THE Guardian’s fourth best comedy show of 2019, Max & Ivan’s
Commitment, will play Selby Town Hall on February 7.
“I’m delighted that Selby is the only Yorkshire date on their UK tour
and am genuinely very excited to see the show in our little venue,” says Chris
Jones, Selby Town Council’s arts officer.
“It’s one of the most talked-about comedy shows of last year, receiving a
slew of four and five-star reviews for its Edinburgh Fringe debut, and an agent
for an entirely different comedian told me last week that it was one of the
best things she’d seen…and that doesn’t happen very often.”
Performed by comedy duo Max Olesker and Ivan Gonzalez, Commitment is the
true story of how Max, as Ivan’s Best Man, attempted to reunite Ivan’s teenage
band – Voodoo 7:2, the premier “art rock post-punk funk” group in mid-Noughties
Liverpool – for one final gig.
“It’s a show about dreaming big, growing up, and trying – but ultimately
very much failing – to make it in the band,” says Chris.
“Directed by multiple Edinburgh Comedy Award nominee Kieran Hodgson, it melds
fast-paced visuals – including a wealth of embarrassing adolescent photos – with
razor-sharp gag writing, classic double-act dynamics and a smattering of
virtuoso multi-character performances.
“At its heart, the show is a storytelling hour about Max & Ivan’s
real-life friendship and the lengths Max will go to in order to pull off the
best night of Ivan’s life.”
Olesker and Gonzalez have performed at the Melbourne International
Comedy Festival; the SXSW (South By Southwest) festival in Austin, Texas; UCB
Sunset in Los Angeles and Brooklyn’s Union Hall in New York, as well as touring
throughout Britain.
Among their past work is the super-show The Wrestling, where the world’s
best comedians step into the ring and wrestle alongside enormous professional
wrestlers in Edinburgh and Melbourne.
At last year’s Edinburgh Fringe, they debuted Max & Ivan’s Prom
Night, an anarchic, interactive, 1950s’ high-school prom show-cum-party, to a
sell-out, thousand-strong crowd in Assembly High, a purpose-designed location.
Max & Ivan created, wrote and starred in the BBC Radio 4 sitcom The
Casebook Of Max & Ivan, attracting such guest stars as Matt Lucas, June
Whitfield, Reece Shearsmith and Jessica Hynes, as well as appearing in BBC Two comedy
W1A as Ben and Jerry.
“Max & Ivan’s Commitment tour is one of The Times’s picks of 2020,”
says Chris. “I’m aware that Max & Ivan are not yet household names, but I would
love as many people as possible to catch this 8pm show.”
Tickets cost £14 on 01757 708449 or at selbytownhall.co.uk or £16 on the door from 7.30pm.
Cosmic Collective Theatre’s Anna Soden, Joe Feeney, Lewes Roberts and Kate Cresswell in Heaven’s Gate
FOUR cups of Apple Sauce. Four
canvas camp beds. One Comet. Heaven’s Gate is closing
and the Away Team are ready for Graduation, but whatever you do,
don’t say the C-word. Cult.
Premiered by the new York company Cosmic
Collective Theatre at last summer’s Great Yorkshire Fringe in York, the
55-minute Heaven’s Gate opens its debut Yorkshire tour at Harrogate Theatre’s
Studio Theatre tonight.
Written by company co-founder Joe Feeney, this intergalactic pitch-black comedy imagines the final hour of four fictionalised members of the real-life UFO-theistic group, Heaven’s Gate.
“As they prepare for their ‘Graduation’
to the ‘Kingdom of Heaven’, initially the excitement is palpable,
but soon the cracks start to appear,” says Joe, an alumnus of York
Theatre Royal Youth, along with fellow cast member Anna Soden.
Cosmic Collective Theatre, who enjoyed
a sold-out run at the Drayton Arms Theatre, London, after the York
premiere, will follow up today and tomorrow’s 8pm Harrogate performances with shows
at The Carriageworks, Leeds, on February 5 and 6 at 7.30pm; York Theatre
Royal Studio, February 7, 7.45pm; Hull Truck Theatre Studio, February 14, 8pm, and Slung Low at Holbeck Theatre, Leeds,
February 16, 5pm.
