Productions
SUMMER 2012 DATES
(More TBA)
20 & 22 MAY - MIDNIGHT AT THE BOAR’S HEAD
The Hurly Burly, Brighton Fringe 2012
Scroll down for full details.
The Hurly Burly (Family Fringe) Website
20 MAY - FINE CHISEL ‘LAZY SUNDAY’ & EVENING ‘ROUND-UP’
The Hurly Burly, Brighton Fringe 2012
FREE live music, poetry, storytelling and more before our Sunday shows in Brighton, curated by Fine Chisel. And finish the night with a good old knees up, Shakespeare style! Featuring the Fine Chisel band and guest artists from across the festival.
The Hurly Burly (Family Fringe) Website
23 MAY - ‘DEVISING SHAKESPEARE‘ PUBLIC WORKSHOP
The Hurly Burly, Brighton Fringe 2012
Tom Spencer leads an on-your-feet workshop looking at devising with Shakespeare’s text. more information here.
The Hurly Burly (Family Fringe) Website
5 & 6 JULY - FINE CHISEL BAND @ RSC OPEN STAGES
Sherman Cymru, Cardiff
FREE live music from the Fine Chisel band in the foyer of the Sherman before and after the Royal Shakespeare Company Open Stages events. Shakespeare’s lyrics set to all-original, foot-stomping folk music.
3 - 27 AUGUST - FINE CHISEL EDINBURGH SEASON
ZOO VENUES, Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2012
Full listings of our biggest ever Edinburgh season to be announced very soon.
Midnight at the Boar’s Head
FINE CHISEL present
A SHAKESPEARE UNPLUGGED Commission
20 & 22 MAY 2012
THE HURLY BURLY, BRIGHTON FRINGE
Originally produced by the egg at Theatre Royal Bath.
Join us for an evening of foot-stomping, folk-fuelled storytelling, with handmade puppets and live music.
Fine Chisel breathe life into an eclectic collection of often-overlooked characters plucked from the Complete Works. Armed with nothing more than a handful of acoustic instruments, our actor-musicians dive headlong into the world of the nation’s favourite playwright.
On Sunday 20 May, Fine Chisel are hosting a whole day of performance at the Hurly Burly, the most exciting new venue at the Brighton Fringe. During the afternoon there will be free live music, poetry and comedy. There will also be delicious food available from the Hurly Burly Cafe. After our evening shows, the Fine Chisel band will invite our favourite acts from the day and across the festival to join us for a folkin’ fantastic final knees-up.
**** ‘A charming, witty and ridiculously entertaining piece of theatre’ (Fringe Guru on ‘4.3 Miles from Nowhere’)
***** ‘Every so often… the [Edinburgh] Festival unearths a little gem and this piece sparkles as brightly as any I’ve seen’ (Broadway Baby on ‘Firing Blanks’)
A few words from egg theatre Artistic Director Kate Cross: ‘ Fine Chisel added a touch of class to the Shakespeare Unplugged Festival. Quite apart from their faultless ability to compose and perform foot-tapping, bottom-wigglingly good music, the seamless weaving of that with extracts from Shakespeare’s plays into something of a new artform crept up pleasingly on one: non-derivative but utterly distinct. Catching - very catching indeed.’
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FIRING BLANKS
Having a baby is complicated.
It’s even tougher when you need another man’s sperm.
Richard finds an unlikely therapist in the form of Kate, a quiet but fierce witted teenage girl, alone on a park bench. Always touching and often funny, Firing Blanks is a fresh and compelling new play about donor conception (and ducks). The gentle strumming of a solo busker wafts over the park as two people tell their intimate stories, his music guiding the action between the real world and fantasies of what the future might bring.
Firing Blanks was written in light of conversations with individuals and families (including the writer’s own, he was donor conceived himself) who have faced issues surrounding assisted reproduction, with the full support of the national Donor Conception Network. The play is a bold and timely exploration of under-discussed common fears and big questions. What exactly makes a man a man, and a potential father?
NEW DATES TO BE ANNOUNCED FOR 2012
***** (FIVE STARS) Broadway Baby
‘Every so often… the Festival unearths a little gem and this piece sparkles as brightly as any I’ve seen.’
‘Tom Spencer’s short, new script is perfectly paced under his own direction and both actors, Robin McLoughlin and Holly Beasley-Garrigan are superb’
‘See this play… see how simply, if you have the talent, you can make people laugh and cry. And think.’
***** (FIVE STARS) AllTheFestivals.com
‘a poignant, affecting work… shot through with moments of humour and sensitivity… the performances in this play are simply outstanding’
**** (FOUR STARS) Venue Magazine
‘deceptively simple, beautifully written and tightly acted… Tom Spencer’s script is by turns witty and poignant, and the two actors have a preternatural chemistry’