London International Mime Festival Announces 2018 Lineup
By: BWW News Desk Nov. 10, 2017
The London International Mime Festival, directed by Helen Lannaghan and Joseph Seelig, is a unique event in the theatre calendar, a once a year chance to see very best and newest contemporary visual theatre that embraces cutting edge circus, physical theatre, juggling, object manipulation, physical comedy and productions that interweave theatre and film.
The 2018 festival features 11 UK and 4 London premieres in 16 productions from Belgium, Finland, France, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK, performing at Barbican Theatre; The Pit, Barbican; Central Saint Martin's Platform Theatre; Jacksons Lane; Sadler's Wells' The Peacock and Lilian Baylis Studio; Shoreditch Town Hall and Soho Theatre.
LISTINGS INFORMATION:
Platform Theatre, Central Saint Martins, Handyside Street, King's Cross, London N1C 4AA
Kalle Nio/WHS (Finland), Lähtö (Departure)
UK Premiere
Wed 10 - Sat 13 Jan
Wed - Fri 7.30pm, Sat 5pm
Runs: 60 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 12+
Tickets: £18 / £16 (no booking fee)
After-show discussion: Thursday 11 January
Book through: www.mimelondon.com
Presented in partnership with Jacksons Lane
Supported by The Finnish Institute in London / TelePART
A man and woman are drifting apart. Their relationship is complicated. What remain are memories, images and illusions they cannot control. What is mirage and what is real?
Combining cinematic video projections with 19th century stage-magic techniques, Kalle Nio creates mystery, unease and dark humour in this award-winning show.
Original and intriguing, new circus meets the world of visual art to explore estrangement and conflict; its teasing ambiguity reminiscent of Michelangelo Antonioni's 1960s cult movie L'Eclisse in his famous 'trilogy on modernity and its discontents'. The twisted, dreamlike soundscape is the work of composer, Samuli Kosminen, well known for his collaborations with Kronos Quartet.
Co-founded by Finnish magician/visual artist, Kalle Nio, WHS productions have toured worldwide and been important factors in the recent rise to prominence of Finnish new circus.
Barbican Theatre, Silk Street, London EC2Y 8DS
Toneelhuis/FC Bergman (Belgium), 300 el x 50 el x 30 el
UK Premiere
Wed 31 Jan - Sat 3 Feb at 7.45pm
Runs: 70 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 16+ (contains adult themes and nudity)
£16 - £28* *Membership, Young Barbican, student, school, access, group and business discounts apply
£3 transaction fee applies online/ £4 transaction fee applies by phone.
After-show discussion: Fri 2 Feb
Book through: www.barbican.org.uk/ 0845 120 7511
Presented in partnership with the Barbican
With the support of the Government of Flanders
Theatre and film are ingeniously interwoven in a wordless production that follows the inhabitants of a small village community gripped by the fear of an impending disaster - a flood.
Six humble dwellings sit in a wild forest clearing. At first, we see only their exteriors. But when a live camera crew emerges, surreal, peculiar and humorous slices of life are captured and revealed on a big screen. From the mundane to intimate, sinister to absurd, a symphony of symbolic and unsettling images are served up, making us voyeurs of these atmospheric vignettes.
Young Belgian theatre collective FC Bergman are experimental and daring in their approach, devising visual and poetic work with an anarchic edge. The story of Noah's Ark - the title alludes to the vessel's dimensions - is the starting point for this production, which touches upon hidden desires, the search for life's meaning, the beauty of human failure and, finally, hope. With a cast of thirteen actors, 300 el x 50 el x 30 el unfolds to a soundtrack that includes Vivaldi, The Persuasions and Nina Simone.
Peeping Tom (Belgium), Mother (Moeder)
UK Premiere
Wed 24 - Sat 27 Jan at 7.45pm
Runs: 70 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 14+
£16 - £28* *Membership, Young Barbican, under-16, student, school, access, group and business discounts apply
£3 transaction fee applies online/ £4 transaction fee applies by phone.