They will be playing York Theatre Royal as part of the Visionari Studio Discoveries festival, a week of shows put together by the theatre’s community programming group.
Performing there has particular resonance
for Joe and Anna. “This is incredibly special for us,” says
Joe. “I’ve been involved with York Theatre Royal for more
than 20 years. I was a Youth Theatre member for ten-plus years and have worked as crew backstage on and off since 2010.
Cosmic Collective Theatre in rehearsal for Heaven’s Gate
Soden played Fairy Poppins in this
winter’s Liverpool Everyman pantomime, Sleeping Beauty; Roberts can
be seen in BBC One’s The Tuckers; Cresswell has been treading
the London boards in Hansel And Gretel at the Royal Opera
House, Covent Garden.
Harrogate tickets are on sale on 01423 502116 or at harrogatetheatre.co.uk; Carriageworks, 0113 376 0318 or carriageworkstheatre.co.uk; York, 01904 623568 or yorktheatreroyal.co.uk; Hull, 01482 323638 or hulltruck.co.uk; The Holbeck, slunglow.org/event/heavens-gate/.
Please note: Heaven’s Gate contains references to abuse and suicide and has mild swearing. Age recommendation: 15 plus.
Loud hailer ! Alan Carr announces a third night at York Barbican
WHAT, again, Alan? Tickets have sold so quickly for Alan Carr’s first tour in four years, that Not Again, Alan!, is now, Yes, Again and Again and…Again, Alan, at York Barbican.
Carr, ever-chatty son of former York City footballer Graham Carr,
will play three successive Christmas nights in York, newly adding December 17
to December 18 and 19.
Tickets areon sale on
0203 356 5441, at yorkbarbican.co.uk or in person from the Barbican box office.
Since his
last comedy travels, chat-show host Carr has “managed to find himself in all
sorts of dramas”, apparently. Such as? “Between his star-studded wedding day
and becoming an accidental anarchist, from fearing for his life at border
control to becoming a reluctant farmer, three words spring to mind…Not again,
Alan!” says his tour publicity. “Join Alan on tour as he muses upon the things
that make his life weird and wonderful.”
Carr pile-up: Alan Carr to play York Barbican again and again and again
Not Again,
Alan! will be Carr’s fourth UK solo show in four-year cycles in the wake of
Yap, Yap, Yap’s 200 dates in 2015 and 2016, Spexy Beast in 2011 and Tooth Fairy
in 2007. He last brought his chat, chat, chat to York on the Yap, Yap, Yap!
itinerary on July 11 2015 at the Barbican.
Later this year, Carr will host Alan Carr’s Epic Gameshow on ITV, wherein five all-time favourite game shows will be supersized and reinvigorated for a new audience: Play Your Cards Right, Take Your Pick, Strike It Lucky, Bullseye and The Price Is Right. In 2020 too, Carr will return to the judges’ panel on the second BBC series of RuPaul’s DragRace UK.
Re-cycling a familiar French adventure: Le Navet Bete in The Three Musketeers. Picture: Mark Dawson
AFTER Dracula: The Bloody Truth and
Dick Tracy, travelling players Le Navet Bete come armed only with a baguette and
a questionable steed on their latest adventure.
The award-winning Essex physical comedy
troupe ride into York Theatre Royal on February 7 and 8 with The Three
Musketeers: A Comedy Adventure.
The main-house stage transforms into
the French countryside as hot-headed D’Artagnan travels to Paris full of
childish excitement and misplaced bravado to become a Musketeer. Will things go to plan? Unlikely, but at least this
chaotic caper will be in the hands of four actors wholly assured in taking on
more than 30 character portrayals.
“Sorry, I’m tied up for February 7 and 8 already. I’ll be at York Theatre Royal”. Picture: Matt Austin
Billed as their biggest and most
riotous show to date, The Three Musketeers: A Comedy Adventure is the sixth
time Le Navet Bete have worked with comedy director John Nicholson, co-artistic
director of Peepolykus and regular comedy writer for television and radio.
