July 26, 2011 by katie
If you’ll be up in Edinburgh for the festival this August, you’ll have another chance to catch our current show Avon Calling.
We’ll be performing just 3 times on 23rd, 24th & 25th August at 7pm. With just 10 places for each show do book tickets early to avoid disappointment.
June 20, 2011 by katie
Seeking ‘Audience Members’ for film of Avon Calling
Then we’d love it if you could join us as we film Avon Calling, in the starring role of one of six ‘audience members’.
We’ve just finished a successful run of Avon Calling in association with mac Birmingham. Our next job is to create a film of the piece that we will use to promote the show to encourage future bookings.
As you may know, Avon Calling is a show performed in audience members’ own homes, in their lounge, and takes the form of an Avon Party. Its very participatory.
In order to properly reflect this, we need an ‘audience’ of six people to appear in our film of the piece – and this is where you come in. We have found from past experience that when it comes to filming, our audience members need to have the ability to act – you’ll need to act surprised, or amused etc even on the third or fourth take!
It would be great if you were able to spend the afternoon with us on Sunday 26th June to be in the film. You’d also get to see most of the show, as it gets filmed. And we’ll all go out for a curry (on us) afterwards to say thanks.
Details:
Sunday 26 June (this Sunday)
12pm – 6pm
House on Stirchley/Kings Heath border, Birmingham
Wear what you’d wear to go to a friends house for an night with friends
If you would like to take part, please email info@theotherwayworks.co.uk ASAP.
Many thanks in advance.
Katie Day, Artistic Director, The Other Way Works
www.theotherwayworks.co.uk
June 16, 2011 by katie
We were pleased to receive a 4 Star review for Avon Calling in today’s Birmingham Mail.
“A thought – provoking performance and a lovely evening with friends in the comfort of my own home.”
What more could you ask for, eh?!
We are also really pleased to have SOLD OUT the entire run in collaboration with mac.
May 25, 2011 by katie
Watch our thoroughly spiffing new video trailer for Avon Calling!
Avon Calling is now on sale through mac Birmingham. 9 out of the 10 performances have already been booked, so get in quick to avoid disappointment.
For further info click here, or to go straight to mac’s website page click here.
Ding dong!
May 24, 2011 by katie
I’ve just received my accreditation, and am now very happy to be an Accredited Action Learning Facilitator.
I experienced Action Learning as a ‘set’ member whilst I was undertaking my Cultural Leadership Programme Placement last year. This led me to apply for and be accepted onto the Action Learning and Leadership Facilitation Skills course run by the Action Learning Associates and the Cultural Leadership Programme early this year.
I’m really interested in using the skills I’ve gained to support my current facilitation roles, and also find opportunities to use them in a ‘pure’ Action Learning context. The Action Learning Associates Website has some useful info about what Action Learning is, if you’d like to find out more about it.
Katie Day, Artistic Director
May 12, 2011 by katie
We are pleased to announce that our new show Avon Calling is now on sale through mac Birmingham.
For further info click here, or to go straight to mac’s website page click here.
Ding dong!
April 25, 2011 by katie
We’ve had the pleasure of Lucy Ellinson’s company in the devising room for the last couple of days. Its been great to have another creator in the room, and we’ve enjoyed the momentum that can be created by three people taking turns rather than two (takes the pressure off, and feels more like a team effort).
by katie
Here’s an update of what we’ve been exploring as part of the development of our new production – Avon Calling…
We now have funding confirmed from Arts Council England through Grants for the Arts for this project, and are under the wing of mac in Birmingham and rehearsing in their building.
We also had our first session with our mentor Alex Kelly from Third Angel. This was a good provocation for us to develop some bits and bobs to show him, to introduce him to our thoughts and ideas. We got him playing some Avon Party Games, gave him a moisturising hand treatment (he’s a good sport) and filled him in on our ideas around the structure of the audience experience. Alex introduced us to a couple of exercises which we played then, and have modified and played since – which have helped us to access and generate stories.
In the last few weeks we’ve explored conventional story structures, created a kind of ‘wheel of experience’ for the audience, come up with ideas for our central character’s back-story, researched compulsive hoarding and made character notes from this, and moved into exploring writing our own fairy-type stories. We’ve been using an ‘automatic writing’ technique where we write non-stop for 10 minutes on a theme, which helps us not to censor what we produce. In case you weren’t aware, Reese Witherspoon is the international face of Avon, and as a result she features heavily in our tales and fantasies – I mean who wouldn’t aspire to be Reese? She’s stunningly beautiful and yet approachable like the girl next door. Its only a matter of time till you crack too…
March 7, 2011 by katie
After just over a year away from working on the Avon Calling project (due to me being in Bristol producing Theatre Sandbox for 12 months – more about that here) Louise Platt and myself are easing ourselves back into it. Here’s a brief summary about where our thinking is right now.
One Minute Manifesto
February 10, 2011 by katie
A One Minute Manifesto by Katie Day, Artistic Director of The Other Way Works, as delivered at Forest Fringe in Edinburgh, August 2010.
Thanks to Lucy Ellinson for initiating the One Minute Manifesto phenomenon.
Standing here in the Forest Fringe I can’t help feeling that I’ll be preaching to the converted tonight, but that said, here we go…
My manifesto is aimed at theatre makers.
Now is the time for us to take ourselves less seriously. Breathe out. Let it go. Laugh at ourselves.
I’m the worst offender.
I was once heard saying with no irony “I’m a very serious person”.
I fiercely defend my patch, my company, my work, my ‘practice’ – Its a learned response.
It started in earnest at university. The constant jibes at my silly course that must just be messing around – even though we clocked up 40 hour weeks compared to the 6 of my friend studying geology. I imagine the ‘clowning classes’ didn’t help me to make my case.
More recently the endless meetings with Business Link advisors and the like, wanting a sensible business plan, a viable (meaning financially viable) business, laughing in my face about the concept of performing to less people in a night than you have performers in the cast.
No wonder I feel the need to be serious about my work. Its hard work, its my life, and I believe in it.
But now is the time to stop trying to do things the right way. Let’s stop aping the big guys. As Andy Field said at Shift Happens about technology – as artists we shouldn’t follow the rules about how the new tools are used, we should find new ways, and if we can we should break the internet.
We’ve seen big business fail, banks fall, now’s the time for our brand of collaborative innovation. What’s so wrong about a Ministry of Fun? Let’s get ready to lead the way, but not because we’ve learned how to wear a business suit and deliver financial forecasts, but because we know how to work together well, to have fun, to think differently, and to make beautiful things with just ourselves and our voices.