After-show discussion: Fri 26 Jan (BSL-interpreted)
BSL-interpreted performance: Fri 26 Jan
www.barbican.org.uk or 0845 120 7511
Presented in partnership with the Barbican
Peeping Tom evoke a dreamlike universe, at once disturbing and oddly humorous, to explore an archetypal figure familiar to us all, in a production of astonishing physicality that defies characterisation.
Taking audiences into a series of recognisable spaces, including a museum, studio and maternity ward, this non-narrative work draws on the memories of director Gabriela Carrizo and her performers to trigger disquieting reflections about motherhood.
Suffering, desire, fear, life and death are unexpectedly intertwined in Mother, which shies away from neither the subconscious nor the stuff of nightmares, reflecting the unstable atmosphere of a David Lynch film. The soundscape has a cinematic quality, sometimes amplified to disconcerting effect. It is matched by surreal visual imagery and choreography of rare imagination where bodies bend, flip, contort and isolate.
Peeping Tom's 32 rue Vandenbranden, seen as part of LIMF at the Barbican in 2015 won the Olivier Award for Best New Dance Production.
The Pit, Barbican, Silk Street, London EC2Y 8DS
L'Insolite Mécanique (France), Lift Off (Je Brasse de l'Air).
UK Premiere
Tue 23 - Sat 27 Jan
Tue - Fri 6.30pm & 8.30pm
Sat 3pm & 6pm
Runs: 45 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 7+
Tickets: £16* *Membership, Young Barbican, under-16, student, school, access, group and business discounts apply
£3 transaction fee applies online/ £4 transaction fee applies by phone.
After-show discussion: Sat 27 Jan after 3pm show
www.barbican.org.uk/0845 120 7511
Presented in partnership with the Barbican
Supported by Institut français
Be transported into a mysterious world of shadow and light, where mechanical installations that defy the laws of gravity come alive, illuminating Magali Rousseau's childhood dream of achieving flight.
An enigmatic yet charismatic artist tells her story of a little girl wishing to escape by becoming a master of the air. As she leads us to different parts of the atmospherically lit stage, her simple words become a symbolic force for this promenade performance in which exquisite metal creatures emerge from the dark. Some small, some very large, each is an actor, a work of art in its own right, set into action through steam power, flame, time or weight, all playing their part in this ingenious theatrical tale.
Rousseau's astonishingly engineered machines are born out of a career working in set and prop design. Here she collaborates with musician Stéphane Diskus, whose live clarinet playing heightens the unusual ambience, to relate a most personal memory: how trying to fly became an act of resistance. A journey into the imagination for all dreamers, young and old alike.
Bêtes de foire - Petit Théâtre de Gestes (France)
UK Premiere
Tue 16 - Sat 20 Jan
Tue - Fri 7.45pm, Sat 5pm
Runs: 60 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 7+
£18* *Membership, Young Barbican, under-16, student, school, access, group and business discounts apply
£3 transaction fee applies online/ £4 transaction fee applies by phone.
After-show discussion: Thu 18 Jan
www.barbican.org.uk/ Tel: 0845 120 7511
Presented in partnership with the Barbican
Supported by Institut français
Welcome to an intimate circus, a space tinged with nostalgia, full of 'charm, invention and fantasy' (Télérama), where artistry, puppetry and object theatre combine in an endearing spectacle.
Surrounded by old clothes, mannequins and bric-a-brac, a seamstress tinkers with assorted fabrics in her workshop, reassembling materials of all kinds while her antiquated sewing machine provides musical cues for her fellow performer's routines. He, a little down-at-heel but clearly talented, launches into an eccentric dance, juggling precariously with hats, and props that disappear before your eyes. A supporting cast of mechanical characters, including tightrope walker, acrobats and one-man band, adds to the mystique of an itinerant fairground show.
Elsa De Witte and Laurent Cabrol performed with various French travelling theatre companies before founding their own miniature circus universe, Bêtes de foire. With echoes of Tadeusz Kantor, Alexander Calder and the sensibility of silent film, this is a feelgood performance of surprise, wonder, offbeat humour and exceptional skill.