“This time we’ve collaborated on a
comedy version of Alexander Dumas’s classic French tale, turning it on its head,”
say Le Navet Bete, who have worked on the show with choreographer Lea Anderson
and set designer Ti Green too. “Expect all the main characters from the book,
but in ways you wouldn’t expect to see them,” they tease.
Le Navet Bete and Exeter Northcott Theatre present The Three Musketeers: A Comedy Adventure, York Theatre Royal, February 7 and 8, 7.30pm and 2.30pm Saturday matinee. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk. Suitable for age seven upwards.
Five Minutes in the 1980s, when they were four, before they became six, although they were never five! From left to right: Nigel Dennis, Sean Rochester, Mark Pearson and Chris Turnbull. Matthew “Duck” Hardy and Paul Shelbourne joined later.
A BAND called Five Minutes had their 15 minutes in York in the late 1980s. Now they are re-uniting for a one-off gig at the Victoria Vaults, in Nunnery Lane, on February 29.
The reason? “The singer and youngest member of the band still living here will be the last of us to turn 50 in February and in his words, ‘Let’s do it before one of us dies’,” reveals trumpet player Matthew “Duck” Hardy, now 50 and a professional musician.
“Our last gig was in January 1989 and most of us haven’t seen each other for 30 years. Now we want to get as many people from York’s late ‘80s music scene down to the gig for a huge reunion.”
In the soul and funk line-up on February 29 will be Hardy; business development manager Chris Turnbull, newly turned 50 next month, on vocals and guitar; IT consultant Sean Rochester, 53, on bass; cinema owner Nigel Dennis, 52, on drums, and retired police officer turned Criminology MSc mature student Mark Pearson, 52, on saxophone.
Not there, but there by the wonder of a video link, will be ex-pat trombonist and urban dog trainer Paul Shelbourne, 49, from his home in Brisbane.
“We’ll be playing original, danceable, driving Northern Soul-esque music with hard- hitting catchy brass riffs and a couple of covers thrown in near the end,” says Matthew, .introducing a set list featuring The Party; Smile; Sequels; Merry-go-round; Bridge In Time; Happy Home; Casanova; Could It Be; This Innocent Kiss; Only A Fool; Soul On Fire; Cornflake Packet; Time Will Tell; B Derdela; All The Daughters and Heatwave.
Back in their day, Five Minutes played York Arts Centre and Harry’s Bar, in Micklegate; Temple Hall, York campus of the College of Ripon and York St John; Central Hall, University of York; the Gimcrack pub (now flats), in Fulford Road, and Bretton Hall (now the Yorkshire Sculpture Park), near Wakefield.
Come February 29, Five Minutes will be back in action for rather more than five minutes, preceded by a DJ set by Rocky from Sweatbox, but why were/are they called Five Minutes?
“I’ve absolutely no idea why, as it started off as a four-piece and ended up as a six-piece!” says Matthew. “When Paul joined, the Evening Press photographer took a photo of us in the courtyard of Ye Olde Starre Inn, on Stonegate, and the paper did a write-up under the headline ‘Six appeal for Five Minutes’.”
What’s in a name?
Five Minutes start their set or encore with the instrumental B Derdela, so named after saxophonist Mark Pearson asked how singer Chris Turnbull wanted him to play the sax line. Chris gave him the note and the rhythm: B…derdela!
Barrie Rutter after receiving his OBE on June 25 2015 at Buckingham Palace. Picture: Nobby Clark
BARRIE Rutter, award-winning Yorkshire actor, director and founder of Northern Broadsides, has been diagnosed with throat cancer.
In an official statement, 73-year-old Rutter is “in the good care of the mighty NHS and will begin his treatment very shortly”.
Born in 1946, the son of a Hull fish
worker, Rutter grew up in a two-up, two-down in the fish dock area of
Hull.
Barrie Rutter as Lear in King Lear in 2015. Picture: Nobby Clark
At school, an English teacher
frogmarched him into the school play because he had “the gob for it”, and
feeling at home on stage, Rutter chose his future direction.
There followed many years in the National Youth Theatre, culminating in The Apprentices, with a role written specially for him by Peter Terson: a practice to be repeated later in his career.
