Last week I was invited by Talking Birds to partake in their Nestival Of Ideas. This panel discussion wrestled with the ethics of who do you accept money from. A transcript of my 5 minute provocation is published here on our website here. An audio recording of the full proceedings has been released as a Talking Birds Podcast here. JY
This summer, we are running an Edinburgh Fringe room hire discount @ Our Facility! 
25% off our Classrooms! £65 per day + VAT!
The offer runs from May – August 2025 and applies to any early career and student companies going to Edinburgh Fringe 2025!
Interested? Contact us at [email protected] telling us who you are, what you’re rehearsing for & when you’d need the space.
See more info about our space hires here.
On Saturday 5th July, we are hosting Satie 100: Memoirs of an Amnesiac, an evening celebrating the life and works of seminal/eccentric/genius french composer Erik Satie 100 years after his death.
If you don’t think you know his music – we’re sure you do!
This playful evening will include:
– A performance of our second ever show Memoirs Of An Amnesiac. Made in 1992 by Graeme Rose and James Yarker with Graeme’s long time friend Richard Chew this performance introduced audiences to Eric Smith, an Erik Satie obsessive who builds a Satie museum in his bedsit. This revival brings together the original cast 33 years on for one night only!
– Piano Music – Satie repertoire will be performed live.
– Dada Buffet – eat before you come.
– Bonus Material – to be announced (we are working on some things and we are also open to suggestions).
Dress Code: 1920s Paris (if you wish)
More info on the Satie 100: Memoirs Of An Amnesiac here.
More info on the orignal production of Memoirs Of An Amnesiac here.
Last Tuesday our great friend Nick Booth died. He had an accident at home on Saturday and died peacefully in hospital surrounded members of his family. This news comes as a terrible shock to everyone in his extraordinarily wide circle. We extend our warmest and deepest condolances to all who knew and loved Nick, especially his wonderful family. Our contribution to the growing catalogue of tributes can be found here.
Exciting news! The Many Lives of PET #1 is on the lineup for Greenbelt Festival 2025! We’ll be performing on Saturday 23rd August. #GB25
Tickets 
https://www.greenbelt.org.uk/buy-tickets/
We are proud of our long association with Greenbelt. Two years ago we performed in their big top with All Our Money. Long before that, in 2012 when the festival was at Cheltenham Racecourse we shared The Cardinals with them and even before that, in 2009, a version Of All The People In All The World was created in a marquee.
Birmingham Community Tour, 29th March – 12th April
Poor old PET #1. Distantly related to pre historical plankton, used and cast aside every day, desperate not to be buried or cremated, now they’re at the heart of an almighty row between business, governments and people who all love them and hate them at the same time. And that’s before the cousins #2 – #7 come on the scene!
Stan’s Cafe’s brand new tabletop drama dives deep into the world of plastic.
What’s all the fuss about?
What are our options?
What could the future look like?
Don’t lose your bottle.
Exciting news is emerging from Leamington Spa – casting has been completed for Loft Theatre‘s production of The Just Price Of Flowers. Apparently competition was very stiff and as the standard of productions there is reputed to be very high we are expecting great things. As the show was written for an ensemble it has seven equally sized parts and gender blind casting – so it is well suited for amateur productions where larger casts are not just affordable but actively encouraged!
This production is directed by Dr. Mark Crossley who, as well as being an active member of Loft Theatre, also wrote Devising Theatre With Stan’s Cafe, so he knows his way around a Stan’s Cafe play. The piece was last performed at Latitude in 2012 so we are all excited to see it back again this coming April.
To book a free 16-25 ticket, email your name, postcode and required tickets to [email protected]
Treason has nowhere to hide.
After the electromagnetic pulse, swords and a heathen mysticism return to a newly tribal Britain. In Macbeth’s castle betrayal and bloodshed are unleashed as CCTV watches on unnoticed and unblinking. Nothing here is truly secret, no one is ever fully alone, we witness everything.
Performed live on stage and for camera by a cast of 15, this genuinely radical production brings a unique perspective to one of Shakespeare’s most popular texts. It opens up scenes previously hidden off-stage and encourages us to consider the lives of those who live as innocents in nations at war.