Barbican Cinema 1, Silk Street London EC2Y 8DS
Variety (PG), Germany 1925 Dir EA Dupont
Sun 21 Jan at 4pm
Runs: 104 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 14+
Standard £12.50; Barbican Members £10; Concessions £11.50; Young Barbican £5
70p transaction fee for phone cinema bookings/ 60p online. No charge in person
Presented in partnership with the Barbican.
Renowned German actor Emil Jannings stars as a seedy circus owner who leaves his wife for a young dancer, but explodes when he discovers that the dancer is having an affair with an acrobat in his troupe.With stunning trapeze sequences shot by legendary cinematographer Karl Freund in the Berlin Wintergarten theatre, the enduring power of the movie, in Pauline Kael's words, "is the restless, subjective camera and the fast editing, which make it an almost voluptuous experience".
The screening features a live musical accompaniment by acclaimed musicians Stephen Horne and Martin Pyne, who perform Horne's original score for this classic of both the silent film and circus genre.
Jacksons Lane, 269a Archway Road, London N6 5AA
Fauna (UK), Fauna
London Premiere
Thu 11 - Sun 14 Jan
Thu - Sat 8pm, Sun 5pm
Runs: 60 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 5+
£18 / £16 + £1.95 transaction fee
After-show discussion: Fri 12 Jan
www.jacksonslane.org.uk/Tel: 020 8341 4421
Presented in association with Jacksons Lane.
Witness courtship rituals and the pleasure of play. See Machiavellian cunning and the aggression of competition. Enjoy entwinings on the trapeze and games of footsie set to flamenco.
Winner of the 2017 Edinburgh Fringe Festival Total Theatre and Jacksons Lane award for Best Circus, Fauna is brilliantly entertaining physical theatre that highlights similarities between human movement and animal behaviour.
Spiders, lemurs, tree frogs and birds of paradise are just some of a wondrous menagerie brought to life through the awesome skills of this new company, made up of five international performers drawn from leading circus groups: NoFit State, Seven Fingers, Poivre Rose and Gravity & Other Myths, with original music by guitarist Geordie Little. They first met at Sweden's famous DOCH circus school and came together again in 2016 with a show premiered at the Glastonbury Festival. Fauna is set to take them around the world.
Gabriela Muñoz (Mexico), Perhaps, Perhaps, Quizas
London Premiere
Fri 19 - Sun 21 Jan
Fri & Sat 8pm, Sun mat 5pm
Runs: 55 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 12+
£18 / £16 + £1.95 transaction fee
After-show discussion: Sat 20 Jan
www.jacksonslane.org.uk/Tel: 020 8341 4421
Presented in association with Jacksons Lane.
Perhaps you've felt lonely. Perhaps you've sat at home wondering just when 'the one' is going to come along and into your life. Perhaps you've even felt lonely enough to don a white dress, hum Mendelssohn's Wedding March and rehearse the ceremony.
That's the set-up for Gabriela Muñoz's wordless show, a heart-wrenching yet hilarious piece that plays with ideas of loneliness, hope, jealousy, and the longing for true romance. In today's digital age, when everyone is too busy to notice anyone, the chance of real connection seems more than ever elusive. Moving from pathos to sophisticated humour, our protagonist goes through the wedding ritual weekly. Emotionally overwrought in her world of chintz and lace, the act of marriage and lawful companionship excite her. Will she get lucky tonight? In the words of the song... perhaps, perhaps, perhaps...
Nacho Flores (France), Tesseract
UK Premiere
Fri 26 - Sat 27 Jan at 8pm
Sun 28 Jan at 3pm
Runs: 60 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 6+
£18 / £16 + £1.95 transaction fee
After-show discussion: Sat 27 Jan
www.jacksonslane.org.uk/Tel: 020 8341 4421
Presented in association with Jacksons Lane.