Seasons at the Royal Shakespeare
Company in Stratford, London and Europe completed the 1970s. In 1980, he joined
the National Theatre, a formative period when he met and worked closely with a
poet who was to become his guru, Leeds writer Tony Harrison.
Rutter performed in three of
Harrison’s adaptations, all written for the Northern voice: The Mysteries, The
Oresteia, and The Trackers Of Oxyrhynchus, wherein he played Silenus, a part
penned for Rutter.
Barrie Rutter as flash banker Fuller in Northern Broadsides’ For Love Or Money in 2017. Picture: Nobby Clark
This experience was the spark for actor-manager Rutter setting up Northern Broadsides in 1992, the Halifax company noted for bringing the northern voice, song and clog dancing to Shakespeare, classical theatre and new works alike.
Frustrated by what he perceived to be
inadequate Arts Council funding for Broadsides, he stepped down from the artistic director’s post in
April 2018. By then he had received the OBE for services to drama in 2015.
He last appeared on the York Theatre Royal stage in November 2017, when the quizzically eye-browed Rutter was at his most Rutter in his farewell Broadsides tour, For Love Or Money, a typically anarchic theatrical double act with Blake Morrison.
YORK’S
grand old dame, Berwick Kaler, is back in panto. Oh yes, he is.
At York
Theatre Royal, his “beloved home” for 41 years? Oh, no he isn’t.
Dame
Berwick is switching to the other side, the Grand Opera House, to become the
Grand’s old dame. What’s more, he will be bringing the rest of the Not Famous
But Famous In York Five along for the ride in Dick Turpin Rides Again: villain
David Leonard; sidekick stooge Martin Barrass; ageless principal girl Suzy
Cooper and luverly Brummie A J Powell.
Tickets for the December 12 to January 10 run will go on general sale on February 14, Valentine’s Day, when fans can have a love-in with Dame Berwick in the box office, when he sells the first tickets at 10am.
A delighted Kaler
says: “Qdos Entertainment have come to the rescue of the most lauded pantomime
in the country, having found us a new home at the Grand Opera House in our
beloved City of York.
“To make this a success we need
you – the most articulate and loyal audience in the entire country. We can go
forth with a management that believes we have enhanced the reputation of a
local pantomime that has caught the imagination of young and old, from all
walks of life.”
Qdos Entertainment’s managing director Michael Harrison enthuses: “We are absolutely delighted to be embarking on an all-new pantomime partnership with our colleagues at the Ambassador Theatre Group, Grand Opera House and, of course, Berwick and the gang.
“Berwick is an undeniable master in the world of pantomime, with his own inimitable style and approach and we are delighted to be working closely with him and the cast to bring back the magic for which they are best known.”
Kaler, 73, retired from playing the Theatre Royal’s dame after 40 years last February, but has signed a three-year contract with Qdos Entertainment, the pantomime powerhouse of British theatre, who are taking over the Grand Opera House panto from Three Bears Productions from Winter 2020.
Dame
Berwick will write and direct the show, as well as pulling on his trademark big
boots, unruly wig and spectacular frocks again, after regretting his decision
to retire, breaking his run as Britain’s longest-running dame, from the moment
he announced it.
Fully
recovered from his double heart bypass in the summer of 2018, It was a
sentiment he repeated regularly, not least on the last night of The Grand Old Dame
Of York on February 2 last year, saying he “would be back like a shot” if
asked.
Now the veteran dame does return, but across the city, where he has chosen Dick Turpin Rides Again for his first Grand Opera House pantomime, revisiting a show that brought him his highest ever audience figures at the Theatre Royal: 54,000 for Dick Turpin in 2008-2009.
He last appeared on the Opera House stage as fey drag artist Captain Terri Dennis in Peter Nichols’ Privates On Parade in 1996.
Kaler made
an emotional, provocative speech at the finale to last Saturday’s final night
of Sleeping Beauty, the troubled Theatre Royal pantomime he had written and
co-directed this winter, but whose progress was jolted by executive director
Tom Bird’s confirmation, with a fortnight still to run, that Dame Berwick would
not be back, as writer or director, let alone as dame.