Big Brother Macbeth is an ambitious collaboration between 3rd Year Acting students at Bath Spa University and the internationally renowned theatre company Stan’s Cafe.
13 – 15th February, Bath Spa University
For our fifth micro-production Stan’s Cafe will spend a week exploring the ethics, practicalities, history, iconography and raw emotions of a heart-transplant. Made in consultation with medics from Queen Elizabeth and Royal Papworth hospitals this production features live music and promises to be beautiful, poetic and meditative.
14th December, 2pm & 6pm, Our Facility
Stan’s Cafe are holding auditions for our new, original show ‘The Many Lives of PET #1’ – a complicated comedy about a plastic bottle!
The show period will be between the 10th March – 12th April.
Auditions are being held on the 4th & 5th December.
If you’re interested, please send a CV making clear your experience with puppetry/object manipulation to [email protected].
For more information about the show, rehearsal period & casting requirements please click here.
We’ve started hanging out with Birmingham Plastics Network (BPN) at the University of Birmingham (UoB). We’re making a performance dramatising their report in the Future Of Plastic called The Many Lives Of PET #1. It’s going to be a fast and fun show exploring and explaining all that’s good, bad, fascinating and challenging about plastic, its reduction, recycling and replacement, formation and its future.
As part of our research for the show we are collaborating with academics from BPN & UoB running a workshop for Year 10 science students. The workshop is FREE. It will cover material the students need to know for their GCSE, plus they will help us work out what should go in our show. Later we return to perform the final show to them, as revision, also FREE.
If you think this sounds good then all the details are linked to here. There are just 8 slots available so please move fast to avoid disappointment.
On 30th August a free concert will take place at Our Facility in Selly Oak. This occasion marks the conclusion of James McIlwrath‘s time as Composer In Residence at Stan’s Cafe. Two pieces will be performed, both issuing from his residency. The Minutes is one of numerous pieces James has created translating our weekly company meetings into music, it is scored for a toy piano and runs for approximately two hours, audience members are encouraged to bring administrative work with them to do during the performance (note administrative work – if you are a blacksmith please leave your work at home). Scrap Score is composed in response to material pulled from our office’s recycling bin. This is scored for two bass recorders and is a concert performance to be sat and listened to. Following the concert there will be a miniature feast to celebrate James’ time with us (the food will be full size but there won’t be much of it). Everyone is welcome, please book tickets here.
The wonderful luxuary of having James with us came courtesy of the Composition Department at the Royal Birmingham Conservertoire and Midlands4Cities Doctoral Training Partnership. Essentially, James has spent a couple of years with us exploring a doctoral thesis of how to ‘add value’ to Stan’s Cafe as a Composer In Residence. Our self-imposed rule – which we’ve more or less stuck to – was that he couldn’t do any work we would normally pay a musician to do. This has resulted in a fantastic range of playful interventions that we feel have indeed added great value to Stan’s Cafe. James is now writing up his PhD and collating all the works he has made with us. When this stage is completed we’ll share things with you on website. Until then ring our door bell and please come to this concert.
Year 4 students at Kings Rise Academy have been musing over some philosophical conundrums:
Is it ever okay to lie? Can money buy happiness? What is friendship? What is love? and What exactly makes a chair a chair?
The result is a song cycle created with Katy Rose Bennett.
The song cycle will be performed, with snippets of drama, illustrations and a little choreography, to the students and friends of Kings Rise Academy on 26th June. Then a public performance will take place on 27th June at the University of Birmingham, in their Education Department at 15:30 as part of their Philosophy In Schools Showcase, which is free to attend and runs from 10:00 – 16:30.
There are lots of fun and interesting activities throughout the day, perhaps the least of which is James’ illustrated talk Thinking and acting in schools. Sign up for the whole fun and philosophical games here.
Yesterday, at Bath Spa University, a group of second year drama students performed their interpretation of our old show The Cleansing Of Constance Brown. The show is essentially wordless. Set in a 14m long, 2m wide corridor, all the principle action takes place in rooms opening off from the corridor. The audience cannot see into the rooms, so they must deduce what is happening by what they see in the corridor. It is an exercise in visual storytelling, which is why the students had been set the challenge by their tutor, who was once one of our Associate Artists and, as a recent graduate, had watched us devise the show.
