In the spotlight

There are a number of powerful small-scale productions touring to Yorkshire venues in the coming weeks. Nick Ahad reports.
Yes Yes UCS promo (Heather Gourdie and Janie Thomson) credit Robert McFadzean PhotographyYes Yes UCS promo (Heather Gourdie and Janie Thomson) credit Robert McFadzean Photography
Yes Yes UCS promo (Heather Gourdie and Janie Thomson) credit Robert McFadzean Photography

The job of writing about theatre in Yorkshire is a blessing and a curse. The blessing is that there is so much of it: I could, were I minded, choose what to cover each week by throwing a dart in a map of the county. I don’t, by the way. That there is too much of it is also the curse.

Sometimes the scale of the show dictates what to cover - it would look odd were there a new Ayckbourn or an epic Crucible production and I chose to write about a fringe theatre event. Every now and then, though, I find a sweet spot in which I can justify taking you to some of the smaller spaces and productions we have in the region. This is such a week.

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We begin with a company that, while not Yorkshire-based, brings all its tours here and just feels like it has a Yorkshire sensibility. Townsend Theatre Productions has among its mission statements that it wants to take theatre to audiences that find ‘traditional’ venues and theatre a barrier and ‘to form effective links with trade unions, campaign organisations and trade councils’.

It is in sympatico with the Leeds company Rad Ladder. Townsend’s latest production, Yes! Yes! UCS! has been touring in Yorkshire for the last couple of weeks, playing in Scarborough, Sheffield and Doncaster. It stops off in Leeds, at Seven Arts in Chapel Allerton tonight, before returning to Marsden Mechanics on March 11.

Telling the story of the Upper Clyde shipbuilders ‘work-in’ of 1971, it uses live rock and folk music as part of the storytelling. Anyone who saw the company’s previous tour of The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists will know what to expect. Louise Townsend, director, says: “Based on verbatim interviews with shipyard workers, the play is the story of two women workers in an industry facing imminent closure, drawn into the monumental, heroic battle to save thousands of jobs across Glasgow and the West of Scotland.

“At the time, women in pivotal roles made up little more than five percent of the Upper Club Shipbuilders’ workforce and their history is far less well known. Our company’s trademark gritty drama depicts the traditions and skills of Scottish shipbuilding, while shining a light on the role women played in the fight for the right to work, the power of community solidarity, collective resistance and workers’ control.”

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Another visiting company to the region, this one a Manchester-based outfit, is heading on its first tour and bringing Catching Comets to Yorkshire this month. Ransack Theatre has a similarly community-minded approach to Townsend when it comes to making work, having collaborated with Beyond Equality, a charity which works with young men to build gender equality, inclusive communities and healthier relationships.

Catching Comets, a one-man show, is a ‘disaster movie about the end of the world and falling in love’ and it comes to Yorkshire following an acclaimed run at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2019, from where it transferred to London’s Pleasance. Writer Piers Black says: “The show came about largely in response to the trend of rebooting and remaking big Hollywood action blockbusters. For many people, the thrill that comes with that is re-living the moments of wonder and excitement from your childhood. But, there was something quite striking about re-visiting the characters from my childhood. A lot of them are terrible role models. The world is a very different place and our attitudes and tolerance for some of the behaviour they display has moved on a long way.

“For a lot of young men, those people were their idols and who they wanted to be like when they grew up. The play is asking how we’re meant to be brave today if all our ideas of bravery come from this dated and unachievable source.”

Looking at a linked issue is You Heard Me, a one-woman play based on a true story by theatre maker Luca Rutherford. Covered in last week’s Culture, it is in the highly regarded Theatre in the Mill in Bradford tonight and tomorrow.

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This weekend also sees the start of a tour from Yorkshire company Buglight Theatre. Jane Hair: The Brontes Restyled, takes Anne, Emily and Charlotte and reimagines them into a Bradford ‘creative beauty salon’. Buglight’s artistic director Keely Lane says: “Jane Hair is a bold piece which explores themes of feminism, class and the price of fame in a juicy metaphor that runs deeper that just the title gag. Jane Hair is made by female Yorkshire talent about Yorkshire talent and aims to empower and inspire audiences of all ages with the story of how three determined young women from a small northern village managed to stun the literary world.” Written by Bradford playwrights Kirsty Smith and Kat Rose-Martin, expect Yorkshire humour and irreverence from the piece. It’s visiting Sheffield tonight, Halifax tomorrow, York next week, with a tour that takes in Hull, Haworth, Leeds and Barnsley.

The point, I think, has been made – we don’t always get to dig too deep, but scratch the surface and there’s a whole lot of interesting work being made in and brought to Yorkshire.

And a final word on one of those homegrown theatre companies that always make this an interesting county to write about when it comes to theatre. Common Wealth, the Bradford- based company that always does things differently, has announced this week that it is, along with the city’s Speakers’ Corner, going to run women-only swimming sessions. The weekly sessions will be held at Keighley Swimming Pool from March 12, costing £1 per session. Extraordinary work.

Yes! Yes! UCS! – tour includes dates in Leeds, Marsden, Saltaire and Rotherham: www.townsendproductions.org.uk

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Chasing Comets – tour includes Harrogate Theatre tonight; details: www.ransacktheatre.co.uk

You Heard Me –tour includes performances at Bradford’s Theatre in the Mill, details: www.luca-rutherford.co.uk

Jane Hair – tour includes dates in Bradford, Hull, Halifax, Haworth and York details: www.buglight-theatre.com

For details on the Common Wealth / Speakers’ Corner swim sessions, contact [email protected]