This week's news from the Coliseum...

We’re approaching the half-way point of the refurbishment of the theatre. The contractors have been keeping us updated about how it’s all going and all is on schedule for our return in September. When we were first planning how the company could operate around the refurbishment works it became clear fairly quickly that we simply would not have been able to present plays in the Fairbottom Street venue while the building work took place.

We could have skipped a season and not produced any plays while the refurbishment took place but we decided against that. We were determined to continue to programme shows for our audience and it also gave us the unique opportunity to try out new things and experiment.

For example; The Hound of the Baskervilles has been our largest national tour to date – something we’ve not done before – and the use of imitating the dog’s breath taking video projections in the production was also a first for us. We’ve also been able to programme productions that are specific to in-the-round staging which is the configuration at the Grange Arts Centre where we are performing a majority of our spring/summer season. Anyone who came to see Taking Steps will understand why that play benefits from having the audience on all four sides of the stage.

One of the most exciting projects of the season will be our open-air production in Alexandra Park where we’ll be staging a brand new adaptation of Romeo and Juliet - Star-Cross’d - in the summer as a finale to our time out of the building. Producing an open-air play has been a personal aspiration of mine for years and while we were looking for new venues the park was mentioned and it seemed like the ideal opportunity to finally realise the idea.

The refurbishment has also given the Coliseum the chance to create new partnerships with organisations across the borough, especially with Oldham Theatre Workshop, the Oldham Library and Gallery and Oldham Council’s Arts and Events team.

Working on split sites across Oldham has taken a bit of getting used to. It’s a bit odd not to have the rehearsal room just down stairs from my office or the auditorium and box office in the same building. But this is a very minor thing in what is turning out to be a very exciting season. We took a calculated risk when we decided to programme a season while the building was being refurbished but so far everything we have experimented with has been a success and will influence the way we do things in the future.

See you out and about.

Kevin Shaw
Artistic Director