The students worked from our published script, which describes the tightly choreographed moves of each actor through the piece. They had access to some photographs. Nina West kindly sent them a copy of her original soundtrack and we, equally kindly, leant them a few key items of costume and the enigmatic ‘orange billowing mass’.
Watching the student’s interpretation was a very peculiar experience. It triggered in me a huge surge of nostalgia and love for the old friends who had been replaced by these young avatars. I felt a great warmth for this galant troupe of students taking on this ludicrous challenge. Watching them struggle reminded of many things about the original show: how every single move was chosen and placed with clear purpose, how the show is sculptural and this minimalism requires great clarity, how sharp and demanding the lighting was, how particular the acting challenge was and how adept in it the cast became.
There were moments when the student show carried strong echos of our show and in these I got a lovely glimpse of what it may have been like to see our show with a stranger’s eye. There were occasional additions that generated intriguing new takes on our material, which I enjoyed very much and in contrast there were regular moments when I wanted to ask ‘why have you chosen to do that?’ and moments that brought to mind the Scandinavian soft rock covers band we encountered one summer in the Czechia town of Kolin, whose lead singer we were convinced was singing phonetically English lyrics he didn’t understand.
In 1999 Stan’s Cafe restaged Impact Theatre’s show The Carrier Frequency and a number of the original cast were gracious enough to attend. Yesterday, exchanging a few words with the Bath Spa students, I remembered a similar conversation 25 years earlier outside the Crescent Theatre in Birmingham and felt reassured. Of course I was flattered to have had such great attention and energy lavished on an old show of ours. Of course I was delighted to attend.
Maybe one day we can re-stage The Cleansing Of Constance Brown ourselves and show everyone how it’s really done.
It has been brought to our attention that a long term collaborator and vital componant of our current touring team has been left out of the programme notes and biographies. We apologies and rectify this inexcusable omission here.
The Table had no training at all. No experience of drama school. It was plucked from the obscurity of a second hand office furniture store on the Stratford Road and expected to perform. Day Two of rehearsals and it was already buckling, totally unprepared for be jumped on, pushed, pulled and thrashed in a frenzied recreation of Impact Theatre’s iconic show The Carrier Frequency. The Table was sent to Captain Anderson for a bit of bodybuilding. Discreet additional braces were welded to the table’s legs and it has been ready for anything ever since.
Having survived the rigours of its physical theatre workout in 1999 The Table returned in a new millennium to rotate slowly at the centre of Good And True’s ludicrous interrogation.
For almost a decade The Table found stage work difficult to come by and had to content itself working behind the scenes. Then, in 2009, a breakthrough. A table was required to supporting snacks and notepads for The Commentators in their debut performance 24 Hour Scalextric.
Twilightofthefreakingods (2013) brought The Table a minor role as the speaking clock station. It was finally back to centre stage in Time Critical (original production and regional tour 2016-17) – this included a nostalgic moment for The Table as it was stood on once again in a recreation of a moment from the recreation of The Carrier Frequency.
The Table was proud to play a role educating audience about local authority budgets by supporting all the golden dominoes in All Our Money (2021 & 2023). It stretched its range by playing a range of tables from the English Civil Wars in Billesley Primary School’s production (No such thing as a) Civil War.
The Table is now delighted be joining such a talented cast for Community Service and looks forward to the challenge of playing multiple roles including, a living room table, police desk, a bar, a bed, a wall, a front door, half a car, half a mini-bus, a barbecue and a riot shield – it is expecting to find the quick changes challenging.
Back in 2000 we considered making a show with an interval. In those days the term ‘experimental theatre’ existed for the likes of us and, because intervals were so associated with the codes of conventional theatre, for the likes of us to make a show with an interval was, ironically, a crazily radical idea.