Supported by Institut français
Tesseract brilliantly does what circus arts are meant to do - transform the ordinary into the extraordinary. After ten years as a highwire specialist, Nacho Flores puts incredible balancing skills to the test in climbing fearsome stacks of teetering wooden cubes that rise like mountains and topple like dominoes. The result of three years research, Tesseract (in geometry a complex cubic form) is unlike anything you've seen before. Combining circus, architecture, puppetry, video and live music, it's a surreal, witty and gravity-defying adventure in a shape-shifting landscape. With every action played out in precarious situations, the tension never slips.
Born in Madrid, Nacho Flores trained in theatre and circus in Amsterdam, honing his skills at the Moscow Circus School and at Le Lido in Toulouse. After working with various Big Top productions, he took time out to develop his own show, using new technology, and bold new balancing techniques he created for himself. Tesseract, a CircusNext winner in 2014, is the highly acclaimed result.
Vamos Theatre (UK), A Brave Face
UK Premiere
Thu 1 - Sat 3 Feb at 8pm
Sat mat 3pm
Runs: 75 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 12+
£18 / £16 + £1.95 transaction fee
After-show discussion: Sat 3 Feb after 3pm show
www.jacksonslane.org.uk/Tel: 020 8341 4421
Presented in association with Jacksons Lane.
Please note: in keeping with the show's subject matter, the performance will feature special effects including smoke, flashing lights and loud noise
'Dear Mum, things are a bit tough right now. But don't worry - I'm ok. I'll tell you about it when I get back.'
Afghanistan: 2009. Under bright blue skies, a small girl stands and watches the soldier. She smiles, just like his sister...
Ryan is there to see the world, learn a trade, get a life. Training is complete, combat is a buzz; he's part of a team, and knows his job. But on one particular tour of duty Ryan sees things he can't talk about, to anyone. And when he returns home, the trouble really begins.
Vamos is Britain's leading mask theatre company, admired for its physical storytelling skills, and for tackling challenging subjects with compassion, humour and deep emotional insight. Created from two years of research with former and serving soldiers, families and health professionals, A Brave Face explores Post-Traumatic Stress in the military, an unseen and often unrecognised injury of war. Vamos brings its trademark, wordless, full mask style to a story that needs to be told.
A Brave Face is a London International Mime Festival co-commission.
The Peacock, Portugal Street, London WC2A 2HT
Jakop Ahlbom Company (Netherlands),
Lebensraum
Thur 1 - Sat 3 Feb
Thur - Fri 7.30pm, Sun 2.30pm & 6pm
£15 - £29
£1.95 transaction charge online,
£3 by phone, no fee in person
Runs: 70 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 7+
After-show discussion: Thu 1 Feb
www.peacocktheatre.com/020 7863 8222
Presented in partnership with Sadler's Wells.
After 5 star hit Horror at LIMF 2016, reprised in a successful three week run at The Peacock last summer, the Dutch visual theatre masters return with more, silent movie magic, this time based on Buster Keaton's The Scarecrow.
In Lebensraum, two inventors live together in one small room. Lack of space is no problem: a system of ropes and pulleys brings everything to hand and furniture has multiple functions - the bed is a piano and the bookcase serves as a fridge. But when they create a female robot to take care of domestic chores their routine lifestyle quickly spirals out of control. The results are both unexpected and hilarious.
Swedish-born director Jakop Ahlbom is an actor, acrobat and all round theatre-maker. This award-winning show features live music accompaniment from Indie rock band Alamo Race TrackLilian Baylis Studio, Sadler's Wells, Rosebery Avenue, London EC1R 4TN.
Gandini Juggling (UK), Sigma
London Premiere
Mon 15 - Tue 16 Jan at 8pm
Runs: 60 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 8+
£20 (£12 concessions - over 60's & students) +£1.95 transaction fee for online bookings
+£3 transaction fee for phone bookings/ no fee for in person at the box office
www.sadlerswells.com/ 020 7863 8000
Presented in partnership with Sadler's Wells.
