Central Supports International Online Theatre Festival
Central is proud to support the launch of the second annual International Online Theatre Festival, an online theatre festival showcasing the work of diverse global artists and hosted digitally by The Theatre Times.
The theme of the 2020 International Online Theatre Festival is ‘in a world where you can be anything…’ and it aims to create an online space that blurs geographical boundaries, rejects simplifications about borders and national identities and brings us together as a community to think about what it means to be human.
All productions are free to watch from anywhere in the world.
Celebrating theatre-making from across the world, the Festival presents 25 different productions and films from a range of international companies including Schaubühne, Stanislavsky Electrotheatre, Reckless Sleepers, and English Touring Theatre. Iconic productions to be screened include Enemy of the People (dir. Thomas Ostermeier), (A)pollonia (dir. Krzysztof Warlikowski), and Lenin (dir. Milo Rau).
Creating a digital place for exploring multiple definitions of theatrical space, audiences can see a range of work from global artists and companies, as well as renowned filmmakers who have turned to theatre as a mode through which to explore process, craftmanship and performativity. Alongside the productions and performances, The Theatre Times’ videoconferencing chat rooms offer a series of talks and online events related to the screenings.
Featured in the 2020 line up is ‘Home Makers’, a non-traditional theatre collaborative work by BBC and AHRC New Generation Thinker and Central’s British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow Dr Ella Parry-Davies, working alongside migrant and domestic care workers in Lebanon and the UK: Sara, Rose, Dara, Ann, Lina, Espoir, Alehandro, Amara, Lu, Helen and Alexandra.
‘Home Makers’ is described as:
Combining elements of performance, storytelling and applied theatre, these soundwalks invite us to visit different places or just to close our eyes and let ourselves be guided by the voices of the migrant domestic and care workers, who encourage us to reflect on the power of a voice and a story coming from the heart. Home Makers leads us to rethink our definition of theatrical space and, perhaps, the limits of performance and the paradox of presence in absence. The voices in Home Makers seem to ask us: In a world where you can be anything, can you be aware of unheard stories and acknowledge the steps of those who stood in this place before you?
The Festival was curated by co-Artistic Directors Alma Prelec and Gabriel Vivas-Martinez (doctoral candidates at Central), and Xunnan Li (doctoral candidate at Royal Holloway). Central’s Director of Research, Professor Maria Delgado, is the Festival’s Executive Director.
The International Online Theatre Festival runs through 15 May.