Good and True (2000) ran for 60 minutes straight through. In 2011 The Cardinals had an interval, briefly. It was complicated to make, difficult to perform and running long. Being a history of the world told, in a puppet theatre, by a team of Cardinals a theologically sound opportunity for an interval presented itself between Good Friday and Easter Sunday. We seized this as a chance to give the audience a break and actors a chance to sort their props out ready for a charge towards the apocalypse. This ‘pausa’ never really worked. We tightened up the show, got on top of the performances and ran uninterrupted from nothing through everything to whatever happens at the end.
The Cardinals taught us that you shouldn’t put an interval in a show just because it’s ‘long’ and your audience may need to visit the toilet. We should have known this. The previous year we had made Tuning Out With Radio Z, a three hour improvised performance with no interval. The year before that we had made 24 Hour Scalextric which, as the title suggests, ran for twenty four without an interval. The key thing about deciding whether to have an interval is to ask yourself “will the show work better with or without an interval?” and then act accordingly*.
The Anatomy Of Melancholy was our adaptation of Robert Burton’s 1,500 page, 400 year old self-help manual. It was long and dense – we felt audiences would benefit from a break and because the original book is divided into three ‘partitions’ we happy to luxuriate in our first legitimate, no questions asked interval.
Having broken our interval duck in 2013 we have of course gone crazy and a mere 11 years later I’m proud to announce Community Service is a ‘sensible’ length and has a fully justified, structurally satisfying interval a little under half way through. We encourage audience members to make the most of this opportunity to relieve themselves, buy ice-creams and consume drinks in that time – it may be more than a decade before you get another chance to.
James Yarker
* I’m now slightly regretful that the structure of our 270 second long show It’s Your Film was such that it would not have benefitted from an interval after 140 seconds.
James Yarker 4 April, 2024
Stan’s Cafe are recruiting for a brand new role of Deputy General Manager. This is a fantastic opportunity to join the team at this acclaimed theatre company who create a huge variety of original theatre work – from local community tours to larger scale international projects. We also have a busy creative learning programme in schools across the West Midlands, and at our home at Our Facility, we run an artistic hub hiring out rehearsal spaces to the wider theatre and arts community.
The role of Deputy General Manager will be key to the smooth running of the company and the person appointed will have the chance to learn about and be part of the running of an international theatre company and a busy building supporting the West Midlands arts community.
We are looking for an enthusiastic new member of the team bringing some great skills with them but eager to learn more and take on responsibility for key areas. The role needs someone with a flexible approach, great organisational, financial and administrative skills and who enjoys working with a wide variety of people. In return benefits include training and development opportunities, tickets to our shows and a pension and health support scheme.
To download more information about this role with details on how to apply please click this link
It was unexpectedly moving to observe Ultraopticon live chronicle activity of urban areas across the world.
I’ve wanted to break into The Rotunda since I was little.
It’s windows would reflect burning orange and salmon pink sunsets as my feet stumbled and slipped on mushed cabbage leaves, my mom dragging me and my brother through homebound crowds in it’s cool shadow. The bus would take us to Granma’s, who would have Satday soup on the fire; a welcome meal after a long day being jostled, bumped and bashed by bags filled with booty on payday weekend.
On the walk, up the hill, I would stomp as fast as my little leaden legs could carry me and resist the temptation to turn around. Because when I got to Granma’s front door, ahead of my mom, and brother who’d invariably been injured leaping off the bus, I’d be rewarded.
The Rotunda would now be gleaming. Bright like a beacon. The last of the sunlight flaring off the glass on the top floor, the Coca Cola sign piercing the hot light as the sky darkened. I’d go cross-eyed to try to make out what temperature it displayed.
I dreamed of jobs that would make me important enough to gain access to a building that touched the clouds. Predicted I’d be able see to the edge of the world. Wondered if there’d be someone to press the buttons in the lift, how long it would take for the observation deck to rotate, and would it make me feel as sick as I did on the waltzer?
My mom cresting the hill with my brother on her hip, shook me to drink in the last of the magic – less than a minute before I’d be bustled inside, keenly greeted by my sister and then sent to go fetch summat from uppahouse for a grown up.
This morning, hearing air traffic control info from New Zealand over the screech of trains and whistling wind, I peered down to see market traders set up, the teensiest bit disappointed the top floor doesn’t rotate. But I found the job that opens the door to the building that touched the clouds.
