It’s a minimalist scene on entering: an empty stage, with a large projection screen at the back and projector centre stage. To the left a sound desk, anglepoise lamp, and a couple of guitars. Opposite, on the far right of the stage, is the animation table, a camera on a rostrum, paper and art materials […]

The great joy of the Mime Festival is that whilst a stripped back, poetic meditation on the human condition such as Yoann Bourgeois’s He Who Falls is playing in one venue, across town in another space a dense and anarchic circus show such as Svalbard’s All Genius All Idiot is also playing. And what a contrast these […]

Making his British debut, young circus director Yoann  Bourgeois’s He Who Falls (Celui qui tombe) is as intelligent, inquisitive and, most importantly, deftly-pitched a performance as you’ll find in any British theatre this year. These are the kind of performances that the London International Mime Festival is for, and, in the absence of a French level of […]

Sometimes, simple is best. Julian Crouch, however, is not the first name that comes to mind when considering simplicity in the theatre. From the bawdy excess of his Shockheaded Peter collaboration with those dank, camp darlings of underground cabaret, The Tiger Lillies, to the playful opulence of his designs for the Metropolitan Opera, the Brooklyn […]

Rob Young documents his love-love relationship with Ridiculusmus, who he works with as special projects producer It took me 20 years to find the right company. I took the scenic route. Let me set the scene. Me, short body, big head. I looked like a child’s drawing. A child who couldn’t draw. I grew up […]