BERWICKXIT: Berwick Kaler playing the dame in his last York Theatre Royal pantomime, The Grand Old Dame Of York, last winter. Picture: Anthony Robling
Suzy Cooper
and Kaler in The Press splash had called for the dame to return, David Leonard
later backed that campaign, while Martin Barrass addressed the audience at each
show post-announcement to say “this cast and this band” would not be returning.
A public petition was launched too.
“I’m b****y
furious,” said the dame, back on his old stamping ground, in a highly charged Saturday
atmosphere, full of cheers for Kaler and boos for new panto villain Bird.
Kaler could
not reveal “the truth”, but said Bird – or “one man” as he called him throughout
without naming him once – was “wrong” in his decision to move on to a new
creative team when the Theatre Royal pantomime “didn’t need fixing”.
“I’ll give them three days,” he said in a cryptic ultimatum that set tongues wagging that Kaler must have something up his sleeve, while Barrass rubbed his hands when reading out a letter in the shout-outs that suggested the Panto Five should move to “the Grand”.
Those three days passed, but now Dame Berwick rises again, linking up with Qdos Entertainment, whose production facilities are based in Scarborough and Beverley, 100,000 costumes et al. Billed as “the world’s biggest pantomime producer”, with 37 years behind them, they present such big-hitting pantos as the London Palladium and Newcastle Theatre Royal shows, as well as, closer to York, Hull New Theatre.
Welcoming the new partnership of Qdos and the Kaler crew, Grand Opera House theatre director Rachel Crocombe-Lane says: “Qdos bring both world-class expertise and also a Yorkshire heart, being based in Scarborough; the perfect combination together with this talented cast.
“As a venue team, pantomime is our favourite time of year because of the friendship with the company and also the joy and devotion of our audience. We are proud of these new partnerships, excited for the future of our pantomime and will be ready altogether to really blow your Christmas socks off!’
Qdos Entertainment chairman, Nick Thomas, from Scarborough, is excited too. “I am thrilled to welcome Berwick, a true Yorkshire theatre legend, to the Qdos family. Qdos Entertainment has had a long association with Yorkshire, it is my home county, and with our production and wardrobe teams based in Scarborough and Beverley, forming this new relationship with Berwick and the Grand Opera House is especially exciting.”
Meanwhile, York Theatre Royal will be launching its 2020-2021 pantomime on Monday at high noon. Rather than declaring a pantomime civil war in York, executive director Bird says: “We wish the Grand Opera House the very best of luck. As we’ve always said, we’ll be announcing our new pantomime on Monday”.
On Tuesday
this week, Bird told a City of York Council meeting that no performance of Sleeping
Beauty had sold out, save for the traditional last night pandemonium,
compounding a decline in attendances that had started 11 years ago.
He said the
Theatre Royal would “build a new pantomime for the city that to some extent doesn’t
rely on you having been to the pantomime for 30 years in order to get it”.
“I know how much affection there is
for our pantomime in the city. What’s prompted us to make this change is that
that affection isn’t necessarily translating into popularity,” he added. “It’s
with a very heavy heart that we make changes but it’s not something we can
leave.”
Tickets for Dick Turpin Rides Again will be on general sale from February 14 on 0844 871 3024, at atgtickets.com/york and in person from the Cumberland Street theatre’s box office.ATG Theatre Card holders can buy from February 11.
The Essex Tapestries: The Life of Julie Cope (2015) , by Grayson Perry, on the drawing room wall of Nunnington Hall from February 8
GRAYSON Perry will be Stitching The Past Together with
his tapestries at Nunnington Hall, near Helmsley, from February 8.
Out go the National Trust country house’s 17th century
Verdure tapestries for conservation work; in come the Essex transvestite artist,
potter, broadcaster and writer’s typically colourful and thought-provoking pair
of Essex House Tapestries: The Life of Julie Cope (2015).
Hanging in an historic setting for the first time
in the drawing room, this brace of large-scale, striking works tells the story of Julie
Cope, a fictitious Essex “everywoman” created by the irreverent Chelmsford-born
2003 Turner Prize winner.
The tapestries illustrate the key events in the heroine’s journey from
her birth during the Canvey Island floods of 1953 to her untimely death in a tragic
accident on a Colchester street.