And there was someone to press the button in the lift.
Elexi Walker
elexiwalker.com
PS For images of The Rotunda as Lexi remembers them click here (we’re anxious about the copyright or we’d have posted the second image down).
Archive photo: Thanks to BrumPic
Dawn photo: Jim Smith
We are looking for performers and poets, fun, imaginative and inquisitive people, with origins from around the world, now living in or around Birmingham, to collaborate with us on a 24 hour long performance on the top floor of the city’s iconic Rotunda building, between 18:00 on 19th January and 18:00 on 20th January, 2024.
Ultraopticon will be a multi-lingual live streamed video/radio performance. It will be performed as a structured improvisation but there will be some rehearsals.
We have twelve paid guest slots to fill, each corresponding to a different two hour time zone. We are seeking collaborators whose first or home language corresponds with these zones. Each guest will be asked to join the core performance team for a two hour slot.
We are genuinely very open to submissions from people with origins in any country around the world, so the following list is just a reminder of some of the countries there are in the world:
Argentina, Australia, Bangladesh, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Cuba, Egypt, France, Ghana, Germany, India, Indonesia, Iran, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Korea (North or South), Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Namibia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Pacific Islands, Philipines, Poland, Romania, Somalia, Spain, Syria, Turkey, USA, Vietnam, Yemen
Though prior experience of performance may help it is not essential. If you are interested in being considered please get in touch with us via the form you will find if you click here.
If you have any questions please email us on [email protected]
We’ve had a couple of people ask for more details as to what their role as guest artist will involve and what the commitment will be. Here is some more information:
Ultraopticon is an attempt to watch the world for a day. It is a 24 hour act of surveillance, which mixes looking from the top floor of the Rotunda with telescopes, with using the internet, news sites and social media to relate other events around the world as they happen. It’s an artistic, sideways take on a rolling news program. The focus of the news rolls around the world as the world turns.
The guest slots are each two hours long and are arranged so they include 18:00 in the country of the guest’s ‘home language’. Guests will ‘present’ Ultraopticon alongside and supported by one of the two host presenters, who are there for the full 24 hours. We would like guests to mix presentation between English and their ‘home language’.
The material presented will be improvised in response to what is happening and what is revealed through live research. The improvisation will be structured through a list of prompts, suggestions and strategies.
Each guest will be invited to a rehearsal in order to shape and practice for the improvisational slot. Guests will be able to choose between a number of rehearsal slot options so rehearsals are convenient for guests and hopefully bring a few guests together at the same time.
How come Birmingham City Council is bankrupt?
Different people will tell you different things depending on their perspective. We made a theatre show called All Our Money explaining how the budget works. Here are ten things we’ve learnt.
In summary:
We learnt that there are significant tensions between local and central government. Over years growing demands for statutory services, not matched by an equivalent increases in income, have led lots of council’s into financial trouble.
It suits a Conservative Central Government to put the blame for this on opposition controlled Local Governments, but Central Government controls a lot of the variables. Budgets across the country in lots of councils of all kinds are finely balanced and so unable to absorb significant financial shocks.
Birmingham City Council has recently received two such shocks. The equal pay claim turns out not to have been settled after all and their bespoke Oracle IT system needs lots more investment before it works properly. These appear to be two examples of poor management.
So who is to blame?
We experience council inefficiencies. The council is not innocent of all blame, but neither is Central Government. There is a joint culpability. It’s a mess and the people who will suffer are the citizens.
Who are the citizens? Well us, but remember us includes councillors and council officers. Councillors are citizens who have stepped up to help make the city work, we vote for them, they answer to us. We live here together, ultimately it’s all our money, we are all responsible, need to care for our city and each other. But we need to be given a fair chance and not set up to fail.
Central and Local Governments need to collaborate on a solution, not just for Birmingham’s problems but for all those authorities around the country who are on a knife’s edge.
On Tuesday, driving between Birmingham and London, we listened to the radio news tell us that the government has appointed commissioners to run Birmingham City Council’s budget.
