THE JOURNAL
Wednesday, September 5, 2007
www.journalalive.co.uk
Intrepid audience will journey to past
A ripping yarn is to unfold in two of the region’s grandest buildings, as David Whetstone discovers.
SOME of the most ambitious theatre shows don’t take place in theatres. Nor do they play to huge audiences. This doesn’t mean they can’t wallow in a fantastically grandiose title. The Novocastrian Philosophers’ Club opens tomorrow. It takes place in – and is set in and was inspired by – the Literary & Philosophical Society and the adjoining Mining Institute in Newcastle’s Westgate Road.
These are two of the most wonderful buildings in the region, each an architectural gem and a repository of wisdom. The former is a library, the kind where Victorian explorers gathered to dream up daring expeditions. All the modern bestsellers are there, but you can also find, in a leather-bound tome, a description of an Englishman’s first sighting of a wombat. You might also pull out a book that hasn’t been borrowed since before you were born, and I’m assuming you are at least into double figures. The latter is a monument to the memory of King Coal. Its modern custodians, including Stuart Porthouse and William Bell, look after its collection of books, diagrams and paintings, and welcome visitors to admire its imposing splendour below the stained glass windows and the stern gaze of the old coal barons, immortalised in oils. You might not realise the buildings were adjoining. For many years the discreet corridor between the two was blocked off. It served as an office for the Lit & Phil, ensuring that never the twain should meet. Now, though, they have joined forces in embracing the future which will sustain them both. Development plans are afoot, funds are being sought. The Lit & Phil is in the middle of a determined membership drive.
Out of this atmosphere of ancient and modern has emerged the theatrical experience known as the Novocastrian Philosophers’ Club. It is an 80-minute show which will play to audiences of 15 people at a time, rather fewer than have been involved in putting the project together.
Producer Cinzia Hardy promises that audience members will be led around the building by special guides who will “begin to peel back the layers of the stories contained within the books and the buildings themselves as well as the many people who inhabit them”. It is not, she stresses, a heritage trail. The intention is to unlock the audience’s imagination into seeing the two buildings in new and different ways.
Northern Stage has been involved in the production, which has been funded by the Northern Rock Foundation, the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation, the Sir James Knott Foundation and Newcastle City Council. Its apparent cast of thousands is backed by a large behind-the-scenes crew. The plot is simple enough. An explorer visits the library to beg funds for his journey. A beautiful but shy librarian secretly falls in love with him. Director Alison Andrews explains: “As the evening unfolds, the audience is led on a mysterious journey where they meet a chorus of strange philosophers – stumble on paintings that spring to life and join the explorer on one of his most difficult challenges ever.”
Her cast includes Jane Arnfield as The Librarian, Tony Nielson as The Receptionist, Bruno Roubicek as The Explorer and Maurice O’Connell as the Principal Guide.
For Maurice, who is of Irish stock but lives in Cornwall, his involvement in the Novocastrian Philosophers’ Club has been uniquely personal. Entering the Lit & Phil for the first time, he said: “I bet I can find my great-great-grandfather in here.” And so he did. There, on one of the venerable shelves, he found a copy of Henry Peter Deasy’s book, In Tibet and Chinese Turkestan. Published in 1901, it chronicles three years’ exploration in a remote area of the world by the Dublin-born army officer whose life was a ripping yarn in the grant Victorian style. He is remembered as one of the first westerners to write a detailed account of Tibet and won the Royal Geographical Society gold medal for surveying nearly 40,000 square miles of the Himalayas.
Later he returned his attention to cars, setting up the Deasy Motor Company, which later became the Hawker Siddley Group and then part of Rolls-Royce. As well as his exploration, Deasy is remembered for driving a car up a mountain in Switzerland. “Although he was born in Dublin he lived like an English gentleman and entrepreneur,” says Maurice.
A photograph of an exotically dressed Deasy decorates the book in the Lit & Phil. Audiences will find that Maurice’s character in the play will be dressed rather similarly.
The Novocastrian Philosophers’ Club runs from tomorrow until September 16 (no performance on September 11) with weekday performances at 7pm and 9pm (weekends 1.30pm, 3.30pm and 7pm). There is a BSL interpreted performance on Saturday. For tickets (£7 and £5) tel: (0191) 230-5151 or online at www.northernstage.co.uk
Performances are free during heritage Open Days, September 6-9.
METROLIFE
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
www.metro.co.uk
Return of the living dead
THEATRE
Ghosts and ancestral explorers are a thing of the past to theatrical tour group The Novocastrian Philosophers’ Club
According to its latest bulletin, The Novocastrian Philosophers’ Club has been in existence for more than 200 years, shrouded in mystery ever since its establishment in 1794. However, as the moderators at website Wikipedia soon realised when an entry about the organisation was posted online encyclopaedia, it doesn’t actually exist. In fact, The Novocastrian Philosophers’ Club is the invention of theatre producer Cinzia Hardy, providing the dramatic conceit and name for a new site-specific piece of theatre.