After-show discussion: Mon 15 Jan
Gandini Juggling's beautiful new show Sigma explores the creative interface between juggling, geometry and classical Indian dance.
Performed by a virtuosic cast including the award-winning choreographer Seeta Patel, Sigma showcases exuberant rhythms, patterns and colours, at the heart of which is a unique interpretation of the South Indian dance form, Bharatanatyam.
With its dazzling quartet of female artists, seductive percussion score and sumptuous backdrop of multimedia projections, Sigma is a finely crafted work designed to engage in a dialogue with the viewer, transcending cultural barriers and stimulating imaginations. Following its success at recent editions of the Mime Festival and extensive international touring with 4x4:Ephmeral Architectures and Smashed, Gandini Juggling continues to excite and entertain in this latest cross-artform collaboration, winner of an Asian Arts Award and Total Theatre Award at the 2017 Edinburgh Fringe Festival.Sigma is a London International Mime Festival co-commission.
Yasmine Hugonnet (Switzerland), Le Récital des Postures
UK Premiere
Fri 19 - Sat 20 Jan at 8pm
Runs: 50 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 16+
Contains full nudity
£20 (£12 concessions - over 60's & students)
+£1.95 transaction fee for online bookings
+£3 transaction fee for phone bookings
no fee for in person at the box office
www.sadlerswells.com/ 020 7863 8000
Presented in partnership with Sadler's Wells.
After-show discussion: Fri 19 Jan
Le Récital des Postures is a silent concert for one instrument - the human body. As if following a musical score, choreographer and performer Yasmine Hugonnet executes a series of postures and movements referenced in historic paintings, ancient sculptures, marionettes and everyday life, that demand both intense engagement and complete abandonment.
Her agility and astonishing strength make her seem to float, suspended in a beautiful white space. Awesome and mysterious, her slow-burn performance evokes unspoken sensations and images. It speaks to us through her naked skin with a wayward wit that subverts all expectations. This is fifty minutes of magic.
Born in Switzerland and with her childhood spent in Mali, Yasmine Hugonnet trained as a dancer and choreographer in Paris and New York. Her work has been seen throughout Europe and in Asia. In 2010 she founded Company Arts Mouvementés, which has been based in Lausanne since 2013. Its productions have been invited to festivals across Europe including the Venice Biennale, Brussels' Brigittines Festival, Mladi Levi in Ljubljana, and Impuls. Le Récital des Postures was selected for Aerowaves in 2015.Shoreditch Town Hall, 380 Old Street, London EC1V 9LT
Compagnie MPTA, Santa Madera
UK Premiere
Fri 12 - Sun 14 Jan
Fri & Sat 8pm, Sun 3pm
Runs: 60 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 8+
£18/£16 £1.50 booking fee,
no fee in person at the Box Office 1 hour before the performance
www.shoreditchtownhall.com/ Tel: 020 7739 6176
After-show discussion: Sat 13 Jan
Presented in association with Shoreditch Town Hall.
Supported by Institut français
Invented by Daniel Cyr of Canada's Cirque Eloise at the end of the 20th century the Cyr wheel is one of the most spectacular and dangerous circus disciplines. Like the figure in Leonardo da Vinci's famous drawing, the performer is contained in a slender steel hoop, arms and legs stretched taut, spinning like a gyroscope.
Trained at France's top circus schools, Juan Ignacio Tula from Argentina and Swiss-born Stefan Kinsman who was raised in Costa Rica, are two brilliant Cyr wheel artists, who make thrilling theatre from their expertise.
Santa Madera (in Spanish - sacred wood) is inspired by indigenous South American rituals, with choreography that seems to hurl the artists through time and space, evoking the violence of combatants in a pagan power game. Whirling at the limits of control, they tell their story through amazing strength and agility, bravery and grace. Santa Madera is the duo's second production, created in 2017 under the guidance of acrobat/trampoline genius Mathurin Bolze, whose MPTA company has produced some of the festival's most breath-taking shows of recent years including last year's hit, Barons Perchés.Arbonauts, Between the Dog and the Wolf
UK Premiere
Wed 17 - Sun 21 Jan
Wed - Sat 8pm, Sat & Sun 3pm
Runs: 60 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 12+
£18/£16 £1.50 booking fee,
no fee in person at the Box Office 1 hour before the performance
After-show discussion: Wed 17 Jan
www.shoreditchtownhall.com/ Tel: 020 7739 6176
Presented in association with Shoreditch Town Hall.