In 2012 control of Birmingham City Council’s budget switched from a Conservative – Liberal Democrat coalition back to Labour. The returning leader Sir Albert Bore called together representatives of the city’s artistic community to set out his vision of regenerating the City’s fortunes through the arts. It was an inspirational, visionary pitch, for us the stuff of dreams, yet as soon as Sir Albert sat down his place was taken by his Chief Financial Officer, who brought us back down to earth with a lesson in fiscal reality. He showed us an upward curve plotting the increasing cost of the city’s statutory responsibilities and then imposed over it a downward arc plotting the city’s income. He explained that the diminishing delta between these lines represents the city’s budget for discretionary spending, including its funding for the arts. “We call these The Jaws of Doom” he explained, “the point at which the two lines meet is the moment at which the council’s entire budget has to be spent on its statutory responsibilities with nothing left over for any discretionary spending. Beyond this point lies bankruptcy”. Effectively he told us Sir Albert’s vision was a pipe dream.
This horrifying vision of The Jaws of Doom struck me so strongly that nine years later we made a show called All Our Money dramatising the struggle to balance Birmingham City Council’s budget. When it premiered this February the show had a niche curiosity value. Now, driving between performances at Birmingham Ormiston Academy and the New Diorama Theatre, its subject is the lead story on the national news.
We’ve been asked to comment on Birmingham’s bankruptcy but have been wary of doing so. We’re a theatre company and we’ve said what we want to say on the stage. The show speaks of the rising costs of fulfilling statutory responsibilities and the continual search for efficiencies. It unpacks the complex relationship and huge tensions between local and central government. It is broadly sympathetic towards the plight of local authorities whist also pointing towards inefficiencies we have experienced.
As performed on Tuesday All Our Money has a nostalgic feel. It refers to the equal pay dispute in the past tense rather than an on-going nightmare. It refers to expensive I.T. upgrades without specifically naming the failing Oracle system. Over all it harks back to what now seems like a comforting time time when balancing the City’s budget was merely a challenge and not an impossibility.
There are new versions of the show planned, versions for other cities, versions for district and county councils. There are requests to continue touring the Birmingham version – we’re plotting a coda, one year later when the ending is even less happy…
There is no single financial moral to draw from All Our Money but there is a theatrical one – don’t be afraid to make a show of niche curiosity value, you never know when it may become mainstream.
We are looking for a highly engaging actor to lead audience members down a 15m long textile map of the River Indus. This is a one person show, a 40 minute monologue written by Nafeesa Hamid, detailing historical stories and legends of the river, along with tales of politics and nature.
Initially the performance will be indoors at Springfield Project and other community venues around Birmingham over Autumn half term 2023 (28th October – 5th November dates TBC). There will then be options of outdoor performances in the Summer of 2024.
We will prioritise actors based in the West Midlands. We are particularly interested with actors who have a cultural link with the Indus Valley.
This performance will join The Thames, The Volga and The Lune in Stan’s Cafe’s growing River Tours library.
Audition date: Thursday 21st September
Submissions end date: Monday 18th September
Please send your CV along with a one paragraph covering note (or 30 second video) explaining why you are excited by a this opportunity to… [email protected]
Please also complete our confidential equal opportunities questionaire
Thank you and if it’s not you please pass it on to someone it may be.
We need more beautiful things in our lives. So here is my suggestion. I can’t currently imagine anything more beautiful than this. Spem In Alium came to my attention recently when researching incidental music for (No Such Thing As A) Civil War, our collaboration with Billesley Primary School telling the story of the English Civil Wars. This evening I found this visual representation of the piece’s 40 voices coming in and out shifting pitches etc – stunning.
In the next two weeks we open five new productions. This is a major challenge, fortunately we have four hundred and fifty students and their teachers all helping us.
First up, on 13th & 14th July Saltley Academy’s Year 8 open twin productions of Romeo and Juliet at about 10:15 in Shakespeare’s New Place, Stratford-Upon-Avon. This annual project is part of the school’s promise to students when they join the school. It is a collaboration between the English and Drama departments – Craig condensed Shakespeare’s text last year and this year Lucy and Amy are leading rehearsals on our slot-together stage.