Taking the form of a guided tour around the Lit & Phil and adjoining Institute of Mining and Mechanical Engineers, it is a promenade production, the central narrative of which tells the story of an explorer who has been given funds by the club for his latest expedition. Created by Alison Andrews, Maurice O’Connell and Sandra Johnston, it is a labyrinthine journey during which the audience will encounter talking books, waterfalls, mischievous angels and other supernatural phenomena.
‘The Novocastrian Philosophers’ Club is an unusual show,’ explains Hardy, the overall producer. ‘Only 15 people are allowed into each performance to allow for a more intimate experience. As you are guided around the buildings you begin to peel back the layers of the stories contained within the books and the buildings, as well as the people who inhabit them. The idea is that by the time the audience leave, they will have been indoctrinated into the ways of the club.’
The show is based on a piece Hardy worked on in 1999 called If The Dead Could Go Shopping What Would They Buy? A dramatic guided tour through the nooks and crannies of Dublin’s Temple Bar area, including restaurants, bars and private flats, it was such a success that she has been hoping to remount the production elsewhere ever since. ‘We wanted to recreate the idea of a journey, but in a controlled space,’ Hardy continues. ‘You can control what happens in a building much more than when you are on the streets, where there is always the question of how you deal with the drunk with the broken bottle.’ Introduced to the Lit & Phil by a committee member, Hardy fell in love with the Grade II-listed Victorian building, the country’s largest independent library outside London. ‘It immediately began to speak to me,’ she explains. ‘I thought: “I wonder if we could recreate If The Dead Could Go Shopping…using the format of the guided tour but with a different story.”
A devised piece of theatre, The Novocastrian Philosophers’ Club is largely based on interviews with staff and members of the Lit & Phil, as well as books in then library. The central character of the explorer is inspired by O’Connell’s ancestor, Captain Henry M Deasy, whose adventures in Tibet are recorded in a book housed in the library. Meanwhile, the show’s running theme of water is inspired by the building’s leaky roof and a series of spooky stories. Told in the basement, these tales have their origins in the 23 ghosts officially documented by paranormal investigators back in 2003.
‘This is a work of fiction, but it is rooted in what we have seen, heard and learnt here,’ says Hardy. ‘What we’re doing is feeding things back to people in a new and different way.’
Christopher Collett
The Culture Club
The Journal
September 2007
Magical waterfalls, mischievous angels and a marvellous love story are usually trapped in the pages of books in a library. But a unique show in Newcastle brings paintings, statues and books to life at the Literary and Philosophical Society and Mining Institute. When an Explorer returns to the Library to beg for funds for his journey a beautiful but shy Librarian falls secretly in love with him. Audiences are then led on a mysterious journey where they meet a chorus of strange philosophers, stumble on paintings that spring to life and even traverse a real waterfall. “The Novocastrian Philosophers’ Club is a very unusual and fun show.
Only 15 people are allowed into each performance, so everyone gets a totally individual experience." Explained Producer Cinzia Hardy. “We’ve also made the show in a very unusual way. This is a co-production between The Literary and Philosophical Society, Mining Institute Northern Stage and the creative team that I have assembled in Newcastle. Bringing together artists, actors, librarians, researchers, musicians, and book-binders, has created a piece that is funny, romantic, mysterious and exciting. Just like all the people who have made and perform in the show.” Added Cinzia. Culture Club members have the chance to see a special performance of the show on September 5, 2007 at 7pm, before it opens to the public. This production is only open to Culture Club Members. Tickets cost only £5 saving for members and there is a chance to meet the cast at the end of the show. The Literary and Philosophical Society is located on Westgate Road, Newcastle upon Tyne, just down from Central Station.
Preview on the Northern Stage website
At the end of 2006 Northern Stage's participation team were approached to collaborate on an exciting and innovative project that would explore and enliven the Lit &Phil building on Westgate Road: THE NOVOCASTRIAN PHILOSOPHERS' CLUB. It was a promenade, site-specific performance that involved professional performers, staff of the Lit & Phil and 14 members of the Northern Stage Performance Group. Produced by Cinzia Hardy in collaboration with the Lit & Phil and the Northern Stage participation team, the project took off, with monthly exploratory and devising sessions taking place at Northern Stage. Questions were asked as a starting point for this exciting and original performance piece: if you were alone in the space and you really felt like no one could see you, what would you do? Sit and read, run around, make a loud noise, deface the books, go to sleep, make a speech, deliver a lecture in the Mining Institute Amphitheatre, steal the copies of Wire Magazine, move in with all your family, have a party, play librarians, take all your clothes off...? If we really had the freedom to say or do whatever we wanted to, what would we say or do? What, or who, do you think is hovering outside and would like to come in? What, or who, is buried in the Lit and Phil? Where are they buried? How would you dig them up?
We didn't really know where all this would take us, but the journey we went on as we investigated our ideas was extremely exciting and we created a show that we were incredibly proud of.
The show was on at the Lit & Phil from Thursday 6 - Monday 17 September.
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