Rich in cultural and architectural details, the tapestries contain a
social history of Essex and modern Britain that “everyone can relate to”.
These artworks represent, in Perry’s words, ‘the trials, tribulations,
celebrations and mistakes of an average life’.
In Its Familiarity Golden: a close-up of one of Grayson Perry’s Essex House Tapestries: The Life of Julie Cope (2015)
Historically, large-scale tapestry provided insulation for grand
domestic interiors. Perry, by contrast, however, has juxtaposed its
associations of status, wealth and heritage with contemporary concerns of
class, social aspiration and taste.
To write Julie’s biography, he looked to the English ballad and folktale
tradition, narrating a life that conveys the beauty, vibrancy and
contradictions of the ordinary individual.
Laura Kennedy, Nunnington Hall’s visitor experience manager, says: “It’s
extremely exciting to have The Essex House Tapestries: The Life of Julie Cope
Tapestries on the walls that would usually display the hall’s Verdure
tapestries.
“The tapestries will hang in the drawing room amongst the historic
collection, and nearby to the hall’s remaining 17th century
Flemish tapestries telling the story of Achilles.”
Laura continues: “The genuine and relatable stories told through Grayson
Perry’s artworks are a rich contrast to the demonstration of wealth and status
reflected through many historic tapestries, including our own at Nunnington Hall.
“We’ve worked closely with the Crafts Council to bring the hangings to
Nunnington and observe how these contrasting sets of tapestries are a beautiful
contradiction in design, colour palette, storytelling and manufacture,
illustrating the evolution of tapestries over the past four hundred years. It
will also be the first time that The Essex House Tapestries have been hung in a
historic setting.”
One of the Essex House Tapestries: The Life of Julie Cope (2015), by Grayson Perry
Nunnington’s three Verdure tapestries were brought to Nunnington Hall more
than 350 years ago by the 1st Viscount Preston, Richard
Graham, following his time as Charles II’s ambassador at the Court of
Versailles.
Graham was appointed by King James II as the Master of the Royal
Wardrobe because of his style and knowledge of Parisian fashions. He would have
used these tapestries to demonstrate his good taste, wealth and status in
society.
Welcoming Perry’s works to Nunnington Hall, Jonathan Wallis, curator for
the National Trust, says: “It’s great to be able to show these wonderful
tapestries at Nunnington. It continues our aim of bringing thought-provoking
art to rural Yorkshire.
“The Life of Julie Cope is a story that we can all relate to and one
which will delight, surprise and engage people. Digital devises accompany the
tapestries exploring Julie’s life experiences and the reveal much of Perry’s
inspirations.”
This is the first of two opportunities to see work by Grayson Perry in North Yorkshire in 2020. His earliest works and “lost pots” will be showcased in Grayson Perry: The Pre-Therapy Years from June 12 to September 20 at York Art Gallery’s Centre of Ceramic Art (CoCA).
The
touring exhibition, developed by the Holburne Museum in Bath, is the first to
celebrate Perry’s early forays into the art world and will re-introduce the
explosive and creative works he made between 1982 and 1994.
The 70 works have been
crowd-sourced through a national public appeal, leading to the “lost pots”
being on display together for the first time since they were made.
Cocktail Party, 1989, by Grayson Perry, on show in Grayson Perry: The Pre-Therapy Years at CoCA, York Art Gallery, from June 12
The
Pre-Therapy Years exhibition begins with Perry’s early collaged sketchbooks,
experimental films and sculptures, capturing his move into using ceramics as
his primary medium.
From
his first plate, Kinky Sex (1983),
to his early vases made in the mid-1980s, Perry riffed on British vernacular
traditions to create a language of his own.
The
themes of his later work – fetishism, gender, class, his home county of Essex,
and the vagaries of the art world – appear in works of kinetic energy.
Although
the majority of his output consisted of vases and plates, Perry’s early
experiments with form demonstrate the variety of shapes he produced: Toby jugs,
perfume bottles, porringers, funeral urns and gargoyle heads.