In the early evening of 13th St. Gerard’s Catholic Primary School’s Year 6 will perform Our Primary Years, a show revisiting the students time at school alongside world event of the same era. They are devising this with Carys who has spent two years working across the school to help them embed drama as one of their key teaching strategies. This show is inspired by the Stan’s Cafe show Time Critical.
Another version of Our Primary Years, devised by Year 6 at Blakesley Hall Primary school with Craig, will premiere on the 17th July and be performed again on the evening of the 19th. Last year Owen devised a version of Precious Emily with the school and the year before Craig devised A Clearing In Woodlands with them, a performance about local history.
Earlier on 19th Billesley Primary School’s Year 6 will perform (No Such Thing As A) Civil War at MAC. This show, directed by James (me) with songs written by the students with Katy Rose-Bennet, tells the story of England’s civil wars from Elizabeth I’s death to the coronation of Charles II. The cast of approximately 90 limits the number of historical figures that have to be omitted. This show is a form of prequel to our collaboration dramatising the Cuban Missile Crisis – Any Fool Can Start A War.
Although getting these shows to the stage can be taxing and stressful for everyone involved nothing is as rewarding as watching young actors bursting with pride when they come off stage knowing they’ve done a great job or their parents fussing over them after the show amazed at what they have achieved.
Good luck everyone.
JY
Thanks to everyone who attended the Open Space gathering at Our Facility on 5th June. We are pleased to be able to share notes from the discussions that took place across the day. They are all available via this link here.
It was wonderful to host such an energised and positive group of people all seeking ways to support each other building an open and thriving culture of live perfromance in the West Midlands. There were freelance artists, people representing unfunded and funded companies large and small as well as venues and Arts Council England. The overwhelming feel to the day was that people had missed being with each other, sharing with each other, listening to each other and supporting each other. More detals can be found in the notes – remember the link
Thanks To: Jade Samuels for opening the space, China Plate for co-hosting/co-coordinating, Nick Sweeting for advising on the whole Open Space Technology, Jess and Megan from BCU’s Applied Theatre course for most of the posters. It was fun, it was good, let’s do it again some time.
In November 2021 we made three short shows in three weeks with a host of new collaborators. These were Micro Productions #1 – 3. They were intended as a training/development opportunity for artists unfamiliar or inexperienced with devising. It was also a chance for Stan’s Cafe to meet some new people and work in some new spaces trying out some new ideas, all outside the pressure of making a major new show.
It was a great experience – #1 Precious Emily developed into our Birmingham Festival 2022 piece of the same name. #2 All Our Money expanded, toured Birmingham in early 2023 and is expected to have a further life. #3 C90 Qawwali: Emperor In Birmingham has not yet been worked on further, but has never left our thoughts.
We gave significant further work to four of the ten actors we met for the first time and two of the three assistant directors. We have kept in touch and helped out a number of the other participants.
So what? We’re going to try and repeat the trick – in a more modest way. We are recruiting for Micro Production #4: Can You Read Me? This involves a hunt for three new actors, one sound designer / musician and one assistant director. We are partnering with the Arena Theatre in Wolverhampton and so are particularly keen to receive applications from people living in that area. We will be working 11 – 16 September 2023. Full details on how to apply can be found here.
We’re delighted to be able to announce Stan’s Cafe are returning to Greenbelt – the festival of ‘Artistry, Activism and Belief’ – with our smash hit local authority budget show All Our Money. We will be there on 26th August.
My first introduction to Greenbelt was as a Christian festival. When they booked Of All The People In All The World (in 2009) I was surprised but it made sense, the show is not religious but it has a compassion for humanity that aligns with the Christian principle to “love your neighbour as yourself”. They hosted the show in a marquee and it was very well received, the setting worked perfectly.
Three years later (in 2012) we were invited to take The Cardinals to the festival. This quasi-puppet show within a show, in which three cardinals tell the history of the world through their christian lense, while supported and gently contested by a muslim stage-manager felt like a good fit with the festival. Our only concern was that it wouldn’t be interpreted as disrespectful / blasphemous. In the event we needn’t have worried, the audience were tuned in perfectly.
