Seminar – Brave New World

Photo from acta’s Lockleaze Youth Theatre, performing Spooky Tales, October 2020.

Join us on Wednesday 17 March, 2.00pm – 4.00pm for the latest in our series of online interactive seminars, with some inspiring special guests who have all been making visionary and ingenious work throughout the pandemic. The seminar will focus on how community theatre has responded and adapted over the last year and consider future opportunities for our work.

Who is this seminar for?

acta seminars are free and open to everyone.

Specifically, for this seminar:

  • Theatre makers
  • Artists across all disciplines
  • Students and academics
  • Healthcare professionals
  • Those interested in the power of community and theatre

Guest speakers

We have invited practitioners who have responded creatively with humanitarian initiatives in their communities during the pandemic:-

Important details

Date: Wednesday 17th March

Time: 2pm – 4pm (with a break)

Format: Zoom

Networking: Previous feedback has shown guests would like the opportunity to network with each other. In order to keep the event to two hours, we won’t be offering breakout rooms or networking during the session, however in the post-event survey there will be an option to leave your contact details to create an email chain amongst attendees.

Our seminar programme is part of acta’s Cornerstone project, funded by Paul Hamlyn Foundation.

Booking Link: CLICK HERE – to book your free ticket

Guest Speaker Biographies

Alan Lane | Artistic Director of Slung Low, Leeds

Alan has directed most of Slung Low’s work over the last decade including projects with the Barbican, the RSC, The Almeida, West Yorkshire Playhouse, Liverpool Everyman, Sheffield Theatres, Singapore Arts Festival and the Lowry. Slung Low make large scale people’s theatre work on stages, trains, castles, swimming pools, fishing boats and town centres.

Alan has directed in places as wide ranging as the National Theatre of Croatia, a sari shop in Manchester, Buckingham Palace and in a village in Purulia, Southern India. He was the Artistic Director for the National Commemoration of the Centenary of the Battle of the Somme on 1st July 2016: a ceremony with a people’s theatre company of 450.

During the Covid crisis of 2020 the company was the ward lead for Holbeck and Beeston for social care referrals with responsibility for 7500 homes. They run a non-means tested self-referral foodbank: delivering over 250 parcels of food a week.

Elly Goodman | Community Drama Artist, Citizens Theatre, Glasgow

Elly has worked in arts and criminal justice for 30 years, specialising in theatre in prisons and within the broader criminal justice sector.

She is a founder member and Trustee of Justice and Arts Scotland and has delivered an 8-year creative theatre residency in HM Prison Barlinnie, Scotland’s largest institution for male prisoners. Elly’s work places a special emphasis on women and socially excluded adults.

Her many theatre projects and productions have involved a wide range of community groups, including asylum seekers, refugees, homeless organisations, mental health support groups and recovery forums.

She has presented her work and collaborated internationally on many occasions, including sharing her practice at the International Teaching Artist Conference at the Carnegie Hall, New York.

Neil Packham | Community Drama Director, Citizens Theatre, Glasgow

I’ve worked in this role for the past 20 years, having initially trained as an actor. It’s led to numerous adventures, many working alongside my colleague Elly Goodman. We’ve made epic, main stage community productions including, ‘They Shoot Horses Don’t They?’ and ‘Grapes of Wrath’, but also led regular workshops with the Citizens Community Collective, worked with people in recovery, the refugee community and many partner organisations in our local area of the Gorbals.

We’ve also been extremely proud to bring groups of community actors to perform in festivals at acta.

An important strand has been creating theatre in the prison environment, predominantly HMP Barlinnie, where we held a residency for many years. As a contribution to Festival 2014, when Glasgow hosted the Commonwealth Games, we collaborated with, Debajemujig, a Canadian First Nation theatre company and a cast of 100 local people to create an award-winning production ‘On Common Ground’.

Alix Harris | Artistic Director of Beyond Face CIC

Alix is a Director and Theatre Practitioner based in Devon. In her current role at Beyond Face, the organisation’s mission is to raise the profile and visibility of Black, Asian and ethnically diverse artists and young people across the South West. Beyond Face has a youth company for 12-18 year olds, an artist development programme and makes work professionally.

Alix is a Director of Indra Congress, through this role she has worked internationally in South Africa and Palestine. Alix is also a part-time Drama lecturer at Exeter University and associate lecturer of Falmouth University.