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RWCMD’s NEW Festival: Writing to Provoke & Inspire

16 March 2017

This month, NEW, the College’s provocative and inspirational new writing season, enters its fourth year with four new plays from four different playwrights.

The season culminates in a week of premieres at the College in Cardiff before transferring to Notting Hill’s Gate Theatre.

“NEW is brilliant: It’s really quite an incredible thing for a college to produce,”

Gethin Evans, director, The Last Ambulance

This ambitious project, celebrating the tradition of commissioning new writing in the UK, allows final year students to focus on completely new works.

Spooky rehearsals. Feature image is also from Spooky rehearsal.

It allows them to gain the confidence, experience and capability to know that, when they graduate and make those first step into the industry, they have the tools to work with new material and form relationships directly with directors and writers.

“The opportunity to work with a company like Paines Plough, the Royal Court, and the Sherman is a great career launch pad for students, as they represent the future of theatre and the future of new writing,” explains Hannah Banister, director of Hush.

“I can’t think of a better idea than to put students who are literally about to launch their careers with a company like us, who have such taste for excellent working practise as well as putting on the most exciting new work.”

Rehearsals for Hush

In an unusual step, the College pairs both young writers and young directors rather than relying on a more experienced and established member of the team.

The playwrights are  commissioned to write the plays for eight actors.

“The joy of writing a play for these students is that the energy is tangible in the room, it’s amazing,” says White Sky writer Simon Longman.  “It’s about shaping the play with them as much as it is about me saying that this is the way that I want it to be.

“No one else has said this play out loud before. Every single character that was in my head is now walking around and doing things. It’s the first time that anyone has ever done it, and it’s a joy to watch.”

White Sky rehearsals

All 32 graduating actors take part in NEW, as well as students from the design and stage management courses, who are collaborating with some of the country’s most exciting young directors.

“I think the Royal Welsh College should be shouting this from the rooftops,” says Conor Mitchell, writer of The Last Ambulance. “I honestly think it is utterly spectacular.

The whole function of a Drama School for one season, is about growing the direction of the writers, putting them together, talking to other theatres, and four new plays will come from that, four new collaborative relationships, four new set designers.”

Rehearsals for The Last Ambulance


The Plays 

This year the College is collaborating once again with Cardiff’s Sherman Theatre to produce The Last Ambulance by composer/writer Conor Mitchell (The Moot Virginity of Catherine of Aragon), directed by Gareth Evans.

The College is also working again with Paines Plough to produce Hush by Alison Carr, directed by Hannah Banister, and the Royal Court with White Sky by Simon Longman, directed by Ola Ince, and Spooky Action at a Distance by Eve Leigh, directed by Elayce Ismail.

NEW 2017

White Sky

Writer: Simon Longman
Director: Ola Ince

In collaboration with Royal Court Theatre

A town surrounded by fields is shivering against the cold. Everything feels like it could shatter. Jen lives here. She’s looking for someone. Steve lives here too. He’s looking for himself. The pubs are kicking people out. The sun doesn’t seem to want to rise. A car is driving too fast on the bypass. And somewhere, a dog is about to stop barking.

White Sky is a play about community, it’s a play about fear, it’s a play about poison.

Hush

Writer: Alison Carr
Director: Hannah Banister

In collaboration with Paines Plough

Sadie comes home to the town she hates. Josh waits for his brother. Natalie strives to be a good person. Three stories linked by guilt, secrets and a missing boy.  A dark, funny, often tender new play by Alison Carr.

Spooky Action at a Distance

Writer: Eve Leigh
Director: Elayce Ismail

In collaboration with Royal Court Theatre

Spooky Action at a Distance is about an anti-immigration protest in Dover last winter.
It’s about throwing a brick to make a point, how it feels to look at pictures of bad things on the internet, and how snotty your National Front bandanna gets when it’s tied across your face in the cold.

The Last Ambulance

Writer: Conor Mitchell
Director: Gethin Evans

In collaboration with Sherman Theatre

The Last Ambulance - NEW 2017

The Last Ambulance – NEW 2017

Teddy has a theory: all numbers are a countdown. The war that surrounds him forces the numbers to fall faster. The countdown takes a sinister form; one that hides among the fractured soundscape of a bombed city. This work examines the nature of obsession, determinism and music.


Find out more about NEW on the College’s website. 

For more information, press tickets and photos contact press@rwcmd.ac.uk