A Three Course Meal of Theatrical Fresh Meat

A Three Course Meal of Theatrical Fresh Meat

Le Petit Workshop, Refiner’s Fire and Nikki Bennett and Company present

The Feast

The Soldiers Heart and the Feathered Girl/halfatasi/

The Clown That Ran Away from the Circus

Auckland audiences hungry for something fresh, delectable and above all else, interesting will find their appetite satisfied from October 15th. Playing at The Basement Theatre, The Feast serves up a three-course meal of tantalizing new trends in the theatre world.

Across five nights, emerging theatre makers Le Petit Workshop, Refiner’s Fire and Nikki Bennett and Company offer up metaphorical dishes rich with puppetry, Pacific theatre and delightful clowning. Having gone through Red Leap Theatre’s Incubator programme, these three talented groups were nurtured and selected to go forward to the company’s Short Works series, performing work-in-progresses to an audience of theatre professionals in April of this year. The Feast is the culmination of two processes of development – idea generation and audience feedback.

This third and final stage of development (“cooking”) sees a professional season available to the general public. If the programming wasn’t enough to entice theatre-goers, for two nights The Basement plan to offer an actual three-course meal, with each theatre company designing a dish tailored for their show and cooked by POPdining (www.popdining.com).

Le Petit Workshop’s The Soldier’s Heart and The Feathered Girl explores a collection of folk tales written by the company, centred on the journey of a girl born covered in feathers. Visually stunning, combining folklore with a profusion of 3D and shadow puppetry, The Soldier’s Heart and The Feathered Girl is a sweet and sour love story, garnished with authentic originality.

Halfatasi, served by Refiner’s Fire, blends of European theatrical tradition with Samoan movement, song and culture – with a side of history and drizzled with identity and crisis. The work explores what it means to be born into two cultures and the conflicts that arise while living a double identity. The clash of Europe and Pasifika creates what can only be described as a “mouth-wateringly fresh theatrical voice.”

The final course comes in the form of Nikki Bennett and Company’s The Clowns That Ran Away From The Circus; a tale of a delightfully naïve clown who runs away from the circus to explore the big and often terrifying city. Immersed in the marinade of childish play, bouffon, large and small-scale props, projection and mask, these diverse flavours spark with elements of surprise - finishing off the night with great satisfaction.

The structure of The Feast event has been influenced by traditional practices of a Samoan banquet.Opening and closing with the traditional Samoan formality of speech and song, the audience will be both metaphorically and literally fed by their theatre company hosts. Every night aselection of “treats” that reference the theatrical themes and motifs of theprevious show will be offeredbetween each performance.

The Feast presents the best of Auckland’s emerging creative minds and gives audiences a chance to see what is the very best in new trends within the theatre world.

THE SOLDIER’S HEART AND THE FEATHERED GIRL features: Ella Becroft, Ash Jones, Katrina Wesseling, Alisha Lawrie Paul

HALFATASI features: Antonia Stehlin, Seidah Tuaoi, Mele Taeiloa, Lavinia Uhila

THE CLOWNS THAT RAN AWAY FROM THE CIRCUS features: Nikki Bennett, Robert Mignault

THE FEAST plays:

15th – 19th October 2013, 7:30pm
The Basement Theatre, Lower Greys Avenue
Tickets: $25:00 (POPdining nights - $50 including a three course meal)
Bookings: www.iticket.co.nz or 0508 ITICKET

ENDS

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