Perry says: “This show has been such a joy to put together. I am really looking forward to seeing these early works again, many of which I have not seen since the Eighties. It is as near as I will ever get to meeting myself as a young man, an angrier, priapic me with huge energy but a much smaller wardrobe.”
Grayson Perry’s The Essex House Tapestries: Life of Julie Cope (2015)
will be on display at Nunnington Hall, Nunnington, Helmsley, from February 8 to
December 20. Opening hours: Tuesday to Saturday, 10.30am to 4pm.
Nunnington Hall’s Verdure Tapestries: away for conservation work; back on display from January 2021
What’s happening to the Nunnington Hall Verdure tapestries?
ALL three tapestries at Nunnington Hall have been taken
off the walls. At various times they were sent to Belgium to be cleaned and
each is being worked on by a selected conservator.
At each studio, the tapestries have been placed on to a frame with a
linen scrim. The conservators are working across each tapestry, undertaking
conservation stitching.
This includes closing the gaps that have appeared and replacing worn historic
threads and previous conservation repairs. These stiches are placed through
both the tapestry and the linen to provide extra support.
One of the conservators has estimated this work will take 740 hours. The
work should be completed in the middle of 2020 to be placed back on the drawing
room wall in January 2021.
Grayson Perry’s Essex House Tapestries: The Life of Julie Cope (2015) at Nunnington Hall
The story behind Grayson Perry’s Essex House Tapestries
THE Essex House Tapestries were made for A House for Essex, designed by
Grayson Perry and FAT Architecture, as featured on the Channel 4 programme Grayson
Perry’s Dream House.
The house was conceived as a mausoleum to Julie Cope, a fictitious Essex
“everywoman”, who was inspired by the people Perry grew up among.
The tapestries are the only pair in a public collection, acquired by the
Craft Council.
Lips’ ink: Poet Laureate Simon Armitage with a pen for his thoughts
SIMON Armitage is the fourth Yorkshireman to be appointed Poet Laureate, in the wake of Laurence Eusden, Alfred Austin and the rather better-known Ted Hughes.
“I know bits and pieces of the other two,” says the 56-year-old Huddersfield poet, who succeeded Carol Ann Duffy as the 21st incumbent of the prestigious ten-year post last May.
Next Tuesday and Wednesday (February 4 and 5), he will be performing in York for the first time since his appointment, presenting Seeing Stars: An Evening With Simon Armitage at York Theatre Royal in two fundraising shows to support the theatre’s community work.
“But I don’t see myself as someone who speaks for the county,” says Simon, “Though I’m obviously from here and speak with the voice I grew up with, the noises and dialect I grew up with, and I certainly use Yorkshire in my poetry.”
Historically, the payment for the laureateship was a gift of wine until Henry Pye chanced his arm by asking for a salary in 1790 in the reign of George III. That all changed again when Ted Hughes became Poet Laureate, whereupon Graham Hines, director of the Sherry Institute of Spain, invited him to Jerez in 1986, and the traditional gift was re-constituted.
“They invited me over to Spain last year, and I did my tasting, educating my palate and getting to choose my sherry, and then effectively they send over a barrel every year.”
Do you like sherry, Simon? “I do now!” he says.
Meanwhile, let’s raise a glass to his shows in York next week when Simon will be joined by “well-known actors” for the Seeing Stars poetry readings. “The performance is devised around the shows we did at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse [at Shakespeare’s Globe in London], maybe four years ago, when Tom Bird [now York Theatre Royal’s executive director] was at the Glob,” says Simon.
“In fact, the first performance was just when Dominic Dromgoole was leaving the artistic director’s post, and we did Sir Gawain And The Green Knight and The Death Of King Arthur poems, and it will be something along those lines with four actors in York.”
As the show’s title indicates, Seeing Stars will feature selections from Armitage’s book of dramatic monologues, allegories and absurdist tall tales of that title. “That book is ten years old this year: it’s very dramatic, very theatrical,” he says.
The York show is being curated by Scarborough-born theatre director Nick Bagnall, with the actors involved yet to be confirmed at the time of going to press.
