I, on the behalf of the Local Theatre Blogging Community, recently had the pleasure interviewing Flying Cloud Theatre, lead by Leandra Ashton, Marta Rizi and Jennifer Kidd, and the company is renowned for their creativity and empowerment on and off stage!
Photo Credit: The Flying Cloud
(http://www.flyingcloudtheatre.com/)
Please could you tell me a bit in your own words about Flying Cloud Theatre and its theatre aims?
With Flying
Cloud we’re trying to do things differently. When we say on our website,
‘Flying Cloud aims to break down barriers and link up the world in previously
unimaginable ways’ – we mean it and work hard to make that happen. We take
inspiration from The Flying Cloud – a clipper ship in the 1800’s that defied
the status quo, blazing a trail around the world and making the seemingly
impossible, possible. We try to live up to the daring pioneer spirit of that
ship and it’s young female navigator, Eleanor Creesy.
We want to
break down barriers and reach for new horizons not only in theatre but also in
our outreach work, business workshops and within ourselves.
When it
comes to our theatre work we write daring new plays which collaborate across
art forms, mixing music, spoken word and movement.
Our
outreach work is integral to our new plays and is offered free in every venue
we perform in. Underpinning all Flying Cloud’s work is our motto: ‘empowering
through creativity’ and we want to offer that experience to as many people as
we can.
We also
push the limits of theatre outside of the rehearsal room and auditorium. We
believe there is so much potential in unleashing the creative skills you find
in a theatre company in contexts outside of theatre: in business,
communication, education, politics, relationships… The type of collaboration,
energy and creative problem solving you find in a theatre company is a potent recipe for any organisation. The popularity
of our business workshops is proving that people want that fresh perspective
and reinvigoration of process.
And finally
all that combines to mean we really push ourselves as artists and challenge any
limiting beliefs that come up, just like Eleanor Creesy did. Someone once said
you have to be an artist of your time. In our time, we can’t just be actors
waiting for the phone to ring – we’re also writers, directors, and
businesswomen… We’re all creating our own lives.
We loved
our tour! It’s hard work being on the road, driving from venue to venue,
unloading the set, setting up, performing in different spaces, sleeping in
different beds, packing up… and then doing it all over again but it makes it
worthwhile when you play in beautiful venues and get to meet such lovely
audiences. We met a lot of people through our free community workshops which we
ran alongside our play. The workshops went down a storm! We’re really proud of
our outreach work and how it fulfills our ambition to link up the world and
break down barriers. You can see a whistle-stop tour of the workshops on our website.
We toured
to 6 venues in the North (York Theatre Royal, Stephen Joseph Theatre (in Scarborough), The
Maltings (in Berwick), Hull Truck, Richmond Georgian Theatre Royal (in Harrogate
Theatre) before a short run in London at RADA.
The play
really developed as we toured. That’s one of the challenges of being an
emerging company. Nothing beats a run of a play to develop it but sometimes it
can be hard to get theatres to offer you more than one night. Luckily we’ve
built up some great partnerships with York Theatre Royal and Harrogate Theatre.
We had nice little runs at both venues and they also helped out with the
development of the piece with feedback from York Theatre Royal’s artistic
director, Damian Cruden and Harrogate’s producer Kevin Jamieson. A run of a new
play means you get to know the rhythm of it, what needs cutting or changing,
plus your audience gives you feedback in Q+A’s. The more you perform the more
you get to feel your character’s journey and know what’s driving them scene to
scene. A run means you get into a sense of flow with the words, the other
actors, and the set… and suddenly you’re all feeling the heart beat of the
play. That makes things very special. We think we got there on the last
performance in London. It was a cracker. That’s why we need to do it again!
Flying Cloud prides itself with its outreach work with an aim to explore the themes and beliefs raised from the productions. Please could you share any feedback from the workshops Flying Cloud have been involved with at schools and in the communities?
People
genuinely seem to love our workshops which makes our job very satisfying. Here
are a few comments from the workshops we ran alongside The Book:
“We all have different stories and beliefs that people don’t know
about us and they’re all completely different – no one’s exactly the same but
they quite often have some common ground and that’s what connects us.” York
Theatre Royal participant
“You just have to let your fears go away and be you.” Hull Truck
participant
“Drama is such a good way to know people. We are from such diverse
backgrounds but when we had to come together they all look like they’ve known
each other for all their lives.” Georgian Theatre Royal Participant
“It might be raining outside but in here there’s been a lot of
laughter and sunshine.” Darlington participant
What have been the organisation's highlights
to date?
Perhaps the
biggest achievement is that we’re still here, still friends, still up for it
and still wanting to make a difference to our own lives and the lives of
others. One big stand out moment was when we got our first ‘yes’ from the Arts
Council to develop our debut play NAPOLI at West Yorkshire Playhouse. It was a
bit of an X factor moment – opening that letter, screaming, then crying and
then falling over!! It’s always a big moment when you get the thumbs up for
your next project. We work project to project, funding ourselves in between through
our business workshops. We don’t have a regular income from The Arts Council so
it’s tough. You have to be resilient and practical. But we’re lucky because we
love doing our Business workshops and we can reinvest the profits into the
shows and community work. We sold out in York because of all the business
contacts we’d made over the last few years – they all wanted to come and see us
in our ‘natural habitat’. That’s was very satisfying and really what we’re
about – introducing people to experiences or other people they might otherwise
not encounter.
How are your future projects and
plans?
We’ve had the summer to take things easy
and recharge after The Book – it was almost two years work to get to the
touring stage so we were all in need of a rest. We’re meeting this week to
discuss the next steps. We’d like to bring The Book back for another tour,
perhaps with some dates abroad. We think the play and workshops would be very
pertinent in so many places like Northern Ireland, Gaza, The Ukraine… there’s a
line up for you! We’re also thinking about bringing our first play, NAPOLI back
to life which we premiered in 2012. Our business workshops with York University
are selling well and we’ve got more in the pipeline with old and new clients,
so we’re keeping busy! We’ll be sure to give you the exclusive on the latest
news!
I would like to say thank you for Flying Cloud for the interview. I saw The Book at York Theatre Royal earlier on in the year and please check out my review of The Book's three journeys! Please follow them on Twitter, @FlyingCloudT ,to check out latest news on their current and forthcoming projects on their website.
By Dawn Smallwood
On behalf of the Local Theatre Blogging Community
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