Your show was one of the first things I saw at Greenbelt and remained a highlight – and there was plenty of competition from lots of other things on the programme. Immensely clever and thought-provoking with some great iconic imagery. Goodness knows how you ever came up with the idea!
Greenbelt Audience Comment
I agree with the above comment. The show was the first thing I saw at the festival and has really stuck in my mind. I need to see it again as there was so much to take in and process. Humorous, poignant, devastating, thought provoking, beautifully crafted visuals and acting – brilliant, thank you!
Greenbelt Audience Comment
Now, more than a decade on, we are back and it is clear that Greenbelt is now very far from the ‘Christian Festival’ I had first believed it to be. This is the festival’s 50th anniversary year and the programme covers a range of art forms, it displays a strong interest in social engagement and mixes people coming from a wide range of religious perspectives. A show about how over a people come together to contribute financially to a shared pot to organise services for their mutual benefit appears to fit in nicely.
An invitation from Stan’s Cafe, China Plate and Jade Samuels.
An audio described version of this invitation is available via this link and below.
We know that the theatre and live performance sector currently faces huge challenges and that the economic crisis threatens access into the industry and career progression. But we also know that connecting and sharing ideas can help us to survive, to solve problems, and to thrive.
During the Commonwealth Games, the performing arts had never been more visible in the West Midlands. Birmingham 2022 Festival demonstrated the abundance of talent in our region and gave opportunities for a greater diversity of voices to be heard. Now we want to keep talking and share ideas about what’s next and how we work together to make that happen.
If you’re interested in thinking about the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead, while also meeting other creatives and companies from across the West Midlands, then this event is for you. It is a chance for theatre and live performance people to gather together, make new alliances, strengthen existing bonds, and work together towards a better future.
The gathering will be facilitated using Open Space, an active, democratic way of meeting in which attendees set their own agenda to ensure issues they are concerned with are addressed. Attendees choose what discussions they engage with, when and for how long. The spirit is open and focused on producing positive outcomes.
Previous Open Space gatherings in this region have led to new collaborations and have kick started and shaped initiatives including BE Festival, Pilot Nights, The Optimists, First Bite & Bite Size Festival and East Meets West.
If you are interested to learn more about Open Space, here are some useful websites:
https://openspaceworld.org/wp2/
https://www.devotedanddisgruntled.com/about-open-space-technology
Hot, cold and soft drinks will be supplied along with unhealthy biscuits. Please bring a packed lunch if you tend to get hungry at lunch. There are cafes and take-aways on the doorstep.
The gathering is FREE but please do sign up in advance on EventBrite as we need to know how many people are coming.
Click the link here to register for a ticket.
We actively encourage attendance from people of all backgrounds, of different ages, genders, social and economic backgrounds, ethnicities, religions and sexual orientations, and from people who are disabled, D/deaf, or have chronic health conditions. We want this event to be accessible to the whole theatre and live performance community so please do let us know in advance with any access requirements you have by emailing [email protected]
EVENT DETAILS
Date: Monday 5 June
Times: 9:30am – 17:00pm
Our Facility (our base)
Oakdale Centre
Umberslade Road
Birmingham
B29 7RZ
What3Words/// dawn.affair.choice
Directions are available to download here.
We are seeking to commission a Birmingham based Textile Artist to create a 15m long ribbon map of the Indus River for our expanding River Tours project. We are particularly keen to meet artists who have hertiage links to the Indus River valley.
The commission invites you to respond to a script decribing a tour along the length of the Indus and requires you to come up with your own creative solution to a tight brief about features that must be included on the map. The commission would suit a solo artist or an artist working with a community group.
Timeline are negotiable but we would like the map delivered by mid-September.
Expressions of interest or questions are welcomed ASAP to [email protected]
At the start of 2023 we worked with St. Matthews Primary School where children explored the Indus and learning about its people, its history and its geography. With our Associate Artists Nafeesa Hamid and Abeda Begum they created their own story of the river and to-scale textile representation of its significant features.
We’re returning to St. Matthews in 2024 to begin our exploration of the Tigris and the Euphrates,
Schools River Tours projects sit side by side with our family versions and we’re keen to work with schools who would like to explore a river of their choice with us.
For more information do get in touch.