“I first met Nick when he was playing a monkey trapped in a bathroom in Huddersfield!” Simon reveals. What? “It was a promenade event in a house in Huddersfield in an area called The Yards that was being knocked down,” he explains.
“I’ve since done a couple of my plays with him directing them: first my dramatisation of Homer’s The Iliad, The Last Days Of Troy, at Manchester’s Royal Exchange and Shakespeare’s Globe.
“There are no rules really, no written spec, so it’s a question for each incumbent to decide how they will interpret it,” says Simon Armitage of his post as Poet Laureate
“Then the Liverpool Everyman did The Odyssey: Missing Presumed Dead, which ended up at the Globe.”
Looking beyond next week to Simon’s decade-long tenure as Poet Laureate, what does the role entail?
“There are no rules really, no written spec, so it’s a question for each incumbent to decide how they will interpret it,” he says.
“I’ve decided to do several projects: one of them will be The Laurel Prize: a prize for poems on the theme of the environment and nature and all that goes with that.
“It’s very prevalent in poetry now, and I’m delighted that the Yorkshire Sculpture Park [near Wakefield] will host the prize ceremony in May.
“I’m also making tours of public libraries this year,[The Laureate’s Library Tour], doing a week of eight readings from March 16 to 21 of A and B places: Aberdeen, Belfast, the British Library, Bacup, and several others.” A tour of C and D locations will follow in the autumn.
“This is to give some support to the pretty beleaguered library service because I believe it to be a really important institution,” says Simon.
His greatest wish is to introduce a National Centre of Poetry. “Not in London,” he says. “Poetry is one of our proudest traditions, and hopefully a national centre can be a place of writing, reading, research and residencies.
“It’s a huge capital funding project, a kind of legacy idea, not a one-year pop-up space but something that becomes part of the landscape.”
You may not know, but “there is no writing obligation associated with the role of Poet Laureate,” says Simon. “Wordsworth never wrote one poem in the post!”
The ever-prolific Simon, however, will be writing as prolifically as ever, having been appointed Poet Laureate by Her Majesty The Queen and the Prime Minister.
“The call came from Theresa May a week before she resigned,” recalls Simon. What did that involve? “It was a private call.”
What did the Prime Minister say? “It was a private call!” Simon says again.
Seeing Stars: An Evening With Simon Armitage, York Theatre Royal, February 4 and 5, 7.30pm. Box office: 01904 623568 or at yorktheatreroyal.co.uk
Customer experience manager Lauren Atkins, left, deputy customer experience manager Laura Castle, ticketing and sales manager Beth Scott and York Teaching Hospital Charity community fundraiser Joe Fenton with the Grand Opera House bucket collection cheque in the York theatre’s auditorium. Picture: David Harrison
THE Grand Opera House, York, is to donate £8,765 to the York Teaching Hospital Charity from bucket collections held at performances in 2019.
The donation will go towards “helping to fund the extras to improve
healthcare facilities above and beyond the NHS making patients feel better”.
Joe Fenton, the hospital charity’s community fundraiser, said: “We’d like to say a huge thank-you to the Grand Opera House and to everyone who generously donated at the bucket collections held across 2019.
“The incredible amount that has been raised is truly inspiring and will
go a long way in improving the staff and patient experience across our
hospitals.
“The money will be used benefit a number of wards, including the Children’s
Ward, Dementia, the Renal Unit and our Maternity Bereavement Suite, so thank
you for your fantastic support.”
Clare O’Connor, theatre manager at the Cumberland Street theatre, said: “We’re absolutely delighted to have contributed nearly £9,000 (£8765.17) to numerous departments – Renal Unit, Children’s Ward, Dementia Appeal and Butterfly Appeal – in the hospital over the past 12 months, in conjunction with the wonderful York Teaching Hospital Charity.
“Without the very generous donations of our audience members, and the time kindly given by volunteers for collections, we wouldn’t have achieved so great a figure, which means so much to all the staff at the Grand Opera House.”
Clare continued: “The patients and relatives who use these departments
at York Hospital will benefit greatly from these funds, which will improve
their experience during a difficult time, and we look forward to more
successful fundraising over the next 12 months. Thank you.”
