faultless and they both bring buckets of experience with them. Fine Time has been working in panto for many years as a performer, writer and director and Richard was trained in physical theatre which he superbly shows off on stage mastering the prat falls and slap stick routines. We have a few more characters left to fill and we saw a great range of actors yesterday. I can also confirm that we have the brilliant Andonis Anthony returning to play evil King Rat.

Richard Fletcher in Sleeping Beauty last year

Auditions for the chorus will be on Sunday 18 September. This is a great experience for young girls to get involved in a professional production. Hundreds apply each year so not everyone will get in. In fact, last year a girl was cast having unsuccessfully auditioned for the previous five years. She went away, worked hard to improve and appeared in Sleeping Beauty. Each year the teams rise to the occasion and add a huge amount to the show. It’s fantastic to see them interacting with the professional cast and learning from them.

It might be July but we’re already in panto mode over here at the Coliseum.

See you at the theatre.

Kevin Shaw
Artistic Director

This week's news from the Coliseum...

Our Open Day on Saturday was a huge success (pics in blog below) – if you came along I do hope you made the most of all the exciting activities we put on throughout the day. Hopefully the day will have given you all a real insight into all that goes into to putting a production on the stage at the Coliseum.

As we draw to the end of our spring summer season we have had quite a few events in our small studio space. One of these was by our weekly performance group ActingLAB who have been working with previously unperformed scripts and produced them for the first time last night. The group work incredibly hard over three terms to prepare for this final performance. I managed to grab a seat last night to see the emerging performers showcase the plays and it’s great to see how well the group work together put on a an engaging production.

Elsewhere, Carly and Amy from our education and outreach department have been working with an organisation called Nacro, a crime reduction charity. They arranged for a group of young people accessing Nacro services to take part in a project at the Coliseum over the last few weeks. Many of the participants are homeless or accessing temporary accommodation. The project aims to encourage the individuals to learn from each other and their different experiences, supporting them to develop communication, problem-solving and team-working skills.

They have been working with image theatre which is a really simple way to present ideas by striking a pose that represents a certain feeling or character. It works especially well with participants who might be nervous about expressing themselves. Using this technique the group challenged stereotypes of young homeless people and authority figures and from that the project took off. They developed comedy sketches and writing rap music about their experiences of homelessness and presented a mini performance piece on that theme at the Open Day last Saturday.

This weekend is the Mela; live music, street dancing, fun fair and puppets - should be a great day out! The Coliseum team will be there ready to tell you all about our big move and the new season. They’ll be joined by members of Rifco Arts who are bringing the glittering Britain’s Got Bangra to the theatre in November.

Another date for the diary this weekend; Saturday is the last performance of A Fine Bright Day Today and the last Coliseum production of the season. Make sure you catch it before it’s too late.

See you at the theatre.

Kevin Shaw
Artistic Director

Open Day – What a success!

We exclusively opened our backstage doors to the public on Saturday and, boy, did they make the most of it! People were waiting to get in before 10:00am to take a look round all the fantastic activities on offer during the day.

We've had nothing but positive feedback so thank you all for coming.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words so I'll just let them do the talking...

This week's news from the Coliseum...

In the last couple of weeks we’ve had the world premiere of A Fine Bright Day Today, announced our new season, popped up at the Oldham Carnival, I even looked over the first sketches of the costumes and set model for Dick Whittington (it’s June!).

I’ve been dying to talk about the new season, it’s great to finally get the new season announced. We know what the programme is months before season launch but we have to keep our lips. Now we can get all the information about the fantastic productions up on our website for you to look at.

After panto we’re temporarily moving out of the building due to it needing essential refurbishment. We’ll be producing Alan Ayckbourn’s hilarious Taking Steps at the Grange Arts Centre in February 2012 which is near Oldham College on Rochdale Road. The space seats 336 people, so it will feel the same size as the Coliseum but they’ll be an entirely different and exciting experience for audiences as it’s set in the round with the audience seated on all four sides of the stage.

While we’re operating away from Fairbottom Street you can still reach our box office on 0161 624 2829 or at boxoffice@coliseum.org.uk and we’ll find a venue in the town centre where you can pick up your tickets.



I’m thrilled with the reception of our current production A Fine Bright Day Today. There’s a great sense of achievement not just for me but for the whole company when a show gets such rave reviews from The Guardian, M.E.N. and the Chronicle. The audience also love it – there have been regular standing ovations which is a huge stamp of approval. If you haven’t seen it yet, there’s still another week to go.

In the meantime we’re knee deep in Coliseum t-shirts, pens, coasters, bags and balloons ready for Saturday’s Open Day. You’ll get a chance to walk behind the scenes of A Fine Bright Day Today, take a look at the set models and compare them to the real thing on our stage. Easy to read maps of where all the activities are taking place are being printed, the final rehearsals for our drama groups are happening as I type, the bar staff are getting their stirrers, shakers and straws ready for cocktail making and - most importantly - the glitter has been delivered ready to be used on the fairy rainbow wands that you can make on the day.

See you at the theatre.

Kevin Shaw
Artistic Director