Between the Dog and the Wolf is a site-responsive performance where the audience crosses an unnerving threshold between hope and fear.
In the twilight hours, when the shadow of a dog becomes the silhouette of a wolf, it is hard to distinguish friend from foe. Darkness is falling across Europe. In the embers of the dusk, shadows form and silhouettes distort. Fear begins to take hold in the confines of the familiar and comfortable, the unknown and dangerous, the domestic and the wild. Who is the dog? Where is the wolf? And what happens in between?
Arbonauts was founded in 2012 by Helen Galliano and Dimitri Launder. They devise and direct bold, site-specific performance that starts where theatre, installation and dance collide. Between the Dog and the Wolf is their third London production, following sell-out runs of Biped's Monitor in Nunhead Cemetery and The Desire Machine in the Brunel Museum's subterranean tunnel shaft. Co-commissioned by London International Mime Festival and Shoreditch Town Hall, Between the Dog and the Wolf has been specially created for Shoreditch Town Hall's iconic Council Chamber, the meeting point of light and power.Between the Dog and the Wolf is commissioned by Shoreditch Town Hall and London International Mime Festival.
Sacékripa, Vu
UK Premiere
Thur 25 - Sat 27 Jan
Thur - Sat 8pm, Sat mat 3pm
Runs: 45 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 7+
£18/£16 £1.50 booking fee,
no fee in person at the Box Offce 1 hour before the performance
After-show discussion: Thur 25 Jan
www.shoreditchtownhall.com/ Tel: 020 7739 6176
Presented in association with Shoreditch Town Hall.
Supported by Institut français
A man attempts to make the perfect cup of tea. It's a delicate and obsessively ordered process. You may yourself become addicted, or never want to see another cup of tea again. Either way, you'll laugh out loud.
Vu concerns a sensitive and meticulous man and his relationship with objects - how he transforms them and how in turn they affect him. A delightful and suspense-filled miniature circus spectacle exploring happiness, obsession and humanity, it puts our daily routines under a magnifying glass, reveals our manias and shows us what we take for granted in a totally new light.
As a demonstration of eccentric wit, dexterity and ingenuity, Vu is a small masterpiece. Etienne Manceau trained at the famous Lido circus school in Toulouse. In 2001 with fellow graduates - acrobats, jugglers, variety artists - he formed the Sacékripa group, a collective that works as a large ensemble and in smaller units. It's Marée Basse at the Barbican Pit was a hit at LIMF 2017.Soho Theatre, 21 Dean Street, London W1D 3NE
Trygve Wakenshaw & Barnie Duncan (New Zealand), Different Party
London Premiere
Mon 8 - Sat 20 Jan at 7pm
Previews Mon 8 - Tue 9 Jan
Sat mats 4pm. No show 14 Jan
Runs: 55 mins / no interval
Age Guidance: 12+
£9 - £20 (no booking fees)
After-show discussion: Sat 13 Jan after 4pm show
www.sohotheatre.com / Tel: 020 7478 0100
Presented in association with Soho Theatre.
Business drones Gareth Krubb and Dennis Chang whittle away the minutes in the barren office of Ruck's Leather Interiors, patiently waiting for the phone call that may or may not give them something to actually do. In between the drudgery of the 9-5, the minutiae of office existence open up a fantastical world of fancy where a sticky piece of paper turns men into pigeons, where briefcases are dogs, and where that elusive client is always a missed call away. Picture the most mundane place imaginable descending into a world of absurdist fantasy
Full programme details, including workshops and after-show discussion dates are available online at www.mimelondon.com.
Photo credit: Julien Joubert
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